504 Darwinism and the Study of Religions 



pation that exists mainly in the minds of hymn-writers. The real 

 savage is more actively engaged. Instead of asking a god to do what 

 he wants done, he does it or tries to do it himself; instead of prayers 

 he utters spells. In a word he is busy practising magic, and above 

 all he is strenuously engaged in dancing magical dances. When the 

 savage wants rain or wind or sunshine, he does not go to church ; 

 he summons his tribe and they dance a rain-dance or wind-dance or 

 sun-dance. When a savage goes to war we must not picture his 

 wife on her knees at home praying for the absent ; instead we must 

 picture her dancing the whole night long ; not for mere joy of heart 

 or to pass the weary hours ; she is dancing his war-dance to bring 

 him victory. 



Magic is nowadays condemned alike by science and by religion; 

 it is both useless and impious. It is obsolete, and only practised by 

 malign sorcerers in obscure holes and corners. Undoubtedly magic 

 is neither religion nor science, but in all probability it is the spiritual 

 protoplasm from which religion and science ultimately differentiated. 

 As such the doctrine of evolution bids us scan it closely. Magic 

 may be malign and private ; nowadays it is apt to be both. But in 

 early days magic was as much for good as for evil ; it was publicly 

 practised for the common weal. 



The gist of magic comes out most clearly in magical dances. We 

 think of dancing as a light form of recreation, practised by the young 

 from sheer joie de vivre and unsuitable for the mature. But among 

 the Tarahumares 1 in Mexico the word for dancing, noldvoa, means 

 "to work." Old men will reproach young men saying "Why do you 

 not go to work ? " meaning why do you not dance instead of only 

 looking on. The chief religious sin of which the Tarahumare is 

 conscious is that he has not danced enough and not made enough 

 tesvino, his cereal intoxicant. 



Dancing then is to the savage working, doing, and the dance is 

 in its origin an imitation or perhaps rather an intensification of 

 processes of work 2 . Repetition, regular and frequent, constitutes 

 rhythm and rhythm heightens the sense of will power in action. 

 Rhythmical action may even, as seen in the dances of Dervishes, 

 produce a condition of ecstasy. Ecstasy among primitive peoples is 

 a condition much valued ; it is often, though not always, enhanced by 

 the use of intoxicants. Psychologically the savage starts from the 

 sense of his own will power, he stimulates it by every means at his 

 command. Feeling his will strongly and knowing nothing of natural 

 law he recognises no limits to his own power; he feels himself a 



1 Carl Lumholtz, Unknown Mexico, p. 330, London, 1903. 



a Karl Backer, Arbeit und Rhythmus, Leipzig (3rd edit.), 1902, passim. 



