INTRODUCTION LTHOUGH, as we have seen, there is no com mon measure of Mind and Matter, the connections between the two are so intimate that, in organised beings, any change in the one entails a corresponding change in the other. This is a principle which has long been accepted in the Science of Man. A quarter of a century ago Professor Schaffhausen expressed it in these words: "One of the weightiest doctrines in Anthropology is the constant correlation between intellectual capacity and physical organisation." That branch of Anthropology called Somatology is devoted to the investigation of the human body, its measurements, structure, and functions, as they differ in individuals, groups, and races, for the purpose of defining and explaining this correlation. The expressions of the individual mind are largely the reflex of its environment, of the external impulses, stimuli, and conditions which surround it. These are physical, measurable, quantitative, and therefore within the province of the "natural" sciences. In their relation to the individual, they mostly belong to the domain of "experimental" psychology; but as they influence the group and decide its constitution they form an important branch of ethnic psychology also. The natural history of the Mind is chiefly the study of its environments, its milieu. But that term is to be taken in its widest sense. The nearest environment of my mind is my body. Indeed, it is the only environment of which I have positive knowledge. As John Stuart Mill well said, "I know my own feelings with a higher certainty than I know aught else." Hence the physical constitution of the individual is that which has primary importance. That may be considered first as an individual question, without going beyond the circumstances of the personal life and health, a purely somatic investigation. We may next inquire how many of his peculiarities the individual owes to his ancestors, which will bring up the questions of heredity, hybridity, and others, including mental as well as physical traits. His debt is large to these, but still larger, say some writers, to his contemporaries, the associates with whom he has been thrown from birth. These are his "people," the "group" of which He is modified in a thousand ways he is a member. by this "demographic" environment. All these his ancestors, fellows, and his own body -are "human influences. Beyond them lies the great world of other beings and of unconscious forces, the animals and plants, the land and water, the clime and spot, which make up his "geographic" environment. How dependent is he upon these! How utterly they often control his thoughts and actions! Each of these I shall endeavour to estimate in their influence on the individual, not as an individual, but as a member of a group; and on the group itself, as an independent, psychic entity, nowise identical in character with any individual. |