Page:Religion in the Making.djvu/27



In this primitive phase of religion, dominated by ritual and emotion, we are dealing with essentially social phenomena. Ritual is more impressive, and emotion more active, when a whole society is concerned in the same ritual and the same emotion. Accordingly, a collective ritual and a collective emotion take their places as one of the binding forces of savage tribes. They represent the first faint glimmerings of the life of the spirit raised beyond concentration upon the task of supplying animal necessities. Conversely, religion in its decay sinks back into sociability.

Mere ritual and emotion cannot maintain themselves untouched by intellectuality. Also the abstract idea of maintaining the ritual for the sake of the emotion, though it may express the truth about the subconscious psychology of primitive races, is far too abstract to enter into their conscious thoughts. A myth satisfies the demands of incipient rationality. Men