The PRESIDENT said he so fully agreed with the author of the paper that it was unnecessary for him to speak on the subject immediately after it had been read. He wished to state, however, that he had had no communication with Mr. Guppy, though from the identity of opinion between them-on the incapacity of the negro for comprehending European civilisation-it might have been so supposed. This coincidence of opinion was the more remarkable as his own observations on the incapacity of the negro for European civilisation were not contained in the paper he had read at the meeting of the British Association, and which only had been seen by Mr. Guppy, but were introduced when he afterwards read the paper in that Society.

Mr. REDDIE considered the paper of Mr. Guppy's a very appropriate sequel to the one that had been read before it. It was a clear statement of facts of the condition of emancipated negroes, devoid of speculation. They could see from that statement that there was a great deal to be done in comparing the different degrees of intelligence in man without descending to a comparison with brutes. In endeavouring to establish a comparison in the latter case there was this difficulty, that they had no facts to depend on. It could be seen and ascertained how far the negro is capable of understanding the higher grades of human intelligence, but with regard to inferior animals the difference was not one of degree but of kind.

Mr. PIKE remarked that it had been just said by Mr. Reddie that he approved of the paper because it contained a lucid statement of facts and not speculation; but at the same time he had asserted that the difference between man and brutes is one of kind and not of degree, which assertion was a speculation and not a fact.

Mr. WALLACE said the author of the paper dwelt much on a fact which no one had denied-that the negro is very inferior in intellectual capacity to the European. The only question to be determined was, how far that inferiority extends. The African negro was often spoken of as being the lowest race of mankind; but he believed that the negro is not the lowest grade. The Australians, the North and South American Indians, and even the Malays, he considered to be inferior to the negro. The negro, he believed, possesses a considerable amount of intelligence and energy that might enable him to rise much higher than he has done yet. It was not fair to compare a negro emancipated from a state of slavery with Hindoos and Chinese who belong to the oldest civilised nations on the earth. It was true, indeed, that the negro would not work and exert himself, except under the pressure of necessity; but that remark was applicable to mankind in general, for everyone required a stimulus to exertion. They had never seen the negro in that state of stimulus fitted to develope his moral and intellectual faculties and to enable him to appreciate the benefits of civilisation. When the negroes in our West Indian possessions were emancipated they ought to have been placed in circumstances that would have given them a stimulus to labour. There was no necessity to have given them the land on which they were located. If it had been an established rule that the negroes were to pay rent for the land they occupied, that would have obliged them to

labour, and we should have had a different state of things from that described by Mr. Guppy. The necessity to provide money for the payment of rent and to enable them to live would have given them a stimulus to work. The necessity of exertion to obtain a livelihood was even among ourselves an excellent means of improvement. We had never seen the negro under favourable circumstances. We had always seen him either as a slave or perfectly free without any stimulus to exertion. Allowance should be made for the contrast between his present condition of perfect freedom and his former state of slavery. We had not yet seen the negro under the circumstances that would show him to the greatest advantage.

Mr. S. E. BOUVERIE PUSEY observed that the emancipated negroes of our West Indian colonies were placed under very unfavourable circumstances. When in a state of slavery they were treated by the planters with great severity and in a very different manner from the slaves in the Confederate States of America. The planters were always in debt and they forced their slaves to work hard and behaved to them with barbarity. The planters had no ideas of political economy, and when the slaves were emancipated they thought the negroes were bound to work for a fixed price. But the negroes, on being released from such harsh bondage, would not be compelled to work. They migrated, and, in some instances, they squatted, and indulged in what to them was the luxury of idleness. He agreed with Mr. Wallace in thinking that sufficient allowance had not, under such circumstances, been made for the negro, and that we should not judge of his mental capacity by his present low degree of intellectual development.

Mr. PINKERTON thought that too much had been said both on the one side and the other about the capabilities of the negro for European civilisation, and that they should look on him in the state he was found and see what he is. It was useless to speak of the negro as he might have been under different circumstances. When compared with the Hindoos and Chinese there could be no doubt the negro was very different.

Mr. C. CARTER BLAKE noticed the allusion in the paper to the observations of Mr. Craft in the discussion of Dr. Hunt's paper on the negro at the last meeting of the British Association. Mr. Craft had there stated that the agricultural labourers in England were bent in figure as well as the negro; but the fact was suppressed by him that, in the case of the English labourer, the stooping figure was not concomitant with any anatomical peculiarity. The agricultural labourer exhibits the "European type" as characteristically as any of the white races of mankind. With respect to the negro, however, it was well known that the angle of the occipital foramen is different from that of the white races, and there are other distinctions in his anatomical characters. With regard to the assertions sometimes made, that the civilisation of the negro is capable of altering his cranium from the true character of the race, what were the facts? One of the most degraded skulls of the negro type which is yet known is that of a civilised negro who was a Wesleyan deacon in the West Indian islands. Mr. Wallace had stated that

no one denies, and that no one had ever denied, the inferior mental capacity of the negro, but he could have paid little attention to what had been again and again asserted by the advocates of the negro, or he would not have said so. If they turned to the popular literature, it would be found there stated not only that the negro is equal, but that he is superior to Europeans, and it had been recommended by some persons on the other side of the Atlantic, that the European races there should be improved by mixture with the negro.

The PRESIDENT considered it to be due to the author of the paper to say a few words in support of his opinions. In the first place, he would observe that the paper showed that the volumes published by the Anthropological Society had got out to Trinidad, one of the results of which had been the production of the interesting communication which they had just heard. Mr. Guppy had told them very properly that slavery does not degrade the negro, and when they hear so much about what slavery has done to degrade them it was well that they should now have the statement of a gentleman, founded on observation of the facts of the case, that the opposite effect was produced by slavery. The children of the slaves, who have had the means of improvement and of civilisation, were, on his evidence, worse than their parents when in a state of slavery, and were said to have greatly deteriorated. The cause of this was, that the children who are free want the stimulus of necessity to work. Mr. Wallace, indeed, said that all men require that stimulus, and would do nothing without it. He (the President) did not believe that to be the case with Europeans. There were, for example, upwards of 10,000 men in this metropolis who work daily without any necessity for so doing. At the last meeting of the British Association it had been asserted by Professor Wilson that there were in the English workhouses many men whose mental capacities were not superior to those of negroes, and that if the latter had the opportunity, they would become equal to the white man. In the instance of Hayti, however, the contrary was seen; the free negroes were there either savages, or were quickly becoming so. The opinion expressed by the author of the paper that the mulattoes are not so robust as either the European or the negro, agreed with the opinions of other good authorities and with experience, for it is known that they die off fearfully. Mr. Wallace had said that the negro is not the lowest of the human races, and that there are several lower than he is. That assertion fully agreed with the statement in his (the President's) paper on the negro, in which he said there were six races lower. If they looked to the facts of the case, as recommended by Mr. Pinkerton, and examined the condition of the negro in every possible condition, they found the same result that the highest state of civilisation and mental development which the negroes exhibited was when they were in a state of slavery under the treatment of a kind proprietor. They were treated, as had been observed, very differently in some parts of America from the cruel manner in which they were formerly treated in the West Indies. The treatment most of the negroes received in the Confederate States was well adapted to improve them, and it had produced

that effect. At present they were dying off very quickly in America. He thanked Mr. Guppy for having contributed so valuable a paper; and he hoped that other gentlemen would send their opinions on the subject. He had been accused of being prejudiced, and of having interested motives in his representation of the incapacity of the negro for European civilisation. He begged to assure the meeting, however, that he had no prejudice on the question, but he thought it was the duty of anthropologists to oppose the opinion attempted to be established of the equality of the negro and the white man; and, as to the alleged interested motives, it was well known that the men who made such charges were generally those who were themselves most influenced by such motives.

Mr. PUSEY rose to explain that he considered himself opposed to the opinions expressed in the paper. The freed negro did not work because he was not adequately and steadily paid for his labour. With regard to the state of the negroes in Hayti, there were peculiar circumstances in that case, which prevented it from being fairly taken as an illustration.

The PRESIDENT then briefly noticed that the translation of Broca's work on Human Hybridity was now ready; and he proposed a vote of thanks to Mr. Carter Blake for the careful and prompt manner in which the work had been edited. This proposal was seconded by Mr. REDDIE, and carried unanimously.

The meeting then adjourned to the 5th of April.

APRIL 5TH, 1864.

DR. JAMES HUNT, PRESIDENT, IN THE CHAIR.

THE minutes of the proceedings of the last meeting were read and confirmed.

The thanks of the for donations to the Georges Pouchet; J.

Society were given to the following gentlemen library :-Professor Rudolph Wagner; M. Frederick Collingwood, Esq.; T. Bendyshe, Esq.; the Royal Society of London; and the Cotteswold Club.

The following new members were announced as having been elected since the last meeting.

John Brinton, Esq.; Handel Cossham, Esq., F.G.S.; E. Bickerton Evans, Esq.; Edward C. Healey, Esq.; J. Byerley, Esq.; G. S. Gibson, Esq.; Lieutenant-Colonel H. Clerk, R.A.; W. Cory, Esq.; David Gray, Esq.; John S. Burke, Esq.; Edmund Farmer, Esq.; Antonio Brady, Esq., F.G.S.

The following papers were then read.

On the Universality of Belief in God, and in a Future State. By the REV. F. W. FARRAR, M.A.

"Es ist ein seltsamer Irrthum, anzunehmen, dass alle Völker an das Dasein eines Gottes glauben; ich habe viele Wilde gesehen, die davon keinen Begriff hatten." DE LAUTURE.

WHETHER or not all nations believed in a God, was a question debated even by the ancients. On the one hand, Artemidorus* and Plutarch positively assert that there was no race without this belief; on the other hand, the Phlegyes, Nasamones, Callaici, Akrothoi,‡ and others, are expressly charged with such ignorance, and Cicero§ pointedly affirms his belief in the existence of such people.

In modern times it has generally been assumed that there is no doubt about the matter, and such a consensus of the whole human race has even been most needlessly inserted among the certain evidences of religion. But what are the facts? If we may believe the testimony of travellers,-who are generally prejudiced in the opposite direction, and who frequently implant their own belief, which is found there by subsequent voyagers-there are not only isolated tribes, but whole nations who are so degraded as to live with no knowledge of their Creator. Schmidt says, "They

For instance-1. Of the Australians, Mr. have no idea of a Divine Being," and Mr. Parkes, "That they have no words for justice or for sin;" and Dr. Laing, "They have no idea of a superior Divinity, no object of worship, no idols, nor temples, no sacrifices, nothing whatever in the shape of religion to distinguish them from the beasts." Similarly Perty, in describing the aborigines of Solomon's archipelago, says, "that in many of the islands there is no trace of any religion." 2. If we turn to Africa, the missionary, J. Leichton, tells us of the Mpongwes, that he found among them neither religion nor idolatry; and another missionary, the Rev. G. Brown, tells us of the Kaffirs, "That they have not in their language any word to use as the name, or to denote the being, of a God-of any God." According to one account, the nearest approach to it appears to be the word Tixo, which means "wounded knee," and was the name of a celebrated medicine-man a few generations back! The natives of Cape Mount, when questioned by Smith about their religion, said, they obeyed their chiefs, and troubled themselves about nothing higher. A Bosjesman, when asked the difference between good and wicked, said, "It was good to steal another person's wife, and wicked when one's own wife was stolen." Respecting Fetishism in general, which is the prevalent religion (?)

* Οὐδὲν ἔθνος ἀνθρώπων ἄθεον. Artemid., i, 9.

+ ̓Ανιέρου δὲ πόλεως καὶ ἀθέον . . . οὐδείς ἐστιν οὐδ ̓ ἐσται γεγονώς θεατής. Plut. Adv. Colot. Epicureum, p. 1124.

See Fabricius, Bibl. Antiq., p. 229

"Equidem arbitror multas esse gentes sic immanitate efferas, ut apud eas nulla suspicio Deorum sit." Cic. De Nat. Deor., i, 23. Grundzüge d. Ethn., § 282.