A few preliminary observations in regard to the aim and method of this work may be useful to the reader.
He will do well to begin by persuading himself, with Montaigne, that the “hinges of custom” are not always the “hinges of reason,” and still less those of reality in all times and places. He will do better still to steep himself in the spirit of scientific evolution, and to bear in mind that incessant change is the law of the social, quite as much as of the physical and organic world, and that the most splendid blossoms have sprung from very humble germs. This is the supreme truth of science, and it is only when such a point of view has become quite familiar to us that we shall be neither troubled nor disconcerted by the sociological history of humanity; and however shocking or unnatural certain customs may appear, we shall guard ourselves against any feeling of indignation at them, and more especially against a thoughtless refusal to give credence to them, simply because they run counter to our own usages and morality.
All that social science has a right to ask of the facts which it registers is that they should be authentic; this duly proved, it only remains to accept, classify, and interpret them. Faithful to this method, without which there could be no science of sociology, I have here gathered together as proofs a number of singular facts, which, improbable as they may appear according to our pre-conceived notions, and criminal according to our moral sense, are nevertheless most instructive. Although in a former work I have taken care to establish the relativity of morality, the explanations that I am about to make are not out of season; for the subject of this book is closely connected with what, par excellence, we call “morals.”
On this point I must permit myself a short digression.
No one will pretend that our so-called civilised society has a very strict practical morality, yet public opinion still seems to attach a particular importance to sexual morality, and this is the expression of a very real sentiment, the origin of which scientific sociology has no difficulty in retracing. This origin, far from being a lofty one, goes back simply to the right of proprietorship in women similar to that in goods and chattels—a proprietorship which we find claimed in savage, and even in barbarous countries, without any feeling of shame. During the lower stages of social evolution, women are uniformly treated as domestic animals; but this female live-stock are difficult to guard; for, on the one hand, they are much coveted and are unskilful in defending themselves, and on the other, they do not bend willingly to the one-sided duty of fidelity that is imposed on them. The masters, therefore, protect their own interests by a whole series of vexatious restraints, of rigorous punishments, and of ferocious revenges, left at first to the good pleasure of the marital proprietors, and afterwards regulated and codified. In the chapter on adultery, especially, will be found a great number of examples of this marital savagery. I have previously shown, in my Evolution de la Morale, that the unforeseen result of all this jealous fury has been to endow humanity, and more particularly women, with the delicate sentiment of modesty, unknown to the animal world and to primitive man.
From this evolution of thousands of years there has finally resulted, in countries and races more or less civilised, a certain sexual morality, which is half instinctive, and varies according to time and place, but which it is impossible to transgress without the risk of offending gravely against public opinion. Civilisations, however, whether coarse or refined, differ from each other. Certain actions, counted as blameworthy in one part of the world, are elsewhere held as lawful and even praiseworthy. In order to trace the origin of marriage and of the family, it is therefore indispensable to relate a number of practices which may be scandalous in our eyes. While submitting to this necessity, I have done so unwillingly, and with all the sobriety which befits the subject. I have striven never to depart from the scientific spirit, which purifies everything, and renders even indecency decent.
Like the savages of to-day, our distant ancestors were very little removed from simple animal existence. A knowledge of their physiology is nevertheless necessary to enable us to understand our own; for, however cultivated the civilised man may be, he derives from the humble progenitors of his race a number of instincts which are energetic in proportion as they are of a low order. More or less deadened, these gross tendencies are latent in the most highly developed individuals; and when they sometimes break out suddenly in the actions of a man’s life, or in the morals or literature of a people, they recall to us our very humble origin, and even show a certain mental and moral retrogression.
Now it is to this primitive man, still in such a rudimentary state, that we must go back for enlightenment on the genesis of all our social institutions. We must take him at the most distant dawn of humanity, follow him step by step in his slow metamorphoses, without either disparaging or poetising him; we must watch him rising and becoming more refined through accumulated centuries, till he loses by degrees his animal instincts, and at length acquires aptitudes, inclinations, and faculties that are truly human.
Nothing is better adapted to exemplify the evolution which binds our present to our past and to our future than the sociological history of marriage and of the family.
After having spoken of the aim of this book, it remains for me to justify its method. This differs considerably from what the mass of the public like far too well. But a scientific treatise must not take purely literary works for its models; and I can say to my readers, with much more reason than old Rabelais, that if they wish to taste the marrow, they must take the trouble to break the bone. My first and chief consideration is to assist in the foundation of a new science—ethnographical sociology. Elegant and vain dissertations, or vague generalities, have no place here. It is by giving way to these, and in attempting to reap the harvest before sowing the seed, that many authors have lost themselves in a pseudo-sociology, having no foundation, and consequently no value.
Social science, if it is to be seriously constituted, must submit with docility to the method of natural science. The first task, and the one which especially falls to the lot of the sociologists of the present day, is to collect the facts which will form materials for the future edifice. To their successors will fall the pleasure of completing and adorning it.
The present work is, therefore, above all, a collection of facts which, even if taken alone, are curious and suggestive. These facts have been patiently gleaned from the writings of ethnographers, travellers, legists, and historians. I have classed them as well as I could, and naturally they have inspired me here and there with glimpses of possible inductions, and with some slight attempts at generalisation.
But whether the reader rejects or accepts my interpretations, the groundwork of facts on which they rest is so instructive of itself that a perusal of the following pages cannot be quite fruitless.
CH. LETOURNEAU.