828 ECCLESIASTICAL INSTITUTIONS. 



account of the genesis of religion must begin by describing 

 the steps through which the transition takes place. 



The ghost-theory exhibits these steps quite clearly. We 

 are shown by it that the mental differentiation of invisible and 

 intangible beings from visible and tangible beings progresses 

 slowly and unobtrusively. In the fact that the other-self, sup 

 posed to wander in dreams, is believed to have actually done 

 and seen whatever was dreamed in the fact that the other- self 

 when going away at death, but expected presently to return, 

 is conceived as a double equally material with the original ; 

 we see that the supernatural agent in its primitive form, 

 diverges very little from the natural agent is simply the 

 original man with some added powers of going about secretly 

 and doing good or evil. And the fact that when the double 

 of the dead man ceases to be dreamed about by those who 

 knew him, his non-appearance in dreams is held to imply 

 that he is finally dead, shows that these earliest supernatural 

 agents are conceived as having but temporary existences : the 

 first tendencies to a permanent consciousness of the super 

 natural, prove abortive. 



In many cases no Aigher degree of differentiation is 

 reached The ghost-population, recruited by deaths on the 

 one oide but on the other side losing its members as they 

 cease to be recollected and dreamed about, does not increase; 

 and no individuals included in it come to be recognized 

 through successive generations as established supernatural 

 powers. Thus the Unkulunkulu, or old-old one, of the 

 Zulus, the father of the race, is regarded as finally or 

 completely dead; and there is propitiation only of ghosts 

 of more recent date. But where circumstances favour the 

 continuance of sacrifices at graves, witnessed by members 

 of each new generation who are told about the dead and 

 transmit the tradition, there eventually arises the conception 

 of a permanently-existing ghost or spirit. A more marked 

 contrast in thought between supernatural beings and natural 

 beings is thus established. There simultaneously results an 



