The Pelew custom shows how regicide may be regarded as an ordinary incident of constitutional government.
If this account of the existing or recent usage of the Pelew Islanders sheds little light on the motives for putting chiefs to death, it well illustrates the business-like precision with which such a custom may be carried out, and the public indifference, if not approval, with which it may be regarded as an ordinary incident of constitutional government. So far, therefore, the Pelew custom bears out the view that a systematic practice of regicide, however strange and revolting it may seem to us, is perfectly compatible with a state of society in which human conduct and human life are estimated by a standard very different from ours. If we would understand the early history of institutions, we must learn to detach ourselves from the prepossessions of our own time and country, and to place ourselves as far as possible at the standpoint of men in distant lands and distant ages.
Index.
Aban, a Persian month, ii. [68]
Abd-Hadad, priestly king of Hierapolis, i. 163 n. 3
Aberdeenshire, All Souls' Day in, ii. [79] sq.
Abi-baal, i. 51 n. 4