Page:Folk-lore - A Quarterly Review. Volume 24, 1913.djvu/564

 526 Reviews.

attempt to treat a "problem of origins" of such a fmidamental and general social phenomenon as religion. In his methodolo- gical work, Regies de la methode sodologique, he has strenuously insisted upon the treatment of social phenomena "as things," upon the necessity of excluding all forms of psychological explana- tions from sociology.- This postulate undoubtedly appears to many a rule rather artificial and barren in its practical applications, — and especially to British anthropologists, who prefer psychological explanations of origins ; and this volume enables us to judge as to the success of his method.

The book has several aspects and aims. It attempts to state the essential and fundamental elements of religion, being thus a revision of the author's former definition of the religious ; it investi- gates the origins of religion : it gives a theory of .totemism ; and it is designed as a substantial contribution to philosophy.

All these problems M. Durkheim seeks to solve by an analysis of the beliefs of practically one single tribe, the Arunta. His keen eye detects in the facts we owe to iMessrs. Spencer and Gillen much that is not patent to a less acute mind, and his researches through their two volumes, completed by the records made by Mr. Strehlow, yield him an abundant crop of theoretical results. Nevertheless, to base most far-reaching conclusions upon prac- tically a single instance seems open to very serious objections. It is extremely dangerous to accept any people as "the absolutely primitive type of mankind," or as "the best example of elementary forms of social organization and creed," and to forego the verifica- tion of conclusions by other available instances. For example, when M. Durkheim, in trying to determine the fundamental aspect of religion, finds it in an universal and absolute bipartition of men, things, and ideas into "sacre et profane,"(pp. 50 f/j^^.), he may refer to a well-known passage by the Australian ethnographers,^ and, in fact, a sharp division of all things into religious and non-religious seems to be a very marked feature of the social life of Central Australian natives. But is it universal? I feel by no means persuaded. In reading the detailed monograph by Dr. and Mrs. Seligmann about the Veddas, no such division is suggested as exist-

- Op. cit.. Table of Contents, cap. ii.

^ The Northern Tribes of Central Australia, p. 33.