On the contrary, I proved by evidence, which Mr. Mivart does not
venture to impugn, that Suarez, in his "Tractatus de Opere sex
Dierum," expressly rejects St. Augustin's and St. Thomas' views; that
he vehemently advocates the literal interpretation of the account of
the creation given in the Book of Genesis; and that he treats with
utter scorn the notion that the Almighty could have used the language
of that Book, unless He meant it to be taken literally.
Mr. Mivart, therefore, either has read Suarez and has totally
misrepresented him--a hypothesis which, I hope I need hardly say, I do
not for a moment entertain: or, he has got his information at second
hand, and has himself been deceived. But in that case, it is surely
an imprudence on his part, to reproach me with having "read Suarez _ad
hoc_, and evidently without the guidance of anyone familiar with
that author." No doubt, in the matter of guidance, Mr. Mivart has the
advantage of me. Nevertheless, the guides who supplied him with his
references to Suarez' "Metaphysica," while they left him in ignorance
of the existence of the "Tractatus," are guides with whose services
it might be better to dispense; leaders who wilfully shut their eyes,
being even more liable to lodge one in a ditch, than blind leaders.
At the time when the essay on "Methods and Results of Ethnology" was
written, I had not met with a passage in Professor Max Müller's "Last
Results of Turanian Researches"[1] which shows so appositely, that
the profoundest study of philology leads to conclusions respecting the
relation of Ethnology with Philology, similar to those at which I had
arrived in approaching the question from the Anatomist's side, that I
cannot refrain from quoting it:
[Footnote 1: LONDON, _April_ 1873.]
"Nor should we, in our phonological studies, either expect or
desire more than general hints from physical ethnology. The
proper and rational connection between the two sciences is
that of mutual advice and suggestion, but nothing more. Much
of the confusion of terms and indistinctness of principles,
both in Ethnology and Phonology, are due to the combined
study of these heterogeneous sciences. Ethnological race
and phonological race are not commensurate, except in
ante-historical times, or perhaps at the very dawn of history.
With the migration of tribes, their wars, their colonies,
their conquests and alliances, which, if we may judge from
their effects, must have been much more violent in the
ethnic, than even in the political, period of history, it is
impossible to imagine that race and language should continue
to run parallel. The physiologist should pursue his own
science unconcerned about language."
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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