PRESIDENTIAL ADDRESS. 079 



all their qualities. Hence every non-humau personality was couceived in larger 

 than human terms, and its qualities were larger than human. 



Not merely was every personality, human and other, endowed with qualities, 

 but by virtue of those qualities it possessed a potentiality and an atmosphere of its 

 own. The successful warrior and huntsman by more than his successes, by his 

 confidence and his brag, his readiness to quarrel, and his viudictiveness, or the 

 many-wintered elder, wise and slow to wrath, experienced in war and forestry, of 

 far-reaching purpose and subtle in execution, would be enshrined in a belief in his 

 powers, surrounded with a halo of which we still see a dim, a very dim, reflection 

 in the touching regard entertained for a political leader or the worship paid to an 

 ecclesiastical dignitary. Nor would this atmosphere surround only important or 

 successful men. Everyone is conscious of powers of some sort, and everyone 

 would attribute to others capabilities larger or smaller. Some would possess in 

 their own consciousness and in the eyes of their fellows a very small modicum of 

 power for good or evil. The mere glance or voice of others would inspire terror 

 or confidence. This potentiality, this atmosphere, would often cling with greater 

 intensity to non-human beings, objective or imaginary. The snake, the bird, the 

 elephant, the sun, the invisible wind, the unknown wielderof the lightning, would 

 be richly endowed. None, human or non-human, would (in theory at least) be 

 wholly without it. 



The Iroquoian tribes of North America possess a word which exactly expresses 

 this potentiality, this atmosphere, which they believe inheres in and surrounds 

 every personality. They call it orenda. A fine hunter is one whose orenda ia 

 fine, superior in quality. When he is successful he is said to baffle or thwart the 

 orenda of the quarry ; when unsuccessful, the game is said to have foiled or out- 

 matched his orenda. A person who defeats another in a game of skill or chance 

 is said to overcome his orenda. ' At public games or contests of skill or 

 endurance, or of swiftness of foot, where clan is pitted against clan, phratry against 

 phratry, tribe against tribe, or nation against nation, the shamans — men reputed to 

 possess powerful orenda — are employed for hire by the opposing parties respectively 

 to exercise their orenda to thwart or overcome that of their antagonists,' and thus 

 secure victory. So, when a storm is brewing, it (the storm-maker) is said to be 

 preparing its orenda ; when it is ready to burst, it has finished, has prepared its 

 orenda. Similar expressions are used for a man or one of the lower animals when 

 in a rage. A prophet or soothsayer is one who habitually puts forth his orenda, 

 and has thereby learned the secrets of the future. The orenda of shy birds and 

 other animals which it is difficult to ensnare or kill is said to be acute or sen.sitive — 

 that is, in detecting the presence of the hunter, whether man or beast. Anything 

 reputed or believed to have been instrumental in obtaining some good or accom- 

 plishing some end is said to possess orenda. Of one who, it is believed, has died 

 from witchcraft it is said, ' An evil oreixda has struck him.' ' 



Equivalent expressions are used by a large number of American tribes. The 

 same general idea is found elsewhere. ' The Melanesian mind,' says Dr. Oodrington, 

 ' is entirely possessed by the belief in a supernatural power or influence, called 

 almost universally mana. This is what works to efiect everything which is beyond 

 the ordinary power of men, outside the common processes of nature ; it is present 

 in the atmosphere of life, attaches itself to persons and to things, and is mani- 

 fe.sted by results which can only be ascribed to its operation.' And again : ' It is 

 a power or influence not physical, and in a way supernatural ; but it shows itself 

 in physical force, or in any kind of power or excellence which a man possesses. 

 This mana is not fixed in anything, and can be conveyed in almost anything ; but 

 spirits, whether disembodied souls or supernatural beings, have it and can impart 

 it ; and it essentially belongs to personal beings to originate it, though it may act 

 through the medium of water, or a stone, or a bone.' - The idea of ma7ia seema 

 to difler from that of orenda in that, according to Dr. Oodrington, it does 

 not belong to all men, and is rather a special than universal characteristic of 



' J. N. B. Hewitt, in American Anthropologist, N.S., vol. iv. p. .38. 

 * Oodrington, Tito Melatiesiang, p. 118. 



