We can now appreciate the philosophic tone in which the Humboldts
use such terms as myths, fiction, and pretended tradition, in
reference to every account purporting to give us the origin of mankind—
Semitic narrations inclusive. On the real authority of the
latter, they doubtless held the same views as their great country
man, I d e ler :
Traditiones semiticse, quse in libris Veteris Testamenti depositse
sunt et conservatæ, haud quaquam sufficiunt, quîppe quia recentioris
sunt originis, omni fabularum.genere refertæ et nimis arcto terrarum
traetu circumscriptæ, prætereaque tarn indoles Hebræorum nationi
propiia quam diversorum, qui singulos libros composuerunt, aucto-
rum manifestum consiliüm doctrinam theocratiæ a sacerdotum corpore
quasi repræsentatæ condendi effeeerunt, ut veræ historiæ princi-
pia multis in locis aperte negligerentur.” 17
In common with their equally-renowned G-erman contemporary,
L e p s iu s , each, in his inquiries into the origin of humanity, “ leaves
aside the theological point of view, which has nothing to do with
science.” 18 “ The paradisiacal myth,” observes Prof. Tuch,19 “ has
been generally more profoundly understood by philosophers than by
theologians. Kant20 and Schiller21 have employed the Scripture
document in elucidating physiological inquiries on the progressive
development of mankind: both of these philosophers correctly
remark, that the myth does not represent a debasement or sinking
down from original perfection to imperfection—not a victory of
sensuality over reason; but, on the contrary, it manifests the adB
u n s e n : nor could one have credited à priori that his learned contributor is the same person
who wrote that excellent work, “ The Languages of the Seat of War” (London, 2d ed., 1855.)
I am not singular either in this opinion. A philologist of far severer and profounder
training than the above-named scholars, M. E r n e s t K en a n , of the Bibliothèque Impériale,
has already remarked : “ As for the ideas recently put forth by M. Mix-Miiller rdans leB
Outlines de M. Bunsen, t. I, p. 263 et suiv. 473 et suiv.) upon the division of tongues into
three families, Semitic, Arian, Touranian—this last containing everything which is neither
Arian nor Semitic !—and about the original unity of these three families, it is difficult to
see m them anything else than an act of complaisance towards views that are not his own •
and one likes to believe that the learned editor of the Rig-Veda would regret that a work
so little worthy of him should be too seriously discussed” (Histoire a Systeme comparé des
Langues Sémitiques, “ Ouvrage couronné par l’Institut,” 1 « partie, Paris, 1855, p. 466).
g H e rm a p io n , sive Rudimmta Hieroglyphic Velerum Ægyptiorum 'Literatures. Pars
prior, Lipsiæ, 4to, 1841 ; p. 3 of Introduction.
18 Types of Mankind, p. 233.
19 Kom™™tar über die Genesis, p. 61 : cited in “ Introduction to the Book of Genesis, &o.”
from the German of D r . P e t e r v o n B o h i e n ; edited b y J am e s H eywood M P i ’r s .
London, 1855^ II, p. 78.
20 Ifuthmasslicher Anfang des Menschengesehlecls (Probable Beginning of the Human
Race): Berliner Monatschrift, 1786, S1. 1.” Ibid.
» “ Etwas über die erste MenschengeseUschaft (On the First Human Society) • Sämmtliche
Werke, 1825, Band 16 —Heywood's Von Bohlen."
vancement of man from a state of comparative rudeness to freedom
and civilization. The historical individuality of Adam is no longer
maintained; he becomes the general representative of humanity.”
“ It is strange,” continues D ohm, “ that such pains have been
taken to trace to the Jews not only the origin of all the ideas of
science and religion which are found among eastern nations, but
even the commencement of every possible variety of usage, custom,
and ceremony: The small and circumscribed people of the Hebrews,'
who were generally despised, and who never maintained any intercourse
with other nations, by trade or by conquest, by religious
missionaries or by philosophical travellers, are supposed, according
to the dreams of certain learned men, to have supplied all Asia, and
from thence the . whole world, with religion, philosophy, and laws,
and even with manners and nlorals —not to mention Ethnography!
But, in Lutheran Germany, where thorough Hebraical scholarship
has liberated the public mind from the thraldom of ignorant priestcraft,
these reasonings are familiar to every reader of a “ Kosmos for
the People z”28
“Nothing remains but to embrace the opinion, that the distinct
characteristics of the human race were imprinted at all times; or
that, in general, mankind does not descend from one man and one
woman, from Adam and Eve, but from several human pairs; and to
answer this question was already our purpiose in the present chapter.
But many of my readers will now say, that God, in the Bible, has
created only one human pair. Perfectly correct. I reply to this only,
that God did not write the Bible, but that Moses may have written
the Pentateuch ; and that whether he actually did write (these five,
books), scholars do not know themselves. But we know, quite certainly,
that plants and animals were created at the same time, and
not in several days of creation. We know, very positively, that,
without the sun, no day or night interchanges; and that the sun
was not created on the fourth, but on the first day. As certainly
do we know, that neither plants nor animals could have lived previously
to that creation of the sun; that the beasts, the worms, and
the reptiles, were not created later than the birds; and that Adam
and Eve were not alone the first human beings upon earth.”
Ihe Semitic race,” holds the latest and ablest historian of their
language, R e n a n ,23 “ is recognized almost uniquely through its negative
characteristics : it has neither mythology [of its own] nor epopee,
neither science nor philosophy, neither fiction nor plastic arts, nor
22 G i e b e l , Geschichte des Weltalls der Erde und ihrer Bewohner; Ein Kosmos furs Volke:
LeiPzig, 1851.
23 Kistoire des Langues Sémitiques (supra, note 16), p. 16, 25-6.