On the Diversity of Origin of the Human Races [pp. 603-642]

1850.] On the Diversity of Origin of the Human Races 603
ART. VI.-1. The Christian Examiner and Religious Mis cellany. March, 1850. On the Geographical Distribution
of Animals: July 1850. On the -)iversity of Origin of the
Human Races. By Prof. Louis Agassiz.
2. T/le UVnity of the Human Races, proved to be the Doctrine
of Scripture, Reason and Science. With a Review of the
Present Position and Theory of Prof. Agassiz. By Rev.
Thomas Smythe, D. D. New York: George P. Putnam.
155 Broadway. 1850.
3. Researches into the Physical History of Mankind. By
James Cowles Prichard, M.D. F. R. S. &c.
4. Atlas Ethnographique du Globe, ou Classification des Peu ples Anciens et Modernes d' apres leurs Langues, Par
Adrien Balbi, Prof. et cet: A Paris.
5. Mithridates: oder Allgemeine Sprachenkunde et cet: Yon
Johann Christoph Adelung, und Dr. Johann Severin
Vater.
6. Philological Proofs of the Original Unity and Recent Ori gin of the Human Race. Derived from a comparison of the
Languages of Asia, Europe, Africa and America. By Ar thur James Johnes, Esq. London: 1846.
We think the protracted controversy touching the Origin
and Unity of the Human Race is rapidly approaching its substantial settlement. This opinion is founded, not so much
upon the earnestness with which it is now waged, as upon the
progress which has been made, in shifting the grounds of the
dispute, from the question of the diversity of species, to that
of the diversity of origin, of the races of men, as well as upon
the direct and inevitable issue which is now joined in
regard to the bearing of the Scriptures upon the present
state of the main question. This change in the whole
aspect and bearings of the discussion, has been unexpectedly
brought about chiefly by the agency of Prof. Agassiz, whose
name and authority are so justly influential in questions of
Science.
We shall not enter into the curious and instructive history
of this controversy in its earlier stages; except to say that the