MORALITY, PRIMITIVE. We know nothing of the be ginnings of the moral life of man, nothing of the transition from animal behaviour to human conduct. In animal behaviour there is not a rudimentary morality but rather the material which, in human life, intelligence fashions into morality. The only source of knowledge available is the mind of the modern savage, with those relics of primitive ways of thought which survive in the folklore and superstitious practices of higher races. The basic needs which must be subserved if life is to endure are self-preser vation and the preservation of the race. It is by food and the pro duction and survival of offspring that these needs are satisfied, and round them the body of primitive morality is built up. Uni versally among primitive peoples there are tabus ("it is forbid den") in connection with food. As to the other great instinc tive process, the preservation of the race, we find everywhere a close knit body of custom. Pregnancy, birth, puberty, menstrua tion, marriage, death, all are crises in which man comes into con tact with the "sacred," all are bound up with the preservation of the race, so round them gathers a body of tabus and regulations.
Undoubtedly bravery is approved and cowardice condemned by primitive races; love is shown for spouse and children, and gen erosity is often considered a high social virtue. Again "over sexed" persons are regarded with a contempt which approaches moral reprobation, while in barter the whole system depends on the reliance to be placed on the good faith of both parties. But we
find Society all-powerful, the individual wholly subordinate. Yet, in those early, hard days the assertion of man's individuality would only have procured his extinction. Life and the handing on of life were the vital interests of the individual as of society. "The individual, tended and cared for throughout his childhood, grows up accustomed to expect from others what he comes to find that they expect from him. So he comes to see himself as others see him when he is praised or blamed for acts that he has long been ready to approve or disapprove in them. In a word his self consciousness becomes conscience : he seems to hear two voices within his breast, and one speaks with the authority of law: it is his 'tribal self'." (Ward, Psychological Principles.) If man is to live, he must so live that others may live also, thus he passes on himself moral judgment in the name of the community. But all the moral innovators down the ages have been those who, in some degree at least, have outgrown the "tribal self," primitive morality, and been inspired themselves and inspired others with an "Enthusiasm of humanity."