42 JOURNAL AND PROCEEDINGS. 



not in complete harmony with that power, of whose existence he is 

 terribly conscious, but of which he knows nothing. This naturally 

 keeps him in a state of uneasiness lest his person or possessions 

 suffer, for it seems an instinct in the human mind, which education 

 does not always eradicate, to erroneously regard all the unusual 

 phenomena of nature as evidences of the pleasure or displeasure 

 of that power, as these happen to be favorable or adverse to him. 

 Now a man in perplexity how to act, in a matter which he is quite 

 ignorant about, naturally seeks advice of his fellows. One, profess- 

 ing to be wiser than the others, recommends a course to follow ; his 

 advice is taken^ and as in all cases where a person has performed 

 what he regards as a duty, an amount of self-satisfaction naturally 

 follows. He gets for the time a degree of relief, and concludes that 

 the advice was good. The adviser consequently rises in his estima- 

 tion as a man of wisdom, to be consulted in all times of trouble, and 

 to be recommended to others in like cases. This gives him position 

 and authority in the tribe. His services are found useful, then neces- 

 sary, and so become permanent ; and here we have the natural origin 

 of the priestly class. 



Now it is not in the power of the human mind to conceive of 

 that of which it has no knowledge, and whenever it makes the 

 attempt, it begins at once to form its conception of it by that which 

 it does know ; and when man tries to define that power of which he 

 is so much in dread, he takes himself for the model as the highest 

 being he knows of, and exaggerates upon that ; and in this we get 

 the natural origin of all the gods of all the world. For as each 

 individual is, to some extent, diverse in character from every other, 

 each will form his own estimate of what would be pleasing to that 

 being of his imagination, by what would be most satisfactory to 

 himself if he were in his place. In this we have the origin and 

 explanation for what appears to be a standing source of bewilder- 

 ment to many, the endless diversity we find in the world of the 

 external manifestations of the internal religious principle. And 

 when this comes to be controlled by the intelligent guidance of a 

 a priestly class, we have the foundation laid for all the religious- 

 systems that man has ever invented to give expression to that 

 principle within him, from the most primitive or debased to the 

 most gorgeous and refined that the cultivated imagination and the 

 wealth of the class can produce. Now we are in a position to see 



