14 JOURNAL OF RELIGIOUS PSYCHOLOGY 



of the community, as looked at from their point of view. Whatever 

 experience has taught them to be best is done, guided by superstitious 

 usages and customs.&quot; (45: 294.) 



The Greenlanders conception of evil, was, to quote Eink 



all that was contrary to the laws and customs, as regulated by the 

 angakoks.&quot; So when the Danish missionaries presented to them the 

 Christian views, the Eskimo &quot; conceived the idea of virtue and sin as 

 what was pleasing or displeasing to the Europeans, as according or dis 

 according with their customs and laws.&quot; (51: 201.) 



The Eskimo are pronounced a very conservative people. In 

 the words of Boas, 



The language, as well as the traditions of the Eskimo, points out 

 an exceptionally high degree of conservatism among this people. The 

 tenacity with which small peculiarities in the type of implements are 

 retained by each tribe throws a new light upon this conservatism, which, 

 while characteristic of most primitive people, is in few cases as well 

 developed as among the Eskimo.&quot; (6: 375; Cf. 33: 316; 3. Introduction, 

 xvii.). 



5. &quot; ETHNOCENTRISM &quot; 



Closely connected with this conservatism is the trait which 

 Sumner has called * ethnocentrism, the basis of what is known 

 in civilized countries as patriotism, with its perversions in 

 chauvinism and jingoism. 



Peary remarks: 



1 Much nonsense has been told by travelers in remote lands about the 

 aborigines regarding as gods the white men who come to them, but I 

 have never placed much credence in these stories. My own experience 

 has been that the aborigine is just as content with his own way as we 

 are with ours, just as convinced of his own superior knowledge, and that 

 he adjusts himself with his knowledge in regard to things in the same 

 way that we do.&quot; 



It is a question how much racial egotism should be read into 

 the well-nigh universal usage of an ethnic group s calling itself 

 &quot;human beings&quot; or &quot;people,&quot; in the Eskimo language, Innuit. 

 It is perhaps only a natural and convenient term for designating 

 their own folk, sometimes the only human being of whom they 

 know. Among the Point Barrow Eskimo, &quot;Inuin&quot; includes 

 white men as well as Eskimo, and Murdoch is of the opinion that 

 this is true everywhere (42:42), even though there are special 

 names for other nations, the most common word for Europeans 

 or white men being &quot;Kablunak.&quot; Language does undoubtedly 



