24 On the Unity of the Hionan Species. 



they connect themselves with the White race, which are their 

 elders in civilization. 



If this latter has become degenerate, in proportion as 

 it receded from its point of departure, future ages will be 

 furnished with the proof that certain varieties of the hu- 

 man race, after having been subjected to degradations more 

 or less marked, may yet reascend, by continued intellec- 

 tual efforts, to their first origin. It will not be without sur- 

 prise that they shall be seen to resume the beauty of their 

 primordial type, after having reconquei-ed, so to speak, the 

 intelligence, whose precious light they had allowed to be ex- 

 tinguished. This view, like the preceding, tends to establish 

 the unity of the human species, and to justify us in assigning 

 the same cradle to the most elevated as well as the most de- 

 gi-aded of the human species. 



This consideration leads us to the examination of another fact, 

 not less important, and which arises in some measure from the 

 preceding. If man constitutes only a single species, he must 

 have been placed on a single point, whence he has radiated, 

 as from a centre, and extended his tribes over the whole sur- 

 face of the earth. Here history agrees with the information 

 we obtain from the study of man, considered without reference 

 to his primitive abode. It teaches us that Adam was created 

 alone, with a consort ; that he was placed in the centre of 

 Asia, with the injunction to people the earth, and that his 

 posterity have extended from this central point, the one most 

 favourable for its dispersion over all parts of the globe where 

 the conditions were found requisite for his existence. The 

 study of languages, as well as that of history, leads to the 

 same conclusion ; by mutually supporting each other, philo- 

 logy and historical documents impart a striking character of 

 truthfulness to this inference. It is confirmed by facts in- 

 dependent the one of the other; and this agreement is the most 

 manifest proof of its justice and accuracy- 

 Such are some of the facts which prove that, on this ques- 

 tion, science goes hand in hand with i-eligion and historical 

 traditions. In fact, all traditions represent nations as deriv- 

 ing their origin from a single stock, and as emanating from 

 one individual. 



