civilization

[C]ivilization means, above all, an unwillingness to inflict unnecessary pain.

Society was not invented by reasoning men. It evolved as part of our nature. It is as much a product of our genes as our bodies are.

Matt Ridley (ed.), The origins of virtue: human instincts and the evolution of cooperation, London, 1996, p. 6

It is a mistake to suppose that, in a country where the usual evidences of civilization exist, the condition of a very large body of the inhabitants may not be as degraded as that of savages.

Henry David Thoreau, Walden; or, Life in the woods, Boston, 1854