_For more extended reading:_

BOSANQUET, _The Family_.
SALEEBY, _Parenthood and Race Culture_.






CHAPTER IV


THE ORIGIN OF THE FAMILY

We must understand the biological roots of the family before we can
understand the family as an institution, and especially before we can
understand its origin. Let us note, then, briefly the chief biological
facts connected with the family life.

The Biological Foundations of the Family.--(1)_The Family rests upon
the Great Biological Fact of Sex._ While sex does not characterize
all animal forms, still it does characterize all except the simplest
forms of animal life. These simplest forms multiply or reproduce by
fission, but such asexual reproduction is almost entirely confined to
the unicellular forms of life. It may be inferred, therefore, that the
higher animal types could not have been evolved without sexual
reproduction, and something of the meaning or significance of sex in the
whole life process will, therefore, be helpful in understanding all of
the higher forms of evolution. Biologists tell us that the meaning or