288 MYTH AND SCIENCE. 



does not merely obey the innate impulse to give an 

 external form to the image already in his mind, but 

 while satisfying the aesthetic sentiment which actuates 

 him, he is conscious of some mysterious power and 

 superstitious influence. This sentiment is not only 

 apparent in our own children, but among nearly all 

 savages, of which many instances might be given; 

 8 >me of them are even afraid to look at a portrait, 

 and shrink from it as from a living person. 



As time went on, a belief in spirits was developed 

 from causes already mentioned, the rude theory of 

 incarnation followed as its corollary, and this senti- 

 ment was naturally confirmed by incised and sculp- 

 tured images ; for since they supposed a spirit to be 

 present in every object whatever, this was much 

 more the case with incised or sculptured figures of men 

 and animals. In these figures the amulet, talisman, 

 or gris-gris of savages especially consisted ; portraits, 

 however rude, of animals, monsters, of the human 

 form as a whole or in parts, as in the universal 

 phallic superstitions. The belief in spirits, resulting 

 from the personification of shadows, or of the image 

 of a man's own soul which was supposed to return 

 from the tomb, had a mythical influence on the mode 

 and ceremonies of sepulture, on the position of corpses, 

 on the orientation of tombs, and their form. In fact, 

 the mythical ideas of spirits, and the fanciful place 

 they took in the primitive idea of the world, produced 

 the custom of burying corpses in an upright, stooping, 



