next book we shall proceed to consider the population of
Europe.
S e c t io n III.—General Observations on the intellectual
Faculties of the African Nations.
I cannot finish the concluding reflections which form the
subject of the present chapter, without advertingipina general
point of. view, to the opinion of those who consider the native
races of Africa as mentally inferior to the rest of mankind. I
shall briefly survey the evidence deducible with reference to
this question from the preceding account of the African nations,
and from some other arguments which appear to throw
light upon it.
It is well known that many celebrated writers on natural'
history, and particularly on that of, man,: have regarded -the
natives of Africa as inferior to Europeans in intellect and in
the organization contrived for the developement or exercise
of the intellectual faculties. Among these writers, the most
eminent are Camper, Soemmering, Cuvier, Lawrence, White,
Virey, and M. Bory de St. Vincent. By all of these it is
maintained that Negroes make a decided approach towards
the natural inferiority of the monkey tribe-—that they were
endowed by the Creator with the noble gift of reason in a very
inferior degree, when compared with the more favoured inhabitants
of Europe.
It has been well observed by a late writer th atit is important?
to elucidate this question if possible, on several accounts; and
that if it were proved to be correct, the Negro ought to occupy
a different situation in society from that which has been declared
to belong to him bythe British government, and we
may add,-by the unanimous acclaim of the British nation.
In reality the Negro—if his capabilities and aptitudes are such
as some of the writers above mentioned, particularly White
and Bory de St. Vincent, argue?—is only fitted, by his natural
constitution and endowments, for a servile state; and the
zealous friends of his tribe, Wilberforce and Clarkson and
others, who are thought to have obtained an exalted station
among thé', greats benefactors of the human race, must be regarded
as Swell-meaning enthusiasts, who, under an imagined
principleuof philanthropy, have argued with tqo much success
for the emancipationof domestic animals—of creatures plainly
destined by nature do remain in that condition, and to serve
the lords of the êïêatioh in common, with his oxen, his horses,
and dogs:.-?' If SQfen.ce has led to this conclusion, and itijs the
true and just-inference/ftfom the sootier it is admitted
the better: the opinion which is opposed to it must be an unreasonable
and injurious .'prejudice:
It may be observed, that those- writers <who maintain the
mental -inferiority of the African have not- extended that allegation
to all-the native races of Africa. They hav4$pestricted
it, for the mosM-pWt; -or have principally ascribed it to the.
Negroes , of thedntertropical region, ièpmprisin^: however, thd
Hottentots^
J have endeavoured to show that the Kafir, or woolly-haired
tribes In the southern parts of Africa, cannot be considered as
a pépple permanently distinct from the -Nj^grpesp sdnae tribes
of the Kafir race, namely those who live-mean:-or within the
tropic, having every attribute that camfefe ascribed to theimost*
-genuine Negroes. The Kafirs, in fact; are'^pt distinguished
by any decided or elearly-marked lirfe.^tiThey are,, as Dr.
Knox has very properly termed them,^only improveff -Ne-
groes, or Negroes of a -temperate, and mountainous -region.
Those who maintain that a natural and permanent1 .inferiority
belongs, as a general attribute, to theNegroes, and that they
form a particular race of a lower rank in the - creation than
white men, must extend this assertion to all the woolly-haired
nations of Africa. They must, indeed, comprehend notonly the
Hottentots and Negroes, usually so termed, but likewise the
Kafirs : all these tribes have physical characters in -common,
which appear to be much more distinctive and permanent than
any characteristics which separate them: ,
But if it is pretended that all the woolly-haired races in
Africa are uniformly inferior in intellect to other tribes of men,
the assertion is at most a gratuitous, one. „ Nay, it is contradicted
bythe most clear and decisive^testimony. Travellers in
South Africa have been struck by the proofs of vigour and