14 
LAND &? WATER 
October 17, 1918 
A Revival of Paganism: By M. A. Czaplicka 
IT is. being more and more universally recognised, under 
the searchlight of the Great War, that religion — I mean 
in the wide sense of the word — is a factor of life "which 
calls for readjustment, if in the future it is to satisfy ■ 
those cravings of human nature which it apparently 
met in pre-war time. 
Those who regard religion as co-ordinate with education, 
art, industry, and similar spheres of activities, aiming at 
bringing large groups of people sharing similar interests under 
general rules would like to bring the idea of reconstruction 
to religion as well. Others, for whom this term means the 
most private and confidential desires and humiliations of 
soul, would prefer to avoid discussing in public church 
reorganisation in the same way as trade union reorganisa- 
tion, and divide off from the big established religious institu- 
tions into smaller organisations wherein they think they can 
find more privacy. On the whole, the religious movement 
which is taking place dm^ing the present war is characterised 
by this : that it is not new ideas or dogmas that are sought 
for, but a new form of life wherein religion would play a 
larger part. 
Anyone who takes the trouble to observe the families of 
men killed at the front would probably be amazed at the 
number of cases where spiHtHalism, or an erttempt at com- 
municating with the dead, has been resorted to. . It is to 
be questioned whether this spiritualistic state of mind is a 
religious one, i.e., whether the communication of the spirit can 
take the place of prayers, and the belief in the bodily pre- 
sence of the dead can satisfy the necessity of the belief in 
God. According to official psychology •' such a thing is 
inadmissible, but in practice it is only too true that people 
endowed with some amount of imagination, great passion, 
small capacity of reasoning, and still smaller will-power, 
do not find any room for other comfort when once they fall 
a prey to spiritualistic practices. The book which played 
such an enormous r61e in the spiritualistic revival in this 
country — it need scai"cely be said that its title is Raymond* , 
by Sir Oliver Lodge — according to the author's intention 
was not meant to be taken as a Bible for "all bereaved 
persons," but, as a matter of fact, serves as a text-book for 
all attracted to such kind of comfort. And it is often doubted 
whether Sir Oliver Lodge is more sincere when he says " I 
am a student of the subject, and a student often undertakes 
detailed labour of a special kind," or when he says "Some 
may get it (this peaceful comfort) from the consolations of 
religion, some from the testimony of trusted people, while 
some may find it necessary to have first-hand experience of 
their own for a time." {Raymond, pages 342-3.) 
Out of the mass of literature written about, against, or for, 
Raymond, two book's especially are noticeable as the expres- 
sion of two opinions contrary to one another, but both 
strongly opposed to Raymondism, by which name must be 
understood epidemics of spiritualism excluding all the other 
forms of religious beliefs and practices. These two books, stand- 
ing at opposite poles, and both bringing a remedy for those 
whom there is still hope to save, are : Immortality, an Essay 
in Discovery co-ordinating Scientific, Psychical, and Biblical 
Research, by Canon Streeter, A. Clutton-Brock, C. W. Emmett, 
and othersf ; and The Question : " If a man die, shall he live 
again?" A brief history and examination of Modern 
Spiritualism, by Edward Clodd.J 
Immortality is a perfect expression of .the most profound, 
scholarly, and earnest spirit of the Church of England of 
to-day. It will be read with real appreciation by all people 
with creed and scholarship of whatever belief, and will dis- 
perse such doubts as may arise in. an educated Christian 
mind whose beliefs are disquieted by spiritualistic or other 
mental adventures. But it is scarcely probable that this 
book will be known to the hundreds and thousands who read 
or only heard of Raymond, who have fallen into the hands 
of some dishonest medium, and who live in the kind of 
nervous ecstasy which does not qualify them for urgent 
medical assistance, and yet cuts them off from the normal 
and healthy life of community. 
Mr. Edward Clodd's book is not addressed to students 
of psychic research, who take spiritualistic experiences as 
materials for the enlargement of our knowledge of the human 
mind in its various stages of development. Nor will philo- 
* Raymond, or Life and Death, with Examples of the Evidence for 
Survival of Memory and Affection after Death. Methuen. 1916. 
t Macmillan, 1917. 
Grant Richards, 1917 
sophers busy with research on "immortality" be pleased 
with Mr. Clodd's conclusive remarks, "there has been . . . 
no advance in knowledge of the conditions of existence in 
any after life, from the dawn of thought to the present day." 
{301). He addresses primarily those people for whom spiritual- 
ism is not a subject of study, but a belief and passion. The title 
Mr. Clodd has chosen, or the second part of it, is so overwhelm- 
ingly large that one feels almost discouraged from looking into 
it. Surely, Mr. Clodd did not want to settle in this work the 
enormous and hopelessly complicated question of the immor- 
tality of the soul ! Though all know he is inclined to answer it 
in the negative, his opinion is expressed in a more moderate 
way. He writes, on page 301 : "To Job's question, 'If a 
man die, shall he live again ? ', science can answer neither 
'yes' nor 'no.' " 
Spiritualism as Magic 
Yet it is not Job's question which forms the subject of 
this book, and it seems that a sub-title "Is Spiritualism a 
Modern Revival of Paganism," would, if less festhetic (?) 
be more accurate. For it is the history and examination of 
modern spiritualism, and a skilful analogy between its prac- 
tices arid magic as found among the existing primitive races 
which forms the main contents and value of Mr. Edward 
Clodd's most interesting book. He deals with the various 
phenomena of spiritualism, such as clairvoyance, crystal- 
gazing, telepathy, and with the well-known mediums. 
Except for these particulars which are open to questions 
still debatable, the book answers its purpose. It is acces- 
sible to a large public. It is rich in ethnological data showing 
that the magical rites of the Patagonians, Fijians, or North 
American Indians have revived in a similar form in Mrs. 
Piper's and others' seances. Thus the classics of ethnology 
as "Primitive Culture" or "The Golden Bough" are used by 
the author as "antiseptics' to Spiritualism." 
Since Mr. Clodd does me the honour of quoting my experi- 
ences of the shamanistic rites (witnessed in Northern Siberia 
— piage 194), it is only fair to admit that, but for the differ- 
ence in climate, implements, and habitat, the Samoyed 
shamanistic religious ceremony was strikingly like a 
spiritualistic seance which I have witnessed in this 
country. In the first case, the spirits of ancestors were 
called upon to deliver the clan from leprosy and the dry 
winds ; in the second, the dead relative was called upon 
to deliver one or two people of his family from the moral 
pain of separation and loneliness. It would be difficult to 
witness in England a Spiritualistic seance aiming at some 
material advantage assuming the medium is honest ; but, 
then, if the Samoyeds lived undei; the care of a well-organised 
State, protecting them from' epidemics and climatic disasters, 
perhaps their seances would also be of a merely moral 
character. 
The contents of the book would gain if more spiritualistic 
experiences were analysed, because, on the whole, the author 
is more familiar with the practices as found In the Childhood 
of Mankind, than with those which can be considered as 
' survivals or reversions to the state of mind familiar to the 
Stone Age ancestors of European nations. Such analysis 
would add to the success of the book among those who are 
well acquainted with the spiritualistic life of Western Europe, 
since the tendency of the author is obviously to reach these 
people. 
As regards the utilitarian side of the book, it may be 
doubted whether the method of Mr. Edward Clodd is not too 
surgical, too brusque, for those who, after all, in most cases 
come to Spiritualism through some mental shock, and there- 
fore need to be treated with sympathy and delicacy. Still,, 
it is difficult to know exactly how such a book- ought to be 
written. For people brought up on false assumptions that 
thp civilised races are made of a clay and soul of a higher 
quality, the mere fact of their most intimate experiences 
being compared with the heathen practices of uncivilised 
savages comes as a disagreeable shock. For others, in 
whose mind a belief in the immortality of soul is deeply 
rooted, it might be not altogether successful to oppose their 
spiritualistic idiosyncrasies lay upsetting their belief in a 
different and more fundamental category. 
The Question will, no doubt, be read widely — perhaps even 
more widely than Mr. Edward Clodd's other books. One 
can only hope that the nufnber of those whom he guides to 
reason .and tranquillity will be greater than those whom 
he merely vexes and hurts. 
