146 THE MISMEASURE OF MAN
adult size" (1904, vol. 2, p. 649). A. F. Chamberlain, his chief dis-
ciple, opted for the paternalistic mode: "Without primitive peoples,
the world at large would be much what in small it is without the
blessing of children."
The recapitulationists extended their argument to an astonish-
ing array of human capacities. Cope compared prehistoric art with
the sketches of children and living "primitives" (1887, p. 153): "We
find that the efforts of the earliest races of which we have any
knowledge were quite similar to those which the untaught hand of
infancy traces on its slate or the savage depicts on the rocky faces
of cliffs." James Sully, a leading English psychologist, compared
the aesthetic senses of children and savages, but gave the edge to
children (1895, p. 386):
In much of this first crude utterance of the aesthetic sense of the child
we have points of contact with the first manifestations of taste in the race.
Delight in bright, glistening things, in gay things, in strong contrasts of
color, as well as in certain forms of movement, as that of feathers—the
favorite personal adornment—this is known to be characteristic of the sav-
age and gives to his taste in the eyes of civilized man the look of childish-
ness. On the other hand, it is doubtful whether the savage attains to the
sentiment of the child for the beauty of flowers.
Herbert Spencer, the apostle of social Darwinism, offered a pithy
summary (1895, pp. 89-90): "The intellectual traits of the uncivil-
ized... are traits recurring in the children of the civilized."
Since recapitulation became a focus for the general theory of
biological determinism, many male scientists extended the argu-
ment to women. E. D. Cope claimed that the "metaphysical char-
acteristics" of women were
... very similar in essential nature to those which men exhibit at an early
stage of development.... The gentler sex is characterized by a greater
impressibility;... warmth of emotion, submission to its influence rather
than that of logic; timidity and irregularity of action in the outer world.
All these qualities belong to the male sex, as a general rule, at some period
of life, though different individuals lose them at very various periods... •
Probably most men can recollect some early period of their lives when the
emotional nature predominated—a time when emotion at the sight of suf-
fering was more easily stirred than in maturer years.... Perhaps all men
can recall a period of youth when they were hero-worshippers—when they
felt the need of a stronger arm, and loved to look up to the powerful