900 C O M P L 
but that they have heart! it obferved by others. Neither 
is this variation in' the child from the colour of the pa¬ 
rent improbable. The children of the blacked Africans 
are born vvbite. In this date they continue for about a 
month, when they change to a pale yellow. In time they 
become brown. Their (kin dill continues to increafe in 
. riarknefs with their age, till it becomes of a dirty fallow 
black: and at length,'after a certain period of years, 
gloify and finning. Now, if climate has any influence on 
the mucous fubdance of the fkin, this variation in the 
children from the colour of their parents is an event 
which mud be reafonably expefted : for being born white, 
and not having equally powerful caufes to aft upon them 
in colder as their parents had in the hotter climates 
which they left, it mud necefiarily follow, that the fame 
efteft cannot poflibiy be produced. Hence alfo, if the 
hypothecs be admitted, may be deduced the reafon why 
even thofe children who have been brought from their 
country at an early age into colder regions, have become 
of a lighter colour than thofe wlvo have remained at 
home till they arrived at a date of manhood. For having 
undergone fome of the changes which we mentioned to 
have attended their countrymen from infancy to a certain 
age, and having been taken away before the red could be 
completed, fhefe farther changes, which would have 
taken place had they remained at home, feetn either to 
have been checked in their progrefs, or weakened in their 
degree, by a colder climate. 
We now come to the fecond and oppoflte cafe; for a 
proof of which we appeal to the words of Dr. Mitchell' 
in' the Philofophical Tranfaftions, No. 476. St-ft. 4. 
“ The Spaniards who have inhabited America under the 
torrid zone for any time, are become as dark coloured as 
our native Indians of Virginia, of which I mylelf have 
been a witnefs; and were they not to intermarry with 
the Europeans, but lead the lame rude and barbarous 
lives with the Indians, it is very probable, that, in afuc- 
ceffion of generations, they would become- as dark in 
complexion.” To this inltance we may add another, 
mentioned by a late writer of eminence, who, deferibing 
the African coaft and the European fettlements there, 
has the following paflage. “ There are feveral fmall Por¬ 
tuguefe fettlements, and one of fome note at Mitcmba, 
a river in Sierra Leona. The people here called Portu- 
guefe, are principally perfons bred from a mixture of the 
nrlt Portuguefe difeoverers with the natives, and now be¬ 
come, in their complexion and woolly hair, perfeft ne¬ 
groes, retaining, a (mattering of the Portuguefe lan¬ 
guage.” 
But though thefe fafts feem fufficient to confirm the 
liypothefis, yet they are not the only fafts which can be 
adduced in its fopport. It can be fliewn, that the mem¬ 
bers of the very fame family, when divided from each 
other, and removed into different countries, have not only 
changed their family complexion, but that they have 
changed it to as many different colours as they have gone 
into different "regions of the world. We cannot have, per¬ 
haps, a more flunking inltance of this than in the Jews. 
Thefe people are fcattered over the face of the whole 
earth. They have preferved themfelves diftinft from the 
reft of mankind by their religion ; and, as they never in¬ 
termarry with any but thofe of their own feft, fo they 
have no mixture of blood in their veins that they fiiould 
differ from each other: and yet nothing is more true, 
than that the Englifli Jew is white, the Portuguefe fwar- 
thy, the Armenian olive, and the Arabian copper; in 
ihoi t, that there appear to be as many different Jews as 
there are countries in which they reftde. To thefe fafts 
we may add the following obfervation, that if we can give 
credit to the ancient hiftorians, a change from the darkeft 
black to the pureft white muff have aftually been accom- 
piifhed. One infiance, perhaps, may be thought fufficient. 
Herodotus relates., that the Colchi were black, and that 
they had crlfped hair. Thefe people were a detachment 
of the ^Ethiopian army under Sefofiris, who followed him 
E|rON, 
in his expedition, and fettled in that part of the world 
where Colchis is ufuaily reprefented to have been fltuated. 
Had not the fame author informed us of this ciicumffance, 
we fiiould have thought it ft range that a people of this de- 
feription fiiould have been found in fuch a latitude. Now, 
as they were undoubtedly fettled there, and as they were 
neither fo totally deftroyed, nor made any fuch rapid con- 
quefts, as that hiftory fhould notice the event, there is 
great reafon to prel’ume that their defeendants continued 
in the fame, or fettled in the adjacent, country; from 
whence it will follow, that they mult have changed their 
complexion to that which is obferved in the inhabitants 
of this particular region at the prefent day; or, in other 
words, that the black inhabitants of Colchis muft have 
been changed into the fair Circadian. Suppofe, without 
the knowledge of any hiltorian, they had made fuch con- 
fiderable conquefis as to have fettled themfelves at the 
diffance of a thoufand miles in any one direftion from 
Colchis, feiil they muft have changed their colour: for, 
had they gone in an eaftern or weftern direftion, they 
muft have been of the fame colour as the Circaffians; if 
to the north, whiter; if to the fouth, of a copper. There 
are no people within that diftance of Colchis who are 
black. 
From the whole of the preceding obfervations we may 
conclude, that as all the inhabitants of the earth cannot 
be otherwil’e than the children of the fame original pa¬ 
rent, and as the difference of their appearance muff have 
or courfe proceeded from incidental caufes, thefe caufes 
are a combination of thofe qualities which we call cli¬ 
mate: that the blacknefs of the Africans is fo far engraft¬ 
ed in their coriftitution, in a courfe of many generations, 
that their children wholly inherit it if brought up in the 
fame f'pot; but that it is not fo wholly interwoven in their 
nature, that it cannot be removed if they are born and 
fettled in another. 
The lame principles are adopted by the late profeffor 
Zimmerman, of Brunfwick, in his celebrated work the 
Geographical Hiftory of Man. He proves, in the molt 
fatisfaftory manner, that the complexion of the human 
fpecies is uniformly correfpondent with the degree of heat 
of cold to which they are habitually expofed. In main¬ 
taining this pofition, he makes a very proper diftinftion 
with regard to climate. By climate we are'to underlland, 
not Amply or folely that which is diftinguiflied by the 
geographical divifions of the globe, to the exclulion of 
what he terms phyfical climate, or that which depends on 
the changes produced in any given latitude by fuch ad¬ 
ventitious circumftances as the lower or more elevated 
fituations of a country, its being encompaffed by water 
or large trafts of land, overfpread or fur-rounded with 
forefts, placed in an extenfive plain, or environed by lofty 
mountains. Peculiarities of the like kind, as has been 
already noticed, frequently prevent the phyfical climate 
from correfponding entirely with the geographical, as 
Country influenced by them is often much warmer or 
colder than other regions placed under the fame degree 
of latitude. At Senegal, and in the adjacent lands, the 
thermometer is often at 112 or 117 degrees in the (hade ; 
and here we find the inhabitants jet black, with woolly 
hair. The heat is equally great in Congo and Loango, 
and thefe countries are inhabited by negroes only; where¬ 
as in Morocco, to the north of thefe regions, and at the 
Cape of Good Hope, to the fouth, the heat is not fo in- 
teni'e, nor are the inhabitants of fo deep a hue. Lord 
Karnes afks, “ Wherefore are not the Abyffinians and the 
inhabitants of Sahara of as dark a complexion as the 
Moors on the coaft of Guinea?” M. Zimmerman an. 
fwers, that ” thefe countries are much cooler.” The de^ 
feit is not only farther from the equator, but the winds 
blowing over the Atlas mountains, which like the Alps 
are covered with fnow, and the wefterly wind coming 
from the lea, muft conliderably mitigate the heat. Nor 
is Abyffinia fo warm as either Monomotopa or Guinea, 
The north-eaft winds from the fide of Perfia and Arabia 
are 
