XLIX] Studies in primitive Greek religion. 95 



who in reraote prehistoric times settled in the country to 

 which they gave their name and who during their wanderings 

 had become accustomed to a nomadic manner of life practiced, 

 we may assume, agriculture to a very small degree. From 

 this point of view also we have reason to assume that the sun- 

 spirit and rain-spirit, as begetters and sustainers of things 

 agricultural, played but an inferior part in primitive Greek 

 religion. 



If at the lower stages of religions evolution the heavenly 

 deities are only of small importance this is simply owing to the 

 fact that they are too far ofif to attract savage man's atten- 

 tion to any great degree and that as a rule they do not in- 

 terfere with his practical life. Far otherwise it is with the 

 powers of the earth who for this very reason become the prin- 

 cipal objects of worship. This appears all the more clearly 

 when we consider that in the lower cnlture the gods are ad- 

 dressed, not in the first place with the view of obtaining po- 

 sitive favours, but in the hope of averting evils and misfor- 

 tunes. For savage man the fear of evils that threaten his life 

 and excite his instinct of self-preservation is always a stron- 

 ger motive of worshipping supernatural powers than the mere 

 desire for positive goods ^). Hence the fact that among many 

 savage peoples the evil or harmful deities are propiated with 

 prayers and oflferings while the benevolent ones aro more or 

 less neglected. What Miss Kingsley says with special refe- 

 rence to the religion of the "West African negroes indeed holds 

 good of the religious view of all lower races. „The savage", 

 she writes, „is conscious of a set a of phenomena which do 

 not interfere with human affairs. The sun, the tide, for in- 

 stauce, what do they care? Nothing. He, therefore, turns his 

 attention to those other spirits who do take only too much 

 interest as proved by those unexpected catastrophes, and as 

 their action shows these spirits are all malignant, so he deals 

 with them as he would deal with a bad man whom he were 

 desirous of managing" 2). 



^) Cf. my Orighi of WorsM'p. ch. III." 



-) Kingsley, Travels in West Africn, p. 505. 



