Page:Folk-lore - A Quarterly Review. Volume 28, 1917.djvu/302

 270 What was in the mind of the early Egyptian, or of the men who first used a digging-stick, different though it was from modern European geometry, or from a steam-plough, is nevertheless connected by a continuous process with the later developments, and it is no more reasonable to say that the earlier stages were "the product of sheer unreflective habit" than it would be to say that the later stages of geometry or agriculture are. If there is something more than "sheer unreflective habit" in the work of modern geometry or agriculture, so there was in the earlier stages of the work. And in the same way, if there is something more than "sheer unreflective habit" in the later stages of the growth of religion, so there must have been in the earlier stages. What is evident is that in geometry, agriculture and religion alike, the earlier stages would not have been practised unless they had been thought worth while—unless they were felt to have some value. But whereas the value of geometry or agriculture is displayed mainly, if not wholly, in their material results, the value of religion is felt mainly if not wholly in the frame of mind or state of spirit produced. The Australian (as Messrs. Spencer and Gillen testify) is profoundly moved by the ceremonies in which he participates, whether as celebrant or witness; and, as the Archbishop of Upsala says (l.c, p. 195), in those ceremonies the Australian feels that man is in relation with what is holy—and feels such a state of mind or spirit to be the highest of all. Its value we may in other words say is supreme.

Dr. Marett (E.R.E., viii., p. 248b) deprecates the idea of dividing magic from religion by a horizontal line as it were, and inclines rather to regard the line of division between magic and religion as perpendicular. And he would place rudimentary cult, as we find it for instance amongst the Australians, on one side of the perpendicular line and magic on the other side. Thus we have not magic first existing for itself and religion subsequently