202 ASSAYS SCIENTIFIC AND PHILOSOPHICAL. 



X. 



SPENCER'S ECCLESIASTICAL INSTI- 

 TUTIONS. 1 



" THERE can be no true conception of a structure 

 without a true conception of its function." This 

 is the opening sentence of Ecclesiastical Institu- 

 tions, and it is the best criticism of the book itself. 

 If from first to last we get no true conception of 

 ecclesiastical institutions, it is because the author 

 starts with an utterly inadequate view of the 

 function of religion. Even Mr. Spencer fails when 

 he tries to give us the play of " Hamlet " with the 

 Prince of Denmark left out. 



The first two pages and a half of which one 

 page is given to a dialogue between Sir Samuel 

 Baker and a chief of the Latooki, a born Positivist, 

 named Commoro are thought sufficient to dis- 

 prove the theory " that religious ideas have a 

 supernatural origin." The rest of the volume has, 

 therefore, only to deal with the question " What 

 is their natural origin, and how do they express 

 themselves in ecclesiastical institutions ? " 



1 "Ecclesiastical Institutions." Part VI. of "The Principles of 

 Sociology." By Herbert Spencer. Williams and Norgate. 



