RACE AND CIVILIZATION. 501 



provided it be not mixed in blood so as to disturb the equilibrium of 

 constitution ? This is to be answered by the Jews and the Parsis. As 

 with the Copts, an oppressed religious minority has no chance of mix- 

 ture, as all mixed marriages are abhorrent to its exclusiveness and are 

 at once swept into the hostile majority. The study is, however, far 

 more difficult, owing to the absence of such good conditions of the preser- 

 vation of material. But nothing could throw so much light on this as 

 an excavation of some Jewish cemeteries of a thousand years or so ago 

 in various European countries, and comparison of the skeletons with the 

 proportions of the Jews now living. The countries least affected by 

 the various proscriptions and emigrations of the race would be the proper 

 ground for inquiry. When these studies have been made we shall being 

 to understand what the constants of a race really are. 



We will now look at another word which is incessantly used — " civili- 

 zation." Many definitions of this have been made, from that of the 

 Turk drinking champagne, who remarked about it that " after all, civili- 

 zation is very nice," up to the most elaborate combinations of art and 

 science. It is no doubt very comfortable to have a word which only 

 implies a tendency, and to which everyone can assign his own value; 

 but the day of reckoning comes, when it is brought into arguments as 

 a term. Civilization really means simply the art of living in a commu- 

 nity, or the checks and counterchecks, the division of labor, and the 

 conveniences that arise from common action when a group of men live 

 in close relation to each other. This will perhaps be objected to as 

 including all, or nearly all, mankind in its scope. Quite true; all civili- 

 zation is relative and not absolute. 



We shall avoid much confusion if we distinguish high and low types 

 of civilization, and also perfect and imperfect civilization. Like organ- 

 isms, we may have a low type of civilization very perfect in its struc- 

 ture, capable of endless continuance, and of great shocks without much 

 injury. Such are some of the civilizations of the African races who 

 have great orderliness and cleanliness of arrangements, and are capable 

 of active recuperation after warfare, without any internal elements of 

 instability. Again, some low types are very imperfect, and can only 

 exist by the destruction of others, while any severe shock destroys their 

 polity; the governments which only exist by raids and plunder, such 

 as that of the Zulus, illustrate this. Turning to high types of civiliza- 

 tion, we may see them perfect or imperfect. Countries of financial sta- 

 bility, not undergoing any rapid organic changes, are the more perfect 

 in type; while those deeply in debt and in continual revolution have 

 but imperfect civilization, of however high a type it may be. With 

 these types of all variety, from the highest complexity to the lowest 

 simplicity, and of all degrees of perfection, or stability and completion, 

 in any given level of complexity — with these distinctions some of the 

 vagueness of verbal usage may perhaps be avoided. 



