main, a characteristic of the individual, not of race or
of sex. It is probable that brain efficiency (speaking from the
biological standpoint) has been, on the average, approximately the
same in all races and in both sexes since nature first made up a good
working-model, and that differences in intellectual expression are
mainly social rather than biological, dependent on the fact that
different stages of culture present different experiences to the
mind, and adventitious circumstances direct the attention to different
fields of interest.

II

In approaching the question of the parity or disparity of the mental
ability of the white and the lower races, we bring to it a fixed and
instinctive prejudice. No race views another race with that generosity
with which it views itself. It may even be said that the existence of
a social group depends on its taking an exaggerated view of its own
importance; and in a state of nature, at least, the same is true of
the individual. If self-preservation is the first law of nature, there
must be on the mental side an acute consciousness of self, and a habit
of regarding the self as of more importance than the world at large.
The value of this standpoint lies in the fact that, while a wholesome
fear of the enemy is important, a wholesome contempt is even more so.
Praising one's self and dispraising an antagonist creates a confidence
and a mental superiority in the way of confidence. The vituperative
recriminations of modern prize-fighters, the boastings of the Homeric
heroes, and the _bogan_ of the old Germans, like the back-talk of the
small boy, were calculated to screw the courage up; and the Indians of
America usually gave a dance before going on the war-path, in which
by pantomime and boasting they magnified themselves and their past,
and so stimulated their self-esteem that they felt invincible. In
race-prejudice we see the same tendency to exalt the self and the
group at the expense of outsiders. The alien group is belittled by
attaching contempt to its peculiarities and habits--its color, speech,
dress, and all the signs of its personality. This is not a laudable
attitude, but it has been valuable to the group, because a bitter and
contemptuous feeling is an aid to good fighting.

No race or nation has yet freed itself from this tendency to exalt
and idealize itself. It is very difficult for a member of western
civilization to understand that the orientals regard us with a