We sometimes see it attempted to strengthen the plea for the essential equality of the Negro by reference to the Japanese, who are declared not inferior, though "they would have been called an inferior, a hopelessly submerged race, half a century ago. But they have made a sudden change. This has been no slow Darwinian development, but a _per saltum_ evolution of a new intellectual type--if we may not rather call it a spring blossoming out of ages of winter. There is now every appearance that a similar efflorescence is coming with the negro race--only they have begun with utter ignorance and slavery, and have more to learn, and find less encouragement". Now, in this notion of "efflorescence" there is an element of truth. There _are_ bloom-periods in the life of the race, as of trees and of men. We speak of the Periclean, the Augustan, the Elizabethan age. "For greater dooms do greater doles obtain,"[19] was said in the ancient mystery. "Spirits are not finely touch'd but to fine issues". Extraordinary junctures and crises in the life of the individual and of the race may rouse slumbering powers into vehement activity. But that such admitted facts will bear the weight of inference thrown upon them, we must stoutly deny. The thorn and the thistle may indeed bloom and fructify, but they will not bear grapes or figs. They will bring forth fruit after their kind. Greeks were Greeks before Marathon or Salamis, before even Homer or Agamemnon. Witness the outburst of Arabic genius after Mohammed! Yet Bagdad and Granada could never become like unto Athens or Alexandria. But why multiply illustrations? Efflorescence is one thing, transmutation is another. "We seem to see such a paroxysmal impulse now taking possession of the negro race in this country"! We gravely doubt this "sudden start upward"; we strongly suspect things are not what they seem. We label all such statements "important, _if true_".[20] [19] Hippolytus, _Philosophoumena_, V. 8. [20] That they are a total inversion of the truth is proved elaborately in Chapter Five.