TRANSACTIONS OF SECTION H. 769 



assumed by fish, amphibia, and reptiles when at rest or moving, in which verte- 

 brates the body is horizontal and more or less parallel to the surface on which 

 they move. Birds, although far removed from the erect attitude, yet show a 

 closer approximation to it than the lower vertebrates or even the quadrupedal 

 mammals. But of all vertebrates, those which most nearly approximate to man 

 in the position assumed by the body when standing and walking are the higher 

 apes. 



The various adaptations of structure in the trunk, limbs, head, and brain 

 which conduce to give man this characteristic attitude are essential parts of his 

 bodily organisation, and constitute the structural test which one employs in 

 answering the question whether a particular organism is or is not human. 



These adaptations of parts are not mere random arrangements, made at hap- 

 hazard and without a common purpose ; but are correlated and harmonised so as 

 to produce a being capable of taking a distinctive position in the universe, superior 

 to that which any other organism can possibly assume. If we could imagine a fish, 

 a reptile, or a quadruped to be provided with as highly developed a brain as man 

 possesses, the horizontal attitude of these animals would effectually impede its full 

 and proper use, so that it would be of but little advantage to them. It is essential, 

 therefore, for the discharge of the higher faculties of man, that the human brain 

 should be conjoined with the erect attitude of the body. The passage of a verte- 

 brate organism from the horizontal position, aay of a fish, in which the back, with 

 its contained spinal column, is uppermost, and the head is in front, to the vertical 

 or erect position of a man, in which the back, with its contained spinal column, is 

 behind, and the head is uppermost, may be taken as expressing the full range and 

 limit of evolution, so far as the attitude is concerned, of which such an organism is 

 capable. Any further revolution of the body, as in the backward direction, would 

 throw the back downwards, the head backwards, and would constitute a degrada- 

 tion. It would not be an advance in the adaptation of structure to the duties to be 

 discharged, but rather an approach to the relation of parts existing so generally 

 in invertebrate organisms. 



At an early period in the evolution of the human mind and intelligence an 

 anthropomorphic conception of the Deity arose, to whom were ascribed the posses- 

 sion of the bodily form and attitude of man, and even human affections and 

 passions. This idea took so firm possession of the imagination that, in the course 

 of time, it obtained objective expression in the statues of ancient Greece and Rome 

 and in the masterpieces of Christian art. In one of the most ancient of all books, 

 in which is embodied the conception entertained by the Jewish writers of the 

 Genesis of the world, and of all creatures that have life, we read that ' God created 

 man in his own image, in the image of God created he him, male and female 

 created he them.' By the association, therefore, of the human form with the idea 

 of Deity, there was naturally present in the minds of these writers, although not 

 expressed in precise anatomical language, a full recognition of the dignity of the 

 human body, of its superiority to that of all other creatures, and that the human 

 form was the crown and glory of all organic nature. 



This conception of the dignity of man in nature is not confined to those writings 

 which we are accustomed to call sacred. The immortal Greek philosopher and 

 naturalist, Aristotle, in his treatise ' On the Parts of Animals,' composed at least 

 three hundred years B.C., refers more than once to the erect attitude of man, and 

 associates it with his 'God-like nature and God-like essence.' In the second 

 century of our present era lived another Greek author, Claudius Galen, whose 

 writings exercised for many centuries a dominating influence in medicine and 

 anatomy, comparable to that wielded by Aristotle in philosophy. Although Galen, 

 as has been shown by Vesalius and other subsequent anatomists, was often incorrect 

 in his descriptions of the internal parts of the human body, doubtless because his 

 opportunities of dissection were so scanty, he had attained a correct conception of 

 the perfection of its external form, and he thoroughly understood that in its con- 

 struction it was admirably fitted for the sentient and intelligent principle which 

 animated it, and of which it was merely the organ. In his treatise on the use of 

 the various parts of the body he associates the hand with the exercise of the gift 



1897. 3 D 



