700 THE TUSAYAN RITUAL. 



So environment is a potent influence on the culture of man, but there 

 are laws, as yet not clearly made out, back of it which control the 

 evolution of man. 



When in the struggle for existence the fittest came to be measured by 

 degrees of intelligence, and no longer by superiority of bodily structure, 

 climatic conditions were still powerful to modify and stimulate thought. 

 The increase in intelligence due to these agents did not develop a 

 new species, for, to whatever heights he rises, man still remains Homo 

 sapiens. If, then, the specific identity of all individual men on the 

 globe to-day is true, the superstitions which we have studied are errors 

 of minds like our own, but imperfectly developed and modified by 

 environment. In her mistakes, said the great naturalist Geoffrey St. 

 Hilaire, nature betrays her secrets. By a study of erroneous working 

 of the mind and their probable causes we can discover the nature of 

 mind. Below all ceremonials among all men, savage or barbarous, may 

 be traced aspirations akin to our own since they spring from our com- 

 mon nature. Until some philosopher shall arise who can so analyze 

 environment as to demonstrate that the great religious teachers of man, 

 who, suddenly appearing, have stimulated the race to great bounds in 

 progress, were solely the products of surroundings, we may believe 

 that there is another most potent influence behind environment control- 

 ling the development of culture. Throughout all history man, from his 

 own consciousness, has recognized that controlling influence to be higher 

 than environment, and no science nor philosophy has yet succeeded in 

 banishing the thought from his mind. 



