566 HABITS OF NATIONS. 



compared together, complete discordances ; and that, if such an illustra- 

 tion be permissible, it is like a general expression in algebra, which gives 

 rise to different results .according as we assign different values to its 

 quantities, yet in every one of those results the original expression exists. 



From this it therefore follows that there is a capability of metamor- 

 phosis or transmutation from form to form ; that the human system pos- 

 sesses no inherent resistance to change, no physiological inertia, but will 

 pass indifferently upward and downward, toward perfection or toward 

 degradation, as circumstances overrule, yet is it the same human system 

 throughout. Nor is it of any consequence that the progress of these 

 re uired cnan S es ma 7 ^e, as we term them, tardy, and that for their 

 for physiolog- completion a long time may be required. Even a mass of 



change, inorganic matter a rock transferred from the equator 

 toward the pole, or from the pole to the equator, would not change 

 its temperature to that of the new locality at once ; it would come to 

 its destined equilibrium in a gradual way, in a time depending en its 

 mass and conducting power. We should not impute its slow manner 

 of yielding to any inherent principle of resistance which it possessed. 

 The physiological metamorphosis of man is an affair of centuries. The 

 universal recognition of the principle that such changes are possible lies 

 at the bottom of all our attempts to elevate communities by ameliorating 

 their social condition and by education. 



In the remarks which follow, it will therefore be understood that I re- 

 ceive the classifications of Blumenbach and other authors as offering a 

 convenience in description, but do not attach to them any essential sig- 

 nificance. 



Though plants and animals are limited to certain localities of the earth's 

 Habits of dif- surface, some species being formed in one and some in an- 

 ferent nations. O ther region, the human family lives indifferently all over the 

 surface of the globe. It occupies countries where the thermometer falls 

 to 50 below zero, or where the temperature of the midday sun is 160. 

 In these different climates, the most marked differences in color, stature, 

 conformation, and habits are exhibited, there being every shade, from 

 a jet black to a fair white ; every stature, from the pigmy Esquimaux 

 and Laplanders to the tall Patagonian ; every variety of facial angle, from 

 that acute one which characterizes the ape to the classical aspect of the 

 Greek, which is more than 90 ; every pursuit of life, hunting, fishing, 

 the keeping of flocks, agriculture, commerce, and the arts of civilized so- 

 ciety. To these might be added the use of every variety of food, from a 

 wretched subsistence on worms and roots scratched out of the ground to 

 the luxurious habits of the epicure ; every grade of locomotion, from 

 those who never leave the hill or valley where they were born to those 

 who are perpetually wandering all over a continent, nay, even all over 



