Anthropoid

“ The cave-men were not only true men, but men of a comparatively high type. 2. But the river-drift men, who preceded them, were men of a lower social organization, and probably of a lower physical organization as well. 3. The earliest human remains which we possess, though, on the whole, decidedly human, are yet, in some respects, of a type more brute-like than that of any existing savages. 4. They specially recall the most striking traits of the larger anthropoid apes. 5. There is no reason to suppose that these remains are those of the earliest men who inhabited the earth. ”

“ While, from this theoretical point of view, anthropology must devote itself to the investigation of human types and human activities and thought the world over, its actual field of work is much more restricted. Biology and psychology on the one hand, and history, economics, sociology, and philology on the other, have taken up anthropological problems, each from its own point of view, and each in connection with its own subject of investigation. ”

“ Thus, then, Anthropology and its handmaids, Ethnology, Philology, and History, have wrought out, beyond a doubt, proofs of the upward evolution of humanity since the appearance of man upon our planet. ”

“ A nobler race should reach their fruitful clime;
Or, if a common source all nations claim,
Their lineage, form and faculties the same,
What sovereign secret cause, yet undisplay'd,
This wondrous change in nature's work has made;
Why various powers of soul and tints of face
In different lands diversify the race;
To whom the Guide: Unnumbered causes lie,
In earth and sea, in climate, soil and sky,
That fire the soul, or damp the genial flame,
And work their wonders on the human frame. ”

“ The studies of anthropology, whose final object is to solve the problems of the evolution of the human race and man's place in nature, begin with analysis, or the examination of particular characteristics. Human characteristics may be arranged, according to their bearing on anthropology and ethnography, in five orders: External physical traits ”

“ But what can we learn of the state of anthropological knowledge in the days before Herodotus wrote?
The task of the anthropologist is, in its essence, to find an answer to these principal questions:—What is Man? What kinds of Men are there? and how and by what agencies are they formed, and distributed over the lands, as we find them? How is human life propagated under parental sanction, maintained by social institutions, and made tolerable by useful arts? ”

“ But all human races and tribal types, known to us either from historical monuments, or who still live to-day in their primitive homes, in spite of climatic and cultural influences, have reproduced their original types in such a way that the anthropologist can tell, at a glance, the different types of humanity, according to their physiological and psychical characteristics. ”

“ Ethnology thus treats of the resemblances and differences of the modifications of the human species in their relations to each other, but anthropology, as now understood, has a far wider scope. It treats of mankind as a whole. It investigates his origin and his relations to the rest of the universe. It invokes the aid of the sciences of zoölogy, comparative anatomy, and physiology ”

“ So likewise in hygiene and medicine, in ethics and religion, in language and arts, in painting, architecture, sculpture and music, the full import and often unconscious intention of human activity can only be understood, and directed in the most productive channels, by such a careful historical and physical analysis as Anthropology aims to present. ”

“ Anthropology, a science which studies man: his physical constitution in different climates, his races, his physical development, and the evolution of his institutions and social, moral, and religious conceptions. The institutions and the social, moral, and religious conceptions are, however, often considered as part of Ethnology. ”

“ They were the result of the contact of these different peoples with Nature, with the circumstances of their own time, and with those universal experiences which fall to the lot of all men, and which are, in the long run, the prime sources and instruments of human education.
The interpretations of life which each of these races has left us are revelations both of race character and of life itself; they embody the highest thought, the deepest feeling, the most searching experiences, the keenest suffering, the most strenuous activity. ”

“ Ethnology, as thus defined, is a branch of anthropology, the great science which unravels the complexities of human structure; traces out the relations of man to other animals; studies all that is especially human in the mode in which man's complex functions are performed; and searches after the conditions which have determined his presence in the world. And anthropology is a section of zoology, which again is the animal half of biology—the science of life and living things. ”

“ The science of anthropology deals with the biological and mental manifestations of human life as they appear in different races and in different societies. The phenomena with which we are dealing are therefore, from one point of view, historical. We are endeavoring to elucidate the events which have led to the formation of human types, past and present, and which have determined the course of cultural development of any given group of men. From another point of view the same phenomena are the objects of biological and psychological investigations. ”

“ I do not mean by this that mesmerism and spiritualism combined with mechanical physiology constitute anthropology: far from it. Both mesmerism and spiritualism are rich but empirical collections of facts, in which there is a large amount of material, but very little that can be called philosophy or satisfactory science.
Anthropology is established by investigating the centre of man's existence—the seat of his conscious life—the brain, in which the spiritual comes into contact with the physical, and is subject to analogous laws. ”

“ In so far, then, as anthropology deals with culture, which is, after all, the only distinctly human phenomenon in the objective sense, it conceives of it as historical phenomena and this conception is in so far the soul of its method. But anthropology is something more than the study of culture ”

“ Anthropology, therefore, in the widest sense of the word, aims at discovering the general laws which have regulated human history in the past, and which, if nature is really uniform, may be expected to regulate it in the future. ”

“ In other words, I shall examine the extent of its claim, and then go on to examine how that claim, under modern conditions of science and education, is to be made good.
Firstly, then, what is the ideal scope of anthropology? Taken at its fullest and best, what ought it to comprise?
Anthropology is the whole history of man as fired and pervaded by the idea of evolution. Man in evolution—that is the subject in its full reach. Anthropology studies man as he occurs at all known times. It studies him as he occurs in all known parts of the world. ”

“ If my theories are correct, they prove the ontological character of historical evolution and the value of the study of history for the comprehension of the human soul. I have shown in a specific and highly important domain that that which we are fond of regarding as the characteristic quality of man was not present from the beginning, but has gradually been evolved in historical time. In other words: history can and must teach us the origin and evolution of the spirit and soul of man, as anthropology teaches us the construction of the body. ”

“ Here hast thou that noble human race, that delightful creation, which has been granted sense and immortality. How it bears on it the image of the infinite God, and the likeness to Him, that wilt thou recognise by the variety of His creations. As in a looking-glass wilt thou see the worth of this thy human race. ”

“ Thus we have, in this particular, a race which has established a complex civil and religious polity, and made great progress in the useful and fine arts,—as its pottery, textile fabrics, wrought metals, highways and aqueducts, colossal architectural structures and court of almost imperial splendour prove,—on the same level, as regards the quantity of brain, with a race whose social and religious conditions are among the most degraded exhibited by the human race. ”

“ The purely psychological branch of the subject takes up half of the space allotted to Geist in the Encyklopädie. It falls under the three heads of anthropology, phenomenology and psychology proper. Anthropology treats of the mind in union with the body—of the natural soul—and discusses the relations of the soul with the planets, the races of mankind, the differences of age, dreams, animal magnetism, insanity and phrenology. ”

“ The term anthropology now stands for the specific science of man. Ethnology, archæology, and somatology are merely divisions, or convenient groups of problems within the scope of this science. The ideal of anthropology is to coordinate all the data concerning man's culture, language and anatomy, past and present, with a view to solving the problems of his origin and the interpretation of his culture. ”

“ With increasing knowledge of the data of anthropology, the forms of society, of religion, of art, and the development of invention, do not seem quite so simple as they appeared to earlier investigators. Attempts were made to fit the hypothetical typical evolution of mankind to the historical development of culture in different parts of the world, so far as it had been reconstructed. ”

“ It is probable that it will lead also to the establishment of a number of good types which have remained permanent through long periods. It will be seen that that part of human history which manifests itself in the phenomena that are the subject of physical anthropology is by no means identical with that part of history which manifests itself in the phenomena of ethnology and of language. ”

“ It is precisely the same in the science of humanity, which we may call anthropology. In order to prepare the way for 'applied anthropology' whereby we may dominate the immaterial world, the minds and tempers of men, we must begin with 'pure anthropology'; that is to say, we must idealize and speak of man not as he is but as he would be if certain tendencies which we see in him conducive to social order and individual development, could be infinitely—yes, and we must add, if we limit our horizon to this present life, impossibly—extended. ”

“ To understand these modifications, we require a knowledge of individual anatomy, physiology, and psychology, because the establishment of a characteristic social group can be brought about only by a parallel development which occurs in all the individuals exposed to similar influences.
Thus it appears that the genesis of the types of man, considered from an anatomical, physiological, and psychological point of view, is the chief object of anthropological research. ”

“ We have further proof in the stem-history of the soul, which we gather from the comparative psychology of the lower and higher mammals, and of savage and civilised races. Modern ethnography shows us in actual existence the various stages through which the mind rose to its present height. ”

“ The racial life of the species to which we happen to belong is a brief episode even in the brief life of the planet. And what we call civilization or culture, though much older than we used to suppose, is a brief episode in the life of our race. ”

“ The work treats of the unity, origin, antiquity, and original localization of the human species, peopling of the globe, acclimatization, primitive man, formation of the human races, fossil human races, present human races, and the physical and psychological characters of mankind. ”

“ Half a century has now passed since the theory of organic evolution captured the philosophic mind of the day, and at once placed the science of anthropology into the position of being one of the most fascinating of intellectual pursuits. Our object in the present chapter is to give some idea of the progress that has been made during this long interval, in investigating the history of humanity and civilization from the new standpoint. ”

“ The Arts of Life in Anthropology.—The one great feature which it is desirable to emphasize in anthropological museums, said Lieutenant-General Pitt-Rivers, in the British Association, is evolution. To impress upon the mind the continuity and historical sequence of the arts of life is one of the most important lessons to be inculcated. ”

“ That branch of anthropology which treats of the actual distribution of the human race in its different divisions, as distinguished by physical character, language, institutions, and customs, in contradistinction to ethnography, which treats historically of the origin and filiation of races and nations. ”

“ Applied anthropology has for its aims to bring to bear on the improvement of the species, regarded on the one hand as groups, and on the other as individuals, the results obtained by ethnography, ethnology, and psychology. ”

“ In the end, if we go patiently onward, we shall find that 'pure anthropology' will be of immense practical importance in helping us to control and develop ourselves and individuals around us and all communities of men. ”

“ III ANTHROPOLOGY AND RELIGION Among the various forms of science which are reaching and affecting the new popular tradition, we have reckoned Anthropology. Pleasantly enough, Anthropology has herself but recently emerged from that limbo of the unrecognised in which Psychical Research is pining. The British Association used to reject anthropological papers as 'vain dreams based on travellers' tales.' No doubt the British Association would reject a paper on clairvoyance as a vain dream based on old wives' fables, or on hysterical imposture. ”

“ Thus the existing races of mankind may be taken to represent the budding twigs and foliage, each in accordance with the relative superiority of its civilization, appertaining to branches higher and higher placed, upon the great stem of life. ”