INTELLECTUAL EVOLUTION 319 



admirable ! in action how like an angel ! In apprehension how 

 like a god ! the beauty of the world ! the paragon of animals ! " 



High-flown as this passage is Hamlet, as is his wont in his 

 talk, fairly flings away the scabbard it is impossible to feel that 

 there is any exaggeration in it. When we think of the noblest 

 men of the noblest races we feel it to be true. But when we 

 turn our thoughts to the lowest of savages we seem to be think- 

 ing of beings of an entirely different order. 



Yet it may be shown that the gulf between the savage, who 

 can count only up to four, and the highest product of civilisation, 

 is not nearly so wide as is often supposed, and when once this 

 truth is grasped, it is not so difficult to imagine the evolution of 

 intellect. On the question of comparative brain power most 

 divergent views are held. On the one side we have those who Brain 

 consider that there is very little difference bet-ween man and man ca P aclt 7 



J _ t and educa- 



in respect of intellect ; education, environment, they say, is every- tion 

 thing. On the other side are extremists who tell us that inborn 

 mental power is all in all, and education counts for next to 

 nothing. Both views may easily be proved to be wrong. Bring 

 to bear on a negro boy all the resources that the educationalist 

 can command, and the results will be but poor. Take a boy of 

 first-rate ability and put him in a meagre environment, give him 

 the kind of education that starves the brain ; he will not advance 

 far. But we must be careful when glorifying education, to ex- 

 plain the word in its widest sense. It must be taken to include 

 all the influences brought to bear on the person in question in 

 childhood and boyhood till maturity is reached. When educa- 

 tion is thus defined it is difficult to overrate its importance, pro- 

 vided we do not fall into the error of imagining that it can create. 

 It can only develop and make the most of the qualities that are 

 born in the man. Education puts nothing in, it can only stimu- 

 late the growth of what is there already. 



If we bear this in mind we shall not be likely to fall into Attempt to 

 the mistake of considering that education is everything, and U^n" 1 ^ 

 that natural endowment is of no importance. But it is equally power 

 fatal to assume, that the great inequality of intellectual attain- 

 ment is due entirely to inequality of innate capacity. Mr 





