SOCLARUS. Well then, Autobulus, suppose me to be
one of those that affirm these things. For it is great
folly for men to compare the actions of beasts with the
customs, actions, and manner of living men, and above all,
to deny that beasts have the least inclination or aim at any
progress towards virtue, to which we bent our discourse.
Indeed, I doubt whether Nature gave them a beginning or
no, since they are so incapable to attain the end.
AUTOBULUS. Why truly, Soclarus, this is not a thing that
[p. 164]
seems so absurd to those men. For that while they assert
the extreme love of parents towards their children to be
the principle of society and justice, and find at the same
time this virtue apparent and surpassing in brute animals,
yet they will not allow them in the least to partake of justice; like mules, which, though they are furnished with
genital parts, as wanting neither privities nor wombs, and
mixing with delight and pleasure, yet cannot attain the end
of generation. But then again I would have you consider,
whether they be not ridiculous, that affirm Socrates or
Plato to be no less vicious than the meanest of slaves,—
nay more, that they were fools, intemperate, and unjust,—
and then find fault with the nature of beasts, as being
impure and no way accurately framed for the reception of
virtue; as if this were proof of utter want of reason, and
not of depravedness and imbecility of reason. And all
the while, they acknowledge that there are vices of reason,
of which all brute beasts are guilty; many of which we
plainly find to be intemperate, fearful, malicious, and unjust. Therefore he that denies that reason exists by Nature
in a creature, because it is not framed by Nature to attain
to the perfection of reason, little differs from one that
should deny a monkey to partake of deformity by Nature,
or a tortoise of slowness, as being neither susceptible of
beauty or swiftness. Nor do they observe the distinction
that lies before their eyes. For reason is in the creature
by Nature, but right and perfect reason is attained by industry and education; so that naturally all creatures may
be said to be rational. But if they look for perfection of
reason and true wisdom, they will hardly find those perfections in any man whatever. For as there is a difference
between sight and sight, and between flight and flight,
—for hawks and grasshoppers do not see alike, neither do
eagles and partridges fly with equal swiftness,—so neither
in all rational creatures is there to be found the same perfection
[p. 165]
of cunning and acuteness. For as there are many
examples to be produced of several brute creatures, excelling in the observance of society; fortitude, and foresight
as to their particular economy and making provision for
themselves; so on the other side, there may be found
among them as many of injustice, cowardice, and folly.
Which is evident from the present contest wherein these
young gentlemen have engaged themselves, while the one
has undertaken to maintain that land-animals, the other
that creatures bred in the sea, are most inclined to virtue.
Which is plainly demonstrated by comparing river-horses
with storks. For the one support and cherish their fathers,
the others kill them that they may enjoy their dams. So
likewise, if you compare doves with partridges. For the
cock partridge will not suffer the hen to sit, but breaks her
eggs and throws them out of the nest if she refuses to be
trod. But the cock pigeon takes upon him part of the
female's duty, in brooding over the eggs and feeding the
young ones; and if the hen happens to be too long absent,
he corrects her with his bill, till he forces her to return to
her nest. So that, while Antipater found fault with sheep
and asses for their nastiness, I wonder how he came to
pass by lynxes and swallows, of which the one are so
cleanly that they always remove and hide their excrements,
the others teach their young ones to turn their tails out of
their nest, before they let fall their defilement. And indeed, why may we not say that one tree is more docible
than another, as dogs are more docible than sheep; or one
pot-herb more timorous than another, as harts are more
fearful than lions? Or otherwise, as among things immovable, there is not one thing slower in motion than another;
nor among things that are mute, one thing more vocal than
another; so neither, among things to which Nature has
not afforded a faculty of understanding, is there one thing
more timorous, more slothful, or more intemperate than
[p. 166]
another. But as to those creatures where that faculty is
present, the difference is manifest in the degrees of more
or less.
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