14 
— I do not mean an epoch of refined and perfected knowledge 
like our own, in which art and science are laying all nature 
under tribute to promote the happiness and serve the interests 
of mankind. This high state of knowledge has been only 
reached by a long course of gradual development, and is, no 
doubt, much in advance of anything that ever belonged to 
primeval man. But that is no reason why man's original con- 
dition should have been savage. On the contrary, the whole 
balance of probability (apart from Scripture testimony) lies on 
the side of its having been one of considerable culture; — of 
culture, at all events, sufficient as a starting-point for civiliza- 
tion, because capable of providing for the necessary wants of 
nature, and of transmitting to posterity a primary knowledge 
of the arts which regulate the laws of human progress. 
Yet, while man's possession of civilization was in this way 
capable of development, we hold it to have been equally liable 
to deterioration — of deterioration, moreover, which, when it 
fell beyond a certain point, left him without any power of self- 
recovery. In this respect I would compare the civilization of 
man to the physical constitution of his body. For as the 
human body, when exhausted beyond a certain limit of weak- 
ness can never rally without some external means of renova- 
tion, so when the civilization of a race falls beyond a certain 
limit of mental and moral debasement, it is left without any 
recuperative power ; and unless aided by some foreign nation 
superior to itself, will continue degraded in barbarism to the 
end of time. We see in some of the most debased races, 
trifling relics of this past civilization ; as in the iron- smelting 
in Sumatra, the manufacture of pottery in the Fiji Islands, 
and the boomerang in Australia. Yet, in spite of such 
reminiscences of better days, these barbarians are in them- 
selves hopelessly degraded. 
But I must add no more. Many fresh thoughts flash like 
rays of light upon the picture, and tempt us to go wandering 
forward. But the limits of my paper have been reached. I 
will detain you no longer. I have offered you these obser- 
vations as a small contribution towards the solution of a most 
important problem. J trust they will not be without their 
due share of weight and influence among our opponents. I 
desire no less that they may have been interesting and profit- 
able to ourselves. 
Captain Fishbourne. — As a sailor, it may be thought I ought to make 
some remarks on the Ark ; though the allusion to it in the Paper is but 
cursory, there is still sufficient to indicate that very extraordinary knowledge 
and intelligence was displayed in its production, since no large vessels were 
