INTRODUCTION.   vii

to biographical study, and his study of the comparative worth of different races, and the influences that affect the natural ability of nations, must command the attention of historians and politicians. In his concluding paragraph he says: "Our personalities are not so independent as our self-consciousness leads us to believe. We may look upon each individual as something not wholly detached from its parent source,-as a wave that has been lifted and shaped by normal conditions in an unknown, illimitable ocean. There is decidedly a solidarity as well as a separateness in all human, and probably in all lives whatsoever ; and this consideration goes far, as I think, to establish an opinion that the constitution of the living universe is a pure theism, and that its form of activity is what may be described as co-operative. It points to the conclusion that all life is single in its essence, but various, ever-varying, and inter-active in its manifestations, and that men and all other living animals are active workers and sharers in a vastly more extended system of cosmic action than any of ourselves, much less of them, can possibly comprehend. It also suggests that they may contribute, more or less unconsciously, to the manifestation of a far higher life than our own." This work was followed and confirmed by Mr. Galton's next book, !' English Men of Science: their Nature and Nurture" (1874), in which he gave an account of the ancestry, early education, health, stature, temperament, religious opinions, etc., of one hundred and eighty leading men of science, derived from their own answers to an elaborate series of questions. He completely proved all and more than all he had previously advanced as to the effects of inheritance, and incidentally showed how unanimous scientific men were in their dislike of the old-fashioned system of grammar school education.

Meanwhile, in addition to his active work on the Geographical Society, Mr. Galton served the British Association as Honorary General Secretary from 1863 to 1868, and was President of its Geographical Section in 1862 and 1872, of the Anthropological subsection of Biology in 1877, and of the Anthropological Section in 1885, after its separation from Biology. After having long been an important member, he became President of the Anthropological Institute in 1885, which office he continued to hold till 1888. His presidential addresses and other papers in connection with these societies have all marked distinct advances in anthropological science.

In 1883 Mr. Galton published what may be regarded as his most