Magic Science and Religion ^j 



great extent from purely individual sources. Secondly, society as 

 a crowd is by no means always given to the production of religious 

 beliefs or even to religious states of mind, while collective effer- 

 vescence is often of an entirely secular nature. Thirdly, tradition, 

 the sum-total of certain rules and cultural achievements, embraces, 

 and in primitive societies keeps in a tight grip, both Profane and 

 Sacred. Finally, the personification of society, the conception 

 of a " Collective Soul," is without any foundation in fact, and is 

 against the sound methods of social science. 



2. The Moral Efficiency of Savage Beliefs 



With all this, in order to do justice to Robertson Smith, 

 Durkheim, and their school, we have to admit that they have 

 brought out a number of relevant features of primitive religion. 

 Above all, by the very exaggeration of the sociological aspect of 

 primitive faith they have set forth a number of most important 

 questions : Why are most religious acts in primitive societies 

 performed collectively and in public ? What is the part of society 

 in the establishment of the rules of moral conduct ? Why are not 

 only morality but also belief, mythology, and all sacred tradition 

 compulsory to all the members of a primitive tribe ? In other 

 words, why is there only one body of religious beliefs in each tribe, 

 and why is no difference of opinion ever tolerated ? 



To give an answer to these questions we have to go back to 

 our survey of religious phenomena, to recall some of our conclusions 

 there arrived at, and especially to fix our attention upon the 

 technique by which belief is expressed and morals established in 

 primitive religion. 



Let us start with the religious act par excellence, the ceremonial 

 of death. Here the call to religion arises out of an individual 

 crisis, the death which threatens man or woman. Never does 

 an individual need the comfort of belief and ritual so much as in 

 the sacrament of the viaticum, in the last comforts given to him 

 at the final stage of his life's journey — acts which are well-nigh 

 universal in all primitive religions. These acts are directed 

 against the overwhelming fear, against the corroding doubt, from 

 which the savage is no more free than the civilised man. These 

 acts confirm his hope that there is a hereafter, that it is not worse 

 than present life ; indeed, better. All the ritual expresses that belief, 

 that emotional attitude which the dying man requires, which is 



