THE RELIGIOUS IDEA. 689 



the popular mind, this belief in their reality is, on occasion, 

 taken advantage of. At Hamoa (Navigator s Islands) &quot; they 

 have an idea which is very convenient to the reputation of 

 the females, that some of these liotooa poiv [mischievous 

 spirits] molest them in their sleep, in consequence of which 

 there are many supernatural conceptions.&quot; Among the 

 Dyaks it is the same. We are told both by Brooke and St. 

 John of children who were begotten by certain spirits. Of 

 like origin and nature was the doctrine of the Babylonians 

 concerning male and female spirits and their offspring. And 

 the beliefs in incubi and succubi lasted in European history 

 down to comparatively late times : sometimes giving rise to 

 traditions like that of Eobert the Devil. Of course the 

 statement respecting the nature of the supernatural parent 

 is variable he is demoniacal or he is divine ; and conse 

 quently there now and then result such stories as those 

 of the Greeks about god-descended men. 



Thus Comparative Sociology discloses a common origin 

 for each leading element of religious belief. The conception 

 of the ghost, along with the multiplying and complicating 

 ideas arising from it, we find everywhere alike in the 

 arctic regions and in the tropics ; in the forests of North 

 America and in the deserts of Arabia ; in the valleys of the 

 Himalayas and in African jungles ; on the flanks of the 

 Andes and in the Polynesian islands. It is exhibited with 

 equal clearness by races so remote in type from one another, 

 that competent judges think they must have diverged before 

 the existing distribution of land and sea was established 

 among straight-haired, curly-haired, woolly -haired races; 

 among, white, tawny, copper-coloured, black. And we find 

 it among peoples who have made no advances in civilization 

 as well as among the semi-civilized and the civilized. 

 Thus we have abundant proofs of the natural genesis of 

 religions. 



586. To give to these proofs, re-inforcing those before 



