SECT. IV.] DESCENT PROM A SINGLE PAIE. 203 



tiplication of agents is something different from a great com- 

 plication of acting causes ; and that, as regards miracles, science 

 cannot concern itself about the degree of admissibility, but 

 about a suspension of the natural laws which is in conflict with 

 science ; for a miracle, as such, has no degrees. On the other 

 hand, it may be readily admitted that it is but a weak argu- 

 ment when Agassiz, from the analogy of bees and other 

 inferior social animals, endeavours to render the descent of 

 mankind from a single pair highly improbable ; for as Smith 1 

 justly observes, this analogy can neither be extended to all 

 animals, nor is it at all applicable to highly organized beings. 



They are completely in error who, adopting the views of 

 Agassiz, assume as many original types of mankind as there 

 are typically different peoples on the globe. It is permissible 

 to assume, that men have appeared in masses in various centres 

 of creation, and that the peoples of the globe have descended 

 from several stocks, whose descendants have intermixed. It 

 might even be difficult, from the known facts, to deny the pro- 

 bability of such a supposition or to refute it : the more is it 

 necessary to be cautious in extending the theory to the solution 

 of the difficult question with regard to the origin of man. By 

 adopting it we escape, no doubt, many difficulties ; but none is 

 solved, especially the question, whether the pairs which ori- 

 ginated in a centre of creation, simultaneously or successively, 

 were of the same species or not. An indefinite multiplication 

 of human species is inadmissible on account of the resemblances 

 found among many and very remote peoples, to explain which 

 we must either have recourse to paradoxical accidents or to 

 common descent. Common structure of language, and a great 

 number of common radicals, render the unity of the Indo-Ger- 

 manic peoples unquestionable. It may further be considered as 

 proved that, with the transition of a people from a state of 

 nature into the civilized state, the typical uniformity of the 

 corporeal form is gradually diminished, and gives place to 

 greater variety ; there is, therefore, every reason to assume a 

 less number of original types than at present exist. 



Finally, it has been clearly ascertained that numerous mi- 

 ' Loc. cit., p. 356. 



