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266 possession and application of exclusively appropriated products to the advantage of specific individuals is an inevitable condition of the education and preparation of children for success in life; and that the acquisition of property consequently must absorb more and more of the zeal of civilized men as the monogamic family is more and more developed. Furthermore, in proportion as the love of parents is intensified by the development of the monogamic family, the father's mind will reach out with more intense longing to the future, and he will desire to secure his children against the ills of life so far as that can be done by a provision of capital. There are very few men, also, who ever have the power to "found a family," and who rise superior to the ambition of doing so. The tide of popular prejudice is running strongly against some of these feelings and sentiments, but where are the signs that they are felt any less intensely now than formerly? or that they are felt any less intensely in this country than in old countries?

The family sentiment is the most essentially conservative force which exists. If each generation spends itself to advance the next, we see the motive force of a constantly advancing struggle against nature. It is appalling to look at history and see how impossible it has been to maintain any regular or steady advance of this kind; families, generations, and states have gained a little for a time, and then it has all been swept away in some social convulsion. No doubt it must always be so. One generation will be sacrificed without advancing the next, but the family affection and devotion come in here to reinforce the deathless hope, and here to renew the never-ending struggle on which all civilization depends. Moreover, the family sentiment aims to hold and defend what has been achieved; it therefore often