DEMON WORSHIP. 



3 



In the following pages, we propose to class the different forms 

 of superstition prevailing among our countrymen, under the fol- 

 lowing heads, viz: — I. Demon ism, or the worship of demons or evil 

 spirits; II. Capuism, or the worship of gods, demigods, and deified 

 heroes; III. Grahaism, or the worship of planets and stars; IV. 

 Miscellaneous Superstitions, or such as cannot properly be 

 classed under any of the preceding heads. Not only will each of 

 these be found to be distinct from the rest in all material points, 

 but they also appear to have originated in the Island at different 

 periods of time. 



It is not easy, however, to fix definitely any particular period of 

 time as that in which any of these systems of superstition first 

 originated in the Island, no positive information of a very reliable 

 character being supplied by any records of native annals now 

 extant. Nevertheless the most reasonable supposition, and one 

 which is supported by all who have touched upon the subject, and, 

 to a certain extent, by the native historical records themselves, is, 

 that the greater portion of them existed here at a very early period, 

 long anterior to the commencement of the Christian era. 



With the exception of Buddhism (also which is partly, though 

 in some few respects only, based upon Brahminism) every species 

 of superstition, science, or literature, which exists among the 

 Singhalese, with certain exceptions of minor importance, may be 

 traced, more or less directly to Brahminism and its Vedas and Shas- 

 ters. Whether this is solely a consequence of Wijeyo's invasion 

 (543 b. c.), or whether any portion of them, such as the worship 

 of demons and of planets, had existed here even before that event, 

 and only became assimilated to the Brahminical doctrines itself 

 in subsequent times, it is not easy to decide; but yet, if the wild, 

 ignorant savages, who inhabited this Island, when Wijeyo landed on 

 it, and whom Native Chroniclers have styled demons, did profess 

 any form of worship, as no doubt they must have done, it is more 

 likely that it related to demons and planets, than to any thing else. 

 Men steeped in complete barbarism and ignorance, separated by 

 their insular position from the rest of the world, attributing, with 



