SECT. III.] RELIGIOUS NOTIONS. 371 



visions, in which they are supposed to approach the higher 

 spirits. The young medicine-man, especially, required such an 

 initiation. The chiefs among the Caribs, Mexicans, and Peru- 

 vians, who exercised both spiritual and temporal powers, had to 

 undergo similar ordeals. 



When nature is thus spiritualised, every little accidental oc- 

 currence is attributed to the mysterious action of higher powers, 

 and in them the primitive man sees prognostications. To in- 

 terpret these becomes an art which requires much study. The 

 want of a mediation with the higher spirits, to interpret their 

 signs, to conciliate them, to take their advice as regards the 

 future, gives rise to priestcraft, and gradually endow it with 

 power and influence in all the affairs of life. As the spirit 

 world is always called upon when human means are exhausted, 

 so its aid is also invoked in the administration of justice : 

 hence the ordeals which are found among nearly all primitive 

 peoples. This fundamental idea is well shown in the doctrine 

 of Indian legislation, in which the proof by ordeals is only ad- 

 mitted where other proofs are wanting. The opinion of Wuttke, 

 that the belief in prognostics and ordeals rests upon some ob- 

 scure innate idea of fate which is beyond religion, cannot be 

 admitted. 



In consequence of this transference of sensible impres- 

 sions to a spiritual province, the gods are generally located in 

 elevations, or at great distances, on high distant mountains, 

 the clouds, the sky. It is, therefore, very possible that, as 

 Squire 1 observes, among many peoples the first temples were 

 artificial mounds, an imitation of the localities in which they 

 placed their gods. The Mexicans, Peruvians, and Cherokees 

 called their high buildings " Houses of God." 2 Temples pro- 

 perly so called were only built when man himself lived in 

 houses. 



If nature is once spiritualised in the manner indicated, so 

 that the spiritual world is not something above or beside the 

 physical world, but contained within it, the idea of the influence 

 of deceased persons on earthly life suggests itself. As Tiede- 



1 " The Serpent Symbol," p. 77, New York, 1851. 



2 Adair, " History of the American Indians." 



B B 2 



