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Show 190 THE DESCENT OF 1\fAN. PAP.T I. blances in other less important or quite unimportant points. The o-reater number of naturalists who have taken into con~ideration the whole structure of man, including his mental faculties, have followed Blumenbach and Cnvier, and have placed man in a separate Order, un~er the title of the Bimana, and therefore on an equality with the Orders of the Quadrumana, Carnivora, &c. Recently many of our best naturalists have recurred to the view first propounded by Linnmus, so remarkable for his sagacity, and have placed rna~ in the same. Order with the Quadrumana, under the title of the Pnmates. The justice of this conclusion will be admitted if, in the first place, we bear in mind the remarks just made on the comparatively small importance for classification of the great development of the brain in man; bearing, also, in mind that the strongly-marked differences between the skulls of man and the Quadrumana (lately insisted upon by Bischoff, Aeby, and others) apparently follow from their differently developed brains. In the second place, we must remember that nearly all the other and more important differences between man and the Quadrumana are manifestly adaptive in their nature, and relate chiefly to the erect position of man; such as the structure of his hand, foot, and pelvis, the curvature of his spine, and the position of his head. 'The family of seals offers a good illustration of the small importance of adaptive characters for classification. These animals differ from all other Carnivora in the form of their bodies and in the structure of their limbs, far more than does man from the higher apes : vet m every sysliem, from that of Cuvier to the most re\:ent <me by Mr. Flower,4 seals are ranked as a mere family ' 'Proc. Zoolog. Soc.' 1869, p. 4. CHAP. VI. AFFINITIES AND GENEALOGY. 191 in the Order of the Carnivora. If man had not been his own classifier, he would never have thouO'ht of founding a separate order for his own reception. 0 It would be beyond my limits, and quite beyond my knowledge, even to name the innumerable points of structm·e in which man agrees with the other Primates. Our great anatomist and philosopher, Prof. Huxley, has fully discussed this subject, 5 and has come to the conclusion that man in all parts of his organisation differs less from the higher apes, than these do from the lower members of the same group. Consequently there "is " no justification for placing man in a distinct order." In an early part of this volume I brought forward various facts, shewing how closely man agrees in constitution with the higher mammals; and this agreement, no doubt, depends on our close similarity in minute structure and chemical composition. I gave, as instances, our liability to the same diseases, and to the attacks of allied parasites; our tastes in common for the same stimulants, and the similar effects thus produced, as well as by various drugs ; and other such facts. As small unimportant points of resemblance between man and the higher apes are not commonly noticed in systematic worh:s, and as, when numerous, they clearly reveal our relationship, I will specify a few such points. The r~lative position of the features are manifestly the same m man and the Quadrumana ; and the various emotions are displayed by nearly similar movements of the muscles and skin, chiefly above the eyebrows and round the mouth. Some few expressions are indeed almost the same, as in the weeping of certain' kinds of mo~keys, ~nd in the laughing noise made by others. durmg whiCh the corners of the mouth are drawn back- 3 'Evidence as to Man's Place in Nature,' 1863, p. 70, et passim. |