It is generally admitted that within the reach of the historic periods, several predominant races proceeded from the middle of Asia, in several directions—north, south, east, and west. The advocates of the different species contend that there are no nomade invaders on record who did not find inhabitants in the countries they intruded on. If such were the case, the creation of these autocthonoi, or “children of the ground,” was an unnecessary thing; for the Hyperboreans, Mongols, Egyptians, Arabs, Circassians, Pelasgians, Getæ, and so forth, came to obliterate them and flourish in their stead. And if the invaders could thus flourish in localities for which they were not created, there would seem to have been little necessity for the creation of more than one species of man. Altogether, it does appear that the scheme of making a distinct species for distinct zones or parallels is incompatible with our received notions of divine wisdom.
As for the production and distribution of animals and plants, we have no objection to consider them on the Lamarckian principle. The germs of earth’s million vegetable varieties were and are doubtless scattered through the crust of the earth, to be modified by the elements which act upon the surface; they may exist in an infinitesimal manner, baffling to our senses and our ideas alike. The reptiles, fishes, and animals, probably owed their origin to infusoria and a variety of changes following the law of development, and influenced by the sea or the sun. But between these and man—as we have already insisted—there is only an imperfect analogy, extremely helpless in this question of human derivation. That Lamarckian hypothesis—set forth so eloquently in the Vestiges of Creation—a work which, of a surety, belongs to Professor Nichol of Glasgow—answers very well for every thing but the man. Leave him out. Omit the part of Hamlet, and so play out the play. But man, the miraculous—that strange compound of dirt and divinity—will not be amenable to all this gradation—will not be put in a category and decided on, like a cactus or a kangaroo. He still remains apart—
The glory, jest, and riddle of the world.
Such are the considerations which lead us to reject the idea of a variety of pristine pairs. The arguments by which it is supported are many, but they are feeble. One of them is the fact, that, so far back as the records of the race have extended, the existing distinctions of it are discoverable. The most ancient Egyptian sculptures show the different features of the Negro and Ethiopian races, such as they appear at this day. These sculptures bear date nearly four thousand years ago; and it is concluded these heads had not time enough, since the beginning of the world, to be changed from a common type—seeing they have not since been changed in a lapse of time twice as long. They assume that our race has only been six thousand years on the globe. But that sort of argument is set aside by general consent. Chronological science is not among the truths which the Bible was intended to teach; with respect to the age of the world that venerable book is not historic nor authoritative. The most orthodox believers all over the world have admitted the demonstrations of geology; and we may safely conclude that our race has been roaming over the periphery of this planet for a longer period than that deduced by Usher from the Hebrew records. Philosophical science does not avail itself of such uncertainties as the world’s age is allowed to be. Again; it is argued by the doctors of development that a pair could not naturally propagate a species. They keep their eyes very closely upon the habits of the lower animals. They do not consider what was contrary to nature in making the paragon of animals, only a little lower than the angels. The propagation of a species from a pair, seems a very conquerable sort of difficulty, compared with others, that lie along this field of our disquisition. Why should people strain so much at a gnat, after they have swallowed the dromedary?
We have been following this argument through the pages of Col. Smith’s work[[1]] on the Human Species, with an Introduction by Dr. Kneeland. The doctor gives the views of Pritchard, Agassiz, and others, pro and con, on this matter, and subjoins his own opinions, supporting those of Agassiz, and claiming more than one original species. Dr. Kneeland’s conclusions seem lame enough. He argues, among other things, that a human mixture is bad. He says history proves that artificial breeds and mixed races of men have no permanency, and become extinct, unless they procure supplies from a pure stock. If this be true, God help these United States of ours! Here we are receiving increments from almost all the races of the world—certainly from all those of the old world—and making a perfect olla podrida of our civilization! Are we to decline, fall away, perish and become extinct, if we do not call upon the pure Celtic, Teutonic, or Anglo-Saxon stock for large periodical supplies? We hope not. Intermixture may not turn out so fatally. England has certainly drawn her strength and empire, in a great measure, from the fountain of her mongrel blood of Peghts, Britons, Celts, Romans, Danes, Teutons, Northmen, and all the rest of them. And yet there may be, after all, something in this ethnic philosophy of Dr. Kneeland. Still it is not good to despair; and, in fact, there is much to console the future of this federation, should its mingled blood grow too much diluted. Ireland is bent on coming over here bodily; and the pure Celtic blood of that island will be happily available to the veins and arteries of our debilitated body politic!
In this question of the human species—whether there were many created, or only one—we think it most reasonable to abide by the old doctrine of a single pair, seeing that the advocates of repeated creations cannot overthrow it, nor recommend their own. It is, at all events, simplest to believe in one; for if you believe in more, you will soon be bewildered into the belief of twenty or thirty primordial pairs. Assuming, then, that the race first issued from some part of Central Asia—where it seems generally allowed that it originated—we see nothing very violent in the supposition, that climate and locality produced the varied appearances of the human family, which we see at this day. After a certain lapse of time, black races were found to exist—especially in Africa—exhibiting features which distinguished them, in a very marked manner, from the white and other varieties:—viz—flat noses, protruding thick lips, retreating foreheads, and a wooliness of hair. These peculiarities are found, more or less, in all the races of that continent; the exceptions are few—still exhibiting the prevailing marks of race. The Egyptians sculptured on monuments have features resembling those of the Negroes—in the breadth of nostril, the thickness of the lips, and the general expression, but certainly of a higher facial order. A number of authorities, among whom are reckoned Pritchard and Denon, sanction the idea, that the Egyptian must, in a great degree, be classed with the Negro race. This race exhibits no proof of having been created especially to occupy an appropriate place, for it is found in a hundred localities. Clans of Negroes have existed in Laristan, in Makran, in Persia, and on the Helmund. They are also scattered over the Indian Archipelago—bearing the Hindoo, Mongol, and Malay characteristics. The Papuas of Nicobar, the Philippine Islands, and these oriental longitudes, resemble the numerous tribes of Negro variety to be found in Africa. On the latter continent, the races have all a strong family likeness; marked, however, by diversities which seem to prove the existence of modifying influences. In South Africa, the Hottentots and Bushmen greatly resemble, in size and face, their brother men of the Mongolian stock, in the opposite latitudes—to wit, the Chinese, the Esquimaux, and the other tribes of Northern Asiatics. Some of these diversified Negro races have woolly hair, and others straight hair. The skulls of the woolly tribes cannot be classed sufficiently distinctly. They exhibit that variety which runs through all those dusky families, recognized as one stock from their general resemblance. Thus it would seem that races of men were made Negroes in Asia as well as in Africa—perhaps long before they reached the latter continent—in which similar elemental influences were prepared to produce a like result.
If we consider the other extremes of mankind which we call the Caucasian, Japhetic, Bearded, and so forth, we find no certain sign that they constitute a distinct species. They have such diversities among themselves, and such intermingling resemblances to other divisions of humanity, that it is bewildering and, indeed, impossible to abide by any arbitrary distribution of them. In Asia, the Caucasian features are blended with the Mongolian, and Capuan or Negro, in a variety of degrees, in different localities, and under many nomenclatures. Toward the West, the Caucasian face is modified into the Egyptian, which is still further modified into some of the several Negro types. Each of the extreme divisions is found to be connected with the other by many signs of common likeness, and the races seem imperceptibly to run into one another as they appear to be modified by locality, or habits of existence. We may mention, in passing—as showing the resemblance that human aspects bear to one another, though the owners of them may have their native habitats a thousand leagues asunder—that the daguerreotype of Erasmus York, (a Mongol boy,) taken a few months ago in London, presents a face which we thought we saw with a basket of oranges the other day, in the street, a few days after it had arrived from the county Galway, in an emigrant ship.
People have speculated a good deal on the aspect and general appearance of our first parents. Some suppose they had white skin—that Adam was colored and shaped somewhat resembling the Sagittarius Apollo, and that the first of women was like the finest of her daughters at Almack’s or Saratoga, in the season—
That she, who lived six thousand years ago,
Was made exactly like the best we know.