288 CAUSES OF DEGENERATIVE EVOLUTION 



taxes, finally found it was quite impossible to meet 

 their engagements, and made every effort to leave 

 the curia. 1 



2. The degeneration of Societies in all their parts. 

 A number of instances might be mentioned of 

 general social degeneration bringing about the 

 atrophy of some one or other institution in 

 particular. 



Besides giving classical examples, such as the 

 Eomans, Peruvians and Astecs, V. Lilienfeld men- 

 tions the decline of the Negro kingdoms which 

 existed during the sixteenth and seventeenth 

 centuries in Southern and Western Africa, and 

 which are merely represented nowadays by 

 wretched little tribes. 2 



There are, according to Waitz, at some distance 

 from Carimango (the equatorial Eepublic) some 

 people of pure Spanish blood who have fallen back 

 into absolute barbarism. Their language is de- 

 formed pa"st recognition, and their manners and 

 customs exhibit no traces of their former condi- 

 tion. 3 



Space precludes us from dwelling further upon 

 the various causes often complex and obscure 

 which bring about the downfall of societies, 

 suffice it to say that they are connected with 



1 Lavisse and Rambeaud, Histoire gtndrale, I., ch. i., pp. 14 and 

 following. 



2 Von Lilienfeld, Gedarike uber de Sozialwissenschaft der 

 Zulcunft, ii., p. 241. 



3 Waitz, Anthropologie der Naturvolker, 1. B., p. 369. 



