60 PRE-ANIMISM 



Assam is one of fear or dread." 1 A Lushei's whole life is 

 spent in propitiating spirits to whom all illnesses and mis- 

 fortunes are attributed. 2 



The savage will sometimes die of sheer fright from the 

 pronouncement of a curse, or for having broken tabu. Some 

 Maoris found and used a tinder-box, not knowing who was 

 its owner. When this turned out to be their chief, they died 

 of fright induced by the tribal belief in the sanctity of all his 

 property. 3 " It must seem incredible to people at home that 

 a man can die because a ju-ju has been made against him ; 

 for example, two sticks crossed on the path with, say, a rotten 

 egg and a fowl stuck on a stick, the man's name having been 

 'called.' And yet one knows of numerous instances where 

 men have died and young, healthy men, too against whom 

 such a ju-ju has been made " (Preface to Ikom Folk Stories 

 from Southern Nigeria, p. v ; by E. Dayrell ; 1913). Tabu, 

 the terror of the lower races, as Dr. Frazer has shown in his 

 Psyche's Task, plays an important part in the protection of 

 property. It is both the tribal conscience and the tribal 

 Inquisition. 



But we need not leave home for examples. There is echo 

 of what is quoted above from Parkman in Montaigne when he 

 says : " A gust of contrarie winds, the croking of a flight of 

 Ravens, the false pace of a Horse, the casual flight of an 

 Eagle, a dreame, a sodain voice, a false sign, are enough to 

 overthrow, sufficient to overwhelme and able to pull him to 

 the ground." 4 Professor Davenport says there is "also in 

 the average man a great slumbering mass of fear that he 

 cannot shake off, made up of instincts and feelings inherited 

 from a long human and animal past. This can be awakened 

 in ways that every psychologist understands theoretically, 

 and that the skilful revivalist employs practically." 5 The 

 wrath of an offended God who can be placated only by the 

 sacrifice of his Son, the ceaseless activity of a personal devil, 

 and pictures of a literal hell of eternal torment still form part of 

 the fear-inspiring methods of the Salvation Army, with its 

 standard of " Blood and Fire," and of many an uneducated 

 preacher in obscure villages. How "revivals," instead of 

 effecting permanent change of character, too frequently stimu- 

 late the emotions to dire results is well known. During the 

 movement in Wales in 1905 a "Native-born Cymro," writing 



1 Endle's Kachdris, p. 33. 2 Shakespeare's Lushei Kuki Claris^ p. 61. 

 3 Funk's New Zealand, p. 70. 4 Essays, Bk. II, ch. xii. 



5 Primitive Traits in Religious Revivals, p. 224. 



