We have already remarked on the ambiguity and vagueness of the phrase 'parental instinct '1 employed by biologists, on the ground that love with which they identify it contains all the instincts of its component emotions. We inferred that the love of the maternal instinct is at least a combination or system of subsidiary instincts: and if we recall the conclusion to which we have come in the last few chapters, that even single emotional systems, as anger and fear, contain, not as has been supposed, only one instinct apiece, but a number of instincts, which enable the same emotion to respond differently, and to evoke a different behaviour, in different situations, then we shall recognise how many instincts must be included in love which, beside anger and fear, organises so many other emotions.

Now if the stimulus of maternal love is not only the perception by the mother of the small and weak creature in close proximity to herself, but also the joy infused into this perception, then we have to inquire how the disposition of this joy stands related to the other emotional dispositions of love. Let us confine ourselves to the two with which we have been occupied in the last two chapters, fear and anger. If without an innate susceptibility to this joy there can be no love, and if this love is instinctive, then our hypothesis will run as follows: there is an innate connexion between the disposition to joy and the dispositions to fear and anger, of such a kind that, given a susceptibility to the one on behalf of the child, there will arise a susceptibility to the other two on behalf of the same object; and these being the anger and fear of love will be the disinterested varieties of these emotions. Now if there be this innate connexion between these three dispositions, it follows that when, instead of the external causes which arouse joy, there are substituted the external causes which arouse fear or anger, and these we may summarise as situations of either danger or aggression-then, because there is this susceptibility to joy on behalf of the child, there will arise in place of it either the emotion of fear or anger, according to the particular situation.

1 Book i. ch. iv.

That maternal love is instinctive in normal mothers will therefore mean that at least any one of these three primary emotions is capable of being instinctively aroused by its appropriate stimuli on behalf of the offspring in the manner we have described.

Let us then attempt to express this law so far as it concerns fear and anger: (36) So far as there is an instinctive susceptibility to feel joy in presence of an object, so far there is an instinctive susceptibility to feel disinterested fear and anger on behalf of the same object.

We have so far dealt with the instinctive nature of the animal's disinterested fear and anger on that side of the nature of instinct which is referred to in the question: "Whether birds fear or have instinctive knowledge of their enemies." But beside the connexion between the stimulus and the emotion, there is the connexion between the emotion and the behaviour; and if the first shows that the emotion is instinctively aroused, does the second show that the behaviour evoked is itself instinctive? If disinterested fear and anger employ one or other of the instincts of the ordinary egoistic varieties of these systems, they are so far instinctive in respect of their behaviour. But when an emotion is employed disinterestedly, its behaviour must be more or less different from the behaviour it manifests when an animal acts for itself. Sometimes this difference is considerable. If the hen feels fear on behalf of her chicks she tries to conceal them under her wings, though she remains exposed herself. If an animal feels anger on behalf of her young, in fighting to defend them she interposes her body between them and their enemy, or distracts him in some other way. Now this disinterested behaviour of different animals does not appear to be learnt through experience, but to be more or less adequate from the beginning. We shall therefore conclude provisionally, that the behaviour of both disinterested fear and anger among animals is not wholly acquired, but in part instinctive, and that it employs instincts which, even when they most closely resemble the egoistic instincts of these emotions, have some features which distinguish them.

1 Hudson, 'The Naturalist in La Plata,' ch. v. p. 88,

If we have not been able to account for the development of disinterested fear through the influence of sympathetic emotion, it is not more likely that the same influence will account for disinterested anger. The young may play unconscious of the approach of an enemy, while the parent is aroused to disinterested anger on their behalf. With human beings it is the same. We are angry when we see one person ill-treating another: his feeling may be fear, ours is anger. Wrongs of individuals and classes arouse our moral indignation. And thus the end of this anger is different from that of other varieties, being to threaten, or to punish, or to break down opposition, or to destroy for the preservation or wellbeing of another life.

R

CHAPTER IV

ANGER (II)

1. Of the Varieties of Anger that are acquired in the

Sentiments

THE variety of Anger which is directed to the infliction of pain, though sometimes regarded as instinctive, is probably acquired, and either peculiar to the human species or shared by them only with the apes and monkeys. It is probable that these animals alone can distinguish between inflicting bodily injury and causing pain; and the variety of anger we are now considering seems to depend on this distinction. In other varieties of anger the infliction of pain is an incident, here alone it is the end.

It is commonly said that certain animals are cruel, and the play of the cat with the mouse is popularly supposed to indicate a purpose of causing pain. But it is more likely that this is a manifestation of their play-instinct, directed, not to causing pain, but to perfecting the animal in those modes of attack and destruction on which its livelihood depends.1 Hudson observes that" some hawks do certainly take pleasure in pursuing and striking birds when not seeking prey."2 But to take pleasure in the exercise of an instinct is one thing and even where it is an instinct of killing is what we should expect to take pleasure in it because it produces pain in another animal is a different matter. If there is an instinct

1 See Groos, 'The Play of Animals ch. iii. 3.

2 Op. cit. ch. v. p. 96.

to inflict pain it must be shown that the instinctive behaviour in which it is manifested is directed to this end and no other. This type is so highly developed in human beings that it has been taken by Bain to define all varieties of anger, just as formerly Aristotle selected revenge for a similar purpose. Tyrants have kept alive their victims to perpetuate their sufferings, and have regretted their deaths as depriving them of an exquisite enjoyment. But, in civilised life, it is sometimes through speech that the endeavour to cause pain effects its purpose. When two persons are venting their anger in words, each often endeavours to inflict pain on the other, and to discover his most sensitive spots.

The development of the anger which is directed to inflict pain seems, then, to be an acquired variety, and to depend on the discrimination of pain as one of the normal effects of anger, after which it is possible to pursue pain as an end. Yet many varieties of anger not only incidentally produce pain, but require to produce it as a means. The effectiveness of threats depends on their arousing fear; and where animals fight for leadership of their bands, the pain and fear which they inflict on those who oppose them are necessary as means to their end.

Seeing that the infliction of pain appears to be an incident or a means and not an end, in primitive types of anger, it must seem strange that Bain should be so much impressed by its wide diffusion in the human race as to define the entire emotion by it, as in his well-known declaration that, "Anger contains, as its essential peculiarity, an impulse knowingly to inflict suffering on another sentient being, and to derive a positive gratification therefrom." Yet he at the same time recognises that among predatory animals, "the disposition to kill and destroy "2 is sufficient for their preservation. Thus he recognises other tendencies in anger and yet, in treating of man, tries to confine his emotion to one.

Now supposing pain to have been distinguished as one of the normal effects of anger, what influences it consciously to pursue pain as its proximate end? If the anger which is preventative, or that which seeks to subordinate others or to 2 Op. cit. ch. ii. 24.

'The Emotions and the Will,' ch. ix. 4.