They know no more of time or space as
world-receptacles, or of permanent subjects and changing predicates,
or of causes, or kinds, or thoughts, or things, than our common
people know of continental cyclones. A baby's rattle drops out of
his hand, but the baby looks not for it. It has 'gone out' for him,
as a candle-flame goes out; and it comes back, when you replace it
in his hand, as the flame comes back when relit. The idea of its
being a 'thing,' whose permanent existence by itself he might
interpolate between its successive apparitions has evidently not
occurred to him. It is the same with dogs. Out of sight, out of
mind, with them. It is pretty evident that they have no GENERAL
tendency to interpolate 'things.' Let me quote here a passage from
my colleague G. Santayana's book.
"If a dog, while sniffing about contentedly, sees afar off his
master arriving after long absence...the poor brute asks for no
reason why his master went, why he has come again, why he should be
loved, or why presently while lying at his feet you forget him and
begin to grunt and dream of the chase--all that is an utter mystery,
utterly unconsidered. Such experience has variety, scenery, and a
certain vital rhythm; its story might be told in dithyrambic verse.
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