The Philosophy of History. Friedrich von Schlegel
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itself may be included in the number of those lakes that bear very evident traces of a volcanic origin. The supposition, however, which we have ventured to make, must not be looked upon in the light of a formal hypothesis, but rather as a question dictated by a love of enquiry, and by a desire for the further elucidation of a subject not yet sufficiently understood.
Thus have I now taken a general survey of the early condition of the globe, considered as the habitation of man, and as far as was necessary for that object; and in this rapid sketch, I have endeavoured, as far as was possible for a layman, to place in the clearest light the most remarkable and best attested facts and discoveries of geology, with a constant attention to the testimony of primitive and historical tradition. No longer embarrassed by these physical discussions, we may now proceed to meet the main question: "What relation hath man to this his habitation—earth; what place doth he occupy therein; and what rank doth he hold among the other creatures and cohabitants of this globe, what is his proper destiny upon, and in relation to, the earth, and what is it which really constitutes him Man?"
The absolute, and, for that reason, Pagan system of natural philosophy spoken of above, has indeed in these latter times had the courage, laudable perhaps in the perverse course which it had taken, to rank man with the ape, as a peculiar species of the general kind. When in its anatomical investigations, it has numbered the various characteristics of this human ape, according to the number of its vertebræ, its toes, &c. it concedes to man, as his distinguishing quality, not what we are wont to call reason, perfectibility, or the faculty of speech, but "a capacity for Constitutions!" Thus man would be a liberal ape! And so far from disagreeing with the author of this opinion, we think man may undoubtedly become so to a certain extent, although the idea that he was originally nothing more than a nobler or better disciplined ape is alike opposed to the voice of history, and the testimony of natural science. If in the examination of man's nature we will confine our view exclusively to the lower world of animals, I should say that the possible contagion and communication of various diseases, and organic properties and powers of animals, would prove in man rather a greater sympathy and affinity of organic life and animal blood with the cow, the sheep, the camel, the horse and the elephant, than with the ape. Even in the venomous serpent and the mad dog, this deadly affinity of blood and this fearful contact of internal life exist in a different and nearer degree, than have yet been discovered in the ape. The docility too, of the elephant and other generous animals, bears much stronger marks of analogy with reason than the cunning of the ape, in which the native sense of a sound, unprejudiced mind will always recognize an unsuccessful and abortive imitation of man. The resemblance of physiognomy and cast of countenance in the lion, the bull, and the eagle, to the human face—a resemblance so celebrated in sculpture and the imitative arts, and which was interwoven into the whole mythology and symbolism of the ancients—this resemblance is founded on far deeper and more spiritual ideas than any mere comparison of dead bones in an animal skeleton can suggest.
The extremes of error, when it has reached the height of extravagance, often accelerate the return to truth; and thus to the assertion that man is nothing more than a liberalized ape, we may boldly answer that man, on the contrary, was originally, and by the very constitution of his being, designed to be the lord of creation, and, though in a subordinate degree, the legitimate ruler of the earth and of the world around him—the vice-gerent of God in nature. And if he no longer enjoys this high prerogative to its full extent, as he might and ought to have done, he has only himself to blame; if he exercises his empire over creatures rather by indirect means and mechanical agency than by the immediate power and native energy of his own intellectual pre-eminence, he still is the lord of creation, and has retained much of the power and dignity he once received, did he but always make a right use of that power.
The distinguishing characteristic of man, and the peculiar eminence of his nature and his destiny, as these are universally felt and acknowledged by mankind, are usually defined to consist, either in reason, or in the faculty of speech. But this definition is defective in this respect, that, on one hand, reason is a mere abstract faculty, which to be judged, requires a psychological investigation or analysis; and that on the other hand, the faculty of speech is a mere potentiality, or a germ which must be unfolded before it can become a real entity. We should therefore give a much more correct and comprehensive definition, if, instead of this, we said: The peculiar pre-eminence of man consists in this—that to him alone among all other of earth's creatures, the word has been imparted and communicated. The word actually delivered and really communicated is not a mere dead faculty, but an historical reality and occurrence; and for that very reason, the definition we have given stands much more fitly at the head of history, than the other more abstract one.
In the idea of the word, considered as the basis of man's dignity and peculiar destination, the internal light of consciousness and of our own understanding, is undoubtedly first included—this word is not a mere faculty of speech, but the fertile root whence the stately trunk of all language has sprung. But the word is not confined to this only—it next includes a living, working power—it is not merely an object and organ of knowledge—an instrument of teaching and learning; but the medium of affectionate union and conciliatory accommodation, judicial arbitrement and efficacious command, or even creative productiveness, as our own experience and life itself manifest each of those significations of the word; and thus it embraces the whole plenitude of the excellencies and qualities which characterize man.
Nature too, has her mute language and her symbolical writing; but she requires a discerning intellect to gain the key to her secrets, to unravel her profound enigmas; and, piercing through her mysteries, interpret the hidden sense of her word, and thus reveal the fulness of her glory. But he, to whom alone among all earth's creatures, the word has been imparted has been for that reason constituted the lord and ruler of the earth. As soon, however, as he abandons that divine principle implanted in his breast; as soon as he loses that word of life which had been communicated and confided to him; he sinks down to a level with nature, and, from her lord, becomes her vassal; and here commences the history of man.
LECTURE II.
ON THE DISPUTE IN PRIMITIVE HISTORY, AND ON THE DIVISION OF THE HUMAN RACE.
"In the beginning man had the word, and that word was from God."
Thus the divine, Promethean spark in the human breast, when more accurately described and expressed in less figurative language, springs from the word originally communicated or intrusted to man, as that wherein consist his peculiar nature, his intellectual dignity and his high destination.—The pregnant expression borrowed above from the New Testament, on the mystery and internal nature of God, may with some variation, and bating, as is evident, the immense distance between the creature and the Creator, be applied to man and his primitive condition; and may serve as a superscription or introduction to primitive history in the following terms: "In the beginning man had the word, and that word was from God—and out of the living power communicated to man in and by that word, came the light of his existence."—This is at least the divine foundation of all history—it falls not properly within the domain of history, but is anterior to it.—To this position the state of nature among savages forms no valid objection; for that this was the really original condition of mankind is by no means proved, and is arbitrarily assumed; nay, on the contrary, the savage state must be looked upon as a state of degeneracy and degradation—consequently not as the first, but as the second, phenomenon in human history—as something which, as it has resulted from this second step in man's progress, must be regarded as of a later origin.
In history, as in all science and in life itself the principal point on which every thing turns, and the all-deciding problem, is whether all things should be deduced from God, and God himself should be considered the first, nature the second, existence—the latter holding undoubtedly a very important place;—or, whether, in the inverse order, the precedency should be given to nature, and, as invariably happens in such cases, all things should be deduced from nature only, whereby the deity, though not by express, unequivocal words, yet in fact is indirectly