1909.

[259] See Westermarck, _Origin and Development of the Moral Ideas_, vol.
i, pp. 386-390, 522.

[260] Westermarck, _Origin and Development of the Moral Ideas_, pp. 9,
159; also the whole of Ch. VII. Actions that are in accordance with custom
call forth public approval, actions that are opposed to custom call forth
public resentment, and Westermarck powerfully argues that such approval
and such resentment are the foundation of moral judgments.

[261] This is well recognized by legal writers (e.g., E.A. Schroeder, _Das
Recht in der Geschlechtlichen Ordnung_, p. 5).

[262] W.G. Sumner (_Folkways_, p. 418) even considers it desirable to
change the form of the word in order to emphasize the real and fundamental
meaning of morals, and proposes the word _mores_ to indicate "popular
usages and traditions conducive to societal reform." "'Immoral,'" he
points out, "never means anything but contrary to the _mores_ of the time
and place." There is, however, no need whatever to abolish or to
supplement the good old ancient word "morality," so long as we clearly
realize that, on the practical side, it means essentially custom.

[263] Westermarck, op. cit., vol. i, p. 19.

[264] See, e.g., "Exogamy and the Mating of Cousins," in _Essays Presented
to E.B. Tylor_, 1907, p. 53. "In many departments of primitive life we
find a naive desire to, as it were, assist Nature, to affirm what is
normal, and later to confirm it by the categorical imperative of custom
and law. This tendency still flourishes in our civilized communities, and,
as the worship of the normal, is often a deadly foe to the abnormal and
eccentric, and too often paralyzes originality."

[265] The spirit of Christianity, as illustrated by Paulinus, in his
_Epistle XXV_, was from the Roman point of view, as Dill remarks (_Roman
Society_, p. 11), "a renunciation, not only of citizenship, but of all the
hard-won fruits of civilization and social life."

[266] It thus happens that, as Lecky said in his _History of European
Morals_, "of all the departments of ethics the questions concerning the
relations of the sexes and the proper position of woman are those upon the
future of which there rests the greatest uncertainty." Some progress has
perhaps been made since these words were written, but they still hold true
for the majority of people.

[267] Concerning economic marriage as a vestigial survival, see, e.g.,
Bloch, _The Sexual Life of Our Time_, p. 212.

[268]