the consumption, an overplus arises, which, according to well-known principles, increases itself, and eventually becomes a fund out of which, immediately or remotely, every one is supported who does not create the wealth upon which he lives. And now it is that the existence of an intellectual class first becomes possible, because for the first time there exists a previous accumulation, by means of which men can use what they did not produce, and are thus enabled to devote themselves to subjects for which at an earlier period the pressure of their daily wants would have left them no time. Thus it is that of all the great social improvements the accumulation of wealth must be the first, because without it there can be neither taste nor leisure for that acquisition of knowledge on which, as I shall hereafter prove, the progress of civilization depends. Now, it is evident that among an entirely ignorant people, the rapidity with which wealth is created will be solely regulated by the physical peculiarities of their country. At a later period, and when the wealth has been capitalized, other causes come into play; but until this occurs, the progress can only depend on two circumstances: first on the energy and regularity with which labour is conducted, and secondly on the returns made to that labour by the bounty of nature. And these two causes are themselves the result of physical antecedents. The returns made to labour are governed by the fertility of the soil, which is itself regulated partly by the admixture of its chemical components, partly by the extent to which, from rivers or from other natural causes, the soil is irrigated, and partly by the heat and humidity of the atmosphere. On the other hand, the energy and regularity with which labour is conducted, will be entirely dependent on the influence of climate. This will display itself in two different ways. The first, which is a very obvious consideration, is, that if the heat is intense, men will be indisposed, and in some degree unfitted, for that active industry which in a milder climate they might willingly have exerted. The other consideration, which has been less noticed, but is equally important, is, that climate influences labour not only by enervating the labourer or by invigorating him, but also by the effect it produces on the regularity of his habits.* Thus we find that no people living in a very northern latitude have ever possessed that steady and unflinching industry for which the inhabitants of temperate regions are remarkable. The reason of this becomes clear, when we remember that in the more northern countries the severity of the weather, and, at some seasons, the deficiency of light, render it impossible for the people to continue their usual out-of-door employments. The result is, that the working-classes, being compelled to cease from their ordinary pursuits, are rendered more prone to desultory habits; the chain of their industry is as it were broken, and they lose that impetus which long-continued and uninterrupted practice never fails to give. Hence there arises a national character more fitful and capricious than that possessed by a people whose climate permits the regular exercise of their ordinary industry. Indeed, so powerful is this principle, that we may perceive its operation even under the most opposite circumstances. It would be difficult to conceive a greater difference in government, laws, religion, and manners, than that which distinguishes Sweden and Norway on the one hand, from Spain and Portugal on the other. But these four countries have one great point in common. In all of them, continued agricultural industry is impracticable. In the two southern countries, labour is interrupted by the heat, by the dryness of the weather, and by the consequent state of the soil. In the two northern countries, the same effect is produced by the severity of the winter and the shortness of the days. The consequence is, that these four nations, though so different in other respects, are all remarkable for a certain instability and fickleness of character; presenting a striking contrast to the more regular This has been entirely neglected by the three most philosophical writers on climate: Montesquieu, Hume, and M. Charles Comte in his Traité de Législation. It is also omitted in the remarks of M. Guizot on the influence of climate, Civilisation en Europe, p. 97. and settled habits which are established in countries whose climate subjects the working-classes to fewer interruptions, and imposes on them the necessity of a more constant and unremitting employment.5 These are the great physical causes by which the creation of wealth is governed. There are, no doubt, other circumstances which operate with considerable force, and which, in a more advanced state of society, possess an equal, and sometimes a superior, influence. But this is at a later period; and looking at the history of wealth in its earliest stage, it will be found to depend entirely on soil and climate: the soil regulating the returns made to any given amount of labour; the climate regulating the energy and constancy of the labour itself. It requires but a hasty glance at past events, to prove the immense power of these two great physical conditions. For there is no instance in history of any country being civilized by its own efforts, unless it has possessed one of these conditions in a very favourable form. In Asia, civilization has always been confined to that vast tract where a rich and alluvial soil has secured to man that wealth without some share of which no intellectual progress can begin. This great region extends, with a few interruptions, from the east of Southern China to the western coasts of Asia Minor, of Phoenicia, and of Palestine. To the north of this immense belt, there is a long line of barren country which has invariably been peopled by rude and wandering tribes, who are kept in poverty by the ungenial nature of the soil, and who, as long as they remained on it, have never emerged from their uncivilized state. How entirely this depends on physical causes, is evident from the fact that these same Mongolian and Tartarian hordes have, at different periods, founded great monarchies in China, in India, and in Persia, and have, on all such oc 5 See the admirable remarks in Laing's Denmark, 1852, pp. 204, 366, 367; though Norway appears to be a better illustration than Denmark. In Rey's Science Sociale, vol. i. pp. 195, 196, there are some calculations respecting the average loss to agricultural industry caused by changes in the weather; but no notice is taken of the connexion between these changes, when abrupt, and the tone of the national character. casions, attained a civilization nowise inferior to that possessed by the most flourishing of the ancient kingdoms. For in the fertile plains of Southern Asia, nature has supplied all the materials of wealth; and there it was that these barbarous tribes acquired for the first time some degree of refinement, produced a national literature, and organized a national polity; none of which things they, in their native land, had been able to effect.7 In the same way, the Arabs in their own country have, owing to the extreme aridity of their soil, always been a rude and uncultivated people; for in their case, as in all others, great ignorance is the fruit of great poverty. But in the seventh century they conquered Persia; in the eighth century they conquered the best part of Spain;10 in the ninth century they conquered the Punjaub, and eventually nearly the whole of India. Scarcely were they This expression has been used by different geographers in different senses; but I take it in its common acceptation, without reference to the more strictly physical view of Ritter and his followers in regard to Central Asia. See Prichard's Physical History of Mankind, vol. iv. p. 278, edit. 1844. At p. 92, Prichard makes the Himalaya the southern boundary of Central Asia. 7 There is reason to believe that the Tartars of Tibet received even their alphabet from India. See the interesting Essay on Tartarian Coins in Journal of Asiatic Society, vol. iv. pp. 276, 277; and on the Scythian Alphabet, see vol. xii. p. 336. In Somerville's Physical Geography, vol. i. p. 132, it is said that in Arabia there are "no rivers;" but Mr. Wellsted (Travels in Arabia, vol. ii. p. 409) mentions one which empties itself into the sea five miles west of Aden. On the streams in Arabia, see Meiners über die Fruchtbarkeit der Länder, vol. i. pp. 149, 150. That the sole deficiency is want of irrigation appears from Burckhardt, who says (Travels in Arabia, vol. i. p. 240), “In Arabia, wherever the ground can be irrigated by wells, the sands may be soon made productive.' And for a striking description of one of the oases of Oman, which shows what Arabia might have been with a good river system, see Journal of Geographical Society, vol. vii. pp. 106, 107. Mr. Morier (Journal of Geog. Soc. vol. vii. p. 230) says, "the conquest of Persia by the Saracens A.D. 651." However, the fate of Persia was decided by the battles of Kudseah and Nahavund, which were fought in 638 and 641: see Malcolm's History of Persia, vol. i. pp. xvi. 139, 142. 10 In 712. Hallam's Middle Ages, vol. i. p. 369. 11 They were established in the Punjaub early in the ninth century, but did not conquer Guzerat and Malwa until five hundred years later. Compare Wilson's note in the Vishnu Purana, pp. 481, 482, with Asiatic_Researches, vol. ix. pp. 187, 188, 203. On their progress in the more southern part of the Peninsula, see Journal of Asiatic Society, vol. iii. pp. 222, 223, vol. iv. pp. 28-30. established in their fresh settlements, when their character seemed to undergo a great change. They, who in their original land were little else than roving savages, were now for the first time able to accumulate wealth, and, therefore, for the first time did they make some progress in the arts of civilization. In Arabia they had been a mere race of wandering shepherds;12 in their new abodes they became the founders of mighty empires,they built cities, endowed schools, collected libraries; and the traces of their power are still to be seen at Cordova, at Bagdad, and at Delhi.13 Precisely in the same manner, there is adjoining Arabia at the north, and only separated from it elsewhere by the narrow waters of the Red Sea, 12A race of pastoral barbarians." Dickinson on the Arabic Language, in Journal of Asiat. Society, vol. v. p. 323. Compare Reynier, Economie des Arabes, pp. 27, 28; where, however, a very simple question is needlessly complicated. The old Persian writers bestowed on them the courteous appellation of " a band of naked lizard-eaters." Malcolm's Hist. of Persia, vol. i. p. 133. Indeed, there are few things in history better proved than the barbarism of a people whom some writers wish to invest with a romantic interest. The eulogy passed on them by Meiners is rather suspicious, for he concludes by saying, "die Eroberungen der Araber waren höchst selten so blutig und zerstörend, als die Eroberungen der Tataren, Persen, Türken, u. s. w. in ältern und neuern Zeiten waren." Fruchtbarkeit der Länder, vol. i. p. 153. If this is the best that can be said, the comparison with Tartars and Turks does not prove much; but it is singular that this learned author should have forgotten a passage in Diodorus Siculus which gives a pleasant description of them nineteen centuries ago on the eastern side: Bibliothec. Hist. lib. ii. vol. ii. p. 137. ἔχουσι δὲ βίον λῃστρικὸν, καὶ πολλὴν τῆς ὁμόρου χώρας κατατρέχοντες λῃστεύουσιν, &c. 13 The only branch of knowledge which the Arabians ever raised to a science was astronomy, which began to be cultivated under the caliphs about the middle of the eighth century, and went on improving until "la ville de Bagdad fut, pendant le dixième siècle, le théâtre principal de l'astronomie chez les orientaux." Montucla, Histoire des Mathématiques, vol. i. pp. 355, 364. The old Pagan Arabs, like most barbarous people living in a clear atmosphere, had such an empirical acquaintance with the celestial phenomena as was useful for practical purposes; but there is no evidence to justify the common opinion that they studied this subject as a science. Dr. Dorn (Transactions of the Asiatic Society, vol. ii. p. 371) says, of a scientific knowledge of astronomy among them no traces can be discovered." Beausobre (Histoire de Manichée, vol. i. p. 20) is quite enthusiastic about the philosophy of the Arabs in the time of Pythagoras! and he tells us, that ces peuples ont toujours cultivé les sciences.' To establish this fact, he quotes a long passage from a life of Mohammed written early in the eighteenth century by Boulainvilliers, whom he calls "un des plus beaux génies de France." If this is an accurate description, those who have read the works of Boulainvilliers will think that France was badly off for men of genius; and as to his life of Mohammed, it is little |