Saint Paul Weekly Minnesotian

Are the Italians Degenerate?

This question is asked, and answered in the negative, in Edward Everett's last Ledger paper. He says:

"The cause of the unhappy state of things in Italy is not to be sought, as it is perhaps generally supposed in the degeneracy of the people. Trusting to the hasty generalization of tourists, who pass a few weeks in the large towns and see the outside of Italian life and manners—the indolence of the lazzaroni—the swarm of beggars and of monks, in some portions of the country—who see something and hear more of the dissoluteness of the manners in high life—and the want of occupation which must exist where there is but little commerce, few manufactures, and no political career, and almost all the springs of industry feel the pressure of arbitrary government, we hastily agree with them, that the people themselves must be degenerate. This, however, is far from being the case. The physical development of the population in Italy, male and female, is in the aggregate, as far as my observation has extended, quite equal to that of the population of any other part of Europe. Nowhere are finer forms or faces to be seen in places of public or private resort. The Italians are a temperate people, and the climate allows them to live much in the open air; and this in the large towns leads to social and companionable habits, and is everywhere favorable to health. In intellect they are surely not a degenerate race. Their universities still boast of accomplished men of science and distinguished scholars in all the faculties; and though the provision for popular education is in none of the Italian States to be compared with that which is made in Prussia, England, and this country, it is respectable in Tuscany, Sardinia, and even Lombardy; and about equal in the other parts of the Peninsula to what it is in most parts of Europe. I attended the meeting of the Association for the Promotion of Science in Italy, which was held at Florence in 1841. About a thousand persons were present, and it appeared to me that the discussions and the memoirs occupied fairly with those of similar bodies, at which I have been present in England and this country. At the close of its meeting the entire association was invited to dine by the Grand Duke, and conveyed in carriages at his expense to the halls where the entertainment was served. Each member also received a present of a bronze medal of Galileo, with a copy in quarto of a new volume of his experiments. Every branch of letters, except those which can exist only under free constitutions, flourish and have always flourished in Italy. Some of the most eminent writers, scientific and literary, of the present day, astronomers, physiologists, antiquaries, publicists, historians, poets, and writers of popular fiction, are Italians. Their museums and libraries are unsurpassed in Europe. Italy is still the land of art. In the highest walks of painting and sculpture she is excelled by foreigners, but there is an atmosphere of artistic culture, which still draws the foreign artist to her soil. Most of the distinguished German, English, French and American artists have studied their art in Italy. "In music she still reigns supreme, or divides the empire with Germany alone. Surely it is the extreme of arrogance or ignorance to speak of such a people as degenerate."