clur. XL.] IN THE MAldT ARCHIPELAGO. 595 



We most of us believe that we, flie higher races, have 

 progressed and are progre^sinj:^. If so, there must be some 

 state of perfection, some ultimate goal, which we may 

 never reach, but to which all true progress must bring ua 

 nearer. What is this ideally perfect social state towards 

 wiiich mankind ever has been, and still is tending ? Our 

 best thinkers maintain, that it is a state of individual free- 

 dom and self-government, i-endered pos^sible by the equal 

 development and just balance of the intellectuah moml, 

 and physical parts of our nature, — a state in which we 

 shall each he so perfectly fitted for a social existence, 

 by knowing what is right, and at the same time feeling 

 an irresistible impulse to do what we know to l>e right, 

 that all laws and all punishments shaLL be imnecessary. 

 In such a state every man would iiave a sufficiently 

 well-balanced intellectual oi-ganization, to understand the 

 moral law in all its details, and would require no other 

 motive but the free impulses of his own nature to obey 

 that law. 



Now it is very remarkable, that among people in a very 

 low stage of civilization, we find some approach to such 

 a perfect social state. I have lived with communities of 

 sAvages in South America and in the East, who have no 

 laws or law courts but the public opinion of the village 

 freely expressed. Eacli man scrupulously respects the 

 rights of his fellow, and any infraction of those rights 

 rarely or never takes place. In such a community, all are 

 nearly eqiiaL There are none of those wide distinctions, 

 of education and ignomnce, wealth and povertj', master 

 and servant, which are the pniduct of our civilization; 

 there is none of that wide-spi^e^ division of labom*, which, 

 while it increases wealth, produces also conflicting iu- 

 terests ; there is not that severe competition and struggle 

 for existence, or for wealth, which the dense population of 

 civilized countries inevitably creates. All incitements to 

 great crimes are thus wanting, and petty ones are repressed, 

 partly by the influence of public opinion, but ehieily by 

 that natural sense of justice and of his neighbour's right, 

 which seems to be, in some degi"ee, iulierent in every race 

 of man, 



JSTow, although we have progressed vastly beyoiid the 

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