232 RELIGIOUS FEELING 



And the same may be quite as truly said of their masters ; 

 they may be good, pious men, but it is not the going to 

 church that constitutes either goodness or piety. In so far, 

 however, as mere church attendance, the observance of rites 

 or ceremonies, seriousness of look or demeanour, are to be 

 accepted as outward marks of religion or religiousness in 

 man, there is no good reason, but the reverse, why they 

 should not equally be accepted as evidences of religion in 

 the dog; for, as has already been seen, the lower animal 

 makes sacrifices of a kind that is at least uncommon in man 

 in order to obtain the much-coveted privilege. 



Scotch shepherds' collies are not, however, the only dogs 

 that have been popularly, and with a certain degree of 

 propriety, denominated ' religious.' In France, a Catholic 

 country, dogs attend prayers or mass with their masters, 

 exhibiting in the grand cathedrals of that beautiful land a 

 becoming behaviour, including gravity of look and de- 

 meanour, silence and motionlessness, an attitude of apparent 

 attention or intentness, and a probable feeling of awe, pro- 

 duced, it may be, by the 'dim religious light* of such 

 edifices, or by the varied, impressive sights and sounds that 

 environ them a kind of conduct, in short, only too in- 

 structive or suggestive to irreverent man (Pierquin and 

 Watson). It would appear further that in Catholic 

 countries imitation of man leads church-going dogs to the 

 stage of fasting (Southey). So that Catholic and Protestant 

 dogs may be spoken of with somewhat of propriety the 

 one group fasting and attending mass and all church 

 festivals, like Catholics ; the other going to the kirk and 

 sometimes at least attempting psalm-singing, like Protest- 

 ants or Presbyterians. 



Nor are dogs the only animals that may claim occasion- 

 ally to be considered ' pious.' While collies regularly attend 

 church they cannot be said, as a rule, to take any active 

 or intelligent part in the service; but in the case of the 

 parrot, which is not usually allowed to attend church, the 

 bird not unfrequently takes a prominent and certainly in- 

 telligent part in the private worship of its master's house- 

 hold. Such parrots, for instance, make responses at the 



