ABORTION, INFANTICIDE, KILLING THE OLD
The able-bodied and the burdens.--The advantages and
disadvantages of the aged. Respect and contempt for them.--
Abortion and infanticide.--Relation of parent and child.--
Population policy.--The burden and benefit of children.--
Individual and group interest in children.--Abortion in
ethnography.--Abortion renounced.--Infanticide in
ethnography.--Infanticide renounced.--Ethics of abortion and
infanticide.--Christian mores as to abortion and infanticide.--
Respect and contempt for the aged.--The aged in ethnography.--
Killing the old.--Killing the old in ethnography.--Special
exigencies of the civilized.--How the customs of infanticide and
killing the old were changed.
+314. The competent part of society; the burdens.+ The able-bodied and
competent part of a society is the adults in the prime of life. These
have to bear all the societal burdens, among which are the care of those
too young and of those too old to care for themselves. It is certain
that at a very early time in the history of human society the burden of
bearing and rearing children, and the evils of overpopulation, were
perceived as facts, and policies were instinctively adopted to protect
the adults. The facts caused pain, and the acts resolved upon to avoid
it were very summary, and were adopted with very little reasoning.
Abortion and infanticide protected the society, unless its situation
with respect to neighbors was such that war and pestilence kept down the
numbers and made children valuable for war. The numbers present,
therefore, in proportion to the demand for men, constituted one of the
life conditions. It is a life condition which is subject to constant
variation, and one in regard to which the sanctions of wise action are
prompt and severe.
+315. The advantages and disadvantages of the aged. Mores of respect
and contempt.+ Those who survive to old age become depositaries of all
the wisdom of the group, and they are generally the possessors of power
and authority, but they lose physical power, skill, and efficiency in
action. In time, they become burdens on the active members of the group.
"As a man grows old and weak he loses the only claim to respect which
savages understand; but superstitious fear then comes to his protection.
He will die soon and then his ghost can take revenge."[901] That is to
say that the mores can interfere to inculcate duties of respect to the
old which will avert from them the conclusion that they ought to die. In
respect to the aged, therefore, we find two different sets of mores:
(_a_) those in which the aged are treated with arbitrary and
conventional respect; and (_b_) those in which the doctrine is that
those who become burdens must be removed, by their own act or that of
their relatives. In abortion, infanticide, and killing the old there is
a large element of judgment as to what societal welfare requires,
although they are executed generally from immediate personal
selfishness. The custom of the group, by which the three classes of acts
are approved as right and proper, must contain a judgment that they are
conducive, and often necessary, to welfare.
+316. Abortion and infanticide.+ Abortion and infanticide are two
customs which have the same character and purpose. The former prevents
child bearing; the latter child rearing. They are folkways which are
aggregates of individual acts under individual motives, for an
individual might so act without a custom in the group. The acts,
however, when practiced by many, and through a long time, change their
character. They are no longer individual acts of resistance to pain.
They bear witness to uniform experiences, and to uniform reactions
against the experiences, in the way of judgments as to what it is
expedient to do, and motives of policy. They also suggest to, and teach,
the rising generation. They react, in the course of time, on the welfare
of the group. They affect its numbers and its quality, as we now
believe, although we cannot find that any group has ever been forced by
its experience to put these customs under taboo.[902]
+317. Relation of parent and child.+ Children add to the weight of the
struggle for existence of their parents. The relation of parent to
child is one of sacrifice. The interests of children and parents are
antagonistic. The fact that there are, or may be, compensations does not
affect the primary relation between the two. It may well be believed
that, if procreation had not been put under the dominion of a great
passion, it would have been caused to cease by the burdens it entails.
Abortion and infanticide are especially interesting because they show
how early in the history of civilization the burden of children became
so heavy that parents began to shirk it, and also because they show the
rise of a population policy, which is one of the most important
programmes of practical expediency which any society ever can adopt.
+318. Population policy.+ At the present moment the most civilized
states do not know whether to stimulate or restrict population; whether
to encourage immigration or not; whether emigration is an evil or a
blessing; whether to tax bachelors or married men. These questions are
discussed as if absolute answers to them were possible, independently of
differences in life conditions. In France the restriction of population
has entered into the mores, and has been accomplished by the people,
from motives which lie in the standard of living. In New England the
same is true, perhaps to a greater extent. There are many protests
against these mores, on the ground that they will produce societal
weakness and decay, and ethical condemnation is freely expended upon
them by various schools of religious and philosophical ethics. What is
certain, however, is that in the popular ethics of the people who
practice restriction it is regarded as belonging to elementary common
sense. The motives are connected with economy and social ambition. The
restriction on the number of children, in all modern civilized society,
issues in an improvement of the quality of the children, so far as that
can be improved by care, education, travel, and the expenditure of
capital (sec. 320). Thus the problem of rearing children has pressed
upon mankind from the earliest times until to-day. It is a problem of
the last degree of simplicity and reality,--a problem of a task and the
strength to perform it, of an expenditure and the means to meet it. For
the group, also, population has always presented, as it now does, a
problem of policy. That group interests are involved in it is
unquestionable. It is one of the matters in regard to which it would be
most proper to adopt a careful and well-digested programme of policy. A
great many of the projects which are now urged upon society are really
applications of population philosophy assumed to be wise without
adequate knowledge, or they set population free from all restraints on
behalf of certain beneficiaries, while a sound population policy,
according to the best knowledge we have, would be the real solution of a
number of the most serious evils (alcoholism, sex disease, imbecility,
insanity, and infant mortality) which now exhaust the vigor of society.
+319. Burden or benefit of children.+ Abortion and infanticide are, as
already stated, the earliest efforts of men to ward off the burden of
children and the evils of overpopulation by specific devices of an
immediate and brutal character. The weight of the burden of children
differs greatly with the life conditions of groups, and with the stage
of the arts by which men cope with the struggle for existence. If a
territory is underpopulated, an increase in numbers increases the output
and the dividend per capita. If it is overpopulated, the food quest is
difficult and children cause hardship to the parents. On the other hand,
the demand for children will be great, if the group has strong neighbors
and needs warriors. The demand may be greater for boys than for girls,
or contrariwise. Girls may be needed in order that wives may be obtained
in exchange for them, but the greater demand for girls is generally due
to the mores which have been established. The demand may be so great as
to offset the burden of rearing children and make it a group necessity
that that burden shall be endured. From the standpoint of the individual
father or mother this means that there are compensations for the toil
and cost of rearing children. When girls bring a good bride price to the
father, it is evident that he at least receives compensation. As to the
mothers, if they receive no compensation, that accords with all the rest
of their experience. It is a well-known fact that they often show
resentment when a daughter is given (sold) in marriage. That fact has
never been adequately explained, but it seems to be anything but strange
if the husband sells the girl and takes the bride price, although the
wife bore and reared the child. Amongst the Marathas of India, on the
contrary, "even to the well-to-do, to have many daughters is a curse."
The bride's father has to give a big dowry to the groom. If the fathers
have rank, but are poor, the girls often have to marry men who are
inferior in age or rank.[903]
+320. Individual and group interest.+ It follows that, in all variations
of the life conditions, in all forms of industrial organization, and at
all stages of the arts, conjunctures arise in which the value of
children fluctuates, and also the relative value of boys and girls turns
in favor, now of one, now of the other. In the examination of any case
of the customs of abortion and infanticide chief attention should be
directed to these conjunctures. On the stage of pastoral-nomadic life,
or wherever else horde life existed, it appears that numerous offspring
were regarded as a blessing and child rearing, in the horde, was not
felt as a burden. It was in the life of the narrower family, whatever
its form, that children came to be felt as a burden, so that "progress"
caused abortion and infanticide. Further progress has made children more
and more expensive, down to our own times, when "neomalthusianism,"
although unavowed, exists in fact as a compromise between egoism and
child rearing. All the folkways which go to make up a population policy
seem to imply greater knowledge of the philosophy of population than can
be ascribed to uncivilized men. The case is one, however, in which the
knowledge is simple and the acts proceed from immediate interest, while
the generalization is an unapprehended result. The mothers know the
strain of child bearing and child rearing. They refuse to undergo it,
for purely egoistic reasons. The consequent adjustment of the population
to the food supply comes of itself. It was never foreseen or purposed by
anybody. The women would not be allowed by the men to shirk motherhood
if the group needed warriors, or if the men wanted daughters to sell as
wives, so that the egoistic motive of mothers never could alone suffice
to make folkways. It would need to be in accord with the interest of the
group or the interest of the men. Abortion and infanticide are primary
and violent acts of self-defense by the parents against famine, disease,
and other calamities of overpopulation, which increase with the number
which each man or woman has to provide for. In time, the customs get
ghost sanction, but it does not appear that they are in any way directly
due to goblinism or to the aleatory element. They become ritual acts and
are made sacred whenever they are brought into connection with societal
welfare, which implies some reflection. The customs begin in a primary
response to pain and the strain of life. Doctrines of right and duty go
with the customs and produce a code of conduct in connection with them.
Sometimes, if a child lives a specified time, its life must be spared.
Sometimes infanticide is practiced only on girls, of whom a smaller
number suffices to keep up the tribe. Sometimes it is confined to the
imperfect infants, in obedience to a great tribal interest to have
able-bodied men, and to spend no strength or capital in rearing others.
Sometimes infanticide is executed by exposure, which gives the infant a
chance for its life if any one will rescue it. Sometimes the father must
express by a ritual act (e.g. taking up the newborn infant from the
ground) his decision whether it is to live or not. With these customs
must be connected that of selling children into slavery, which, when
social hardship is great, is an alternative to infanticide. The Jews
abominated infanticide but might sell their children to Jews.[904]
Abortion by unmarried women is due to the penalties of husbandless
mothers, and is only in form in the same class with abortion by the
married. Cases are given below in which abortion is not due to misery,
but to the egoistic motive only; also cases in which abortion and
infanticide are actually carried to the degree of group suicide. Finally
we may mention in this connection superstitious customs or ancient and
senseless usages to prevent child bearing, since they bear witness to
the dominion of the same ideas and wishes to which abortion and
infanticide are due (see sec. 321).
+321. Illustrations from ethnography.+ The Papuans on Geelvink
Bay, New Guinea, say that "children are a burden. We become tired
of them. They destroy us." The women practice abortion to such an
extent that the rate of increase of the population is very small
and in some places there is a lack of women.[905] Throughout
Dutch New Guinea the women will not rear more than two or three
children each.[906] In fact, it is said of the whole island that
the people love their children but fear that the food supply will
be insufficient, or they seek ease and shirk the trouble of
rearing children.[907] In German Melanesia the custom is current.
Although many Europeans live with native women, few crossbreeds
are to be seen.[908] Codrington[909] gives as reasons: "If a
woman did not want the trouble of bringing up a child, desired to
appear young, was afraid her husband might think the birth before
its time, or wished to spite her husband." Ling Roth[910] quotes
Low that the Dyaks never resort to wilful miscarriage, but this
statement must be restricted to some of them. Perelaer[911] says
that even married women do it and employ harmful means. The
Atchinese practice abortion both before marriage and in marriage.
It is a matter of course.[912] The women of Central Celebes will
not bear children, and use abortion to avoid it, lest the
perineum be torn,--"a thing which they consider the greatest
shame for a woman."[913] If an unmarried woman of the Djakun, on
the peninsula of Malacca, used abortion, she lost all standing in
the tribe. Women despised her; no man would marry her, and she
might be degraded by a punishment inflicted by her parents.
Married women practiced it sometimes to avoid the strain of
bearing children, but, if detected, they might be beaten by the
husbands, even to death. In the neighboring tribe of the Orang
Laut no means of abortion was known. "Such an abomination was not
regarded as possible."[914] These tribes on Malacca are very low
in grade of civilization. They are aborigines who have been
displaced and depressed. The people of Nukuoro are all of good
physique, large, and well formed. They have a food supply in
excess of their wants and are well nourished. The population has
decreased in recent years, by reason of the killing of children
before or after birth.[915] On the New Britain islands the women
dislike to become mothers soon after marriage. Generally it is
from two to four years before a child is born.[916] On the New
Hebrides the women employ abortion for egoistic reasons, and
miscarriage is often produced by climbing trees and carrying
heavy loads.[917] The inhabitants of the New Hebrides are
diminishing in number, especially on the coasts, because they
flee inland before the whites. Ten years ago there were at Port
Sandwich, on Mallicolo, six hundred souls. To-day there are only
half so many. In the last years there have been five births and
thirty deaths. Abortion is very common. If a malformed child is
born, it and the mother are killed. The nations raid each other
to get slaves or cannibal food.[918] These citations seem to
represent the general usage throughout the Pacific islands.
+322.+ Oviedo said of the women "of the main land" of South
America, when first discovered, that they practiced abortion in
order not to spoil their bodies by child bearing.[919] The
Kadiveo of Paraguay are perishing largely through abortion by the
women, who will not bear more than one child each.[920] They are
a subdivision of the Guykurus, who were reported sixty or seventy
years ago to be decreasing in number from this cause. The women,
"until they are thirty, procure abortion, to free themselves from
the privations of pregnancy and the trouble of bringing up
children."[921] Martius[922] gave as additional reasons, that the
tribe lived largely on horseback, and the women did not want to
be hindered by greater difficulties in this life, nor did they
want to be left behind by their husbands. The Indians of the
plains of North America were driven to similar limitations. "It
has long been the custom that a woman should not have a second
child until her first is ten years old."[923] Infants interfere
very seriously with their mode of life.
Neither abortion nor infanticide is customary in the Horn of
Africa unless it be in time of famine.[924] In South Africa
abortion is a common custom.[925] Abortion and infanticide are so
nearly universal in savage life, either as egoistic policy or
group policy, that exceptions to the practice of these vices are
noteworthy phenomena.
+323. Abortion renounced.+ In ancient India abortion came to be
ranked with the murder of a Brahmin as the greatest crimes.[926]
Plato's idea of right was that men over fifty-five, and women
over forty, ought not to procreate citizens. By either abortion
or infanticide all offspring of such persons should be
removed.[927] Aristotle also thought that imperfect children
should be put to death, and that the numbers should be limited.
If parents exceeded the prescribed number, abortion should be
employed.[928] These two philosophers evidently constructed their
ideals on the mores already established amongst the Greeks, and
their ethical doctrines are only expressions of approval of the
mores in which they lived. The Jews, on the other hand, regarded
abortion and infanticide as heathen abominations. Both are
forbidden in the "Two Ways," sec. 2. In the laws of the German
nations the mother was treated as entitled to decide whether she
would bear a child. Abortion produced on her by another was a
crime, but not when she produced it on herself. Only in the law
of the West Goths was abortion by the mother made criminal,
because it was the view that the state was injured.[929] In
modern Hungary, at a marriage, the desire to have no children is
expressed by a number of ancient and futile usages to prevent
child bearing for years, or altogether. Abortion is practiced
throughout Hungary by women of all the nationalities. Women
rejoice to be barren, and it is not thought creditable to have an
infant within two or three years of marriage.[930] Nevertheless
the birth rate is very high (thirty-nine per thousand).
+324. Illustrations of infanticide.+ The Australians practiced
infanticide almost universally. A woman could not carry two
children. Therefore, if she had one who could not yet march, and
bore another, the latter was killed. One or both twins were
killed. The native men killed half-white children.[931]
Australian life was full of privations on account of limited
supplies of food and water. The same conditions made wandering a
necessity. If a woman had two infants, she could not accompany
her husband.[932] One reporter says that the fate of a child
"depended much on the condition the country was in at the time
(drought, etc.), and the prospect of the mother's rearing it
satisfactorily."[933] Sickly and imperfect children were killed
because they would require very great care. The first one was
also killed because they thought it immature and not worth
preserving.[934] Very generally it was eaten that the mother
might recover the strength which she had given to it.[935] If
there was an older child, he ate of it, in the belief that he
might gain strength. Very rarely were more than four children of
one woman allowed to grow up.[936] Curr[937] says that before the
whites came women bore, on an average, six children each, and
that, as a rule, they reared two boys and a girl, the maximum
being ten. All authorities agree that if children were spared at
birth they were treated with great affection. On the Andaman
Islands infanticide was unknown.[938] It was not common on New
Zealand. Boys were wanted as warriors, girls as breeders.[939] A
missionary reports a case in New Guinea where the parents of a
sickly, peevish child, probably teething, calmly decided to kill
it.[940] In British New Guinea there is more or less infanticide,
the father strangling the infant at birth to avoid care and
trouble. Daughters are preserved by preference because of the
bride price which the father will get for them.[941] On Nukuoro
the civil ruler decides long before a birth whether the child is
to be allowed to live or not. If the decision is adverse, it is
smothered at birth.[942] On the Banks Islands girls are
preferred, because the people have the mother family, and because
of the marriageable value of girls.[943] On the Murray Islands in
Torres Straits all children beyond a prescribed number are put to
death, "lest the food supply should become insufficient." "If the
children were all of one sex, some were destroyed from shame, it
being held proper to have an equal number of boys and
girls."[944] On some islands of the Solomon group infanticide is
not practiced, except in cases of illegitimate births. On others
the coast people kill their own children and buy grown-up
children from the bush people of the interior, that being an
easier way to get them.[945] There is no infanticide on Samoa.
The unmarried employ abortion.[946] Throughout Polynesia
infanticide was prevalent for social selection, all of mixed
blood or caste being put to death. Only two boys in a family were
allowed to live, but any number of girls.[947] In Tahiti they
killed girls, who were of no use for war, service of the god,
fishing, or navigation.[948] The Malagassans on Madagascar kill
all children who are born on unlucky days.[949]
+325.+ The women of the Pima (Arizona) practice infanticide,
because, if their husbands die, they will be poor and will have
to provide by their own exertions for such children as they
have.[950] All Hyperboreans practice infanticide on account of
the difficulty of the food supply.[951]
+326.+ The Bondei of West Africa strangle an infant at birth if
any of the numerous portents and omens for which they watch are
unfavorable. An infant is also killed if its upper teeth come
first.[952] Until very recently it was customary in parts of
Ahanta for the tenth child born of the same mother to be buried
alive.[953] In Kabre (Togo) there is a large population and
little food. The people often sell their own children, or kidnap
others, which they sell in order to provide for their own.[954]
The Vadshagga put to death illegitimate children and those whose
upper incisors come first. The latter, if allowed to live, would
be parricides.[955] On the Zanzibar coast weak and deformed
children are exposed. The Catholic mission saved many, but the
natives then exposed more to get rid of them.[956] The Hottentots
expose female twins.[957] The Kabyls put to death all children
who are illegitimate, incestuous, or adulterine. If the mother
should spare the infant she would insure her own death.[958]
There is said to be no infanticide in Cambodia.[959] "Widows
among the Moghiahs [a criminal tribe of central India] are
allowed to remarry. The murder of female infants has, therefore,
never prevailed amongst them."[960] The Chinese on Formosa
practice female infanticide, "in cases of a succession of girls
in a family." "The aborigines, both civilized and savage, looked
with horror upon the Chinese for their inhumanity in this
respect." They brought the custom from China, where in the
overpopulated southeastern provinces it is current custom.[961]
The Khonds of India are a poor, isolated hill tribe, who put
female infants to death because they regard marriage in the same
tribe as incest.[962] All tribes in their status who refuse to
practice endogamy have a peculiar problem to deal with.
Wilkins[963] says that six sevenths of the population of India
have for ages practiced female infanticide. Buddhism is declared
to be inhuman and antisocial. It palliates everything which is
done to limit population--polygamy and infanticide in China,
concubinage in Japan, and prostitution in both. It started and
developed in countries which had for generations suffered from
overpopulation, with its regular consequences of famine,
pestilence, and war.[964]
+327. Revolt against infanticide.+ The ancient Egyptians
revolted, in their mores, against infanticide and put an end to
it.[965] Strabo[966] thought it a peculiarity of the Egyptians
that every child must be reared. The Greeks regarded infanticide
as the necessary and simply proper way to deal with a problem
which could not be avoided. Dissent was not wanting. At Thebes
infanticide was forbidden.[967] Sutherland[968] points out the
effect of infanticide to bring the Greek and Latin races to an
end. They neglected their own females and begot offspring with
foreign and slave women, thus breeding out their own race blood.
The Romans do not appear to have had any population policy until
the time of the empire, when the social corruption and egoism so
restricted reproduction that the policy was directed to the
encouragement of marriage and parenthood. Therefore infanticide
was disapproved by the jurists and moralists. Ovid, Seneca,
Plutarch, Favorinus, and Juvenal speak of abortion as general and
notorious, but as criminal.[969] Tacitus praised the Germans
because, as he erroneously asserted,[970] they did not allow
infanticide, and he knew that the Jews prohibited it.[971] In the
cases of Greece and Rome we have clear instances to prove the
opposite tendencies of the mores, with their attendant
philosophies and ethical principles, on the conjuncture of the
conditions and interests. At Rome children were exposed either on
account of poverty, which was the ancient cause, or on account of
luxury, egoism, and vice. "Pagan and Christian authorities are
united in speaking of infanticide as a crying vice of the
empire."[972] These protests show that the custom was not fully
protected by the mores. Pliny thought it necessary.[973] Seneca
refers to the killing of defective children as a wise and
unquestioned custom which he can use for illustration.[974] For
the masses, until the late days of the empire, infanticide was,
at the worst, a venial crime. "What was demanded on this subject
was not any clearer moral teaching, but rather a stronger
enforcement of the condemnation long since passed upon
infanticide, and an increased protection for exposed infants....
The church labored to deepen the sense of the enormity of the
crime."[975] Evidently infanticide was a tradition with serious
approval from one state of things to another in which it was
harmful and not needed in any view. In 331 A.D. Constantine gave
title to those who rescued exposed children against the parents
of the children.[976] This was in favor of the children, since it
increased the chances that they would be rescued, if we must
assume that it was their interest that their lives should be
spared, even if they were reared by men who speculated on their
future value as slaves or prostitutes. As a corollary of the
legislation against infanticide, institutions to care for
foundlings came into existence. Such institutions rank as
charitable and humanitarian. Their history is such as to make
infanticide seem kind. In 374 infanticide was made a crime
punishable by death. Justinian provided that foundlings should be
free.[977] Infanticide continued to be customary. The church
worked against it by the introduction of the mystic religious
element. The infants died unbaptized. As the religion took a more
and more ritualistic character this fact affected the minds of
the masses more than the suffering or death of the infants ever
had. In a cold estimate of facts it was also questionable whether
the infants suffered any great harm, and the popular estimate of
the crime of extinguishing a life before any interests had
clustered around it was very lenient. "The criminality of
abortion was immeasurably aggravated when it was believed to
involve not only the extinction of a transient life, but also the
damnation of an immortal soul."[978] The religious interest was
thus brought to reënforce the love of children in the struggle
against the old custom. The canon law also construed it as
murder. Through the Middle Ages the sale of children was not
common, but the custom of exposure continued.[979] The primitive
usages of the Teutons included exposure of infants. The father by
taking the child up from the ground ordained that it should live.
It was then bathed and named. Rulers exposed infants lest
dependent persons should be multiplied. Evil dreams also caused
exposure. When the Icelanders accepted Christianity a minority
stipulated that they should still be allowed to eat horseflesh
and to practice exposure of infants.[980] In old German law
infanticide was treated as the murder of a relative. The guilty
mother was buried alive in a sack, the law prescribing, with the
ingenious fiendishness of the age, that a dog, a cat, a rooster,
and a viper should also be placed in the sack.[981] In ancient
Arabia the father might kill newborn daughters by burying them
alive. The motive of the old custom was anxiety about provision
for the child and shame at the disgrace of having become the
father of a daughter.[982] In the Koran it is forbidden to kill
children for fear of starvation. In modern countries infanticide
has been common or rare according to the penalties, in law or the
mores, upon husbandless mothers. In the sixteenth century, in
Spain, illegitimate births were very common. Infanticide was very
uncommon, but abandonment (foundlings) took its place. The
foundlings became vagabonds and rogues.[983]
+328. Ethics of abortion and infanticide.+ Abortion and infanticide are
at war with the attachment of parents to children, which is a sentiment
common, but not universal, amongst animals while the offspring are
dependent. It might seem that these customs have been abolished by
speculative ethics. In fact, they have not been abolished. They have
been modified and have been superseded by milder methods of
accomplishing the same purpose. It is evidently a question at what point
parental affection begins to attach to the child. We think that we have
gained much over savage people in our notion of murder, but it appears
that primitive men did not dare to take anything out of nature without
giving an equivalent for it, and that they did not dare to kill anything
without first sacrificing it to a god, or afterwards conciliating the
spirit of the animal or of its species. If it is murder to prevent a
life from coming into existence, it would be a question of casuistry at
what point such a crime would ensue. It might be murder to remain
unmarried.
+329. Christian mores as to abortion and infanticide.+ The tradition
against abortion and infanticide came down into our mores from the Jews.
It never got strength in the mores of Christianity until each of those
acts was regarded as a high religious crime because the child died
unbaptized. The soul was held to belong to it from the moment of
conception. In reality nothing has put an end to infanticide but the
advance in the arts (increased economic power), by virtue of which
parents can provide for children. Neomalthusianism is still practiced
and holds the check by which the population is adjusted to the economic
power. There is shame in it. No one dare avow it or openly defend it. A
"two-child system" is currently referred to in French and German
literature as an established family policy, and restriction is certainly
a fact in the mores of all civilized people. It is certain that the
masses of those people think it right and not wrong. They do not accept
guidance from any speculative ethics, but from expediency. Their
devotion to their children is greater than a similar virtue ever has
been at any previous time, and they prove their willingness to make the
utmost sacrifices for them. In fact, very many of them are unwilling to
have more children because it would limit what they can do for those
they have. In short, the customs and their motives have changed very
little since the days of savagery.
+330. Mores of respect or contempt for the aged.+ In the introductory
paragraph to this chapter it was observed that there are two sets of
mores as to the aged: (_a_) in one set of mores the teaching and usages
inculcate conventional respect for the aged, who are therefore
arbitrarily preserved for their wisdom and counsel, perhaps also
sometimes out of affection and sympathy; (_b_) in the other set of mores
the aged are regarded as societal burdens, which waste the strength of
the society, already inadequate for its tasks. Therefore they are
forced to die, either by their own hands or those of their relatives. It
is very far from being true that the first of these policies is
practiced by people higher up in civilization than those who practice
the second. The people in lower civilization profit more by the wisdom
and counsel of the aged than those in higher civilization, and are
educated by this experience to respect and value the aged. "The
introduction of the father-right won more respect for the aged
man."[984] In some cases we can see the two codes in strife. Amongst the
ancient Teutons the father could expose or sell his children under age,
and the adult son could kill his aged parents.[985] There was no fixed
duty of child to parent or of parent to child.
+331. Ethnographical illustrations of respect to the aged.+ "The
people of Madagascar pay high honor to age and to parents. The
respect to age is even exaggerated." The Hovas always pay formal
respect to greater age. If two slaves are carrying a load
together, the younger of them will try to carry it all.[986] In
West Africa, "all the younger members of society are early
trained to show the utmost deference to age. They must never come
into the presence of aged persons or pass by their dwellings
without taking off their hats and assuming a crouching gait. When
seated in their presence it must always be at a 'respectful
distance,'--a distance proportioned to the difference in their
ages and position in society. If they come near enough to hand an
aged man a lighted pipe or a glass of water, the bearer must
always fall upon one knee."[987] "Great among the Oromo is the
veneration for the old. Failure in respect to age is considered
an injury to the customs of the country. The aged always sit in
the post of honor, have a voice in public councils, in
discussions, and controversies which arise amongst citizens. The
young and the women are taught to serve them on all
occasions."[988] The Hereros respect the old. Property belongs to
an old man even after his son assumes the care of it. Milk pails
and joints of meat are brought to him to be blessed.[989] The old
are well treated in Australia. Certain foods are reserved for
them.[990] Amongst the Lhoosai, on the Chittagong hills of
southeastern India, "parents are reverenced and old age honored.
When past work the father and mother are cared for by the
children."[991] The Nicobarese treat the old kindly and let them
live as long as they can.[992] The Andamanese also show great
respect to the old and treat them with care and
consideration.[993] The tribes in central Australia have no such
custom "as doing away with aged or infirm people; on the
contrary, such are treated with especial kindness, receiving a
share of the food which they are unable to procure for
themselves."[994] The Jekris, in the Niger Protectorate, "have
great respect for their fathers, chiefs, and old age generally.
Public opinion is very strong on these points."[995] The Indians
on the northwest coast of North America "have great respect for
the aged, whose advice in most matters has great weight."[996]
"Great is the respect for the aged" amongst the Chavantes, a Ges
tribe of Brazil.[997] Cranz[998] says that the Greenland Eskimo
take care of their old parents. "The Ossetines [of the Caucasus]
have the greatest love and respect for their parents, for old age
in general, and for their ancestors. The authority of the head of
the family, the grandfather, father, stepfather, uncle, or older
brother is unconditionally recognized. The younger men will never
sit down in the presence of elders, will not speak loudly, and
will never contradict them."[999] "A young Kalmuck never dares
show himself before his father or mother when he is not sober. He
does not sit down in the presence of old people, drawing his legs
under him, which would be a gross familiarity, but he squats on
his knees, supporting himself with his heels in the ground. He
never shows himself before old people without his girdle. To be
without a girdle is extreme negligé."[1000] Maine[1001] says: "A
New Zealand chief, when asked as to the welfare of a
fellow-tribesman, replied, 'He gave us so much good advice that
we put him mercifully to death.'" This gives a good idea of the
two views which barbarous men take of the aged. At first they are
considered useless and burdensome, and fare accordingly; later a
sense of their wisdom raises them to a place of high honor. It
is evident that the statement here made, of the relation in time
of the two ways of treating the old, is not correct. The cases
above cited are nearly all those of savages and barbarians. The
people of higher civilization will be found amongst those of the
other mores to be cited below (see sec. 335).
+332.+ "The position of the Roman father assured him respect and
obedience as long as he lived. His unlimited power of making a will kept
his fate in his own hands."[1002] The power in his family which the law
gave him was very great, but his sons never paid him affectionate
respect. "It is remarkable that we do not hear so often of barbarous
treatment of old women as of old men. Could love for mothers have been
an effective sentiment? Under mother right the relation of child to
parent was far stronger, and the relation to the maternal uncle was
secondary and derivative with respect to that to the mother."[1003]
+333. Killing the old.+ The custom of killing the old, especially one's
parents, is very antipathetic to us. The cases will show that, for
nomadic people, the custom is necessary. The old drop out by the way and
die from exhaustion. To kill them is only equivalent, and perhaps
kinder. If an enemy is pursuing, the necessity is more acute.[1004] All
this enters into the life conditions so primarily that the custom is a
part of the life policy; it is so understood and acquiesced in. The old
sometimes request it from life weariness, or from devotion to the
welfare of the group.
+334. Killing the old in ethnography.+ The "Gallinomero sometimes
have two or three cords of wood neatly stacked in ricks about the
wigwam. Even then, with the heartless cruelty of the race, they
will dispatch an old man to the distant forest with an ax, whence
he returns with his white head painfully bowed under a back-load
of knaggy limbs, and his bare bronzed bowlegs moving on with that
catlike softness and evenness of the Indian, but so slowly that
he scarcely seems to get on at all."[1005] An old squaw, who had
been abandoned by her children because she was blind, was found
wandering in the mountains of California.[1006] "Filial piety
cannot be said to be a distinguishing quality of the Wailakki, or
any Indians. No matter how high may be their station, the aged
and decrepit are counted a burden. The old man, hero of a hundred
battles, when his skill with the bow and arrow is gone, is
ignominiously compelled to accompany his sons into the forest,
and bear home on his shoulders the game they have killed."[1007]
Catlin describes his leave-taking of an old Ponca chief who was
being deserted by the tribe with a little food and water, a
trifling fire, and a few sticks. The tribe were driven on by
hunger. The old chief said: "My children, our nation is poor, and
it is necessary that you should all go to the country where you
can get meat. My eyes are dimmed and my strength is no more.... I
am a burden to my children. I cannot go. Keep your hearts stout
and think not of me. I am no longer good for anything."[1008]
This is the fullest statement we can quote, attributed to one of
the abandoned old men, of the view of the proceeding which could
make him acquiesce in it. The victims do not always take this
view of the matter. This custom was common to all the tribes
which roamed the prairies. Every one who lived to decrepitude
knew that he must expect it. A more recent authority says that
Poncas and Omahas never left the aged and infirm on the prairie.
They were left at home, with adequate supplies, until the hunting
party returned.[1009] That shows that they had a settled home and
their cornfields are mentioned in the context. The old watched
the cornfields, so that they were of some use. By the law of the
Incas the old, who were unfit for other work, drove birds from
the fields, and they were kept at public cost, like the
disabled.[1010] The Hudson's Bay Eskimo strangle the old who are
dependent on others for their food, or leave them to perish when
the camp is moved. They move in order to get rid of burdensome
old people without executing them.[1011] The central Eskimo kill
the old because all who die by violence go to the happy land;
others have not such a happy future.[1012] Nansen[1013] says that
"when people get so old that they cannot take care of themselves,
especially women, they are often treated with little
consideration" by the Eskimo. Many tribes in Brazil killed the
old because they were a burden and because they could no longer
enjoy war, hunting, and feasting. The Tupis sometimes killed a
sick man and ate the corpse, if the shaman said that he could not
get well.[1014] The Tobas, a Guykuru tribe in Paraguay, bury the
old alive. The old, from pain and decrepitude, often beg for
death. Women execute the homicide.[1015] An old woman of the
Murray River people, Australia, broke her hip. She was left to
die, "as the tribe did not want to be bothered with her." The
helpless and infirm are customarily so treated.[1016] In West
Victoria the old are strangled by a relative deputed for the
purpose and the body is burned. One reason given is that, in
cases of attack by an enemy, the old would be captured and
tortured to death. The victims often beg for delay, but always in
vain.[1017] The Melanesians buried alive the sick and old. "It is
certain that, when this was done, there was generally a kindness
intended." Even when the younger hastened the end, for selfish
reasons, the sick and aged acquiesced. They often begged to be
put out of their misery.[1018] On the Easter Islands the aged
were treated with little respect. The sick were not kindly
treated, unless they were near relatives.[1019] The Solomon
Islanders are described as "a community where no respect whatever
is shown by youth to age."[1020] Holub[1021] mentions a great
cliff from which some South African tribes cast the old when
tired of caring for them. Hottentots used to put decrepit old
people on pack oxen and take them out into the desert, where they
were left in a little hut prepared for the purpose with a little
food. They now show great heartlessness towards helpless old
people.[1022] Bushmen abandon the aged with a little food and
water.[1023] In the Niger Protectorate the old and useless are
killed. The bodies are smoked and pulverized and the powder is
made into little balls with water and corn. The balls are dried
and kept to be used as food.[1024] The Somali exploit the old in
work to the last point, and then cast them out to die of
hunger.[1025] The people of the Arctic regions generally put the
aged to death on account of the hard life conditions. The aged of
the Chuckches demand, as a right, to be put to death.[1026] Life
is so hard and food so scarce that they are indifferent to death,
and the acquiescence of the victim is described as complete and
willing.[1027] A case is also described[1028] of an old man of
that tribe who was put to death at his own request by relatives,
who thought that they performed a sacred obligation. The Yakuts
formerly had a similar custom, the old man begging his children
to dispatch him. They thrust him into a hole in the forest, where
they left him with vessels, tools, and a little food. Sometimes a
man and his wife were buried together. There was no such thing as
respect for the aged or for aged relatives amongst the Yakuts.
Younger men plundered, scolded, and abused the elder.[1029]
+335.+ "The custom of putting a violent end to the aged and
infirm survived from the primeval period into historic times not
infrequently amongst the Indo-European peoples. It can be
authenticated in Vedic antiquity, amongst the Iranians (Bactrians
and Caspian peoples), and amongst the ancient Germans, Slavs, and
Prussians."[1030] The Bactrians cast the old and sick to the
dogs.[1031] The Massagetæ made a sacrifice of cattle and of an
old man, and ate the whole. This was a happy end. Those who died
of disease were buried and were thought less fortunate.[1032] "As
far as I know no mention is made among the Aryans of the putting
to death of old people in general (we first meet with it in the
migratory period), nor of the putting to death of parents by
their children; but their casting out is mentioned."[1033] The
Greeks treated the old with neglect and disrespect.[1034]
Gomme[1035] quotes a fifteenth-century MS. of a Parsifal episode
in which the hero congratulates himself that he is not like the
men of Wales, "where sons pull their fathers out of bed and kill
them to save the disgrace of their dying in bed." He also cites
mention of the "holy mawle which (they fancy) hung behind the
church door, which, when the father was seventy, the son might
fetch to knock his father on the head as effete and of no more
use."[1036] Once in Iceland, in time of famine, it was decided by
solemn resolution that all the old and unproductive should be
killed. That determination was part of a system of legislation by
which, in that country, the society was protected against
superfluous and dependent members.[1037]
+336. Special exigencies of the civilized.+ Civilized men in certain
cases find themselves face to face with the primitive circumstances, and
experience the primeval necessity, which overrides the sentiments of
civilization, whatever may be the strength of the latter. Colonel
Fremont, in 1849, in a letter to his wife, tells how in crossing the
plains he and his comrades left the weak and dying members of their
party, one by one, to die in the snow, after lighting a little fire for
him.[1038] Many other such cases are known from oral narratives. The
question is not one of more or less humanity. It is a question of the
struggle for existence when at the limit of one of its conditions. Our
civilization ordinarily veils from us the fact that we are rivals and
enemies to each other in the competition of life. It is in such cases as
the one just mentioned, or in shipwrecks, that this fact becomes the
commanding one. The only alternative to the abandonment of one is the
loss of all. Abortion, infanticide, and the killing of the old began at
times when the competition of life was so direct and pitiless that it
left no room for kindly sentiment. The latter is a product of
civilization. It could be cultivated only by men for whom the struggle
for existence was so easy, and the competition of life so moderate, that
the severity was all taken out of them. Then there was a surplus and the
conditions of life were easy. The alternative was not murder or suicide.
Such a state of ease was reached by migration or by advance in the
arts,--in short, by greater command of man over nature. The fundamental
elements in the case were altered.
+337. How the mores were changed.+ Abortion, infanticide, and killing
the old are primary folkways which respond to hard facts of life in the
most direct and primitive manner. They are not blamed when they become
ruling customs which everybody observes. They rise into mores more
easily than other primitive usages because the superficial reasons for
believing that they are conducive to welfare appear so simple and
obvious. When a settled life took the place of a wandering life some
immediate reasons for these customs were removed. When peace took the
place of war with neighboring tribes other causes were set aside. The
cases would then become less frequent, especially the cases of
infanticide and killing the old. Then, if cases which seemed to call for
reëmployment of old customs arose, they could be satisfied only against
some repugnance. Men who were not hard pressed by the burden of life
might then refrain from infanticide or killing the old. They yielded to
the repugnance rather than to the dislike of hardship. Later, when
greater power in the struggle for existence was won the infants and the
old were spared, and the old customs were forgotten. Then they came to
be regarded with horror, and the mores protected the infants and the
old. The stories of the French peasantry which come to us nowadays show
that the son is often fully ready in mind and will to kill his old
father if the mores and the law did not restrain him.
[901] Lippert, _Kulturgesch._, I, 229.
[902] Ancient India may be an exception.
[903] _Ethnog. of India_, I, 95.
[904] Exod. xxi. 7.
[905] Rosenberg, _Geelvinkbaai_, 91.
[906] Krieger, _Neu-Guinea_, 390.
[907] _Ibid._, 165.
[908] Pfeil, _Aus der Südsee_, 31.
[909] _Melanesians_, 229.
[910] _Sarawak_, I, 101.
[911] _Dajaks_, 37.
[912] Snouck-Hurgronje, _De Atjehers_, I, 73.
[913] _Bijdragen tot T. L. en V.-kunde_, XXXV, 79.
[914] _Ztsft. f. Ethnol._, XXVIII, 186.
[915] Kubary, _Nukuoro_, 9, 12, 14.
[916] JAI, XVIII, 291.
[917] _Austral. Assoc. Adv. Sci._, 1892, 704.
[918] _Globus_, LXXXVIII, 164, after Joly.
[919] _Three First English Books about America_, 237.
[920] _Globus_, LXXXI, 4.
[921] Spix and Martius, _Travels in Brazil_, II, 77.
[922] _Ethnog. Brasil._, 231.
[923] Grinnell, _Cheyenne Woman Customs_, 15; _N.S. Amer.
Anthrop._; IV, 13.
[924] Paulitschke, _Ethnog. N. O. Afr._, I, 172.
[925] Fritsch, _Eingeb. Süd-Afr._, 96.
[926] Zimmer, _Altind. Leben_, 333.
[927] _Republic_, V, 9.
[928] _Politics_, VII, 16.
[929] Rudeck, _Oeffentl. Sittlichkeit in Deutschland_, 181.
[930] Temesvary, _Volksbräuche und Aberglauben in der
Gebürtshilfe in Ungarn_, 12-14.
[931] Ratzel, _Völkerkunde_, II, 59.
[932] Eyre, _Cent. Aust._, II, 324; Spencer and Gillen, _Cent.
Aust._, 51, 264.
[933] JAI, XIII, 137.
[934] Smyth, _Victoria_, I, 52.
[935] _Novara-Reise_, I, 32.
[936] Dawson, _West Victoria_, 39.
[937] _Austr. Race_, I, 70.
[938] JAI, XII, 329.
[939] _Ibid._, XIX, 99.
[940] Abel, _New Guinea_, 43.
[941] Krieger, _Neu-Guinea_, 292.
[942] Kubary, _Nukuoro_, 35.
[943] Codrington, _Melanesians_, 229.
[944] JAI, XXVIII, 11.
[945] JAI, XVII, 93.
[946] _Austr. Assoc. Adv. Sci._, 1892, 621.
[947] Waitz, _Anthrop._, V, 139.
[948] Ratzel, _Völkerkunde_, II, 126.
[949] Waitz, _Anthrop._, II, 441.
[950] _Smithson. Rep._, 1871, 407; quoted, _Bur. Eth._, I, 99.
[951] Ratzel, II, 769; _Bur. Eth._, XVIII, 289.
[952] PSM, L, 100.
[953] Ellis, _Tshi-speaking Peoples_, 234.
[954] _Globus_, LXXXIII, 314.
[955] Volkens, _Kilimandscharo_, 252.
[956] Stuhlmann, _Mit Emin Pascha_, 38.
[957] Ratzel, _Völkerkunde_, I, 104.
[958] Hanoteau et Letourneux, _La Kabylie_, III, 220.
[959] PSM, XLIV, 779.
[960] JASB, I, 283.
[961] Pickering, _Formosa_, 61.
[962] Hopkins, _Relig. of India_, 531.
[963] _Mod. Hinduism_, 431.
[964] Humbert, _Japan_, 311.
[965] Lippert, I, 205.
[966] _Geog._, VIII, 24.
[967] Aelian, _Var. Hist._, II, 7.
[968] _Moral Instinct_, I, 134, 136.
[969] Cf. Lecky, _Eur. Morals_, II, 20.
[970] Weinhold, _D. F._, I, 91.
[971] _Germania_, 19; _Hist._, V, 5.
[972] Lecky, _Eur. Morals_, II, 27.
[973] _Nat. Hist._, IV, 29.
[974] _De Ira_, I, 15.
[975] Lecky, _Eur. Morals_, II, 29.
[976] _Cod. Theod._, V, 7.
[977] Blair, _Slavery amongst the Romans_, 44.
[978] Lecky, _Eur. Morals_, II, 23.
[979] _Polyptique de Irminon_, I, 287.
[980] Weinhold, _D. F._, I, 93, 96; II, 93.
[981] Rudeck, _Oeffentl. Sittlichkeit_, 182.
[982] Wellhausen, _Ehe bei den Arabern_, 458.
[983] Chandler, _Romances of Roguery in Spain_, 30.
[984] Lippert, _Kulturgesch._, I, 240.
[985] Grimm, _Deutsche Rechtsalt._ 461, 487.
[986] Ratzel, _Völkerkunde_, II, 511.
[987] Nassau, _Fetishism in West Afr._, 159.
[988] Vannutelli e Citerni, _L'Omo_, 448.
[989] Ratzel, _Hist. of Mankind_, II, 468.
[990] Ratzel, _Völkerkunde_, II, 22.
[991] Lewin, _Wild Races of S. E. India_, 256.
[992] JAI, XVIII, 384.
[993] _Ibid._, XII, 93.
[994] Spencer and Gillen, _Native Tribes, Cent. Austr._, 51.
[995] JAI, XXVIII, 109.
[996] _U.S. Nat. Mus._, 1888, 240.
[997] Martius, _Ethnog. Brasil._, 274.
[998] _Hist. von Grönland_, 197.
[999] von Haxthausen, _Transkaukasia_, II, 35.
[1000] _Russian Ethnog._ (_Russ._), II, 445.
[1001] _Early Law and Custom_, 23.
[1002] Lippert, _Kulturgesch._, I, 241.
[1003] Lippert, _Kulturgesch._, I, 325.
[1004] Powers, _Calif. Indians_, 319.
[1005] _Ibid._, 176; Bancroft, _Native Races_, I, 390.
[1006] _Ibid._, 112.
[1007] _Ibid._, 118.
[1008] _Smithson. Rep._, 1885, Part II, 429.
[1009] _Bur. Eth._, III, 274.
[1010] Martius, _Ethnog. Brasil._, 126, n.
[1011] _Bur. Eth._, XI, 178, 186.
[1012] _Ibid._, VI, 615.
[1013] _Eskimo_, 178.
[1014] Martius, _Ethnog. Bras._, 126.
[1015] _Globus_, LXXXI, 108.
[1016] Eyre, _Cent. Australia_, I, 321.
[1017] Dawson, _West Victoria_, 62.
[1018] Codrington, _Melanesians_, 347.
[1019] Geiseler, _Oster-inseln_, 31.
[1020] Woodford, _Head-hunters_, 25.
[1021] _Sieben Jahre in S. Afr._, I, 409.
[1022] Kolben, _Hist. Good Hope_, I, 324; Fritsch, _Eingeb. S.
Afr._, 334.
[1023] _Globus_, XVIII, 122.
[1024] Kingsley, _West Afr. Studies_, 566.
[1025] Paulitschke, _Ethnog. N.O. Afr._, I, 205.
[1026] _N.S. Amer. Anthrop._, III, 106.
[1027] De Windt in _N.Y. Times_, May 10, 1897.
[1028] _Russ. Ethnog._ (_russ._), II, 578.
[1029] Sieroshevski, _Yakuty_ (_russ._), 511, 621.
[1030] Schrader, _Prehist. Antiq. of the Aryans_, 379; Zimmer,
_Altind. Leben_, 327.
[1031] Strabo, XI, 517; Spiegel, _Eran. Alterthumskunde_, III,
682.
[1032] Herodotus, I, 216.
[1033] Ihering, _Evol. of the Aryan_, 33.
[1034] Mahaffy, _Soc. Life in Greece_, 229.
[1035] _Ethnol. in Folklore_, 136.
[1036] In the national museum at Stockholm is a large collection
of flat clubs from all the churches in Sweden, the use of which
is described with discretion. That the clubs were kept in the
churches denotes that the act was put under religious sanction.
[1037] Weinhold, _D.F._, II, 92.
[1038] Thayer, _Marvels of the New West_, 231.