Chap. IV. Moral Sense, 1 1 5 



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" going to a distant tribe to spear a woman, to satisfy his sense 

 " of duty to bis wife. I told him that if he did so, I would 

 "' send him to prison for life. He remained about the farm for 

 " some months, but got exceedingly thin, and complained that 

 " he could not rest or eat, that his wife's spirit was haunting 

 " him, because he had not taken a life for hers. I was in- 

 u exorable, and assured him that nothing should save him if he 

 " did." Nevertheless the man disappeared for more than a year, 

 and then returned in high condition ; and his other wife told 

 Dr. Landor that her husband had taken the life of a woman 

 belonging to a distant tribe; but it was impossible to obtain 

 legal evidence of the act. The breach of a rule held sacred by 

 the tribe, will thus, as it seems, give rise to the deepest feelings, 

 —and this quite apart from the social instincts, excepting in so 

 far as the rule is grounded on the judgment of the community. 

 How so mtmy strange superstitions have arisen throughout the 

 world we know not ; nor can we tell how some real and great 

 crimes, such as incest, have come to be held in an abhorrence 

 (which is not however quite universal) by the lowest savages. It 

 is even doubtful whether in some tribes incest would be looked on 

 with greater horror, than would the marriage of a man with a 

 woman bearing the same name, though not a relation. " To 

 " violate this law is a crime which the Australians hold in the 

 " greatest abhorrence, in this agreeing exactly with certain 

 " tribes of North America. When the question is put in either 

 " district, is it worse to kill a girl of a foreign tribe, or to marry 

 " a girl of one's own, an answer just opposite to ours would be 

 given without hesitation." z9 AVe may, therefore, reject the 

 belief, lately insisted on by some writers, that the abhorrence of 

 incest is due to our possessing a special God -implanted con- 

 science. On the whole it is intelligible, that a man urged by 

 so powerful a sentiment as remorse, though arising as above 

 explained, should be led to act in a manner, which he has been 

 taught to believe serves as an expiation, such as delivering 

 himself up to justice. 



Man prompted by his conscience, will through long habit 

 acquire such perfect self-command, that his desires and passions 

 will at last yield instantly and without a struggle to his social 

 sympathies and instincts, including his feeling for the judgment of 

 his fellows. The still hungry, or the still revengeful man will not 

 think of stealing food, or of wreaking his vengeance. It is possible, 

 or as we shall hereafter see, even probable, that the habit of self- 

 jommand may, like other habits, be inherited. Thus at last man 



" F.. B. Tylor in ' Contemporary Review,' April, 1873, p. 707. 



