It may be accepted as a hypothesis that there was a time in the history of every branch of the human race when social order was indefinite and that out of this incoherence came by {109} degrees a complex organized society. It was in such a rude state that the relations of individuals to each other were not clearly defined by custom, but were temporary and incidental. Family ties were loose and irregular, custom had not become fixed, law was unheard of, government was unknown unless it was a case of temporary leadership, and unity of purpose and reciprocal social life were wanting. Indeed, it is a picture of a human horde but little above the animal herd in its nature and composition. Living tribes such as the Fuegians and Australians, and the extinct Tasmanians, represent very nearly the status of the horde--a sort of social protoplasm. They wander in groups, incidentally through the influence of temporary advantage or on account of a fitful social instinct. Co-operation, mutual aid, and reciprocal mental action were so faint that in many cases life was practically non-social. Nevertheless, even these groups had aggregated, communicated, and had language and other evidences of social heredity. _The Family Is the Most Persistent of Social Origins_.--The relation of parent and child was the most potent influence in establishing coherency of the group, and next to it, though of later development, was the relation of man and woman--that is, the sex relation. While the family is a universal social unit, it appears in many different forms in different tribes and, indeed, exhibits many changes in its development in the same tribe. There is no probability that mankind existed in a complete state of promiscuity in sex relations, yet these relations varied in different tribes. Mating was always a habit of the race and early became regulated by custom. The variety of forms of mating leads us to think the early sex life of man was not of a degraded nature. Granted that matrimony had not reached the high state of spiritual life contemplated in modern ideals, there are instances of monogamic marriage and pure, dignified rites in primitive peoples. Polygamy and polyandry were of later development.