traits which it is the business of
history, as distinguished from biology, to study.

From this standpoint, all that the man is he owes to others; and what
the others are, they owe, in part, to him. Together, they make up the
social unit, at first the family or clan, itself becoming part of a
larger unit, a tribe, nation or people. The typical folk, or _ethnos_,
is a social unit, the members of which are bound together by certain
traits common to all or most, which impart to them a prevailing
character, an organic unity, specific peculiarities and general
tendencies.

You may inquire what these traits are to which I refer as making up
ethnic character. The answer cannot be so precise as you would like. We
are dealing with a natural phenomenon, and Nature, as Goethe once
remarked, never makes groups, but only individuals. The group is a
subjective category of our own minds. It is, nevertheless,
psychologically real, and capable of definition.

The _Ethnos_ must be defined, like a species of natural history, by a
rehearsal of a series of its characteristics, not by one alone. The
members of this series are numerous, and by no means of equal
importance; I shall mention the most prominent of them, and in the order
in which I believe they should be ranked for influence on national
character.

First, I should rank Language. Not only is it the medium of intelligible
intercourse, of thought-tranference,[TN-3] but thought itself is
powerfully aided or impeded by the modes of its expression in sound. As
"spoken language," in poetry and oratory, its might is recognized on all
hands; while in "written language," as literature, it works silently but
with incalculable effect on the character of a people.[10-1]

Next to this I should place Government, understanding this word in its
widest sense, as embracing the terms on which man agrees to live with
his fellow man and with woman, family, therefore, as well as society
ties. This includes the legal standards of duty, the rules of
relationship and descent, the rights of property and the customs of
commerce, the institutions of castes, classes and rulers, and those
international relations on which depend war and peace. I need not
enlarge on the profound impress which these exert on the traits of the
people.[10-2]

After these I should name Religion, though some brilliant scholars, such
as Schelling and Max Mueller,[10-3] have claimed for it the first place
as a formative influenc