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FRAGMENTS OF A PRISONER'S DIARY
animal impulses are sublimated, that is to say, depraved, degraded, distorted, falsified, as pseudonoble human sentiments and humane actions. This, after all, is a great difference. Moreover, it is not going to be a record of my emotions only. It would rather be a record of my observations of human behaviour, and of critical reflections upon the ideas behind that behaviour.
I think I have sufficiently justified my desire to break into the human monopoly on literature. The monopoly is based upon two factors: Power of articulated speech, and intellectual and emotional superiority. The former does give man a position of vantage; but so far the advantage has been mostly abused. That, however, does not help us. We still remain unable to give man a piece of our mind. I have overcome the difficulty in an ingenious way. As regards the latter factor, the monopoly is based upon a pure fiction.
Man does not know how intelligent I am, or how keen are my feelings. But to-day these are no longer matters of pure speculation. The knowledge of environments and reactions thereto are deter
mined by the organs of sense. It is a well-known fact that the perceptive power of this or that sense is much greater than that of man in various species of lower animals. My sight, for example, is much stronger than man's. I see many things that he cannot. My intelligence is richer to that extent. Some observation gives one a glimpse of the
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