516 POLITICAL INSTITUTIONS. 



son the Lord intact, he says rising up like a god : - f Listen 

 to what I speak unto thee. &quot; And then another tablet 

 narrates how Thothmes IV, travelling when a prince, and 

 taking his siesta in the shade of the Sphinx, was spoken to in i 

 dream by that god, who said &quot;Look at me! ... Answer 

 me that you will do me what is in my heart&quot; &c. ; and when 

 he ascended the throne, Thothmes fulfilled the injunction. 

 Analogous stages were well exemplified among the ancient 

 Peruvians. There is a tradition that Huayna Ccapac, wish 

 ing to marry his second sister, applied for assent to the dead 

 body of his father; &quot;but the dead body gave no answer, 

 while fearful signs appeared in the heavens, portending 

 blood.&quot; Moreover, as before pointed out in 477, &quot; the Ynca 

 gave them (the vassals) to understand that all he did with 

 regard to them was by an order and revelation of his father, 

 the Sun.&quot; Turning to extant races, we see that in the Poly 

 nesian Islands, where the genesis of a pantheon by ancestor 

 worship is variously exemplified, divine direction is habitually 

 sought through priests. Among the Tahitians, one &quot; mode by 

 which the god intimated his will/ was to enter the priest, 

 who then &quot; spoke as entirely under supernatural influence.&quot; 

 Mariner tells us that in Tonga, too, when the natives wished 

 to consult the gods, there was a ceremony of invocation; and 

 the in spired priest then uttered the divine command. Similar 

 beliefs and usages are described by Turner as existing in 

 Samoa. Passing to another region, we find among the Todas 

 of the Indian hills, an appeal for supernatural guidance in 

 judicial matters. 



&quot; When any dispute arises respecting their wives or their buffaloes, it 

 has to be decided by the priest, who affects to become possessed by the 

 Bell-god, and . . . pronounces the deity s decision upon the point in 

 dispute.&quot; 



These instances serve to introduce and interpret for us 

 those which the records of historic peoples yield. Taking 

 first the Hebrews, we have the familiar fact that the laws 

 for general guidance were supposed to be divinely communi 

 cated ; and we have the further fact that special directions 



