Page:Folk-lore - A Quarterly Review. Volume 18, 1907.djvu/382

 34^ Reviews.

born with the child but is imparted by a ceremony. It departs from the man who breaks tribal custom, e.g. becomes a Christian. It causes men to dream. It sends sickness. It hates twins. It is in many men at once, travels with the tribe, can be passed on to an heir like a blessing, indeed, we seem to have here the key to the inmost shrine of Kafir religion.

Perhaps these crumbs will be enough to attract hungry anthropologists to the lavish feast.

R. R. Marett.

Religion in Evolution. By F. B. Jevons, Litt.D. London: Methuen & Co. 1906.

This is a work of apologetics. It consists of four lectures delivered in the Vacation Term for Bibhcal Study at Cambridge. The argument, however, necessitates an enquiry whether religion has been evolved out of, or preceded by, a non-religious or pre- religious stage in the history of man. Seeing that such a stage has been supposed to have been discovered among the Australian natives, Dr. Jevons discusses the evidence of Dr. Howitt, Mrs. Langloh Parker, and Messrs. Spencer and Gillen, on the point. Rightly holding that evolution does not proceed equally in all departments of intellectual and social life, and therefore that religious development may be slower or more rapid than social, or may even decay as social and intellectual life develops, he arrives at the conclusion that a pre-religious stage in the history of man cannot yet be said to have been satisfactorily proved. In the strict sense of the word proved, possibly he may be right. But if the term Evolution and all that it impUes be a correct generalization of the forces which have operated from the beginning of the world to produce its present condition, includ- ing, of course, that of mankind, the presumption of a pre-religious stage in the history of man remains unshaken by his examina- tion of the Australian evidence and the less valuable West African evidence of Dr. Nassau and M. AUegret which he prays in aid. Moreover, I very much doubt whether his interpretation