I have entered into the above details on the immorality of savages,130 because some authors have recently taken a high view of their moral nature, or have attributed most of their crimes to mistaken benevolence.131 These authors appear to rest their conclusion on savages possessing, as they undoubtedly do possess, and often in a high degree, those virtues which are serviceable, or even necessary, for the existence of a tribal community.
Concluding Remarks.—Philosophers of the derivative132 school of morals formerly assumed that the foundation of morality lay in a form of Selfishness; but more recently in the “Greatest Happiness principle.” According to the view given above, the moral sense is 98fundamentally identical with the social instincts; and in the case of the lower animals it would be absurd to speak of these instincts as having been developed from selfishness, or for the happiness of the community. They have, however, certainly been developed for the general good of the community. The term, general good, may be defined as the means by which the greatest possible number of individuals can be reared in full vigour and health, with all their faculties perfect, under the conditions to which they are exposed. As the social instincts both of man and the lower animals have no doubt been developed by the same steps, it would be advisable, if found practicable, to use the same definition in both cases, and to take as the test of morality, the general good or welfare of the community, rather than the general happiness; but this definition would perhaps require some limitation on account of political ethics.
When a man risks his life to save that of a fellow-creature, it seems more appropriate to say that he acts for the general good or welfare, rather than for the general happiness of mankind. No doubt the welfare and the happiness of the individual usually coincide; and a contented, happy tribe will flourish better than one that is discontented and unhappy. We have seen that at an early period in the history of man, the expressed wishes of the community will have naturally influenced to a large extent the conduct of each member; and as all wish for happiness, the “greatest happiness principle” will have become a most important secondary guide and object; the social instincts, including sympathy, always serving as the primary impulse and guide. Thus the reproach of laying the foundation of the most noble part of our nature in the base principle of selfishness is removed; unless indeed the satis99faction which every animal feels when it follows its proper instincts, and the dissatisfaction felt when prevented, be called selfish.
The expression of the wishes and judgment of the members of the same community, at first by oral and afterwards by written language, serves, as just remarked, as a most important secondary guide of conduct, in aid of the social instincts, but sometimes in opposition to them. This latter fact is well exemplified by the Law of Honour, that is the law of the opinion of our equals, and not of all our countrymen. The breach of this law, even when the breach is known to be strictly accordant with true morality, has caused many a man more agony than a real crime. We recognise the same influence in the burning sense of shame which most of us have felt even after the interval of years, when calling to mind some accidental breach of a trifling though fixed rule of etiquette. The judgment of the community will generally be guided by some rude experience of what is best in the long run for all the members; but this judgment will not rarely err from ignorance and from weak powers of reasoning. Hence the strangest customs and superstitions, in complete opposition to the true welfare and happiness of mankind, have become all-powerful throughout the world. We see this in the horror felt by a Hindoo who breaks his caste, in the shame of a Mahometan woman who exposes her face, and in innumerable other instances. It would be difficult to distinguish between the remorse felt by a Hindoo who has eaten unclean food, from that felt after committing a theft; but the former would probably be the more severe.
How so many absurd rules of conduct, as well as so many absurd religious beliefs, have originated we do not know; nor how it is that they have become, in all100 quarters of the world, so deeply impressed on the mind of men; but it is worthy of remark that a belief constantly inculcated during the early years of life, whilst the brain is impressible, appears to acquire almost the nature of an instinct; and the very essence of an instinct is that it is followed independently of reason. Neither can we say why certain admirable virtues, such as the love of truth, are much more highly appreciated by some savage tribes than by others;133 nor, again, why similar differences prevail even amongst civilised nations. Knowing how firmly fixed many strange customs and superstitions have become, we need feel no surprise that the self-regarding virtues should now appear to us so natural, supported as they are by reason, as to be thought innate, although they were not valued by man in his early condition.
Notwithstanding many sources of doubt, man can generally and readily distinguish between the higher and lower moral rules. The higher are founded on the social instincts, and relate to the welfare of others. They are supported by the approbation of our fellow-men and by reason. The lower rules, though some of them when implying self-sacrifice hardly deserve to be called lower, relate chiefly to self, and owe their origin to public opinion, when matured by experience and cultivated; for they are not practised by rude tribes.
As man advances in civilisation, and small tribes are united into larger communities, the simplest reason would tell each individual that he ought to extend his social instincts and sympathies to all the members of the same nation, though personally unknown to him. This point being once reached, there is only an arti101ficial barrier to prevent his sympathies extending to the men of all nations and races. If, indeed, such men are separated from him by great differences in appearance or habits, experience unfortunately shews us how long it is before we look at them as our fellow-creatures. Sympathy beyond the confines of man, that is humanity to the lower animals, seems to be one of the latest moral acquisitions. It is apparently unfelt by savages, except towards their pets. How little the old Romans knew of it is shewn by their abhorrent gladiatorial exhibitions. The very idea of humanity, as far as I could observe, was new to most of the Gauchos of the Pampas. This virtue, one of the noblest with which man is endowed, seems to arise incidentally from our sympathies becoming more tender and more widely diffused, until they are extended to all sentient beings. As soon as this virtue is honoured and practised by some few men, it spreads through instruction and example to the young, and eventually through public opinion.
The highest stage in moral culture at which we can arrive, is when we recognise that we ought to control our thoughts, and “not even in inmost thought to think again the sins that made the past so pleasant to us.”134 Whatever makes any bad action familiar to the mind, renders its performance by so much the easier. As Marcus Aurelius long ago said, “Such as are thy habitual thoughts, such also will be the character of thy mind; for the soul is dyed by the thoughts.”135
Our great philosopher, Herbert Spencer, has recently explained his views on the moral sense. He says,136 “I 102believe that the experiences of utility organised and consolidated through all past generations of the human race, have been producing corresponding modifications, which, by continued transmission and accumulation, have become in us certain faculties of moral intuition—certain emotions responding to right and wrong conduct, which have no apparent basis in the individual experiences of utility.” There is not the least inherent improbability, as it seems to me, in virtuous tendencies being more or less strongly inherited; for, not to mention the various dispositions and habits transmitted by many of our domestic animals, I have heard of cases in which a desire to steal and a tendency to lie appeared to run in families of the upper ranks; and as stealing is so rare a crime in the wealthy classes, we can hardly account by accidental coincidence for the tendency occurring in two or three members of the same family. If bad tendencies are transmitted, it is probable that good ones are likewise transmitted. Excepting through the principle of the transmission of moral tendencies, we cannot understand the differences believed to exist in this respect be
tween the various races of mankind. We have, however, as yet, hardly sufficient evidence on this head.
Even the partial transmission of virtuous tendencies would be an immense assistance to the primary impulse derived directly from the social instincts, and indirectly from the approbation of our fellow-men. Admitting for the moment that virtuous tendencies are inherited, it appears probable, at least in such cases as chastity, temperance, humanity to animals, &c., that they become first impressed on the mental organisation through habit, instruction, and example, continued during several generations in the same family, and in a quite subordinate degree, or not at all, by the individuals pos103sessing such virtues, having succeeded best in the struggle for life. My chief source of doubt with respect to any such inheritance, is that senseless customs, superstitions, and tastes, such as the horror of a Hindoo for unclean food, ought on the same principle to be transmitted. Although this in itself is perhaps not less probable than that animals should acquire inherited tastes for certain kinds of food or fear of certain foes, I have not met with any evidence in support of the transmission of superstitious customs or senseless habits.
Finally, the social instincts which no doubt were acquired by man, as by the lower animals, for the good of the community, will from the first have given to him some wish to aid his fellows, and some feeling of sympathy. Such impulses will have served him at a very early period as a rude rule of right and wrong. But as man gradually advanced in intellectual power and was enabled to trace the more remote consequences of his actions; as he acquired sufficient knowledge to reject baneful customs and superstitions; as he regarded more and more not only the welfare but the happiness of his fellow-men; as from habit, following on beneficial experience, instruction, and example, his sympathies became more tender and widely diffused, so as to extend to the men of all races, to the imbecile, the maimed, and other useless members of society, and finally to the lower animals,—so would the standard of his morality rise higher and higher. And it is admitted by moralists of the derivative school and by some intuitionists, that the standard of morality has risen since an early period in the history of man.137
As a struggle may sometimes be seen going on 104between the various instincts of the lower animals, it is not surprising that there should be a struggle in man between his social instincts, with their derived virtues, and his lower, though at the moment, stronger impulses or desires. This, as Mr. Galton138 has remarked, is all the less surprising, as man has emerged from a state of barbarism within a comparatively recent period. After having yielded to some temptation we feel a sense of dissatisfaction, analogous to that felt from other unsatisfied instincts, called in this case conscience; for we cannot prevent past images and impressions continually passing through our minds, and these in their weakened state we compare with the ever-present social instincts, or with habits gained in early youth and strengthened during our whole lives, perhaps inherited, so that they are at last rendered almost as strong as instincts. Looking to future generations, there is no cause to fear that the social instincts will grow weaker, and we may expect that virtuous habits will grow stronger, becoming perhaps fixed by inheritance. In this case the struggle between our higher and lower impulses will be less severe, and virtue will be triumphant.
Summary of the two last Chapters.—There can be no doubt that the difference between the mind of the lowest man and that of the highest animal is immense. An anthropomorphous ape, if he could take a dispassionate view of his own case, would admit that though he could form an artful plan to plunder a garden—though he could use stones for fighting or for breaking open nuts, 105yet that the thought of fashioning a stone into a tool was quite beyond his scope. Still less, as he would admit, could he follow out a train of metaphysical reasoning, or solve a mathematical problem, or reflect on God, or admire a grand natural scene. Some apes, however, would probably declare that they could and did admire the beauty of the coloured skin and fur of their partners in marriage. They would admit, that though they could make other apes understand by cries some of their perceptions and simpler wants, the notion of expressing definite ideas by definite sounds had never crossed their minds. They might insist that they were ready to aid their fellow-apes of the same troop in many ways, to risk their lives for them, and to take charge of their orphans; but they would be forced to acknowledge that disinterested love for all living creatures, the most noble attribute of man, was quite beyond their comprehension.
Nevertheless the difference in mind between man and the higher animals, great as it is, is certainly one of degree and not of kind. We have seen that the senses and intuitions, the various emotions and faculties, such as love, memory, attention, curiosity, imitation, reason, &c., of which man boasts, may be found in an incipient, or even sometimes in a well-developed condition, in the lower animals. They are also capable of some inherited improvement, as we see in the domestic dog compared with the wolf or jackal. If it be maintained that certain powers, such as self-consciousness, abstraction, &c., are peculiar to man, it may well be that these are the incidental results of other highly-advanced intellectual faculties; and these again are mainly the result of the continued use of a highly developed language. At what age does the new-born infant possess the power of abstraction, or become self106conscious and reflect on its own existence? We cannot answer; nor can we answer in regard to the ascending organic scale. The half-art and half-instinct of language still bears the stamp of its gradual evolution. The ennobling belief in God is not universal with man; and the belief in active spiritual agencies naturally follows from his other mental powers. The moral sense perhaps affords the best and highest distinction between man and the lower animals; but I need not say anything on this head, as I have so lately endeavoured to shew that the social instincts,—the prime principle of man’s moral constitution139—with the aid of active intellectual powers and the effects of habit, naturally lead to the golden rule, “As ye would that men should do to you, do ye to them likewise;” and this lies at the foundation of morality.
In a future chapter I shall make some few remarks on the probable steps and means by which the several mental and moral faculties of man have been gradually evolved. That this at least is possible ought not to be denied, when we daily see their development in every infant; and when we may trace a perfect gradation from the mind of an utter idiot, lower than that of the lowest animal, to the mind of a Newton.
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CHAPTER IV.
On the Manner of Development of Man from some lower Form.
Variability of body and mind in man—Inheritance—Causes of variability—Laws of variation the same in man as in the lower animals—Direct action of the conditions of life—Effects of the increased use and disuse of parts—Arrested development—Reversion—Correlated variation—Rate of increase—Checks to increase—Natural selection—Man the most dominant animal in the world—Importance of his corporeal structure—The causes which have led to his becoming erect—Consequent changes of structure—Decrease in size of the canine teeth—Increased size and altered shape of the skull—Nakedness—Absence of a tail—Defenceless condition of man.
We have seen in the first chapter that the homological structure of man, his embryological development and the rudiments which he still retains, all declare in the plainest manner that he is descended from some lower form. The possession of exalted mental powers is no insuperable objection to this conclusion. In order that an ape-like creature should have been transformed into man, it is necessary that this early form, as well as many successive links, should all have varied in mind and body. It is impossible to obtain direct evidence on this head; but if it can be shewn that man now varies—that his variations are induced by the same general causes, and obey the same general laws, as in the case of the lower animals—there can be little doubt that the preceding intermediate links varied in a like manner. The variations at each successive stage of descent must, also, have been in some manner accumulated and fixed.
108The facts and conclusions to be given in this chapter relate almost exclusively to the probable means by which the transformation of man has been effected, as far as his bodily structure is concerned. The following chapter will be devoted to the development of his intellectual and moral faculties. But the present discussion likewise bears on the origin of the different races or species of mankind, whichever term may be preferred.
It is manifest that man is now subject to much variability. No two individuals of the same race are quite alike. We may compare millions of faces, and each will be distinct. There is an equally great amount of diversity in the proportions and dimensions of the various parts of the body; the length of the legs being one of the most variable points.140 Although in some quarters of the world an elongated skull, and in other quarters a short skull prevails, yet there is great diversity of shape even within the limits of the same race, as with the aborigines of America and South Australia,—the latter a race “probably as pure and homogeneous in blood, customs, and language as any in existence”—and even with the inhabitants of so confined an area as the Sandwich Islands.141 An eminent dentist assures me that there is nearly as much diversity in the teeth, as in the features. The chief arteries so frequently run in abnormal courses, that it has been found useful for surgical purposes to calculate 109from 12,000 corpses how often each course prevails.142 The muscles are eminently variable: thus those of the foot were found by Prof. Turner143 not to be strictly alike in any two out of fifty bodies; and in some the deviations were considerable. Prof. Turner adds that the power of performing the appropriate movements must have been modified in accordance with the several deviations. Mr. J. Wood has recorded144 the occurrence of 295 muscular variations in thirty-six subjects, and in another set of the same number no less than 558 variations, reckoning both sides of the body as one. In the last set, not one body out of the thirty-six was “found totally wanting in departures from the standard descriptions of the muscular system given in anatomical text-books.” A single body presented the extraordinary number of twenty-five distinct abnormalities. The same muscle sometimes varies in many ways: thus Prof. Macalister describes145 no less than twenty distinct variations in the palmaris accessorius.