138 THE DA WN OF MIND. 



transition. But this third line of approach to a 

 knowledge of the earlier phases of Miiid need not 

 detain us long. 



So patient has been the search over almost the 

 whole world for relics of pre-historic Man, that vast 

 collections are now everywhere available where the 

 arts, industries, weapons, and, by inference, the men- 

 tal development, of the earlier inhabitants of this 

 planet can be practically studied. On the two main 

 points at issue in the discussion of mental evolution 

 these collections are unanimous. They reveal in the 

 first instance, traces of Mind of a very low order exist- 

 ing from an unknown antiquity ; and in the second 

 place, they show a gradual improving of this Mind as 

 we approach the present day. It may be that in some 

 cases the evidence suggests a degenerating rather 

 than an ascending civilization ; but perturbations of 

 this sort do not affect the main question, nor neu- 

 tralize the other facts. Evolution is constantly con- 

 fronted with statements as to the former glory of now 

 decadent nations, as if that were an argument against 

 the theory. Granting that nations have degenerated, 

 it still remains to account for that from which they 

 degenerated. That Egypt has fallen from a great 

 height is certain ; but the real problem is how it got 

 to that height. When a boy's kite descends in our 

 garden, we do not assume that it came from the 

 clouds. That it went up before it came down is 

 obvious from all that we know of kite-making. And 

 that nations went up before they came down is ob- 

 vious from all that we know of nation-making. The 

 gravitation, moreover, which brings down nations is 

 just as real as the gravitation which brings down 



