representative of an offending community. In other cases, he is supposed to be polluted by a sin or a curse, owing to the contagious nature of sins and curses. The principle of social solidarity also accounts for the efficacy ascribed to vicarious expiatory sacrifices; but in many instances expiatory sacrifices only have the character of a ransom or bribe. And whilst thus our thesis as to the true direction of moral indignation is not in the least invalidated by facts, apparently, but only apparently, contradictory, it is, on the other hand, strongly supported by the protest which the moral consciousness, when sufficiently guided by discrimination and sympathy, enters against the infliction of penal suffering upon the guiltless. Such a protest is heard from various quarters, both with reference to human justice and with reference to the resentment of gods. Confucius taught that the vices of a father should not discredit a virtuous son.1 Plato lays down the rule that "the disgrace and punishment of the father is not to be visited on the children "; on the contrary, he says, if the children of a criminal who has been punished capitally avoid the wrongs of their father, they shall have glory, and honourable mention shall be made of them, "as having nobly and manfully escaped out of evil into good. According to Roman law, "crimen vel poena paterna nullam maculam filio infligere potest." thing," says Seneca, "is more unjust than that any one should inherit the quarrels of his father." + The Deuteronomist enjoins, "The fathers shall not be put to death for the children, neither shall the children be put to death for the fathers every man shall be put to death for his own ܙܙ 1 Lun Yü, vi. 4. Cf. Thai-Shang, 4. 2 Plato, Leges, ix. 854 sqq. Plato makes an exception for those whose fathers, grandfathers, and great-grandfathers have successively undergone the penalty of death: "Such persons the city shall send away with all their possessions to the city and country of their ancestors, retaining only and wholly "No sin." Lawgivers have been anxious to restrict the bloodfeud to the actual culprit. The Koran forbids the avenger of blood to kill any other person than the manslayer himself. In England, according to a law of Edmund, the feud was not to be prosecuted against the kindred of the slayer, unless they made his misdeed their own by harbouring him.3 So, also, in Sweden, in the thirteenth century, the blood-feud was limited by law to the guilty individual; and we meet with a similar restriction in Slavonic law-books.5 4 7 Passing to the vengeance of gods: according to the Atharva-Veda, Agni who forgives sin committed through folly and averts Varuna's wrath, also frees from the consequence of a sin committed by a man's father or mother." Theognis asks, “How, O king of immortals, is it just that whoso is aloof from unrighteous deeds, holding no transgression, nor sinful oath, but being righteous, should suffer what is not just?" According to Bion, the deity, in punishing the children of the wicked for their fathers' crimes, is more ridiculous than a doctor administering a potion to a son or grandson for a father's or grandfather's disease. The early Greek notion of an inherited curse was modified into the belief that the curse works through generations because the descendants each commit new acts of guilt." The persons who prohibited the sons of such as had been proscribed by Sylla, from standing candidates for their fathers' honours, and from being admitted into the senate, were supposed to have been punished by the gods for this injustice :-" In process of time," says Dionysius of Halicarnassus, "a blameless punishment, the avenger of their crimes, pursued 8 1 Deuteronomy, xxiv. 16. Cf. 2 Kings, xiv. 6. 2 Koran, xvii. 35. 3 Laws of Edmund, ii. 1. ii. 4 Nordström, Bidrag till den svenska samhälls-författningens historia, 103, 334, 335, 399. Wilda, op. cit. P. 174. 5 Kovalewsky, Coutume contemporaine, p. 248. In Montenegro, it was enjoined by Daniel I. (Post, Anfänge 8 Plutarch, De sera numinis vindicta, 19. Cf. ibid. 12; Cicero, De natura Deorum, iii. 38. 9 Farnell, op. cit. i. 77. Maine, Ancient Law, p. 127. 2 them, by which they themselves were brought down from the greatest height of glory, to the lowest degree of obscurity; and none, even, of their race are now left, but women. Among the Hebrews, Jeremiah and Ezekiel broke with the old notion of divine vengeance. The law of individual responsibility, which had already previously been laid down as a principle of human justice, was to be extended to the sphere of religion. "Every one shall die for his own iniquity: every man that eateth the sour grape, his teeth shall be set on edge." "The soul that sinneth, it shall die. The son shall not bear the iniquity of the father, neither shall the father bear the iniquity of the son the righteousness of the righteous shall be upon him, and the wickedness of the wicked shall be upon him.” 1 Dionysius of Halicarnassus, op. cit. viii. 80. 2 Cf. Montefiore, op. cit. p. 220; Kuenen, op. cit. ii. 35 sq. 3 Jeremiah, xxxi. 30. 4 Ezekiel, xviii. 20. For Talmudic views, see Deutsch, Literary Remains, P. 52. CHAPTER III THE NATURE OF THE MORAL EMOTIONS (continued) It was said in the last chapter that moral disapproval is a sub-species of resentment, and that resentment is, in its essence, an aggressive attitude of mind towards an assumed cause of pain. It was shown that, in the course of mental evolution, the true direction of the hostile reaction involved in moral disapproval has become more apparent. We shall now see that, at the same time, its aggressive character has become more disguised. This is evidenced by the changed opinion about anger and revenge which we meet at the higher stages of moral development. Retaliation is condemned, and forgiveness of injuries is laid down as a duty. The rule that a person should be forbearing and kind to his enemy has no place in early ethics. "Let those that speak evil of us perish. Let the enemy be clubbed, swept away, utterly destroyed, piled in heaps. Let their teeth be broken. May they fall headlong into a pit. Let us live, and let our enemies perish." Such were the requests which generally concluded the prayers of the Fijians.1 A savage would find nothing objectionable in them. On the contrary, he regards revenge as a duty,2 and forgiveness of enemies as a sign of weakness, or cowardice, or want of honour. Nor 1 Fison, quoted by Codrington, Melanesians, p. 147, n. I. 2 See infra, on Blood-revenge. 3 Cf. Domenech, Great Deserts of North America, ii. 97, 338, 438 (Da cotahs); Boas, First General Report on the Indians of British Columbia, p. 38; Baker, Albert N'yanza, i. 240 sq. (Latukas). is this opinion restricted to the savage world. In the Old Testament the spirit of vindictiveness pervades both the men and their god. The last thing with which David on his deathbed charged Solomon was to destroy an enemy whom he himself had spared.1 Sirach counts among the nine causes of a man's happiness to see the fall of his enemy. The enemies of Yahveh can expect no mercy from him, but utter destruction is their lot. To do good to a friend and to do harm to an enemy was a maxim of the ancient Scandinavians. It was taken for a matter of course by popular opinion in Greece 5 and Rome. According to Aristotle, "it belongs to the courageous man never to be worsted"; to take revenge on a foe rather than to be reconciled is just, and therefore honourable. Cicero defines a good man as a person "who serves whom he can, and injures none except when provoked by injury."7 Except in domestic life and in the case of friends, Professor Seeley observes, "people not only did not forgive their enemies, but did not wish to do so, nor think better of themselves for having done so. That man considered himself fortunate who on his deathbed could say, in reviewing his past life, that no one had done more good to his friends or more mischief to his enemies. This was the celebrated felicity of Sulla; this the crown of Xenophon's panegyric on Cyrus the Younger." 8 But side by side with the doctrine of resentment, we meet, among peoples of culture, the doctrine of forgive ness. "Recompense injury with kindness," says Lao-Tsze." According to Mencius, << a benevolent man does not lay up anger, nor cherish resentment against his brother, but only regards him with affection and love." 10 In the Laws of Manu the following rule is laid down for the twice-born man :- Against an angry man let him not in return show anger, let him bless 1 1 Kings, ii. 8 sq. 2 Ecclesiasticus, xxv. 7. 3 Cf. Montefiore, Hibbert Lectures, p. 40. 4 Maurer, Bekehrung des Norweg ischen Stammes, ii. 154 sq. 5 Maury, Histoire des religions de la Grèce antique, i. 383. Schmidt, Ethik der alten Griechen, ii. 309 sqq. 6 Aristotle, Rhetorica, i. 9. 24. Cf. Aeschylus, Choeophori, 309 sqq.; Plato, Meno, p. 71; Xenophon, Memorabilia, ii. 6. 35. 7 Cicero, De officiis, iii. 19. Cf. ibid. ii. 14; but cf. also ibid. i. 25, where it is said that nothing is more worthy of a great and a good man than placability and moderation. 8 Seeley, Ecce Homo, p. 273. 9 Tao Teh King, ii. 63. 1. According to Thai-Shang, 4, a bad man "broods over resentment without ceasing." 10 Mencius, v. I. 3. 2. |