The expression of the wishes and judgment of the members of the same community, at first by oral and afterwards by written language, serves, as just remarked, as a most important secondary guide of conduct, in aid of the social instincts, but sometimes in opposition to them. This latter fact is well exemplified by the _Law of Honour_, that is the law of the opinion of our equals, and not of all our countrymen. The breach of this law, even when the breach is known to be strictly accordant with true morality, has caused many a man more agony than a real crime. We recognise the same influence in the burning sense of shame which most of us have felt even after the interval of years, when calling to mind some accidental breach of a trifling though fixed rule of etiquette. The judgment of the community will generally be guided by some rude experience of what is best in the long run for all the members; but this judgment will not rarely err from ignorance and from weak powers of reasoning. Hence the strangest customs and superstitions, in complete opposition to the true welfare and happiness of mankind, have become all-powerful throughout the world. We see this in the horror felt by a Hindoo who breaks his caste, in the shame of a Mahometan woman who exposes her face, and in innumerable other instances. It would be difficult to distinguish between the remorse felt by a Hindoo who has eaten unclean food, from that felt after committing a theft; but the former would probably be the more severe. How so many absurd rules of conduct, as well as so many absurd religious beliefs, have originated we do not know; nor how it is that they have become, in all quarters of the world, so deeply impressed on the mind of men; but it is worthy of remark that a belief constantly inculcated during the early years of life, whilst the brain is impressible, appears to acquire almost the nature of an instinct; and the very essence of an instinct is that it is followed independently of reason. Neither can we say why certain admirable virtues, such as the love of truth, are much more highly appreciated by some savage tribes than by others;[133] nor, again, why similar differences prevail even amongst civilised nations. Knowing how firmly fixed many strange customs and superstitions have become, we need feel no surprise that the self-regarding virtues should now appear to us so natural, supported as they are by reason, as to be thought innate, although they were not valued by man in his early condition.