[7] Since the above was written, I have read Hengstenberg on the Pentateuch, who supposes that the “mixed multitude” were an inferior order of workmen, employed, like the Jews, as slaves, in the building of the pyramids.
EDITOR’S INTRODUCTION
The discovery and history of barbarous races of men, besides affording exquisite gratification to the general mind of civilized society, have always been looked upon as important means toward a right understanding of the history of our species, and the relation in which it stands to natural and revealed theology; and in their prosecution have produced, in latter times, many instances of the most indefatigable disinterestedness and greatest efforts of true courage of which our nature is capable; many, in the person of the traveller, philanthropist and missionary, cheerfully renouncing in their pursuit every comfort of civilized life, braving death itself in every variety of form, and leaving their bones on the distant shore, or far away in the unknown interior of the dreary continent, without a trace of their fate to console those most dearly attached to them. The result of the discoveries hitherto made has invariably confirmed the conclusions of a few superior minds, formed without the assistance drawn from such a source, that under whatever circumstances man is placed, and whatever advantages he may enjoy, there is very little real difference between the characters, intrinsically considered, of the savage and man in what is considered a civilized community. There is this difference between what may be called barbarism, not unfrequently to be met with in a civilized community, springing from the depravity natural to man, and what obtains in a barbarous tribe or nation as such, that, in the former, it forms the exception; the brother, the father, or the son of the person of it often exhibiting the most opposite nature and conduct; while, in the latter, it forms the rule, and what the individual cannot, in a sense, avoid. But, in making this distinction, is there nothing to be found within the former sphere somewhat anomalous to the position thus presented?
The subject of the following enquiry forms the exception, and from its being the only instance to be met with in the history of Europe, it may be said to merit the greatest consideration of the statesman, the historian, the philosopher, and the Christian.
It does not appear possible, from the peculiar mould in which the European mind has been cast, for it to have remained in that state of immobility which, from the remotest antiquity, seems to have characterized that of Asia; in which continent society has remained torpid and inactive, contented with what it has inherited, without making any effort at change or advancement. This peculiarity of character, in connexion with the influences of the Christian religion, seems to have had the effect of bringing about that thorough amalgamation of races and ideas in the various countries of Europe in which more than one people happened to occupy the same territory, or come under the jurisdiction of the same government, when no material difference in religion existed. In no country has such an amalgamation been more happily consummated than in our own; if not altogether as to blood, at least as to feeling, the more important thing of the two; the physical differences, in occasional instances, appearing in some localities, on the closest observation of those curious individuals who make such a subject the object of their learned researches.
Notwithstanding what has been said, how does it happen that in Europe, but especially in our own country, there exists, and has for four hundred years existed, a pretty numerous body of men distinct in their feelings from the general population, and some of them in a state of barbarism nearly as great as when they made their appearance amongst us? Such a thing would appear to us in no way remarkable in the stationary condition so long prevalent in Asia; where, in the case of India, for example, are to be found, inhabiting the same territory, a heterogeneous population, made up of the remnants of many nations; where so many languages are spoken, and religions or superstitions professed, and the people divided into so many castes, which are separated from each other on the most trivial, and, to Europeans, ridiculous and generally incomprehensible points; some eating together, and others not; some eating mutton, and others not; some beef and fowls, others vegetables, milk, butter and eggs, but no flesh or fish; those going to sea not associating with those remaining at home; some not following the occupation of others; and all showing the most determined antipathy to associate with each other;—where, from the numerous facilities so essential toward the perpetuation of peculiar modes of life, and the want of the powerful elements of assimilation and amalgamation so prominent in our division of the human race, a people may continue in a stereotyped state of mind and habits for an indefinite length of time. But in a country that is generally looked upon as the bulwark of the Reformation, and the stronghold of European civilization, how does it happen that we find a people, resembling in their nature, though not in the degree, the all but fabulous tribe that was lately to be found in the dreary wastes of Newfoundland, flying from the approach, and crossing the imagination of the fishermen like a spectre? Or like the wild men of the jungle, in some of the oceanic parts of Asia, having no homes, roaming during the dry season in the forests, and sleeping under or on the branches of trees, and in the rainy season betaking themselves to caves or sheltering beneath rocks, making their beds of leaves, and living on what they can precariously find, such as roots and wild honey; yet, under the influence of the missionary, many of them now raising crops, building dwellings, erecting schoolhouses, keeping the Sabbath, and praising God? But some of the Gipsies with us may be said to do few of these things. They live among us, yet are not of us; they come in daily contact with us, yet keep such distance from the community as a wild fowl, that occasionally finds its way into the farm-yard, does in shrinking from the close scrutiny of the husbandman. They cling like bats to ruined houses, caves, and old lime-kilns; and pitch their tents in dry water-courses, quarry-holes, or other sequestered places, by the way-side, or on the open moor, and even on dung-heaps for the warmth to be derived from them during the winter season, and live under the bare boughs of the forest during the summer;—yet amid all this apparent misery, through fair means or foul, they fare well, and lead what some call a happy life; while everything connected with them is most solicitously wrapt up in inscrutable mystery. These Gipsies exhibit to the European mind the most inexplicable moral problem on record; in so far as such phenomena are naturally expected to be found among a people whom the rays of civilization have never reached; while, in the case of the Gipsies, the first principles of nature would seem to be set at defiance.
“And thus ’tis ever; what’s within our ken,
Owl-like, we blink at, and direct our search
To fartherest Inde, in quest of novelties;
Whilst here at home, upon our very thresholds,
Ten thousand objects hurtle into view,
Of interest wonderful.”