Page:Transactions of the Second International Folk-Congress.djvu/435

Rh approval in deprecating the use of the word "supernatural" with reference to it. He agrees that the uncultured mind has not acquired the idea which the modern civilised man expresses by Nature and the natural, and therefore knows nothing of a supposed world above nature, or superior to it. Thus what is believed in, according to this account (deducting what belongs to our own readings of experience) is simply unseen power which can be turned by man to his own benefit—as in the case of electricity or even wind. True that "Mana" is defined (as we define "will" and "mental energy") as altogether distinct from physical power, and then again Dr. Codrington explains, as "a power or influence not physical and in a way supernatural; but it shows itself in physical force or in any kind of power or excellence which a man possesses. This "Mana" is not fixed in anything, and can be conveyed in almost anything; but spirits, whether disembodied souls or supernatural beings, have it and can impart it; and it essentially belongs to personal beings to originate it, though it may act through the medium of water, or a stone, or a bone." Once more; it "works to effect everything which is beyond the ordinary power of man outside the common process of nature ; it is present in the atmosphere of life, attaches itself to persons and to things, and is manifested by results which can only be ascribed to its operation. When one has got it he can use it and direct it, but its force may break forth at some new point; the presence of it is ascertained by proof." How near this definition surely is to what we see at the exceptional crises of life when the ordinary energies are gathered up into a supreme effort! "Thus", we are assured, "all conspicuous success is a proof that a man has 'Mana'; his influence depends on the impression made on the people's mind that he has it; he becomes a chief by virtue of it. Hence a man's power, though political or social in its character, is his 'Mana'; the word is naturally used in accordance with the native conception of the character of all power and influence as supernatural."

Perhaps the word which would best express what is here meant is still to seek. Anyhow man is conceived as akin to all which moves. And this idea develops into that of beings full of this "Mana", but non-fleshly and called spirits; only, as Dr. Codrington, like Major Ellis, urges, "it is most important to distinguish between