ISRAELITE AND INDIAN. 



57 



attack upon any religion. Let us learn a lesson from the Indians, 

 not only in tolerance but in politeness. One of the early Jesuit 

 missionaries in Canada recounts how he pleased a Huron chief by 

 his discourse upon the cosmology set forth in the Scriptures, and 

 felt that he had secured a convert until the chief, thanking him 

 for his information, added, " Now you have told me how your 

 world was made, I will tell you how my world was made " ; and 

 proceeded to give the now familiar story of the woman falling 

 from the sky, and the turtle. He was willing that the priest should 

 retain his belief, with which his own, in his opinion, did not con- 

 flict. Dr. Franklin tells of a Susquehannock who, after a similar 

 lecture from a Swedish missionary, was answered in the same 

 manner ; but this missionary became angry and interrupted the 

 Indian, whereupon the latter solemnly rebuked him with pity : " I 

 have listened politely to what you told me ; if you had been prop- 

 erly brought up, you would have believed me as I believed you." 



Religion, as accurately denned, embraces only the perficient 

 relations between divinity and man, and the mode in which such 

 relations operate. Popularly it includes cosmology and theology. 

 For present convenience the broad subject may be divided into 

 Religious Opinions and Religious Practices. 



In this comparison, all religious views personally entertained 

 must be laid aside and the study conducted strictly within the 

 scope of anthropology. Modern thinkers adopt the rule not to 

 use a miraculous factor when unnecessary. Nee deus intersit, 

 nisi dignus vindice nodus. It is now regarded as puerile to ex- 

 plain all puzzling phenomena, as was done for ages 



" When solved complete was any portent odd 

 By one more story or another god." 



This attitude, however, is still not universal. When experi- 

 ence of observed facts and of the orderly working of the forces of 

 nature are not sufficient for explanation, some minds yet resort to 

 the miraculous. Others humbly confess ignorance and work for 

 light. This light when gained is real and lasting, not the delusive 

 hues of cloud-region, varying with each instant and to each ob- 

 server's eye, and soon resolving into the same old mists and fogs 

 from which escape was sought. 



In their explanation of phenomena, all the peoples of the world 

 have resorted to revelations. Every myth or early teaching is 

 directly or indirectly through revelation ; but as the revelation is 

 on both sides of the equation, it can be eliminated from any paral- 

 lel such as is now presented. 



A cardinal of more than titular eminence was rash when, ad- 

 mitting that the doctrine of the devil and his command of demons 

 was first learned by the Israelites during the Babylonian captiv- 



