4C50 THE ASCENT OF MAN 



That morality in general has something to do 

 with the relations of people to one another is 

 evident, as everyone knows, from the mere deriva- 

 tion of the word. Mores^ morals are in the first 

 instance customs^ the customs or ways which 

 people have when they are together. Now, the 

 Family is the first occasion of importance where 

 we get people together. And as there are not 

 only a number of people in a Family, but different 

 kinds of people, there will be a variety in the re- 

 lations subsisting between them, in the customs 

 which stereotype the most frequently repeated 

 actions necessitated by these relations, and in the 

 moods and attitudes of mind accompanying them. 

 Leaving out of sight differences of kind among 

 brothers and sisters, consider the probably more 

 divergent and certainly more dominant influences 

 of Father and Mother. What the relation of child 

 to Mother has crystallized into we have suflficiently 

 marked — it is a relation of direct dependence, and 

 its product is Love. But the Father is a wholly 

 different influence. What attitude does the Child 

 take up in this austerer presence, and what ways 

 of acting, what customs, mores^ morals, are en- 

 grained in the child's mind through it ? The 

 acknowledged position of the Father in most early 

 tribes is head of the Family. To the children, 



