man (and very late man too) may have a great idea, or the germ of a great idea, but may be constitutionally incapable of regarding it fixedly, of living on its level, of refraining from sportive fancy in its regard, enfin, from adding "myth" to "religion."
My position may be illustrated by a passage in Mr. Darwin's Descent of Man. Mr. Darwin held that by aid of his "high mental faculties" (and very high they needed to be) "man was first led to believe in unseen spiritual agencies, then in fetishism" (an unseen spiritual agency in a stick, stone, feather, or what not), "polytheism, and ultimately in monotheism."[1] The Australian belief is not, of course, doctrinal monotheism, but it does not seem to me to have been reached by way either of spiritualism, fetishism, or polytheism, of which there are only faint traces. Now, Mr. Darwin had already said "the feeling of religious devotion is a highly complex one, consisting of love, complete submission to an exalted and mysterious superior, a strong sense of dependence, fear, reverence, gratitude, hope for the future, and perhaps other elements. No being could experience so complex an emotion until advanced in his intellectual and moral faculties to at least a moderately high level," but a dog can "make some distant approach to this state of mind." An Australian savage makes a nearer approach. "Love" is implied in the term "Our Father," which, as Mr. Howitt satisfied himself (I think), is not of Christian origin (Journal of the Anthropological Institute, vol. xiii., p. 192). "Submission" is expected of the initiated, and illustrated by Mr. Howitt's old man who would not eat emu eggs: "He might see me, and be very angry." A strong sense of dependence must be felt on the Being whose "voice brings the rain" and makes life possible. "Fear and reverence" are sometimes indicated by the not taking of this Being's name in vain, not men-
- ↑ Darwin, Descent of Man, p. 68, 1871.
