Page:The Collected Works of Theodore Parker Discourse volume 1.djvu/79

32 lished and fixed. Public theological doctrines are not yet formed. There are no mysteries in which each may not share.

This state of Fetichism continues as long as Man is in the gross state of ignorance which renders it possible. Next, as the power of abstraction and generalization becomes enlarged, and the qualities of external nature are understood, there are concrete and visible Gods for the Family; next for the Tribe; then for the Nation. But their power is supposed to be limited within certain bounds. A subsequent generalization gives an invisible but still concrete Deity for each department of Nature—the earth, the sea, the sky.

Now as soon as there is a Fetiche for the family, or the tribe, a mediator becomes needed to interpret the will and insure the favour of that Fetiche, to bring rain, or plenty, or success, and to avert impending evils. Such are the angekoks of the Esquimaux, the medicine-men of the Mandans, the jugglers of the Negroes. Then a priesthood gradually springs up, at first possessing none but spiritual powers; at length it surrounds its God with mysteries; excludes him from the public eye; establishes forms, sacrifices, and doctrines; limits access to the Gods; becomes tyrannical; aspires after political power; and founds a theocracy, the worst of despotisms, the earliest, and the most lasting. Still it has occupied a high and indispensable position in the development of the human race.

The highest form of Fetichism is the worship of the stars, or of the universe. Here it easily branches off into Polytheism. Indeed, it is impossible to tell where one begins and the other ends, for traces of each of the three forms are found in all the others; the two must be distinguished by their centre, not their circumference. The