Plutarch, De sollertia animalium
Goodwin, Ed.

AUTOBULUS. Good now, friend Soclarus, who was he that maintained that, because there are certain beings endued with reason, therefore there is nothing void of reason? For we abound with examples in all things that are destitute of a soul; nor do we want any other antithesis to irrational, but only to oppose whatever is deprived of a soul—as being void of reason and understanding—to that which is endued with reason and understanding together with a soul. But if any one will assert, that Nature is not defective, and that therefore animated Nature is partly rational, partly without reason; another may at the same time allege, that animated Nature is partly endued with imagination, partly deprived of it; partly sensible, partly insensible; to the end that Nature may not want these opposite habits and privations, as it were, equally balanced in the same kind. For, as it would be absurd to expect to find some living creatures sensible and others without sense, and equally ridiculous to grant imagination to some living creatures and not alllow it to others,—since there is no living creature that comes into the world but what is presently endued with sense and imagination,— thus would he be as much out of the way, who should require one living creature to be rational and another void of reason, and that too when he is disputing with men who hold that nothing whatever can partake of sense which does not also partake of understanding, and that there is no animal not endued by Nature with opinion and ratiocination, as well as with sense and instinct. For Nature, which, as they truly say, made all things for the sake of something and to some end, did not make a sensible [p. 161] creature to be merely sensible of barely suffering something; but since there are many things familiar and agreeable, and other things as baneful and pernicious, no one of them could survive for a moment, did they not learn to avoid some things and covet the use and benefit of others. Sense it is, therefore, that affords to every creature the knowledge both of useful and hurtful; but the discretion which accompanies the said sense, choosing and seizing upon things profitable, and discerning and avoiding things pernicious or troublesome, can never be thought to reside in any creature not capable to reason, to judge, remember, and consider. Therefore, if you will deprive the creatures of expectation, memory, design, preparation, hope, fear, desire, and grief, you must at the same time deny them the use either of eyes or ears, and indeed of all sense and imagination; which it is better for them to be without, since they cannot make use of them, than to labor under grief and pain, with no means present of averting them.

There is an oration of Strato the philosopher, demonstrating that without sense there can be no understanding. For many times letters cursorily glanced upon by the eye, and speeches little regarded by the ear, escape our knowledge, our minds being intent on other matters. Afterwards by recollection the same things return into our mind, for us to run through and pursue them in our thoughts as we please. Whence we say proverbially, ‘The mind sees, the mind hears; all other things are deaf and blind,’ in regard there can be no sense in the eyes and ears, if understanding be wanting. Therefore King Cleomenes, after great commendations given to a copy of verses recited at a banquet where he was present, being asked whether it were not an admirable piece, bid them that heard it give their judgment, for that his mind was in the Peloponnesus. Therefore of necessity, whatever creatures are capable of sense must also be capable of understanding, if we can [p. 162] no otherwise be sensible than by the force of understanding.

But suppose we should grant that sense has no need of the understanding for the performance of the duty incumbent upon it; nevertheless, when that same sense which has shown an animal the difference between what is grateful and what is averse to Nature has departed, where is that faculty which retains this difference in the memory, —dreading things that are abominable, and longing after things that are useful, and if they are wanting, seeking means to compass them,—which provides animals receptacles and places of refuge, that they may look out after their prey, and avoid the snares and gins of the hunters? And yet those very authors inculcate these things in their introductions, even to the teasing our ears: defining purpose to be an indication that something is to be brought to completion; design to be an impulse before an impulse; preparation to be an action before an action; memory to be the comprehension of some certain past impression, which at first was apprehended by sense. In all which things there is nothing which may not rightly be said to partake of reason, and yet all these things are common to all creatures; as indeed are certainly all cogitations; which, while they lie concealed in the brain, we call thoughts, but when they come to be in motion, we name conceptions. In the mean time they acknowledge all passions and perturbations of the mind to be false judgments and erroneous opinions; so that it is a wonder to me, that the same men should oversee so many operations and motions, some of desire, others of fear, nay, by Jupiter, many times of envy and emulation itself. And many times they themselves punish their dogs and horses when they commit a fault, and this not to no purpose, but to chastise them by causing in them through pain that trouble of mind which we call repentance. Now the tickling the [p. 163] ear by pleasing sounds is called enchantment, but the bewitching the eye is called bewitching; both which we make use of in the domesticating of wild beasts. Harts and horses are allured by the sounds of pipes and flutes. And there are a sort of crabs which are charmed out of their holes by fifes; and it is reported that the shadfish are drawn to show themselves above water by singing and clapping of hands. The otus also, which is a bird not much unlike a night-raven, is taken by allurement of the sight; for that while he stands staring upon the fowlers dancing before him in measure and figure, and out of affection will be striving to act his part by aping their motions with his wings and shoulders, he is frequently surprised and taken.

But as for those that more foolishly affirm that beasts are not affected with joy or anger or fear, that the swallow does not build, that the bee does not remember, that the lion is not angry, that the hart is not timorous, but that they do all these things only as it were and apparently; I would fain know what answer they will make to those who say, that beasts neither see nor hear, but as it were see and as it were hear; that they neither neigh nor bleat, but as it were send forth a certain sound; lastly, that they do not absolutely live, but live as it were? For, in my opinion, to aver this is as contrary to plain demonstration as the rest.