UNITY OF THE HUMAN RACE.
The theory of the unity of the human race has caused a clash of opinions
among men of science. It has been the great battle field among
anthropologists, ethnologists, geologists, philologists, and
theologists. Men of acknowledged ability have been arrayed on either
side. Among the foremost in favor of a diversity of origin have been
Agassiz, Sir Roderick I. Murchison, Georges Pouchet, A. R. Wallace, and
Schleicher. But the weight of evidence and authority is most in favor of
the unity of the human race.
The advocates of the theory of the diversity of the origin of the human
race have advanced many objections against the unity, and produced
arguments in favor of their opinions. These may be summed up under five
heads. 1. The anatomical differences between the different races, and
especially those which distinguish the black and white. 2. The
separation of the races from each other for unknown ages by great
oceans, and by formidable and almost impassable continental barriers. 3.
The disparity in intelligence, and the grades in civilization. 4. A
medium type cannot exist by itself, except on the condition of being
supported by the two creating types. 5. When two types become united,
two phenomena may arise: _a_, Either one of them will absorb the other;
or _b_, They may subsist simultaneously in the midst of a greater or
less number of hybrids.
The following answers may be given to these objections, or arguments: 1.
It is just as reasonable to suppose that man is affected, as well as the
animals, by climate, food, or peculiar condition. It is well known that
animals have undergone more or less change by their situation or
position. Elephants and rhinoceroses are almost hairless. As certain
extinct species, which formerly lived under an arctic climate, were
covered with hair or long wool, it would appear that the present species
of both genera had lost their hairy covering by exposure to heat. This
is confirmed by the fact that the elephants of the elevated and cool
districts of India are more hairy than those on the lowlands.[112] A
wonderful change is wrought by the influence of climate on turkeys. In
India "it is much degenerated in size, utterly incapable of rising on
the wing, of a black color, and with long pendulous appendages over the
beak, enormously developed." "In the English climate an individual Porto
Santo rabbit recovered the proper color of its fur in less than four
years."[113] Observers are convinced that a damp climate affects the
growth of the hair of cattle. The mountain-breeds always differ from the
lowland breeds; in a mountainous country the hind limbs would be
affected from exercising them more, which would also affect the pelvis,
and, then, from the law of homologous variation, the front limbs and
head would probably be affected.[114] One of the most marked
distinctions in the races of man is that the skull in some is elongated
or dolichocephalic, and in others rounded or brachycephalic. Mr. Darwin
has observed that a change takes place in the skulls of domestic
rabbits; they become elongated, while those of the wild rabbit are
rounded. He took two skulls of nearly equal breadth, the one from a wild
and the other from a large domestic rabbit, the former was only 3.15,
and the latter 4.3 inches in length. Welcker has observed "that short
men incline more to brachycephaly and tall men to dolichocephaly; and
tall men may be compared with the larger and longer-bodied rabbits, all
of which have elongated skulls."[115] The argument from language is of
great weight, especially in considering the differences in color.
Professor Max Mueller has stated this clearly: "There was a time when the
ancestors of the Celts, the Germans, the Slavonians, the Greeks and
Italians, the Persians and Hindus, were living together beneath the same
roof." "The evidence of language is irrefragable, and it is the only
evidence worth listening to with regard to ante-historical periods. It
would have been next to impossible to discover any traces of
relationship between the swarthy natives of India and their conquerors,
whether Alexander or Clive, but for the testimony borne by
language."[116] When the great lapse of ages is taken into
consideration, since man originated, it will be seen that sufficient
time is given to produce the white, black, yellow, red, and brown
varieties of man.
2. The argument from geographical distribution would hardly seem valid,
as it is known that the ocean can be and has been navigated by frail
crafts. Lieutenant Bligh, of the ship Bounty, in a small boat,
twenty-three feet long from stem to stern, deep laden with nineteen men
and one hundred and fifty pounds of bread, twenty-eight gallons of
water, twenty pounds of pork, etc., started from the island of Tofoa
(South Pacific) for the island of Timor, a distance of three thousand
six hundred miles. In this voyage he encountered a boisterous sea, and
great perils, but finally reached his destination.[117] When men began
to dwell on the sea-coast they made their small vessels and carried on a
limited navigation. Many a frail craft has been driven out to sea with
its human freight, some of which landed on uninhabited islands. This has
often happened among the South Sea islanders.[118] If it had been
asserted, a few years ago, that man's distribution might have been
partly caused by the agency of ice, it would have received no attention.
And yet, Captain Tyson and his party, consisting of twelve men, two
women, and five children, being a portion of the crew of the ill-fated
Polaris, drifted about from the 15th of October, 1872, to the 30th of
April, 1873, on an ice-floe, and in the midst of an arctic winter.
Besides the provisions saved from the Polaris they subsisted on the
flesh of seals, birds, and bears that they were able to kill. Every
member of this party was rescued off the coast of Labrador. It must be
further noticed that the surface of the earth was not always the same.
The continents have changed more or less, and during these changes man
must have become more or less separated.
3. In respect to the disparity it may be replied that the two extreme
points are observable in all the nations of the earth. Even in single
families there have been those who were highly cultured and refined,
while other members have been very low in organization, habits, and
tastes. In these days it is manifest that all the races are capable of a
very high degree of improvement. On the other hand, nations have
retrograded. The ignorant, wretched nomads who pitch their tents amid
the ruins of Babylon, are the descendants of the ancient mixed races who
successively occupied Mesopotamia: the Assyrians, Babylonians, Medes,
and Persians, who were ruled by such renowned monarchs as Shalmaneser,
Nebuchadnezzar, Cyrus, and others. The wild marauding Arabs are the
descendants of a people who invented algebra and introduced the
numerals. So the list might be extended.
4 and 5. The fourth and fifth amount to the assumption that no race will
amalgamate with another. The statements embraced under these two heads
are not warranted by facts. Dr. Prichard says, "Mankind of all races and
varieties are equally capable of propagating their offspring by
intermarriages, and that such connections are equally prolific whether
contracted between individuals of the same or of the most dissimilar
varieties. If there is any difference, it is probably in favor of the
latter."[119] He then gives a short account of several examples of new
or intermediate stocks which have been produced and multiplied. They are
Griquas, descended from the Dutch and Hottentots, who occupy the banks
of the Orange River, and number five thousand souls; the Cafusos of
Brazil, a mixture of native Americans and African Negroes; the Papuas of
the island of New Guinea, a mixture between the Malays and Negroes. One
of the best examples yet furnished is that of the Pitcairn Islanders.
This colony originated in this way: The British government had sent a
vessel, called the Bounty, commanded by Lieutenant Bligh, to gather
bread-fruit trees at Otaheite and introduce them into the West Indies.
Bligh was an overbearing, tyrannical, and cruel officer. Driven to fury,
and out of patience with the superior officer, Mr. Fletcher Christian
and others mutinied, and turned Bligh and his eighteen companions
adrift. The mutineers proceeded to Tahiti; here they took on board
provisions and live stock, nine Tahitian men, twelve women, and eight
boys who had secreted themselves, and then proceeded to Toubouai, where
they founded a settlement. Owing to dissensions the colony broke up and
removed to Tahiti. But Mr. Christian, with eight other of the mutineers,
three Toubouaians, three Tahitian men with their wives, and one child,
and nine other women, left in the Bounty and landed at Pitcairn's
Island, and there burned the Bounty on the 23d of January, 1790. In less
than nine years afterward, owing to strifes, the men were reduced to two
in number, both whites, and one of them died the succeeding year. In the
year 1808 the American ship Topaz touched at the island. The colonists
then numbered thirty-five. In 1856 they had increased to the number of
one hundred and ninety, and as the produce of the island was barely
sufficient to support them they were removed by the British government
to Norfolk Island. There are only eight surnames among them--five of the
Bounty stock and three new-comers. They are a fine, healthy race of
people; the men of a bright copper color, but the women are scarcely
distinguishable from English women. If reports be true concerning them,
they are the most remarkable people on earth. They never allow the sun
to go down on their wrath, and are noted for their honesty, truth,
chastity, industry, benevolence, reverence, simplicity, and all the
virtues which combine to form true religion.
The law of hybridity, which has been so strongly urged against the unity
of the race, has proved an argument in favor. The offspring of birds as
much alike as the domestic goose and the large Muscovy duck will not
propagate their species. Mules cannot perpetuate their kind. The
different varieties of the horse, such as the little black Shetland pony
and the tall white Arabian, will not only breed together but these
hybrids will continue to perpetuate their kind, thereby proving their
identity of species. The same may be said of the cross between the most
perfect and the lowest type of mankind. If some of these mixtures die
out in a few generations, it is not owing to their hybridity, but to the
plain violation of natural laws. When the contracting parties to a
marriage are of the same constitution, there will be no issue; if the
constitutions, or rather, temperaments, are in substance too nearly the
same, the issue, if any, will be either still-born, or die very soon
after birth; if the contracting parties shall have an adjunctive
element, the issue will be short-lived, although they may arrive at the
years of maturity.[120] These laws apply to both the mixed and the
unmixed types of mankind.
The close affinity of all the races, their subjection to the same
general laws, their capacity for mental and moral improvement, and the
virtual unity of their languages lead to the conclusion that one
birth-place was common to all. If that place be Central Asia, or any
other locality, it must have been long before traditional times, when
the one tribe was broken up and nations formed.
Races change so slow that they seem to be stationary. On the ancient
Egyptian monuments are representations of the Negro, having exactly the
same features which characterize that race at the present time; and some
of these paintings date as far back as 2000 B. C.
Then from the unity of the race and the persistency in type, an almost
incredible length of time must be assigned to permit of the great
disparity as exhibited by the different types of mankind.