522 RECORD OF yCIENCE FOR 1887 AND 1888. 



(3) Oomliict in view of the ecclesiastical organization. It includes 

 sacred precincts, editices, regalia, paraphernalia of worship, fetes, pro- 

 cessions, selemn services, rites, sacritices, holidays. In a single word, 

 it is the Cult of a people. 



From this definition it will readily be seen that all religious may enter 

 the area of scientific inquiry, aud, again, that it is very difficult to keep 

 philosophy, or the explanation of the universe, religion, or creed and 

 cult and folk-lore, which is the literature and custom of the unlettered, 

 apart in the laboratory. 



It is an evidence of progress that there is in Paris a Mus^e des Re- 

 ligions, iHiblishiug Revue de I'Histoire des Religions. In the sixteenth 

 volume of this periodical, Theodore Reinach has a paper on Les classifi- 

 cations des religions et la role de I'Histoire des religions dans I'enseigne- 

 ment public. Julieu Vinson has also in Revue de Linguistique (xxi, 

 361-364) a paper entitled " Les religions actuelles, leurs doctrines, leur 

 evolution, leur histoire." Anthropological mythology also receives the 

 attention of B. Platuer in the New Englander (1^88), and the ghost 

 theory of the origin of religion is discussed in Bibliotheca Sacra for the 

 same year. 



The whole subject of the basis of morality is being reviewed in the 

 most learned of our periodicals in America, in England, and on the con- 

 tinent. The North American Review, the Forum, the Contemporary 

 Review, the Nineteenth Century, the Revue Politique et Litteraire, the 

 Revue des deux Moudes must be faithfully studied by one who would 

 keep posted on the questions raised. Reviewing the ethical treatises 

 of Schuman and Best, Mr. Romanes enforces the sufficiency of the 

 Darwinian hypothesis to explain the moral sense in all its protean 

 forms as proximately due to natural causes. In Popular Science 

 Monthly, W. S. Lilly discusses materialism and morality (xxx, 474-493), 

 and Prof. A. P. Peabody speaks of classic and Semitic ethics in Andover 

 Review (x, 361-376). All of the tbeological periodicals discuss ethical 

 questions, basing human duty on divine injunction. In addition to the 

 publications of the Musee Guimet and the journals and proceedings of 

 the great anthropological societies, the student must consult for the 

 study of comparative religion the Journal of the Royal Asiatic in Lon- 

 don aud the transactions, etc., of the branches in India and China. At 

 the close of the volume of the Journal for 1888 (vol. xx, pt. 4; appen- 

 dix, pp. 1-218) will be foutul an excellent index to the whole series. 



In the classified index appended to Archiv fiir Anthropologic each 

 year is a separate collection of titles relating to this branch of anthro- 

 pology. 



The Revue d'Anthropologie and Revue d'Ethnographie also give 

 each quarter a list of publications, among which are nuiuy bearing on 

 religion. 



The most fascinating department of our science is folk-lore. It is so 

 familiar to every intelligent person from childhoo<l; it is imbedded in 



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