PREFACE. XV paredness for its removal shall arrive; and one of the most 'advanced' of whom appears to be touched by a lingering sentiment of tenderness, while he blows his trumpet for a final assault at once upon the Syrian Superstition' and, on the poor, pale, and semi-animate substitutes for it, which Deism has devised. . It is not now only the Christian Church, or only the Holy Scripture, or only Christianity, which is attacked. The disposition is boldly proclaimed to deal alike with root and branch, and to snap utterly the ties which, under the still venerable name of religion, unite man with the unseen world, and lighten the struggles and the woes of life by the hope of a better land. These things are done as the professed results, and the newest triumphs of Modern Thought and Modern Science; but I believe that neither Science nor Thought is responsible, any more than Liberty is responsible, for misdeeds committed in their names." F. PETRIE, Hon. Sec. and Editor, 31ST DECEMBER, 1872. JOURNAL OF THE TRANSACTIONS OF THE VICTORIA INSTITUTE, OR PHILOSOPHICAL SOCIETY OF GREAT BRITAIN. ORDINARY MEETING, JUNE 6, 1870. THE REV. J. H. RIGG, D.D., IN THE CHAIR. The Minutes of the last Meeting were read and confirmed. ASSOCIATES, 2ND CLASS.-J. S. SUTCLIFFE, Esq., Bacup; Rev. J. TURNER. B.A., Deddington. Also the presentation of the following books for the Library : Fresh Springs of Truth. By J. Reddie, Esq. Mr. JAMES REDDIE then read the following paper : From the Author. From C. Dibdin, Esq. ON CIVILIZATION, MORAL AND MATERIAL: (Also in reply to Sir John Lubbock, F.R.S., on Primitive Man ;) By JAMES REDDIE,* Esq., Hon. Mem. Dial. Soc., Edin. Univer., HONORARY SECRETARY, Vict. Inst. 1. THIS paper is supplementary to three former Essays by the author, bearing upon the same subject. The first was a paper " On Anthropological Desiderata," read before the Anthropological Society of London in February, 1864;* the second was published in the Ethnological Journal for October, 1865, with the title, "Man, Savage and Civilized: an Appeal to Facts; " and the third was the first paper I had the honour of reading before the VICTORIA INSTITUTE, in our first session in July, 1866,† "On the various Theories of Man's Past and Present Condition," the greater portion of which Paper was subsequently read in the Ethnological Section of the British. Association for the Advancement of Science, at Nottingham, in August, 1866. + 2. In all these Essays my object was to rebut and refute the notion that man could either have been created in a low and almost brutal condition, like what we now find him to be among the lowest and most ignorant savage races; or that he could ever have been transmuted from some kind of monkey or other beast, by natural selection or any other natural process, into man. In the first of these papers I said: "Apart from the physiological objections (which seem to be insuperable) to the theory of transmutation, the grand issue to be decided by anthropologians will mainly depend upon what we can discover, as to whether savage man can civilize himself or not. If not, there simply cannot be a doubt that the 'primitive man' was neither a savage nor his ancestor au ape. And, apart from theories altogether, the existence of mankind, both in a civilized and savage condition, naturally suggests to us the inquiry: To which of these distinctive classes did the primitive man probably helong?" This showed that I was quite prepared to discuss this question with reference to existing facts, and not to press too hardly upon the Darwinians to justify their extravagant speculations as to man's origin, which go beyond all our knowledge and experience of the facts of the animal creation and of human nature. I also then said: "Before this question can be satisfactorily answered, however, or even discussed with advantage, it seems necessary to arrive at some definite understanding as to the meaning of the word civilization with reference to anthropological considerations." 3. It is to supply this desideratum I now write. But I have also another object--a pledge to fulfil-which I must endeavour at the same time to accomplish; and that is, to reply to a Paper by Sir John Lubbock on the same subject. His Paper I heard read in the Ethnological Society of London on 26th November, 1867, and by his courtesy I have since been furnished with a copy of it. It was afterwards read by him at Anthrop. Rev., vol. ii. p. cxv. et seq. I., p. 211. the British Association for the Advancement of Science at Dundee, and in the Royal Institution of Great Britain. Its title is: "On the Origin of Civilization and the Primitive Condition of Man," which well describes the drift both of his Paper and of mine. We both agree, and every thoughtful person must feel, that it is not enough to say, with M. Guizot, that "civilization is a fact:" we require to know its probable origin, i. e., we want to know what kind of a being the primitive man really was. On that point, however, the distinguished baronet and myself are diametrically opposed. He is a professed Darwinian, and does not believe in the special creation of man, but thinks he was developed by some imaginary process, which the Darwinians, nevertheless, call "natural," from a monkey, first into some nondescript and undiscovered animal between an ape and a man, and from that into a savage, something like those we know do now exist, of the very lowest grade. On the contrary I believe that "God created man in His own image," "upright," "very good "; and that savages are degenerate and degraded but remote descendants of superior ancestors. 4. According to Sir John Lubbock, therefore, the origin of civilization is savagery. He thinks that man, little better than a brute originally, has raised himself from that low and savage condition to a state of civilization and superiority; and that it is the tendency of mankind thus to rise. I hold diametrically the reverse of all this: I believe that man was originally perfect, "made a little lower than the angels," and has fallen from that state of moral elevation; that civilization owes its existence to this original superiority of man, to the remains of it in the oldest civilized races, and to its revival and recovery in those races which had degenerated; and that unfortunately it is rather the tendency of mankind to degenerate and to fall from better to worse, than to rise and elevate themselves from a savage or barbarous condition. 5. Now I contend, that apart altogether from what is revealed in Holy Scripture as to man's creation and his fall, the view I maintain is the only one consistent with all our experience, with all our positive knowledge of mankind, with all the history of the past that can be relied on, and with all the unquestionable facts of nature with which we are acquainted. I contend, further, that the view entertained by Sir John Lubbock is in the teeth of all such facts and history and knowledge and experience; that the arguments with which he supports his view are weak and illogical; and that he has shrunk besides from looking all the facts in the face, and from meeting arguments which he was aware had been advanced |