selves in the place of other peoples, and to treat them as they would themselves be treated. But, except by occasional individuals here and there, moral consideration is by men not extended in a serious way beyond the boundaries of their own species. Non-humans are outsiders. They may be attacked, beaten, starved, killed, eaten, deceived, cut to pieces out of curiosity, or shot down for pastime. "Wild" animals, that is, those species which are not in any way attached to the "tribe," are especially destitute of all considerations of human justice and mercy. They are mere targets for anyone who wants to practice shooting. The tribal instinct is the instinct to stand by one's group and to exaggerate the importance of one's place of living. It is the instinct of partiality-the instinct which prompts one to say: "My Country! May she ever be right. But right or wrong, my Country!" "Patriotism," as it is usually understood, is an expression of the tribal instinct. The true patriot does not believe that his country is the only country in the world, nor necessarily the best country; but he wants it to be a better country than it is, and he works to make it so. "The world is my country," said Thomas Paine. Such words come from men whose sympathies are too big to be limited to any particular group of human beings. Any one who is completely recovered from the tribal instinct does not stop even at the bounds of his species, but is a brother to all that feel. PART V. Savage Survivals in Higher Peoples (Continued.) 1. The Play Instinct. The play instinct itself is not vestigial in higher peoples. The instinct has its uses today the same as it had in the ages of savagery. But the general form of play among higher animals is vestigial. Play is nature's schooling. It is preparation for life. The young of nearly all the higher animals play. And when they play they practice on the things they will do in actual life when they are older. Young dogs and wolves scuffle and chase each other when they play, because in after life they will be attacking and pursuing other animals a great deal in their business. A kitten likes to play with a spool or a ball. A spool is a "mouse." Young goats and sheep run and leap in their play. Their schooling (at least in the wild life) is to prepare them for getting away from the flesh-eating animals which later will chase them. Fishes play by darting and dipping, and monkeys by swinging and rollicking in the trees. When we play we go to school-to the oldest school in this world-to a school which existed long before there were any school-houses or school-ma'ams in the world, even long before there were any human beings on the earth. The wild goats went to school on the mountains and the wild cats in the woods for thousands and thousands of years before the alphabet and the spelling book were ever thought of. But human plays are nearly all battles. They are preparation for a life of fighting and war. The modern world is largely co-operative. The ideals of higher men are the ideals of peace. But our plays still retain their ancient forms. We still learn our lessons of life in the school of the savage. We practice for a life left behind, rather than for the actual life we are to lead. A game of football or baseball or cricket is a mimic battle between two tribes. The young goat leaps a great deal in its play. It is developing strength and accuracy to leap from rock to rock. The young wild goat will have a great deal of running and leaping to do in later years, when the hungry mouths and fleet limbs of the wolves are on its track. And it is very important for it to be very diligent in its studies, and learn well the lessons of fleetness and farleaping. But the domesticated goat is a lowlander. It will probably never see a mountain nor a wolf. But the children of these lowlanders continue to practice in their play for the wild mountain life gone by, just as the children of higher men continue to prepare themselves in their plays for the vanished life of the savage. These savage forms of play are beneficial indirectly in building up the body and in developing ingenuity and shrewdness. But the reason why we use in our plays the forms of running and fighting instead of computing and co-operatingthe reason why our plays are arranged to give us practice in downing people instead of helping them up-is because the play instinct has never been modernized. The play instinct in boys takes a different form from what it does in girls, for the same reason that the play-forms of goats and wolves are different. They practice for different ends. A boy likes to ride a stick-horse and play ball and fight; a girl likes her dolls and her play-houses. 2. The Imitative Instinct. This is the instinct which causes us to be inclined to do as others do-the urge to copy others -in manners, dress, speech, walk, belief, occupation, etc. The tendency to do as others do is much stronger in higher peoples than it needs to be. We often imitate others in spite of ourselves, even to our disadvantage, in obedience to an urge which survives in us from the past. In all animals that live in groups or societies, that is, in gregarious animals, the conduct of each individual is determined largely by the conduct of the rest of the group. There is a certain uniformity in the conduct of the members of the group. If some of the members do a certain thing, there is a tendency in the rest to do the same thing. In a school of fishes, if some of them dart away, the whole school will do the same thing without thinking. It is the same way with birds. They are each geared to do what the rest do, and they do it without thinking-often, it seems, in spite of their thinking. Once in a while when a flock of birds fly up, there may be one or two with originality enough to remain. But this is generally the result of repeated alarms of the same kind, and the ones that refuse to fly are the ones with more sense and strength of mind than the rest. Experience in this case modifies the original instinct. Children are highly imitative. They are always copying those around them, especially those who strike their fancy or stand high in some way. The child will is not only weak but untrained. It is |