This stage lands us not only in existing custom, but also in the realm of history. The patriarchal and monogamian families have been developed from the pairing family. The first stage in the sequence given no longer exists, so far as is known, either in Australia or elsewhere. The other stages are nowhere, probably, existing with hard and sharp lines of separation from each other, but the groups representing them are distinct.
I submit with some confidence that these conclusions may be accepted by advocates either of the degradation or progression theories indifferently. As the former hold that man has become degraded from a once perfect and innocent state, and from perhaps a civilized condition, the two views may have a concurrent course backwards to the undivided commune, beyond which it is difficult to conceive of any society as existing. It is therefore at that stage that the two rival theories may be held to take divergent courses. It can be of little moment whether the degradation theory stops short at the divided commune, which still exists in modified forms, or at the undivided commune, which, though not known to exist now, is to be inferred as having once existed.
What further evidence future researches may afford cannot be foretold, but this is certain, that the evidence so far obtained discountenances the conclusion that existing savages are the degraded descendants of once civilized races.
