The Mismeasure of Man

  I have allotted the first place to the Caucasian … which makes me esteem it the primeval one. This diverges in both directions into two, most remote and very different from each other; on the one side, namely, into the Ethiopian, and on the other into the Mongolian. The remaining two occupy the intermediate positions between that primeval one and these two extreme varieties; that is, the American between the Caucasian and Mongolian; the Malay between the same Caucasian and Ethiopian.

  Scholars often suppose that academic ideas must remain, at worst, harmless and, at best, mildly amusing or even instructive. But ideas do not reside in the ivory tower of our usual metaphor about academic irrelevancy. People are, as Pascal said, thinking reeds, and ideas motivate human history. Where would Hitler have been without racism, Jefferson without liberty? Blumenbach lived as a cloistered professor all his life, but his ideas reverberate through our wars, our conquests, our sufferings, and our hopes. I therefore end by returning to the coincidence of 1776, as Jefferson wrote the Declaration of Independence while Blumenbach published the first edition of his treatise in Latin. Consider the words of Lord Acton on the power of ideas to propel history, as illustrated by potential passage from Latin to action:

  It was from America that … ideas long locked in the breast of solitary thinkers, and hidden among Latin folios—burst forth like a conqueror upon the world they were destined to transform, under the title of the Rights of Man.

  The Moral State of Tahiti—and of Darwin

  Childhood precocity is an eerie and fascinating phenomenon. But let us not forget the limits; age and experience confer some blessing. The compositions that Mozart wrote at four and five are not enduring masterpieces, however sweet. We even have a word for such “literary or artistic works produced in the author’s youth” (Oxford English Dictionary)—juvenilia. The term has always borne a derogatory tinge; artists certainly hope for substantial ontogenetic improvement! John Donne, in the second recorded use of the word (1633) entitled his early works: “Iuuenilia: or certaine paradoxes and problemes.”

  I shouldn’t place myself in such august company, but I do feel the need to confess. My first work was a poem about dinosaurs, written at age eight. I cringe to remember its first verse:

  Once there was a Triceratops

  With his horns he gave big bops

  He gave them to an allosaur

  Who went away without a roar.

  (I cringe even more to recall its eventual disposition. I sent the poem to my boyhood hero, Ned Colbert, curator of dinosaurs at the American Museum of Natural History. Fifteen years later, when I was taking his course as a graduate student, Colbert happened to clean out his old files, found the poem, and gleefully shared it with all my classmates one afternoon.)

  Now, a trivia question on the same theme: What was Charles Darwin’s first published work? A speculation on evolution? Perhaps a narrative of scientific discovery on the Beagle? No, this greatest and most revolutionary of all biologists, this inverter of the established order, published his first work in the South African Christian Recorder for 1836—a joint article with Beagle skipper Robert FitzRoy on “The Moral State of Tahiti.” (The standard catalogue of Darwin’s publications lists one prior item—a booklet of Beagle letters addressed to Professor Henslow and printed by the Cambridge Philosophical Society in 1835. But this pamphlet was issued only for private distribution among members—the equivalent of an informal modern Xeroxing. “The Moral State of Tahiti” represents Darwin’s first public appearance in print, and biographers record this article as his first publication—even though the writing is mostly FitzRoy’s, with long excerpts from Darwin’s diaries patched in and properly acknowledged.)

  The great Russian explorer Otto von Kotzebue had poured fuel on an old and worldwide dispute by arguing that Christian missionaries had perpetrated far more harm than good in destroying native cultures (while often cynically fronting for colonial power) under the guise of “improvement.” FitzRoy and Darwin wrote their article to attack Kotzebue and to defend the good work of English missionaries in Tahiti and New Zealand.

  The two shipmates began by noting with sorrow the strong anti-missionary sentiments that they had encountered when the Beagle called at Cape Town:

  A very short stay at the Cape of Good Hope is sufficient to convince even a passing stranger, that a strong feeling against the Missionaries in South Africa is there very prevalent. From what cause a feeling so much to be lamented has arisen, is probably well known to residents at the Cape. We can only notice the fact: and feel sorrow.

  Following a general defense of missionary activity, FitzRoy and Darwin move to specific cases of their own prior observation, particularly to the improved “moral state” of Tahiti:

  Quitting opinions … it may be desirable to see what has been doing at Otaheite (now called Tahiti) and at New Zealand, towards reclaiming the “barbarians.” … The Beagle passed a part of last November at Otaheite or Tahiti. A more orderly, quiet, inoffensive community I have not seen in any other part of the world. Every one of the Tahitians appeared anxious to oblige, and naturally good tempered and cheerful. They showed great respect for, and a thorough good will towards, the missionaries; … and most deserving of such a feeling did those persons appear to be.

  FitzRoy and Darwin were, obviously, attentive to a possible counterargument—that the Tahitians have always been so decent, and that missionary activity had been irrelevant to their good qualities by European taste. The article is largely an argument against this interpretation and a defense for direct and substantial “improvement” by missionaries. Darwin, in particular, presents two arguments, both quoted directly from his journals. First, Tahitian Christianity seems deep and genuine, not “for show” and only in the presence of missionaries. Darwin cites an incident from his travels with native Tahitians into the island’s interior, far from scrutiny. (This event must have impressed Darwin powerfully, for he told the tale in several letters to family members back home and included an account in his Voyage of the Beagle):

  Before we laid ourselves down to sleep, the elder Tahitian fell on his knees, and repeated a long prayer. He seemed to pray as a christian should, with fitting reverence to his God, without ostentatious piety, or fear of ridicule. At daylight, after their morning prayer, my companions prepared an excellent breakfast of bananas and fish. Neither of them would taste food without saying a short grace. Those travellers, who hint that a Tahitian prays only when the eyes of the missionaries are fixed on him, might have profited by similar evidence.

  Second, and more important, Tahitian good qualities have been created, or substantially fostered, by missionary activity. They were a dubious lot, Darwin asserts, before Western civilization arrived.

  On the whole, it is my opinion that the state of morality and religion in Tahiti is highly creditable.… Human sacrifices,—the bloodiest warfare,—parricide,—and infanticide,—the power of an idolatrous priesthood,—and a system of profligacy unparalleled in the annals of the world,—have been abolished,—and dishonesty, licentiousness, and intemperance have been greatly reduced, by the introduction of Christianity.

  (On the subject of sexual freedom in women, so long an issue and legend for Tahitian travelers from Captain Cook to Fletcher Christian, FitzRoy remarked: “I would scarcely venture to give a general opinion, after only so short an acquaintance; but I may say that I witnessed no improprieties.” Nonetheless, FitzRoy did admit that “human nature in Tahiti cannot be supposed superior to erring human nature in other parts of the world.” Darwin then added a keen observation on hypocrisy in Western male travelers who do not sufficiently credit missionaries as a result of their private frustration on this issue: “I do believe that, disappointed in not finding the field of licentiousness so open as formerly, and as was expected, they will not give credit to a morality which they do not wish to practise.”)

  Many arguments float back and forth through this interesting article, but the dominant theme can surely be summarized in a single
word: paternalism. We know what is good for the primitives—and thank God they are responding and improving on Tahiti by becoming more European in their customs and actions. Praise the missionaries for this exemplary work. One comment, again by FitzRoy, captures this theme with special discomfort (to modern eyes) for its patronizing approach, even to royalty:

  The Queen, and a large party, passed some hours on board the Beagle. Their behavior was extremely correct, and their manners were inoffensive. Judging from former accounts, and what we witnessed, I should think that they are improving yearly.

  Thus, we may return to my opening issue—the theme of juvenilia. Shall we place this article on the “Moral State of Tahiti,” Darwin’s very first, into the category of severe later embarrassments? Did Darwin greatly revise his views on non-Western peoples and civilizations, and come to regard his early paternalism as a folly of youthful inexperience? Much traditional commentary in the hagiographical mode would say so—and isolated quotations can be cited from here and there to support such an interpretation (for Darwin was a complex man who wrestled with deep issues, sometimes in contradictory ways, throughout his life).

  But I would advance the opposite claim as a generality. I don’t think that Darwin ever substantially revised his anthropological views. His basic attitude remained: “they” are inferior but redeemable. His mode of argument changed in later life. He would no longer frame his attitude in terms of traditional Christianity and missionary work. He would temper his strongest paternalistic enthusiasm with a growing understanding (cynicism would be too strong a word) of the foibles of human nature in all cultures, including his own. (We see the first fruits of such wisdom in his comment, cited previously, on why sexually frustrated travelers fail to credit Tahitian missionaries.) But his basic belief in a hierarchy of cultural advance, with white Europeans on top and natives of different colors on the bottom, did not change.

  Turning to the major work of Darwin’s maturity, The Descent of Man (1871), Darwin writes in summary:

  The races differ also in constitution, in acclimatisation, and in liability to certain diseases. Their mental characteristics are likewise very distinct; chiefly as it would appear in their emotional, but partly in their intellectual faculties. Every one who has had the opportunity of comparison, must have been struck with the contrast between the taciturn, even morose, aborigines of S. America and the lighthearted, talkative negroes.

  The most striking passage occurs in a different context. Darwin is arguing that discontinuities in nature do not speak against evolution, because most intermediate forms are now extinct. Just think, he tells us, how much greater the gap between apes and humans will become when both the highest apes and the lowest people are exterminated:

  At some future period, not very distant as measured by centuries, the civilized races of man will almost certainly exterminate and replace throughout the world the savage races. At the same time the anthropomorphous apes … will no doubt be exterminated. The break will then be rendered wider, for it will intervene between man in a more civilized state, as we may hope, than the Caucasian, and some ape as low as a baboon, instead of as at present between the negro or Australian and the gorilla.

  The common (and false) impression of Darwin’s egalitarianism arises largely from selective quotation. Darwin was strongly attracted to certain peoples often despised by Europeans, and some later writers have falsely extrapolated to a presumed general attitude. On the Beagle voyage, for example, he spoke highly of African blacks enslaved in Brazil:

  It is impossible to see a negro and not feel kindly towards him; such cheerful, open, honest expressions and such fine muscular bodies; I never saw any of the diminutive Portuguese with their murderous countenances, without almost wishing for Brazil to follow the example of Hayti.

  But toward other peoples, particularly the Fuegians of southernmost South America, Darwin felt contempt: “I believe if the world was searched, no lower grade of man could be found.” Elaborating later on the voyage, Darwin writes:

  Their red skins filthy and greasy, their hair entangled, their voices discordant, their gesticulation violent and without any dignity. Viewing such men, one can hardly make oneself believe that they are fellow creatures placed in the same world.… It is a common subject of conjecture, what pleasure in life some of the less gifted animals can enjoy? How much more reasonably it may be asked with respect to these men.

  On the subject of sexual differences, so often a surrogate for racial attitudes, Darwin writes in The Descent of Man (and with direct analogy to cultural variation):

  It is generally admitted that with woman the powers of intuition, of rapid perception, and perhaps of imitation, are more strongly marked than in man; but some, at least, of these faculties are characteristic of the lower races, and therefore of a past and lower state of civilization. The chief distinction in the intellectual powers of the two sexes is shown by man attaining to a higher eminence, in whatever he takes up, than woman can attain—whether requiring deep thought, reason, or imagination, or merely the use of the senses and hands.

  Darwin attributes these differences to the evolutionary struggle that males must pursue for success in mating: “These various faculties will thus have been continually put to the test, and selected during manhood.” In a remarkable passage, he then expresses thanks that evolutionary innovations of either sex tend to pass, by inheritance, to both sexes—lest the disparity between men and women become ever greater by virtue of exclusively male accomplishment:

  It is, indeed, fortunate that the law of the equal transmission of characters to both sexes has commonly prevailed throughout the whole class of mammals; otherwise it is probable that man would have become as superior in mental endowment to woman, as the peacock is in ornamental plumage to the peahen.

  Shall we then simply label Darwin as a constant racist and sexist all the way from youthful folly to mature reflection? Such a stiff-necked and uncharitable attitude will not help us if we wish to understand and seek enlightenment from our past. Instead I will plead for Darwin on two grounds, one general, the other personal.

  The general argument is obvious and easy to make. How can we castigate someone for repeating a standard assumption of his age, however much we may legitimately deplore that attitude today? Belief in racial and sexual inequality was unquestioned and canonical among upper-class Victorian males—probably about as controversial as the Pythagorean theorem. Darwin did construct a different rationale for a shared certainty—and for this we may exact some judgment. But I see no purpose in strong criticism for a largely passive acceptance of common wisdom. Let us rather analyze why such potent and evil nonsense then passed for certain knowledge.

  If I choose to impose individual blame for all past social ills, there will be no one left to like in some of the most fascinating periods of our history. For example, and speaking personally, if I place every Victorian anti-Semite beyond the pale of my attention, my compass of available music and literature will be pitifully small. Though I hold no shred of sympathy for active persecutors, I cannot excoriate individuals who acquiesced passively in a standard societal judgment. Rail instead against the judgment, and try to understand what motivates men of decent will.

  The personal argument is more difficult and requires substantial biographical knowledge. Attitudes are one thing, actions another—and by their fruits ye shall know them. What did Darwin do with his racial attitudes, and how do his actions stack up against the mores of his contemporaries? By this proper criterion, Darwin merits our admiration.

  Darwin was a meliorist in the paternalistic tradition, not a believer in biologically fixed and ineradicable inequality. Either attitude can lead to ugly statements about despised peoples, but practical consequences are so different. The meliorist may wish to eliminate cultural practices, and may be vicious and uncompromising in his lack of sympathy for differences, but he does view “savages” (Darwin’s word) as “primitive” by social circumstance and biologically capable of “impro
vement” (read “Westernization”). But the determinist regards “primitive” culture as a reflection of unalterable biological inferiority, and what social policy must then follow in an era of colonial expansion: elimination, slavery, permanent domination?

  Even for his most despised Fuegians, Darwin understood the small intrinsic difference between them in their nakedness and him in his regalia. He attributed their limits to a harsh surrounding climate and hoped, in his usual paternalistic way, for their eventual improvement. He wrote in his Beagle diary for February 24, 1834:

  Their country is a broken mass of wild rocks, lofty hills and useless forests, and these are viewed through mists and endless storms.… How little can the higher powers of the mind come into play: what is there for imagination to paint, for reason to compare, for judgment to decide upon? To knock a limpet from the rock does not even require cunning, that lowest power of the mind.… Although essentially the same creature, how little must the mind of one of these beings resemble that of an educated man. What a scale of improvement is comprehended between the faculties of a Fuegian savage and a Sir Isaac Newton!

  Darwin’s final line on the Fuegians (in the Voyage of the Beagle) uses an interesting and revealing phrase in summary: “I believe, in this extreme part of South America, man exists in a lower state of improvement than in any other part of the world.” You may cringe at the paternalism, but “lower state of improvement” does at least stake a claim for potential brotherhood. And Darwin did recognize the beam in his own shipmates’ eyes in writing of their comparable irrationalisms:

  Each [Fuegian] family or tribe has a wizard or conjuring doctor.… [Yet] I do not think that our Fuegians were much more superstitious than some of the sailors; for an old quartermaster firmly believed that the successive heavy gales, which we encountered off Cape Horn, were caused by our having the Fuegians on board.