THE MORE IMPORTANT RACIAL ELEMENTS 



THAT FORM A PART OF THE PRESENT 



SWEDISH NATION 



AN ORIENTATING SYNOPSIS 



BY 



H. LUNDBORG 



IT IS VERY USUAL TO FIND THAT IN THE COMMON CONCEP. 

 tion, no clear distinction is made between a race, in the antropological sense 

 and a nation. The two ideas are used alternately and in many cases they 

 are regarded as equivalent. This is however wrong. It must be borne in mind 

 that here one has to do with dissimilar terms. By a race is understood a more 

 or less numerous group of human beings all possessing many similar bodily (and 

 mental) qualities, which display a pronounced hereditary tendency. Thus one speaks 

 of certain distinctive racial features, a certain racial characteristic, etc. It includes 

 all^ the qualities that continue to exist through all the ages, as long as the race 

 in question keeps itself pure and unmixed. By a nation again one means a larger 

 group of human beings who constitute a unit for themselves, distinguished by 

 a similar culture. The latter is determined in its turn by the traditions of its 

 environment and the circumstances of the community, i. e. a common language, 

 the same religion, common laws, etc. The characteristics of a nation therefore 

 are not the same thing as the characteristics of a race. The former is gradually 

 changed, the change depending on the one side on the different racial elements 

 of which a nation is composed — they might alter considerably by reason of immi* 

 gration and emigration, a different birth«rate and death-rate, etc. — on the other side 

 by the varying influences of culture on the mass of the people at different times. 



Persons belonging to the jame race have many similar hereditary features. 

 The sum of these gives the characteristics of the race in question. If the race 

 remains pure they appear again and again, generation after generation during 

 hundreds of years and even longer. New hereditary combinations arise through 

 the crossing of different races. 



Science has with great zeal endeavoured to investigate all possible kinds of 

 organisms, but strange as it may sound humanity itself has been treated in rather 

 a grudging fashion. There are to be found animals and plants, of which from 

 a biological point of view, we have far greater knowledge than we have about 

 ourselves. It ought to be obvious to everyone that such a condition of things 

 cannot be right. Mankind of all living things ought to occupy the first place i^ 

 as an object of research. We want to know what mankind is like, as a race and 

 as a nation — what qualities are inherited and how this inheritance is brought 

 about, in what degree it is susceptible to external influences, etc. These questions 

 connected with the life of the family, the nation, the race, which the modern 



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