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That Esquirol did not himself regard instinct as prominent in idiots is seen in the following passage from his chapter on the subject. He is speaking of the varieties of idiocy, and adds: "Who could point out and describe every shade in the descent from the man who thinks to the idiot, who is destitute even of the instincts of our nature?''

It is thus advanced as a scientific truth that idiots, in default of intelligence to guide them, are supplied with instinctive tendencies not common to human beings; or, as others express it, "revert to the use of instincts shared with the lower animals."

According to this theory, or as a corollary from this theory, the lower the grade of the idiocy the more marked should be the manifestation of the instincts. For, observe, the need of the instinct or the occasion for its exercise lies in the failure of the intelligence to meet the needs of the individual. The greater the failure of the one the greater the need of the other, its assumed substitute.

It may be mentioned in passing that the motive of the theory -- for some theories spring from motives, conscious or unconscious, in the minds of the theorizers -- differs with different authorities. In the case of Dr. Carpenter, it was to show a wise provision of the Creator in supplying instinct to meet the need of those deficient in intelligence. With Dr. Maudsley and his followers, it is to show "that some very strong facts and arguments in support of Mr. Darwin's views might be drawn from the field of morbid psychology;" in other words, its supposed harmony with the development theory.

There is no exception in this case to a common rule, that a theory grows more inclusive as it passes from one speculative hand to another. Thus, in a recent lecture before a class in one of our metropolitan medical schools I find the learned professor using the following language in regard to idiots: "The bodies, as a rule, are ill developed. Some have club-feet, some hunchback, and so on. Here is a negro whose feet look as if they were formed to clutch the limb of a tree, and it does not require a great stretch of the imagination to picture his ancestors in no very remote generation jumping or swinging from limb to limb of some African forest. And with this return, if we may call it so, towards the appearance and form of other animals, there is an equally perceptible return in habit and action. The place of intellect seems to be supplied by instinct, and by it the behavior is apparently often governed. . . . Commonly there is a consistent imitation of the habits of some one animal, and its posture and movements will be assumed and its habits copied even to the extent of showing a preference for whatever forms its natural food."

It is difficult to properly characterize these statements from a so-called clinical lecture upon the subject of idiocy. They are not the utterances of a scientist, but rather resemble the flowing language of our great American showman.

The members of this Association have had an experience in the protracted observation of idiocy that in the aggregate is very large. And I venture to say in this presence that a more unnatural description of the features of idiocy could hardly be given than that just quoted. Scarcely one per cent. of our cases are humpbacked. Club-feet are almost equally rare among our pupils. And as for prehensile feet, I have never seen a case. Nor has it fallen to my experience to witness any consistent imitation of the habits of any animal, nor an assumption of the posture or movements of animals, in the case of any idiots. (1)

Science is a compound of fact and inference. Its principles can only be established when the facts are correctly observed in all their immediate relations, when there are enough of them to generalize from safely, and when the inferences are unavoidable, or, at all events, when the balance of probabilities is on the side of the proposed principle.

Let us submit the cases cited by Dr. Carpenter and others, and the doctrine based upon them, to such tests.

Take the first instance. "A perfectly idiotic girl" is a somewhat vague description of the degree of intelligence the case possessed, in the absence of other particulars. "Delivered without assistance, it was found that she had gnawed off the umbilical cord, as is practised by the lower animals. It is scarcely to be supposed that she had any idea of the object of this separation."

It may be remarked here that this act was not necessary for the welfare or preservation of the offspring. The circulation in the cord is in the wrong direction to meet that view. It was, therefore, a purposeless act. There is no occasion to summon instinct in the matter. We can, however, suppose, in the absence of any real knowledge of the cases, that in both this case and the one cited by Dr. Browne, the placentas might have been retained. In which case the gnawing of the cord on the part of the mothers might have been within the scope of their intelligence to free themselves from this unexpected entanglement