On the Unity of the Human Species. 23 



mense progress which civilization has made among certain 

 nations, and the development of the encephalon, which is 

 the consequence of it. We know that this organ implicates 

 the exterior forms in its movements, and that these express 

 its variations. 



According to this new consideration, the modifications of 

 the human species should be dependent on the material organ 

 of intelligence. Accordingly, among the inferior races of 

 men, the more the brain is exercised, the nearer man ap- 

 proaches the "White race; when,on the contrary, he is deprived 

 of the blessings of civilization, his nervous system is under 

 the sway of his other parts. Greatly altered in a physical 

 point of view, man becomes, in some measure, assimilated to 

 the brutes, from which he is so far removed by his type and 

 his future destiny. 



A great portion of the human species has thus descended 

 in the scale of life. It is to this departure from the primor- 

 dial type that we owe those innumerable races, the lowest of 

 which cannot be recognised by those who seek for some traits 

 of the primitive beauty of man. A new experiment is in pro- 

 gress on the American continent, which will soon enable us to 

 perceive the causes of all these alterations. The Negroes, 

 who, up to our times, had never united themselves into a na- 

 tion, nor possessed a regular form of government, have all of 

 a sudden made surprising improvements in these respects, and 

 are advancing with rapid steps, in the New "World, to the pos- 

 session of that knowledge which is now concentrated in the 

 heart of Europe. 



In proportion as intellectual labour causes the vital energy 

 to predominate in the head, men of deeply coloured com- 

 ])lexion, with crisped or w^oolly hair, or with short hair, will 

 shew an obvious tendency to approximate to the White race ; 

 they will advance along with it in the path of improvement. 



The proof of this has only begun ; but even now the effects 

 are perceptible ; and they will become more and moi'e con- 

 spicuous in future, if, in consequence of the vicissitudes which 

 are inseparable from our destiny, men of colour do not abandon 

 the new path they have opened up for themselves. This path 

 will become to them more plain and easy to be followed, if 



