JOHN WESLEY POWELL. 49 



few myths of the Utes were recited in the first annual report of the 

 Bureau of Ethnology ; and the material has been frequently drawn 

 on for purposes of illustration ; but as a body the observations are 

 recorded only in note-books. And yet the time devoted to them 

 was neither lost nor misspent, for it gave him the foundation of 

 personal observation necessary to sound generalisation. It ren- 

 dered him a rare critic of ethnologic material, able by what 

 seemed an intuition to select the grain for use and reject the chaff. 

 More than this, it gave him the breadth of view for which he was 

 distinguished. The American differ so widely in many respects 

 so radically from the Aryan races that their comparative study 

 yielded him generalisations he could never have derived from a 

 comparison of Aryan peoples with one another. With the 'aid of 

 books he brought yet other ethnic stocks within his view, testing 

 and extending his generalisations and developing a system of an- 

 thropologic philosophy. 



The framework of this system of philosophy was mentally ar- 

 ranged before any of it was given to the world, but the different 

 parts have been elaborated and published in a somewhat fragmen- 

 tary way and without strict adherence to their logical order. A few 

 have appeared in the annual reports of the Bureau of Ethnology; 

 the greater number have been prepared and read as addresses 

 to various scientific societies and printed with their proceedings. 

 They are thus widely scattered, and their plan and order, though 

 ever in the mind of their author, and frequently communicated in 

 conversation, have never appeared in print. The central essay is 

 entitled Human Evolution, and was read to the Anthropological 

 Society of Washington in 1883. It begins by characterising the 

 geologic, archaeologic, historic, and ethnolpgic data through which 

 the history of man's evolution is discovered. It then treats of the 

 general character of that evolution. Human activities are then 

 divided into five categories, and a brief sketch is given of the line 

 of evolution within each category. The categories are : first, esthetic 

 arts ; second, industrial arts ; third, institutions ; fourth, languages ; 

 fifth, philosophy. Of the remaining essays of the series, two logic- 

 ally precede this, in that they treat of the relation of human evolu- 

 tion to other evolution and the relation of the science of man to 

 other sciences ; eight logically follow it and develop the philosophy 

 in detail. 



An address to the Philosophical Society of Washington, like- 

 wise in 1883, is entitled Three Methods of Evolution, and in this 

 Powell characterises the processes of inorganic, biotic, and an 



