under consideration the closest affinity to the apes. Only a few points of proximate resemblance have been made out between it and the human skull and these are strictly peculiar to the latter in the fœtal state. The cranium of the human fœtus, however, possesses the lofty dome, the forward position of the frontal respectively to the outer orbital processes, the greatest width at the parietal centres of ossification, and the vertical occipital, which are so conspicuous in the adult, but which are remarkably non-characteristic of the Neanderthal skull. Besides, so closely does the fossil cranium resemble that of the Chimpanzee, as to lead one to doubt the propriety of generically placing it with Man. To advocate this view, however, in the absence of the facial and basal bones, would be clearly overstepping the limits of inductive reasoning.
Moreover, there are considerations of another kind which powerfully tend to induce the belief that a wider gap than a mere generic one separates the human species from the Neanderthal fossil.
The distinctive faculties of Man are visibly expressed in his elevated cranial dome—a feature which, though much debased in certain savage races, essentially characterizes the human species. But, considering that the Neanderthal skull is eminently simial, both in its general and particular characters, I feel myself constrained to believe that the thoughts and desires which once dwelt within it never soared beyond those of the brute.
The Andamaner, it is indisputable, possesses but the dimmest conceptions of the existence of the Creator of the Universe: his ideas on this subject, and on his own moral obligations, place him very little above animals of marked sagacity;[1] nevertheless, viewed in connection with the strictly human conformation of his cranium, they are such as to specifically identify him with Homo sapiens. Psychical endowments of a lower grade than those characterizing the Andamaner cannot be conceived to exist: they stand next to brute benightedness.
Applying the above argument to the Neanderthal skull, and considering that it presents only an approximate reesemblance to the cranium of man, that it more closely conforms to the brain-case of the Chimpanzee, and, moreover, assuming, as we must, that the simial faculties are unimprevable—incapable of moral and theositic conceptions—there seems no reason to believe otherwise than that similar darkness characterized the being to which the fossil belonged.[2]
- ↑ It has often been stated that neither the Andamaners, nor the Australians, have any idea of the existence of God: there are circumstances, however, recorded of these races which prevent my accepting the statement as an absolute truth.
- ↑ A paper advocating the views contained in this article was read at the last meeting of the British Association, held in Newcastle-on-Tyue. In that paper I called the fossil by the name of Homo Neanderthalensis; but I now feel strongly inclined to believe that it is not only specifically but generically distinct from Man.
