Human History Not Explained by Evolution

Human History not Explained by Evolution

BY ROBERT C. WEBB

[This article is a continuation of a series of contributions by thesame author, which appeared in Volumes XVII and XVIII of the Era.The earlier writings have dealt more particularly with the develop-ment of organisms, and the bearing of the doctrine of "Evolution"thereon; the present article treats the subject of the varied traits andtendencies of man as summarized under the title "Human Nature,"and considers the origin and source thereof . While each article iscomplete in itself, students are advised to study the entire series.—Editors.]

IN THREE PARTS—PART II

At some undetermined period in the remote past the "stone-age" people of Europe and other continents were succeeded by theso-called "megalithic" builders, who erected extensive monumentsand other edifices, having one common feature, the use of im-mense blocks of stone in their construction. Some writers havesuggested that these people, "just emerging from a state of lowmentality"—this is said because the theory of evolution demandslow mentality of people living in a great antiquity, just as it de-mands ignorance of writing in people living in the time of Moses—were attempting, in their earlier works, at least, to constructartificial replicas of natural caverns, etc. Yet, in spite of theirconfident derogation of the intelligence of these ancient builders,our modern wise men are quite unable to indicate how it was thatsuch "undeveloped" creatures were able to move and place theirvast stone blocks, without the aid of machinery. To any mindnot determined to prefer hypotheses to facts the inference is un-escapable that, either these ancients possessed and used machineryof some description, or else that they were marvelously efficient inthe performance of hard and difficult tasks. In either case theirevident performances were entirely incompatible with the notionthat they were only a few degrees removed from apes, and show,if nothing beside, a degree of skill and industry that indicates ahigh average of intelligence. When we consider that, in someof the walls built by these people, there are stones weighing notless than one hundred tons, we may appreciate the gravity of theproblems that confronted, and were solved by, these people of"low mentality."

The term "megalithic" indicates a general habit of buildingwith large blocks of stone, which was manifested among peoplesinhabiting widely separated regions and localities over the earth'ssurface, and during an extended period of time. The general

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characteristics of this architectural genus are so marked in all ex-amples, however widely separated, that many authorities have heldthat one race or stock, widely scattered over the earth, must haveoriginated them all. Whatever may have been the real facts, wefind that the situation, as it affects the present discussion, is en-tirely the same. For example, if certain local builders in Europe,Africa, America, or elsewhere, had shown a curious and incom-prehensible ability to handle huge masses of stone and constructvast buildings, it might have been possible to attribute their featsto some accidental development of power. When, however, peo-ples in both hemishperes are found to have done precisely the samethings in the same ways, there can be no reasonable doubt that,if of one race or not, they possessed in common a high order ofmechanical knowledge, which is certainly indicative of intelligenceand achievement. Characteristically, also, these ancient buildersused no mortar or cement in laying the blocks together. In the"Cyclopean" masonry, as it is called, the blocks were not squared,as in "ashlar" work, but left in irregular shapes, each one beingcut or chipped to fit neatly into the hollows or projections ofits neighbors. In many cases such joints are so exactly cut andfitted, that, even after the lapse of ages, they are scarcely sep-arated.

Even more striking than any of these facts, we find that someof the most ancient buildings on earth are constructed on princi-ples entirely scientific. Thus, as several writers have gone tosome pains to indicate, such structures are Stonehenge in England,and the Great Pyramid of Gizeh in Egypt—particularly the lat-ter—are constructed with evident knowledge of astronomy andcomplete observance of the principles of geometry. Although, assome argue, these buildings may be modern, as compared withsome others, of which we have evidence, they were erected bypeople already firmly grounded in the basic sciences. Archaeologyaffords no certain clue as to even the approximate period at whichknowledge of such sciences was first manifested. It knows noth-ing of the beginning or origin of civilization, nor of any of itscharacteristic arts. Consequently, speaking from the scientificpoint of view, which regards facts, and not mere theories, wemust insist that we have no data upon which to base a historyof any of these matters, or to pass a judgment upon the grade ofintelligence attained by any tribe of people at any period of theearth's career, apart from the works that they have left. A fewof these have been mentioned.

One thing we may assert in this connection, even in the faceof uncertainties of other varieties. This is that there are diver-sities in character, mentality and interest in various subjects be-tween races of mankind, precisely as between individuals. Thus,throughout history, there have always been tribes and nations

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possessed, apparently, of a superior faculty for developing thearts and sciences, and originating highly-organized social and eco-nomic structures. These have, accordingly, become "civilized."Other tribes, because of unfavorable environment—such as wouldoccasion constant warfare, etc., or aggravate the struggle forexistence, as in an inclement climate—or because of deficientinterest or capacity in the direction of acquiring knowledge, havelingered in barbarism and savagery. Yet, in the last analysis,the difference between these two varieties of people lies mostlargely in their differing abilities to improve, or "ornament," theirphysical surroundings. The savage attains a certain satisfactionin life, and a certain permanence of type in the fact that he issatisfied with crude surroundings and few "ornamentations." Thecivilized man, on the other hand, tends to develop arts, sciencesand institutions, which, while intelligible objects of interest andeffort, do not ensure the happiness of the individual, nor yetmaintain the permanence of the type. Indeed, the most certainthing that we know of the civilizations of the past is that theyhave ceased to exist, been wiped out, root and branch, and leftvarying weak influences on their successors. Thus, some savageraces, as, for example, the Polynesians and some Africans,strongly suggest a civilized, or semi-civilized, ancestry in theremnants of apparently complicated customs and traditions whichthey maintain, and in the vestigial arts which they still practice.

The story of the rise of civilizations, their progress for a cer-tain period, long or short, and their inevitable decay has been re-peated over and over throughout time. Probably the ancientBabylonians, Egyptians, Persians and Hindus all supposed thattheir institutions would endure forever, and that they had achievedthe humanly ultimate; yet the outcome was far otherwise. Theirdescendants, where such remain, show no capacity to emulatetheir achievements, or to continue their traditions. The maladyof race-degeneration is fatal to all resumption of lost glories. Itis possible, also, that the widely-dispersed builders of Cyclopeanmasonry supposed that their world migrations must ensure theirpermanent importance in history ; yet, today, we know nothingabout them, except that they erected huge buildings and fortifi-cations, which have defied the elements for thousands of years.In many cases civilizations have been overthrown by hostile in-vasions, just as the Persians and Greeks subjected the Egyptians,and as the barbarians of northern and eastern Europe overthrewthe Roman empire. Yet, before such fate could fall, there was along and progressive stage of degeneration, of race-senility, inwhich we must see the real cause of the nation's death.

The civilization of China, which has evidently existed forthousands of years, is an example of a somewhat different orderof culture. This nation ceased, apparently, to originate new meth-

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ods and activities, after a certain degree of institutional develop-ment had been achieved, and acquired, instead, a habit of conser-vatism, which suggests the lines of development followed by"primitives," such as savages and "barbarians," rather than bypeople capable of high achievements in the arts and sciences. Itwas, in a certain sense, however, a source of real strength andstability; for, in every condition of perplexity, the national atten-tion has been called to the "wisdom of the ancients," whichmeans, in effect, the nation's own original strength and self-sufficiency. This habit may yet work mightily in making Chinaa world-power. Whatever defects may be indicated in this typeof civilization, numerous elements embodied in it are distinctlyadmirable; some, also, strongly suggestive of adherence to theprinciple that civilization, considered, in the broadest sense, as anartificial environment for human life, has no other raison d'etre,nor any better use or significance, than safeguarding the well-being of all members of society, and affording the means for pre-serving knowledge. Such, at least, seems to be the theory basingthe Chinese culture.

Although notoriously defective in safeguarding the interestsand happiness of the individual, the present civilization of thedominant races—that, characteristically, of the so-called "Ger-manic" nations—has proven uniquely efficient in utilizing thelearning of the past. Because, in a very real sense, the "heir of allthe ages," our civilization has achieved an unprecedented degreeof culture in several particulars. Yet, as we must not forget, theadvantage derives from the concentration of knowledge, frommanifold sources, among the peoples living in a certain definitearea of the inhabited world—the region surrounding the Mediter-ranean—and its preservation in the cultures and literatures ofsuch distinct races as Egyptians, Arabians, Greeks, and, finally,Romans, rather than from the original and unaided efforts,through the ages, of the present dominant stocks in northern andwestern Europe. Curiously enough, these nations have figuredimportantly in world affairs for not more than 1,000 years, andseveral of them have emerged from barbarism within a very fewcenturies. In the beginning, indeed, they were, like the Japaneseof more recent times, recipients of an alien culture, which they havefinally shown themselves capable of assimilating and cultivatingto a remarkable degree. They are not, therefore, the highest fin-ished product of an alleged evolution process, but the legatees ofa number of well-timed clevises, the beneficiaries of a series ofamazingly fortunate events, which may be attributed to "chance,"or to "providence," as one may feel inclined.

Even with all the advantages of inheritance and opportunity,the strong and restless peoples of Europe have enjoyed their dis-tinctive preeminence, not for centuries, but, rather, for a very few

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decades only. For fully 1,000 years, until the era known as the"revival of learning," Europeans differed from other races, onlyas barbarians of one stock differ from those of others. In theiracts, customs, laws and manners, at least, they showed few of thesymptoms of that "biological" improvement over their predeces-sors, of which we hear so much nowadays. Except for the factthat the peoples of northern Europe, being a strong and healthystock, had always manifested certain native good traits—thesewere mentioned even by the Roman historians and travelers—not-ably, a laudable absence of the squalid cruelty and bloodthirstiness,sadly conspicuous among Latins and orientals, there were fewreal approximations to humanitarian sentiment and practice. Nordid their advances in the arts and sciences exceed those in morals.Even the important acquisitions of printing and gunpowder, de-rived no one knows how or whence—and there are several tradi-tions on both—were not immediately developed with the rapiditythat has characterized the "progress" of the last century and ahalf. In the pure sciences, also, although certain students, profit-ing by the labors of Greeks and Arabians, had gone far towarddiscovering the true principles of astronomy and geography, theirefforts had only slight effect in advancing contemporary culture.The people who solemnly tried and executed pigs and donkeysfor "infractions" of the moral and civil law, also sternly penalized"heresies concerning the antipodes."

Thus, actually until the beginning of the sixteenth century,the nations of Europe had achieved no greater culture than wascompatible with piratical warfare and the broils and mutual per-secuting activities of rival sects and cults. How greatly they wouldhave advanced toward intelligence and sanity, had their conditionremained unchanged to the present time, can not be determinedby any conclusive line of argument: their beginnings, at least,were scarcely promising. But, at this stage, occurred another ofthe remarkable series of events—"coincidences"?—that have donequite as much to give the impetus to European civilization, as eventhe innate force and genius of its peoples, who were already wor-rying to find suitable outlets for their energies and ambitions. Thiswas the discovery—for modern Europeans—of the continentsof America and the western hemisphere. Almost as in a singleday, a new and immense outlet was afforded for human effortand enterprise. The exploration and conquest of a new world,with the corresponding opportunities for quickly amassing wealthand power, attracted the energies previously expended in neigh-borhood strifes and the extermination of heretics. Nor can wediscount the importance of this new world-factor. It meant thealmost explosive expansion of Spain to the dimensions of an im-perial power. It involved, also, rapid improvements in ship-build-ing and the methods of navigation, in order that oceans might be

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crossed in safety by people who had seldom sailed very far outsideof the land-horizon; and because—"necessity being always themother of invention"—national and personal aggrandizement de-pended on improvement of the sailor's art. In fact, the world ofhumanity, in Europe at least, awoke to the vision of unprecedentedopportunities, and proceeded to grow great and develop their tal-ents—not because they would have so behaved, or had the oppor-tunity so to behave, eventually, under circumstances not includinga new world to be overrun and subjugated, and not because theywere of higher or finer quality than their predecessors in otherclimes and of other races, but, and precisely, because they werethe world's greediest and most rapacious materialists, also itsfiercest and strongest fighters. Unlike the Chinese, who, as tradi-tion asserts, had discovered the new world some centuries beforeColumbus, they were profoundly moved by the prospect of un-limited adventure, pillage and the easy acquisition of wealth. TheSpaniards, who had but recently overthrown the Moors, and de-stroyed, with them, a civilization superior to their own, enteredwith keen relish upon the conquest of the Aztecs and Peruvians,both wealthy, and, at the very worst estimate, very little behindthem, either in the arts, or in the cultivation of morals. Nor werethe activities of the English, French, and Dutch in the New Worldentirely of a missionary or benevolent character: their opportuni-ties were merely less conspicuously favorable. The English, hav-ing succeeded at a late date to the least promising portions of theAmericas—for adventurers, conquerors, and other "quick-profit"seekers—utilized their territories as convenient depositories fortheir non-conformists, Papists, Quakers, bankrupt debtors (quitethe least popular of the lot), and other unappreciated and trou-blesome elements, and, thus relieved of some internal distresses,continued to progress as rivals of France, Spain and other king-doms.

Except for the new order of things following on the greatachievement of Columbus, and on the activities of his successors,explorers, treasure-seekers, conquerors and empire-builders, allof whom made a great stir in the world, the new disturbing ten-dencies, crystalized in individualism and habitual insurgency,might have continued longer in the religious lines, and workedthemselves out in such movements as the "Reformation" and other"heretical" disturbances. As it happened, however, partly becausethe newer religious and ecclesiastical systems included certainsociological and political ideals, but, quite as much, probably, be-cause of the general unrest and large activities of the times, pro-tests and uprisings against the older order of things constantly in-creased in number and violence. Thus, within a very few de-cades after the king of England had renounced the pope, the peo-ple of England rebelled against their king; establishing the short-

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lived Protectorate. This revolution came as a logical consequenceon the wide acceptance of the new teachings of the reformers, andwas only a part of the more general movement involving all thetroublesome "non-conformity" and separatism of the seventeenthcentury; notably, the persistent defiance of Britain's New Englandcolonies, which undoubtedly aggravated the final split in theAmerican War of Independence. But, quite characteristic of itstime and associations, the revolt of the American colonies, pro-fessedly and ostensibly a protest against British "tyranny," af-forded an eminent opportunity for sundry radical idealists, such asPaine and Jefferson, who saw in the expulsion of English auth-ority the incoming of a regime of "liberty, equality and frater-nity," as a veritable prelude to the remoter Millennium. Encour-aged by the American success in arms, the European advocates ofthe "rights of man" waxed yet bolder in their propaganda, andachieved the full fruition of their teachings in the volcanic vio-lence of the French Revolution, which created the "opportunity"for Napoleon and his conquests. Within a very few years, as an-other result in the same lines, occurred the South American up-rising, and the defection of all the New World colonies of Spain—except in the West Indies islands—which was the final step inthe dismemberment of its vast empire, until its own time thegreatest in history.

Thy Holy Will

It was so easy, Lord, thy will to do,When all about my pathway roses grew;When sunshine fell upon me all the while,It was so easy, Lord, to sing and smile!

To hear in life but mirthful melodies,To know not pain nor grievous memories,It was so easy—basking in the sun—To say, dear Lord, thy holy will be done!

But now a shadow hovers in my way;The flowers are dead that budded yesterday;The path is dark and cold: Is it thy gift,This agonizing load I am to lift?

If such the purport of thy holy will,Dear Lord, e'en to the summit of life's hillHelp me to be still worthy of thy trust,To lift, to laugh, to love: thy will is just.1ieber city, utah

Ila Fisher