•Chap. XXL 
AND CONCLUDING EEMAKKS. 
405 
bloody sacrifices, practises infanticide without remorse, 
treats his wives like slaves, knows no decency, and is 
haunted by the grossest superstitions. 
Man may be excused for feeling some pride at having 
1‘isen, though not through his own exertions, to the 
very summit of the organic scale ; and the fact of his 
having thus risen, instead of having been aboriginally 
placed there, may give him hopes for a still higher 
destiny in the distant future. But Ave are not here 
concerned Avith hopes or fears, only with the truth as 
far as our reason allows us to discover it. I have given 
the evidence to the best of my ability ; and Ave must 
acknoAvledge, as it seems to me, that man with all his 
noble qualities, with sympathy which feels for the most 
debased, with benevolence Avhich extends not only to 
other men but to the humblest living creature, with his 
god-like intellect which has penetrated into the move- 
ments and constitution of the solar system — AAuth all 
these exalted poAvers — Man still bears in his bodily 
frame the indelible stamp of his loAvly origin. 
