"nothing remains but the water at the bottom of the well"; 1 and in New Zealand native women sometimes killed themselves because they had been rebuked for negligence in cooking or for want of care towards a child.2 Like other injuries, an insult not only affects the feelings of the victim, but arouses sympathetic resentment in outsiders, and is consequently disapproved of as wrong. Among the Maoris, if anybody wantonly tried to hurt another's feelings, it was immediately repressed, and "such a person was spoken of as having had no parents, or, as having been born (laid) by a bird." In the Malay Archipelago, "among some of the tribes, abusive language cannot with impunity be used even to a slave. Blows are still more intolerable, and considered such grievous affronts, that, by law, the person who receives them is considered justified in putting the offender to death." 4 The natives of the Tonga Islands hold no bad moral habit to be more "ridiculous, depraved, and unjust, than publishing the faults of one's acquaintances and friends ..; and as to downright calumny or false accusation, it appears to them more horrible than deliberate murder does to us for it is better, they think, to assassinate a man's person than to attack his reputation." 5 According to the customary laws of the Fantis in West Africa, "where a person has been found guilty for using slanderous words, he is bound to retract his words publicly, in addition to paying a small fine by way of compensation to the aggrieved party. Words imputing witchcraft, adultery, immoral conduct, crime, and all words which sound to the disreputation of a person of whom they are spoken are actionable." Among the Aztecs of ancient Mexico he who wilfully calumniated another, thereby seriously injuring his Bradley-Birt, Chota Nagpore, p. 104. Cf. Dalton, Descriptive Ethnology of Bengal, p. 206. 2 Colenso, op. cit. p. 57. 3 Ibid. p. 53. 4 Crawfurd, op. cit. iii. 119 sq. 5 Mariner, Natives of the Tonga Islands, i 163 sq. Sarbah, Fanti Customary Laws, P. 94. reputation, was condemned to have his lips cut off, and sometimes his ears also; whilst in Tezcuco the slanderer suffered death. In the Chinese penal code a special book is provided for the prevention and punishment of opprobrious and insulting language, as "having naturally a tendency to produce quarrels and affrays."2 Among Arabs all insulting expressions have their respective fines ascertained in the kady's court. It is said in the Talmud:"Let the honour of thy neighbour be to thee like thine own. Rather be thrown into a fiery furnace than bring any one to public shame." + 5 The Roman Law of the Twelve Tables contained provisions against libellers, and throughout the whole history of Roman law an attack upon honour or reputation was deemed a serious crime. As for wrongful prosecution, which may be regarded as an aggravated form of defamation, the law of the later Empire required that any one bringing a criminal charge should bind himself to suffer in case of failure the penalty that he had endeavoured to call down upon his adversary. Among Teutonic peoples defamatory words and libelling were already at an early date punished with a fine. The Salic Law decrees that a person who calls a freeborn man a "fox" or a "hare or a dirty fellow," or says that he has thrown away his shield, must pay him three solidi;9 whilst, according to one text of the same law, it cost 188 solidi (or nearly as much as was paid for the murder of a Frankish freeman) 10 to call a freeborn woman a witch or a harlot, in case the truth of the charge could not be proved.' Bancroft, Native Races of the Pacific States, ii. 463. 2 Ta Tsing Leu Lee, p. 354 n. 3 Burckhardt, Notes on the Bedouins and Wahabys, p. 70 sq. Deutsch, Literary Remains, p. 57. 5 Lex Duodecim Tabularum, viii. 1. Digesta, xlvii. 10. 15. 25. Codex Justinianus, ix. 36. Hunter, Exposi tion of Roman Law, p. 1069 sq. Mommsen, Römisches Strafrecht, p. 794 19. 7 Gunther, Die Idee der Wieder 11 vergeltung, i. 141 sqq. Mommsen, op. cit. p. 496 sq. 8 Wilda, Strafrecht der Germanen, p. 776 sqq. Nordström, Bidrag till den svenska samhällss-författningens historia, ii. 293 sqq. Stemann, Den danske Retshistorie indtil Christian V.'s Lov, p. 686 sq. Brunner, Deutsche Rechtsgeschichte, ii. 672 sqq. Lex Salica, xxx. 4, 5, 2; Hessel's edition, col. 181 sqq. 10 Ibid. xv. col. 91 sqq. The oldest English laws exacted bot and wite from persons who attacked others with abusive words.1 In the thirteenth century, in almost every action before an English local court, the plaintiff claimed compensation not only for the "damage," but also for the "shame" which had been done him. We further find that regular actions for defamation were common in the local courts; whereas in later days the ecclesiastical procedure against defamatory speech seems to have been regarded as the usual, if not the only, engine which could be brought to bear upon cases of libel and slander. In England, as in Rome, there was a strong feeling that men should not make charges which they could not prove: before the Conquest a person might lose his tongue, or have to redeem it with his full wer, if he brought a false and scandalous accusation; and under Edward I. a statute decreed that if the appellee was acquitted his accuser should lie in prison for a year and pay damages by way of recompense for the imprisonment and infamy which he had brought upon the innocent.4 The condemnation of an insult is greatly influenced by the status of, or the relations between, the parties concerned. Among the Goajiro Indians of Colombia a poor man may be insulted with impunity, when the same. treatment to a rich man would cause certain bloodshed." In Nias an affront is punished with a fine, which varies according to the rank of the parties. The Chinese penal code lays down that a person who is guilty of addressing abusive language to his or her father or mother, or father's parents, or a wife who rails at her husband's parents or grandparents, shall be strangled ; and the same punishment is prescribed for a slave who abuses his master. 1 Laws of Hlothhaere and Eadric, 11. 2 Pollock and Maitland, History of English Law till the Time of Edward I. ii. 537. 3 Ibid. ii. 538. Stephen, History of the Criminal Law of England, ii. 409. 4 Pollock and Maitland, op. cit. ii. 539. Simons, Exploration of the Goajira Peninsula,' in Proceed. Roy. Geo. Soc. N.S. vii. 786. 6 von Rosenberg, Der malayische Archipel, p. 167. 7 Ta Tsing Leu Lee, sec. cccxxix. P. 357. Ibid. sec. cccxxvii. p. 356. According to the Laws of Manu, a Kshatriya shall be fined one hundred panas for defaming a Brâhmana, a Vaisya shall be fined one hundred and fifty or two hundred panas, and a Sûdra shall suffer corporal punishment; whereas a Brahmana shall pay only fifty panas for defaming a Kshatriya, twenty-five for defaming a Vaisya, and twelve for defaming a Sûdra. In ancient Teutonic law the fines for insulting behaviour were graduated according to the rank of the person offended.2 The starting-point of the Roman law was that an injuria-which was preeminently an affront to the dignity of the person could not be done to a slave as such, only to the master through the medium of his slave; and even in later times, in the case of trifling injuries, such as mere verbal insults, the master had no action, unless by leave of the Praetor, or unless the insult were meant for the master himself. These and similar variations spring from the same causes as do corresponding variations in the case of other injuries dealt with above. But there are also special reasons why social superiority or inferiority influences moral opinions concerning offences against persons' self-regarding pride. The respect due to a man is closely connected with his station, and in the case of defamation the injury suffered by the loss of honour or reputation is naturally proportionate to the esteem in which the offended party is held. At the same time the harmfulness of an insult also depends upon the reputation of the person who offers it. According to the Gotlands Lag, one of the ancient provincial laws of Sweden, a slave can not only be insulted with impunity, but has himself to pay no fine for insulting another person -obviously because he was too degraded a being to be able to detract from anybody's honour or good name. 1 Laws of Manu, viii. 267 sq. Cf. Gautama, xii. 8 sqq. It is also said that "a once-born man (a Sûdra), who insults a twice-born man with gross invective, shall have his tongue cut out; for he is of low origin" (ibid. viii. 270. See also Institutes of Vishnu, v. 23; Gautama, xii. 1; Âpastamba, ii. 10. 27. 14). 2 Keyser, Efterladte Skrifter, ii. pt. i. 295. 3 Hunter, Exposition of Roman Law, p. 164. Mommsen, Römisches Strafrecht, p. 786, n. 3. 4 Digesta, xlvii. 10. 15. 35. Hunter, op. cit. p. 165. 5 Gotlands-Lagen, i. 19. 37. 5 5 The condemnation of such conduct as is offensive to other persons' self-regarding pride includes condemnation of pride itself, when displayed in an excessive degree; whereas the opposite disposition-modesty which implies regard for other people's "self-feeling," is praised as a virtue. The Fijians say of a boasting person, "You are like the kaka (parrot); you only speak to shout your own. name. On the other hand, among the Tonga Islanders "a modest opinion of oneself is esteemed a great virtue, and is also put in practice." 2 Confucius taught that humility belongs to the characteristics of a superior man.3 Such a man, he said, is modest in his speech, though he exceeds in his actions; he has dignified ease without pride, whereas the mean man has pride without a dignified ease; he prefers the concealment of his virtue, when it daily becomes more illustrious, whereas the mean man seeks notoriety when he daily goes more and more to ruin." So also humility has a distinguished place in the teachings of Lao-tsze :-"I have three precious things which I hold fast and prize, namely, compassion, economy, and humility"; "He who knows the glory, and at the same time keeps to shame, will be the whole world's valley. eternal virtue will fill him, and he will return home to Taou." In the Book of the Dead the soul of the ancient Egyptian pleads, "I am not swollen with pride." According to Zoroastrianism, the sin of pride has been created by Ahriman." Overbearingness was censured in ancient Scandinavia,10 Greece," and Rome. During our prosperity, says Cicero, "we ought with great care to 7 |