VI 



THE MENTAL EVOLUTION OF MAN 



THE problems dealing with the make-up of the human 

 mind and with the evidences of mental evolution bring 

 the student to matters of more vivid human interest. 

 Mental phenomena are so complex and intricate that it 

 is well-nigh impossible to analyze their history without 

 a knowledge of the principles derived from the broad 

 study of evolution as a general doctrine, where human 

 prejudice is not so large a factor and where his perspec- 

 tive is less affected by the proximity of the observer to 

 his facts. For these and other reasons the foregoing 

 treatment of human evolution has been confined to the 

 purely structural characteristics of man as a species and 

 of human races as so many varieties of this type. When 

 the broad comparative methods of biological science are 

 employed for the elucidation of human anatomical 

 facts, the result in this special case, like that established 

 through the study of the characteristics of living things 

 in general, is the proof that evolution gives the most 

 rational and natural explanation of the observed data. 

 This being true, the naturalist who turns from purely 

 structural matters to human intellect and its history, 

 finds well-tried methods of inquiry already available, 



197 



