; but
the latter are not the foundation, but rather the consequence and
application of the principle of honor: the man who recognized no human
judge appealed to the divine. Ordeals, however, are not peculiar to
Christendom: they may be found in great force among the Hindoos,
especially of ancient times; and there are traces of them even now.]

As a palliative to this rash arrogance, people are in the habit of
giving way on everything. If two intrepid persons meet, and neither
will give way, the slightest difference may cause a shower of abuse,
then fisticuffs, and, finally, a fatal blow: so that it would really
be a more decorous proceeding to omit the intermediate steps and
appeal to arms at once. An appeal to arms has its own special
formalities; and these have developed into a rigid and precise system
of laws and regulations, together forming the most solemn farce there
is--a regular temple of honor dedicated to folly! For if two intrepid
persons dispute over some trivial matter, (more important affairs are
dealt with by law), one of them, the cleverer of the two, will of
course yield; and they will agree to differ. That this is so is proved
by the fact that common people,--or, rather, the numerous classes of
the community who do not acknowledge the principle of knightly honor,
let any dispute run its natural course. Amongst these classes homicide
is a hundredfold rarer than amongst those--and they amount, perhaps,
in all, to hardly one in a thousand,--who pay homage to the principle:
and even blows are of no very frequent occurrence.

Then it has been said that the manners and tone of good society are
ultimately based upon this principle of honor, which, with its system
of duels, is made out to be a bulwark against the assaults of savagery
and rudeness. But Athens, Corinth and Rome could assuredly boast of
good, nay, excellent society, and manners and tone of a high order,
without any support from the bogey of knightly honor. It is true that
women did not occupy that prominent place in ancient society which
they hold now, when conversation has taken on a frivolous and
trifling character, to the exclusion of that weighty discourse which
distinguished the ancients.

This change has certainly contributed a great deal to bring about the
tendency, which is observable in good society now-a-days, to prefer
personal courage to the possession of any other quality. The fact is
that personal courage is really a very subordi