To my American ear it sounds perfect.

is a good word here.

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Note added at 12 mins (2005-01-10 10:53:20 GMT)
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http://www.shakespearedc.org/pastprod/macplay.html
The Turbulent World of King Macbeth
Scotland was a sparsely settled, rugged and unforgiving terrain in which populations were divided by mountains, lakes and firths into small and fiercely rivalrous kinship groups. The kinship bond was the MAINSTAY of society.

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Note added at 16 mins (2005-01-10 10:56:31 GMT)
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http://www.us-mission.ch/press1999/1102shali.htm
A key role in the recovery of the family, the MAINSTAY of society, is played by women, who are affected by conflict in a multitude of ways. They often must head the family if husbands and sons or fathers are in combat. And more often than ever women are subject to sexual violence, not as a casual by-product of conflict, but tragically as a deliberate weapon of war.

hope it helps. Good luck, Mirror!
86 English pages for "keystone of society"
Evolution
... American Christian fundamentalists view the family as the keystone of society, and
in their world that means that the male is "captain of the ship," and that ...
www.evoyage.com/Book Reviews/Evolution.htm - 17k - Cached - Similar pages

Vermeer's Children
... "In the Dutch Republic of the seventeenth-century, the family was the keystone of society and had many unique and advanced characteristics. ...
essentialvermeer.20m.com/vermeers_children.htm
49 English pages for family "keystone of society"

link just for fun
Nitcentral's Bulletin Brash Reflections
... This is one of the episodes in which Hawkeye uses the phrase "Finest kind." I love Frank Burns' statement, "Marriage is the headstone of society.". ...
64.33.77.146/discus/messages/522/857.html?1091055612
3 English pages for "headstone of society"

This topic cuts thru deep within me
... I went to a catholic university in Tacloban and was taught that the family is the pillar of society. Once the pillar is weak, the society crumbles. ...
www.pinoyzone.com/family.html

The Family Cycle: The Good Enough Family - Narcissism
... Some of them subscribed to ideologies which promoted the family as a pillar of society,
the basic cell of the national organism, a hothouse in which to breed ...
www.healthyplace.com/communities/ personality_disorders/narcissism/family.html
4,520 English pages for family "pillar of society"