Almost the whole world is agreed on the point that the Law does not sufficiently protect honour. Positive Law evidently does not consider it of such value as material possessions, for the defence of which it knows itself to be qualified. But there are numbers of people whose honour is dearer to them than their fortune, even than their life, and trembling with indignation they see that a thief who steals their purse with a few shillings is haled off to prison, while a slanderer who sullies their honour either goes unpunished, or at most gets off with a fine, which merely adds official insult to the injury. In this case the Law has lagged so far behind Morality that individuals try of their own accord to bridge the gulf without counting on the intervention of the community. For aspersions of their honour the masses take revenge with fists and cudgels, often with bloody results; and among the elect they resort to duels with lethal weapons, a preposterous proceeding due to desperation, and a bitter indictment of the prevailing laws. It is a deed of self-help, like the formation of a vigilance committee among the anarchical throng of a lawless rabble. Hardly to be justified on reasonable grounds, it is intelligible from the point of view of historical tradition, and as a survival of dim and primitive ideas. In early days a properly regulated duel was an ordeal showing the judgment of heaven. It was the general conviction that God would give victory to the right and crush the wrong. When human Law failed, the injured party appealed to the source of all Law and placed his cause in the hands of the Almighty. From this point of view the duel is no unsuitable means of preventing plots to evade the law. Even if the injured party is inexperienced in the use of the weapon, even if his opponent is skilled and vastly his superior, he need not worry, for God fights on his side. Therefore he is more sure of success than if he entrusted his cause to fallible human judges. But from the moment that the duel ceases to be regarded as a means of arriving at the verdict of God, nothing can be urged in its defence, and that it nevertheless persists is a fact that can only be accounted for by the inadequacy of the current laws.