A family, a tribe,
or a nation, which has largely recruited itself by adopted members,
cannot be the same as one which has never practised adoption at all, but
all whose members come of the original stock. But the influence which
the adopting community exercises upon its adopted members is far greater
than any influence which they exercise upon it. It cannot change their
blood; it cannot give them new natural forefathers; but it may do every
thing short of this; it may make them, in speech, in feeling, in
thought, and in habit, genuine members of the community which has
artificially made them its own. While there is not in any nation, in any
race, any such thing as strict purity of blood, yet there is in each
nation, in each race, a dominant element--or rather something more than
an element--something which is the true essence of the race or nation,
something which sets its standard and determines its character,
something which draws to itself and assimilates to itself all other
elements. It so works that all other elements are not co-equal elements
with itself, but mere infusions poured into an already existing body.
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