Читать книгу The Origin and Development of the Moral Ideas - Edward Westermarck - Страница 70

46 Casalis, Basutos, p. 304.

47 Arbousset and Daumas, op. cit. p. 389.

48 Brough Smyth, Aborigines of Victoria, ii. 228.

49 Spencer and Gillen, Native Tribes of Central Australia, p. 46.

50 Mariner, Natives of the Tonga Islands, ii. 159, 163.

51 Buchanan, Sketches of the History, &c., of the North American Indians, p. 158.

Of many savage and barbarous peoples it is directly affirmed that they have a sense of justice. Mr. Man says concerning the Andaman Islanders, “Certain traits which have been noticeable in their dealings with us would give colour to the belief that they are not altogether lacking in the sense of honour, and have some faint idea of the meaning of justice.”52 Colonel Dalton states that, among the Korwás on the highlands of Sirgúja, when several persons are implicated in one offence, he has found them “most anxious that to each should be ascribed his fair share of it, and no more, the oldest of the party invariably taking on himself the chief responsibility as leader or instigator, and doing his utmost to exculpate as unaccountable agents the young members of the gang.”53 The Aleuts, according to Veniaminof, are “naturally inclined to be just,” and feel deeply undeserved injuries.54 Kolben, who is nowadays recognised as a good authority,55 wrote of the Hottentots, “The strictness and celerity of the Hottentot justice are things in which they outshine all Christendom.”56 Missionaries have wondered that, among the Zulus, “in the absence for ages of all revealed truth and all proper religious instruction, there should still remain so much of mental integrity, so much ability to discern truth and justice, and withal so much regard for these principles in their daily intercourse with one another.”57 Zöller ascribes to the Negro a well-developed feeling of justice. “No European,” he says, “at least no European child, could discriminate so keenly between just and unjust punishment.”58 Mr. Hinde observes:—“One of the most marked characteristics of black people is their keen perception of justice. They do not resent merited punishment where it is coupled with justice upon other matters. The Masai have their sense of justice particularly strongly developed.”59 Dieffenbach writes of the Maoris, “There is a high natural sense of justice amongst them; and it is from us that they have learnt that many forbidden things can be done with impunity, if they can only be kept secret.”60 Justice is a virtue which always commands respect among the Bedouins, and “injustice on the part of those in power is almost impossible. Public opinion at once asserts itself; and the Sheykh, who should attempt to override the law, would speedily find himself deserted.”61

52 Man, in Jour. Anthr. Inst. xii. 92.

53 Dalton, Descriptive Ethnology of Bengal, p. 230.

54 Veniaminof, quoted by Dall, Alaska, p. 398.

55 Theophilus Hahn remarks (The Supreme Being of the Khoi-Khoi, p. 40) that Kolben’s reports have been doubted by European writers without any good reason.

56 Kolben, Present State of the Cape of Good Hope, i. 301. Cf. ibid. i. 339.

57 Quoted by Tyler, Forty Years among the Zulus, p. 197.

58 Zöller, Kamerun, ii. 92. Cf. Idem, Das Togoland, p. 37.

59 Hinde, The Last of the Masai, p. 34. Cf. Foreman, Philippine Islands, p. 185.

60 Dieffenbach, Travels in New Zealand, ii. 106.

61 Blunt, Bedouin Tribes of the Euphrates, ii. 224 sqq.

Much less conspicuous than the emotion of public resentment is the emotion of public approval. These public emotions are largely of a sympathetic character, and, whilst a tendency to sympathetic resentment is always involved in the sentiment of social affection, a tendency to sympathetic retributive kindly emotion is not. Among the lower animals this latter emotion seems hardly to occur at all, and in men it is often deplorably defective. Resentment towards an enemy is itself, as a rule, a much stronger emotion than retributive kindly emotion towards a friend. And, as for the sympathetic forms of these emotions, it is not surprising that the altruistic sentiment is more readily moved by the sight of pain than by the sight of pleasure,62 considering that its fundamental object is to be a means of protection for the species. Moreover, sympathetic retributive kindliness has powerful rivals in the feelings of jealousy and envy, which tend to make the individual hostile both towards him who is the object of a benefit and towards him who bestows it. As an ancient writer observes, “many suffer with their friends when the friends are in distress, but are envious of them when they prosper.”63 But though these circumstances are a hindrance to the rise of retributive kindly emotions of a sympathetic kind, they do not prevent public approval in a case when the whole society profits by a benefit, nor have they any bearing on those disinterested instinctive likings of which I have spoken above. I think, then, we may safely conclude that public praise and moral approval occurred, to some degree, even in the infancy of human society. It will appear from numerous facts recorded in following chapters, that the moral consciousness of modern savages contains not only condemnation, but praise.

62 Cf. Jodl, Lehrbuch der Psychologie, p. 686.

63 Schmidt, Ethik der alten Griechen, i. 259.