" The act implies the intent. That is to say,
the tribe is an enlarged family who, since they have no collective system
of sovereignty which gives them common protection by an organized police,
and courts with power to enforce process, have no option but to protect
each other. Therefore, it is incumbent on each member of the tribe or
family to avenge an injury to any other member, whether the injury be
accidental or otherwise; and to be himself the judge of what amounts to an
injury. Such a condition prevailed among the Hebrews at a very early
period; "And God blessed Noah and his sons, and said unto them: ... at the
hand of every man's brother will I require the life of man. Whoso sheddeth
man's blood, by man shall his blood be shed." [Footnote: Gen. IX, 1, 5,
6.] These customs and the type of thought which sustain them are very
tenacious and change slowly. Moses could not have altered the nomadic
customs of thought and of blood revenge, had he tried, more than could
Canute. It would have been impossible. The advent of a civilized
conception of the law is the work of centuries as the history of England
proves.
We know not how long ago it was that the law of the blood feud was fully
recognized in England, but it had already been shaken at the conquest, and
its death-blow was given it by the Church, which had begun to tire of the
responsibility entailed by the trial by ordeal or miracle, and the obloquy
which it involved, at a relatively early date.
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