The Whence and the Whither of Man / A Brief History of His Origin and Development through Conformity to Environment; Being the Morse Lectures of 1895

by John M. Tyler

But other lines of action are relegated as rapidly as possible to the same control. We learn to walk by a conscious effort to take each step; afterward we take each step automatically, and think only whither we wish to go. We learn by conscious effort to talk and write, to sing, or play the piano. Afterward we frame each letter or note automatically, and think only of the idea and its expression.

So also in our moral and spiritual nature.[6]

There has been therefore in the successive forms and stages of animal life a clear sequence of dominant nervous actions. The actions of all animals below the annelid are mainly reflex or automatic, unconscious and involuntary. But in insects and lower vertebrates the highest actions at least are instinctive. Consciousness plays a continually more important part. Still the actions are controlled by hereditary tendency far more than by the will of the individual. But in man instinct has been almost entirely replaced by conscious, voluntary, intelligent action. And yet in man, as rapidly as possible, actions which at first require conscious effort become, through repetition and habit, reflex and automatic. All our conscious effort and the energy of the will, being no longer required for these oft-repeated actions, are set free for higher attainments. The territory which had to be conquered by hard battles has become an integral part of the realm. It now hardly requires even a garrison, but has become a source of supplies for a new advance and march of conquest.

But all this time we have been talking about action and have not given a thought to the will. And we have spoken as if conscious perception and intelligence directly controlled will and action. But this is of course incorrect. Will is practically power of choice. You ask me whether I prefer this or that, and I answer perhaps that I do not care. Until I "care" I shall never choose. The perception must arouse some feeling, if it is to result in choice. I see a diamond in the road and think it is merely a piece of glass. I do not stop. But as I am passing on; I remember that there was a remarkable brilliancy in its flash. It must have been, after all, a gem. My feelings are aroused. How proud I shall feel to wear it. Or how much money I can get for it. Or how glad the owner will be when it is returned to her. I turn back and search eagerly. Perception is necessary, but it is only the first step. The perception must excite some feeling, if choice or exertion of the will is to follow. This is a truism.

Now reflex action takes place independently of consciousness or will. Instinctive action may be voluntary, but it is, after all, not so much the result of individual purpose as of hereditary tendency. Is there then no will in the animal until it has become intelligent? I think there has been a sort of voluntary action all the time. Even the amœba selects or chooses, if I may use the word, its food among the sand grains. And the will is stimulated to act by the appetite. Hunger is the first teacher. And how did appetite develop? Why does the animal hunger for just the food suited to its digestion and needs? We do not know. And the reproductive appetite soon follows. One of these results from the condition of the digestive, the other from that of the reproductive, cells or protoplasm. These appetites are due to some condition in a part of the organism and can be felt. They are in a sense not of the mind but of the body. And the response to them on the part of the mind is in some respects almost comparable to reflex action. But the mode of the response is, to a certain extent at least, within the control of consciousness. They train and spur the will as pure reflex action never could. But the will is as yet hardly more than the expression of these appetites. It expresses not so much its own decision as that of the stomach. It is the body's slave and mouthpiece. And once again it is best and safest for the animal that it should be so.

And these appetites are at first comparatively feeble. There is but little muscle or nerve and but little food is required. But these continually strengthen and spur the will harder and more frequently. And the will stirs up the weary and flagging muscles. The will may be a poor slave and the appetites hard taskmasters. But under their stern discipline it is growing stronger and more completely subjugating the body. Better slavery to hard taskmasters than rottenness from inertia. The first requirement is power, activity, and then this power can be directed to ever higher ends. You cannot steer the vessel until she has sails or an engine; with no "way on" she will not mind the helm, she only drifts. But the condition of the animal at this stage certainly looks very unpromising. Can the will emancipate itself from appetite and control it? Or is it to remain the slave of the body?

In time an emotion appears which marks the influence not directly of the body but of the individual consciousness. This is fear; it is for the body, but not, like hunger, directly of it. It arises in the mind. It results from experience and memory. The first animal which feared took a long step upward. But when and where was the dawn of fear? I touch a sea-anemone and it contracts. Has it felt fear? I think not. The action certainly may be purely reflex. Natural selection, not mind, deserves the credit of that action. But I am sure that the cat fears the dog, or the dog the cat, as the case may be. I have little or no doubt that the bird fears the cat. I am inclined to believe that the insect fears the bird and the spider the wasp. But does the highest worm fear? I do not know. I do not see how there can have been any fear until there was a nerve-centre highly enough developed to remember past experiences of danger and fair sense-organs to report the present risk.

Other emotions soon follow. Anger appears early. The order of appearance of these emotions or motives I shall not attempt to give to you. Indeed this is to us of relatively slight importance. The important point to notice is that a host of these have appeared in mammals and birds, and that each one of these is a new spur to the will. And the will of a horse or dog, to say nothing of a pig, is by no means feeble. And these are slowly emancipating the animal from the tyranny of appetite. But how slow the progress is! Has the emancipation yet become complete in man? I need not answer.

The will has in part, at least, escaped from abject slavery to appetite; it sometimes rises superior to fear. But it is evidently self-centred. The animal may have forgotten the claims of his dead ancestors, he is certainly fully alive to his own interests. Can he even partially rise superior to prudential considerations, as he has to some extent to the claims of appetite? Is it possible to develop the unselfish out of the purely selfish? And if so, how is this to be accomplished? It is not accomplished in the animal; it is but very incompletely accomplished in man. It will be accomplished one day.

In action, at least, the animal is not purely selfish. As Mr. Drummond has shown, reproduction, that old function and first to gain an organ, is not primarily for the benefit of self, but for the species. And not only the storing up of material in the egg, but care for the young after birth, is found in some fish and insects, and increases from fish upward. I readily grant you that this in its beginnings may be purely instinctive, and that not a particle of genuine affection for the young may as yet be present in the mind of the parent. But beneficial habits may, under the fostering care of selection, develop into instincts. The animal may at first be unconscious of these, and yet they may grow continually stronger. But one day the animal awakens to its actions, and from that time on what had been done blindly and unconsciously is continued consciously, intelligently, and from set purpose. This story is repeated over and over again in the history of the animal-kingdom. The care for the young once started as an instinct, affection will follow from the very association of parent with young. Certainly in birds and mammals there seems to be a very genuine love of the parents for their young. This is at first short lived, and the young are and have to be driven away, often by harsh treatment, to shift for themselves. But while it lasts it certainly seems entirely real and genuine. And how strong it is. "A bear robbed of her whelps" is no meaningless expression. And even the weak and timid bird or mammal becomes strong and fierce in defence of her young. In the presence of this emotion appetite and fear are alike forgotten.