used
their fists more than their heads, when priestcraft had enchained the
human intellect, the much bepraised Middle Age, with its system of
chivalry. That was the time when people let the Almighty not only care
for them but judge for them too; when difficult cases were decided by
an ordeal, a _Judgment of God_; which, with few exceptions, meant
a duel, not only where nobles were concerned, but in the case of
ordinary citizens as well. There is a neat illustration of this in
Shakespeare's Henry VI.[1] Every judicial sentence was subject to an
appeal to arms--a court, as it were, of higher instance, namely, _the
Judgment of God_: and this really meant that physical strength and
activity, that is, our animal nature, usurped the place of reason on
the judgment seat, deciding in matters of right and wrong, not by what
a man had done, but by the force with which he was opposed, the same
system, in fact, as prevails to-day under the principles of knightly
honor. If any one doubts that such is really the origin of our modern
duel, let him read an excellent work by J.B. Millingen, _The History
of Dueling_.[2] Nay, you may still find amongst the supporters of
the system,--who, by the way are not usually the most educated or
thoughtful of men,--some who look upon the result of a duel as really
constituting a divine judgment in the matter in dispute; no doubt in
consequence of the traditional feeling on the subject.

But leaving aside the question of origin, it must now be clear to us
that the main tendency of the principle is to use physical menace for
the purpose of extorting an appearance of respect which is deemed too
difficult or superfluous to acquire in reality; a proceeding which
comes to much the same thing as if you were to prove the warmth of
your room by holding your hand on the thermometer and so make it rise.
In fact, the kernel of the matter is this: whereas civic honor aims
at peaceable intercourse, and consists in the opinion of other people
that _we deserve full confidence_, because we pay unconditional
respect to their rights; knightly honor, on the other hand, lays
down that _we are to be feared_, as being determined at all costs to
maintain our own.

As not much reliance can be placed upon human integrity, the principle
that it is more essential to arouse fear than to invite confidence
would not, perhaps, be a false one, if we were living in a state of
nature, where every man would have to protect himself