The chief factors in producing the change are, as has
been shewn by Professor Groos, the possession of a general instinct to
imitate and to experiment, and the existence of a period of youth in
which the young creature may practise these instincts, and so prepare
itself for the more serious purposes of adult life. The anthropoid
apes seem to possess these experimental instincts to an extent much
greater than that observed in any other class of animals, and, as they
have a long period of youth, they have the opportunity of putting them
into practice to the fullest possible extent.
From the natural history of the anthropoid apes, Huxley passed to
consideration of their relation to man, prefacing his observations
with a passage defending the utility of the enquiry, a passage
necessary enough in these days of prejudice, but now chiefly with
historical interest:
"It will be admitted that some knowledge of man's position in the
animate world is an indispensable preliminary to the proper
understanding of his relations to the universe; and this again
resolves itself in the long run into an enquiry into the nature
and the closeness of the ties which connect him with those
singular creatures whose history has been sketched in the
preceding pages.
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