Publisher's Synopsis
Excerpt from The Passing of the Great Race, or the Racial Basis of European History
European history has been written in terms of nationality and of language, but never before in L terms of race; yet race has played a far larger part than either language or nationality in moulding the destinies of men; race implies heredity and hered ix ity implies all the moral, social and intellectual characteristics and traits which are the springs of politics and government.
Quite independently and unconsciously the au thor, never before a historian, has turned this historical sketch into the current of a great bio logical movement, which may be traced back to the teachings of Galton and Weismann, beginning in the last third of the nineteenth century. This movement has compelled us to recognize the superior force and stability of heredity, as being more enduring and potent than environment. This movement is also a reaction from the teach ings of Hippolyte Taine among historians and of Herbert Spencer among biologists, because it proves that environment and in the case of man educa tion have an immediate, apparent and temporary in?uence, While heredity has a deep, subtle and permanent in?uence on the actions of men.
Thus the racial history of Europe, which forms the author's main outline and subject and which is wholly original in treatment, might be para phrased as the heredity history of Europe. It is history as in?uenced by the hereditary impulses, predispositions and tendencies which, as highly distinctive racial traits, date back many thousands of years and were originally formed when man was still in the tribal state, long before the advent of civilization.
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