382 



Tmc loiRXAL OF Hkrkditv 



In some such \va\' as this there was 

 evolved from the motor area itself, in 

 the form of an outgrowth placed at first 

 immediately in front of it, a formation, 

 which attains much larger dimensions 

 and a more pronounced specialization of 

 strvicture in the i)rimatcs than in any 

 other order; it is the germ of that great 

 prefrontal area of the hviman brain which 

 is said to be "concerned with attention 

 and the general orderly coordination of 

 psychic processes,"* and as such is, in 

 far greater measure than any other part 

 of the brain, deserving of being regarded 

 as the seat of the higher mental faculties 

 and the crowning glory and distinction 

 of the human fabric. 



Thus the outstanding feature in the 

 gradual evolution of the primate brain 

 is a steady growth and differentiation of 

 precisely those cortical areas which took 

 on an enchanccd importance in the 

 earliest primates. 



So far in this address I have been 

 delving into the extremely remote, 

 rather than the nearer, ancestry of men, 

 because I V^elicvc the germs of his in- 

 tellectual i^reeminence were sown at the 

 very dawn of the Tertiary period, when 

 the first anaptomorphid began to rely 

 upon vision rather than smell as its 

 guiding sense. In all the succeeding 

 ages since that remote time the fuller 

 cultivation of the means of j^rofiting by 

 experience, which the ^tarsioid had 

 adojited, led to the steady upward jjro- 

 gression of the ]jrimates. From time to 

 time many individuals, finding them- 

 selves amidst surroundings which were 

 thoroughly congenial and called for no 

 effort, lagged behind; and in Tarsius 

 and the lemurs, the New World monkeys, 

 the Old World monkeys, and the an- 

 throjjoids, not to mention the extinct 

 forms, we find preserved a series of these 

 laggards which have; turned aside from 

 the highway which led to man's estate. 



The primates at first were a small and 

 humVjle folk, who led a quiet, unobtru- 

 sive, and safe life in the l)ranches of trees, 

 taking small ]Kirt in the fierce comjK'ti- 

 tion for size and supremac\' that was 

 being waged ujxjn the earth beneath 



them l>y their carnivorous, ungulate, 

 and other brethren. But all the time 

 they were cultivating that equable 

 de\-elopment of all their senses and 

 limbs, and that special development of 

 the more intellectually useful faculties 

 of the mind which, in the long run, were 

 to make them the progenitors of the 

 dominant mammal — the mammal which 

 was to obtain the sujjremacy o\'cr all 

 others, while still retaining much of the 

 primitive structure of limb that his 

 competitors had sacrificed. It is im- 

 portant, then, to keep in mind that the 

 retention of primitive characters is 

 often to be looked upon as a token that 

 their possessor has not been compelled 

 to turn aside from the straight i^ath and 

 adopt protective specializations, but 

 has been able to preserve some of his 

 primitiveness and the plasticity asso- 

 ciated with it, precisely because he has 

 not succumbed or fallen away in the 

 struggle for supremacy. It is the wider 

 triumph of the individual who special- 

 izes late, after benefiting by the many- 

 sided experience of early life, over him 

 who in youth becomes tied to one 

 narrow calling. 



man's primitiveness. 



In many respects man retains more 

 of the primitive characteristics, for 

 exami:)le, in his hands, than his nearest 

 simian relatives; and in the supreme 

 race of mankind many traits, such as 

 abundance of hair, i)ersist to suggest 

 pithecoid affinities, which have been 

 lost by the more specialized negro and 

 other races. Those anthropologists 

 who use the retention of primitive 

 features in the Nordic European as an 

 argument to exalt the negro to equality 

 with him are neglecting the clear teach- 

 ing of comi)arative anatomy, that the 

 jjersistence of ])rimitive traits is often a 

 sign of strength rather than of weakness. 

 This factor runs through the history of 

 the whole animal kingdom. Man is 

 the ultimate jjroduct of that line of 

 ancestry which was never com])clled to 

 turn aside and adopt i)rotective speci- 

 alization either of stnicture or mode 

 of life, which would be f;ilal lo its 



J. S. Bf>It()n "'I'lic Functions i>f ttit- Frontal Lohcs," Brain, 1"MH. 



