Page:Popular Science Monthly Volume 8.djvu/276

262 being exercised by other parts of the nervous system. As we ascend to higher actions, guided by more and more complicated combinations of stimuli, there is not the same instantaneous discharge in simple motions; but there is a comparatively deliberate and more variable adjustment of compound motions, duly restrained and proportioned. It is thus with the passions and sentiments in the less developed natures and in the more developed natures. Where there is but little emotional complexity, an emotion, when excited by some occurrence, explodes in action before the other emotions have been called into play; and each of these, from time to time, does the like. But the more complex emotional structure is one in which these simpler emotions are so coördinated that they do not act independently. Before excitement of any one has had time to cause action, some excitement has been communicated to others—often antagonistic ones—and the conduct becomes modified in adjustment to the combined dictates. Hence results a decreased impulsiveness, and also a greater persistence. The conduct pursued, being prompted by several emotions coöperating in degrees which do not exhaust them, acquires a greater continuity; and while spasmodic force becomes less conspicuous, there is an increase in the total energy.

Examining the facts from this point of view, there are sundry questions of interest to be put respecting the different races of men: (a.) To what other traits than degree of mental evolution is impulsiveness related? Apart from difference in elevation of type, the New-World races seem to be less impulsive than the Old-World races. Is this due to constitutional apathy? Can there be traced (other things equal) a relation between physical vivacity and mental impulsiveness? (b.) What connection is there between this trait and the social state? Clearly a very explosive nature—such as that of the Bushman—is unfit for social union; and, commonly, social union, when by any means established, checks impulsiveness. (c.) What respective shares in checking impulsiveness are taken by the feelings which the social state fosters—such as the fear of surrounding individuals, the instinct of sociality, the desire to accumulate property, the sympathetic feelings, the sentiment of justice? These, which require a social environment for their development, all of them involve imaginations of consequences more or less distant; and thus imply checks upon the promptings of the simpler passions. Hence arise the questions—In what order, in what degrees, and in what combinations do they come into play?

7. One further general inquiry of a different kind may be added: What effect is produced on mental nature by mixture of races? There is reason for believing that, throughout the animal kingdom, the union of varieties that have become widely divergent is physically injurious; while the union of slightly-divergent varieties is physically beneficial. Does the like hold with the mental nature? Some facts seem