thought would have encountered, but was unable to solve. 

 These included the causes of winds, rain, and hot and cold 

 weather; why people sometimes became ill; and how did the 

 Sun, Moon and stars apparently float in the sky without any 

 supports. It seems likely that very long ago Man noticed 

 that some events had visible causes: e.g. he obviously real- 

 ized that day was bright because the Sun was shining above 

 the world, and that night was dark because the Sun was 

 then absent; that men had to eat in order to live; that 

 animals could be killed if they were damaged seriously 

 enough; that he himself must keep reasonably warm or he 

 would die. Thus men would have simply extended the idea 

 of causes for various happenings to include unobservable 

 causes for certain kinds of events. Since no evident cause 

 of wind, rain, heat, or cold was observable, these phenomena 

 would be attributed to forces of an unknown kind, that is 

 to supernatural forces. The same sort of explanation was 

 advanced for disease, and the heavenly bodies were sup- 

 posed to be controlled by superhumans, or gods. Thus we 

 have the early view that many natural events were really 

 caused by gods, and all early peoples seem to have adopted 

 this idea. Since these gods were supposed to be a sort of 

 superior human being, and the good favors of humans 

 could be won by means of suitable gifts, it was assumed 

 that the same method of obtaining the cooperation of the 

 gods was correct. Consequently we find early men making 

 presents for their gods, which were usually burned at places 

 of worship at appropriate times: the flames, with their 

 mysterious properties (not understood until modem times), 

 would be supposed to transfer terrestrial goods to the gods' 

 celestial abode. 



Usually different phenomena were attributed to differ- 

 ent gods, but later men thought that only a few gods would 



37 



