MAN. 



detailed information. He may also con- 

 sult the " Decades Craniorum " of the 

 same author ; Camper, " Trail e des Dif- 

 ferences Keeles," &.c. 4to. ; Buffon, in 

 his large work on " Natural History ;" 

 Hunter, " Disp. Inaug. de Hominum Va- 

 rietatibus, earumque Causis ;" Zimmer- 

 man, " Geographische Geschichte der 

 Menschen, .c." and Ludwig, " Grun- 

 driss der Naturgeschichte der Menschen 

 species." 



The differences which exist between 

 inhabitants of different regions of the 

 globe, both in bodily conformation and in 

 the faculties of the mind, are so striking, 

 that they must have attracted the notice 

 even of superficial observers. There are 

 two ways of explaining these : first, by 

 referring the different races of men to 

 different original families, according to 

 which supposition they will form, in the 

 language of naturalists, different species; 

 or we may suppose them all to have de- 

 scended from one family, and account for 

 the diversity which is observable in them, 

 by the influence of physical and moral 

 causes ; in which case they will only 

 form different varieties of the same spe- 

 cies. 



Before, however, we enter upon this 

 discussion, it will be necessary to dispose 

 of a previous question, viz. what are the 

 characters which distinguish man from all 

 other animals ; those which constitute 

 him a distinct genus ? Several writers, 

 who have pleased themselves with de- 

 scribing what they call a regular grada- 

 tion or chain of beings, represent man 

 only as a superior kind of monkey ; and 

 place the unfortunate African as the con- 

 necting link between the superior races 

 of mankind and the orang-outang ; they 

 deny, in short, that he is generically dis- 

 tinguished from monkeys. Such an opi- 

 nion might reasonably be expected from 

 the slave-merchant who traffics in human 

 blood, and from a West Indian Negro 

 driver, who uses his fellow-creatures 

 worse than brutes ; but we should not 

 think of finding it defended by the natu- 

 ral historian ; and we shall not hesitate to 

 assert, that it is as false philosophically, as 

 the moral and political consequences, to 

 which it would lead, are shocking and 

 detestable. We set out with this posi- 

 tion ; that man has numerous distinctive 

 marks, by which, under every circum- 

 stance of roughness and uncivilization, 

 and every variety of country and race, 

 he is separated, at a broad and most clear- 

 ly defined interval, from every other ani- 

 mal, even of those classes which, from 

 their general resemblance to the human 



subject, have been called anthropo-mor 

 phous. We cannot, indeed, by any means 

 coincide with those moderns, who have 

 indulged their imagination in painting a 

 certain continuity or gradation of created 

 beings ; and who fancy they have disco- 

 vered great wisdom of the Creator, and 

 great perfection of the creation, in this 

 respect ; that nature makes no leaps, but 

 has connected the various objects of the 

 three kingdoms with each other, like the 

 steps of a staircase, or the links of a chain. 

 The candid and unprejudiced observer 

 must allow, that in the animal kingdom 

 there are whole classes, as birds, and par- 

 ticular genera, as the cuttle-fish, which can- 

 not find a place in such a scheme of ar- 

 rangement, without a very forced and un- 

 natural introduction : and, again, that the re 

 are certain genera, as the coccus,wherethe 

 two sexes are so different from each other, 

 that the male and female must be sepa- 

 rated, and occupy different parts of the 

 scale, in this artificial plan of gradation. 



It is frequently easier to perceive, as it 

 were intuitively, the distinctive charac- 

 ters of two neighbouring species of ani- 

 mals, than to express them by words. 

 Hence Linnaeus, whose sagacity in per- 

 ceiving the characteristic marks of the 

 various objects of natural history, and in 

 expressing them in appropriate language, 

 has never been exceeded, declares, in his 

 " Systema Naturae," that the distinctions 

 between man and the monkey still remain 

 to be discovered : " Mi rum, adeo parum 

 differre stultissimam simiam a sapientissi- 

 mo nomine, ut istegeodxtes naturae etiam- 

 num quserendus, qui hos limitet." Accord- 

 ingly, he gives neither the generic nor spe- 

 cific character of man in that work. 



The cirumstances which distinguish 

 man from other animals may be consider- 

 ed under three divisions : 1. Differences 

 in the structure of the body ; 2. in the 

 animal economy ; 3. in the faculties of the 

 mind. 



Under the first head we remark, as the 

 most distinguishing peculiarity of. man, 

 his erect stature : that majestic attitude, 

 which announces his superiority over all the 

 other inhabitants of the globe- He is the 

 only being adapted by his natural formation 

 to the upright position. Enslaved to their 

 senses, and partaking merely of physical 

 enjoyments, other animals have the head 

 directed towards the earth : " qux natu- 

 ra prona atque ventri obedientia finxit." 

 Man, whose more elevated nature is con- 

 nected to surrounding objects by moral 

 relations, who can embrace in his mind 

 the system of the universe, and follow thr 



