WRITING* AS A RECORD. 



oxus, which has no cerebral hemispheres, represents the condition of man 

 when the action of his brain is suspended in sleep ; the fish, the reptile, 

 the bird, follow in an ascending order an order which man himself passes 

 through in his individual progress of development. 



And man in the aggregate in society in the race does the same, his 



historical career being a transcript of his individual career. Generation 



after generation leads a purely automatic life, the life of barbarism ; but, 



by degrees, there is evolved in such conditions the means of registry or 



record. The acts and thoughts of one age can then be trans- 



Writing is the ' . . c 



means of record mitted to another, and can influence its acts and thoughts. 

 Civilization can not exist without writing, or the means of 

 record in some shape. 



Writing once invented, the advance in society is again precisely as it 

 is in the individual. In part it is regulated by the physical circum- 

 stances around, in part by the interior the acquired principle. 



In the superficial sketch which I intend now to give of the progress 

 of European civilization, there are certain facts which, from their promi- 

 nence, can not fail to arrest our attention. They are, 



1. Europe remained in the barbarous state until it obtained the means 

 General facts ^ P er P etua ^ n S i^ eas ? tnat i g * Sa 7> until it learned the art of 



of European writing. 



2. The progress of civilization in Europe was attended by 

 an absolute physiological change in its inhabitants. They were brought 

 nearer to the condition of the inhabitants of a more temperate climate. 

 On this point, however, we have dwelt to a sufficient extent in the pre- 

 ceding chapter. 



3. The European mind is analytic, that of Asia is synthetic. In Eu- 

 rope, the action in philosophy, in religion, in politics, tends to the inces- 

 sant decomposition of a thing into its parts, and their separate discus- 

 sion. The results of this tendency are seen in many of the practical social 

 difficulties of modern times. 



Before entering on this, the conclusion of his work, the author may 

 recall by a few passing remarks the general views which have been in- 

 cidentally scattered through preceding pages respecting the nature of 

 man, the influence of surrounding circumstances over him, his social posi- 

 tion, the definiteness of his career, a definiteness which authorizes us to 

 treat his history, not as though it were composed of chance events, but 

 as a fitting subject for the contemplation of physiology. 



Man is every where constructed upon the same essential type, and 

 hence, in one sense, he acts in an invariable manner, but that type passes 

 forward in development to many different aspects, and hence, in another 

 sense, he exhibits differences in his determinations and movements. 



With the form and size of the brain, the intellectual capacity of man 



