Page:George Archdall Reid 1896 The present evolution of man.djvu/191

Rh other none at all; that the Irish have "by nature" one kind of temperament, and the Scotch another. Almost alone among historians, Buckle has questioned whether races differ inherently as regards their mental peculiarities. He says—

"I cordially subscribe to the remark of one of the greatest thinkers of our time, who says of the supposed differences of race, 'Of all vulgar modes of escaping from the consideration of the effect of social and moral influences on the mind, the most vulgar is that of attributing the diversities of conduct and character to inherent natural differences' (Mill's Principles of Political Economy, vol. i. p. 390). Ordinary writers are constantly falling into the error of assuming the existence of this difference, which may or may not exist, but which most assuredly has never been proved. Some singular instances of this will be found in Alison's History of Europe, vol. ii. p. 336, vol. vi. p. 139, vol. viii. pp. 525, 526, vol. xiii. p. 347, where the historian thinks that by a few strokes of his pen he can settle a question of the greatest difficulty connected with some of the most intricate problems in physiology."—Buckle's History of Civilization, vol. i. p. 40.

"Whatever, therefore, the moral and intellectual progress of men may be, it resolves itself not into a progress of natural capacity, but into a progress, if I may say so, of opportunity; that is, an improvement in the circumstances under which that capacity after birth comes into play. Here, then, lies the gist of the whole matter. The progress is one, not of internal power, but of external advantage. The child born in a civilized land is not likely as such to be superior to one born among barbarians; and the difference which ensues between the acts of the two children will be caused, so far as we know, solely by the pressure of external circumstances; by which I mean the surrounding opinions, knowledge, associations, in a word, the entire