RACE AND FAMILY IN AMERICAN INSTITUTIONS 177 



they became the builders of one of the richest civilizations, known to all 

 time, going on from conquest to conquest over the forces of nature, and lay- 

 ing at least a foundation for world dominion that out-matches the dreams 

 of any former era. 



Again, why did the four nations that earliest gained a foothold here have 

 such unequal shares in this development? Why was the major part of this 

 conquest borne by the British, with such intrusive colonial ingredients as 

 the Dutch, the Germans and the French Huguenots? We cannot follow 

 these nations in any detailed history, but let us glance briefly at the primary 

 urges that animated their activities on the new continent. 



The Spaniards came seeking gold. They were aroused to their greatest 

 efforts by the spectacle of the wealth of the Aztecs. But while they despoiled 

 the Indians and reduced them to a state of dependence, they taught them 

 many crafts and brought them the offices of their religion, — eternal salvation 

 as they understood it. The French too were inspired by missionary zeal, 

 though this seems to have been more than equalled by love of adventure and 

 desire for barter. They were even more impatient than the Spaniards of 

 the hard plodding work necessary to wresting a livelihood from the soil. The 

 English had also heard reports of fabulous wealth. If some of the earliest 

 comers were chiefly lured by the hope of easeful plenty, the dominating 

 motive for the majority was far different. That this brought in its train 

 colonists possessing combinations of traits fitted to cope successfully with the 

 adverse conditions of pioneer existence is made plain by ensuing chapters 

 of our colonial history. 



Human history abounds in instances similar to the one just cited where 

 stocks and races made little or nothing out of fine natural advantages. 

 When through migration these are supplanted by stocks having other types 

 of capacity, there occurs a new efflorescence of culture, to be accounted for 

 only on the ground of the superior ability of the new stocks. This superi- 

 ority may be in no sense of the word absolute. The abilities are superior in 

 the sense that they are fitted to take fuller advantage of the environmental 

 conditions. In our period of colonization and the westward trek across the 

 continent, the dynamic power behind that phenomenal movement lay in the 

 interaction of certain types of personality with new combinations of en- 

 vironal condition. These conditions constituting the natural resources of 

 the land together with new demands on the individual such as adverse cli- 

 mate, vast distances to be traversed, savage enemies, have acted to bring 

 to the fore trait-complexes best fitted to the successful exploitation of those 

 resources. The stage which offered free play for such trait-complexes, fur- 

 nished at the same time, through the social selection of those types for mar- 

 riage, conditions highly favorable to their perpetuation. 



