August 28, 1879] 



NATURE 



413 



most intelligent despiser of Plato who could be found, the 

 master of a grammar school on the modern side, and (perhaps 

 the most efficient of all) a lawyer, who knew nothing about 

 Greek but hated cant. This commission would take evidence 

 that the Platonic writings were not all immoral, that they had 

 been quoted with approval by Fathers of the Church, that they 

 were of great importance to literature and philosophy, and even 

 to the elucidation of the Sacred Writings. It would also be 

 proved that the Platonic Dialogues were far less immoral than 

 multitudes of other widely circulated books, or than a French novel 

 which one of the royal commissioners happened to be reading, 

 and, lastly, that the morals of Greek scholars, and of clergymen 

 who had read Plato at college, were not obviously degraded 

 below those of other people. On the other hand, witnesess 

 would depose that a knowledge of Plato was of no consequence 

 to a student'of philosophy ; that if it were, the text was in so 

 corrupt a condition that no two scholars agreed as to 

 a single chapter, and that, after all, philosophy was of 

 no practical use, least of all to clergymen. Others would 

 affirm that though they had never read a line of him, they knew 

 that his style was as vicious as his sentiments ; and perhaps some 

 cross-grained scholar might be found who, having once edited 

 a play of Euripides, would declare that all studies in Greek litera- 

 ture ought to be restricted to the tragedians, and that for his part 

 he had never opened any other authors and had never felt the 

 want of them. 



At last the commission would report that there was no 

 question of the value of the works of Plato, that it would be 

 mischievous and impracticable to prohibit their study, and that 

 there was no evidence that schoolmasters habitually chose the 

 least edifying p3>S3ges as lessons for boys. Then what is called 

 a compromise would be made. It would be enacted that Plato 

 might be read, but only in colleges annually licensed for that 

 purpose ; that every one wishing to read must have a general 

 certificate signed by certain professors, and setting forth his 

 ■object, also to be renewed every year ; and that special certifi- 

 cates might be severally obtained for reading certain excepted 

 dialogues, for copying from them, for publishing them, or, in 

 rare cases, for translating them. 



However reasonably such a system might be administered, 

 who can doubt the result would be a diminution of the number 

 of scholars, and a check to the progress of learning? 



Now this is what legislation has done for physiological 

 experiments. The Act [39 and 40 Victoria] was hastily drawn 

 and hurriedly discussed ; for noble lords and honourable gentle- 

 men who had been taught from childhood to vivisect for 

 unscientific purposes were eager to hurry off to their own merry 

 vivisections, for which they were ready provided with licence 

 and certificates. And it works as might be expected. Some 

 shrink from seeing their names figure in disreputable newspapers, 

 and receiving more or less savagely abusive anonymous letters. 

 Others have no laboratories, and find difficulty in licensing 

 their houses. Others are refused the certificates they require. 



In one case two thoroughly qualified men were anxious to 

 carry out an important investigation on the treatment of snake- 

 bites. They procured venomous snakes from a distance, and 

 applied for the special certificates necessary. Considerable 

 delay ensued ; various olijections were raised, and set at rest ; 

 and at last all the certificates were obtained ; but meantime the 

 snakes had died. 



I must apologise for having detained you so long. The whole 

 history of this controversy is melancholy but instructive. 



To those of my audience who wish well to science, I hope 

 that I may have made more clear the grounds on which vivi- 

 section is necessary and right, and thus fulfilled one of the chief 

 objects of the Association — "to obtain the removal of any 

 disadvantage of a public kind which impedes the progress of 

 science." 



To those working physiologists who have honoured me by 

 their presence I would express the assurance that they have the 

 confidence and the gratitude of the medical profession, witnesses 

 at once competent and impartial, who know the difficulties and 

 the value of such labours ; and as to present discouragements, 

 looking back to the obstacles which so long retarded the progress 

 of our kindred science, anatomy, I may say 



O pasli graviora, dabit Deus his quoque fincm. 



When, in the earliest years of the Royal Society, Sir 

 Christopher Wren and Dr. Lower made those experiments on 



transfusion of blood 'which have at last proved so beneficent, 

 there were not ^^■auting shallow witlings who scolfed at their 

 researches. It was of them that Cowley wrote with a just 

 indignation — 



Whoever would deposed Truth advance 



into the throne usurped from it. 

 Must feel at first the blows of ignorance 



And the sharp poinu of envious wit. 



You have at least escaped the latter penalty. 



Dishonour f.ill on those 

 Who would to laughter or to scorn expose 



So virtuous and so noble a design. 

 So human for iu use, for knowledge so divine ! 



You wish your calumniators no greater dishonour than failure 

 to do mischief. You wish for yourselves no other reward than 

 " the wages of going on." 



Department of Anthropology 

 Address by Edward B. Tylor, D.C.L., F.R.S. 



In surveying modern scientific opinion, the student is often 

 reminded of a doctrine proclaimed in the ancient hymns of the 

 Zend-Avesta, that of Zrvdna akarana,' or "endless time." Our 

 modern schemes of astronomy, geology, biology, are all framed 

 on the assumption of past time immense in length. In fact, one 

 reason why the latter sciences grew so slowly till almost our own 

 day, was their being shackled by the bonds of a short chronology, 

 allowing no room for the long successive periods through which 

 it is now clear that the earth with its plants and animals passed 

 into their present state. Even the Science of Man, though con- 

 cerned with the later forms of being, belonging to times which 

 geologists treat as almost modern, has nevertheless to deal with 

 periods of time extending far back beyond the range of history 

 and chronology. 



Looking back 4,000 to 5,000 years, what is the appearance of 

 mankind as disclosed to us by the Egyptian monuments and 

 inscriptions? Several of the best-marked races of man were 

 already in existence, including the brown Egyptian himself, the 

 dark-white Semitic man of Assyria or Palestine, the Central 

 African of two varieties, which travellers still find as distinct as 

 ever, namely, the black or Negro proper, and the copper-coloured 

 negroid, like the Bongo or Nyam-nyam of our own time. 

 Indeed, the evidence accessible as to ancient races of man goes 

 to prove that the causes which brought about their differences in 

 types of skull, hair, skin, and constitution, did their chief work 

 in times before history began. Since then the races which had 

 become adapted to their geographical regions may have, on the 

 whole, undergone little change while remaining there, but some 

 alterations are traced as due to migration into new climates. 

 Even* these are difficult to follow, masked as they are by the 

 more striking changes produced by intermarriage of races. Now 

 the view that the races of man are to be accounted for as varied 

 descendants of one original stock is zoologically probable from 

 the close resemblance of all men in body and mind, and the freedom 

 with which races intercross. If it was so, then the fact of the 

 different races already existing eaily in iiic liiMuii.,*! ^-^^i-a 

 compels the naturalist to look to a prehistoric period for their 

 development to have taken place in. And considering how 

 strongly differenced are the Negro and the Syrian, and how 

 slowly such changes of complexion and feature take place 

 within historical experience, this prehistoric period was probably 

 of vast length. The evidence from the languages of the world 

 points in the same direction. In times of ancient history we 

 already meet with families of languages, such as the Aryaii and 

 the Semitic, and as later history goes on many other families of 

 language come into view, such as the Bantu or Kafir of Africa, 

 the Dravidian of South India, the Malayo-Polynesian, the 

 Algonquin of North America, and other families. But what we 

 do not find is the parent language of any of these famihes, the 

 original language which all the other members are dialects of, so 

 that this p'arent tongue should stand towards the rest in the 

 relation which Latin holds to its descendants, Italian and French. 

 It is, however, possible to work back by the method of philo- 

 logical comparison, so as to sketch the outlines of that early 

 Aryan tongue which must have existed to produce Sanskrit and 

 Persian, Greek and Latin, German, Russian, and Welsh, or the 

 outlines of that early Semitic tongue which must have existed to 

 produce Assyrian, Phicnician, Hebrew, and Arabic Ihouett 

 such theoretical reconstructions of parent language from their 

 descendants may only show a vague and shadowy likeness to Uie 



