Man is the only animal that blushes. Or needs to. The higher animals have no understanding of shame,
or decorum; man is the only one who has--and man is the only one who needs it. When a man does a
beastly thing, he doesn't feel the beastliness of it. He is a little ashamed perhaps, but that is
a different thing. The more he does it, the more he is ashamed; and the oftener he is ashamed, the
oftener he does it. I think the Christian's Bible says that man is the only animal that sins. Is
that not correct? Man is the only animal that kills his own for the pleasure of it; for the lust
of it; for the joy of it. Man is the only animal that robs his helpless fellow of his country,
takes possession of it and drives him out of it or destroys him. Man has done it all over the globe.
No animal does that. Man is the only animal that deals in that atrocity of atrocities, War.
He is the only one that gathers his brethren about him and goes forth in cold blood and calm pulse
to exterminate his kind. He is the only animal that for sordid wages will march out, as the Hessians
did in our Revolution, and as the boyish Prince Napoleon did in the Zulu war, and help to slaughter
strangers of his own species who have done him no harm and with whom he has no quarrel.
Man is the only animal that can remain on friendly terms with the victims he intends to eat until
he eats them. Man is the only animal that is cruel. He is the only one that inflicts pain for the
pleasure of doing it. It is a trait of natural species. Man is the only one that is to be dreaded.
This sermon seems pretty definite. Man is the Reasoning Animal. Such is the claim. I think it is
open to dispute. Indeed, my researches have taught me that many people in high places, or in
positions of trust, who prove by their acts that they are anything but reasoning animals, continue
to give it out that man is no better than the lower animals. In truth, man is the only Patriot.
He sets himself apart in his own country, under his own flag, and sneers at the other nations, and
keeps multitudinous uniformed assassins on hand at heavy expense to grab slices of other people's
countries, and keep them from grabbing slices of his. And in the intervals between campaigns he
washes the blood off his hands and works for "the universal brotherhood of man" — with his mouth.
Man is the Religious Animal. He is the only Religious Animal. He is the only animal that has the
True Religion — several of them. He is the only animal that loves his neighbor as himself, and
cuts his throat if his theology isn't straight. He has made a graveyard of the globe in trying
his honest best to smooth his brother's path to happiness and heaven. He was at it in the time
of the Caesars, he was at it in Mahomet's time, he was at it in the time of the Inquisition, he
was at it in France a couple of centuries, he was at it in England in Mary's day, he has been at
it ever since he first saw the light, he is at it today in Crete (as per the telegrams in the
morning paper), he will be at it somewhere else tomorrow. The higher animals have no religion.
And we are told that they are going to be left out, in the Hereafter. I wonder why? It
seems questionable taste.