BELIGION. 
297 
rally invest him with the human form, as the most 
perfect. To believe in a Being devoid of form, 
seems to the negro a belief in nothing, for his only 
test of the truth of an idea is the liveliness of his 
conception. To this supreme Being prayers are 
often offered, when his worshippers turn their 
faces towards the sun, as the most glorious emblem 
of his majesty. Loyer gives us a formula of morn- 
ing prayer used at Issini. " My God, give me 
" this day rice and yams ; give me gold and 
aigris give me slaves and riches; give me 
" health, and grant that I may be active and 
" swift.'' The same inaccuracy of thinking, the 
same vague manner of expression, the same ob- 
stinate adherence to propositions, the terms of 
which are indefinite and obscure, that have occa- 
sioned so many incurable religious dissensions 
among civilized nations, have produced a diversity 
of sects ajiiong the negroes. The chief of these 
sectaries are the believers in two principles, the 
evil and the good, the African and the European ; 
but as the negroes seldom disturb themselves 
about the inconsistency of their opinions, it is im- 
* The Aigris is a stone of a greenish blue colour, supposed 
to be a species of jasper ; small perforated pieces of which, 
valued at their weight in gold, and used for money, like the 
cowry shells which pass current in the countries along the 
Niger, from Bambara to Cassina^ at ten times their value in 
Bengal. 
