The Evolution of Morality. 259 



with the rest of mankind as enemy. We may, 

 therefore, say that under the same conditions the 

 morality of savage and of civilized .peoples is 

 fundamentally the same. There is, however, a 

 further limitation. Life has no sacredness^r se 

 among many savages ; and children and old men, 

 as useless members of the community, are, under 

 the stern law of necessity or of custom, crystal 

 lized from it frequently put to death. This, 

 however, must not be confounded with murder ; 

 since among primitive peoples children fall under 

 the category of property, and are, therefore, like 

 slaves or other chattels, at the absolute disposi 

 tion of the head of the house, as is very forci 

 bly illustrated in early Roman law. With these 

 qualifications and explanations, our proposition 

 in its final form may be thus expressed: The 

 fighting men, actual and potential, in every un 

 civilized community recognize the same rights, 

 obligations, and duties towards one another as 

 constitute the essence of civilized morality. You 

 never find man without a moral nature, a nature 

 essentially like our own ; but the objects he in 

 cludes within the scope of its outgoings vary, and 

 as women and children were (sometimes at least) 

 regarded as property before they were regarded 

 as persons, the ethics of the family may be called 



