246 CULTURE 



The tide of progress has flowed and ebbed. But, 

 even at that time, there was a breath in the air of 

 the spring of a new and more spontaneous 

 vitality. The evils of those days are tearfully 

 deplored by religious chroniclers. But it is 

 something that they were deplored. And we 

 must not forget that there is another side to the 

 picture that above the darkness of a confused 

 morality there uprose the splendour of Gothic 

 cathedrals. 



How far can culture modify the innate charac- 

 ter of an individual or a race ? What are the 

 limits of the artificiality which it can impose ? 

 This is a question of immense importance. Upon 

 the answer to it depends our prospect of the 

 future of each people of mankind. We have 

 already seen reason to believe that there are 

 persistent and obdurate elements in individual 

 and racial character which cannot be modified by 

 culture, and will continue to underlie the veneer 

 which habits and conventions impose upon be- 

 haviour. If the children of a family, or the boys 

 of a school, exhibit strong individualities under 

 identical influences of training, we may feel sure 

 that races will similarly retain peculiarities of 

 disposition, however closely they may be com- 

 pressed by the levelling force of civilization. 

 Habit or culture effects miracles. We owe to 

 it our rise from conditions of barbarism. A 

 European child, brought up from infancy amongst 

 savages, will behave like a savage ; and each of us 

 repeats the development of the race in his progress 

 through culture, from savagery to civilization. 

 If culture can transform an individual, within 

 the space of a few years, from a barbarian into a 

 citizen of a civilized community, may it not be 



