Brutes abstract not. – If it may be doubted whether beasts compound and enlarge their ideas that way, to any degree, this, I think, I may be positive in, that the power of abstracting is not at all in them, and that the having of general ideas is that which puts a perfect distinction between man and brutes, and is an excellency which the faculties of brutes do by no means attain to.
Source:Book II. Of Ideas, Chapter XI. Of Discerning, and other Operations of the Mind
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