Note 261 — Chapter VII · THE GODS AND THE SONS OF GOD

If they did not, then their remote ancestors, the Mousterians who, as we have seen, also had a larger average brain than modern man, were probably the discoverers of the means of fire-production in Europe. O. Peschel, op. cit., p. 142, is of the condescending opinion that the exceptional men of to-day show no more intelligence than men of the Glacial Period (I maintain that in view of their smaller cranial development exceptional modern men must show less). Nevertheless, his is a striking admission: “In sharpness of understanding the men of the Ice Age who discovered fire were not behind a Copernicus, a Kepler, a Champollion, or a Faraday, and we arrive at the conclusion that the highest degree of brain power which a few exceptional men, here and there, have shown in modern times, is not beyond that shown by great men of classical or biblical antiquity, and the latter not beyond that of men of the Ice Age.” Seeing, however, that it is le premier pas qui coûte, Professor Keith’s conclusion is much more fair. He says (Ancient Types of Man, p. 112): “We of a later generation, with a fertility of mechanical invention, can little understand the great brain which was necessary to make the first steps towards human civilisation.”