362 



SCIENCE. 



[Vol. II., No. 32. 



and the broad face, and the fixed compounds called 

 iialural eliaraclerislics ? 



By wliat processes of selection and adaptation has 

 this cosmopolitan species come to occupy the whole 

 earth, its genial climes, its frozen areas, and its fever- 

 cursed tropics ? 



Is it possible to control these phenomena, or to 

 adjust the human machine so as to anticipate and 

 assist nature, to expedite natural selection and the 

 survival of the fittest? or even to subdue nature, and 

 decide for her what shall be the fittest to survive? 



From this hasty survey of the scope of anthro- 

 pology, we return to inquite what benefit the world 

 derives from the cultivation of this science. 



I answer, firstly, that every study is improved by 

 study. All things become clearer to him who steadily 

 fixes his gaze upon them. The sciences all began 

 with vain speculations, — astronomy with astrology, 

 chemistry with alchemy, geology with cosmogonies, 

 biology with nature-worship, aud theology with myth- 

 ology. Long before the word 'anthropology' was 

 employed in its present acceptation, Alexander Pope 

 wrote, "The proper study of mankind is man." 

 But, millenniums before his day, mankind studied 

 mankind by the light of their time. The study of 

 man is no new thing, therefore. Now, since human 

 thought has run, and will continue to run, in that 

 direction, it becomes our privilege to rejoice that the 

 stream has in these last days run wider and deeper 

 and clearer. The proper study of mankind is the 

 scientific study of man, the multiplication of rigor- 

 ously exact observations, the collection of thousands 

 of well-authenticated specimens, the classification 

 of both observations and specimens on rational bases, 

 and the limitation of our conclusions to the extension 

 of our premises. Some of my hearers have worked 

 systematically and patiently for years at Americari 

 archeology, or the anthropology of the modern In- 

 dians ; and you rejoice with me to-day that our 

 science has at last attained dignity and respect. 

 With profound veneration I mention the names of 

 Hildreth, Atwater, Stephens, Gibbs, Schoolcraft, 

 Morton, Gallatin, Wynian, Squier, and Davis: with 

 what buoyant hope they looked forward to this day, 

 and with what exquisite pleasure must such living 

 witnesses of the beginning as Horatio Hale, Col. 

 Whittlesey, Dr. Jones, and Mr. Hempstead now ccm- 

 teniplate the progress of solid work! The Smith- 

 sonian institution will have to republish Squier and 

 Davis, with many additions and corrections by Dr. 

 Kau; the Bureau of ethnology will an tiquate School- 

 craft and Gallatin and Gibbs; Morton's and Wyman's 

 work will be entirely susperseded by that of the Pea- 

 body museum and the Army medical museum. The 

 Archaeological institute of America will throw new 

 light upon the researches of Stephens; and Mr. H. H. 

 Bancroft will make it entirely unnecessary to wade 

 through thousands of pages of ancient Spanish 

 literature. Therefore the first and most beneficial 

 result of modern anthropology has been the direction 

 of an inunense amount of rambling and disorganized 

 labor into systematic and rational employment. 

 This clearing of rubbish, correction of misconcep- 



tions, cultivation of a modest spirit, willingness to 

 abide the result, multiplication of materials, refine- 

 ment of instruments, improvement of processes, in 

 a study which thousands are determined to pursue, 

 must strike every thinking person as a wonderful 

 reformation. 



Secondly, the value of a study must be estimated 

 by its effects upon human weal, farmers, miners, 

 fishermen, lumbermen, mechanics, are slow to rec- 

 ognize their debts to the man of science. But who 

 can estimate the millions of dollars saved by such 

 studies as those of Packard, Riley, and Thomas, on 

 the grasshopper, potato-beetle, and army and cotton 

 worms, and the confidence engendered by the belief 

 that a knowledge of the habits of these animals 

 would lead to their conquest? It would take but a 

 few moments to show that this argument applies 

 with manifold force to the study of man himself. 



It is not enough for the good physician to know 

 the nature of remedies, or the use of knives and 

 diagnostic apparatus. Sad will be his use of these if 

 lie has not familiarized himself with the structure 

 of the hiunan body in health and in disease, and, 

 above all, if he has not made a correct diagnosis of 

 his patient's case. Are not all the questions asked 

 in the first part of this discourse, and many others 

 agitated by anthropologists, connected with humair 

 welfare? Do they not relate to the body, mind, and 

 speech of man, to the races of mankind, their arts, 

 amusements, social needs, political organizations, 

 religion, and dispersion over the earth ? For instance, 

 the French in Africa, the British in India, and our 

 own citizens in malarious and fever-laden regions, — 

 have they not learned from loss of treasure, ruined 

 health, and the shadow of death, that there is a law 

 of nature which cannot be transgressed with im- 

 punity? 



It is the same with sociology and religion. The 

 pages of history glow with the narratives of crusades 

 against' alleged wrongs, which were in reality cam- 

 paigns against the sacred laws of nature. Social 

 systems, which had required centuries to crystallize, 

 have been shattered in the effort to bend them to 

 some new order of things. Arts and industries 

 planted in uncongenial soil, at great expense, have 

 brought ruin upon their patrons, who had notstudied 

 the intricate laws of environrujent. 



What a modification of temper, for instance, has 

 been wrought among Indo-Germanic peoples by those 

 studies in comparative philology which have led them 

 by the hand back to their priscan home, and demon- 

 strated, that though they may have aggregated into 

 antagonistic nationalities, and fostered inimical in- 

 dustries, the same blood courses through their veins! 



The better knowledge of race and race peculiarities 

 has revolutionized and humanized the theories of 

 aborigines. The doctrine of extermination, formerly 

 thought to be the only legitimate result of coloniza- 

 tion, has become as odious as it is illogical. 



The inductive study of mind has hardly begun; 

 but how much more successfully and rapidly will 

 education and the development of the species progress 

 when the teacher aud the legislator can proceed at 



