228 DARWINISM STATED BY DARWIN HIMSELF. 



without being struck with enthusiasm at its marvelous 

 structure and properties. 



DOES MANKIND CONSIST OF SEVERAL SPECIES ? 



Descent ^he question whether mankind consists of 



of Man, one or several species has of late years been 



page ' much discussed by anthropologists, who are 

 divided into the two schools of monogenists and polygen- 

 ists. Those who do not admit the principle of evolution 

 must look at species as separate creations, or as in some 

 manner as distinct entities ; and they must decide what 

 forms of man they will consider as species by the analogy 

 of the method commonly pursued in ranking other or- 

 ganic beings as species. But it is a hopeless endeavor 

 to decide this point, until some definition of the term 

 "species" is generally accepted ; and the definition must 

 not include an indeterminate element such as an act of 

 creation. We might as well attempt without any defini- 

 tion to decide whether a certain number of houses should 

 be called a village, town, or city. We have a practical 

 illustration of the difficulty in the never-ending doubts 

 whether many closely-allied mammals, birds, insects, and 

 plants, which represent each other respectively in North 

 America and Europe, should be ranked as species or geo- 

 graphical races ; and the like holds true of the produc- 

 tions of many islands situated at some little distance from 

 the nearest continent. 



Those naturalists, on the other hand, who admit the 

 principle of evolution, and this is now admitted by the 

 majority of rising men, will feel no doubt that all the 

 races of man are descended from a single primitive stock ; 

 whether or not they may think fit to designate the races 

 as distinct species, for the sake of expressing their amount 



