Chapter I contains elaborate definitions and expositions of the folkways

and the mores, with an analysis of their play in human society. Chapter II shows the bearing of the folkways on human interests, and the way in which they act or are acted on. The thesis which is expounded in these two chapters is: that the folkways are habits of the individual and customs of the society which arise from efforts to satisfy needs; they are intertwined with goblinism and demonism and primitive notions of luck (sec. 6), and so they win traditional authority. Then they become regulative for succeeding generations and take on the character of a social force. They arise no one knows whence or how. They grow as if by the play of internal life energy. They can be modified, but only to a limited extent, by the purposeful efforts of men. In time they lose power, decline, and die, or are transformed. While they are in vigor they very largely control individual and social undertakings, and they produce and nourish ideas of world philosophy and life policy. Yet they are not organic or material. They belong to a superorganic system of relations, conventions, and institutional arrangements. The study of them is called for by their _social_ character, by virtue of which they are leading factors in the science of society.

When the analysis of the folkways has been concluded it is necessary that it should be justified by a series of illustrations, or by a setting forth of cases in which the operation of the mores is shown to be what is affirmed in the analysis. Any such exposition of the mores in cases, in order to be successful, must go into details. It is in details that all the graphic force and argumentative value of the cases are to be found. It has not been easy to do justice to the details and to observe the necessary limits of space. The ethnographical facts which I present are not subsequent justification of generalizations otherwise obtained. They are selections from a great array of facts from which the generalizations were deduced. A number of other very important cases which I included in my plan of proofs and illustrations I have been obliged to leave out for lack of space. Such are: Demonism, Primitive Religion, and Witchcraft; The Status of Women; War; Evolution and the Mores; Usury; Gambling; Societal Organization and Classes; Mortuary Usages; Oaths; Taboos; Ethics; Æsthetics; and Democracy. The first four of these are written. I may be able to publish them soon, separately. My next task is to finish the sociology.

W. G. SUMNER

YALE UNIVERSITY

With the reprinting of _Folkways_ it seems in place to inform the admirers of this book and of its author concerning the progress of Professor Sumner's work between 1907 and his death, in his seventieth year, in April, 1910. Several articles bearing on the mores, and realizing in part the programme outlined in the last paragraph of the foregoing Preface, have been published: "The Family and Social Change," in the _American Journal of Sociology_ for March, 1909 (14: 577-591); "Witchcraft," in the _Forum_ for May, 1909 (41: 410-423); "The Status of Women in Chaldea, Egypt, India, Judea, and Greece to the time of Christ," in the _Forum_ for August, 1909 (42: 113-136); "Mores of the Present and the Future," in the _Yale Review_ for November, 1909 (18: 233-245); and "Religion and the Mores," in the _American Journal of Sociology_ for March, 1910 (15: 577-591). Of these the first and last were presidential addresses before the American Sociological Society. All are included in Volume I (War and Other Essays) of a four-volume set of Sumner's writings, published since his death by the Yale University Press.

Regarding the treatise on the "science of society" (for he had decided to call it that instead of "sociology") mentioned in the Preface, it should be said that Professor Sumner left a considerable amount of manuscript in the rather rough form of a first draft, together with a great mass of classified materials. He wrote very little on this treatise after the completion of _Folkways_, and not infrequently spoke of the latter to the present writer as "my last book." It is intended, however, that the _Science of Society_ shall be, at some time in the future, completed, and in such form as shall give to the world the fruits of Professor Sumner's intellectual power, clarity of vision, and truly herculean industry.

The present revision of _Folkways_ incorporates but few and unimportant corrections. Certain of these are from the hand of the author, and others from that of the present writer.

A photograph of Professor Sumner has been chosen for insertion in the present edition. It was taken April 18, 1902, and is regarded by many as being the most faithful representation in existence of Sumner's expression and pose, as he appeared in later years. This is the Sumner of the "mores," with mental powers at ripe maturity and bodily vigor as yet unimpaired by age. The Yale commencement orator of 1909 said of Sumner, in presenting him for the Doctorate of Laws: "His intellect has broadened, his heart has mellowed, as he has descended into the vale of years." While advancing age weakened in no respect the sheer power and the steady-eyed fearlessness of mind and character which made Sumner a compelling force in the university and in the wider world, it seems to some of us that the essential kindliness of his nature came out with especial clearness in his later years. And it is the suggestion of this quality which lends a distinctive charm, in our eyes, to the portrait chosen to head this volume.

A. G. KELLER

YALE UNIVERSITY

CONTENTS

CHAPTER PAGE

I. FUNDAMENTAL NOTIONS OF THE FOLKWAYS AND OF THE MORES 1

II. CHARACTERISTICS OF THE MORES 75

III. THE STRUGGLE FOR EXISTENCE 119

IV. LABOR, WEALTH 158

V. SOCIETAL SELECTION 173

VI. SLAVERY 261

VII. ABORTION, INFANTICIDE, KILLING THE OLD 308

VIII. CANNIBALISM 329

IX. SEX MORES 342

X. THE MARRIAGE INSTITUTION 395

XI. THE SOCIAL CODES 417

XII. INCEST 479

XIII. KINSHIP, BLOOD REVENGE, PRIMITIVE JUSTICE, PEACE UNIONS 493

XIV. UNCLEANNESS AND THE EVIL EYE 509

XV. THE MORES CAN MAKE ANYTHING RIGHT AND PREVENT CONDEMNATION OF ANYTHING 521

XVI. SACRAL HARLOTRY, CHILD SACRIFICE 533

XVII. POPULAR SPORTS, EXHIBITIONS, DRAMA 560

XVIII. ASCETICISM 605

XIX. EDUCATION, HISTORY 628

XX. LIFE POLICY, VIRTUE VS. SUCCESS 639

LIST OF BOOKS 655

(Titles are under the name of the author, or the leading word of the title)

INDEX 671

FOLKWAYS