THE KUKdR AS ITJEST. 725 



out mediaeval Europe. King Gontran was &quot;like a priest 

 among priests.&quot; Charlemagne, too, had a kind of high- 

 priestly character : on solemn occasions he bore relics on his 

 shoulders and danced before relics. Nor indeed is the con 

 nexion entirely broken even now.* 



604. In illustrating this primitive identity of ruler and 

 priest, and in tracing out the long-continued connexion 

 between the two, I have been unavoidably led away from the 

 consideration of this double function as seen at the outset. 

 Fully to understand the genesis of the priest properly so 

 called, we must return for a moment to early stages. 



At first the priestly actions of the chief differ in nothing 

 from the priestly actions of other heads of families. The 

 heads of all families forming the tribe, severally sacrifice to 

 their departed ancestors ; and the chief does the like to his 

 departed ancestors. How, then, does his priestly character 

 become more decided than theirs ? 



Elsewhere I suggested that besides propitiating the ghosts 

 of dead relatives, the members of a primitive community will 

 naturally, in some cases, think it prudent to propitiate the 

 ghost of a dead chief, regarded as more powerful than other 

 ghosts, and as not unlikely to do them mischief if friendly 



* The fact that most people on reading that Melchizedek was priest and 

 king, are struck by the connexion as anomalous, well exemplifies the quality 

 of current education. When, as I have just learned, a clergyman examin 

 ing young ladies at their confirmation, names as remarkable this combination 

 of characters, which is the normal combination, we may judge how widely 

 prevalent is the ignorance of cardinal truths in the histoties of societies: 

 an ignorance which goes along with knowledge of those multitudinous 

 trivialities that make up primers of history and figure on examination 

 papers. But our many-headed political pope, which is as fit to prescribe a 

 system of education as was the ecclesiastical pope to tell Galileo the structure 

 of the Solar System, thinks well that children should learn (even though the 

 lessons add to that strain which injures health) what woman this or that 

 king married, who commanded at this or that battle, what was the p-nish- 

 ment of this rebel or that conspirator, &c. ; while they are left in utter 

 darkness respecting the early stages of leading institutions under which they 

 live. 



