Still, dreadful as these evils were, it is possible for us, in the conceptions which we form, to overrate the extent of them.

In reading the history of the Roman empire during the civil wars of Marius and Sylla, one might easily imagine that the whole population of the country was organized into the two contending armies, and were employed wholly in the work of fighting with and massacring each other.

But nothing like this can be true.

It is obviously but a small part, after all, of an extended community that can be ever actively and personally engaged in these deeds of violence and blood.

Man is not naturally a ferocious wild beast.