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Tyler, John Mason, 1851-1929

"A Brief History of His Origin and Development through Conformity to Environment; Being the Morse Lectures of 1895"

Thus alone is progress possible.
But the word mind calls up before us a long list of powers. And the
questions arise, Is one mode and line of mental action just as much
the goal of man's development as another? Is man to cultivate the
appetite for food and sense gratification just as much as the hunger
for righteousness? Or is appetite in the mind like digestion in the
body, a function, necessary indeed and once dominant, but no longer
fitted for supreme control? Is there in the development of the
mental powers or functions just as really a sequence of dominance as
in that of the bodily functions? Are there older and lower powers
and modes of action, which, though once supreme, must now be rigidly
kept down in their proper lower place? Are there lower motives, for
which the very laws of evolution forbid us to live, just as truly as
they forbid a man's living for stomach or brute strength instead of
brain and mind? Are these lower powers merely the foundation
on which the higher motives and powers are to rise in their
transcendent glory? This is the question which we now must face,
and it is of vital importance.
We have come to one of the most important and difficult subjects of
zooelogy. Let us distinctly recognize that it is not our task to
explain the origin of mind, or even of a single mental faculty.


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