ersally
acknowledged and rigidly enforced. Two primitive conditions are
present wherever man is found--the tribe and the family. If the family
is never present without the tribe, the tribe is never discovered
without 'those intra-tribal distinctions and sexual regulations which
lie at the bottom of the institution of the family.'[1] Westermarck
indeed says that 'the evidence we possess tends to show that among our
earliest human ancestors the family and not the tribe formed the
nucleus of every social group, and in many cases was itself perhaps the
only social group. The tie that kept together husband and wife,
parents and children, was, if not the only, at least the principal
factor in the earliest forms of man's social life.'[2] If the family
had been an artificial convention called into being by human will and
ingenuity, it might conceivably be destroyed by the same factors. But
whatever arguments may be adduced for the abolition of marriage and
family life to-day, the appeal to primitive history is not one of them.
On the contrary the earliest forms of society show that the family is
no invention, that it has existed as long as man himself, and that all
social evolution has been a struggle for the preservation of its most
valuable features.[3]

2. If, even in early times, and especially among the Hebrews, Greeks,
and Romans, the family was an important factor in national development,
it has been infinitely more so {222} since the advent of Christianity.
Christ did not create this relationship. He found it in existence when
He came to the earth. But He invested it with a new ethical value. He
laid upon it His consecrating touch, and made it the vehicle of all
that is most tender and true in human affection, so that among
Christian people to-day no word is fraught with such hallowed
associations as the word 'home.' This He did both by example and
teaching. As a member of a human family Himself, He participated in
its experiences and duties. He spent His early years in the home of
Nazareth, and was subject unto His parents. He manifested His glory at
a marriage feast. By the grave of Lazarus He mingled His tears with
those of the sorrowing sisters of Bethany. He had a tender regard for
little children, and when mothers brought their infants to Him He
welcomed them with gracious encouragement, and, taking the little ones
in His arms, blessed them, thus consecrating for all time both
childhood and mother