466 NATURAL HISTORY OF MAN. 



guidance ; but where complete knowledge has not yet been 

 reached, and where even the boundary of what may hereafter 

 be effected by human effort is still obscure. 



We are justified in presenting this subject to our readers, 

 even in a very abridged form, from the conviction that the 

 great questions it involves are still only partially appreciated 

 by those familiar with other branches of science. The his- 

 tory of Man, as a denizen of the earth, has indeed been 

 conceived and pursued in many different ways, according to 

 the objects, genius, or opportunity of those engaged in this 

 interesting study. But these portraitures which have seve- 

 rally represented him as 



The glory, jest, and riddle of the world, 



are partial and subordinate, and in nowise fulfill the purport 

 of the larger title before us. The philosopher living in the 

 comparative seclusion of one community, may indeed (as Blu- 

 menbach and Prichard have done) construct a science from the 

 labours of those cosmopolite travellers who have studied 

 mankind on a bold and broad scale, under every diversity of 

 region and race. But, generally speaking, the tendency of 

 common life and habitual pursuits in the more civilised com- 

 munities is to narrow, by division and refinement, all great 

 views of the human race. The social pictures of Man found 

 in poetry, history, essay, and romance, will explain our mean- 

 ing. They are for the most part individualities of character 

 or custom, which tend rather to curtail than enlarge the 

 enquiry, and have little relation to the Natural History of 

 Man as a part of creation at large. Even moral and religious 

 feelings are concerned in giving their tone and temper to 

 such investigations, differently defining the objects and pur- 

 suing them by separate routes. And further, these objects 

 are in themselves so numerous, and their aspects of such 

 endless variety, that we can scarcely wonder at the vague 



