276 THE PASTORAL AGE IN AUSTRALASIA 



their way to the pioneer station, are able to nourish 

 the emotional mood that forms the core of religion. It 

 is otherwise with the stockmen and shepherds, the 

 shearers and rouseabouts. Alone in the sometimes fear- 

 ful solitude of the bush, those of them who are of Calvin- 

 istic rearing torture themselves with the problems of 

 predestination and election, and sometmies go mad 

 with utter bewilderment and terror. The others sink 

 to the level, not indeed of savages, but of primitive folk, 

 who have not yet risen to a dogmatic faith and a cere- 

 monial worship. They revert to the religion appropriate 

 to the pastoral phase — a religion without temples, cere- 

 monies, or priests, without material idols or those idols 

 of the cave or the mind that we call creeds. 



