[205] Hearn, The Aryan Household, p. 431. Hearn is speaking, moreover, of a later and more advanced condition of society, one lying well within "civilization."
[206] Those interested in this important history, as every student of morals may well be, will find easily accessible material in the following references: Hobhouse, Morals in Evolution, ch. iii. of Vol. I.; Hearn, The Aryan Household, ch. xix.; Westermarck, The Origin and Development of the Moral Ideas, Vol. I., pp. 120-185, and parts of ch. xx.; Sutherland, Origin and Growth of the Moral Instinct, chs. xx. and xxi.; Pollock and Maitland, History of of English Law, Vol. II., pp. 447-460 and ch. ix.; Pollock, Oxford Lectures (The King's Peace); Cherry, Criminal Law in Ancient Communities; Maine, Ancient Law. References to anthropological literature, dealing with savage and barbarian customs, will be found especially in Westermarck and Hobhouse.
[207] For facts regarding the importance and nature of these conceptions, see Westermarck, op. cit., pp. 52-72; Robertson Smith, The Religion of the Semites, pp. 427-435 and 139-149; Jevons, Introduction to the History of Religion; Hobhouse, op. cit., Vol. II., chs. i. and ii.; and in general facts bearing on the relations between taboos, holiness, and uncleanness; ablutions, purifications by fire, transference by scapegoats; also the evil power of curses, and the early conceptions of doom and fate. For a suggestive interpretation of the underlying facts, see Santayana, The Life of Reason, Vol. III., chs. iii. and iv.
[208] See Plato, Laws, IX., 873. Compare Holmes, Common Law. In mediæval and early modern Europe, offending objects were "deodand," that is, devoted to God. They were to be appropriated by the proper civil or ecclesiastical authority, and used for charity. In theory, this lasted in England up to 1846. See Tylor, Primitive Culture, Vol. I., pp. 286-287; and Pollock and Maitland, op. cit., II., pp. 471-472.
[209] Op. cit., p. 257.
[210] The very words cause and to blame are closely connected in their origin. Cf. the Greek αἵτία.
[211] Pollock and Maitland, op. cit., II., p. 469; I., 30. For the history of the idea of accident in English law with reference to homicide, see also pp. 477-483. Also Stephen, History of the Criminal Law in England, Vol. III., pp. 316-376.
[212] Pollock and Maitland, II., p. 473; see Westermarck, pp. 240-247.
[213] The slowness and indirectness of change throw light upon the supposed distinction of justice and mercy (see ante, p. 415). When the practical injustice of regarding accidental homicide or killing in self-defense as murder began to be felt, the theory was still that the man in justice was guilty, but that he was to be recommended to the crown for mercy or pardon. This was a mean term in the evolution of our present notion of justice.
[214] For some of the main historic facts on intellectual disability, see Westermarck, pp. 264-277.