TRIBAL SOCIETY MI 



the corpse, to become an ancest .rit. f> 'I ibs 



connect tin- puUes with spiritual beings." 



Si IMC t lii-re was a spirit separable from the body, 

 primitix. man no longer thought of death an the .-ml of 

 conscious life. Tin- -pint mi-ht leave the body, hut it 

 ht return, or it m'mht enter other bodies or obj 



lu.-lliiiLT in them ;m<! animatim: t IK-HI. In ..m;i the body 

 miirht :a\ I in a -tat.- inINt iniruMiahle from death. 

 In 'i.| insanity tin- individual i- ohvimi*ly not 

 himself; henre the U Unly as animated 

 by sori;- il >jirit. To tlii- .lay th< ignorant 

 helirve that an insane person N possessed," and t) 



18 current usage of the forms, "he is not in his r 

 miihl," ami "he is out of his head."" 1 ' Thus, it has be- 

 come a rooted convi. tmn amomr primitive peoples that 

 ghosts or surviving spirits of the dead sometimes 

 come back to their proper bodie>, hut oftener wander 

 through the air. it. -ring now into one person or object 

 \ into another. The world is regarded as peopled 

 with -lio^N. 



Mut primitive men attribute to all external objects, 

 whetji.-r animate or inanimate, the possession either of 



.ana," or of an actuating spirit. The tree, the stone, 



juite as much as the human being or the swift forest 

 animal, may have souls and are moved by feelings of 

 love, envy, appetite, ,-urio-ity, aiul desire. Hence all 

 Nature is animated by spirits. **Some of them are con- 



and man can abuse them or use them; but 

 others are terrible, swift, subtle, or mysterious in their 

 ion and fill the w<>n<lerin human soul with mingled 

 tion ami lival. The serpent that could run with- 

 it le that could breathe air or live in wnt 

 M Tyler, op. "Giddingt, op. rif.. p. 249. 



