ca, evidences of
lack of cohesive life. They represent groups of people without
permanent organization, held together by temporary advantage, with
crude, purposeless customs, with the exercise of fitful social instinct.

However, it is out of such conditions that the tribes, races, and
nations of the early historic period have evolved into barbaric
organization. Reasoning backward by the comparative method, one may
trace the survivals of ancient customs. Following the social heredity
of the oldest civilized tribes, such as the Egyptians, Babylonians,
Greeks, Romans, and Teutonic peoples, there is evidence of the rise
from a rude state of savagery to a higher social life. Historical
records indicate the passage from the middle state of barbarism to
advanced civil life, even though the earlier phases of social life of
primitive man remain obscure. The study of tradition and a comparison
of customs and language of races yield a definite knowledge of the
evolution of society.

_Kinship Is a Strong Factor in Social Organization_.--Of all causes
that held people in coherent union, perhaps kinship, natural and
artificial, was the most potent. All of the direct and indirect
offspring of a single pair settled in the same family group. This
enlarged family took its place as the only organ of social order. Not
only did all the relatives settle and {111} become members of one body,
but also strangers who needed protection were admitted to the family by
subscribing to their customs and religion. Thus the father of the
family had a numerous following, composed of relatives by birth and by
adoption. He was the ruler of this enlarged household, declaring the
customs of his fathers, leading the armed men in war, directing the
control of property, for he alone was the owner of all their
possessions, acting as priest in the administration of religious
ceremonies--a service performed only by him--and acting as judge in
matters of dispute or discipline. Thus the family was a compact
organization with a central authority, in which both chief and people
were bound by custom.

Individuals were born under status and must submit to whatever was
customary in the rule of the family or tribe. There was no law other
than custom to determine the relation of individuals to one another.
Each must abide in the sphere of activity into which he was born. He
could not rise above it, but must submit to the arbitrary rule of
traditional usag