230 PHYSICAL INVESTIGATION. [PART I. 



changes which a human family may in course of time undergo, 

 equalled the differences between the Negro and the European, 

 it would still remain uncertain whether, in fact, the one de- 

 scended from the other. The question as regards unity of 

 species might then be considered as answered ; but not unity 

 of descent. We possess scarcely any facts which may serve 

 as a basis for the solution of the latter question ; and in what- 

 ever way it may be decided, the solution can only claim some 

 degree of probability. 



SECTION V. 



ON THE CLASSIFICATION OF MANKIND. 



It needs no justification if, in passing from the physical to 

 the psychological investigations concerning the unity of the 

 human species, we offer some few remarks on the starting 

 points from which the classification of mankind has been at- 

 tempted. Though we do not pretend to settle the dispute 

 between naturalists and linguists, in regard to the value which 

 they attach to their respective arguments, still the following 

 remarks may, perhaps, assist in removing several prejudices 

 which, founded upon a one-sided conception, have obstructed 

 a proper estimation of some important points. 



In the various attempts which have been made towards a 

 classification of the human species, the main object which has 

 been kept in view was not merely a general grouping of the races 

 according to their resemblance, but a division of the peoples 

 according to their descent. This object was the more naturally 

 followed, inasmuch as the possibility of a common descent was, 

 in all classifications of mankind, either tacitly or expressly 

 assumed. Such a division of mankind, resting upon commu- 

 nity of descent, may be formed from three different points of 

 view, which we may term the physical, the linguistic, and 

 the historical stand-points. The results obtained by no means 

 agree. The. physical and linguistic grounds for a certain clas- 



