THE RELIGION OF NATURE 



on attaining a certain age, instinctively nibbles 

 off a certain part of the two longest feathers in 

 his tail. He does this because it has been a heredi- 

 tary habit in the species ever since its ancestor 

 gained an accidental advantage in life from do- 

 ing it. 



The human savage, however, differs from all 

 other animals in his desire to make himself look 

 better than he is, by decorating himself with 

 feathers, shells, colored earth, skins, flowers, etc. 

 This he would not do if he were not self-conscious ; 

 nor would other animals, such as apes, leave it 

 undone if they were self-conscious. 



Thus we see how the very slight essential dif- 

 ference between man and other animals in man's 

 conscious habit of thinking about things, instead 

 merely of them has given him not only language, 

 but also the instinct of artificial decoration. 

 From these combined acquirements have come all 

 literature and knowledge, all art and poetry, all 

 clothing, fashions, and industries. 



And the greatest of all human 'gifts, the re- 

 ligious sense, has been acquired in exactly the same 

 way. 



The natural consequence of thinking about him- 

 self, as an individual capable of producing mani- 

 fest effects by his own efforts, was that he thought 

 about the way in which other manifest effects 



["8] 



