Inquiries into human faculty and its developmentGalton, Francis
Science
Inquiries into human faculty and its development
Galton, Francis
Ability; Eugenics
Aversion is taught as easily as terror, when the object of it is
neutral and not especially attractive to an unprejudiced taste. I
can testify in my own person to the somewhat rapidly-acquired and
long-retained fancies concerning the clean and unclean, upon which
Jews and Mussulmans lay such curious stress. It was the result of my
happening to spend a year in the East, at an age when the brain is
very receptive of new ideas, and when I happened to be much
impressed by the nobler aspects of Mussulman civilisation, especially,
I may say, with the manly conformity of their every-day practice to
their creed, which contrasts sharply with what we see among most
Europeans, who profess extreme unworldliness and humiliation on one
day of the week, and act in a worldly and masterful manner during
the remaining six. Although many years have passed since that time, I
still find the old feelings in existence--for instance, that of
looking on the left hand as unclean.
It is difficult to an untravelled Englishman, who has not had an
opportunity of throwing himself into the spirit of the East, to
credit the disgust and detestation that numerous every-day acts,
which appear perfectly harmless to his countrymen, excite in many
Orientals.
To conclude, the power of nurture is very great in implanting
sentiments of a religious nature, of terror and of aversion, and in
giving a fallacious sense of their being natural instincts. But it
will be observed that the circumstances from which these influences
proceed, affect large classes simultaneously, forming a kind of
atmosphere in which every member of them passes his life. They
produce the cast of mind that distinguishes an Englishman from a
foreigner, and one class of Englishman from another, but they have
little influence in creating the differences that exist between
individuals of the same class.
HISTORY OF TWINS.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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