236 Shadowings 



Nowhere do I remember reading a plain state- 

 ment of the reason why ghosts are feared. Ask 

 any ten intelligent persons of your acquaintance, 

 who remember having once been afraid of ghosts, 

 to tell you exactly why they were afraid, to 

 define the fancy behind the fear ; and I doubt 

 whether even one will be able to answer the ques- 

 tion. The literature of folk-lore oral and writ- 

 ten throws no clear light upon the subject. 

 We find, indeed, various legends of men torn 

 asunder by phantoms ; but such gross imagin- 

 ings could not explain the peculiar quality of 

 ghostly fear. It is not a fear of bodily violence. 

 It is not even a reasoning fear, not a fear that 

 can readily explain itself, which would not be 

 the case if it were founded upon definite ideas of 

 physical danger. Furthermore, although primi- 

 tive ghosts may have been imagined as capable 

 of tearing and devouring, the common idea of a 

 ghost is certainly that of a being intangible and 

 imponderable. 1 



1 I may remark here that in many old Japanese legends 

 and ballads, ghosts are represented as having power to pull 

 off people's heads. But so far as the origin of the fear of 

 ghosts is concerned, such stories explain nothing, since 

 the experiences that evolved the fear must have been real, 

 not imaginary, experiences. 



