HEREDITARY DESCENT IN ANCIENT GREECE. 17 



rection have here been made in his propositions, that 

 he is not represented by this lecture. 



Compare this average with that of any nation 

 of Europe since the classic age of Athens. Where 

 is the man in modern Europe that we shall put 

 beside Socrates? Where are the men in England 

 who are fit to stand side by side with Aristotle and 

 Plato? Where is the name in art that can match 

 that of Phidias ? I am not underrating modern 

 times, but I beg you to consider the stretch of 

 duration since Greece fell. We have had twenty 

 centuries, and Greece had less time than has elapsed 

 since our fathers' feet pressed Plymouth Rock. The 

 narrow territory of Attica produced fourteen illustri- 

 ous men in less time than has now gone by since 

 the battle of Bunker Hill. Greece gave birth in 

 two centuries to the marvels of human attainment 

 and endowment represented by these twenty-eight 

 names. 



12. In two thousand years all Europe has not 

 brought forth an equal number of men as illustrious 

 as twenty-eight Greeks were who appeared within 

 two hundred years. In twenty centuries the whole 

 world has hardly produced as many important addi- 

 tions to the roll of honor among leaders of thought 

 and action as Greece made in six generations. 



13. Estimated according to the rules of science, 

 the average ability of the Greek race was greatly 

 higher than that of the modern English and Ameri- 

 can. Galton and other British writers assert that it 

 was as much higher than that of the loftiest race on 



