SOUTHERN CULTIVATOR. 
67 
I existence, in a way that tells powerfully on the blood of 
) the family, as well as on that of the individual. Civiliza- 
. tion has control of the future destiny, not only of the 
; Caucasian race, but by its enterprize, knowledge, capital, 
ubiquitous commerce and free trade, of all the other races 
of the human species. 
1 I come now to the consideration of the other material 
elements of superiority in hereditary blood. It is the 
fixedness, or depth, strength and durability of an advan- 
tage gained, no matter how, by one person or family over 
another person or another family. 
Almost every man knows from experience it is one 
thing to acquire property, and quite a different matter to 
; be able to keep and enjoy, as a permanent estate, property 
already acquired. Wealth in hereditary blood is, il pos- 
I sible, a little more uncertain in its abiding place— a little 
i; less exchangeable in trade — but it is infinitely more produc- 
l: tive of good fruits, and useful to mankind, than any 
1 physical achievements of human labor possibly can be. 
Washington derived from the blood, the milk, and the soul 
: ofhis mother, virtues and powers whose fruits are likely 
, to bless unborn millions in ages to come. It is from the 
germ cells of maternal blood that nearly all great men de- 
rive the primary elements of their greatness ; although 
the character of the vitality that passes in sperm cells 
from the blood of the father to his offspring, is by no 
means a matter of little importance. To render greatness 
(in the best sense of the word,) a fixed element in paren- 
tal blood, as it may chance to exist in either parent, so- 
ciety must study and master that part of human physiolo- 
gy which treats*" of the vitality in a family^ a race, and a 
species. For instance, when Capt. Cook discovered the 
Sundwich Islands, they contained between four and five 
hundred thousand native inhabitants. Since that time, 
from some influences, quite obvious to every student of 
ethnology, their numbers have steadily decreased to about 
sixty thousand — showing beyond doubt or dispute, that 
human blood may degenerate — that the vitality in a race 
or nation, may die as well as the vitality in an individual. 
To understand how to improve human blood, the first 
lesson to be learnt is to avoid those adverse agents and 
influences which deteriorate this vital fluid ; and through 
the poison and weakness thus disseminated and planted 
in every organ and function, render the body a feeble, a 
diseased, and a corrupt, half-living, half-dying piece of 
humanity. The natives of the Sandwich Islands have 
not avoided the poisons and degenerating influences to 
which allusion is made ; and all can see the consequences. 
The laws of nature as they affect the human constitution 
are the same at Honolulu as they are in New York, Paris, 
London a^d Vienna. Modern and ancient civilization 
differ only in their outward developments — not in the 
least in their physical character. The same vices that 
made the best man of his age, Noah, a drunkard, and 
shortened the lives of all antediluvians after Methusalah, 
were equally powerful in working the downfall of the 
great city of Babylon, whose walls were 300 feet high, 
75 feet thick, and 60 miles in length ; and for ages were 
adored with hanging gardens that were esteemed one of 
the seven wonders of the world. The dilapidated walls 
of Ninevah are 40 miles in circumference; and those of 
Thebes are only little less in extent. Every distinguished 
’ nation which has conquered the rest of mankind, so far 
as they were known, has in turn been conquered by its 
own internal vices; and some have been utterly extermi- 
nated. 
People who cannot govern their own passions and 
sensual appetites, are only a shade better than wild beasts, 
and must have masters, or be exterminated — by a law en- 
acted, not by man, but by his Maker. The Indians of 
North and South America have been unable to abstain 
from the vices of European civilization. They have had 
no master of superior intellect to govern and protect therm 
from their own natural weakenesses and propensitiea ; 
and the resuK is their gradual extinction on the face of 
the earth. With all its learning, science and advanced 
evilization, the French nation has found itself ir>eapable 
of maintaining a system of self-government, end has 
chosen a master to keep the people from committing sui- 
cide. This, however, is merely a tern poi ary expedient. 
It does not improve the blood of the next generation, nor 
satisfy the self-respect and hopes of the present. Some- 
thing more, and somthing better is needed than an emperor 
to purify the congenital blood of the French nation. 
Spain, Italy, the Ottoman empire, and the Mongolian 
race generally, are in a worse condition than the people 
of France. Their civilization is older in some countries, 
and more debased in others ; but in all evincing an unmis- 
takable want of healthy vitality. Protestant civilization 
in Great Britain, Germany and the United States is the 
youngest of any, and, therefore, displays more activity 
and vital force than is seen either in Catholic, Mohome- 
dan, or heathen civilization. But is it, in fact, any less in- 
jurious to the hereditary blood in the veins of kings, 
queens, lords, ladies, and merchant princes I With every 
desirable opportunity to diminish the vices, follies and dis- 
eases that weaken and pollute the blood of parents, what 
have the royal and aristocratic families of Protestant Eu- 
rope done in two centuries to purify and elevate their 
hereditary vitality I Why has it been necessary to resort 
to plebian blood to add physical and intellectual power to 
the oldest houses in the kingdoms'! But one answer can 
be given; to wit: that the same gross indulgence of ani- 
mal appetites and pasions which vitiates the blood of the 
eanibals of the Pacific islands is no less prejudicial to the 
blood of the most cultivated and refined of the human 
species. One law applies to all of woman born alike; and 
since the lowest and the highest strata of human society 
are known to be losing their constitutional energies and 
virility, let us enquire whether those intermediate between 
the extremes named, are ascending or decending in the 
scale of parental vitality. Has European and American 
civilization operated to diminish the number and general 
severity of human diseases of body and mind, in the last 
one or two centuries % 
No one has made an assertion to that effect. On the 
contrary, an increase of luxuries among farmers, mechan- 
ics, merchants and others, has everywhere tended to pro- 
duce effeminancy, or feebleness of muscle, of bone, nerve, 
brain, intellect, conscience, and of the higher social af- 
fections. Just so far, and just so fast as modern civiliza- 
tion extends, congenital degeneracy follows. Seeing this, 
some have ascribed the evil to the occasional intermarriage 
of first cousins ; as though the mingling of really pure 
blood, however nearly related, could, by possibility, pro- 
duce impurity. After the closest possible intermarriages 
for seven generations from Adam, Methusalah lived to 
the good old age of 969 years ; and when the great and 
virtuous Abraham was, by divine appointment, about to 
give existence to one of the most remarkable nations the 
world has ever known, and establish the parental blood 
whose vitality was to live, and did live in the veins of the 
Saviour of mankind, he married the daughter of his own 
father in preference to all other women. To assert that 
tne blood of the mammalia cannot be healthily propagated 
in the line of first cousins, is to assume that the laws of 
nature have materially changed since the creation of the 
milk-giving species, at the head of which stands our 
own; or to assume, against all probability, and the 
Mosaic account of creation, that many paas instead 
of one pair of each species, were formed of dust, simp- 
ly because the vitality of the race could not long live in 
a sound condition unless it ever flowed in blood not at all 
related ! This abiurd idea has done an infinite amount of 
