of any sort
to other creatures than man. All animals were considered as automata--that
is, as self-acting machines, moved by a something called instinct, for
want of a better name. To talk about the souls of animals or the spirits
of animals would have been very dangerous in the Middle Ages, when the
Church had supreme power; it would indeed have been to risk or to invite
an accusation of witchcraft, for demons were then thought to take the
shape of animals at certain times. To discuss the _mind_ of an animal
would have been for the Christian faith to throw doubt upon the existence
of human souls as taught by the Church; for if you grant that animals are
able to think, then you must acknowledge that man is able to think without
a soul, or you must acknowledge that the soul is not the essential
principle of thought and action. Until after the time of Descartes, who
later argued philosophically that animals were only machines, it was
scarcely possible to argue rationally about the matter in Europe.

Nevertheless, we shall soon perceive that this explanation will not cover
all the facts. You will naturally ask how it happens that, if the question
be a question of animal souls, birds, horses, dogs, cats, and many other
animals have been made the subject of Western poems from ancient times.
The silence is only upon the subject of insects. And, again, Christianity
has one saint--the most beautiful character in all Christian
hagiography--who thought of all nature in a manner that, at first sight,
strangely resembles Buddhism. This saint was Francis of Assisi, born in
the latter part of the twelfth century, so that he may be said to belong
to the very heart of the Middle Ages,--the most superstitious epoch of
Christianity. Now this saint used to talk to trees and stones as if they
were animated beings. He addressed the sun as "my brother sun"; and he
spoke of the moon as his sister. He preached not only to human beings, but
also to the birds and the fishes; and he made a great many poems on these
subjects, full of a strange and childish beauty. For example, his sermon
to the doves, beginning, "My little sisters, the doves," in which he
reminds them that their form is the emblem or symbol of the Holy Ghost, is
a beautiful poem; and has been, with many others, translated into nearly
all modern languages. But observe that neither St. Francis nor any other
saint has anything to say on the subject of insects.

Perhaps we must go ba