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O.New62

general level of their intelligence in regard to those performances which are their proper function, such as flying and nest-building for ordinary birds; and what [is] man's proper function if it be not to embody general Ideas in art-creation, utilities and, above all, cognition? To give the lie to his own consciousness of divining the reasons of phenomena would be as silly in a man, as it would be in a fledgling bird to refuse to trust to its wings and leave the nest; because it had read Babinet and judged aerostation to be impossible on hydrodynamical grounds. Yes, it