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+*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK 30306 ***
+
+  THE OPEN MIND LIBRARY
+
+  BEING A SERIES OF WORKS DEALING WITH
+  QUESTIONS AS HANDLED BY DIFFERENT
+  SCHOOLS OF THOUGHT, IN RELIGION,
+  ETHICS, PHILOSOPHY & PSYCHOLOGY
+
+
+
+
+        RELIGION & SEX
+
+   STUDIES IN THE PATHOLOGY
+   OF RELIGIOUS DEVELOPMENT
+       BY CHAPMAN COHEN
+
+    T. N. FOULIS, PUBLISHER
+  LONDON, EDINBURGH, & BOSTON
+
+
+_Published October 1919_
+
+_Printed by_ MORRISON & GIBB LIMITED, _Edinburgh_
+
+
+
+
+THE LIST OF CHAPTERS
+
+
+     I. SCIENCE & THE SUPERNATURAL              _page_ 1
+
+    II. THE PRIMITIVE MIND & ITS ENVIRONMENT          35
+
+   III. THE RELIGION OF MENTAL DISEASE                51
+
+    IV. SEX & RELIGION IN PRIMITIVE LIFE              89
+
+     V. THE INFLUENCE OF SEXUAL & PATHOLOGIC
+         STATES ON RELIGIOUS BELIEF                  120
+
+    VI. THE STREAM OF TENDENCY                       145
+
+   VII. CONVERSION                                   169
+
+  VIII. RELIGIOUS EPIDEMICS                          205
+
+    IX. RELIGIOUS EPIDEMICS--(_concluded_)           226
+
+     X. THE WITCH MANIA                              243
+
+    XI. SUMMARY & CONCLUSION                         269
+
+
+
+
+PREFACE
+
+
+In spite of all that has been done in the way of applying scientific
+principles to religious ideas, there is much that yet remains to be
+accomplished. Generally speaking science has only dealt with the subject
+of religion in its more normal and more regularised forms. The last
+half-century has produced many elaborate and fruitful studies of the
+origin of religious ideas, while comparative mythology has shown a close
+and suggestive relationship between creeds and symbols that were once
+believed to have nothing in common. But beyond these fields of research
+there is at least one other that has hitherto been denied the attention
+it richly deserves. When the anthropologist has described those
+conditions of primitive culture amid which he believes religious ideas
+took their origin, and the comparative mythologist has shown us the
+similarities and inter-relations of widely separated creeds, religious
+beliefs have yet to submit to the test of a scientific psychology, the
+function of which is to determine how far the same principles apply to
+all phases of mental life whether religious or non-religious. Moreover,
+in addition to the normal psychical life of man, there is that vast
+borderland in which the normal merges into the abnormal, and the healthy
+state into a pathologic one. That there is a physiology of religion is
+now generally admitted; but that there is also a pathology of religion
+is not so generally recognised. The present work seeks to emphasise this
+last aspect. It does not claim to be more than an outline of the
+subject--a sketch map of a territory that others may fill in more
+completely.
+
+From another point of view the following pages may be regarded as an
+attempt more completely to apply scientific principles to religious
+beliefs. And it would be idle to hope that such an attempt could be made
+without incurring much hostile criticism. In connection with most other
+subjects the help of science is welcomed; in connection with religion
+science is still regarded as more or less of an intruder, profaning a
+sacred subject with vulgar tests and impertinent enquiries. This must
+almost inevitably follow when one has to face the opposition of
+thousands of men who have been trained to regard themselves as the
+authorised exponents of all that pertains to religion, but whose
+training fails to supply them with a genuine scientific equipment. It
+should, however, be clear that an attitude of hostility to science,
+veiled or open, cannot be maintained. Mere authority has fallen on evil
+days, and in all directions is being freely challenged. There is
+increasing dislike to systems of thought that shrink from examination,
+and to conclusions that cannot withstand the most rigorous
+investigation. And if science really has anything of value to say on
+this question it cannot be held to silence for ever. Sooner or later the
+need for its assistance will be felt, and the self-elected authority of
+an order must give way. It is, moreover, impossible for science with its
+claim, sometimes avowed, but always implied, to cover the whole of life,
+to forego so large a territory as that of religion. For there can be no
+reasonable question that religion has played, and still plays a large
+part in the life of the race. Whatever be the nature of religion,
+science is bound either to deal with it or confess its main task to be
+hopeless.
+
+Whether or not it is possible to apply known scientific principles to
+the whole of religion will be a matter of opinion; but the attempt is at
+least worth making. So much that appeared to be beyond the reach of
+science has been ultimately brought within its ken, so many things that
+seemed to stand in a class by themselves have been finally brought under
+some more comprehensive generalisation, and so become part of the
+'cosmic machine,' that one is impelled to believe that given time and
+industry the same will result here. And it should never be forgotten
+that one aspect of scientific progress has been the taking over of large
+tracts of territory that religion once regarded as peculiarly its own;
+and just as psychology and pathology were found to hold the key to an
+understanding of such a phenomenon as witchcraft, so we may yet realise
+that a true explanation of religious phenomena is to be found, not in
+some supernatural world, but in the workings of natural forces
+imperfectly understood.
+
+The defences set up by theologians against the scientific advance may be
+summarised under two heads. It is claimed that the 'facts' of the
+religious life belong to a world of inner experience, to a state of
+spiritual development which brings the subject into touch with a
+super-sensuous world not open to the normal human being, and with which
+science, as ordinarily understood, is incompetent to deal. In essence
+this is a very old position, and contains the kernel of 'mysticism' in
+all ages, from the savage state onward. This position involves a very
+obvious begging of the question at issue. It assumes that all attempts
+to correlate religious phenomena with phenomena in general have failed,
+and that all future attempts are similarly doomed to failure. Of course
+nothing of the kind has been shown. On the contrary, the aim of the
+present work is to show that no dividing line can be drawn between those
+states of mind that have been and are classed as religious, and those
+that are admittedly non-religious. For various reasons I have dealt
+almost entirely with those conditions that are admittedly pathological,
+but I believe it would be possible to prove the same of all normal
+frames of mind and emotional states. Any human quality may be enlisted
+in the service of religion, but there are none that are specifically
+religious. It is a pure assumption that the religious visionary
+possesses qualities that are either absent or rudimentary in other
+persons. Human faculty is everywhere identical although the form in
+which it is expressed differs according to education, the presence of
+certain dominating ideas, and the general influence of one's
+environment. To admit the claim of the mystic is to surrender all hope
+of a scientific co-ordination of life. It is quite fatal to the
+scientific ideal and involves the re-introduction into nature of a
+dualism the removal of which has been one of the most marked advantages
+of scientific thinking.
+
+Moreover, whatever views we may hold as to the ultimate nature of 'mind'
+the dependence of all frames of mind upon the brain and nervous system
+is now generally accepted. We may hold various theories as to the nature
+of mind, we may, with the late William James, treat the brain as merely
+a 'transmissive' organ, but even on that assumption--on behalf of which
+not a shred of positive evidence has been offered--the frames of mind
+expressed are determined by the nervous mechanism, and thus the laws of
+mental phenomena become ultimately the laws of the operation of the
+nervous system. The 'facts' of the religious life thus become part of
+the facts of psychology as a whole. Its 'laws' will form part of
+psychological laws as a whole, and religious experiences must be handed
+over for examination and classification to the psychologist who in turn
+relies for help and understanding on various associated branches of
+science.
+
+Closely allied to the claim of the 'mystic' that his experiences bring
+him into touch with a world of super-sensuous reality, is the attempt to
+prove that science is incapable of dealing with anything but "in the
+first place, the endless ascertainment of facts and the physical
+conditions under which they occur, and in the second place to the
+criticism of error." Well, no one denies that it is part of the work of
+science to ascertain facts, or even that its work consists in
+ascertaining facts and framing 'laws' that will explain them. But why
+are we to limit science to _physical_ facts only? All facts are not
+physical. If I have a head-ache, the unpleasant feeling is a fact. If I
+feel hot or cold, angry or pleased, think one thing ugly or another
+beautiful, my feelings are as much 'facts' as anything else that exists.
+Nay, if I fancy I see a ghost, or a vision, these also are 'facts' so
+far as my mental state at the time is concerned. So also are my beliefs
+about all manner of things, and often the most important facts with
+which I am connected. Facts may be objective or subjective. They may
+exist in relation to all minds normally constituted, or they may exist
+in relation to my own mind only; or, yet again, they may exist only in
+relation to certain states of mind, but they do not, nevertheless, cease
+to be facts.
+
+Now the business of science is to collect facts--all facts--classify
+them, and frame generalisations that will explain their groupings and
+modes of operation. It talks of the facts of the physical world, the
+facts of the biological world, the facts of the psychological world, and
+so forth. This last group comprises all sorts of feelings and ideas,
+beliefs and experiences. Some of these facts it calls false, others it
+calls true--that is, they are true when they hold good of all men and
+women normally constituted, they are not true when they hold good of
+isolated individuals only, and can be seen to be the product of
+misinterpreted experience, or arise from a derangement--permanent or
+temporary--of the nervous system. But true or false they remain facts of
+the mental life. They must be collected, grouped, and explained exactly
+as other facts are collected, grouped, and explained. They fall within
+the scope of science, to be dealt with by scientific methods.
+
+There is really no escape from the position that so far as religious
+'facts' are parts of mental life, religion becomes logically a
+department of psychology. The substantial identity of all mental facts
+is quite unaffected by their being directed to this or that special
+object. As mental facts they are part of the material that it is the
+work of science to reduce to order. And as mental facts religious
+phenomena are seen to follow the same 'laws' that govern mental
+phenomena in general. It is perfectly true that we cannot test and
+measure the material of psychology with the same definiteness and
+accuracy that the chemist applies to the subject-matter of his
+department; but that may be due to want of knowledge, or to the extreme
+complexity and variability of the matter with which we are dealing. And
+if it were true that the same tests could not be applied in psychology
+that are applied elsewhere, this would be no cause for scientific
+despair. It would only mean that fresh tests would have to be devised
+for a new group of facts, as every other science has already, as a
+matter of fact, created its own special standard of value.
+
+The second of the two lines of defence consists in the bold assertion
+that the religious interpretation of subjective phenomena is itself in
+the nature of a true scientific induction. The methods of science are
+not repudiated, but welcomed. But it is argued that the non-religious
+explanation of religious phenomena breaks down hopelessly, while the
+religious explanation fully covers and explains the facts. If this were
+true, nothing more remains to be said, and we must accept this dualistic
+scheme, however repugnant it may be to orthodox scientific ideas. But is
+it true? Is it a fact that the non-religious explanation breaks down so
+completely? Hitherto the course of events has been in the contrary
+direction. It is the religious explanation that has, over and over
+again, been shown to be unreliable, the non-religious explanation that
+has been finally established. Insanity and epilepsy, once universally
+ascribed to a supernatural order of being, have been reduced to the
+level of nervous disorders. All the phenomena of 'possession' are still
+with us, it is only our understanding of them that has altered. And
+before it is admitted that the phenomena described as religious can
+never be affiliated to the phenomena described as non-religious, it must
+be shown--beyond all possibility of doubt--that their explanation in
+terms of known forces is impossible. As I have said in the body of this
+work, the question at issue is essentially one of interpretation. The
+'facts' of the religious life are admitted. Science no more questions
+the reality of the visions of the medieval mystic than it questions the
+visions of the non-mystic admittedly suffering from neural derangement.
+The crucial question is whether we have any good reason for separating
+the two, and while we dismiss the one as hallucination accept the other
+as introducing us to another order of being? I do not think there is the
+slightest ground for any such differentiation, and I have given in the
+following pages what I conceive to be good reasons for so thinking. And
+I hope that the fact of the explanations there offered running counter
+to the traditional one will not prevent readers weighing with the utmost
+care the proofs that are offered.
+
+
+
+
+RELIGION AND SEX
+
+CHAPTER ONE
+
+SCIENCE AND THE SUPERNATURAL
+
+
+Accepting Professor Tylor's famous minimum definition of religion as
+"the belief in Spiritual Beings," it is safe to say that religious
+belief constitutes one of the largest facts in human history. No other
+single subject has occupied so large a share of man's conscious life, no
+other subject has absorbed so much of his energy. In very early stages
+of culture religious belief is universal in the fullest sense of the
+word. It shapes all primitive institutions; it dominates life from the
+cradle to the grave, and creates a shadow-land beyond the grave from
+which the dead continue to influence the actions of the living. At a
+later stage of culture we see a distinction being drawn between the
+natural and the supernatural, the secular and the spiritual, and the
+beginning of an antagonism that is still with us. Of all antagonisms
+conceived by the brain of man this is the deepest and the most
+irreconcilable. Each feels that the growth of the other threatens its
+own supremacy, with the result that advance from either side has been
+contested with the greatest obstinacy and determination. And although it
+is true that at present the supernatural is very largely "suspect," it
+is still powerful. Nor is its influence confined to the lower strata of
+European society. It has very many representatives among the higher
+culture, disguised it may be under various pseudo-philosophic forms.
+Altogether we may say that the supernatural has never been without its
+"cloud of witnesses." At all times there have been individuals, or
+groups of individuals, who have believed themselves, and have been
+believed by others, to be in touch with another order of existence than
+that with which people are normally in contact. And apart from these
+specially favoured persons, the wide vogue of the belief in good and
+evil portents, in lucky and unlucky days, the attraction of the "occult"
+in fiction and in fact, all serve as evidence that belief in the
+supernatural is still a force with which one has to reckon.
+
+To what causes are we to attribute the persistence of this belief in the
+supernatural? It is useless replying that its persistence is evidence of
+its truth. That clearly begs the whole question at issue. Mere social
+heredity will doubtless count for much in this direction. Men do not
+start their thinking afresh with each generation. It is based upon that
+of preceding generations; it follows set forms, and is generally
+influenced by that network of ideas and beliefs into which we are born
+and from which none of us ever completely escapes. Still that is hardly
+enough in itself to account for the persistence of supernaturalism.
+Assuming that originally there existed what was accepted as good
+evidence for the existence of a supernatural, it is hardly credible that
+every subsequent generation went on accepting it merely because one
+generation received evidence of its existence. As organs atrophy for
+want of exercise, so do beliefs die out in time for want of proof. Some
+kind of evidence must have been continually forthcoming in order to keep
+the belief alive and active. It is not a question of whether the
+evidence was good or bad. All evidence, it is important to bear in mind,
+is good to some one. The "facts" upon which thousands of people were put
+to death for witchcraft would not be considered evidence to anyone
+nowadays, but they were once accepted as good ground for conviction.
+
+What kind of evidence is it, then, that has been accepted as proof of
+the supernatural? Or, to return to Tylor's definition of religion,
+seeing that the belief in spiritual beings has persisted in every
+generation, upon what kind of evidence has this belief been nourished?
+Various replies might be given to this question, all of which may
+contain some degree of truth, or an aspect of a general truth. In the
+present enquiry I am concerned with one line of investigation only, one
+that has been strangely neglected, but which yet, I am convinced,
+promises fruitful results. In other directions it has been established
+that a great aid to an understanding of the human organism in times of
+health is to study its activities under conditions of disease. Abnormal
+psychology is now a recognised branch of psychology in general, and a
+glance through almost any recent text-book will show that the two form
+parts of a natural whole. The normal and the abnormal are in turn used
+to throw light on each other. And it appears to the present writer that
+in the matter of religious beliefs a much clearer understanding of their
+nature, and also of some of the conditions of their perpetuation, may be
+gained by a study of what has happened, and is happening, in the light
+of mental pathology.
+
+To some, of course, the bare idea of there being a pathology of religion
+will appear an entirely unwarrantable assumption. On the other hand, the
+scientific study of all phases of religions having made so great headway
+it is hoped that a larger number will be prepared for a discussion of
+the subject from a point of view which, if not quite new, is certainly
+not common. Of course, such a discussion, even if the author quite
+succeeds in demonstrating the truth of his thesis, will still leave the
+origin of the religious idea an open question. For the present we are
+not concerned directly with the origin of the religious idea, but with
+an examination of some of the causes that have served to perpetuate it,
+and to trace the influence in the history of religion of states of mind,
+both personal and collective, that are now admittedly abnormal or
+pathological in character. The legitimacy of the enquiry cannot be
+questioned. As to its value and significance, that every reader must
+determine for himself.
+
+One may put the essential idea of the following pages in a
+sentence:--Given the religious idea as already existing, in what way,
+and to what extent has its development been affected by forces that are
+not in themselves religious, and which modern thought definitely
+separates from religion?
+
+Under civilised and uncivilised conditions we find religious beliefs
+constantly associated with various forces--social, ethical, and
+psychological. Very seldom is there any serious attempt to separate them
+and assign to each their respective value; nor, indeed, is the task at
+any time an easy one. The difficulty is made the greater by the way in
+which writers so enlarge the meaning of "religion" that it is made to
+include almost everything for which one feels admiration or respect.
+This practice is neither helpful nor accurate. Human nature under all
+aspects of intellectual conviction presents the same fundamental
+characteristics, and a definition to be of value, while of necessity
+inclusive, must also be decisively exclusive. It must unite, but it must
+also separate. And many current definitions of religion, while they may
+bear testimony to the amiability of those who frame them, are quite
+destitute of scientific value. In any case, the association of the
+religious idea with non-religious forces is a fact too patent to admit
+of denial; and the important task is to determine their reciprocal
+influence. In actual life this separation has been secured by the
+development of the various branches of positive thought--ethics,
+psychology, etc., all of which were once directly under the control of
+religion. What remains to be done is to separate in theory what has
+already been separated in fact, with such additions as a more critical
+knowledge may suggest as advisable.
+
+Far more suggestive, however, than the association of religion with what
+we may call the normal social forces, is its connection with conditions
+that are now clearly recognised as abnormal. From the earliest times we
+find the use of drugs and stimulants, the practice of fasting and
+self-torture, with other methods of depressing or stimulating the action
+of the nervous system, accepted as well-recognised methods of inducing a
+sense of religious illumination, or the feeling that one is in direct
+communion with a supernatural order of existence. Equally significant is
+the world-wide acceptance--right up to recent times--of purely
+pathological states as evidence of supernatural intercourse. About these
+two sets of facts there can be no reasonable doubt. Over and over again
+we can observe how the promptings of disease are taken for the voice of
+divinity, and men and women who to-day would be handed over to the care
+of the physician hailed as an incarnation of deity. In modern asylums
+we find one of the commonest of delusions to be that of the insane
+person who imagines himself to be a specially selected instrument of
+deity. In such instances the causal influence of pathological conditions
+is admitted. On the other hand, we have belonging to the more normal
+type the person who claims a supernatural origin for many of his actions
+and states of mind. And between these two extremes lie a whole series of
+gradations. They exist in all stages of culture, and it is difficult to
+see by what rule of logic or of experience one can say where the normal
+ends and the abnormal begins. If we assume the inference of the normal
+person concerning the origin of his mental states to be correct, it
+seems difficult to deny the possibility of those of the insane person
+having a similar origin, although distorted by the influence of disease.
+If, on the other hand, we say the insane person is wholly wrong as to
+the origin of his mental states, may we not also assume that the normal
+person has likewise erred as to the cause of his emotions or ideas?
+
+Two considerations may be urged in support of this conclusion. In the
+first place, there is the fact of the fundamental identity of human
+qualities under all conditions of their manifestation. It is too often
+assumed--sometimes it is explicitly claimed--that one with what is
+called "a strong religious nature" possesses some quality of mind absent
+or undeveloped in those of an opposite type. This assumption is quite
+unwarrantable. The religious man is marked off from the non-religious
+man, not by the possession of distinct mental qualities, but solely by
+holding different ideas concerning the cause and significance of his
+mental states. There is no such thing as a religious "faculty," but
+only qualities of mind expressed in terms of the religious idea. If I am
+conscious of a strong desire to work on behalf of the social betterment
+of my fellows, I may account for this either by attributing it to having
+inherited a nature modified by generations of social intercourse, or on
+the hypothesis that I am an instrument in the hands of a superhuman
+personality. But in either case the qualities manifested remain the
+same. Love and hatred, fear and courage, honesty and roguery, with all
+other human qualities, may be expressed in terms of religion, or they
+may be expressed in non-religious terms. It is the cause to which they
+are attributed, or the object to which they are directed, that marks off
+the religious from the non-religious person.
+
+The second point is that the whole issue arises on a conflict of
+interpretations. If I question the reality of the visions or states of
+illumination experienced by Santa Teresa, I am not questioning that, so
+far as the saint herself was concerned, these states of exaltation were
+real. All mental states--whether arising under normal or abnormal
+conditions--are quite real to those who experience them. The visions of
+the hashish-eater are real, while they last; so are those of the victim
+of delirium tremens. All I question is their genuineness as
+corresponding to an objective reality. Over the mind of the subject
+these visions may exercise an absolute sway. As to their occurrence, he
+or she is the final and absolute authority. There can be no question
+here. But when we proceed from the occurrence of these visions to the
+question of their causation, then we are on entirely different ground.
+Here it is not a question of their genuineness, or of their power, but
+a question of how we are to interpret them. The honesty and
+singlemindedness of these "inspired" characters may be admitted, but
+honesty or singlemindedness is no guarantee of accuracy. We do not need
+to ask whether the peasant girl of Lourdes experienced a vision of the
+Madonna, but we do need to ask whether there was anything in her mental
+history, social surroundings, or nervous state that would account for
+the vision. All the "facts" of the religious life may be admitted; the
+sole question at issue is whether an adequate interpretation of at least
+some of them may not be found in terms of a purely scientific
+psychology.
+
+Taking, then, the religious idea as already existing, the following
+pages will be devoted to an examination of the extent to which this idea
+has been associated with forces and conditions that were plainly
+pathological. In very many individual cases it will not be difficult to
+trace a vivid sense of the supernatural to the presence of abnormal
+nervous states, sometimes deliberately induced, at other times arising
+of themselves. And it is a matter of mere historical observation that
+such individual cases have operated most powerfully to strengthen the
+belief in the supernatural with others. The example of Lourdes is a case
+in point. All Protestants will agree that the peasant girl's vision was
+a sheer hallucination. And yet there can be no question that this vision
+has served to strengthen the faith of many thousands of others in the
+nearness of the supernatural. And it needs but little effort of the
+imagination to realise how powerful such examples must have been in ages
+when medical science was in its infancy, and the more subtle operations
+of the nervous system completely unknown.
+
+This question, I repeat, is distinct from the much larger and wider
+enquiry of the origin of religion. A fairly lengthy experience of the
+capacity of the general mind for missing the real point at issue
+prevents my being too sanguine as to the efficiency of the most explicit
+avowal of one's purpose, but the duty of taking precautions nevertheless
+remains. And in elaborating an unfamiliar view of the nature of much of
+the world's so-called religious phenomena, the possibility of
+misconception is multiplied enormously. Still, a writer must do what he
+can to guard against misunderstanding, and in the most emphatic manner
+it must be said that it is not my purpose to prove, nor is it my belief,
+that religion springs from perverted sexuality, nor that the study of
+religion is no more than an exercise in pathology. Nothing is further
+from the writer's mind than so essentially preposterous a claim. Neither
+sexuality, no matter how powerful, nor disease, no matter how
+pronounced, can account for the religious idea. That has an entirely
+separate and independent origin. This should be plain to anyone who has
+but a merely casual acquaintance with the history of religion. It is,
+however, a very different thing to enquire as to the part played in the
+history of religion by morbid nervous states or perverted sexual
+feeling. That is an enquiry both legitimate and desirable; and it is one
+that promises to shed light on aspects of the subject otherwise very
+obscure. And certainly, if so-called religious feelings do not admit of
+explanation in terms of a scientific psychology, nothing remains but to
+recognise religion as something quite apart from normal life, to hand
+it over to the custody of word-spinning "Mystics," and so surrender all
+possibility of a rational understanding of either its nature or its
+history.
+
+In saying what I have concerning the probability of misconception, I
+have had specially in mind the attack made by the late Professor William
+James on what he called the "medical materialists." In that remarkable
+piece of religious yellow-journalism, _The Varieties of Religious
+Experience_, Professor James says of those who take up the position that
+a great deal of what has been accepted by the world as religious
+inspiration or exaltation can be accounted for as the products of
+disordered nervous states or perverted sexual feeling, "We are surely
+all familiar in a general way with this method of discrediting states of
+mind for which we have an antipathy. We all use it in some degree in
+criticising persons whose states of mind we regard as overstrained. But
+when other people criticise our own exalted soul-flights by calling them
+'nothing but' expressions of our organic disposition, we feel outraged
+and hurt, for we know that, whatever be our organism's peculiarities,
+our mental states have their substantive value as revelations of the
+living truth; and we wish that all this medical materialism could be
+made to hold its tongue." Again, "Few conceptions are less instructive
+than this re-interpretation of religion as perverted sexuality.... It is
+true that in the vast collection of religious phenomena, some are
+undisguisedly amatory--_e.g._ sex deities and obscene rites in
+polytheism, and ecstatic feelings of union with the Saviour in a few
+Christian Mystics. But then why not equally call religion an aberration
+of the digestive functions, and prove one's point by the worship of
+Bacchus and Ceres, or by the ecstatic feelings of some other saints
+about the Eucharist?" Or, seeing that the Bible is full of the language
+of respiratory oppression, "one might almost as well interpret religion
+as a perversion of the respiratory function." And if it is pointed out
+that active interest in religion synchronises with adolescence, "the
+retort again is easy.... The interest in mechanics, physics, chemistry,
+logic, philosophy, and sociology, which springs up during adolescent
+years along with that in poetry and religion, is also a perversion of
+the sexual instinct."[1]
+
+Excellent fooling, this, but little else. I do not know that anyone has
+ever claimed that religion took its origin in sexual feeling, or that
+this would alone provide an explanation of historical religion. All that
+anyone has ever urged is that a deal of so-called religious feeling,
+past and present, can be shown to be due to unsatisfied or perverted
+sexual feeling--which is a very different statement, and one of which
+the truth may be demonstrated from Professor James's own pages. But
+between saying that certain feelings are wrongly interpreted in terms of
+an already existing idea, and saying that the idea itself is nothing but
+these same feelings transformed, there is an obvious and important
+difference. In every case the religious idea is taken for granted. Its
+origin is a quite different subject of enquiry. But once the idea is in
+existence there is always the probability of evidence for its truth
+being found in the wrong direction. The analogy of the digestive and
+respiratory organs is clever, but futile. The belief that much which
+has passed for religious feeling is perverted sexuality is not based
+merely upon the language employed. The language is only symptomatic. The
+terminology of respiration and digestion when used in connection with
+religion is frankly and palpably symbolic. That of sexual love is as
+often frankly literal, and can be correlated with the actual state of
+the person using it. Digestion and respiration must go on in any case;
+but it is precisely the point at issue whether with a different sexual
+life these so-called religious ecstatic states would have been
+experienced. When we find religious characters of strongly marked
+amorous dispositions, but leading an ascetic life, using toward the
+object of their adoration terms usually associated with strong sexual
+feeling, it does not seem extravagant to find here a little more than
+what may be covered by mere symbolism. Would the medieval monk have been
+tempted by Satan in the form of beautiful women had he been happily
+married? Would Santa Teresa or Catherine of Sienna have used the
+language they did use to express their relations to Jesus had they been
+wives and mothers? Such questions admit of one answer, which is, in its
+way, decisive. Professor James admits that modern psychology holds as a
+general postulate "there is not a single one of our states of mind, high
+or low, healthy or morbid, that has not some organic process as its
+condition."[2] The 'medical materialist' can ask for no more than this.
+But this being granted, on what ground are we to be forbidden finding in
+these same organic processes the condition of the visions and ecstatic
+states with which _The Varieties of Religious Experience_ is so largely
+concerned?
+
+Again, it may be granted that adolescence brings with it an awakening of
+the whole mental life, not of religion alone. But the analogy goes no
+further, and, in any case, it begs the question. The full significance
+of the connection will be seen when we come to deal with initiation in
+primitive times and conversion in the modern period. At present it
+suffices to point out that the interest in art, in science, in
+literature, in sociology, are ends in themselves, and one need go no
+further than the developing mental life for an explanation. But the
+essential question here is whether this growing life can or cannot find
+complete satisfaction quite apart from religion. A developing interest
+in the larger social life is common to all, and to some extent this is
+secured by the pressure of forces that are simply inescapable. On the
+other hand, an interest in religion only exists with some, and then it
+may usually be traced to a conscious direction of their energies.
+Moreover, those who show no special interest in religion evince no lack
+of anything--save in religious terms. In every respect they exhibit the
+same mental and emotional qualities as their fellows. The only
+discernible difference is that while in the one case adolescent nature
+is expressed in terms of religion, in the other case it is expressed in
+terms of a larger social life.
+
+The question here might be put thus: Given a generation not taught to
+express its growing life in terms of religion, could adequate and
+satisfactory expression be found in the social life to which adolescence
+is unquestionably an introduction? Many would answer unhesitatingly,
+yes. They would argue that what are called the religious feelings, are
+normal social feelings exploited in the interests of the religious idea.
+They would deny that there is any such thing as a religious quality of
+mind. Any mental quality may be directed to a religious end, but all may
+find complete expression and satisfaction in a non-religious social
+life. This is the real question at issue, and yet Professor James never
+once, in the whole of his 500 pages, addresses himself to it.
+
+Apart from sex, there is the important question of the relation between
+abnormal and morbid nervous states and religious illumination. How far
+has the one been mistaken for the other? To what extent have people
+accepted the outcome of pathological conditions as proofs of intercourse
+with an unseen spiritual world? There is no doubt that among uncivilised
+people this is usually, if not invariably, the case. And our knowledge
+of the relations between the nervous system and mental states--imperfect
+as it still is--is so recent, that it is not surprising that fasting,
+self-torture, solitary meditation, etc., because of the states of mind
+to which they give rise, have been universally valued as aids to the
+religious life. Dr. D. G. Brinton says:--
+
+"When I say that all religions depend for their origin and continuation
+directly upon inspiration, I state an historic fact. It may be known
+under other names, of credit or discredit, as mysticism, ecstasy,
+rhapsody, demoniac possession, the divine afflatus, the gnosis, or, in
+its latest christening, 'cosmic consciousness.' All are but expressions
+of a belief that knowledge arises, words are uttered or actions
+performed not through conscious ideation or reflective purpose, but
+through the promptings of a power above or beyond the individual
+mind."[3]
+
+The connection between very many, at least, of these inspirational moods
+and pathological states is too obvious to be ignored. Professor James
+admits that "we cannot possibly ignore these pathological aspects of the
+subject." His notice of them, however, reminds one of the preacher who
+advised his hearers to look a certain difficulty boldly in the face--and
+pass on. No serious attempt is made to deal with them. A huge mass of
+"religious experiences" is thrown at the reader's head without any
+adequate explanation. It is a glorified revival meeting in an expensive
+volume. The testimony of a crowd of religious enthusiasts of all ages is
+accepted at practically face value. Thus, a religious writer who
+experiences the fairly common feeling of exaltation during a storm at
+sea, and explains his carelessness of danger as resulting from his
+"certainty of eternal life,"[4] is gravely cited as evidence of the
+working of the religious consciousness. What, then, are we to make of
+those who experience a similar feeling, but who are without the
+certainty of eternal life? The declaration of St. Ignatius that a single
+hour of meditation taught him more of the truth of "heavenly things than
+all the teachings of the doctors" is given as evidence of mystic
+illumination.[5] So with numerous other cases. We are even informed that
+"nitrous oxide and ether, especially nitrous oxide, when sufficiently
+diluted with air, stimulate the mystical consciousness in an
+extraordinary degree."[6] There seems no reason why the same claim
+should not be made on behalf of whisky. If one were not assured to the
+contrary, one might conclude that Professor James wrote this volume to
+poke fun at the whole tribe of mystics and their followers.
+
+The use made by Professor James of his long list of cases is the more
+remarkable, since he quite correctly points out that there are no
+religious feelings, only feelings directed towards a religious end. But
+if this be so, how are we justified in taking the accounts of religious
+visionaries as correct descriptions of the nature of their own mental
+states? Clearly, we need a study of these cases quite apart from the
+mystical interpretation of them. Instead of a study Professor James
+presents us with a catalogue--useful from a documentary point of view,
+but useless to any other end. And he is so averse to subjecting his
+examples to analysis that, when the extravagance of certain cases are
+glaring, he warns us that it is unfair to impute narrowness of mind as a
+vice of the individual, because in "religious and theological matters he
+probably absorbs his narrowness from his generation."[7] Granted; only
+one would like to know what reason there is for not deriving virtues as
+well as vices from the same source? And, deeper enquiry still, may not
+the religious interpretation itself be a product of the special
+environment of the period?
+
+The study of religious phenomena from the point of view above indicated
+is of first-rate importance. But although much has been said,
+parenthetically and inferentially, on the subject by various writers,
+the enquiry has never been exhaustively or systematically pursued. This
+is not due to any lack of material; that is abundant among both savage
+and civilised peoples. Perhaps it is because, while it has been
+considered permissible to point out that certain individuals have
+mistaken their own morbid states for evidence of divine illumination,
+too much ill-will would have been aroused had the powerful part played
+by this factor in religious development as a whole been pointed out.
+Still less admissible would it have been to point out, as will be done
+in succeeding chapters, that the deliberate culture of abnormal states
+of mind has been a part of the ritual of religions from the most
+primitive to the most recent times. In this connection it is worth
+noting that a very clear and shrewd essay on the connection between love
+and religious devotion by Isaac d'Israeli, which appeared in the first
+issue of the _Miscellanies of Literature_, was quietly eliminated from
+subsequent editions.
+
+My purpose, therefore, is to give Professor James's query--"Under just
+what biographic conditions did the sacred writers bring forth their
+contributions to the holy volume? and what had they exactly in their
+several individual minds, when they delivered their utterances?"[8]--a
+wider scope. What are the conditions, biographic and social, under which
+certain persons have imagined themselves, and have been believed by
+others, to be specially favoured with divine illumination? The majority
+of people, it may safely be said, are conscious of no such experience.
+In what respect, then, do the favoured few differ from their fellows?
+Must we assume that by some rare quality of natural endowment, or by
+some unusual development of faculty, they are brought into touch with a
+wider and deeper reality? Or are we to seek a less romantic explanation
+with the aid of known tendencies and forces in human nature? And,
+further, as this minority are not conscious of divine illumination all
+the time, what is it that differentiates their normal state from their
+abnormal condition?
+
+These are pertinent questions, and demand answer. But no answer of real
+value will be found in ordinary religious writings. Rhapsodical eulogies
+of religion tell us nothing; less than nothing that is useful, since
+theories that obtain in such quarters are based upon the absolute
+veracity of the phenomena under consideration. We may gather from this
+direction what religious people say or do, but not why they say or do
+these things. A description of the states of mind of religious people,
+such as is given by Professor James, is interesting enough, but it is
+their causation that is of fundamental importance. And their causation
+is only to be understood by associating them with other and more
+fundamental processes. Within recent years psychology owes much of the
+advance made to a closer study of the physiology of the nervous system,
+and if genuine advance is to be made in our understanding of religious
+phenomena we must adopt the same plan of investigation. We do not, for
+example, understand the nature of demoniacal possession by a mere
+collation of cases. It is only when we put them side by side with
+similar cases that now come under the control of the physician, and
+associate them with certain peculiar nervous conditions, and a
+particular social environment, that we find ourselves within sight of a
+rational explanation. Without adopting this plan we are in the position
+of one trying to determine the nature of a locomotive in complete
+ignorance of its internal mechanism. Yet this is precisely the position
+of the professional exponent of religion. As a student the budding
+divine has his head filled with historic creeds, and texts, and dogmas,
+and doctrines, none of which can possibly tell him anything of the real
+nature of religion. On the contrary, they act as so many obstacles to
+his acquiring real knowledge in later life. And it is a striking fact
+that while the professional astronomer, biologist, or physicist each
+adds to our knowledge of the subject that falls within his respective
+department, we owe little or nothing of our knowledge of the nature of
+religion to the professional theologian.
+
+To put the whole matter in a sentence, the study of religion must be
+affiliated to the study of life as a whole. If possible, we must get at
+the determining factors that lead one person to expend his energy on
+religion and see supernatural influence in a thousand and one details of
+his life, while another person, with apparently the same mental
+qualities, finds complete satisfaction in another direction, and is
+conscious of no such supernatural influence. It is scientifically
+inadmissible to posit a "religious faculty" organically ear-marked for
+religious use. Something of this kind is evidently in the minds of those
+who explain Darwin's agnosticism as due to atrophy of his religious
+sense, consequent on over-absorption in scientific pursuits, and who
+also argue that the "religious faculty," like a physiological structure,
+increases in efficiency with use and atrophies with disuse. There is no
+reason for believing that, had Darwin been profoundly religious, his
+mental qualities would have been different to what they were. They would
+have been expressed in a different form, that is all. As I have already
+said, there are no such things as specifically religious qualities of
+the mind. There may be hope or fear or love or hatred or terror or
+devotion or wonder in relation to religion, but they are precisely the
+same mental qualities that meet us in relation to other things. The old
+"faculty" psychology is dead, and the religious faculty must go with
+it.[9] Mental qualities may be roused to activity in connection with a
+belief in the supernatural, or they may be expressed in connection with
+mundane associations. Even the belief in the supernatural is only an
+expression of the same qualities of mind that with fuller knowledge
+result in a scientific generalisation. Whatever be the exciting cause,
+mental qualities themselves remain unchanged.
+
+In the present enquiry we are not concerned with a disproval of the
+religious idea, but with an examination of the conditions of its
+expression; less with the varieties of religious experience than with
+the nature of its manifestations. How far may religious experience be
+explained as a misinterpretation of normal non-religious life? To what
+extent have pathological nervous states influenced the building up of
+the religious consciousness? There can be no question that the
+last-named factor is an important one. This is admitted by Professor
+James in the following passage:--
+
+"You will in point of fact hardly find a religious leader of any kind in
+whose life there is no record of automatisms. I speak not merely of
+savage priests and prophets, whose followers regard automatic utterance
+and action as by itself tantamount to inspiration, I speak of leaders of
+thought and subjects of intellectualised experience. St. Paul had his
+visions, his ecstasies, his gifts of tongues, small as was the
+importance he attached to the latter. The whole array of Christian
+saints and heresiarchs, including the greatest, the Bernards, the
+Loyolas, the Luthers, the Foxes, the Wesleys, had their visions, voices,
+rapt conditions, guiding impressions, and 'openings.' They had these
+things because they had exalted sensibility, and to such things persons
+of exalted sensibility are liable."[10]
+
+The fact is unquestionable, but the question remains, In what sense were
+these people exalted? Did their exalted sensibility really bring them
+into touch with a form of existence hidden from persons of a coarser
+fibre? Or did it belong to a class of cases which in a more violent form
+comes within the province of the physician? The subjects, says Professor
+James, "actually feel themselves played upon by powers beyond their
+will. The evidence is dynamic; the god or spirit moves the very organs
+of their body.... We have distinct professions of being under the
+direction of a foreign power, and serving as its mouthpiece." Of course
+we have, but for diagnostic purposes such professions are quite
+valueless. What these people are conscious of, and all they are
+conscious of, is a series of feelings of a more or less unusual kind.
+Equally convinced was the medieval demoniac that a spirit moved the very
+organs of his body. Equally convinced is the modern spiritualist medium
+that his body is controlled by a disembodied spirit. It is not a
+question of the actuality of certain states, but of their origin. The
+intense conviction of the subject of the seizure is, as evidence, quite
+irrelevant. The subjective state is always real, whether it belongs to a
+saint in ecstasy or a drunkard in delirium tremens. There are no states
+of mind more "real" while they last than those due to opium or hashish.
+But it is never suggested that this is evidence of their veracity. In
+such cases the testimony of a skilled outsider is of far greater value
+than the conviction of the visionary. We are bound to appeal to Paul,
+and Loyola, and Fox, and Wesley to know what their feelings were,
+because here they are the supreme authorities. But we must consult
+others to discover why they experienced these feelings. An illusion is
+no more than a false interpretation of a real subjective experience;
+although many are inclined to treat the rejection of the interpretation
+as equivalent to a charge of imposture or deliberate lying.
+
+It is also a matter of demonstration that these religious experiences
+are strictly determined by environmental conditions. Thousands of
+Christians have been favoured with visions of Jesus or of the Christian
+heaven in their dying moments. Millions of Jews and Mohammedans have
+lived and died without any such experience--the very persons to whom,
+from an evidential point of view--such visions would be most useful. The
+spiritual experience is determined by the pre-existing religious belief.
+When belief in a personal devil was general, visions of Satan were
+common. The evidence for personal conflicts with Satan is of precisely
+the same nature and strength as is the evidence for intercourse with
+deity. When the belief in Satan died out, visions and conflicts with him
+ceased. How can we discriminate between the two classes of cases? Why
+should the testimony of a great Christian character that he is conscious
+of intercourse with deity be more authoritative than the testimony of,
+perhaps, the same person on other occasions, of conflict with a personal
+devil? Moreover, visions and a sense of contact with a super-normal
+world are not peculiar to the religious character. It is a common
+feature of a general psychopathic condition. Medical works are filled
+with such instances. And it is only to be expected that when the
+psychopath is of a deeply religious nature the affection will find a
+religious expression. What is clearly needed is an explanation that will
+cover the phenomenon as it appears in both a religious and a
+non-religious form.
+
+We may take as illustrative of what has been said the following case as
+given by Dr. W. W. Ireland. It is that of a Berlin bookseller who placed
+on record a clear description of his impressions while in ill-health,
+and which entirely ceased on recovery. His delusions mostly took the
+form of human figures; of these he says:--
+
+"I saw, in the full use of my senses, and (after I had got the better of
+the fright which at first seized me, and the disagreeable effects which
+it caused) even in the greatest composure of mind, for almost two
+months, constantly and involuntarily, a number of human and other
+apparitions--nay, I even heard their voices. For the most part I saw
+human figures of both sexes; they commonly passed to and fro, as if they
+had no connection with each other, like people at a fair where all is
+bustle. Sometimes they appeared to have business with one another. Once
+or twice I saw amongst them persons on horseback, and dogs and birds;
+these figures all appeared to me in their natural size, as distinctly as
+if they had existed in real life, with the several tints on the
+uncovered parts of the body, and with all the different kinds and
+colours of clothes."[11]
+
+Here we have the case of a man who was under no misconception as to the
+nature of his visions. But it is safe to say that had he been of a less
+practical and analytic turn of mind, had he been, moreover, deeply
+interested in religious matters, we might have had an altogether
+different presentation of the facts.
+
+In the next instance, also given by Dr. Ireland, we have a religious
+explanation given of somewhat similar experiences:--
+
+"A poor woman complained to me that she was continually persecuted by
+the devils who let loose at her all sorts of blasphemies, and, indeed,
+all the worse the more she exerted herself not to attend to them; but
+often, also, when she was talking and active. She had already been to a
+clergyman who should exorcise the devil, and who had judiciously
+directed her to me. I asked in which ear the devil always talked to her.
+She was surprised at the question, which she had never started for
+herself, but now recognised that it always occurred in the left ear. I
+explained to her that it was an affection of the ear which now and then
+occurs, but she was doubtful."[12]
+
+Here we have a distinctly physical affection ascribed to supernatural
+agency. In this case the inference is promptly corrected by the
+physician. But given a different environment, an atmosphere permeated
+with a belief in the supernatural, an absence of adequate scientific
+advice, and the more primitive explanation is certain to prevail. In the
+next instance--that of Martin Luther--we have just this conjuncture of
+circumstances, with the inevitable result. Writing of his experience in
+1530, Luther says:--
+
+"When I was in Coburg in 1530, I was tormented with a noise in my ear,
+just as though there was some wind tearing through my head. The devil
+had something to do with it.... When I try to work, my head becomes
+filled with all sorts of whizzing, buzzing, thundering noises, and if I
+did not leave off on the instant I should faint away. For the last two
+or three days I have not been able to even look at a letter. My head has
+lessened down to a very short chapter; soon it will be only a paragraph,
+then only a syllable, then nothing at all. The day your letter came from
+Nuremberg I had another visit from the devil.... This time the evil one
+got the better of me, drove me out of my bed, and compelled me to seek
+the face of man."[13]
+
+There is no need to quote more of this class of cases, at least for the
+present. Their name is legion. One could, in fact, construct an
+ascending series of cases, all agreeing in their symptom, and differing
+only in the explanation offered. The series would commence with the
+explanation of a possessing spirit, and end with that of a deranged
+nervous system. Ignorant of the nature, or even of the existence, of a
+nervous system, primitive man explains abnormal mental states as due to
+a malignant spirit. Martin Luther, George Fox, or John Bunyan, living at
+a time when the activity of evil spirits was a firmly held doctrine,
+attribute their infirmities to satanic influence. We are in the true
+line of descent. To-day we have with us every one of the phenomena on
+which the satanic theory rested, but they are described, and prescribed
+for, in medical works instead of manuals of exorcism. The
+supernaturalist theory gives way to that of the expert neurologist. The
+exorcist is replaced by the physician. Instead of expelling an intruding
+demon, we have to repair a deranged system. We cannot argue that while
+these affections remain constant in character their causes may have been
+different in other ages from what they are now. That is pure absurdity.
+To claim that the religious mystic is in moments of exaltation brought
+into contact with a "deeper reality" is to invite the retort that one
+might make a similar claim on behalf of the inmates of a lunatic asylum.
+We cannot, with any pretence to rationality, accept the verdicts of both
+the neurologist and the exorcist. If we agree that certain states of
+mind to-day have their origin in neural disorder, on what ground can we
+believe that similar mental states occurring a thousand or two thousand
+years ago were due to supernatural stimulation? We may be told that
+there are more things in heaven and earth than are dreamed of in our
+philosophy. This may be true, and while it is an observation that would
+not occur to a fool, it needs no supreme wisdom for its excogitation,
+and as generally used it is an excuse for idle speculation and grotesque
+theory. Far more useful is the lesson, sadly needed, that there are few
+things in heaven or earth that will not yield their secret to a method
+of investigation that is sanely conceived and diligently employed.
+
+The utter uselessness of accepting at its face value anyone's
+explanation of the nature of his subjective experience, is well shown by
+the once universal belief in witchcraft. If there is a single belief on
+behalf of which a mass of apparently unimpeachable evidence could be
+produced, it is this one. It has run its course throughout the whole
+world. It is still accepted by probably half the human race. In our own
+country eminent men, not alone theologians, but doctors, lawyers,
+statesmen, and men of letters, have given their solemn testimony in its
+favour. Thousands of people have been bewitched, and their symptoms
+described by thousands of others. More remarkable still, those accused
+have often enough confessed their guilt. Every possible corroboration
+has been given to this belief, and yet it is now scouted by educated
+persons all over the civilised world. Even religious teachers accept the
+explanation that these witchcraft cases were due to distinctly
+pathological conditions, and to the power of suggestion operating upon
+uninformed minds during an unenlightened age. But communications with
+spiritual beings rest on no better foundation than communication with
+Satan. Whether the alleged illumination be diabolic or angelic, the
+evidence for either, or both, is the same. The testimony of a man like
+the Rev. R. J. Campbell that he is conscious of a divine influence in
+his life is of no greater value than that of the medieval peasant who
+felt himself tormented by Satan. The one person is no better authority
+than is the other on such a topic. Both are the heirs of the ages,
+inheritors of a superstition that goes back to the most primitive ages
+of mankind, only modified in its expression by the culture of
+contemporary life.
+
+There is nothing new under the sun, and human nature remains
+substantially unchanged generation after generation. All the phenomena
+on which the belief in witchcraft was based, remain. Cases of delusion
+are common, and the power of suggestion is an established fact in
+psychology. All that has happened is this: taking the facts on which the
+belief was based, modern science has shown them to be explainable
+without the slightest reference to the supernatural. And this is the
+principle that must be applied in other directions. Old occurrences must
+be explained in the light of new knowledge. This is the accepted rule in
+other directions, and it is of peculiar value in relation to religious
+beliefs. To know what religious people have thought and felt and said
+gives us no more than the data for a scientific study of the subject. To
+know _why_ they thought and felt and spoke thus is what we really need
+to understand. But if we are to do this we must relate phases of mind
+that are called religious to other phases of a non-religious character.
+I believe it is quite possible to do this. From medical records and from
+numerous biographies it is possible to parallel all the experiences of
+the religious mystic. We can see the same sense of exaltation, the same
+conviction of illumination, the same belief that one is the tool of a
+superior power. Take, as merely illustrative of this, the case of J.
+Addington Symonds, as narrated by Professor James, who cites it as an
+example of a "mystical experience with chloroform." Symonds tells us
+that until he was twenty-eight years of age he was liable to extreme
+states of exaltation concerning the nature of self. (It is worth while
+pointing out that Sir James Crichton-Browne expresses the opinion that
+Symonds's higher nerve centres were in some degree enfeebled by these
+abnormal states.) In addition to this confession he placed on record an
+interesting experience while under the influence of chloroform. He
+says:--
+
+"After the choking and stifling had passed away, I seemed at first in a
+state of utter blankness; then came flashes of intense light,
+alternating with blankness, and with a keen sense of vision of what was
+going on in the room around me, but no sensation of touch. I thought
+that I was near death; when suddenly my soul became aware of God who was
+manifestly dealing with me, handling me, so to speak, in an intense
+personal reality. I felt him streaming in like light upon me.... I
+cannot describe the ecstasy I felt. Then, as I gradually awoke from the
+influence of the anæsthetic, the old sense of my relation with the world
+began to return, the new sense of my relation to God began to fade....
+Only think of it. To have felt for that long dateless ecstasy of vision
+the very God, in all purity, tenderness, and truth, and absolute love,
+and then to find that I had after all had no revelation, but that I had
+been tricked by the abnormal excitement of my brain."
+
+With a slight variation of expression this confession might have come
+direct from the lips of the most pronounced mystic. There is no question
+of the intense reality of the experience. That was as vivid as anything
+that ever occurred to any saint in the calendar. Still, no one will
+dream of claiming that the way to get _en rapport_ with the higher
+mysteries is by way of a dose of chloroform. The distinction here is
+that Symonds knew and described the cause of his experience. And no one
+will question that the phrase "tricked by the abnormal excitement of my
+brain" covers the ground. Of course, there is always the easy retort
+that saints and mystics did not use chloroform to produce their visions.
+True, but chloroform is not the only agent by means of which a person
+may be thrown into an abnormal state. Other means may be used; and as a
+matter of fact, the use of herbs and drugs, as methods of producing
+ecstatic states, have obtained in religious ceremonies from the most
+primitive times. As we shall see later, tobacco, hashish, coca, laurel
+water, and similar agents have been largely utilised for this purpose.
+And when this plan is not adopted--although very often the two things
+run side by side--we find fasting and other forms of self-torture
+practised because of the abnormal conditions produced.
+
+It is not argued or implied that in all this there was of necessity
+deliberate imposture. That would imply the possession of greater
+knowledge than actually existed. But it was known that ecstatic states
+followed the use of certain drugs, or were consequent on certain
+austerities, and they were valued because they were believed to bring
+people into communion with a hidden spiritual world. In this way there
+has always been going on a more or less deliberate culture of the
+supernatural, in more primitive times by crude and easily recognisable
+means, later by methods that are more subtle in character and more
+difficult of detection. But the method of inducing a sense of
+"spiritual" illumination by means of practices alien to the normal life
+of man remains unchanged throughout. The collation of the conditions
+under which mystical states of mind are experienced among savages with
+similar experiences among the higher races, proves at once that this
+statement contains no exaggeration of the facts.
+
+The continuity of the phenomena is, indeed, of profound significance,
+and is too often ignored. It is often asserted that we have to explain
+the lower by the higher, and we can only understand the significance of
+religion in its lower forms by bearing in mind the higher
+manifestations. This is sheer fallacy. In nature the higher develops out
+of the lower, of which it is compounded. In biology, for example, it is
+now generally conceded that the secret of animal life lies in the cell.
+This may be modified in all kinds of directions, the resulting organic
+structure may be of the utmost complexity, but the basis remains
+unchanged. So, too, with a great deal of so-called religious phenomena.
+The story is not only continuous, but the same elements remain unchanged
+with only those modifications initiated by a changed environment. And
+just as we are driven back to the cell to explain organic structure, so
+for an understanding of the phenomena under consideration we must study
+their primitive elements. Analysis must precede synthesis here as
+elsewhere.
+
+A survey of the subject is not at all exhausted by a study of abnormal
+conditions, so far as these have entered into the life of religion.
+There still remains the study of perfectly normal frames of mind that
+are misinterpreted and diverted into religious channels. The importance
+of this will be seen more clearly when we come to deal with the subject
+of conversion. That "conversion" is a phenomenon of adolescence is now
+settled beyond all reasonable doubt. Statistics are conclusive on this
+point. But the advocate of revivalism quite misses the true significance
+of the fact. Current religious literature is full of quite meaningless
+chatter concerning the change of view, the larger and more unselfish
+activities, that arise as a consequence of conversion. There is really
+no evidence that the changes indicated have any connection with
+conversion. All that does happen can be more simply and more adequately
+explained as resulting from physiological and psychological changes in
+terms of racial and social evolution. The whole significance of
+adolescence lies in the bursting into activity of feelings hitherto
+dormant, and the quickening of a desire for communion with a larger
+social life. The individual becomes less self-centred, more alive to,
+and more responsive to the claims of others; he displays tendencies
+towards what the world calls self-sacrifice, but which mean, in the
+truest sense, self-realisation. That these changes are often expressed
+in terms of religion is undeniable. This, however, may be no more than
+an environmental accident, quite as much so as was the case when
+epilepsy was explained in terms of possession.
+
+So far as one can see, there are no feelings or impulses characteristic
+of adolescence that could not receive complete satisfaction in a
+rationally ordered social life. To-day it usually happens that the
+strongest expressed influences brought to bear upon the individual are
+of a religious kind, with the result that adolescent human nature is
+most apt to express itself in religious language. It must always be
+borne in mind that we are all as dependent upon our environment for the
+form in which our explanation of things is cast, as we are for the
+language in which we express those ideas. The whole enquiry opened is a
+very wide one, with which I can only deal parenthetically. It is really
+an enquiry as to how far the religious theory of human nature rests upon
+a wrong interpretation of perfectly normal feelings, or to what extent
+supernaturalistic ideas are perpetuated by the exploitation--innocent
+exploitation, maybe--of man's social nature. It is extremely probable
+that a deeper knowledge, a more accurate analysis of human qualities,
+will disclose the truth that man is a social animal in a much more
+profound sense than has usually attached to that phrase, and the
+expression of these qualities in terms of religious beliefs, or in terms
+of non-religious beliefs, is wholly determined by the knowledge current
+in the society in which he moves.
+
+I conclude this chapter with one more attempt to avoid misunderstanding.
+For purposes of clarity it will be necessary to consider various factors
+out of relation to other factors. But it should hardly need pointing out
+that in actual life such a separation does not obtain. The organism
+functions as a whole; each part acts upon and is acted upon by every
+other part. Life in action is a synthesis, and one resorts to analysis
+only for the purpose of more adequate comprehension. It is not,
+moreover, pretended that any one of the factors described in the
+following pages will explain religion, nor even that all of them
+combined will do so. The origin of the religious idea is a quite
+different enquiry, and is adequately dealt with in the writings of men
+like Tylor, Frazer, Spencer, and other representatives of the various
+schools of anthropologists. My present purpose is of a more restricted
+kind. It is that of tracing the operation of various processes, some
+normal, but most of them abnormal, that have in all ages been accepted
+as evidence for the supernatural. That the religious idea has been
+associated with these processes, and that for multitudes they have
+served as strong evidence of its truth, cannot be denied. And an
+examination of this aspect of the history of religion ought not to be
+ignored, however unpalatable such a study may be to certain
+supersensitive minds.
+
+
+FOOTNOTES:
+
+[1] _Varieties of Religious Experience_, pp. 11-3.
+
+[2] _Varieties_, p. 14.
+
+[3] _Religions of Primitive Peoples_, p. 50.
+
+[4] Page 288.
+
+[5] Page 410.
+
+[6] Page 387.
+
+[7] Page 370.
+
+[8] _Varieties_, p. 4.
+
+[9] "The hypothesis of faculties ... must be regarded as productive of
+much error in psychology. It has led to the false supposition that
+mental activity, instead of being one and the same throughout its
+manifold phases, is a juxtaposition of totally distinct activities,
+answering to a bundle of detached powers, somehow standing side by side,
+and exerting no influence on one another. Sometimes this absolute
+separation of the parts of mind has gone so far as to personify the
+several faculties as though they were distinct entities."--Sully,
+_Outlines of Psychology_, p. 26.
+
+[10] _Varieties_, p. 478.
+
+[11] _The Blot upon the Brain_, p. 4.
+
+[12] _The Blot upon the Brain_, p. 16.
+
+[13] Cited by Dr. Ireland, p. 49.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER TWO
+
+THE PRIMITIVE MIND & ITS ENVIRONMENT
+
+
+Ever since the time of Aristotle it has been an accepted truth that man
+is a social animal. Not only is individual human nature such that it
+craves for intercourse with its kind, but it can only be effectively
+understood in the light of those thousands of generations of associated
+life that lie behind us all. As an isolated object, considered, that is,
+apart from his fellows, man is more or less of a myth. At any rate, he
+would not be the man we know and so may well be left out of account. Man
+as we know him is essentially a member of a group; he is a part of a
+really organic structure inasmuch as the characteristics of each part
+are determined by its relations to the whole, and the characteristics of
+the whole determined by a synthesis of the qualities of the parts.
+
+But while there is agreement in the fact, there is a considerable
+divergence of opinion as to its nature. What is the nature of this fact
+of sociability? What is the character of the force that binds the
+members of a group so closely together? By some, the cause of
+sociability is found in the pressure exerted upon all by purely external
+forces. The need for protection, it is said, drives human beings
+together, and thus in course of time the feeling of sociability is
+developed. This seems much like mistaking a consequence for a cause. It
+certainly leaves unanswered the question _Why_ should people have drawn
+together in the face of danger? Most certainly collective action
+strengthens the capacity for defence; and it also increases the
+certainty of obtaining the means of subsistence. Such consequences
+furnish a justification, so to speak, of group life, but they disclose
+neither its nature nor its cause. And most certainly they do not bring
+us into touch with the fundamental qualities of _human_ society. The
+need for food, shelter, or protection will not differentiate the
+gregarious from the non-gregarious forms of life, nor the social from
+the merely gregarious. All forms of life require food, protection, and
+shelter; they are part of animal economics. There is nothing
+specifically human about them.
+
+We may reach what I conceive to be the truth in another way. Environment
+is to-day almost a cant word. It is very largely used, and, as one might
+expect, largely misunderstood. Without actually saying it in so many
+words, a vast number of people seem to conceive the environment as
+consisting of the purely material surroundings of man. This is to
+overlook a most important fact. Even in the lowest stages of human
+society, where man's power over natural forces is of the poorest kind,
+it is not an exact statement of the case, and it is profoundly untrue
+when we take society in its higher developments. If we take the lowest
+existing savage race we find that its attitude towards life, what it
+does, and what it refrains from doing, is the product of a certain
+mental attitude, which is itself the outcome of a number of inherited
+ideas and customs. A number of white people, placed in exactly the same
+material environment and faced with exactly the same external
+circumstances, bring a different psychological inheritance into play,
+and act in an entirely different manner. If we transport a Chinaman into
+England, or an Englishman into China, we find that both of them possess
+the same biological and material needs whether in their native country
+or elsewhere. Yet this community of needs does not make the Chinaman a
+member of English society, nor an Englishman a member of Chinese
+society. They are one in virtue of certain broad human characteristics;
+they are divided by certain qualities characteristic of their special
+groups. Each society is marked by the possession of certain
+psychological characteristics--a number of specific beliefs and
+emotional developments--without which its distinctive group character
+disappears. This is true of groups within the State; it is true of the
+State as a whole; it is true, on the most general scale of all, of the
+race.
+
+In other words, the distinguishing feature of human society is the
+possession of a psychological medium. The adaptations that the human
+being must make are mainly of a psychological character. Their _form_
+may be partly determined by external conditions, but this does not
+affect the general truth. Whether we take man in a civilised or in an
+uncivilised state we find the important thing about him to be his
+relations to his fellows. He is not merely a member of a tribe or a
+society, but he thinks that society's thoughts, he feels their emotions,
+his individual life is an expression of the psychical life of the group
+to which he belongs. And his transactions with nature are an expression
+of the ideas and beliefs current in the society of which he is a part.
+
+The recognition of this truth was one of the outstanding contributions
+of Herbert Spencer to the science of sociology. Whereas other writers
+had stressed the power of the environment, as a purely material thing,
+in shaping human institutions, Spencer placed chief stress upon the
+emotional and intellectual life of primitive man as determining their
+beginnings. He showed how man's feelings and beliefs about himself, and
+about his fellows, and about the world of living forces with which he
+believed himself to be surrounded, were the all-important factors of
+social evolution. And the subsequent history of society has been such
+that scientific sociology is very largely the study of the growth and
+elaboration of an essentially psychical environment. The lower animal
+world--except so far as we allow for the operation of instincts--has,
+broadly, only the existence of other animals and the physical
+surroundings for its environment. With man it is vastly different. Owing
+primarily to language, the environment of the man of to-day is made up
+in part of the ideas of men who lived and died thousands of years ago.
+The use of clothing and the invention of tools would alone make mind a
+dominant fact in human life. But apart from these things, the great fact
+of social heredity, in virtue of which one generation enjoys the
+acquired culture of preceding generations, and without which
+civilisation would have no existence, is a great and dominant _mental_
+fact. Our institutions, our customs, are transmitted to us as so many
+psychic facts. Every new invention, every fresh culture acquisition, is
+helping to strengthen and broaden the psychical environment of man. Each
+newcomer is born into it; it moulds his nature and determines his life,
+as his own career and his own acquisition help to mould the life of his
+successors. Whether the phenomena be simple or complex, whether we are
+dealing with man in a civilised or in an uncivilised state, there is no
+escape from the general truth that man is everywhere under the
+domination of his mental life.
+
+So far as this enquiry is concerned, we need only deal with one aspect
+of the psychological medium in which primitive human life moves. And so
+far as primitive mankind seeks to control the movements of social life,
+there can be no question that this is done under the impulsion of that
+class of beliefs which we call religious. The operation of religious
+belief in savage society is neither spasmodic nor local. It is, on the
+contrary, universal and persistent. It influences every event of daily
+life with a force that the modern mind finds very difficult to
+appreciate. In almost every action the savage feels himself to be in
+touch with a supersensual world of living beings that exert a direct and
+inescapable influence. And any study of human evolution that is to be of
+real value must take this circumstance into consideration to a far
+greater extent than is usually done. Professor Frazer, dealing with the
+origin of various social institutions, rightly observes that "we are
+only beginning to understand the mind of the savage, and therefore the
+mind of our savage forefathers who created these institutions and handed
+them down to us," and warns us that "a knowledge of the truth may
+involve a reconstruction of society such as we can hardly dream of." He
+also warns us that we have at all times, in dealing with social origins,
+to "reckon with the influence of superstition, which pervades the life
+of the savage and has contributed to build up the social organism to an
+incalculable extent."[14]
+
+In emphasising this it must not be taken to imply that because social
+institutions and human actions are in primitive times moulded by
+religious beliefs, they stand to them in a relation of complete
+dependence. It only means that the psychological medium is of such a
+character that supernaturalistic reasons are found for doings things
+that are susceptible to a totally different explanation. The facts of
+life are expressed in terms of supernaturalism. Birth, marriage, death,
+social cohesion, leadership, health and disease, are all natural facts,
+and the mere play of social selection determines the weeding out of
+practices that are sufficiently adverse to tribal well-being to threaten
+its security. But in primitive times all these facts are allied with
+religious beliefs, and to the primitive mind the religious belief
+becomes the chief feature connected with them. As a matter of fact, this
+is far from an uncommon feature of social life to-day. The amount of
+supernaturalism current is still very large; and one still finds people
+explaining some of the plainest facts of social life in terms of
+supernaturalistic beliefs. It is all part of the truth that man is
+always under the domination of the psychological forces.
+
+This being granted, the enquiry immediately presents itself, How comes
+it that the facts of social life should be expressed in terms of
+supernaturalism? Why do these facts not immediately present themselves
+in their true nature? To answer this question one must bear in mind a
+yet further truth. This is that the explanation which man offers to
+himself or to others of phenomena must always be in terms of current
+knowledge. A modern called upon to explain a storm, an eclipse, or a
+disease, does so in terms of current physical or biological science.
+This is done in virtue of a mass of prepared knowledge, slowly
+accumulated by preceding generations, and which forms part of his social
+heritage. Primitive man likewise explains things in terms of current
+knowledge, but in his case the amount of reliable information is of a
+very scanty and generally erroneous description. The inherited knowledge
+which enables a modern schoolboy to start life with what would have been
+an outfit to an ancient philosopher, had yet to be created. Instead of
+finding, as we find, tools ready to hand, replies prepared to questions
+that may arise, primitive mankind must create its own tools and prepare
+its own answers. And in consequence of this the social environment,
+which at all times determines the form of man's mental output, is with
+primitive man radically different from our own. But however the form
+varies there is agreement on this one point--in both cases phenomena are
+explained in terms of known forces; the reasoning of each is determined
+by the knowledge of each. The laws of mental life remain the same in all
+stages of culture. The brain functions identically whether we take the
+savage or the scientist. In a general way the savage intelligence is as
+rational as that of a modern thinker. The difference is dependent upon
+the accuracy and extent of the information possessed by each. Hence the
+vital difference in the conclusions reached. Hence, too, the dominance
+of supernaturalism in primitive times.
+
+The great distinction between primitive and scientific thinking may be
+expressed in a sentence--the modern mind explains man by the world,
+primitive thought explained the world by man. In the one case we move
+from within outward, in the other from without inward. We are not now
+concerned with semi-metaphysical idealistic theories that would reduce
+the "whole choir of heaven and furniture of earth" to the creation of
+mental activity, but with the plain, understandable truth that the
+human organism is fashioned by the environment in which it dwells. And
+there is amongst those capable of expressing an authoritative
+opinion--an agreement supported by evidence that has simply nothing
+against it--that the world of primitive man is overpoweringly animistic.
+In the absence of that mass of scientifically verified knowledge which
+forms part of our social heritage, humanity commences its intellectual
+career by endowing natural forces with the qualities possessed by
+itself. The forces conceived are living ones. They are to be dreaded
+exactly as human beings are to be dreaded; to be appeased or
+circumvented by the same methods that man applies to his fellows. The
+problem before the savage is thus a very real one. In essence it is the
+problem that is ever before humanity--that of subjugating forces to its
+own welfare. Primitive man is not, however, concerned with the
+elaboration of theories; nor is he consumed with vague 'spiritual
+yearnings.' His difficulty is how to control or placate those invisible
+but very real powers upon which he believes everything depends. He would
+willingly ignore them if he could, and would cheerfully dispense with
+their presence altogether if he believed that things would proceed as
+well in their absence. But there they are, inescapable facts that have
+to be reckoned with.
+
+The general outlook of the primitive mind is well put by Miss Mary
+Kingsley in the following passage:--
+
+"To the African the Universe is made up of matter permeated by spirit.
+Everything happens by the direct action of spirit. The thing he does
+himself is done by the spirit within him acting on his body ...
+everything that is done by other things is done by their spirit
+associated with their particular mass of matter.... The native will
+point out to you a lightning-stricken tree and tell you that its spirit
+has been killed. He will tell you, when the earthen cooking pot is
+broken, it has lost its spirit. If his weapon fails him, it is because
+someone has stolen its spirit or made it weak by means of his influence
+on spirits of the same class.... In every action of his life he shows
+you how he lives with a great spirit world around him. You see him
+before he starts out to fight rubbing stuff into his weapon to
+strengthen the spirit that is in it; telling it the while what care he
+has taken of it.... You see him leaning over the face of the water
+talking to its spirit with proper incantations, asking it when it meets
+an enemy of his to upset his canoe and destroy him.... If a man is
+knocked on the head with a club, or shot by an arrow or a bullet, the
+cause of death is clearly the malignity of persons using these weapons;
+and so it is easy to think that a man killed by the falling of a tree,
+or by the upsetting of a canoe in the surf, or in a whirlpool in the
+river is also a victim of some being using these things as weapons. For
+a man holding this view, it seems both natural and easy to regard
+disease as a manifestation of the wrath of some invisible being, and to
+construct that intricate system which we find among the Africans, and
+agree to call Witchcraft, Fetish, or Juju."[15]
+
+Miss Kingsley is here dealing specifically with West Africa, but her
+description applies in a general way to uncivilised people all over the
+world. There is much closer resemblance between the beliefs of
+uncivilised peoples than between civilised ones, because the conditions
+are much more alike. And under substantially identical conditions the
+human mind has everywhere reached substantially identical conclusions.
+The philosophy of the savage is simple, comprehensive, and, given the
+data, logical. He does not divide the world into the natural and the
+supernatural; it is all one. At most, he has only the seen and the
+unseen. The supernatural, as a distinct category, only appears when a
+definite knowledge of the natural has arisen to which it can be opposed.
+He has no such distinction as that of the material and the immaterial;
+so far as he thinks of these things, the invisible is only a finer form
+of the visible. Of one thing, however, he is perfectly convinced, and
+this is that he is at all times surrounded by a host of invisible
+agencies to which all occurrences are due, and with whom he must come to
+terms. Even death wears a different aspect to the primitive mind from
+that which it presents to the modern. To us death puts a sharp and
+abrupt termination to life. To the primitive mind death involves no such
+ending.[16] Death is no more of a break than is sleep; and at all times
+the conception of an annihilation of personality requires a marked
+degree of mental power. So with the savage--the 'dead' man simply goes
+on living. He may be incarnated in some natural object, or he may simply
+go on living as one of the innumerable company of tribal ghosts. But he
+remains a force to be reckoned with, and the need for dealing with these
+ghostly personages is one of the ever-present problems of primitive
+sociology, and brings us very near the beginnings of all religious
+beliefs and ceremonies--if it does not form their real starting-point.
+
+On one point all modern schools of anthropologists are agreed. This is
+that man's first conception of the supernatural--or what afterwards
+ranks as such--is derived from a purely mistaken interpretation of
+natural phenomena. In this they have returned to the standpoint of
+Hobbes, that "fear of things invisible" forms the "natural seed of
+religion." One source of origin of this belief in a supernatural world
+is certainly found in the phenomena of dreaming. To the savage his
+dreams are as real as his waking experiences. He does not _dream_ he
+goes to distant places; he goes there during his sleep. He does not
+_dream_ that people visit him; they actually come. If a West African
+wakes up in the morning with a tired, bruised feeling, this arises, as
+Miss Kingsley says, from his 'soul' having been out fighting and got
+ill-treated. The only philosophy of dreaming amongst savage races is
+that of the excursions and incursions of a 'soul' or double.
+
+Another powerful factor in the development of belief in the supernatural
+is that of man's attempt to explain natural happenings. Why do things
+happen? Why does the sun rise and set, why does rain fall, thunder
+crash, rivers flow? Note the way in which a child answers similar
+questions, and one is on the track of the primitive intelligence. If
+man's own movements are caused by a 'soul' or double, then other things
+must also move because they possess a 'soul.' If an answer is to be
+found at all, it is only along these lines that the primitive mind is
+able to find it. And, once the answer is given, there are a thousand
+and one things occurring that lend it apparent support. Resemblances in
+nature, coincidences, echoes, shadows, etc., all give their support to
+this primitive hypothesis--the only one possible in the circumstances,
+and the one still endorsed by the majority of the world's population.
+
+Particularly strong endorsement of this belief is supplied by disease
+and abnormal nervous states. Instances to illustrate this are
+innumerable, but from the numerous cases cited by Spencer I select the
+following: Among the Amazulus convulsions are believed to be caused by
+ancestral spirits. With Asiatic races epileptics are regarded as
+possessed by demons. With the Kirghiz the involuntary muscular movements
+of a woman in childbirth are believed to be caused by a spirit taking
+possession of the body. The Samoans attribute all madness to possession.
+The Congo people have the same notion of epilepsy. The East Africans
+believe that falling sickness is due to spirits.[17] In Rajputana, says
+Mr. W. Crooke, disease is generally attributed to Khor or the agency of
+offended spirits. The Mahadeo Kolis of Ahmadnagar believe that every
+malady or disease that seizes man, woman, or child, or cattle, is caused
+either by evil spirits or by an angry god. The Bijapur Veddas have a
+yearly feast to their ancestors to prevent the dead bringing sickness
+into the house.[18] "A Catholic missionary," says Professor Frazer,
+"observes that in New Guinea the _nepir_, or sorcerer, is everywhere....
+Nothing happens without the sorcerer's intervention; wars, marriage,
+death, expeditions, fishing, hunting, always and everywhere the
+sorcerer."[19]
+
+In Ancient Egypt, Chaldea, and Assyria there is ample evidence that the
+same belief flourished. Everywhere we find the exorcist and the
+witch-doctor existing as natural consequents of the belief that disease
+has a supernatural origin. We see it in both the teaching and practice
+of the early Christian Church. That great father of the Church, Origen,
+says: "It is demons which produce famine, unfruitfulness, corruption of
+the air, and pestilence." St. Augustine said that "All diseases of
+Christians are to be ascribed to demons." The Church of England still
+retains in its Articles an authorisation for the expulsion of demons;
+and a number of charms yet in wide use amongst civilised nations show
+how persistent is this belief. For centuries there existed all over
+Europe sacred pools, wells, grottos, etc., all bearing eloquent witness
+to the deep-seated belief that disease was of supernatural origin, and
+was to be conquered by supernatural means.
+
+Enough has been said to indicate the kind of environment in which
+primitive man moves, and also to understand why ideas concerning the
+supernatural exert such an enormous influence in early society. In a
+world where everything was yet to be learned, man's first attempts at
+understanding himself and his fellows were necessarily blundering and
+tentative. His first attempts at explanation are expressed in terms of
+his own nature. He sees himself, his own passions, strengths, and
+weaknesses reflected in the nature around him. This is the outstanding,
+dominating fact in primitive life. Leave out this consideration and
+primitive sociology becomes a chaos. Admit it, and we see the reason why
+social institutions assumed the form they took, and also a key to much
+that happens in subsequent human history. In primitive life religious
+beliefs are not something separate from other forms of social life; so
+far as man seeks consciously to shape that life they are to him an
+essential part of it. And the mistake once made is perpetuated. The
+initial blunder once committed, daily experience seems to give it
+constant justification. In the absence of knowledge concerning natural
+forces every event,--particularly if unusual,--every case of disease,
+endorses and strengthens the mistake made. A psychological fatality
+drives the human race along the wrong path of investigation, and only
+very slowly is the mistake rectified. One cannot see how it could have
+been otherwise. The only corrective is knowledge, and knowledge is a
+plant of slow growth. This psychological first step was man's first
+attempt to frame a theory of things satisfactory to his intellect--an
+attempt that, beginning in the crude animism of the savage, ends in the
+verifiable laws of modern science.
+
+From the point of view of our present enquiry two things are to be
+noted. The first is that man's conviction of the nearness of a
+supernatural world began in his lack of knowledge concerning the nature
+of natural forces. Of this there can be little doubt. One can take all
+the facts upon which primitive mankind built, and still builds, its
+theories of supernaturalism, and show that they may be explained in a
+quite different manner. The movements of the planets, the rush of
+comets, the presence of disaster, the thousand and one operations of
+natural forces no longer suggest to educated minds the action of
+personal beings. The whole data of the primitive theory of things have
+been rejected. The premises were false, and the conclusions necessarily
+false also.
+
+The second point is that from the earliest times one of the strongest
+proofs of human contact with a supernatural world has been found in the
+existence of abnormal or pathological states of mind. These may have
+sometimes arisen quite naturally; at other times they have been
+deliberately induced. How much the perpetuation of religious beliefs as
+a whole owes to this factor has never yet been adequately realised. That
+it has had a very great influence seems beyond dispute. For it seems
+certain that had not "proofs" of a supernatural world been offered in
+the shape of visions, ecstatic states, etc., religious beliefs would
+hardly have exercised the power that has been theirs. The number of
+people who are able to maintain a strong consciousness of the truth of
+religion, merely looking at it as a philosophy of existence, is
+naturally very few. The great majority require more tangible evidence if
+their belief is to be kept alive and active. And curiously enough, the
+very growth of a naturalistic explanation has driven a great many to
+find the evidence they desired in those abnormal states of mind that
+seemed to defy scientific analysis. In succeeding chapters evidence will
+be given to show to what extent this kind of evidence for the
+supernatural has been offered and accepted. It will be seen, as
+Professor Tylor points out, that the line of religious development is
+continuous. The latest forms stretch back in an unbroken line to the
+earliest. And if this proves nothing else, it at least proves that
+consequences do not always die out with the conditions that gave them
+birth. It was the world of the savage that gave birth to the
+supernatural. But the supernatural is still with us, even though the
+world that gave it birth has disappeared. We retain conclusions based on
+admittedly false premises.
+
+
+FOOTNOTES:
+
+[14] _Lectures on the Early History of the Kingship_, pp. 36-7.
+
+[15] _West African Studies_, pp. 394-6.
+
+[16] See an interesting article on this point by W. H. R. Rivers on "The
+Primitive Conception of Death," in _The Hibbert Journal_ for Jan. 1912.
+
+[17] _Principles of Sociology_, vol. i.
+
+[18] _Popular Religion and Folklore of Northern India_, i. p. 124.
+
+[19] _Golden Bough_, 3rd ed., i. 337.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER THREE
+
+THE RELIGION OF MENTAL DISEASE
+
+
+"It is an interesting problem," says Professor J. H. Leuba, "to
+determine what influences have led theologians to anchor their beliefs
+upon the proposition that religious experience differs from other forms
+of consciousness in that it gives one an _immediate_ knowledge of the
+external existence of certain objects of belief, although they do not
+fall under the senses, and an immediate knowledge of the truth of
+certain historical facts."[20] This is, indeed, an interesting problem,
+and, we may add, one of growing importance, since there is a pronounced
+tendency on the part of present-day exponents of religion to rest their
+case almost entirely upon the immediacy of their religious
+consciousness. This conception of a certain order of experience,
+however, is not and cannot have always existed. A belief may be so
+widely and so generally diffused that it is accepted without resistance,
+and, as it would almost seem, in the absence of evidence. But its
+intuitive character is only superficial, and disappears on careful
+examination. The mere vogue of a belief constitutes in itself a kind of
+evidence, and for many people the most powerful kind of evidence. But
+the conviction itself has a history, and it is in the unravelling of
+that history, in the discovery of the class of facts upon which the
+conviction has been built, that the work lies. And when this is done it
+will be found that our intuitions are invariably based upon a
+continuous--even though partly unconscious--appeal to facts. Sometimes
+it will, of course, be found that a renewed and deliberate appeal to the
+facts in question will justify the conviction. At other times it will
+be found that the facts demand an altogether new interpretation. For
+centuries all the observed facts supported a conviction that the earth
+was flat. It was a fresh scrutiny of the facts in the light of a new
+conception that revolutionised human opinion on the subject.
+
+What, then, is the history, and what are the facts upon which the belief
+that religious experience brings man into contact with a kind of
+existence not given in ordinary experience, is based? The kind of answer
+that will be given to this question has already been indicated.
+Religious beliefs are in their origin of the nature of an induction from
+an observed order. The induction is not the result of that careful
+collection of facts, leading up to an equally careful generalisation and
+subsequent verification, which is a characteristic of modern science,
+but it is an induction none the less. The primitive mind is not so much
+engaged in seeking an explanation of certain experiences, as it has an
+explanation forced upon it. To picture the savage as inventing a theory
+in the sense in which Darwin propounded the theory of Natural Selection
+is to quite misconceive the nature of the savage intelligence. But to
+conceive the savage as having a certain explanation suggested by the
+pressure of repeated experiences, and that this explanation subsequently
+assumes the character of a fixed belief, is well within the scope of the
+facts known to us. In this stage of culture the existence of
+supernatural beings is as much a deduction from experience as any modern
+scientific generalisation. Certain things are seen, certain feelings are
+experienced, and the conclusion is that they are the products of
+supernatural agency. From this point of view religion is no more than a
+primitive science. It is the first stage of that long series of
+generalisations which, beginning with crude animism, ends with the
+discoveries of a Copernicus, a Newton, a Darwin, or a Spencer. It is a
+history that begins with vitalism and ends with mechanism. We commence
+with a world in which there exists a chaotic assemblage of independent
+personal forces, and end with a universe that is self-acting,
+self-adjusting, self-contained, and in which science makes no allowance
+for the operation of intelligence save such as meets us in animal
+organisation.
+
+Now amongst the facts that suggest to the primitive intelligence the
+operation of 'spiritual' forces are those connected with the human
+organism itself in both its normal and abnormal states. But it is
+important to note--particularly so for the understanding of the part
+played by ecstatic religious phenomena in comparatively recent
+times--that once the occurrence of a certain state of mind is conceived
+as the product of intercourse between man and spirits, there is every
+inducement to cultivate these frames of mind whenever renewed
+intercourse is desired. This does not imply, at least in the earlier
+stages, conscious imposture. Generally the operator imposes on himself
+as much as he imposes on others. Noting that privation of body, or
+torture of mind, or the use of certain herbs is followed by visions or
+ecstasy, it is believed, not that the vision is the product of the
+practice, but that the practice is the condition of illumination.
+
+This attitude of mind is fairly paralleled by what takes place at the
+ordinary spiritualistic _seance_. Those attending are advised that the
+chief condition of a communication with the inhabitants of the other
+world is a passive state of mind. This passivity cannot exclude
+expectancy, since it is only assumed in order that something may occur.
+If nothing occurs, if no communications are received, it is because the
+requisite conditions have not been fulfilled, and the sceptic is met
+with much semi-scientific jargon as to conditions being necessary to
+every scientific investigation. The fact that this passivity and
+expectancy, with other attendant circumstances, not the least of which
+is the contagious influence of a number of people with a similar mental
+disposition, opens the way to self-delusion is ignored. Then when the
+expected and desired result follows, the mental attitude cultivated is
+taken as the condition of communication with the spiritual world,
+instead of its being, in all probability, the true cause of what is
+experienced. In this way the story of supernatural intercourse runs
+clear and unbroken from primitive savagery to its survival in modern
+civilisation. When Professor Tylor says, "The conception of the human
+soul is, as to its most essential nature, continuous from the philosophy
+of the savage thinker to that of the modern professor of theology,"[21]
+he makes a statement that is true of the whole story of supernatural
+intercourse in all its varied manifestations.
+
+The chief distinction between primitive and modern man lies in the
+consideration that in the first case the blunder is inevitable, in the
+latter case the remedy lies to hand. How could primitive man be aware of
+the real connection between the use of certain drugs or herbs and an
+excitation or depression of the activities of the nervous system? He
+does observe consequences, but he is quite ignorant of causes. Even
+to-day their full consequences are unknown; and it is absurd to expect
+that savage humanity should have been better informed. And even when a
+more rational theory exists, the practice persists under various forms.
+This is a principle that receives vivid illustration from the history of
+religions. The modern believer in mystical states of consciousness no
+longer advocates the use of drugs, and even fasting is going out of
+fashion. But we still have a continuation of the primitive practice in
+the shape of insistence on the cultivation of abnormal frames of mind if
+we are to experience a consciousness of communion with an alleged
+supersensible reality. That is, we are to achieve by a mental discipline
+what the savage or the medieval monk achieved by coarser and more
+obvious methods. To withdraw the mind from the normal influence of
+everyday life is to expose it to the play of hallucination and delusion.
+There is really no vital difference between unhealthy, solitary brooding
+on a given subject and drugging the mind with hashish. This class of
+modern mystic is one with the savage in an inability to recognise that
+the illumination is the product of the discipline, not the mere
+condition of its possession. Between the drug of the savage, the fasting
+and self-torture of the medieval monk and the prayerful meditation of
+the modern mystic, the difference is only that of changed times and
+altered conditions. The method is the same throughout.
+
+The truth of this has been well put by Tylor:--
+
+"The religious beliefs of the lower races are in no small measure based
+on the evidence of visions and dreams, regarded as actual intercourse
+with spiritual being. From the earliest stages of culture we find
+religion in close alliance with ecstatic physical conditions. These are
+brought on by various means of interference with the healthy action of
+body and mind, and it is scarcely needful to remind the reader that,
+according to philosophic theories antecedent to those of modern
+medicine, such morbid disturbances are explained as symptoms of divine
+visitation, or at least of superhuman spirituality. Among the strongest
+means of disturbing the functions of the mind so as to produce ecstatic
+vision, is fasting, accompanied, as it usually is, with other
+privations, and with prolonged solitary contemplation in the desert or
+in the forest. Among the ordinary vicissitudes of savage life, the wild
+hunter has many a time to try involuntarily the effects of such a life
+for days together, and under these circumstances he soon comes to see
+and talk with phantoms which are to him invisible spirits. The secret of
+spiritual intercourse thus learnt, he has thence-forth but to reproduce
+the cause in order to renew the effects."[22]
+
+As a means, then, of strengthening and perpetuating a consciousness of
+intercourse with the spiritual world, we have to reckon with, not merely
+the accidental occurrence of abnormal nervous conditions, but with their
+deliberate cultivation. The practice is world-wide, and persists in some
+form or other in all ages. Thus we find the Australians and many tribes
+of North American Indians use tobacco for this purpose. In Western
+Siberia a species of fungi, the 'fly Agaric,' so called because it is
+often steeped and the solution used to destroy house flies, is used to
+produce religious ecstasy. Its action on the muscular system is
+stimulatory, and it greatly excites the nervous system.[23] An early
+Spanish observer says of the ancient Mexicans that they used a kind of
+mushroom, "which are eaten raw, and on account of being bitter, they
+drink after them, or eat with them a little honey of bees, and shortly
+after they see a thousand visions."[24] The mushroom was called the
+"bread of the gods." The Californian Indians give children tobacco, in
+order to receive instruction from the resulting visions. North American
+Indians held intoxication by tobacco to be supernatural ecstasy, and the
+dreams of men in this state to be inspired. The Darien Indians use the
+seeds of the Datura Sanguinea to induce visions. In Peru the priests
+prepared themselves for intercourse with the gods by partaking of a
+narcotic drink from the same plant. In Guiana the priest was prepared
+for his functions by fasting and flagellation, and was afterwards dosed
+with tobacco juice.[25] In India the Laws of Manu give explicit
+instructions as to the means of producing visions. Chief of these is the
+use of the 'Soma' drink. This is prepared from the flower of the lotus.
+The sap of this, says De Candolle, would be poisonous if taken in large
+quantities, but in small doses merely induces hallucination. Opium and
+hashish, a preparation of the hemp plant, have been in general use among
+Eastern peoples, as a means of producing ecstasy from remote antiquity.
+Opium, it is well known, produces an extraordinary state of exaltation,
+intensifying the sense of one's personality, and inducing a pleasurable
+consciousness of mental strength and clarity. Under its influence, as De
+Quincey said, time lengthens to infinity and space swells to
+immensity.[26] Belladonna, a drug much used by medieval witches and
+sorcerers, has also had its vogue for purely religious purposes. With
+the Greeks the laurel was sacred to Æsculapius. Those who wished to ask
+counsel of the god appeared before the altar crowned with laurel and
+chewing its leaves. Before prophesying, the Greek priestesses drank a
+preparation of laurel water. This contains, although it was, of course,
+unknown to them, two toxic substances--prussic acid and the volatile oil
+of laurel. The first would induce convulsions, the second, hallucinatory
+visions. The two combined were calculated to produce with both subject
+and observer a profound impression of spiritual illumination and
+possession.
+
+It is unnecessary to multiply examples of the action of various drugs or
+herbs on the nervous system, or to cite the people who use them. Enough
+has been said to indicate how widespread is the practice, and the
+consequences are not hard to foresee. A very moderate development of
+intelligence would enable men to associate certain consequences with the
+use of particular drugs, but a very considerable amount of knowledge
+would be required to explain why these consequences were produced. In a
+social environment saturated with superstition the explanation lies
+ready to hand, and is accepted without question. A people that sees
+spiritual agency in all the familiar phenomena of nature are certainly
+not less likely to trace its influence in the mysterious and
+unaccountable effects of narcotics and stimulants. And each repeated
+experiment provides additional proof. Man thus not only believes himself
+to be surrounded by a spiritual world; he is actually able to enter into
+communication with it by methods that are defined in the clearest
+possible manner. Every repetition strengthens the delusion and even
+when the delusion, as such, is exploded, the temper of mind induced by
+it persists.
+
+Various other methods are employed to induce a feeling of religious
+exaltation. Prominent among these are dancing and singing. Dancing in
+connection with religious ceremonies is now generally outgrown in the
+civilised world, but singing is still the vogue. That is, singing is
+not, it must be remembered, practised from any desire to cultivate a
+love of music, although it may appeal to music-lovers. Still, its avowed
+purpose is to induce a feeling of devoutness in the congregation. The
+hypnotic consequences of a body of people singing in unison, or the
+soothing, mystical effect of certain airs from a choir upon a
+congregation, are recognised in practice if not in theory. This is a
+phenomenon that is not, of course, exclusively associated with religion.
+In this as in other instances religion only utilises the ordinary
+qualities of human nature. But in all cases the purpose and the result
+are the same. That is, the subject is placed for the time being in a
+supernormal condition, and the mild state of passivity or enthusiasm
+created makes him more susceptible to the influence brought to bear upon
+him. This is true of religious singing and chanting, from the forest
+gatherings of the primitive savage down to the more sedate and elaborate
+assemblages in church or chapel.
+
+Primitive dancing had both a sexual and religious significance,
+although, as will be seen later, in the primitive mind the sexual
+functions themselves are very closely associated with supernatural
+agency. Tylor is of opinion that originally men and women dance in order
+to express their feelings and wishes,[27] but it is certain it very
+early and universally became associated with religious ceremonies, and
+that because of the ecstasy induced. In some cases drug-taking and
+dancing go together. In others, reliance is placed on dancing alone.
+This latter is the case with the 'devil dancers' of Ceylon. In Africa
+the witch doctor discovers who has been guilty of sorcery by the aid of
+inspiration furnished during a dance. The whirling dance of the Eastern
+dervish is well known. Dancing also figures in the Bible. The Jews
+danced around the golden calf (Ex. xxxii. 19) in a state of nudity.
+David, too, danced naked before the Lord. Dancing was also part of the
+religious ceremonies attendant on the worship of Dionysos or
+Bacchus.[28] Along with the drinking of certain vegetable decoctions,
+dancing formed an important part of the witches' saturnalia during the
+medieval period. When in a state of frenzy, partly drug induced and
+partly the product of exhilaration caused by wild dancing, visions of
+Satan followed. In the dancing mania of the fourteenth century, the
+sufferers saw visions of heaven opened, with Jesus and the Virgin
+enthroned. Dancing was one of the prominent characteristics of the
+French Convulsionnaires in the eighteenth century. In more recent times
+we have the dancing and singing connected with the Methodist revival. In
+modern instances the dancing seems to have been consequent on religious
+excitement rather than precedent to it, but in earlier times there is no
+doubt that it was deliberately practised as a means of producing a state
+of exaltation.
+
+Among the commonest methods of inducing a sense of religious exaltation
+is the practice of fasting. In various guises, this is the most
+persistent form of religious self-torture. Amongst more civilised people
+the reason given for fasting is that it is a form of repentance, the
+genuineness of which is attested by voluntary punishment. But originally
+there seems little reason to doubt that it was adopted for a different
+purpose. It was valued not because the fasting person felt that he had
+done anything for which it was necessary to repent, but because it was
+believed to bring people into closer touch with the spiritual world.
+There is, of course, a very obvious reason for this belief. A lowered
+vitality is favourable to hallucinations of every description. A
+shipwrecked sailor is placed, by no act of his own, in precisely the
+same condition as is the primitive medicine man or the medieval saint by
+his own volition. It has always been recognised, and by none more
+readily than by the great religious teachers of the world, that a
+well-nourished body is inimical to what they chose to term "spiritual
+development." The historic Christian outcry against fleshly indulgence
+has much more in it than a revolt against mere sensualism. A well-fed
+body has been deprecated because it closed the avenue to spiritual
+illumination. Hence it is that fasting has found such favour in all
+religious systems. The ascetic saw more because, by reducing the body to
+an abnormal state, he provided the conditions for seeing more. The Zulu
+maxim, "A stuffed body cannot see secret things," really expresses in a
+sentence the philosophy of the matter.
+
+Among the Blackfoot Indians of North America, when a boy reaches puberty
+he is sent away from his father's lodge in search of a spiritual
+protector or totem. Seeking a secluded spot, he abstains from food until
+he is favoured in a dream with a vision of some animal or bird, which is
+at once adopted by him.[29] This custom obtains with most of the North
+American tribes. Among these tribes, also, the soothsayer prepares
+himself by fasting for the ecstatic state in which the spirits give
+their messages through him. The ordinary member of the tribe who wants
+anything will fast until he is assured in a dream that it will be
+granted him. Similarly, the Malay, to procure supernatural intercourse,
+retires to the jungle and abstains from food. The Zulu doctor prepares
+for intercourse with the tribal spirits by spare diet or solitary fasts.
+Fasting is part of the ordinary regimen of the Hindu yogi. Of certain
+Indian tribes we are told that before proceeding on an expedition they
+"observe a rigorous fast, or rather abstain from every kind of food for
+four days. In this interval their imagination is exalted to delirium;
+whether it be through bodily weakness or the natural effect of delirium,
+they pretend to have strange visions. The elders and sages of the tribe,
+being called upon to interpret these dreams, draw from them omens more
+or less favourable to the success of the enterprise; and their
+explanations are received as oracles, by which the expedition will be
+faithfully regulated."[30] Amongst the Samoans, when rain was required,
+the priests blackened themselves all over, exhumed a dead body, took the
+skeleton to a cave and poured water over it. They had to fast and remain
+in the cave until it rained. Sometimes they died under the experiment,
+but they generally chose the showery months for their rain-making.[31]
+
+In both the Old and New Testaments fasting figures largely. The
+encounter of Jesus with Satan is preceded by a forty days' fast. St.
+Catherine of Sienna began regular fasts at a very early age. Santa
+Teresa kept lengthy fasts every year. The fasting of the monks and nuns
+during the epidemic period of monasticism is too well known to call for
+more than a mere reference. Perhaps the most curious religious reason
+given for fasting is that cited by a writer from a monkish chronicler:--
+
+"As a coach goes faster when it is empty, a man by fasting can be better
+united to God; for it is a principle with geometers that a round body
+can never touch a plane except in one point.... A belly too well filled
+becomes round, it cannot touch God except in one point; but fasting
+flattens the belly until it is united with the surface of God at all
+points."[32]
+
+George Fox, the founder of the Society of Friends, confesses that he
+"fasted much" and "walked abroad in solitary places," and "frequently in
+the night walked about mournfully by myself." After much brooding and
+fasting, he heard a voice which said, "There is one, even Jesus Christ,
+that can speak to thy condition." Such an experience is not at all
+surprising, seeing the method pursued to acquire it. Less fasting and
+brooding, with more genial intercourse with his fellows, might easily
+have prevented Fox, as it has prevented others, hearing heavenly voices
+proffering him counsel. Such an experience is well within the reach of
+anyone who cares to acquire it. Tylor has well said that "So long as
+fasting is continued as a religious rite, so long the consequences in
+morbid mental exaltation will continue the old savage doctrine that
+morbid phantasy is supernatural experience. Bread and meat would have
+robbed the ascetic of many an angel's visit; the opening of the
+refectory door must many a time have closed the gate of heaven to his
+gaze." No one will question the truth of this principle, so long as we
+are dealing with uncivilised mankind. Many, however, shrink from
+acknowledging that the practices current in more civilised times are
+disguised illustrations of the same principle of interpretation, which
+descends direct from savages, and but for them would never have existed.
+
+Commenting on the practices of certain savage medicine-men, a missionary
+remarks:--
+
+"It always appeared probable to me that these rogues, from long fasting,
+contract a weakness of brain, a giddiness, a kind of delirium, which
+makes them imagine that they are gifted with superior wisdom, and give
+themselves out for physicians. They impose upon themselves first, and
+afterwards upon others."[33]
+
+This is shrewdly said, and is a good example of the readiness with which
+obvious truths are recognised when they do not clash with religious
+prepossessions. The difficulty for others is to discern any real line of
+demarcation between the practices of civilised and uncivilised. So far
+as one can see, the only real distinction is that the method employed by
+savages is open. That followed by civilised people is more or less
+disguised. But derangement of function is derangement of function, no
+matter how produced. And if we decline to believe that a savage holds
+genuine intercourse with a spiritual world, as a consequence of this
+derangement, in what way are we justified in accepting the testimony of
+a Christian visionary to similar intercourse, when the derangement is in
+his case no less clear? It is a case of accepting both, or neither. The
+sane and scientific conclusion seems to lie in the following from Dr.
+Henry Maudsley:--
+
+"Now that the mental functions are known to be inseparably connected
+with nervous substrata, disposed and united in the brain in the most
+orderly fashion, superordinate, co-ordinate, and subordinate--the whole
+a complex organisation of confederate nerve centres, each capable of
+more or less independent action--a natural interpretation presents
+itself. The extraordinary states of mental disintegration evince the
+separate and irregular function of certain mental nerve tracts, or
+grouped nerve tracts with which goes necessarily a coincident
+suspension, partial or complete, of the functions of all the rest; the
+supernatural incubus, therefore, neither demoniac nor divine, only
+morbid. Thus the strange nervous seizures, with their mental
+concomitants, not being outside the range of positive research, but
+interesting events within it, become useful natural experiments to throw
+an instructive light upon the intricate functions of the most complex
+organ in the world--the human brain. Steadily are the researches of
+pathology driving the supernatural back into its last and most obscure
+retreat; for they prove that in the extremest ecstasies there is neither
+_theolepsy_ nor _diabolepsy_, nor any other _lepsy_ in the sense of
+possession of the individual by an external power; what there is truly
+is a _psycholepsy_."[34]
+
+States of exaltation produced by the aid of drugs, fasting, or other
+forms of self-torture come naturally under the category of deliberately
+induced states of mind, owing to the conviction that spiritual knowledge
+may be gained in this way. But there are other states that arise
+naturally and which foster the same conviction. It has already been
+pointed out that the generally accepted theory with uncivilised peoples
+is that all disease is due to the action of malevolent spirits. There is
+no need now to repeat proof of this, and in any case it lies to hand in
+any work that deals with uncivilised life. Nor need we go back to
+uncivilised times for evidence. One requires only to look but a very
+little way into the history of any country to find the supernaturalistic
+theory of disease in full swing, and even to-day one may discover
+indications of its once general rule. Its importance to the present
+enquiry lies in the part it has played in building up in the religious
+consciousness a general conviction of religious truth that does not
+disappear even when it is seen that the evidence upon which it rests is
+faulty. Just as the inhabitants of a Welsh village have their general
+belief in religion strengthened by the semi-hysterical speeches of an
+Evan Roberts, and the convulsive capers of a whole congregation, so in
+all ages people have found endorsement of their belief in a supernatural
+world in the existence of cases the pathological nature of which admits
+of no doubt. Belief in the supernatural character of specific nervous
+conditions or mental states may disappear, but the fact that this
+belief has been general for a time leaves behind a certain psychological
+residuum in favour of supernaturalism in general.
+
+The connection between the priest and the physician is naturally a very
+ancient one. The priest, indeed, is the primitive physician, the belief
+that diseases are supernaturally caused indicating him as the agent of
+their cure. And it is only to be expected that when the attempt is made
+to divert the treatment of disease from priestly hands the effort should
+be met with determined opposition. Quite naturally, too, the first
+gropings after a scientific theory of disease show a curious mixture of
+rationalism and superstition. Thus, in Greece, the temple hospitals
+devoted to the mythical Æsculapius, which were situated at Epidaurus,
+Pergamus, Cyrene, Corinth, and many other places, served as colleges,
+hospitals, and places of worship. Sufferers slept in the temples in the
+hopes of receiving messages from the gods, and the priests themselves
+professed to have ecstatic visions which enabled them to prescribe for
+those afflicted.[35] Great emphasis was placed on bathing, light, air,
+and food, and it is pretty clear that the priests had begun to mix both
+faith and physic in a most perplexing manner.
+
+The definite separation of medicine from magic and religion begins with
+Hippocrates. His theory of disease was simple. He did not deny that
+there might be a supernatural side to disease; he insisted that there
+was always a natural one, and that this was the side with which we
+should be concerned. Each disorder, he said, had its own physical
+conditions, and he laid down the rule that we "ought to study the nature
+of man, what he is with reference to that which he eats and drinks, and
+to all his other occupations and habits, and to the consequences
+resulting from each."[36] In Egypt, also, very considerable advance was
+made in the same direction. Probably a good deal of their knowledge
+resulted from the practice of embalming, in spite of the priestly
+interdict on dissection. At all events, there is no doubt that
+considerable advance had been made. Herophilus and Erasistratus wrote of
+the structure of the heart, and described its connection with the veins
+and arteries. The two kinds of nerves, motor and sensory, were
+described, and the influence of foods, etc., as influencing health,
+dwelt on. Insanity was also dealt with as due to natural and
+controllable causes, and the effects of colour and music in dealing with
+mania noted.[37] Had this advance been followed, the history of European
+civilisation might have been different from what it was. Plagues,
+epidemics, and diseases, with their far-reaching social and political
+consequences,--consequences that are too little noted, or even
+understood, by historians,--might have met with adequate resistance, and
+some would never have occurred.
+
+The Pagan schools of medicine came to an untimely, although in some
+cases a lingering, end. "The introduction of Christianity," says a
+medical writer, "had an undoubted influence on the course of medical
+science; for the Christian was taught to recognise, in every bodily
+infirmity, the dispensation of the Almighty, and in the calm, abstracted
+pursuits of those holy men who passed their time in prayer and
+meditation, a propitiation: hence medicine fell into the hands of monks
+and anchorites, who assumed to themselves, exclusively, the power of
+interpreting all natural phenomena as indications of the Divine Will,
+and pretended to possess some occult and supernatural means of curing
+disease."[38] Reversing the natural order of things, the physician was
+replaced by the priest. The supernaturalistic theory was revived, and
+held its own for well on a thousand years. For every complaint the
+Church provided a specific in the shape of a charm, an incantation, or a
+saint. St. Apollonia for toothache, St. Avertin for lunacy, St. Benedict
+for stone, St. Clara for sore eyes, St. Herbert for hydrophobia, St.
+John for epilepsy, St. Maur for gout, St. Pernel for agues, St.
+Genevieve for fevers, St. Sebastian for plague, etc.[39] The height of
+absurdity was reached when, in spite of the monopoly of the treatment of
+disease by the priesthood, the Council of Rheims (1119) actually forbade
+monks to study medicine. This was followed by the Council of Beziers
+(1246) prohibiting Christians applying for relief to Jewish physicians,
+at a time when practically the only doctors of ability in Christendom
+were Jews. In 1243 the Dominicans banished all books on medicine from
+their monasteries. Innocent III. forbade physicians practising except
+under the supervision of an ecclesiastic. Honorius (1222) forbade
+priests the study of medicine; and at the end of the thirteenth Century
+Boniface VIII. interdicted surgery as atheistical. The ill-treatment and
+opposition experienced by the great Vesalius at the hands of the Church,
+on account of his anatomical researches, is one of the saddest chapters
+in the history of science.[40]
+
+When the sight of bodily disease strengthened and confirmed belief in
+the supernatural, mental disease must have offered still more convincing
+evidence. Among uncivilised people we know that this is so. To quote
+again from the indispensable Tylor:--
+
+"The possessed man ... rationally finds a spiritual cause for his
+sufferings.... Especially when the mysterious unseen power throws him
+helpless on the ground, jerks and writhes him in convulsions, makes him
+leap upon the bystanders with a giant's strength and a wild beast's
+ferocity, impels him with distorted face and frantic gesture, and voice
+not his own nor seemingly even human, to pour forth wild incoherent
+raving, or with thought and eloquence beyond his sober faculties to
+command, to counsel, to foretell--such a one seems to those who watch
+him, and even to himself, to have become the mere instrument of a spirit
+which has seized him or entered into him, a possessing demon in whose
+personality the patient believes so implicitly that he often imagines a
+personal name for it, which it can declare when it speaks in its own
+voice and character through his organs of speech."[41]
+
+It was this conception of insanity, universally current in the
+uncivilised world, that was revived with fearful intensity in the early
+Christian Church, and which certainly served its purpose in intensifying
+the genuine belief in supernaturalism. Jesus had given His followers
+power to expel demons "In My name," and this power of exorcism was one
+upon which the early Christians specially prided themselves. It is with
+unconscious sarcasm that Dean Trench puts the question, If one of the
+disciples "were to enter a madhouse now, how many of the sufferers there
+he might recognise as 'possessed'?"[42] One may safely say that he would
+regard all as under the dominion of evil spirits. No other cause of
+insanity appears to have been recognised, and the Church devised the
+most elaborate formulæ for casting out demons. The assumed demoniac was
+prayed over, incensed, and evil-smelling drugs burned under his nose. A
+set form of objurgation then followed:--
+
+"Thou lustful and stupid one.... Thou lean sow, famine-stricken and most
+impure.... Thou wrinkled beast, of all beasts the most beastly.... Thou
+bestial and foolish drunkard.... Thou sooty spirit from Tartarus.... I
+cast thee down, O Tartarean boor, into the infernal kitchen....
+Loathsome cobbler ... filthy sow ... envious crocodile.... Malodorous
+drudge ... swollen toad ... lousy swineherd," etc. etc.[43]
+
+Then followed the exorcism proper:--
+
+"By the Apocalypse of Jesus Christ, which God hath given to make known
+unto His servants those things which are shortly to be ... I exorcise
+you, ye angels of untold perversity.... May all the devils that are thy
+foes rush forth upon thee and drag thee down to hell!... May the Holy
+One trample on thee and hang thee up in an infernal fork, as was done to
+the five kings of the Amorites!... May God set a nail to your skull, and
+pound it with a hammer as Jael did to Sisera!... May Sother break thy
+head and cut off thy hands, as was done to the cursed Dagon!... May God
+hang thee in a hellish yoke, as seven men were hanged by the sons of
+Saul!"[44]
+
+Marcus Aurelius mentions as one of his debts to the philosopher
+Diognetus that he had taught him "not to give credit to vulgar tales of
+prodigies and incantations, and evil spirits cast out by magicians or
+pretenders to sorcery, and such kind of impostors."[45] What would have
+been the thoughts of the great emperor, could he have revisited the
+earth two centuries after his death and seen the then civilised world
+enveloped in a mental atmosphere in which such ideas as those above
+described could live?
+
+All over Europe for centuries lunatics were whipped, and otherwise
+ill-treated, in the hopes of expelling the demons that were troubling
+them. The seventy-second Canon of the Church of England still provides
+that no unlicensed person shall "cast out any devil or devils" under
+pain of penalties prescribed. A Bishop of Beauvais, in the fifteenth
+century, not only caused five devils to come out of one person, but
+actually induced them to sign a document promising not to molest this
+particular sufferer again. Tremendous, again, were the labours of the
+Jesuit Fathers of Vienna, who boasted that they had cast out no less
+than 12,652 'living devils.' Such arithmetical exactitude silences all
+hostile comment. In some parts of Scotland, as late as 1783, lunatics
+were left all night in the churchyard, with a holy bell over their
+heads. In Cornwall, St. Nun's pool was famous for the cure of lunatics.
+The poor devils were tied hand and foot and doused in the water until
+they were cured--or killed. Even the embraces of prostitutes, for some
+peculiar reason, were recommended as a cure for insanity.[46] In 1788,
+in Bristol, a drunken epileptic, one George Larkins, was brought into
+church, and seven clergymen solemnly set themselves to the task of
+exorcising the possessing demon. Whereupon Satan swore 'by his infernal
+den'--an oath, says the chronicler, nowhere to be found but in Bunyan.
+Under date of October 25, 1739, John Wesley also relates how he was sent
+for and assisted at the expulsion of a demon from the body of a young
+girl.
+
+Of all nervous diseases that of epilepsy appears to have been most
+favourable to the encouragement of a belief in spiritual agency. One
+medical authority whose experience enables him to speak with a peculiar
+degree of authority has pointed out that with epilepsy there is often an
+exaltation of the religious sentiments.[47] A more recent writer, Dr.
+Bernard Hollander, asserts that epileptics are "highly religious."[48]
+Sir T. S. Clouston also points out that strong religious emotionalism
+often accompanies epilepsy.[49] Another eminent physician, while
+pointing out that "a high degree of intelligence, amounting even to
+genius, has in some cases been associated with epilepsy," observes that
+"the epileptic is apt to be influenced greatly by the mystical and
+awe-inspiring, and he is disposed to morbid piety."[50]
+
+Every medical man is acquainted with the close relation that exists
+between epilepsy and all kinds of hallucinations and delusions, and it
+would be more than surprising if in an environment where the religious
+interpretation of things is paramount, or with a patient of strong
+religious convictions, these delusions did not take a religious form.
+And of all nervous disorders epilepsy seems most favourable for
+producing this. Under its influence hallucination attacks every one of
+the senses with a varying degree of intensity. "The patient hears
+voices, and generally words expressing definite ideas, though he is
+often unable to properly refer them to any speaking person. Sometimes
+instead of external sounds or voices, the patient has a consciousness of
+an internal voice that may be as real to him as any external auditory
+perception. At first the voices may be indistinct, but upon constant
+repetition and evolution from sub-conscious thought they acquire
+intensity, eventually dominating the life of the individual."[51] Dr.
+Ball says: "One patient perceives at the beginning of the attack a
+toothed wheel, in the middle of which there appears a human face making
+strange contortions; another sees a series of smiling landscapes. In
+some cases it is the sense of hearing which is affected;--the patient
+hears voices or strange noises. Others are warned by the sense of smell
+that the fit is going to commence."[52]
+
+Sometimes these hallucinations of sight and hearing are in curious
+contrast with each other. "Not rarely," says Dr. Conolly Norman, "a
+patient has visual hallucinations of a cheering kind--as of God or
+angels; yet his auditory hallucinations are full of blasphemy, mockery,
+and insult."[53]
+
+Dr. Maudsley thus describes the general symptoms accompanying an
+epileptic attack:--
+
+"The patient's senses are possessed with hallucinations, his ganglionic
+central cells being in a state of what may be called convulsive action;
+before the eyes are blood-red flames of fire, amidst which whoever
+happens to present himself appears as a devil or otherwise horribly
+transformed; the ears are filled with a terribly roaring noise, or
+resound with a voice imperatively commanding him to save himself; the
+smell is one of sulphurous stifling, and the desperate and violent
+actions are the convulsive reaction to such fearful hallucinations."[54]
+
+If anyone will bear in mind the numerous descriptions of religious
+visions, written in all good faith, and the behaviour of many an assumed
+'inspired' character, he will have little difficulty in realising how
+easily, to a people unacquainted with the real character of such
+phenomena, epilepsy lends itself to a religious interpretation. It must
+also be borne in mind that the consequences of vivid hallucinations
+experienced during epilepsy do not always disappear with the attack to
+which they were originally due.
+
+It is certain that from the earliest times cases of what are undoubtedly
+epilepsy have been taken as positive indications of supernatural
+influence. "There is," says Emanuel Deutsch, "a peculiar something
+supposed to inhere in epilepsy. The Greeks called it a divine disease.
+Bacchantic and chorybantic furor were God-inspired stages. The Pythia
+uttered her oracles under the most distressing signs. Symptoms of
+convulsion were ever needed as a sign of the divine."[55] Much of the
+evidence for the supernatural in the New Testament rests upon cases that
+are obviously pathological in character. A man brings his son to Jesus
+and describes how "ofttimes he falleth into the fire, and oft into the
+water" (Matt. xvii. 15), and in another place (Mark ix. 18) the same
+patient is described as having a dumb spirit, "and wheresoever he taketh
+him, he teareth him; and he foameth, and gnasheth with his teeth, and
+pineth away." The response to the father's appeal for help is an
+exorcism of the possessing spirit such as one meets with in all savage
+culture. Between possession by a malignant spirit and domination by a
+god, the difference is clearly one of terminology alone. And at the
+side of the New Testament case just cited one may place this account
+from Polynesia, written by a very competent observer, and a
+missionary:--
+
+"As soon as the god was supposed to have entered the priest, the latter
+became violently agitated and worked himself up to the highest pitch of
+apparent frenzy; the muscles of the limbs seemed convulsed, the body
+swelled, the countenance became terrific, the features distorted, the
+eyes wild and strained. In this state he often rolled on the earth,
+foaming at the mouth, as if labouring under the influence of the
+divinity by whom he was possessed, and in shrill cries, and often
+violent and indistinct sounds, revealed the will of the god."[56]
+
+Advancing to a higher culture stage than that indicated in the last
+passage, there is much evidence that Mohammed was subject to
+hallucinations, and many authorities have indicated epilepsy as their
+source. There is a tradition that someone who saw Mohammed while he was
+receiving one of his revelations observed that he seemed unconscious and
+was red in the face. Mohammed himself said:--
+
+"Inspiration descendeth upon me in two ways. Sometimes Gabriel cometh
+and communicateth the revelation unto me, as one man unto another, and
+this is easy; at other times it affecteth me like the ringing of a bell,
+penetrating my very heart, and rending me as it were in pieces; and this
+it is which grievously afflicteth me."
+
+Emanuel Deutsch, although, in a passage already cited, recognising the
+religious significance attached to epilepsy, has the following curious
+comment:--
+
+"Mohammed was epileptic; and vast ingenuity and medical knowledge have
+been lavished upon this point as explanatory of Mohammed's mission and
+success. We, for our own part, do not think that epilepsy ever made a
+man appear a prophet to himself or even to the people of the East; or,
+for the matter of that, inspired him with the like heart-moving words
+and glorious pictures. Quite the contrary. It was taken as a sign of
+demons within--demons, 'Devs,' devils to whom all manner of diseases
+were ascribed throughout the antique world."
+
+This seems very largely to miss the point at issue. Of course, no one
+would claim that Mohammed's success was due to epilepsy, or even that
+the very severe forms of epilepsy were favourable to inducing a
+conviction of revelation. But the disease assumes various forms, and in
+some cases it is expressed in the form of a period of mental excitement
+and general irritability. All that is claimed is that, given the
+complaint in its less severe forms in one with whom religious beliefs
+are strong, there are present all the conditions for attributing the
+resulting hallucinations to personal revelation or ecstatic vision. And
+it is also true that while some patients after emerging from a fit of
+epilepsy are in a dazed or confused condition, others have a very clear
+recollection of all they have seen and heard. Mohammed simply took the
+current explanation of cases of nervous derangement, and being a man of
+strong religious feeling, naturally gave his visions a religious
+interpretation. All the rest has to be explained in terms of the innate
+genius of the man and of the circumstances of his time.
+
+A similar case to the above is that of Emanuel Swedenborg. His followers
+naturally resent the ascription of his visions and voices to a
+pathologic origin, and point to his pronounced mental ability. And
+certainly no one who is at all acquainted with the writings of
+Swedenborg will question his great mental power, amounting at times to
+positive genius. But here, again, we have strong religious conviction in
+alliance with pathological conditions. Swedenborg's communications with
+celestial beings were of a more frequent and more ordered character than
+Mohammed's, but there is the same general likeness between them. Of his
+first revelation he writes:--
+
+"At ten o'clock I lay down in bed and was somewhat better; half an hour
+after I heard a clamour under my head; I thought that then the tempter
+went away; immediately there came over me a rigor so strong from the
+head and the whole body, with some din, and this several times. I found
+that something holy was over me. I thereupon fell asleep, and at about
+twelve, one, or two o'clock in the night there came over me so strong a
+shivering from head to foot, as if many winds rushed together, which
+shook me, was indescribable, and prostrated me upon my face. Then, while
+I was prostrated, I was in a moment quite awake, and saw that I was cast
+down, and wondered what it meant. And I spoke as if I was awake, but
+found that the word was put into my mouth, and I said, 'Omnipotent Jesus
+Christ, as of Thy great grace Thou condescendest to come to so great a
+sinner, make me worthy of this grace!' I held my hands together and
+prayed, and then came a hand which squeezed my hands hard; immediately
+thereupon I continued in prayer."[57]
+
+Swedenborg confessed to repeated walks and talks with celestial
+visitants, and, of course, all thought of imposture must be put on one
+side. What one has to consider is whether we are to accept these
+experiences as hallucinations or not. On the one side no further
+evidence seems possible than the profound faith of the man himself, his
+recognised mental ability, and the belief of his followers. And against
+this it must be urged that the most complete honesty is no guarantee
+against self-deception, while ability and even genius are not at all
+incompatible with a pathologic strain. And in addition it must be borne
+in mind that these hallucinations are, after all, part of a very large
+class. Men of very little ability and influence experience substantially
+the same visions; they occur all over the world, under all conditions of
+culture, and always express the personal idiosyncrasies of the subject
+and reflect the character of his social environment. One may safely say
+that had Swedenborg lived a century later, while he might still have
+gone through the same mental and physical experiences, he himself would
+have given a very different interpretation of them.
+
+St. Paul, Professor James points out, "certainly had once an epileptoid,
+if not an epileptic seizure." One needs to add to this that the seizure
+occurred at the one critical moment of his life which eventuated in his
+conversion from Judaism to Christianity. Mary Magdalene, the first who
+brought tidings of the resurrection, had been delivered of seven
+devils. Luther's religious opinions were, of course, quite apart from
+his physical state, sound or unsound. Still, even with him the reality
+of supernatural intercourse became intensely vivid as a result of
+nervous affections. His latest biographer points out that as a youth
+while in the monastery he was seized with something that might well have
+been an epileptic fit, and that although there is no record of a return
+of this, he did suffer from ordinary fits of fainting.[58] He confesses
+to have been much troubled, at twenty-two years of age, with giddiness
+and noises in the ear, which he attributed to the devil. And right
+through his life he attributed similar experiences to the same source.
+Bunyan confesses that even during childhood the Lord "did scare and
+affright me with fearful dreams, and did terrify me with dreadful
+visions." George Fox, founder of the Society of Friends, describes how,
+in the middle of winter, when approaching Lichfield, "the Word of the
+Lord was like a fire in me," and as he went through the town, "there
+seemed to me to be a channel of blood running down the streets, and the
+market-place appeared like a pool of blood." Reflecting on the meaning
+of the vision, he remembered that, "In the Emperor Diocletian's time a
+thousand Christians were martyred at Lichfield. So I was to go without
+my shoes through the channel of their blood in the market-place, that I
+might raise up the blood of these martyrs which had been shed above a
+thousand years before."[59]
+
+In none of these cases could it be fairly claimed that the religious
+conviction, as such, was the consequence of the hallucinations
+experienced. But it can scarcely be questioned that these served to
+strengthen it to an enormous extent. These trances, ecstasies, visions,
+were accepted by the subjects as proofs of their 'divine mission,' and
+were so accepted by multitudes of their followers. In their absence
+religion would most probably have failed to be the fiercely irruptive
+force in life that it has been. The religious idea has, so to speak
+given hallucination a standing and an authority in life it would not
+have possessed in its absence. In the case of men of ordinary capacity
+these visions possess little authority. But in the case of men of
+extraordinary capacity, men like Luther, Mohammed, Fox, Swedenborg,--who
+must in any case have stood superior to their fellows,--these
+hallucinations are then under favouring social conditions invested with
+enormous authority. And there is no doubt about the fact that religious
+leaders have been peculiarly subject to these psychical variations. This
+is pointed out by Professor James in the following passage:--
+
+"Even more perhaps than other kinds of genius, religious leaders have
+been subject to abnormal psychical visitations. Invariably they have
+been creatures of exalted emotional sensibility. Often they have led a
+discordant inner life, and had melancholy during a part of their career.
+They have known no measure, been liable to obsessions and fixed ideas;
+and frequently they have fallen into trances, heard voices, seen
+visions, and presented all sorts of peculiarities which are ordinarily
+classed as pathological. Often, moreover, these pathological features in
+their career have helped to give them their religious authority and
+influence."[60]
+
+Well, in what way are we to discriminate between the visions of a
+religious person, admittedly of an abnormal disposition, subject to fits
+of melancholy, etc., and presenting "all sorts of peculiarities
+ordinarily classed as pathological," and the hallucinations of an
+admittedly pathologic subject? Why should the ordinary classification
+break down at this point? Dr. Granger, dealing with this aspect of the
+question, says: "The religious genius is not proved to be morbid by the
+extent to which he diverges from the average type."[61] Quite so, genius
+_must_ depart from the average type in order to be genius. But the
+statement is quite beside the point at issue. It is not a mere
+divergence from the average type that warrants one in assuming that much
+passing for divine illumination owes its origin to pathological
+conditions, but the fact that it is possible to affiliate certain cases
+of religious exaltation with these conditions. Hallucinations are common
+to all forms of ecstasy, and ecstasy is not confined to religion. Given
+a one-sided mental activity, intense concentration on one or a few
+analogous ideas, combined with a lowered nervous sensibility, and we
+have all the conditions present favourable to hallucination.[62] These
+hallucinations may occur in connection with any topic that engrosses the
+subject's mind. In every other direction their true nature is recognised
+and admitted. In connection with religious belief alone, it is held that
+they bring the subject into touch with a supersensual world of reality.
+What possible scientific warranty is there for any such distinction?
+
+Let us take, as an example, one of James's own cases, which he admits is
+'distinctly pathological,' but without allowing this admission to
+disturb his general conclusion. The case is that of Suso, a famous
+fourteenth-century mystic. As a young man he wore a hair shirt and an
+iron chain next the skin. Later he had made a leathern garment studded
+with one hundred and fifty nails, points inward. The garment was made
+very tight, and he used it to sleep in. To prevent himself throwing it
+off during sleep he procured a pair of leather gloves studded with
+tacks, so that if he attempted to get rid of the dress the tacks would
+penetrate his flesh. Next he had made a wooden cross, with thirty
+protruding nails, to emulate the sufferings of Jesus. He procured an old
+door to sleep on. In winter he suffered from the frost. His feet were
+full of sores, his legs became dropsical, his knees bloody and seared,
+his loins covered with scars, his hands tremulous. During twenty years
+he fed scantily upon the coarsest food, slept in the most uncomfortable
+places, and during the whole of the time never took a bath. No wonder
+that after his fortieth year he was favoured with a series of visions
+from God. Would not one be surprised if any other result than this had
+been achieved? And Suso's case is only one of thousands, many of not so
+extreme a character, others quite as bad.
+
+In the case of Catherine of Sienna the austerities began earlier than
+with Suso. As a child she flogged herself, and was favoured with visions
+before she reached her teens. Santa Teresa, as a young woman, prayed to
+God to send her an illness, and describes how she remained for days in a
+trance, during which time her tongue was bitten in many places. She
+describes how, during these trances, her body became to her light, and
+she remained rigid. "It was altogether impossible for me to hinder it;
+for my world would be carried absolutely away, and ordinarily even my
+head, as it were, after it."[63] These are typical examples from a very
+large number of cases. The annals of monasticism are filled with
+accounts of self-inflicted tortures, with the one end in view, and in
+serious belief that their experiences brought them into touch with a
+reality denied them under normal conditions. The practice not only
+quickened their own sense of the reality of religion, it served the same
+purpose for thousands of others pursuing the course of ordinary social
+existence. "Religious teachers," says Francis Galton, "by enforcing
+celibacy, fasting, and solitude, have done their best towards making men
+mad, and they have always largely succeeded in inducing morbid mental
+conditions among their followers."[64]
+
+The phenomenon is thus continuous and, in its essentials, unchanging.
+From the most primitive times there has been a close association between
+the belief in divine illumination and spiritual intercourse, and mental
+states that are unquestionably pathological. Following this there has
+been a more or less deliberate cultivation of these states in the desire
+to renew communion with a spiritual world hidden from man's normal
+senses. In this there need be no deliberate imposture. When imposture
+does occur, it would be at a later culture stage. At the beginning
+there is nothing but misunderstanding. First in order of time comes the
+crude animistic interpretation of almost every phase of human activity.
+So far as primitive life is concerned, the evidence of this is simply
+overwhelming. Next, as Tylor has pointed out, from believing that the
+occurrence of certain mental states provides the conditions of
+communication with an unseen world to the deliberate creation of those
+states is a natural and an easy step. There is thus set on foot a
+deliberate culture of the supernatural. This cultivation of abnormal
+states of mind once initiated persists, now in one form, now in another,
+but is substantially the same throughout. Whether we are dealing with
+the crude practices of the savage, the less crude, but still obvious
+methods of solitary living and bodily maceration of the medieval monk,
+or the morbid and unhealthy dwelling upon a single idea which remains
+one of the conditions of 'illumination' to-day, we are confronted with
+the same thing. In every case the object--unconscious, maybe--is the
+provision of conditions that render hallucination and illusion a
+practical certainty. In connection with non-religious matters the
+unhealthiness of mind, distortion of vision, and unreliability of
+judgment induced by methods akin to those named is now generally
+recognised. We have yet to see the same thing as generally recognised in
+connection with religious beliefs. We see in addition that a great many
+of those experiences, once accepted as clear evidence of supernatural
+communication, are more properly explainable in terms of nervous
+derangement. In such cases there is neither celestial illumination nor
+diabolic communion, neither--to use Maudsley's phrase--theolepsy nor
+diabolepsy, only psycholepsy. In the present chapter we have been
+striving to apply this principle to a little wider field than is usual.
+We have been studying the misinterpretation, in terms of religion, of
+abnormal or pathological states of mind, and observing how far these
+have contributed to building up and perpetuating a conviction of the
+possibility of supernatural intercourse. We have yet to trace the same
+principle of misinterpretation in the sexual and social life of mankind.
+
+
+FOOTNOTES:
+
+[20] _A Psychological Study of Religion_, p. 234.
+
+[21] _Primitive Culture_, i. p. 501.
+
+[22] _Primitive Culture_, ii. p. 410.
+
+[23] Some very curious information concerning the use of this and other
+fungi is given by Dr. J. G. Bourke in his _Scatologic Rites_, pp. 69-75.
+
+[24] Cited by Bourke, p. 90.
+
+[25] Tylor, ii. pp. 417-9.
+
+[26] For a clear account of the effects of hemp preparations, calculated
+to produce a feeling of religious ecstasy, the reader should consult Dr.
+Hale White's _Text-Book of Pharmacology_, 1901, pp. 318-22. The effects
+of opium are thus described by another writer: "Opium, in those who are
+capable of stimulation by it, gives rise to a pleasurable feeling,
+something like that which is produced by wine in not excessive doses;
+but the excitement derived from it, instead of tending to some highest
+point, remains stationary for hours, and in place of the slight
+incoherence of thought always present in those who are exhilarated with
+wine, the most perfect harmony is established among all the conceptions.
+There is an extraordinary stimulation of the pure intellect, and not
+merely of the power of expression. The opium-eater seems to have had the
+eyes of his spirit opened, to have acquired a gift of insight into
+things that to mere mortals are inexplicable. The most remote parts of
+consciousness come into clear light; the finer shades of personality,
+those that had been unknown even to the opium-eater himself, are brought
+into view and become distinct; the smallest details of the things around
+take new significance, and are seen to be profoundly important; their
+analogies with other phenomena of nature are revealed. It is the same
+with the moral as with the intellectual being; that also becomes
+indefinitely exalted. An absolute balance of the faculties seems to have
+been attained. The whole man _is_ what in his ordinary state he only
+tends to be; he has realised the highest perfection of which he is
+capable; only his 'best self' now remains; his lower self has been left
+behind without need of the purgatorial fire of contention with the
+environment to destroy it."--T. Whittaker, _Essays and Notices,
+Psychological and Philosophical_, p. 367.
+
+[27] _Anthropology_, p. 296.
+
+[28] For a general account of religious dances, see Major-General
+Forlong's _Faiths of Man_, art. "Dancing."
+
+[29] Catlin, _North American Indians_, i. p. 36.
+
+[30] Cited by Frazer, _Taboo and the Perils of the Soul_, p. 161.
+
+[31] Turner's _Samoa_, p. 345-6.
+
+[32] Brady, _Clavis Calendaria_, vol. i. p. 223.
+
+[33] Cited by Tylor, _Primitive Culture_, ii. pp. 412-3.
+
+[34] _Natural Causes and Supernatural Seemings_, p. 277.
+
+[35] A very good account of the methods followed in these places will be
+found in Miss Hamilton's _Incubation, or the Cure of Diseases in Pagan
+Temples and Christian Churches_, 1906.
+
+[36] Grote, _History of Greece_, vol. i. p. 359 and vol. v. p. 232.
+
+[37] "The ancient Egyptians and Greeks," says Dr. Maudsley, "used humane
+and rational methods of treatment; it was only after the Christian
+doctrine of possession by devils had taken hold of the minds of men that
+the worst sort of treatment, of which history gives account, came into
+force" (_Pathology of Mind_, p. 523). For a general account of Egyptian
+medicine see the chapter on Egypt in Dr. Berdoe's _Origin and Growth of
+the Healing Art_.
+
+[38] Meryon, _The History of Medicine_, vol. i. p. 67.
+
+[39] _Ibid._, vol. i. p. 104.
+
+[40] See Sir Michael Foster's _Lectures on the History of Physiology_,
+chap. i.
+
+[41] _Primitive Culture_, ii. 124.
+
+[42] _On the Miracles_, p. 168.
+
+[43] Cited by White, who gives original authorities, _Warfare of Science
+with Theology_, ii. 107.
+
+[44] White, ii. 108.
+
+[45] _Meditations_, bk. i.
+
+[46] Fort's _Medical Economy during the Middle Ages_, p. 345.
+
+[47] Dr. Howden, Medical Superintendent of the Montrose Lunatic Asylum,
+in _Journal of Mental Science_, 1873.
+
+[48] _First Signs of Insanity_, p. 293.
+
+[49] _Clinical Lectures on Mental Diseases_, p. 428. The whole of
+chapter xi. is very pertinent.
+
+[50] Dr. R. Jones, in Allbutt's _System of Medicine_, vol. viii. p. 335
+
+[51] Dr. Hollander, _First Signs of Insanity_, pp. 64-5.
+
+[52] Cited by Ireland, _The Blot on the Brain_, p. 39.
+
+[53] Allbutt's _System of Medicine_, viii. 395.
+
+[54] _Physiology of Mind_, p. 251. See also Dr. Mercier's _The Nervous
+System and the Mind_, p. 55.
+
+[55] _Literary Remains_, p. 83.
+
+[56] W. Ellis, _Polynesian Researches_, ii. 235-6.
+
+[57] Dr. H. Maudsley has gone fully into the case of Swedenborg in an
+article in the _Journal of Mental Science_ for July and October 1869,
+since reprinted in his _Body and Mind_.
+
+[58] See _Luther_, by H. Grisar, 1913, vol. i. pp. 16-7.
+
+[59] For other cases, and a general account of the relations between
+pathologic states and religious delusion, see Lombroso, _Man of Genius_,
+chap. iv. pt. iii.
+
+[60] _Varieties of Religious Experience_, pp. 6-7.
+
+[61] _The Soul of a Christian_, p. 13.
+
+[62] See Parish's _Hallucinations and Illusions_, pp. 38-9.
+
+[63] _Saint Teresa_, by H. Joly, pp. 25, 26, and 58.
+
+[64] _Inquiries into Human Faculty_, 1883, p. 68.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER FOUR
+
+SEX & RELIGION IN PRIMITIVE LIFE
+
+
+The connection between sexual feeling and religious belief is ancient,
+intimate, and sustained. It has impressed itself on many observers who
+have approached the subject from widely different points of view. Some
+have treated the connection as purely accidental, and as having no more
+than a mere historical interest. Others have used it as illustrating the
+way in which so sacred a subject as religion may suffer degradation in
+degenerate hands. Others of a more scientific temper have dealt with the
+relations between sexualism and religion as illustrations of a mere
+perversion. A deal may be said in favour of this last point of view. We
+know, as a matter of fact, that such cases of perversion do exist, in
+what form and to what extent will be discussed later. We are also aware
+that strong feeling which cannot find vent in one direction will secure
+expression in another. The annals of Roman Catholicism contain accounts
+of numerous persons who have sought refuge in a monastery or a nunnery
+as the result of disappointment in love, and it would be foolish to
+conclude that strong amorous feelings are annihilated because there is a
+change in the object to which they are directed. Paul was not a
+different man from the Saul of pre-conversion days, but the same person
+with his energies directed into a new channel. Protestantism is without
+the obvious outlets for unsatisfied sexual feeling such as is provided
+by Roman Catholicism, but it provides other outlets. Religious service
+as a whole remains, and intense religious devotion may very often owe
+its origin to sources undreamt of by the devotee.
+
+Between religious beliefs and sexual feelings the connection is,
+however, wider and deeper, than the relation expressed by mere
+perversion. Neither is the relation one of mere accident. An examination
+of the facts in the light of adequate scientific knowledge, combined
+with a due perception of primitive human psychology and sociology, have
+shown that the two things are united at their source. One eminent
+medical writer asserts that "in a certain sense, the history of religion
+can be regarded as a peculiar mode of manifestation of the human sexual
+instinct."[65] Another writer substantially endorses this by the remark
+that "in a certain sense the religious life is an irradiation of the
+reproductive instinct."[66] How easily one glides into the other very
+little observation of life or study of history will show. The language
+of devotion and of amatory passion is often identical, and seems to
+serve equally well for either purpose. The significance of this fact is
+often obscured by our having etherealised the conception of love, and so
+losing sight of its physiological basis. And, having hidden it from
+sight, we, not unnaturally, fail to give it due consideration. This is,
+in its way, a fatal blunder. The sex life of man and woman is too large
+a fact and too pervasive a force to be ignored with safety. Ignorance
+combined with prudery conspires to perpetuate what ignorance alone
+began; and the sex life, in both its normal and abnormal manifestations,
+has been perpetually exploited in the interests of supernaturalism.
+
+The evidence that may be adduced in favour of what has been said is
+vast, and covers a wide range. Historically it covers such facts as the
+relations between primitive religious beliefs and the sexual life, and
+the multiplication of sects of a markedly erotic character during
+periods of religious enthusiasm. "Even the most casual students of
+religion," says Professor G. B. Cutten, "must have observed an
+apparently intimate connection between religious and sexual emotions,
+and not a few have read with amazement the abnormal cults which have had
+the sexual element as a foundation for their denominational
+dissent."[67] A phenomenon so striking as to force itself on the notice
+of the most 'casual students' raises the presumption that the relation
+between the two sets of facts is rather more than that of 'apparent'
+intimacy. When in the course of history two things appear together over
+and over again, one is surely justified in assuming that there is some
+underlying principle responsible for the association. The search for
+this principle leads to the next class of evidence--the psychological.
+In this we are concerned with the relation between the sexual feelings
+and the religious idea, an association not always expressed through the
+comparatively harmless medium of language. And, finally, we have the
+evidence derived from pathology, where we are able to discern a
+perverted sexuality masquerading as religious fervour.
+
+In a previous chapter there has been pointed out the kind of mental
+environment in which primitive man moves. As one of the earliest forms
+of systematised thinking, religion dominates all other forms of mental
+activity. In savage culture there is hardly a single event into which
+religious considerations do not enter. The savage does not merely
+believe in a supernatural world, he lives in it; it is as real to him as
+anything around him, and far more potent in its action. Above all, it is
+important to bear in mind that although one is compelled to speak of the
+natural and the supernatural when dealing with early beliefs, no such
+separation is present to the primitive intelligence. The division
+between the natural and the supernatural in the external world is the
+reflection of a corresponding division in the world of thought, and this
+arises only at a subsequent stage. What is afterwards recognised as the
+supernatural pervades everything. In a sense it is everything, since
+most of what occurs is by the agency or connivance of animistic forces.
+
+In such a world, where even the ordinary events of life have a
+supernatural significance, the strange and sometimes terrifying
+phenomena of sexual life carry peculiarly strong evidences of
+supernatural activity. Events which are to the modern mind the most
+obvious consequences of sex life are to the primitive mind proofs of
+supernatural or ghostly agency. Nothing, for example, would appear less
+open to misconception than the connection between sexual relations and
+the birth of children. Yet, on this head, Mr. Sidney Hartland has
+produced a mass of evidence, gathered from all parts of the world, and
+leading to the conclusion that in the most primitive stages of human
+culture, conception and birth are ascribed to direct supernatural
+influence. Setting out from a study of the world-wide vogue of the
+belief in supernatural birth--contained in the author's earlier work,
+_The Legend of Perseus_--Mr. Hartland finds in this a survival of a
+culture stage in which all birth is believed to be supernatural.
+Survivals of this belief that birth is a phenomenon independent of the
+union of the sexes are found in the existence of numerous semi-magical
+devices to obtain children, still practised in many parts of Europe, and
+which were practised on a much more extensive scale during the medieval
+period; in the ignorance of man concerning physiological functions in
+general, the existence of Motherright which appears to have universally
+antedated Fatherright--the origin of which he traces to economic causes,
+and to the animistic nature of primitive beliefs in general.[68]
+
+Such a conclusion is not without verification from the beliefs of
+existing savages. The Bahau of Central Borneo have no notion of the real
+duration of pregnancy, and date its commencement only from the time of
+its becoming visible. The Niol-Niol of Dampier Land in North-Western
+Australia hold birth to be independent of sexual intercourse. It is
+engendered by a pre-existing spirit through the agency of a medicine
+man. The North Queenslanders have a similar belief. They believe a child
+to be sent in answer to the husband's prayer as a punishment to his wife
+when he is vexed with her. On the Proserpine River the Blacks believe
+that a child is the gift of a supernatural being called Kunya. In South
+Queensland the Euahlayi believe that spirits congregate at certain spots
+and pounce on passing women, and so are born. On the Slave Coast of West
+Africa the Awunas say that a child derives the lower jaw from the
+mother; all the rest comes from the spirits. Among these people and
+others that might be named paternity exists in name, but it implies
+something entirely different to what it afterwards connotes. Mr.
+Hartland gives numerous instances of this curious fact, and points out
+that "the attention of mankind would not be early or easily fastened
+upon the procreative process. It is lengthy, extending over months
+during which the observer's attention would be inevitably diverted by a
+variety of objects, most of them of far more pressing import.... The
+sexual passion would be gratified instinctively without any thought of
+the consequences, and in an overwhelming proportion of cases without the
+consequence of pregnancy at all. When that consequence occurred it would
+not be visible for weeks or months after the act which produced it. A
+hundred other events might have taken place in the interval which would
+be likely to be credited with the result by one wholly ignorant of
+natural laws."
+
+There seems, therefore, fair grounds for Mr. Hartland's conclusion
+that:--
+
+"for generations and æons the truth that a child is only born in
+consequence of an act of sexual union, that the birth of a child is the
+natural consequence of such an act performed in favouring circumstances,
+and that every child must be the result of such an act and of no other
+cause, was not realised by mankind, that down to the present day it is
+imperfectly realised by some peoples, and that there are still others
+among whom it is unknown."
+
+This, however, is but one of the ways in which supernatural beliefs
+become associated with sexual phenomena. In truth, there is not a stage
+of any importance in the sexual life of men and women where the same
+association does not transpire. There is, for example, the important
+phenomenon of puberty--important from both a physiological and
+sociological point of view. Pubic ceremonies of some kind are found all
+over the world, and in all forms, from those current amongst savages up
+to the contemporary practice of confirmation in the Christian Church. At
+all stages the period of puberty is the time of initiation. With
+uncivilised peoples a very general rule is the separation of the sexes,
+with fasting. Mr. Stanley Hall in his elaborate work on _Adolescence_
+has dealt very exhaustively with these customs, with which we shall be
+more closely concerned when we come to deal with the subject of
+conversion. At present it is only necessary to point out that the
+governing idea is that at puberty the boy and the girl are brought into
+special relationship with the tribal spirits, the proof of which
+relationship lies in the sexual functions originated.
+
+With boys, once puberty is attained, the sexual development is orderly
+and unobtrusive. In the case of girls certain recurring phenomena make
+the essential fact of sex much more impressive to the primitive mind,
+with far-reaching sociological consequences. "Ignorance of the nature of
+female periodicity," says A. E. Crawley, "leads man to consider it as
+the flow of blood from a wound, naturally, or more usually,
+supernaturally produced."[69] In Siam an evil spirit is believed to be
+the cause of the wound. Amongst the Chiriguanas the girl fasts, while
+women beat the floor with sticks in order to drive away "the snake that
+has wounded the girl." Similar beliefs are found very generally among
+people in a low stage of culture, and customs and beliefs still
+surviving among people more advanced point to the conclusion that
+convictions of the same kind were once fairly universal. It is this
+function, combined with the function of childbirth, that brings woman
+into close contact with the supernatural world, makes her an object of
+fear and wonder to primitive man, accounts for a number of the customs
+and beliefs associated with her, and finally helps to determine her
+social position. It is because her periodicity is taken as evidence of
+her communion with spiritual forces that special precautions have to be
+taken concerning her. She becomes spiritually contagious. Thus, the
+natives of New Britain, while engaged in making fish-traps, carefully
+avoid all women. They believe that if a woman were even to touch a
+fish-trap, it would catch nothing. Amongst the Maoris, if a man touched
+a menstruous woman, he would be taboo 'an inch thick.' An Australian
+black fellow, who discovered that his wife had lain on his blanket at
+her menstrual period, killed her, and died of terror himself within a
+fortnight. In Uganda the pots which a woman touches while the impurity
+of childbirth or menstruation is on her, are destroyed. With many North
+American Indians the use of weapons touched by women during these times
+would bring misfortune. A menstruating woman is with them the object
+they dread most. In Tahiti women are secluded. In some cases she is too
+dangerous to be even touched by others, and food is given her at the end
+of a stick. With the Pueblo Indians contact with a woman at these times
+exposes a man to attacks from an evil spirit, and he may pass on the
+infection to others.[70]
+
+It is needless to multiply instances; the same general reason governs
+all, and this has been clearly expressed by Dr. Frazer:--
+
+"The object of secluding women at menstruation is to neutralise the
+dangerous influence which is supposed to emanate from them at such
+times. The general effect of these rules is to keep the women suspended,
+so to say, between heaven and earth. Whether enveloped in her hammock
+and slung up to the roof, as in South America, or elevated above the
+ground in a dark and narrow cage, as in New Zealand, she may be
+considered to be out of the way of doing mischief, since being shut off
+both from the earth and from the sun, she can poison neither of these
+great sources of life by her deadly contagion. The precautions thus
+taken to isolate and insulate the girl are dictated by regard for her
+own safety as well as for the safety of others.... In short, the girl is
+viewed as charged with a powerful force which, if not kept within
+bounds, may prove the destruction both of the girl herself and all with
+whom she comes in contact. To repress this force within the limits
+necessary for the safety of all concerned is the object of the taboos in
+question."
+
+The savage is far too logical in his methods to allow such an idea to
+end here. If a woman is so highly charged with spiritual infection as to
+be dangerous at certain frequently recurring periods, she may be more or
+less dangerous between these periods. As Havelock Ellis says: "Instead
+of being regarded as a being who at periodic intervals becomes the
+victim of a spell of impurity, the conception of impurity becomes
+amalgamated with the conception of woman; she is, as Tertullian puts it,
+_Janua diaboli_; and this is the attitude which still persisted in
+medieval days."[71] This is to be expected from what one knows of the
+workings of the primitive intelligence, but it is surprising to find Mr.
+Ellis continue by saying, on apparently good grounds, that "the belief
+in the periodically recurring impurity of women has by no means died out
+to-day. Among a very large section of the women of the middle and lower
+classes of England and other countries it is firmly believed that the
+touch of a menstruating woman will contaminate; only a few years since,
+in the course of a correspondence on this subject in the _British
+Medical Journal_ (1878), even medical men were found to state from
+personal observation that they had no doubt whatever on this point.
+Thus, one doctor, who expressed surprise that any doubt could be thrown
+on the point, wrote, after quoting cases of spoiled hams, etc., presumed
+to be due to this cause, which had come under his own personal
+observation: 'For two thousand years the Italians have had this idea of
+menstruating women. We English hold to it, the Americans have it, also
+the Australians. Now, I should like to know the country where the
+evidence of any such observation is unknown.'" Evidently animism is a
+more persistent frame of mind than most people are inclined to believe.
+
+It is certain, however, that this conception of woman's nature is
+dominant in the lower stages of culture. She is spiritually dangerous,
+and the principle of 'taboo' is made to cover a great many of her
+relations to man. In Tahiti a woman was not allowed to touch the weapons
+or fishing implements of men. Amongst the Todas women are not permitted
+to touch the cattle. If a wife touches the food of her husband, among
+the Hindus, the food is unfit to be eaten. An Eskimo wife dare not eat
+with her husband. In New Zealand wives were not allowed to eat with the
+males lest their taboo should kill them. Many tribes are careful to
+refrain from contact with women before going to fight. They believe that
+this would rob them and their weapons of strength. Other practices
+followed by savages before going to war forbid one assuming that this
+abstention is due to any rational fear of dissipating their energies.
+Instead of conserving their strength they weaken themselves by the many
+privations they undergo before fighting, in order to ensure victory.
+Professor Frazer well says:--
+
+"When we observe what pains these misguided savages took to unfit
+themselves for the business of war by abstaining from food, denying
+themselves rest, and lacerating their bodies, we shall probably not be
+disposed to attribute their practice of continence in war to a rational
+fear of dissipating their bodily energies by indulgence in the lusts of
+the flesh."[72]
+
+The conception of woman as one heavily charged with supernatural
+potentialities, and, therefore, a source of danger to the community,
+seems to lie at the basis of the widespread belief in the religious
+'uncleanness' of women. The real significance of the word 'unclean' in
+religious ritual has been obscured by our modern use of it in a hygienic
+or ethical sense. In reality it is but an illustration of the principle
+of 'taboo,' and 'taboo' may extend to anything, good or bad, useful or
+useless, hygienically clean or unclean. The primary meaning of 'taboo,'
+a Polynesian word, is something that is set aside or forbidden. The
+field covered by this word among savage and semi-savage races is, as
+Robertson Smith points out, "very wide, for there is no part of life in
+which the savage does not feel himself surrounded by mysterious agencies
+and recognise the need of walking warily."[73] Anything may thus become
+the object of a 'taboo.' Weapons, food, animals, places, special
+relations of one person to another at certain times and under certain
+conditions. It is enough that some special or particular degree of
+supernatural influence is associated with the object in question. The
+ancient Jews, for example, in prohibiting the eating of swine's flesh,
+were as far as possible removed in their thought from any connection
+with dietetics. They were simply following the well-known savage custom
+that the totem of a tribe is sacred. The pig was a totem with many of
+the Semitic tribes, and must not, therefore, be eaten.[74] It was not an
+unclean animal, in the modern sense, it was a 'holy' animal. With the
+Syrians the dove was so holy that even to touch it made a man 'unclean'
+for a whole day. No North American Indian will eat of the flesh of an
+animal that is a tribal totem, except under grave necessity, and even
+then with elaborate religious ceremonies. So, "a prohibition to eat the
+flesh of an animal of a certain species, that has its ground not in
+natural loathing but in religious horror and reverence, implies that
+something divine is ascribed to every animal of the species. And what
+seems to us to be a natural loathing often turns out, in the case of
+primitive peoples, to be based on a religious _taboo_, and to have its
+origin not in feelings of contemptuous disgust, but of reverential
+dread."[75]
+
+The real significance of 'unclean' in connection with religious ritual
+is 'holy', something that partakes in a special manner of supernatural
+influence and therefore involves a certain danger in contact. As the
+writer just cited observes:--
+
+"The acts that cause uncleanness are exactly the same which among savage
+nations place a man under taboo.... These acts are often involuntary,
+and often innocent, or even necessary to society. The savage,
+accordingly, imposes a taboo on a woman in childbed, or during her
+courses ... simply because birth and everything connected with the
+propagation of the species on the one, and disease and death on the
+other hand, seem to involve the action of supernatural agencies of a
+dangerous kind. If he attempts to explain, he does so by supposing that
+on these occasions spirits of deadly power are present; at all events
+the persons involved seem to him to be sources of mysterious danger,
+which has all the characters of an infection, and may extend to other
+people unless due precautions are observed.... It has nothing to do with
+respect for the gods, but springs from mere terror of the supernatural
+influences associated with the woman's physical condition."[76]
+
+It is interesting to observe the manner in which this notion of the
+sacramentally 'unclean' nature of woman has affected her religious
+status, and by inference, her social status likewise. Among the
+Australians women are shut out from any part in the religious
+ceremonies. In the Sandwich Isles a woman's touch made a sacrifice
+unclean. If a Hindu woman touches a sacred image the divinity is
+destroyed. In Fiji women are excluded from the temples. The Papuans have
+the same custom. The Ainus of Japan allow a woman to prepare the
+sacrifice, but not to offer it. Women are excluded from many Mohammedan
+mosques. Among the Jews women have no part in the religious ceremonies.
+In the Christian Church women were excluded from the priestly office. A
+Council held at Auxerre at the end of the sixth century forbade women
+touching the Eucharist with their bare hands, and in various churches
+they were forbidden to approach the altar during Mass.[77] In the
+gospels Jesus forbids the woman to touch Him, after the resurrection,
+although Thomas was allowed to feel His wounds. "The Church of the
+Middle Ages did not hesitate to provide itself with eunuchs in order to
+supply cathedral choirs with the soprano tones inhering by nature in
+women alone."[78] The 'Churching' of women still in vogue has its origin
+in the same superstition that childbirth endows woman with a
+supernatural influence which must be removed in the interests of others.
+This ceremony was formerly called "The Order of the Purification of
+Women," and was read at the church door before the woman entered the
+building. Its connection with the ideas indicated above is obvious. The
+Tahitian practice of excluding women from intercourse with others for
+two or three weeks after childbirth, with similar practices amongst
+uncivilised peoples all over the world, led with various modifications
+up to the current practice of churching. They show that in the opinion
+of primitive peoples "a woman at and after childbirth is pervaded by a
+certain dangerous influence which can infect anything and anybody she
+touches; so that in the interests of the community it becomes necessary
+to seclude her from society for a while, until the virulence of the
+infection has passed away, when, after submitting to certain rites of
+purification, she is again free to mingle with her fellows."[79] The
+gradual change of this ceremony, from a getting rid of a dangerous
+supernatural infection to returning thanks for a natural danger passed,
+is on all fours with what takes place in other directions in relation to
+religious ideas and practices.
+
+The important part played by this conception of woman's nature may be
+traced in the fierce invective directed against her in the early
+Christian writings. Of course, by that time society had reached a stage
+when the primitive form of this belief had been outgrown, but ideas and
+attitudes of mind persist long after their originating conditions have
+disappeared. In this particular case we have the primitive idea
+expressed in a form suitable to altered circumstances, and the primitive
+feeling seeking new warranty in ethical or social considerations. But in
+the main the old notion is there. Woman is a creature threatening
+danger to man's spiritual welfare.[80] In this connection we may note
+an observation of Westermarck's during his residence among the country
+people of Morocco. He was struck, he says, with the superstitious fear
+the men had of women. They are supposed to be much better versed in
+magic, and therefore one ran greater danger in offending them. The
+curses of women are, generally, much more feared than those of men. To
+this we have a parallel in Christianity which so often revived and
+strengthened the lower religious beliefs. During the witch mania an
+overwhelming proportion of those charged with and executed for sorcery
+were women. As a matter of fact, women were more prone than men to
+credit themselves with possessing supernatural power. But the
+theological explanation was that the devil had more power over women
+than men. This was, obviously, a heritage from the primitive belief
+above described.[81]
+
+Another way in which religion becomes closely associated with sexualism
+is through the widely diffused phallic worship. The worship of the
+generative power in the form of stones, pillars, and carved
+representations of the male and female sexual organs plays an
+unquestionably important part in the history of religion, however hardly
+pressed it may have been by some enthusiastic theorisers. "The farther
+back we go," says Mr. Hargrave Jennings, "in the history of every
+country, the deeper we explore into all religions, ancient as well as
+modern, we stumble the more frequently upon the incessantly intensifying
+distinct traces of this supposedly indecent mystic worship."[82] On the
+lower Congo, says Sir H. H. Johnston:--
+
+"Phallic worship in various forms prevails. It is not associated with
+any rites that might be called particularly obscene; and on the coast,
+where manners and morals are particularly corrupt, the phallus cult is
+no longer met with. In the forests between Manyanga and Stanley Pool it
+is not rare to come upon a little rustic temple, made of palm fronds and
+poles, within which male and female figures, nearly or quite life size,
+may be seen, with disproportionate genital organs, the figures being
+intended to represent the male and female principle. Around these carved
+and painted statues are many offerings, plates, knives, and cloth, and
+frequently also the phallic symbol may be seen dangling from the
+rafters. There is not the slightest suspicion of obscenity in all this,
+and anyone qualifying this worship of the generative power as obscene
+does so hastily and ignorantly. It is a solemn mystery to the Congo
+native, a force but dimly understood, and, like all mysterious natural
+manifestations, it is a power that must be propitiated and persuaded to
+his good."[83]
+
+The Egyptian religion was permeated with phallicism. In India phallic
+worship is widely scattered. In Benares, the sacred city, "everywhere,
+in the temples, in the little shrines in the street, the emblem of the
+Creator is phallic." Symbols of the male and female sexual organs, the
+Lingam and the Yoni, have been objects of worship in India from the
+earliest times. With the Sakti ceremonies, Hindu religion dispenses with
+symbols, and devotion is paid to a naked woman selected for the
+occasion.[84] This worship of a nude female is a very familiar
+phenomenon in the history of religion. Some of the early Christian sects
+were said to have practised it, and it is a feature of some Russian
+religious sects to-day. The subject will be dealt with more fully
+hereafter.
+
+In ancient Rome, in the month of April, "when the fertilising powers of
+nature begin to operate, and its powers to be visibly developed, a
+festival in honour of Venus took place; in it the phallus was carried in
+a cart, and led in procession by the Roman ladies to the temple of Venus
+outside the Colline gate, and then presented by them to the sexual part
+of the goddess."[85] In the Greek Bacchic religious processions huge
+phalli were carried in a chariot drawn by bulls, and surrounded by women
+and girls singing songs of praise. Phallic worship was also associated
+with the cults of Dionysos and Eleusis. It is met with among the ancient
+Mexicans and Peruvians, and also among the North American tribes. The
+famous Black Stone of Mecca, to which religious honours are paid, is
+also said by authorities to be a phallic symbol. The stone set up by
+Jacob (Gen. xxviii. 18-9) falls into the same category. References to
+phallic worship may be found in many parts of the Bible, and
+authoritative writers like Mr. Hargrave Jennings and Major-General
+Forlong have not hesitated to assert that the god of the Jewish Ark was
+a sexual symbol. Seeing the extent to which phallic worship exists in
+other religions, it would be surprising did this not also exist in the
+early Jewish religion.
+
+In Christendom we have evidence of the perpetuation of the phallic cult
+in the decree of Mans, 1247, and of the Synod of Tours, 1396, against
+its practice. Quite unsuccessfully, however. Indeed, the architecture of
+medieval churches bear in their ornamentation numerous evidences of the
+failure at suppression. Of course, much of this ornamentation may have
+been due to mere imitation, but often enough it was deliberate. "The
+scholar," says Bonwick, "who gazed to-day at the roof of Temple Church,
+London, had the illustration before him. A symbol there, repeatedly
+displayed, is the popular Hindu one to express sex worship."[86] The
+belief found expression in other ways than ornamentation. When Sir
+William Hamilton visited Naples in 1781 he found in Isernia a Christian
+custom in vogue which he described in a letter to Sir William Banks, and
+which admitted of no doubt as to its Priapic character. Every September
+was celebrated a festival in the Church of SS. Cosmus and Damianus.
+During the progress of the festival vendors paraded the streets offering
+small waxen phalli, which were bought by the devout and placed in the
+church, much as candles are still purchased and given. At the same time,
+prayers are offered to St. Como by those who desire children. In
+Midlothian, in 1268, the clergy instructed their flock to sprinkle water
+with a dog's phallus in order to avert a murrain. The same practice
+existed in Inverkeithing, and in Easter week priest and people danced
+round a wooden phallus.[87] Mr. Westropp, quoting an eighteenth-century
+writer,[88] says: "When the Huguenots took Embrun, they found among the
+relics of the principal church a Priapus, of three pieces in the ancient
+fashion, the top of which was worn away from being constantly washed
+with wine." The temple of St. Eutropius, destroyed by the Huguenots, is
+said to have contained a similar figure. From Mr. Sidney Hartland's
+collection of practices for obtaining children I take the following:--
+
+"At Bourg-Dieu, in the diocese of Bourges, a similar saint" (similar to
+the priapean figure previously described) "was called Guerlichon or
+Greluchon. There after nine days' devotions women stretched themselves
+on the horizontal figure of the saint, and then scraped the phallus for
+mixture in water as a drink. Other saints were worshipped elsewhere in
+France with equivalent rites. Down to the Revolution there stood at
+Brest a chapel of Saint Guignolet containing a priapean statue of the
+holy man. Women who were, or feared to be, sterile used to go and scrape
+a little of the prominent member, which they put into a glass of water
+from the well and drank. The same practice was followed at the Chapel of
+Saint Pierre-à-Croquettes in Brabant until 1837, when the archæologist
+Schayes called attention to it, and thereupon the ecclesiastical
+authorities removed the cause of scandal. Women have, however, still
+continued to make votive offerings of pins down almost, if not quite, to
+the present day. At Antwerp stood at the gateway to the Church of Saint
+Walburga in the Rue des Pêcheurs a statue, the sexual organ of which
+had been entirely scraped away by women for the same purpose."[89]
+
+From what has been said, it will not be difficult to understand the
+existence of the custom of religious prostitution. Considering the
+sexual impulse as specially connected with a supernatural force, man
+pays it religious honour, and comes to identify its manifestations as an
+expression of the supernatural and also as an act of worship towards it.
+In India the practice existed, when most temples had their 'bayadères.'
+In ancient Chaldea every woman was compelled to prostitute herself once
+in her life in the temple of the goddess Mylitta--the Chaldean Venus.
+This custom existed elsewhere, and by it the woman was compelled to
+remain within the temple enclosures until some man chose her, from whom
+she received a piece of money. The money, of course, belonged to the
+temple.[90] In Greece, Carthage, Syria, etc., we find the same custom.
+Among the Jews, so orthodox a commentary as Smith's _Bible Dictionary_
+admits that the 'Kadechim' attached to the temple were prostitutes. The
+frequent references to the service of the 'groves' surrounding the
+temple irresistibly suggest their likeness to the groves around the
+temples of Mylitta, and their use for the same purpose.
+
+There is no necessity to prolong the subject,[91] nor is it necessary to
+my purpose to discuss the origin of phallic worship. It is enough to
+have shown the manner in which, from the very earliest times, religious
+belief and sexual phenomena have been connected in the closest possible
+manner. In this respect it is only on all fours with the relation of
+religion to phenomena in general, but here the attitude of mind is
+accentuated and prolonged by the startling facts of sexual development.
+The connection becomes consequently so close it is not surprising to
+find that the association has persisted down to the present time, and
+moods that have their origin in the sexual life are frequently
+attributed to religious influences. The primitive intelligence, frankly
+seeing in the phenomena of sex a manifestation of the supernatural, sees
+here a continuous endorsement of religious life. The more sophisticated
+mind raised above this point of view continues, with modifications, the
+primitive practices, and in ignorance of the physiological causes of its
+own states is only too ready to interpret ebullitions of sex feeling as
+evidence of the divine.
+
+
+NOTE TO PAGE 104.
+
+      It is strange that so little attention has been paid to
+      these primitive beliefs as important factors in determining
+      the social position of women. It is too generally assumed
+      that because woman is physically weaker than man it is her
+      weakness that has determined her subordination. Both the
+      advocates and the opponents of 'Woman's Rights' appear to
+      have reached a common agreement on this point. During some
+      of the debates in the House of Commons, for example, it was
+      openly stated by prominent politicians, as an axiom of
+      political philosophy, that all laws rest upon a basis of
+      force, and if men say they will not obey woman-made laws
+      there is no power that can compel them to do so. On the
+      other side, women, while appealing to what they properly
+      call higher considerations, themselves dwell upon the
+      physical weakness of woman as the reason for her
+      subordination in the past. Both parties are helped in their
+      arguments by the facile division of social history into two
+      periods, an earlier one in which club law plays the chief
+      part, and a later period when mental and moral qualities
+      assume a dominating position. The consequence is, runs the
+      argument, that each sex has to battle with the dead weight
+      of tradition and custom. The woman is oppressed by the
+      tradition of subordination to the male; the man is inspired
+      by that of dominance over the female.
+
+      It is when we ask for evidence of this that we see how
+      flimsy the case is. Social phenomena in either civilised or
+      uncivilised society furnishes no proof that institutions
+      and customs rest upon a basis of physical force. The
+      rulership of a tribe often rests with the old men of a
+      tribe; with some tribes the women are consulted, and
+      invariably custom and tradition plays a powerful part. The
+      notion that the primitive chief is the primitive strong man
+      of the tribe is as baseless as the belief in an original
+      social contract, and owes its existence to the same kind of
+      fanciful speculation. As Frazer says, "it is one of those
+      facile theories which the arm-chair philosopher concocts
+      with his feet on the fender without taking the trouble to
+      consult the facts." The primitive chief may be a strong
+      man. The tribal council or chief may use force or rely upon
+      physical force to enforce certain decrees, just as the
+      modern king or parliament may call on the help of policeman
+      or soldier, but this no more proves that their rule is
+      based upon force than Mr. Asquith's premiership proves his
+      physical superiority to the rest of the Cabinet.
+
+All political life, and to a smaller degree all social life, involves
+the direction of force, but neither appeal to force for an ultimate
+justification, nor do social institutions originate in an act of force.
+It is one of the commonplaces of historical study that when an
+institution is actually forced upon a people it very quickly becomes
+inoperative. Other things equal, one group of people may overcome
+another group because of physical superiority, but the conquest over,
+the question as to which group shall really rule, or which set of
+institutions shall survive, is settled on quite different grounds. The
+history of almost any country will give examples of the absorption of
+the conqueror by the conquered, and the bringing of imported
+institutions into line with native life and feeling. Fundamentally the
+relations binding people together into a society are not physical, but
+psychological. Society rests upon the foundations of a common mental
+life--upon sympathy, beliefs, the desire for companionship, etc. As
+Professor J. M. Baldwin puts it, the fundamental social facts are not
+_things_, but _thoughts_.[92] As a member of a social group man is born
+into an environment that is essentially psychological, and his attitude
+not only towards his fellow human beings, but towards nature in general,
+is determined by the psychological contents of the society to which he
+belongs.
+
+Now if the relation of one man to another is not determined by physical
+superiority and inferiority, if the relations of classes within a
+society are not determined in this manner, why should it be assumed that
+as a sex woman's position is fixed by this means? It seems more
+reasonable to assume that some other principle than that of club law, a
+principle set in operation very early in the history of civilisation,
+fixed the main lines upon which the relations of the sexes were to
+develop, however much other forces helped its operation. I believe this
+desired factor is to be found in the superstitious notions savages
+develop concerning the nature and function of woman, and which society
+only very slowly outgrows. For, as Frazer says: "The continuity of human
+development has been such that most, if not all, of the great
+institutions which still form the framework of a civilised society have
+their roots in savagery, and have been handed down to us in these later
+days through countless generations, assuming new outward forms in the
+process of transmission, but remaining in their inmost core
+substantially unchanged."
+
+In considering the play of primitive ideas as determining the lines of
+human evolution several things must be kept clearly in mind. One is that
+the course of biological development has made woman, as a sex, dependent
+upon man, as a sex, for protection and support. This is true quite apart
+from economic considerations or from those arising from the relative
+physical strength of the sexes. The prime function of woman,
+biologically, is that of motherhood. She is, so to speak, mother in a
+much more important and more pervasive sense than man is father. In the
+case of woman, her functions are of necessity subordinated to this one.
+With man this is not the case. It is with the woman that the nutrition
+of the child rests before birth, and a large portion of her strength is
+expended in the discharge of this function. The same is true for some
+period immediately after birth. Again to use a biological illustration,
+during the period of child-bearing and child-rearing the relation of the
+man to the woman may be likened to that which exists between the germ
+cells and the somatic cells. As the latter is the medium of protection
+and the conveyer of nutrition in relation to the former, so it falls to
+the male to protect and in some degree to provide for the woman as
+child-bearer. It would not, of course, be impossible for woman to
+provide for herself, but it would detract so considerably from social
+efficiency that any group in which it was done would soon disappear. It
+is the nature and supreme function of woman that makes her dependent
+upon man. And even though the dreams of some were realised, and society
+as a whole cared for woman in the discharge of this function, the issue
+would not be changed. It would mean that instead of a woman being
+dependent upon one man she would be dependent upon all men. Nor are the
+substantial facts of the situation changed by anyone pointing out that
+all women do not and cannot under ordinary circumstances become wives
+and mothers. Human nature will always develop on the lines of the normal
+functions of men and women, and there can be no question in this case as
+to what these are.
+
+I have used the word 'dependence,' but this does not, of necessity,
+involve either subordination or subjection. It may provide the condition
+of either or of both, but the dependence of the woman on the man is, as
+I have said, biologically inescapable. Her subjection is quite another
+question. Dependence may be mutual. One class of society may be
+dependent upon another class, but the two may move on a perfect level of
+equality. And with uncivilised peoples the evidence goes to prove that,
+while the spheres of the sexes are more clearly differentiated than with
+us, this difference is seldom if ever expressed in terms of superior and
+inferior. Savages would say, as civilised people still say, there are
+many things that it is wrong for a woman to do, and they would add there
+are also things that a man must not do. They would be as shocked at
+woman doing certain things as some people among ourselves were when
+women first began to speak at public meetings. Their disapproval would
+not rest on the ground that these things were 'unwomanly', nor upon any
+question of weakness or strength, of inferiority or superiority, but for
+another and, to the savage, very urgent reason.
+
+One can very easily exaggerate the extent of the subjection of women
+among uncivilised people. As a matter of fact, it usually is
+exaggerated. Not all travellers are capable of accurate observation, and
+very many are led astray by what are really superficial aspects of
+savage life. They are so impressed by the contemplation of a state of
+affairs different from our own that they mistake mere lines of
+demarcation for a moral valuation. Many travellers, for example,
+observing that women are strictly forbidden to do this or that, conclude
+that the woman has no rights as against the man. As in nearly all these
+cases the man is as strictly forbidden to encroach on the woman's
+sphere, one might as reasonably reverse the statement and dwell upon
+male subjection. As a matter of fact, both furnish examples of the
+all-powerful principle of 'taboo.' Some things are taboo to the man,
+others to the woman. And the key to the problem lies in the nature and
+origin of these taboos. But taboo does not extinguish rights; it
+confirms them. Under its operation, far from its being the truth that
+women are without status or rights or power, her position and rights are
+clearly marked, generally recognised, and quickly enforced. Some
+examples of this may be noted.
+
+A Kaffir woman when ill-treated possesses the right of asylum with her
+parents, and remains there until the husband makes atonement. The same
+thing holds of the West African Fulahs. In the Marquesas a woman is
+prohibited the use of canoes; on the other hand, men are prohibited
+frequenting certain places belonging to the women. In Nicaragua no man
+may enter the woman's market-place under penalty of a beating. With most
+of the North-American tribes a woman has supreme power inside the lodge.
+The husband possesses no power of interference. In most cases the
+husband cannot give away anything belonging to the lodge without first
+getting the consent of his wife. With the Nootkas, women are consulted
+on all matters of business. Livingstone relates his surprise on finding
+that a native would not accompany him on a journey because he could not
+get his wife's consent. He found this to be one of the customs of the
+tribe to which the man belonged. Among the Kandhs of India nothing
+public is done without consulting the women. In the Pellew Islands the
+head of the family can do nothing of importance without consulting the
+oldest female relative. Among the Hottentots women have supreme rule in
+the house. If a man oversteps the line, his female relatives inflict a
+fine, which is paid to the wife. With the Bechuanas the mother of the
+chief is present at all councils, and he can hardly decide anything
+without her consent. These are only a few of the cases that might be
+cited, but they are sufficient to show that the common view of women
+among savages as without recognised status, or power, needs very serious
+qualification. Of course, ill-treatment of women does occur with
+uncivilised as with civilised people, and she may suffer from the
+expression of brutal passion or superior strength, but an examination of
+the facts justifies Starcke's opinion that "we are not justified in
+assuming that the savage feels a contempt for women in virtue of her
+sex."
+
+In primitive life, in short, the dominant idea is not that of
+superiority in relation to woman, but that of difference. She is
+different from man, and this difference involves consequences of the
+gravest character, and against which due precautions must be taken.
+Superiority and inferiority are much later conceptions; they belong to a
+comparatively civilised period, and their development offers an
+admirable example of the way in which customs based on sheer
+superstitions become transformed into a social prejudice, with the
+consequent creation of numerous excuses for their perpetuation. What
+that initial prejudice is--a prejudice so powerful that it largely
+determines the future status of woman--has already been pointed out. Her
+place in society is marked out in uncivilised times by the powerful
+superstitions connected with sexual functions. Not that she is
+weaker--although that is, of course, plain--nor that she is inferior, a
+thought which scarcely exists with uncivilised peoples, but that she is
+dangerous, particularly so during her functional crises and in
+childbirth. And being dangerous, because charged with a supernatural
+influence inimical to others, she is excluded from certain occupations,
+and contact with her has to be carefully regulated. I agree with Mr.
+Andrew Lang that in the regulations concerning women amongst uncivilised
+people we have another illustration of the far-reaching principle of
+taboo (_Social Origins and Primal Law_, p. 239) she suffers because of
+her sex, and because of the superstitious dread to which her sex nature
+gives birth.
+
+Of course, at a later stage other considerations begin to operate.
+Where, for example, as amongst the Kaffirs, women are not permitted to
+touch cattle because of this assumed spiritual infection, and where a
+man's wealth is measured by the cattle he possesses, it is easy to see
+that this would constitute a force preventing the political and social
+equality of the sexes. The pursuits from which women were primarily
+excluded for purely religious reasons would in course of time come to be
+looked upon as man's inalienable possessions. And here her physical
+weakness would play its part; for she could not take, as man could
+withhold, by force. Even when the primitive point of view is discarded,
+the social prejudices engendered by it long remains. And social
+prejudices, as we all know, are the hardest of all things to destroy.
+
+A final consideration needs to be stated. This is that the customs
+determined by the views of woman (above outlined) fall into line, in a
+rough-and-ready fashion, with the biological tendency to consecrate the
+female to the function of motherhood and conserve her energies to that
+end, leaving other kinds of work to the male. It would be an obvious
+advantage to a tribe in which woman, relieved from the necessity of
+physical struggle for food and defence, was able to attend to children
+and the more peaceful side of family life. Children would not only
+benefit thereby, but the home with all its civilising, humanising
+influences would develop more rapidly. Assuming variations in tribal
+life in this direction, there is no question as to which tribe that
+would stand the better chance of survival. The development of life has
+proceeded here as elsewhere by differentiation and specialisation; and
+while the tasks demanding the more sustained physical exertions were
+left to man, and to the performance of which his sexual nature offered
+no impediment, woman became more and more specialised for maternity and
+domestic occupations. This, I hasten to add, is not at all intended as a
+plea for denying to women the right to participate in the wider social
+life of the species. I am trying to explain a social phase, and neither
+justifying nor condemning its perpetuation.
+
+
+FOOTNOTES:
+
+[65] Dr. Iwan Bloch, _The Sexual Life of Our Time_, p. 97.
+
+[66] E. D. Starbuck, _The Psychology of Religion_, p. 401.
+
+[67] _The Psychological Phenomena of Christianity_, p. 419.
+
+[68] _Primitive Paternity_, 2 vols., 1909-10.
+
+[69] _The Mystic Rose_, p. 191.
+
+[70] See Frazer's _Taboo and the Perils of the Soul_, pp. 145-63, and
+Crawley's _Mystic Rose_.
+
+[71] _Man and Woman_, p. 15.
+
+[72] _Taboo_, pp. 163-4.
+
+[73] _Religion of the Semites_, p. 142.
+
+[74] A long list of animals that were sacred to various Semitic tribes
+has been compiled by Robertson Smith, _Kinship and Marriage in Early
+Arabia_, pp. 194-201.
+
+[75] Robertson Smith, _Kinship and Marriage in Early Arabia_, pp. 306-7.
+
+[76] _Religion of the Semites_, pp. 427-9. For a fuller discussion of
+the subject, see _Studies in the Psychology of Sex_, by Havelock Ellis,
+1901.
+
+[77] Westermarck, _Origin and Development of the Moral Ideas_, p. 666.
+
+[78] Westermarck, p. 666.
+
+[79] Frazer, _Taboo_, p. 150.
+
+[80] See the Rev. Principal Donaldson's _Woman: her Position and
+Influence in Ancient Greece and Rome, and among the Early Christians_,
+bk. iii.
+
+[81] For the general influence of these beliefs about woman in
+determining her social position, see note at the end of this chapter.
+
+[82] _The Worship of Priapus_, Pref. p. 9.
+
+[83] _The River Congo_, p. 405.
+
+[84] A description of the Sakti ceremony is given by Major-General
+Forlong, _Faiths of Man_, iii. pp. 228-9.
+
+[85] Westropp, _Primitive Symbolism_, p. 30.
+
+[86] _Egyptian Belief and Modern Thought_, p. 256.
+
+[87] Forlong, _Faiths of Man_, iii. p. 66.
+
+[88] _Primitive Symbolism_, p. 36.
+
+[89] _Primitive Paternity_, i. pp. 63-4.
+
+[90] Major-General Forlong agrees with many other authorities in tracing
+our custom of kissing under the mistletoe to this ancient practice. "The
+mistletoe," he says, "marks in one sense Venus's temple, for any girl
+may be kissed if caught under its sprays--a practice, though modified,
+which recalls to us that horrid one mentioned by Herodotus, where all
+women were for once at least the property of the man who sought them in
+Mylitta's temple."--_Rivers of Life_, i. p. 91.
+
+[91] Those who desire further and more detailed information may consult
+Forlong's great work, _The Rivers of Life_, Payne Knight's _Worship of
+Priapus_, Westropp and Wake's _Phallicism in Ancient Religion_, Brown's
+_Dionysiak Myth_, Westropp's _Primitive Symbolism_, R. A. Campbell's
+_Phallic Worship_, Hargrave Jennings's _Worship of Priapus_, etc.
+
+[92] A good discussion of the topic will be found in this author's
+_Social and Ethical Interpretations in Mental Development_.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER FIVE
+
+THE INFLUENCE OF SEXUAL AND PATHOLOGIC STATES ON RELIGIOUS BELIEF
+
+
+In the preceding chapter we have been concerned with the various ways in
+which the phenomena attendant on the sexual life of man and woman become
+associated with religious beliefs. As a force that arises in the life of
+each individual, and intrudes, as it were, into consciousness, the
+phenomena of sex fill primitive man with an amazement that is not
+unmixed with terror. In strict accord with primitive psychology sexual
+phenomena are conceived as more or less connected with the supernatural
+world, and becoming thus entwined with religious convictions are made
+the nucleus of a number of superstitious ceremonies. The connection is
+close and obvious so long as we restrict our survey to uncivilised
+humanity. The only room for doubt or discussion is the exact meaning of
+certain ceremonies, or the order of certain phases of development. It is
+when we take man in a more advanced stage that obscurity gathers and
+difficulties arise. The sexual life is no longer lived, as it were,
+openly. Symbolism and mysticism develop; a more complex social life
+provides disguised outlets for primitive and indestructible feelings.
+Sexualism, instead of being something to be glorified, and, so to speak,
+annotated by religious ceremonies, becomes something to be hidden or
+decried. Ignored it may be. Decried it may be; but it will not be
+denied. That is a practical impossibility in the case of so powerful and
+so pervasive a fact as sex. We may disguise its expression, but only too
+often the disguise is the equivalent of undesirable and unhealthy
+manifestations.
+
+The modern history of religion offers a melancholy illustration of the
+truth of the last sentence, and it is quite clearly exhibited in the
+history of Christianity itself. From the beginning it strove to suppress
+the power of sexual feeling. It was an enemy against whom one had to be
+always on guard, one that had to be crushed, or at least kept in
+subjection in the interests of spiritual development. And yet the very
+intensity of the efforts at suppression defeated the object aimed at.
+With some of the leaders of early Christianity sex became an obsession.
+Long dwelling upon its power made them unduly and unhealthily conscious
+of its presence. Instead of sex taking its place as one of the facts of
+life, which like most other facts might be good or bad as circumstances
+determined, it was so much dwelt upon as to often dwarf everything else.
+Asceticism is, after all, mainly a reversed sensualism, or at least
+confesses the existence of a sensualism that must not be allowed
+expression lest its manifestation becomes overpowering. Mortification
+confesses the supremacy of sense as surely as gratification. Moreover,
+mortification of sense as preached by the great ascetics does not
+prevent that most dangerous of all forms of gratification, the
+sensualism of the imagination. That remains, and is apt to gain in
+strength since the fundamentally healthful energies are denied
+legitimate and natural modes of expression. Thus it is that we find
+developing social life not always providing a healthy outlet for the
+sexual life, and thus it is that the intense striving of religious
+leaders against the power of the sexual impulse has often forced it into
+strange and harmful forms of expression. So we find throughout the
+history of religion, not only that a deal of what has passed for
+supernatural illumination to have undoubtedly had its origin in
+perverted sexual feeling, but the constant emergence of curious
+religio-erotic sects whose strange mingling of eroticism and religion
+has scandalised many, and offered a lesson to all had they but possessed
+the wit to discern it.
+
+Although there is an understandable disinclination, amounting with some
+to positive revulsion, to recognise the sexual origin of much that
+passes for religious fervour, the fact is well known to competent
+medical observers, as the following citations will show. More than a
+generation since a well-known medical authority said:--
+
+"I know of no fact in pathology more striking and more terrifying than
+the way in which the phenomena of the ecstatic--which have often been
+seized upon by sentimental theorisers as proofs of spiritual
+exaltation--may be plainly seen to bridge the gulf between the innocent
+foolery of ordinary hypnotic patients and the degraded and repulsive
+phenomena of nymphomania and satyriasis."[93]
+
+Dr. C. Norman also observes:--
+
+"Ecstasy, as we see in cases of acute mental disease, is probably always
+connected with sexual excitement, if not with sexual depravity. The same
+association is seen in less extreme cases, and one of the commonest
+features in the conversation of acutely maniacal women is the
+intermingling of erotic and religious ideas."[94]
+
+This opinion is fully endorsed by Sir Francis Galton:--
+
+"It has been noticed that among the morbid organic conditions which
+accompany the show of excessive piety and religious rapture in the
+insane, none are so frequent as disorders of the sexual organisation.
+Conversely, the frenzies of religious revivals have not infrequently
+ended in gross profligacy. The encouragement of celibacy by the fervent
+leaders of most creeds, utilises in an unconscious way the morbid
+connection between an over-restraint of the sexual desires and impulses
+towards extreme devotion."[95]
+
+Dr. Auguste Forel, the eminent German specialist, points out that--
+
+"When we study the religious sentiment profoundly, especially in the
+Christian religion, and Catholicism in particular, we find at each step
+its astonishing connection with eroticism. We find it in the exalted
+adoration of holy women, such as Mary Magdalene, Marie de Bethany, for
+Jesus, in the holy legends, in the worship of the Virgin Mary in the
+Middle Ages, and especially in art. The ecstatic Madonnas in our art
+galleries cast their fervent regards on Jesus or on the heavens. The
+expression in Murillo's 'Immaculate Conception' may be interpreted by
+the highest voluptuous exaltation of love as well as by holy
+transfiguration. The 'saints' of Correggio regard the Virgin with an
+amorous ardour which may be celestial, but appears in reality extremely
+terrestrial and human."[96]
+
+Another German authority remarks:--
+
+"I venture to express my conviction that we should rarely err if, in a
+case of religious melancholy, we assumed the sexual apparatus to be
+implicated."[97]
+
+Dr. Bevan Lewis points out how frequently religious exaltation occurs
+with women at puberty, and religious melancholia at the period of sexual
+decline. And Dr. Charles Mercier puts the interchangeability of sexual
+and religious feelings in the following passage:--
+
+"Religious observances provide an alternative, into which the amatory
+instinct can be easily and naturally diverted. The emotions and
+instinctive desires, which finds expression in courtship, is a vast body
+of vague feeling, which is at first undirected.... It is a voluminous
+state of exaltation that demands enthusiastic action. This is the state
+antecedent to falling in love, and if an object presents himself or
+herself, the torrent of emotion is directed into amatory passion. But if
+no object appears, or if the selected object is denied, then religious
+observances yield a very passable substitute for the expression of the
+emotion. Religious observances provide the sensuous atmosphere, the call
+for self-renunciation, the means of expressing powerful and voluminous
+feeling, that the potential or disappointed lover needs. The madrigal is
+transformed into the hymn; the adornment of the person that should have
+gone to allure the beloved now takes the shape of ecclesiastical
+vestments; the reverence that should have been paid to the loved one is
+transformed to a higher object; the enthusiasm that would have expanded
+in courtship is expressed in worship; the gifts that would have been
+made, the services that would have been rendered to the loved one, are
+transferred to the Church."[98]
+
+Dr. Krafft-Ebing, after dwelling upon the substantial identity of sexual
+love and religious emotion, summarises his conclusions by saying:--
+
+"Religious and sexual hyperæsthesia at the acme of development show the
+same volume of intensity and the same quality of excitement, and may,
+therefore, under given circumstances interchange. Both will in certain
+pathologic states degenerate into cruelty."[99]
+
+Even so orthodox a writer as the Rev. S. Baring-Gould points out that--
+
+"The existence of that evil, which, knowing the constitution of man, we
+should expect to find prevalent in mysticism, the experience of all ages
+has shown following, dogging its steps inevitably. So slight is the film
+that separates religion from sensual passion, that uncontrolled
+spiritual fervour roars readily into a blaze of licentiousness."[100]
+
+No useful purpose would be served by lengthening this list of citations.
+Enough has been said to show that the point of view expressed is one
+endorsed by many sober, competent, and responsible observers. There
+exists among them a general, and one may add a growing, recognition of
+the important truth that the connection between religious and sexual
+feeling is of the closest character, and that one is very often mistaken
+for the other. Asceticism, usually taken as evidence to the reverse, is
+on the contrary, confirmative. The ascetic often presents us with a
+flagrant case of eroto-mania, expressing itself in terms of religion.
+It is highly significant that the biographies of Christian saints should
+furnish so many cases of men and women of strong sensual passions, and
+whose ascetic devotion was only the reaction from almost unbridled
+sensualism. No wonder that in the temptations experienced by the monks
+the figures of nude women so often appeared before their heated
+imaginations. Sexual feeling suppressed in one direction broke out in
+another. Feelings, in themselves perfectly normal, became, as a
+consequence of repression and misdirection, pathologic. And one
+consequence of this was that many of the early Christian writers brought
+to the consideration of the subject of sex a concentration of mind that
+resulted in disquisitions of such a nature that it is impossible to do
+more than refer to them. The sexual relation instead of being refined
+was coarsened. Marriage was viewed in its lowest form, more as a
+concession to the weakness of the flesh than as a desirable state for
+all men and women. Nor can it be said, after many centuries, that these
+ideas are quite eradicated from present-day life.
+
+A field of investigation that yields much illuminating information is
+the biographies of the saints and of other religious characters. In many
+of these cases the acceptance of sexual feeling for religious
+illumination is very clear. Thus of St. Gertrude, a Benedictine nun of
+the thirteenth century, we read:--
+
+"One day at chapel she heard supernaturally sung the words, '_Sanctus,
+Sanctus, Sanctus_.' The Son of God, leaning towards her like a sweet
+lover, and giving to her soul the softest kiss, said to her at the
+second _Sanctus_, 'In the _Sanctus_ addressed to My person, receive with
+this all the sanctity of My divinity and of My humanity.'... And the
+following Sunday, while she was thanking God for this favour, behold the
+Son of God, more beauteous than thousands of angels, takes her to His
+arms as if He were proud of her, and presents her to God the Father, and
+in that perfection of sanctity with which He had endowed her."[101]
+
+Of Juliana of Norwich, who was granted a revelation in 1373, we are told
+that she had for long 'ardently desired' a bodily sight of the Lord upon
+the cross; and that finally Jesus appeared to her and said, "I love thee
+and thou lovest Me, and our love shall never be disparted in two."[102]
+So, again, in the case of Sister Jeanne des Anges, Superior of the
+Convent of Ursulines of Loudun, and the principal character in the
+famous Grandier witchcraft case, we have a detailed account, in her own
+words, of the lascivious dreams, unclean suggestions, etc.--all
+attributed to Satan--and alternating with impressions of bodily union
+with Jesus.[103] Marie de L'Incarnation addresses Jesus as follows:--
+
+"Oh, my love, when shall I embrace you? Have you no pity on the torments
+that I suffer? Alas! alas! My love! My beauty! My life! Instead of
+healing my pain, you take pleasure in it. Come, let me embrace you, and
+die in your sacred arms."[104]
+
+Veronica Juliani, beatified by Pope Pius II., took a real lamb to bed
+with her, kissed it, and suckled it at her breasts. St. Catherine of
+Genoa threw herself on the ground to cool herself, crying out, "Love,
+love, I can bear it no longer." She also confessed to a peculiar
+longing towards her confessor.[105]
+
+The blessed Mary Alacoque, foundress of the Sacred Heart, was subject
+from early life to a number of complaints--rheumatism, palsy, pains in
+the side, ulceration of the legs--and experienced visions early in her
+career. As a child she had so vivid a sense of modesty that the mere
+sight of a man offended her. At seventeen she took to wearing a knotted
+cord drawn so tightly that she could neither eat nor breathe without
+pain. She compressed her arms so tightly with iron chains that she could
+not remove them without anguish. "I made," she says, "a bed of
+potsherds, on which I slept with extreme pleasure." She fasted and
+tortured herself in a variety of ways, and the more her physical
+disorders increased the more numerous became her visions. Before she was
+eighteen years of age, in 1671, she entered a nunnery. From the time she
+donned the habit of a novice she was 'blessed' with visions. "Our Lord
+showed me that that day was the day of our spiritual wedding; He
+forthwith gave me to understand that He wished to make me taste all the
+sweetness of the caresses of His love. In reality, those divine caresses
+were from that moment so excessive, that they often put me out of
+myself." "Once," says one of her biographers, "having retired into her
+chamber, she threw off the clothes with which she had bedecked herself
+during the day, when the Son of God showed Himself to her in the state
+in which He was after His cruel flagellation--that is, with His body all
+wounded, torn, gory--and He said to her that it was her vanities that
+had brought Him into that condition." In one of these visions Jesus
+took the head of Mary, pressed it to His bosom, spoke to her in
+passionate words, opened her side and took out her heart, plunged it
+into His own, and then replaced it. He then explained His design of
+founding the Order of the Sacred Heart. Ever after, Mary was conscious
+of a pain in her side and a burning sensation in her chest--two plain
+symptoms of hysteria.[106]
+
+Santa Teresa, who died at the early age of thirty-three, and in whose
+family more than one case of well-developed neurasthenia can be traced,
+was favoured with 'messages' at a very early age. She believed some of
+these were temptations from the devil suggesting an 'honourable
+alliance.' A nervous breakdown followed directly after entrance into a
+convent. She was then twenty years of age, was subject to fainting fits
+and longed for illness as a sign of divine favour. She was subject to
+convulsions, and soon after taking the veil fell into a cataleptic
+trance, which lasted three days. She was thought to be dead, but at the
+end of the time sat up and told those around that she had visited both
+heaven and hell, and seen the joys of the blessed and the torments of
+the damned. It is at least suggestive that, in spite of the longing for
+personal communion with Jesus, her first experience of the ecstasy of
+divine love was experienced after discovering a 'very realistic' picture
+of a martyred saint--St. Joseph. The significance of the intense
+contemplation of a tortured body--possibly made by one whose sexual
+nature was undergoing a process of suppression--is unmistakable.[107]
+
+On these and similar cases Professor William James makes the following
+comment:--
+
+"To the medical mind these ecstasies signify nothing but suggested
+hypnoid states, on an intellectual basis of superstition, and a
+corporeal one of degeneration and hysteria. Undoubtedly these
+pathological conditions have existed in many and possibly in all the
+cases, but that fact tells us nothing about the value for knowledge of
+the consciousness which they induce. To pass a spiritual judgment upon
+these states, we must not content ourselves with superficial medical
+talk, but enquire into their fruits for life."[108]
+
+Now the question is really not what these ecstasies suggest to the
+'medical mind,' as though that were a type of mind quite unfitted to
+pass judgment. It is a question of what the facts suggest to any mind
+judging the behaviour of a person under the influence of strong
+religious emotion exactly as it would judge anyone under any other
+strong emotional pressure. And if it be possible to explain these states
+in terms of known physiological and mental action, what warranty have we
+for rejecting this and preferring in its stead an explanation that is
+both unprovable and unnecessary? And one would be excused for thinking
+that cases which certainly involve some sort of abnormal nervous action
+are precisely those in which the medical mind should be called on to
+express an opinion. What is meant by passing 'a spiritual judgment'
+upon these states is not exactly clear, unless it means judging them in
+terms of the historic supernatural interpretation. But that is precisely
+the interpretation which is challenged by the 'medical mind.'
+
+I do not see how any enquiry "into their fruits for life" can affect a
+rational estimate of the nature of these mystical states. Mysticism adds
+nothing to the native disposition of a person. It merely gives their
+energies a new turn, a new direction. What they were before the
+experience they remain, substantially, afterwards. That is why we find
+religious mystics of every variety. Some energetically practical; others
+dreamily unpractical. Professor James admits this in saying that "the
+other-worldliness encouraged by the mystical consciousness makes this
+over-abstraction from practical life peculiarly liable to befall mystics
+in whom the character is naturally passive and the intellect feeble; but
+in natively strong minds and characters we find quite opposite
+results."[109] And when it is further admitted that "the mystical
+feeling of enlargement, union, and emancipation has no specific
+intellectual content whatever of its own," but "is capable of forming
+matrimonial alliances with material furnished by the most diverse
+philosophies and theologies, provided only they can find a place in
+their framework for its peculiar emotional mood," mysticism seems
+reduced to an emotional development on all fours with emotional
+development in other directions. It is not peculiar to religious minds
+because "it has no specific intellectual content." It is amorphous, so
+to speak. And it may form diverse 'matrimonial alliances' precisely
+because it does not point to a hidden world of reality, but is merely
+indicative of tense emotional moods. In the face of nature the
+non-theistic Richard Jeffries experiences all the feelings of mental
+enlargement and emotional transports that Mary Alacoque or Santa Teresa
+experienced in their visions of the 'Risen Christ.'
+
+It is idle, then, to sneer at 'medical materialism,' and stigmatise it
+as superficial. Many people are constitutionally afraid of words, and
+there is nothing that arouses prejudice so quickly as a name. But it is
+really not a question of materialism, medical or non-medical. It is a
+mere matter of applying knowledge and common sense to the cases before
+us. Are we to take the subject's explanation of his or her mental states
+as authoritative, so far as their nature is concerned; or are we to
+treat them as symptoms demanding the skilled analysis of the specialist?
+If the former, how can we differentiate between the mystic and the
+admittedly hysterical patient? If the latter, what ground is there for
+placing the mystic in a category of his own? Rational and scientific
+analysis will certainly take far more notice of the nature of the
+feelings excited than of the object towards which they are directed.
+Here is the case of a young lady, given by Dr. Moreau, in his _Morbid
+Psychology_:--
+
+"During my long hours of sleeplessness in the night my beloved Saviour
+began to make Himself manifest to me. Pondering over the meditations of
+St. François de Sales on the _Song of Songs_, I seemed to feel all my
+faculties suspended, and crossing my arms upon my chest, I awaited in a
+sort of dread what might be revealed to me.... I saw the Redeemer
+veritably in the flesh.... He extended Himself beside me, pressed me so
+closely that I could feel His crown of thorns, and the nails in His feet
+and hands, while He pressed His lips over mine, giving me the most
+ravishing kiss of a divine Spouse, and sending a delicious thrill
+through my entire body."[110]
+
+Get rid of the narcotising effect of theological associations by
+eliminating the name of Jesus and other religious terms from this case,
+and from the others already cited, and no one would have the least doubt
+as to their real nature. Given a condition of physical health in these
+cases, with conditions that favoured social activity, healthy
+intercourse with the opposite sex, culminating in marriage and
+parenthood, can there be any doubt that this species of religious
+ecstasy would have been non-existent? If, as Tylor says, the refectory
+door would many a time have closed the gates of heaven, happy family
+life would in a vast number of cases have prevented those religio-erotic
+trances which have played so powerful a part in the history of
+supernaturalism. Most people will agree with Dr. Maudsley:--
+
+"The ecstatic trances of such saintly women as Catherine Sienne and St.
+Theresa, in which they believed themselves to be visited by their
+Saviour and to be received as veritable spouses into His bosom, were,
+though they knew it not, little better than vicarious sexual orgasm; a
+condition of things which the intense contemplation of the naked male
+figure, carved or sculptured in all its proportions on a cross, is more
+fitted to produce in young women of susceptible nervous temperament than
+people are apt to consider. Every experienced physician must have met
+with instances of single and childless women who have devoted
+themselves with extraordinary zeal to habitual religious exercises, and
+who, having gone insane as a culmination of their emotional fervour,
+have straightway exhibited the saddest mixture of religious and erotic
+symptoms--a boiling over of lust in voice, face, gestures, under the
+pitiful degradation of disease.... The fanatical religious sects, such
+as the Shakers and the like, which spring up from time to time in
+communities and disgust them by the offensive way in which they mingle
+love and religion, are inspired in great measure by sexual feeling; on
+the one hand, there is probably the cunning of a hypocritical knave, or
+the self-deception of a half-insane one, using the weaknesses of weak
+women to minister to his vanity or his lust under a religious guise; on
+the other hand, there is an exaggerated self-feeling, often rooted in
+the sexual passion, which is unwittingly fostered under the cloak of
+religious emotion, and which is apt to conduct to madness or to sin. In
+such cases the holy kiss owes its warmth to the sexual impulse, which
+inspires it, consciously or unconsciously, and the mystical religious
+union of the sexes is fitted to issue in a less spiritual union."[111]
+
+Many manuals of devotion will be found to furnish the same kind of
+evidence as biographical narratives concerning the intimate relations
+that exists between sexuality and religious feeling. What has just been
+said may be repeated here, namely, that if the religious associations
+were dispelled, there would be no mistaking the nature of feelings that
+originated much of this class of writing, or the feelings to which they
+appeal. The serious fact is that the appeal is there whether we
+recognise it or not, and it is a question worthy of serious
+consideration whether the unwary imagination of the young may be not as
+surely debauched by certain books of devotion as by a frankly erotic
+production. It is not without reason that d'Israeli the elder, in an
+essay omitted from all editions of his book after the first, remarked
+that "poets are amorous, lovers are poetical, but saints are both."[112]
+Take, for example, the following from a collection of old English
+homilies, dating from the thirteenth and fourteenth centuries:--
+
+"Jesus, my holy love, my sure sweetness! Jesus, my heart, my joy, my
+soul-heal! Jesus, sweet Jesus, my darling, my life, my light, my balm,
+my honey-drop!... Kindle me with the blaze of Thy enlightening love. Let
+me be Thy leman, and teach me to love Thee.... Oh, that I might behold
+how Thou stretchedst Thyself for me on the cross. Oh, that I might cast
+myself between those same arms, so very wide outspread.... Oh, that I
+were in Thy arms, in Thy arms so stretchedst and outspread on the
+cross."
+
+Or this, from the same collection:--
+
+"Sweet Jesus, my love, my darling, my Lord, my Saviour, my balm, sweeter
+is the remembrance of Thee than honey in the mouth. Who is there that
+may not love Thy lovely face? Whose heart is so hard that may not melt
+at the remembrance of Thee? Oh! who may not love Thee, lovely Jesus?
+Jesus, my precious darling, my love, my life, my beloved, my most worthy
+of love, my heart's balm, Thou art lovesome in countenance, Thou art
+altogether bright. All angels' life is to look upon Thy face, for Thy
+cheer is so marvellously lovesome and pleasant to look upon.... Thou art
+so bright, and so white that the sun would be pale if compared to Thy
+blissful countenance. If I, then, love any man for beauty, I will love
+Thee, my dear life, my mother's fairest son."[113]
+
+The language of erotic piety figures much more prominently in Roman
+Catholic medieval writings than in Protestant literature. This is not
+because an appeal to the same feelings is absent from the religious
+literature of Protestantism, it is mainly due to the fact that more
+modern conditions leads to a less intense religious appeal, while the
+broadening of social life encourages a more natural outlet for all
+aspects of human nature. Still, the following expression of a young lady
+convert of Wesley's offers a fair parallel to the specimen given above.
+It is taken from Southey's _Life of Wesley_:--
+
+"Oh, mighty, powerful, happy change! The love of God was shed abroad in
+my heart, and a flame kindled there with pains so violent, and yet so
+very ravishing, that my body was almost torn asunder. I sweated, I
+trembled, I fainted, I sang. Oh, I thought my head was a fountain of
+water. I was dissolved in love. My beloved is mine, and I am His. He has
+all charms; He has ravished my heart; He is my comforter, my friend, my
+all. Oh, I am sick of love. He is altogether lovely, the chiefest among
+ten thousand. Oh, how Jesus fills, Jesus extends, Jesus overwhelms the
+soul in which He lives."
+
+The _Imitation of Christ_ has been described by more than one writer as
+a manual of eroticism, and certainly the chapters "The Wonderful Effects
+of Divine Love," and "Of the Proof of a True Lover," might well be cited
+in defence of this view. In the following canticle of St. Francis of
+Assisi it does not seem possible to distinguish a substantial difference
+between it and a frankly avowed love poem:--
+
+    "Into love's furnace I am cast,
+     Into love's furnace I am cast,
+     I burn, I languish, pine, and waste.
+     Oh, love divine, how sharp thy dart!
+     How deep the wound that galls my heart!
+     As wax in heat, so, from above,
+     My smitten soul dissolves in love.
+     I live, yet languishing I die,
+     While in thy furnace bound I lie."[114]
+
+It would certainly be possible to furnish exact parallels from volumes
+of secular verse that would be strictly 'taboo' among those who fail to
+see anything objectionable in verses like the above when written in
+connection with religion. Such people fail to recognise that their
+attractiveness lies in the hidden appeal to amatory feeling, and owe
+their origin to the suppressed or perverted sexual passion of their
+author. We must not allow ourselves to be blinded by the consideration
+as to whether the object of adoration be an earthly or a heavenly one.
+Men and women have not distinct feelings that are aroused as their
+objective differs, but the same feelings directed now in one direction,
+now in another. The direction of these feelings, their exciting cause,
+are sheer environmental accidents. How can one resist the implications
+of the following, from a devotional work widely circulated amongst the
+women of France:--
+
+    "Praise to Jesus, praise His power,
+     Praise His sweet allurements.
+     Praise to Jesus, when His goodness
+     Reduces me to nakedness;
+     Praise to Jesus when He says to me,
+     My sister, my dove, my beautiful one!
+     Praise to Jesus in all my steps,
+     Praise to His amorous charms.
+     Praise to Jesus when His loving mouth
+     Touches mine in a loving kiss.
+     Praise to Jesus when His gentle caresses
+     Overwhelm me with chaste joys.
+     Praise to Jesus when at His leisure
+     He allows me to kiss Him."[115]
+
+Against this we may place the following hymn, sung at an American camp
+meeting of some thousands of persons between the ages of fourteen and
+twenty-five:--
+
+    "Blessed Lily of the Valley, oh, how fair is He;
+            He is mine, I am His.
+     Sweeter than the angels' music is His voice to me;
+            He is mine, I am His.
+     Where the lilies fair are blooming by the waters calm
+     There He leads me and upholds me by His strong right arm.
+
+     All the air is love around me--I can feel no harm;
+            He is mine, I am His."[116]
+
+Special significance is given to this reference by the age of those who
+composed the gathering. This period embraces the years during which
+sexual maturity is attained, and the organism experiences important
+physiological and psychological changes. The consequence is that the
+atmosphere is, so to say, charged with unsuspected sex feeling, and it
+is not surprising that many complaints have been made of immorality
+following such gatherings. The organism is then peculiarly liable to
+suggestion in all forms. Along with the imitativeness of early years
+there is something of the decisive initiative of maturity. These
+qualities wisely guided might be turned to the great advantage of both
+the individual and of the community. Mere incitement by religious
+revivalism can result in little else than misdirection and injury. It
+should be the most obvious of truths that the attractiveness of hymns
+such as the one given, with the keen delight in the suggested pictures,
+lies in their yielding--all unknown, perhaps, to those participating--
+satisfaction to feelings that are very frequently imperious in their
+demands, and are at all times astonishingly pervasive in their
+influence.
+
+Much valuable light is thrown upon this aspect of the subject by a
+study of human behaviour under the influence of actual disease. Of late
+years much useful work has been done in this direction, and our
+knowledge of normal psychology greatly helped by a study of abnormal
+mental states.[117] This is mainly because in disease we are able to
+observe the operation of tendencies that are unobscured by the
+restraints and inhibitions created by education and social convention.
+And one of the most striking, and to many startling, things observed is
+the close relation existing between erotic mania and religious delusion.
+The person who at one time feels himself under direct religious
+inspiration, or who imagines himself to be the incarnation of a divine
+personage, will at another time exhibit the most shocking obscenity in
+action and language. Sir T. S. Clouston furnishes a very striking case
+of this character, which he cites in order to show "the common mixture
+of religious and sexual emotion."[118] I do not reproduce it here
+because of its grossly obscene character; but, save for coarseness of
+language, it does not differ materially from illustrations already
+given. Almost any of the text-books will supply cases illustrating the
+connection between sexualism and religion, a connection generally
+recognised as the opinions cited already clearly show.
+
+Dr. Mercier, in dealing with the connection between sexualism and
+religion, which he says "has long been recognised, but never accounted
+for," traces it to a feeling of, or desire for self-sacrifice common to
+both. Certainly sacrifice in some form--of food, weapons, land, money,
+or bodily inconvenience--is a feature present in every religion more or
+less. And it is quite certain that not merely the fact, but the desire
+for some amount of sacrifice, forms "an integral, fundamental, and
+preponderating element" in the sexual emotion. Dr. Mercier further
+believes that the benevolence founded on religious emotion has its
+origin in sexual emotion, which is, again, extremely likely. This
+community of origin would allow for the transformation of one into the
+other, and supplies a key to the language of lover-like devotion and
+self-abnegation which is so prominent in religious devotional
+literature. The importance attached to dress is also very suggestive;
+for here, again, the element of sacrifice expresses itself in the
+cultivation of a studied repulsiveness to the normal attractiveness of
+costume. "Thus," says Dr. Mercier, "we find that the self-sacrificial
+vagaries of the rejected lover and of the religious devotee own a common
+origin and nature. The hook and spiny kennel of the fakir, the pillar of
+St. Simeon Stylites, the flagellum of the monk, the sombre garments of
+the nun, the silence of the Trappists, the defiantly hideous costume of
+the hallelujah lass, and the mortified sobriety of the district visitor,
+have at bottom the same origin as the rags of Cardenio, the cage of Don
+Quixote de la Mancha, and the yellow stockings and crossed garters of
+Malvolio."[119]
+
+Professor Granger, who at times comes very near the truth, says:--
+
+"There is something profoundly philosophical in the use of _The Song of
+Songs_ to typify the communion of the soul with its ideal. The passion
+which is expressed by the Shulamite for her earthly lover in such
+glowing phrases becomes the type of the love of the soul towards
+God."[120]
+
+One fails to see the profoundly philosophic nature of the selection. The
+_Song of Songs_ is a frankly erotic love poem, written with no other aim
+than is common to such poetry, and its spiritualisation is due to the
+same process of reinterpretation that is applied to other parts of the
+Bible in order to make them agreeable to modern thought. Had it not been
+in the Bible, Christians would have found it neither profoundly
+philosophical nor spiritually illuminating; and, as a matter of fact,
+similar effusions are selected by Christians from non-Christian writings
+as proofs of their sensual character. The real significance of its use
+in religious worship is that it gives a marked expression to feelings
+that crave an outlet. And the lesson is that sexual feeling cannot be
+eliminated from life; it can only be diverted or disguised. Some
+expression it will find--here in open perversion resulting in positive
+vice, there in obsession that leads to a half-insane asceticism, and
+elsewhere the creation of the unconsciously salacious with an unhealthy
+fondness for dabbling in questions that refer to the illicit relations
+of the sexes.
+
+"One of the reasons why popular religion in England," says Professor
+Granger, "seems to be coming to the limits of its power, is that it has
+contented itself so largely with the commonplace motives which, after
+all, find sufficient exercise in the ordinary duties of life." Here,
+again, is a curious obtuseness to a plain but important truth. With
+what else should a healthy religion associate itself but the ordinary
+motives or feelings of human life? With what else has religion always
+associated itself? Far from that being the source of the weakness of
+modern religion, it is its only genuine source of strength. If religion
+can so associate itself with the ordinary facts and feelings of life
+that these are unintelligible or poorer without religion, then religious
+people have nothing to fear. But if it be true, as Professor Granger
+implies, that life in its normal moods can receive complete
+gratification apart from religion, then the outlook is very different.
+From a merely historic point of view it is true that as men have found
+explanations of phenomena, and gratifications of feelings apart from
+religion, the latter has lost a deal of its power. This is seen in the
+growth of the physical sciences, and also, although in a smaller
+measure, in sociology and morals.
+
+This, however, opens up the enquiry, previously indicated, as to how far
+the whole range of human life may be satisfactorily explained in the
+complete absence of religion or supernaturalism. And with this we are
+not now directly concerned. What we are concerned with is to show that
+from one direction at least supernaturalism has derived strength from a
+misinterpretation of the facts. These facts, once interpreted as clear
+evidence for supernaturalism, are now seen to be susceptible to a
+different explanation. But they have nevertheless played their part in
+creating as part of the social heritage a diffused sense of the reality
+of supernatural intercourse. It is not, then, a question of religion
+losing power because it has contented itself with commonplace motives,
+and because these have now found satisfaction in ordinary life. It is
+rather a question of the adequacy of science to deal with facts that
+have been taken to lie outside the scientific order. Has science the
+knowledge or the ability to deal with the extraordinary as well as with
+the ordinary facts of life? I believe it has. The facts we have passed
+in review _are_ amenable to scientific treatment, for the reason that
+they belong to a class with which the physician of to-day finds himself
+in constant contact. And it is too often overlooked that the belief in
+the existence and influence of a supersensible world is itself only a
+theory put forward in explanation of certain classes of facts, and like
+all theories it becomes superfluous once a simpler theory is made
+possible.
+
+
+FOOTNOTES:
+
+[93] Article in _The Lancet_, Jan. 11, 1873.
+
+[94] Article in Tuke's _Dictionary of Psychological Medicine_.
+
+[95] _Inquiries into Human Faculty_, pp. 66-7.
+
+[96] _The Sexual Question_, pp. 354-5.
+
+[97] Cited by Havelock Ellis, _Psychology of Sex_, pp. 233-4.
+
+[98] _Conduct and its Disorders_, pp. 368-9.
+
+[99] _Psychopathia-Sexualis_, pp. 9-11.
+
+[100] _Lost and Hostile Gospels_, Preface.
+
+[101] Cited by James, _Varieties_, pp. 345-6.
+
+[102] Inge, _Christian Mysticism_, pp. 201-9.
+
+[103] See Ellis, _Psychology of Sex_, pp. 240-2.
+
+[104] Parkman's _Jesuits in North America_, p. 175.
+
+[105] Krafft-Ebing, _Psychopathia-Sexualis_, p. 8.
+
+[106] See L. Asseline's _Mary Alacoque and the Worship of the Sacred
+Heart of Jesus_.
+
+[107] See _St. Teresa of Spain_, by H. H. Colvill, and _Saint Teresa_,
+by H. Joly.
+
+[108] _Varieties_, p. 413.
+
+[109] _Varieties_, p. 413.
+
+[110] Cited by J. F. Nisbet, _The Insanity of Genius_, p. 248.
+
+[111] _Pathology of Mind_, p. 144. Also Mercier, _Sanity and Insanity_,
+pp. 223, 281.
+
+[112] _Miscellanies_, 1796, p. 365. From the same essay I take the
+following: "Even the ceremonies of religion, both in ancient and in
+modern times, have exhibited the grossest indecencies. Priests in all
+ages have been the successful panders of the human heart, and have
+introduced in the solemn worship of the divinity, incitements,
+gratifications, and representations, which the pen of the historian must
+refuse to describe. Often has the sensible Catholic blushed amidst his
+devotions, and I have seen chapels surrounded by pictures of lascivious
+attitudes, and the obsolete amours of saints revived by the pencil of
+some Aretine.... Their homilies were manuals of love, and the more
+religious they became, the more depraved were their imaginations. In the
+nunnery the love of Jesus was the most abandoned of passions, and the
+ideal espousal was indulged at the cost of the feeble heart of many a
+solitary beauty" (pp. 369-70).
+
+[113] From a collection published by the Early English Text Society,
+1868, pp. 182-4, 268.
+
+[114] G. A. Coe, _The Spiritual Life_, p. 210.
+
+[115] _Les Perles de Saint François de Sales_, 1871. Cited by Bloch, p.
+111.
+
+[116] Davenport's _Primitive Traits in Religious Revivals_, p. 29.
+
+[117] See, for example, _Conduct and its Disorders_, by Dr. C. Mercier;
+_Psycho-Pathological Researches_, by Dr. Boris Sidis; and _Abnormal
+Psychology_, by I. H. Coriat.
+
+[118] _Clinical Lectures on Mental Diseases_, p. 584.
+
+[119] _Sanity and Insanity_, chap. viii.
+
+[120] _The Soul of a Christian_, p. 178.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER SIX
+
+THE STREAM OF TENDENCY
+
+
+It should hardly need pointing out that the facts presented in the last
+chapter are not offered as an attempt at the--to use Professor William
+James's expression--"reinterpretation of religion as perverted
+sexuality." Nor, so far as the present writer is aware, has anyone ever
+so presented them. The expression, indeed, seems almost a deliberate
+mis-statement of a position in order to make its rebuttal easier.
+Obviously the idea of religion must be already in existence before it
+could be utilised for the purpose of explaining any group of phenomena.
+But if the biographic and other facts described have any value whatever,
+they are at least strong presumptive evidence in favour of the position
+that in very many cases a perverted or unsatisfied sexuality has been at
+the root of a great deal of the world's emotional piety. Of course, the
+strong religious belief must be in existence before-hand. But given
+this, and add thereto a sexual nature imperious in its demands and yet
+denied legitimate outlet, and we have the conditions present for its
+promptings being interpreted as the fruits of supernatural influence. It
+is not a reinterpretation of _religion_ that is attempted, but a
+reinterpretation of phenomena that have been erroneously called
+religious. And on all sides the need for this reinterpretation is
+becoming clear. Over sixty years ago Renan wrote, "A rigorous
+psychological analysis would class the innate religious instinct of
+women in the same category with the sexual instinct,"[121] and since
+then a very much more detailed knowledge of both physiology and
+psychology has furnished a multitude of data for an exhaustive study of
+the whole question.
+
+In the present chapter our interest is mainly historical. And for
+various reasons, chief amongst which is that interested readers may the
+more easily follow up the study should they feel so inclined, the survey
+has been restricted to the history of that religion with which we are
+best acquainted--Christianity. Moreover, if we are to form a correct
+judgment of the part played in the history of religions by the
+misinterpretations already noted, it is necessary to trace the extent to
+which they have influenced men and women in a collective capacity. For
+the striking fact is that, in spite of the purification of the sexual
+relations being one of the avowed objects of Christianity, in spite,
+too, of the attempts of the official churches to suppress them, the
+history of Christianity has been dogged by outbreaks of sexual
+extravagance, by the continuous emergence of erotico-religious sects,
+claiming Christian teachings as the authority for their actions. We need
+not discuss the legitimacy of their inferences. We are concerned solely
+with a chronicle of historic facts so far as they can be ascertained;
+and these have a certain significance of their own, as events, quite
+apart from their reasonableness or desirability.
+
+A part cause of the movements we are about to describe may have been a
+violent reaction against an extravagant asceticism. Something may also
+be due to the fact that over-concentration of mind upon a particular
+evil is apt to defeat its end by the mere force of unconscious
+suggestion in the contrary direction. But in all probability much was
+due to the presence of certain elements inherited by Christianity from
+the older religions. At any rate, those whose minds are filled with the
+idea that sexual extravagance on a collective scale and under the cloak
+of religion is either a modern phenomenon, or was unknown to the early
+history of Christianity, would do well to revise their opinions in the
+light of ascertainable facts. No less a person than the Rev. S.
+Baring-Gould has reminded us that criticism discloses "on the shining
+face of primitive Christianity rents and craters undreamt of in our old
+simplicity," and also asserts "that there was in the breast of the
+newborn Church an element of antinomianism, not latent, but in virulent
+activity, is a fact as capable of demonstration as any conclusion in a
+science which is not exact."[122]
+
+There would be little value in a study of these erotico-religious
+movements if they involved only a detection of individual lust
+consciously using religion as a cloak for its gratification. Such a
+conclusion is a fatally easy one, but it does little justice to the
+chief people concerned, and it is quite lacking in historical
+perspective. In most cases the initiators of these strange sects have
+put forward a philosophy of religion as a justification of their
+teaching, and only a slight knowledge of this is enough to prove that we
+are face to face with a phenomenon of much greater significance than
+mere immorality. This may be recognised even in the pages of the New
+Testament itself. It is not a practice that is there denounced; it is a
+teaching that is repudiated. And one sees the same thing at later
+periods. The conviction on the one side that certain actions are
+unlawful, is met on the other side with the conviction that they are
+perfectly legitimate. Conviction is met with conviction. Each side
+expresses itself in terms of religion; the ethical aspect is incidental
+or subordinate. It is a contest of opposing religious beliefs and
+practices.
+
+The real nature of the conflict is often obscured by the fact of social
+opinion and the social forces generally being on the side of the more
+normal expression of sexual life. This, however, is no more than a
+necessity of the situation. The continuance of a healthful social life
+is dependent upon the maintenance of a certain balance in the relations
+of the sexes, and anything that strikes at this strikes at social life
+as a whole. In such cases we have, therefore, to allow for the operation
+of social selection, which is always on the side of the more normal
+type. From this it follows that although a small body of people may
+exemplify a variation that is in itself socially disastrous, the main
+forces of social life will prevent its ever assuming large dimensions.
+Moreover, a large body of people, such as is represented by a church
+holding a commanding position in society, will be forced to come to
+terms with the permanent tendencies of social life, and will either
+suppress undesirable variations or expel them. It thus happens that
+while the larger and more dominant churches have been on the side of
+normal, regularised expressions of the sexual life, abnormal variations
+have constantly arisen and have been denounced by them. But the
+significant feature is that they have arisen within the churches, and
+most commonly during periods of great religious stress or excitement.
+
+These tendencies, as the Rev. S. Baring-Gould has pointed out, existed
+in the very earliest days of Christianity. It is quite apparent from
+Paul's writings that as early as the date of the First Epistle to the
+Corinthians some of the more objectionable features of the older Pagan
+worship had shown themselves in the Church. The doctrine of 'spiritual
+wifehood' appeared at a very early date in the Church, and its teachers
+cited even St. Paul himself as their authority. Their claim was based
+upon Paul's declaration (1 Cor. ix. 5) that he had power to lead about
+"a sister, a wife, as well as other apostles, and as the brethren of the
+Lord and Cephas." Curiously enough, commentators have never agreed as to
+what Paul meant by this expression. The word translated may mean either
+wife, or sister, or woman. Had it been wife in the ordinary sense, it
+does not appear that at that date there would have been any room for
+scandal. The clear fact is, however, that others claimed a like
+privilege; the privilege was not always restricted to one woman, and the
+practice, if not general, became not uncommon, and furnished the ground
+for scandal for a long period. Two epistles, wrongly attributed to St.
+Clement of Rome, and dating from some time in the second century,
+condemn the practice of young people living together under the cloak of
+religion, and specially warns virgins against cohabiting with the clergy
+and so giving offence. That the practice was difficult to suppress is
+shown by its being condemned by several church councils--Antioch in 210,
+Nicea in 325, and Elvira in 350.[123] At a later date a much more
+elaborate theory has been built on Paul's claim. The Pauline Church has
+found several expressions both in England and America within recent
+times.[124] These sects have claimed that both St. Paul and the woman
+with whom he travelled were in a state of grace, and, therefore, above
+all law. We do not mean the maintenance of an ascetic relationship, but
+the normal relation of husband and wife. It is really the doctrine of
+'Free Love' with a spiritual warranty instead of a secular one.
+
+This doctrine of religious 'Free Love' rests upon a twofold basis.
+First, it was held that, apart from a wife after the flesh, one might
+also have a wife after the spirit, and this spiritual union might exist
+side by side with the fleshly one, and with different persons. A great
+impetus appears to have been given to this theory from Germany, many of
+the originators of the American sects of Free Lovers being Germans.
+Secondly, it was held that a Christian in a state of grace was absolved
+from laws that were binding upon other people. His actions were no
+longer subject to the categories of right and wrong; as it was said, to
+one in a state of grace all things were lawful, even though all things
+might not be expedient. Some went the length of teaching that not only
+were all things lawful, but all things were desirable. Separating by a
+sharp division things that influenced the soul from things that
+influenced the body, it was openly taught by some of the early sects
+that nothing done by the body could injure the soul, and so could not
+affect its salvation. Reversing the practice of asceticism, which sought
+to crush bodily passions by a course of deprivation, it was taught that
+all kinds of forbidden conduct might be practised in order to
+demonstrate the soul's superiority. There is no question whatever that
+this tendency was very prominent in the early Christian Church. It was
+not there as something hidden, something of which men ought to be
+ashamed; it was an avowed teaching, claiming full religious sanction.
+"The Church," says Baring-Gould, "trembled on the verge of becoming an
+immoral sect." The same writer also says:--
+
+"This _teaching_ of immorality in the Church is a startling feature, and
+it seems to have been pursued by some who called themselves apostles as
+well as by those who assumed to be prophets. In the Corinthian Church
+even the elders encouraged incest. Now, it is not possible to explain
+this phenomenon except on the ground that Paul's argument as to the Law
+being overridden had been laid hold of and elevated into a principle.
+These teachers did not wink at lapses into immorality, but defiantly
+urged on the converts to the Gospel to commit adultery, fornication, and
+all uncleanness ... as a protest against those who contended that the
+moral law as given on the tables was still binding upon the
+Church."[125]
+
+A certain detachment from modern conditions, and from modern frames of
+mind, is essential to an adequate appreciation of what has been said.
+Looking at these events through the distorting medium of an altogether
+different social atmosphere, one is apt to attribute them to the
+operation of lawless desire, and so have done with it. This, however, is
+to overlook the fact that we are dealing with a society in which sexual
+symbols were common in religious worship, and in which theories of the
+religious life were propounded and accepted which to-day would be
+regarded as little less than maniacal. Unquestionably even then, once
+the situation had established itself it would be utilised by those of a
+coarser nature for mere sensual gratification. But practices such as we
+know existed, on the scale we have every reason for believing they were,
+could never have been had they not taken the form of an intense
+conviction. To assume otherwise is equal to arguing that because men
+have entered the Church from mere love of power or lust for wealth, the
+Church owed its establishment to the play of these motives. It is true
+that those who opposed these religio-erotic sects accused them of
+immorality, but it is the form these teachings assumed to the members of
+the impeached sects, not how they appeared to their enemies, that is
+important. Eroticism taught and practised as a religious
+conviction--that is the essential and significant feature of the
+situation. Not to grasp this is to fail to realise the vital fact
+embodied in the phenomena under consideration. We are not dealing with
+mere sensualists, even though we may be dealing with what is largely an
+expression of sensualism. It is sensualism expressed as, and sanctioned
+by, religious conviction that is the vital fact of the situation.
+
+One of the earliest Christian institutions around which scandals
+gathered was that of the Agapæ, or love-feasts. From the outset the
+Pagan writers asserted that these love-feasts were new versions of
+various old orgiastic practices, some of which were still current,
+others of which had been suppressed by the Roman government. There is no
+doubt that they were the grounds of very serious accusations against the
+Christians. On the other hand, it must be remembered that, at the outset
+at least, these charges were indignantly rejected by the Christians. The
+Agapæ were called indiscriminately Feasts of Love and Feasts of
+Charity. Each member, male and female, greeted each other with a holy
+kiss, and the institution was described by Tertullian as "a support of
+love, a solace of purity, a check on riches, a discipline of weakness."
+These love-feasts were held on important occasions, such as a marriage,
+a death, or the anniversary of a martyrdom. Some churches celebrated
+them weekly. From the Acts of the Apostles we learn that the feasts
+began about nightfall, and continued till after midnight, or even till
+daybreak. It was only natural that mixed assemblies of men and women
+that gathered in this manner, and where there was eating and drinking,
+should create scandal. It is absolutely certain that some of this
+scandal had a basis in fact. The Rev. S. Baring-Gould confesses that "at
+Corinth, and certainly elsewhere, among excitable people, the wine, the
+heat, the exaltation of emotion, led to orgiastic ravings, the jabbering
+of disconnected, unintelligible words, to fits, convulsions, pious
+exclamations, and incoherent ravings." And unless St. Paul was
+deliberately slandering his fellow-believers worse things than these
+occurred.
+
+Generally, even by non-Christian writers, it has been assumed that the
+Agapæ commenced as a perfectly harmless, even admirable institution, and
+afterwards degenerated, and so gave genuine cause for scandal. It is not
+easy to see that this opinion rests on anything better than a mere
+prejudice. It is true that there is no unmistakable evidence to the
+contrary, but no clear evidence is to be found in its behalf. The Agapæ
+was not, after all, an essentially Christian institution. Similar
+gatherings existed among the Pagans, more or less orgiastic in
+character. And even though at first some of the more extreme forms were
+avoided amongst the Christians, it is not improbable, on the face of it,
+that some kind of sexual extravagance or symbolism was present from the
+outset. At any rate, as I have said, the charges were made, first by
+Pagans, afterwards by Christians against other Christians. The charges
+were persistent, and were made in districts far removed from each other.
+Says Lecky: "When the Pagans accused the Christians of indulging in
+orgies of gross licentiousness, the first apologist, while repudiating
+the charge, was careful to add, of the heretics, 'Whether or not these
+people commit those shameful acts ... I know not.' In a few years the
+language of doubt and insinuation was exchanged for that of direct
+assertion; and if we may believe St. Irenæus and St. Clement of
+Alexandria, the followers of Carpocrates, the Marcionites, and some
+other gnostic sects habitually indulged, in their secret meetings, in
+acts of impurity and licentiousness as hideous and as monstrous as can
+be conceived, and their conduct was one of the causes of the persecution
+of the orthodox."[126] Tertullian accused some of the sects of
+practising incestuous intercourse at the Agapæ. Ambrose compared the
+institution to the Pagan Parentalia. Clement says, probably referring to
+the Agapæ, "the shameless use of the rite occasions foul suspicion and
+evil reports." The first epistle on Virginity by the Pseudo-Clement
+(probably written in the second century) admits the existence of
+immorality by saying, "Others eat and drink with them (_i.e._ the
+virgins) at feasts, and indulge in loose behaviour and much uncleanness,
+such as ought not to be among those who have elected holiness for
+themselves." Justin Martyr, referring to certain sects, says more
+cautiously: "Whether or not these people commit these shameful acts (the
+putting out of lights, and indulging in promiscuous intercourse) I know
+not." Others are more precise in their charges. That the Agapæ became
+the legitimate cause of complaint is admitted by all. The only question
+is whether it was the institution itself or the public mind in relation
+to it that underwent a change. Eventually, on the avowed ground of evil
+conduct, the Agapæ were forbidden by the Council of Carthage, 391, of
+Orleans, 541, and of Constantinople, 680.
+
+The whole subject is obscure, but the one certain and significant thing
+is that charges of licentiousness were connected with the Agapæ from the
+outset. These may at first have been unfounded or exaggerated. On the
+other hand, it is quite probable that just as Christianity continued
+Pagan ceremonies in other directions, so there was also a carrying over
+into the Church of some of the sexual rites and ceremonies connected
+with earlier forms of worship. And we know that the principle of
+Antinomianism, a prolific cause of evil at all times, was active amongst
+the Christians from the outset.
+
+It is almost impossible to say at this distance how many sects
+exhibiting marked erotic tendencies appeared in the early Christian
+centuries. Many must have disappeared and left no trace of their
+existence. But there can be no question that they were fairly numerous.
+The extensive sect, or sects, of the gnostics contained in its teachings
+elements that at least paved the way for the conduct with which other
+Christians charged them, although the charges made may not have been
+true of all. To some of the gnostic sects belongs the teaching--quite in
+accord with the doctrine of the evil nature of the world, that
+liberation from the 'Law' was one of the first conditions of spiritual
+freedom. From this came the teaching, subsequently held by numerous
+other sects, that those born of the Spirit could not be defiled by any
+acts of the flesh, and that so-called vicious actions were rather to be
+encouraged as providing experience useful to spiritual welfare. Some
+branches of the gnostics had 'spiritual marriages,' similar to what
+existed in India in the Sakti rites already described. Thus the
+Adamites, a rather obscure gnostic sect of the second century, attempted
+to imitate the Edenic state by condemning marriage and abandoning
+clothing. Their assemblies were held underground, and on entering the
+place of worship both sexes stripped themselves naked, and in that state
+performed their ceremonies. They called their church Paradise, from
+which all dissentients were promptly expelled. The Adamites themselves
+claimed that their object was to extirpate desire by familiarising the
+senses to strict control. Their religious opponents gave a very
+different account of the practice, and it is not difficult to realise,
+whatever may have been the motive of the founders, the consequences of
+such a practice. It is curious, by the way, to observe how strong
+religious excitement seems to lead people to discard clothing. Thus,
+during the Crusade of 1203-42 the women crusaders rushed about the
+streets in a state of nudity.[127] During the wars of the League in
+France, men and women walked naked in procession headed by the
+clergy.[128] Other examples of this curious practice might be given.
+
+The Nicolaitanes, a second-century sect referred to in the New Testament
+(Rev. ii. 14), were accused of practising religious prostitution. So
+also were the Manichæans, a very numerous sect, against whom the charges
+were of a much more detailed character. With them the ceremonial
+violation of a virgin is said to have formed a part of their regular
+ritual, and that their meetings frequently ended in an orgy of
+promiscuous intercourse.[129] As both these acts are found in connection
+with other religious ceremonies, and, as will be seen later, have
+persisted until recent times, the story does not sound so incredible as
+otherwise it might. The difficulty of deciding definitely is intensified
+by the fact of the Manichæans being split into a number of sects, and
+statements true of some might be untrue of others. So we find St.
+Augustine, who had been a Manichæan, declaring that if all did not
+practise licentious rites, one sect (the Catharists) did, believing that
+they could only mortify the flesh by the exercise of bad instincts,
+since the flesh proceeded from demons. St. Augustine himself confesses
+to have taken part in various phallic ceremonies before his conversion.
+"I myself," he says, "when a young man used to go sometimes to the
+sacrilegious entertainments and spectacles; I saw the priests raving in
+religious excitement, and heard the choristers; I took pleasure in the
+shameful games which were celebrated in honour of gods and goddesses, of
+the Virgin Coelestia, and of Berecynthia, the mother of all gods. And
+on the day consecrated to her purification, there were sung before her
+couch productions so obscene and filthy to the ear--I do not say of the
+mother of the gods, but of the mother of any senator or honest man--nay,
+so impure that not even the mother of the foul-mouthed players
+themselves could have formed one of the audience."[130]
+
+The Carpocratians, who claimed to be a branch of the Gnostics, taught
+that faith and charity were alone necessary virtues: all others were
+useless. There is nothing evil in itself, and life only becomes complete
+when all so-called blemishes are fully displayed in conduct. Their
+leader "not only allowed his disciples a full liberty to sin, but
+recommended a vicious course of life as a matter of obligation and
+necessity; asserting that eternal salvation was only attainable by those
+who had committed all sorts of crimes.... It was the will of God that
+all things should be possessed in common, the female sex not
+excepted."[131]
+
+A little later we have the sect of the Agapetæ. They rejected marriage
+as an institution, and permitted unrestrained intercourse between the
+sexes. St. Jerome, alluding to this sect, says: "It is a shame even to
+allude to the true facts. Whence did the pest of the Agapetæ creep into
+the Church? Whence is this new title of wives without marriage rites?
+Whence this new class of concubines? I will infer more. Whence these
+harlots cleaving to one man? They occupy the same house, a single
+chamber, often a single bed, and call us suspicious if we think anything
+of it. The brother deserts his virgin sister, the virgin despises her
+unmarried brother, and seeks a stranger, and since they pretend to be
+aiming at the same object, they ask for the spiritual consolation of
+each other that they may enjoy the pleasures of the flesh."[132]
+
+This form of extravagance does not appear to have been limited to a
+single sect. It was more or less general during the ascendancy of
+asceticism. Tertullian says that the desire to enjoy the reputation of
+virginity led to much immorality, the effects of which were concealed by
+infanticide. The Council of Antioch lamented the practice of unmarried
+men and women sharing the same room. In 450, the Anchorites of Palestine
+are described as herding together without distinction of sex, and with
+no garments but a breech-clout.[133] The practice of priests travelling
+about with women, mothers and wives, and the scandals created thereby,
+is referred to in regulation after regulation. Although legislated
+against, it never entirely disappeared, and eventually led to a
+recognised priestly concubinage--recognised, that is, by public opinion,
+although condemned by the Church.
+
+There is no need to go over even the names of all the numerous sects
+that appeared during the early centuries manifesting curious features
+concerning sexual relations. When suppressed in one form they reappeared
+in another, and were unusually prominent during seasons of religious
+unrest. Many of the teachings already noted made their appearance again
+with the "Brethren of the Free Spirit" in the thirteenth, fourteenth,
+and fifteenth centuries. Some of these sects took their stand on the
+Pauline teaching, "The law of the spirit of life in Jesus Christ hath
+made me free from the law of sin and death," and claimed freedom from
+sin, no matter what their actions. The "Brethren of the Free Spirit"
+carried women about with them, held midnight assemblies, and, according
+to Mosheim, attended these meetings in a state of nudity. The Ranters,
+the Spirituels of Geneva, the Berghards, the Flagellants, the Molinists,
+were all accused of sexual misconduct in their assemblies. One of the
+specific teachings of the last-named body, as condemned by the
+Inquisition, ran as follows: "God, to humble us, permits in certain
+perfect souls that the devil should make them commit certain acts. In
+this case, and in others, which without the permission of God, would be
+guilty, there is no sin because there is no consent. It may happen, that
+this violent movement, which excites to carnal acts, may take place in
+two persons, a man and a woman, at the same instant."[134]
+
+It has been pointed out that the dominant Church made continuous efforts
+to suppress these sects, but the remarkable thing is that they should so
+often reappear, and always with strong claims to existence on the basis
+of religious conviction. That a number of men and women should seek
+gratification of their sensual feelings in ways not countenanced by the
+laws of normal life need not excite surprise. There always have been and
+always will be such. But to do this in the name of religion, and with a
+persistency as great as that of the religious idea itself, is a
+phenomenon that surely deserves more attention than it ordinarily
+receives. Nor can it be said with justice that these sects began in mere
+conscious lust. They ended there, true; more or less disguised, it may
+always have been present, but those who initiated them believed that
+they were justified in doing so by religious principles, and appealed to
+those principles to justify their conduct. Why should this have been the
+case? Why should conduct of which men and women are ashamed in the
+social sphere, and which their social sense promptly condemns, in the
+religious sphere be crowned with the dignity of lofty principles and
+fought for with the fervour of intense conviction? So long as
+theologians leave that question unanswered, their arguments are simply
+wide of the real issue.
+
+Naturally, the closer we get to our own day, and to times when religious
+feeling is more vigorously controlled by purely social forces, these
+manifestations of sexuality become less frequent, less widely spread,
+and more transient in character. Still they do occur. For reasons that
+do not concern us here, America has in recent years been a favourable
+ground for these religio-sexual developments. A sympathetic account of
+many of these American sects will be found in Hepworth Dixon's
+_Spiritual Wives_, with accounts of similar sects in Germany and
+England. In some cases many of the features of the early Christian sects
+were reproduced, even to the length of young women sharing the bedrooms
+of their spiritual guides. All took Paul as their principal authority.
+J. H. Noyes, one of the best known and most representative of these
+teachers, laid down the main principles of his teachings thus:--
+
+"When the will of God is done on earth as it is in heaven, there will be
+no marriage. The marriage supper of the Lamb is a feast at which every
+dish is free to every guest. Exclusiveness, jealousy, quarrelling, have
+no place there, for the same reason as that which forbids the guests at
+a thanksgiving dinner to claim each his separate dish, and quarrel with
+the rest for his rights. In a holy community there is no more reason why
+sexual intercourse should be restrained by law, than why eating and
+drinking should be; and there is as little occasion for shame in the one
+case as in the other.... The guests of the marriage supper may have each
+his favourite dish, each a dish of his own procuring, and that without
+the jealousy of exclusiveness. I call a certain woman my wife; she is
+yours; she is Christ's; and in Him she is the bride of all saints. She
+is dear in the hands of a stranger, and according to my promise to her I
+rejoice."[135]
+
+In a letter to Mr. Hepworth Dixon, J. H. Noyes claims the "right of
+religious inspiration to shape society and dictate the form of family
+life," and with probable accuracy says that the origin of these American
+sects is to be found in revivals:--
+
+"The philosophy of the matter seems to be this: Revivals are theocratic
+in their very nature; they introduce God into human affairs.... In the
+conservative theory of revivals, this power is restricted to the
+conversion of souls; but in actual experience it goes, or tends to go,
+into all the affairs of life.... Religious love is very near neighbour
+to sexual love, and they always get mixed in the intimacies and social
+excitements of revivals. The next thing a man wants, after he has found
+the salvation of his soul, is to find his Eve and his Paradise.... The
+course of things may be restated thus: Revivals lead to religious love;
+religious love excites the passions; the converts, finding themselves
+in theocratic liberty, begin to look about for their mates and their
+liberty."[136]
+
+With regard to the beginnings of these modern movements of "Spiritual
+Wifehood," all involving the abrogation of the normal relations of the
+sexes, Hepworth Dixon writes:--
+
+"It has not, I think, been noticed by any writer that three of the most
+singular movements in the churches of our generation seem to have been
+connected, more or less closely, with the state of mind produced by
+revivals; one in Germany, one in England, and one in the United States;
+movements which resulted, among other things, in the establishment of
+three singular societies--the congregation of Pietists, vulgarly called
+the Mucker, at Königsberg; the brotherhood of Princeites at Spaxton; and
+the Bible Communists at Oneida Creek.... They had these chief things in
+common: they began in colleges, they affected the form of family life,
+and they were carried on by clergymen; each movement in a place of
+learning and of theological study: that in Germany at the Luther-Kirch
+of Königsberg, that in England at St. David's College, that in the
+United States at Yale College.... These three divines, one Lutheran, one
+Anglican, one Congregational, began their work in perfect ignorance of
+each other.... Each movement was regarded by its votaries as the most
+perfect fruit of the revival spirit. In truth, the change which came
+upon the saints from their close experience of revival passion, was
+regarded by themselves as in some degree miraculous, equal in divine
+significance to a new creation of the world."[137]
+
+For an almost exact replica of the erotic extravagances of some of the
+early Christian sects, one may turn to Russia. The difficulties and
+dangers of political life in Russia are doubtless responsible for having
+made religion such a power among the mass of the people, and this will
+also explain the diversion into religious channels of energy that under
+more favourable conditions is expended in social agitation and activity.
+Many of these sects are, of course, of a harmless character, mostly
+originating in an even greater love for the past and a more slavish
+adherence to ancient formulas than is displayed by the orthodox Church.
+Some, however, present the wildest excesses of sexual theory and
+practice. Nothing seems too wild or too extravagant to become the
+originating point of a new sect. Theories of marriage and sexual
+relations generally are developed with a logical fearlessness peculiarly
+Russian. Among the Bezpopovtsi, a numerous sect split up into several
+branches, opinions on marriage vary between regarding it as a mere
+conventional affair, and denouncing it as a hindrance to spiritual
+development. "Between these two extremes," says Mr. Heard, "there is
+room for the wildest and most repulsive theories. Carnal sensuality is
+allied in monstrous union with religious mysticism. Free love,
+independence of the sexes, possession of women in common, have been
+preached and practised. Debauchery, as an incidental weakness of human
+nature, has been advocated as the lesser evil; libertinism as preferable
+to concubinage, and the latter as better than marriage. One of their
+most austere teachers cynically declares that 'it is wiser to live with
+beasts than to be joined to a wife; to frequent many women in secret,
+rather than to live with one openly.'"[138]
+
+Another sect called 'Eunuchs' take their stand on Matt. xix. 12: "There
+are some eunuchs, which were so born from their mother's womb: and there
+are some eunuchs, which were made eunuchs of men: and there be eunuchs,
+which have made themselves eunuchs for the kingdom of heaven's sake. He
+that is able to receive it, let him receive it." This sect believes in
+and practises emasculation as the surest way of attaining perfection.
+Man, they say, should be like the angels, without sex and without
+desire. This practice reminds one of an early Christian sect, the
+Valesians, which not only emasculated members of their own sect, but
+performed the same operation forcibly on those who fell into their
+hands.[139] The Khlysti, a sect which derives its name from the practice
+of flagellation, denounce marriage as unclean, and part of their
+religious ritual is, according to some writers, the worship of a naked
+woman. Baron Von Haxthausen, writing in 1856, gives the following
+description of their ceremonies on Easter night:--
+
+"On this night the Khlysti all assemble for a great solemnity, the
+worship of the mother of God. A virgin, fifteen years of age, whom they
+have induced to act the part by tempting promises, is bound and placed
+in a tub of warm water; some old women come, and first make a large
+incision in the left breast, then cut it off, and staunch the blood in a
+wonderfully short time. During the operation a mystical picture of the
+Holy Spirit is put into the victim's hand, in order that she may be
+absorbed in regarding it. The breast which has been removed is laid upon
+a plate and cut into small pieces, which are eaten by all the members of
+the sect present; the girl in the tub is then raised upon an altar which
+stands near, and the whole congregation dance wildly round it, singing
+at the same time. The jumping then grows madder and wilder, till the
+lights are suddenly extinguished and horrible orgies commence."[140]
+
+The 'Jumpers,' an offshoot of the Khlysti, are much more pronounced in
+their sexual extravagances. They openly profess debauchery, for the
+usual reason, that of conquering the flesh by exhaustion and satiety.
+They meet usually by night, and after prayers are chanted and hymns
+sung, the leader commences a slow jumping movement, keeping time with a
+song. Then:--
+
+"The audience, arranged in couples, engaged to each other in advance,
+imitate his example and join the strain; the bounds and the singing grow
+faster and louder as it spreads, until, at its height, the elder shouts
+that he hears the voices of angels; the lights are extinguished, the
+jumping ceases, and the scene that follows in the darkness defies
+description. Each one yields to his desires, born of inspiration, and
+therefore righteous, and to be gratified; all are brethren in Christ,
+all promptings of the inner spirit are holy; incest, even, is no sin.
+They repudiate marriage, and justify their abominations by the Biblical
+legends of Lot's daughters, Solomon's harem, and the like."[141]
+
+There are many other curious sects in Russia, many of which bring us
+back to the religious atmosphere of the European dark ages. But without
+pursuing a description of these to any greater extent, enough has been
+said to show the persistence of the stream of sexualism in the history
+of Christianity. Of course, this feature did not enter religion with
+Christianity. On the contrary, I have shown that it was present from the
+earliest times. The association of religion with sexual phenomena does
+not commence as a sexual aberration; it only assumes that form at a
+comparatively late stage in religious history. The origin of the
+connection has to be found in that atmosphere of the supernatural which
+envelops primitive life, moulds primitive conceptions, and more or less
+fashions all primitive institutions. The sexual side of religious belief
+and religious symbolism only becomes abnormal, and even morbid, when the
+development of social life makes possible a truer view of sexuality. In
+this the great churches have, perhaps, unconsciously assisted. Their
+position of social control has compelled them to set their faces against
+the sexual symbolism which is so closely associated with early religious
+history, while at the same time countenancing religious fervour in
+general. The consequence has been that small bodies of men and women,
+freed from the restraining influence of social responsibility, have
+developed to extravagant length certain phases of religious belief that
+have been generally discountenanced elsewhere. Their so doing certainly
+helps the present-day student to make a more complete survey of all the
+factors that have played their part in religious history than would
+otherwise have been possible. Repulsive as some of these features now
+are, they have helped in their time to nourish the general belief in a
+supernatural order, and so to strengthen the general idea to which they
+were affiliated.
+
+
+FOOTNOTES:
+
+[121] _The Future of Science_, p. 465.
+
+[122] _Lost and Hostile Gospels_, Preface, p. 7.
+
+[123] See Baring-Gould's _Study of St. Paul_, pp. 450-1.
+
+[124] See Hepworth Dixon's curious work, _Spiritual Wives_, 1888, 2
+vols.
+
+[125] _Study of St. Paul_, p. 458.
+
+[126] _History of European Morals_, i. p. 417.
+
+[127] Cutten, _Psychological Christianity_, p. 157.
+
+[128] Sanger, _History of Prostitution_, p. 116.
+
+[129] See Blunt's _Dictionary of Sects_, art. "Manichæans."
+
+[130] _De Civitate Dei_, ii. 4.
+
+[131] Mosheim, _Cent. 2_, chap. v. sec. 4.
+
+[132] _Dictionary of Sects_, p. 13.
+
+[133] Lea, _Hist. of Sacerdotal Celibacy_, 1884, p. 42.
+
+[134] Cited by Michelet, _Priests, Women, and Families_, p. 130.
+
+[135] _Spiritual Wives_, ii. pp. 55-6.
+
+[136] _Spiritual Wives_, pp. 176-7, 181.
+
+[137] _Ibid._, pp. 84-6.
+
+[138] _The Russian Church and Russian Dissent_, p. 201.
+
+[139] Lea, _Hist. of Sacerdotal Celibacy_, p. 40.
+
+[140] _Visit to the Russian Empire_, i. p. 254. Merejkowski, in his
+historical novel, _Peter and Alexis_, gives a more detailed account of
+the sexual ceremonies of this sect. See also Heard's description,
+_Russian Church_, p. 258.
+
+[141] _Russian Church and Russian Dissent_, p. 262.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER SEVEN
+
+CONVERSION
+
+
+From what has been already said, it should be clear that a complete
+understanding of religious phenomena--whether legitimately or wrongly so
+called--involves acquaintance with a number of factors that are not
+usually called religious. Man's religious beliefs are usually a very
+composite product; they are built up from a number of states of feeling
+and mental convictions, some of which have only an accidental connection
+with the religious idea itself. Unfortunately, the training given to
+professional religious teachers rarely equips them for dealing with
+religion from the scientific point of view. Their training gives them a
+knowledge of several ancient languages, makes them acquainted with the
+rise and fall of certain doctrines, the nature of Church ritual and the
+like, all of which, while interesting enough in themselves, give little
+more genuine enlightenment than a knowledge of the dates of English
+monarchs provides of the character of genuine historic processes. One
+writer pertinently asks:--
+
+"What does the ordinary seminary graduate know of the histology,
+anatomy, and physiology of the soul? Absolutely nothing. He must stumble
+along through years of trying experience and look back over countless
+mistakes before he understands these things even in a general way. What
+does the ordinary graduate understand about doubt? It is all classed
+together, whether in adolescents or in hardened sinners, and one dose is
+applied. What does the graduate know about sexuality, so closely allied
+with certain forms of religious manifestations? What about ecstasy, in
+its various forms, the numerous methods of faith cure thrust upon an
+illiterate but credulous people, or the significance or insignificance
+of visions and dreams?"[142]
+
+It is, indeed, not too much to say that a theological training tends to
+prevent a rational comprehension of religion in both its normal and
+abnormal manifestations. Religious phenomena are not affiliated to
+phenomena as a whole; they are treated as quite distinct from the rest
+of life, possessing both an independent origin and justification. The
+consequence is that what are usually called studies of religion move
+round and round the same circle of ideas, and a revolution is mistaken
+for progress. Genuine enlightenment has come to us from men who have
+attacked the subject from a quite different point of view. They
+recognised that whether the religious idea was accepted as true or
+rejected as false, it could not be separated from that host of ideas and
+beliefs which make up the psychological side of the social structure. It
+was to be studied as a piece of natural history first of all. Whether it
+involved more than this they left to be settled later. It cannot be said
+that they belittled the _power_ of religion; on the contrary, the
+investigations showed it to be one of the most potent of the forces that
+shape social institutions. But they demonstrated the absurdity of
+placing religion in a category of its own. As an objective fact, they
+showed that religion was subject to the same forces that determine the
+form of other objective facts. As a culture fact, they traced its
+connection with corresponding phases of social development; and as a
+psychological fact, they demonstrated its workings to be in harmony with
+workings of normal psychological laws. Five thousand years of
+theological study had left the world as ignorant of the nature of
+religious phenomena as it was in the days of ancient Chaldea. Fifty
+years of scientific study has served to make at least a broad path
+through what was hitherto an impenetrable jungle.
+
+What has been said holds with peculiar force of the subject of
+conversion. This is not a phenomenon peculiar to Christianity, for
+initiation and conversion accompanies religion in all its phases. I do
+not think that it is peculiar to religion even as a whole. A sudden
+discharge of feeling in a special direction leading to a changed
+attitude, more or less permanent towards life, may be seen in connection
+with the non-religious life, although it fails to receive the attention
+bestowed on changes that are connected with religion. But if conversion
+is not a peculiarly Christian phenomenon, one school of theologians, at
+least, has raised it to a position of peculiar eminence in connection
+with Christianity. They have taken it to be the mark of a person who has
+attained spiritual manhood, and have laid down elaborate rules for its
+achievement. Many theologians will agree that this has been almost
+wholly disastrous. On the one side, conversion has been dwelt upon as a
+cataclysmal epoch in a person's life, produced, negatively, by an act of
+self-surrender, and, positively, by a supernatural act of grace. This
+has had the effect of blinding people to the real nature of the process,
+and has led to certain evil consequences that must always accompany
+attempts at wholesale conversion. On the other hand, it has given rise
+to a class of professional evangelists who count their trophies in
+'souls' as a Red Indian might count scalps, and who are ignorant of
+nearly everything except the art of working upon the emotions of a crowd
+of more or less uncultured people. Here, for instance, is an account of
+an American evangelist and ex-prize fighter, and evidently a great
+favourite with certain sections of the religious public in America. The
+account is cited by Dr. Cutten from a local paper, Illinois:--
+
+"5843 converts, 683 in a day. Total gift to Mr. Sunday, $10,431.
+Greatest revival in history. Will attract the attention of the religious
+world. Sermon on 'Booze,' the great effort of the revival! These are all
+headlines to the report of the meeting, which covers six
+columns--evidently a response to the interest shown in 'Billy' Sunday's
+meetings. The sermon on 'Booze' is given in full, and the physical
+exertions of the preacher described in detail. He began with his coat,
+vest, tie, and collar off. In a few moments his shirt and undershirt
+were gaping open to the waist, and the muscles of his neck and chest
+were seen working like those in the arm of a blacksmith, while
+perspiration poured from every pore. His clothing was soaked, as if a
+hose had been turned on him. He strained, and twisted, and reached up
+and down. Once he was on the floor for just a second, in the attitude of
+crawling, to show that all crime crawled out of the saloon; then he was
+on his feet as quickly as a cat could jump. At the end of forty-five
+minutes he mounted a chair, reached high, as he shouted, then again was
+on the floor, and dropped prostrate to illustrate a story of a drunken
+man, bounded to his feet again as if steel springs filled that lithe,
+slender, lightning-like body. He generally breaks a common kitchen chair
+in this sermon, and this came after a terrible effort, with eyes
+flashing, face scowling, the picture of hate. He whirled the chair over
+his head, smashed the chair to the platform floor, whirled the shattered
+wreck in the air again, and threw it to the ground in front of the
+pulpit. In two minutes men from the front row were tearing the wreck to
+pieces and dividing it up--a round here, a leg there, a piece of the
+back to another, and so on. Later, men carried away in cheering could be
+seen in the audience waving those chair fragments in the air."
+
+This is, of course, an extreme case, although it is but an exaggeration
+of methods in common use among these professional revivalists. The whole
+aim and purpose of these men is to arouse in the audience a high
+emotional tension, and any means is acceptable that succeeds in doing
+this. On the part of the congregation a large portion go for the express
+purpose of indulging in an emotional debauch. Many attend revival after
+revival, living over again the debauch of the last, and treasuring
+lively expectations of the next. Between these and the victim of alcohol
+tasting again his last 'burst,' and seeking opportunities for another,
+there is really little moral or psychological distinction. The social
+consequences of these engineered revivals have never been fully worked
+out, but when it is done by some competent person, the conclusions will
+be a revelation to many. One thing is certain: to expect really useful
+social results from such methods is verily to look to gather grapes from
+thistles.
+
+During recent years the phenomena of religious conversion have been
+studied in a more scientific spirit.[143] Statistics have been compiled
+and analysed, the frames of mind attendant on conversion arranged and
+studied, with the result that the salient features are to be discerned
+by all who approach the study of the subject with a little detachment of
+mind. One outstanding feature of this more scientific enquiry into the
+nature of conversion has been to demonstrate that it is almost
+exclusively a phenomenon of puberty and adolescence. Mr. Hall has
+compiled a lengthy list of the ages at which noted religious characters
+experienced what is known as conversion.[144] From this I take the
+following examples. Religious conviction came to St. Thekla at the age
+of 18, to St. Agnes at 13, St. Antony at 18, Martin of Tours at 18,
+Euphrasia at 12, Benedict at 14, Cuthbert at 15, St. Bernard at 12, St.
+Dominic at 15, St. Collette at 20, St. Catherine at 7, St. Teresa at 12,
+St. Francis of Sales at 11. In his _Life of Jesus_, Keim also remarks
+that although some of the disciples may have been married, most of them
+were probably about twenty years of age.[145]
+
+Professor Starbuck, placing on one side both historical and
+anthropological aspects, set himself the task of examining cases of the
+present day. A paper was sent out asking various questions as to age,
+state of health, frame of mind, before, during, and following
+conversion. The questions were sent to male and female members of
+different religious denominations. In reply, 1265 papers were filled up
+and returned. One result of a scrutiny of these returns was to show that
+the age at which religious conversion was experienced began as early as
+7 or 8 years, it increased gradually till 10 or 11, then a more rapid
+increase till 18 or 20, a decline increasing in rapidity to the age of
+25, and its practical disappearance beyond the age of 30. In girls, the
+period of conversion antedates that of boys by about two years.[146]
+Starbuck's conclusion is the perfectly valid one that conversion
+"belongs almost exclusively to the years between 10 and 25," and is
+distinctly a phenomenon of adolescence.
+
+This conclusion would be borne out by a study of almost any revival
+crusade. Thus a few years ago--1904--England received a visit from the
+American evangelist, Dr. Torrey. At the conclusion of his visit, Sir
+Robertson Nicol invited opinions from ministers in the towns visited by
+Torrey, and published the replies in his paper, _The British Weekly_, on
+October 27. There was no attempt whatever to elicit the ages of the
+reported converts; the enquiry was directed to the point of ascertaining
+whether these engineered missions had a beneficial effect on church
+life, or the reverse. But incidentally the ages of the converts were
+given in some cases, and one may safely assume that in the reports where
+no age was mentioned the facts, if disclosed, would not run counter to
+the generalisation above given. The Rev. T. Towers, Birmingham, noted
+that 16 out of 25 reported converts were children. Rev. A. Le Gros,
+Rugby, reported: "A number of our youngest members, especially amongst
+the young girls, were amongst those who professed conversion." Rev. H.
+Singleton, Smethwick, says: "The bulk of the names sent to me were those
+of children under thirteen years of age." Rev. W. G. Percival, Lozells
+Congregational Church, says of the 'inquiry' meeting held after the
+preaching: "The dear little things followed one another for inquiry
+until the place was a scene of utter confusion." Reports of a similar
+nature came from other places. The ages were pointed out quite
+incidentally; conversions of youths of 17 or 18 would not excite comment
+with these. Were the ages of all given, we should, without doubt, find
+them fall into line with Starbuck's and Hall's figures.
+
+Professor James quite accepts this view of conversion. The conclusion,
+he says, "would seem to be the only sound one: conversion is in its
+essence a normal adolescent phenomenon, incidental to the passage from
+the child's small universe to the wider intellectual and spiritual life
+of maturity."[147] Conversion, in the sense of a change from "the
+child's small universe" to the large world of human society, may be a
+normal fact in life, but the really essential fact in the enquiry is not
+the fact of growth, but growth in a specific direction. Why should this
+normal change from childhood to maturity be the period during which
+_religious_ conversion is experienced? This question is not only ignored
+by Professor James, it is made more confused by his method of stating
+it. Of course, if all people experienced this religious conviction, as
+all people undergo other changes at adolescence, the question would be
+simplified. But this is obviously not the case. A large number of people
+never experience it so long as they are only brought into contact with
+ordinary social forces. Special circumstances seem usually to be
+required to rouse this sense of religious conviction. Nearly every story
+of conversion turns upon something unusual, unexpected, or dramatic
+occurring as the exciting cause. The question is, therefore, why should
+the line of growth, general with all at adolescence, be, in the case of
+some, diverted into religious channels? A study of the subject from this
+point of view will, I think, show that conversion is only normal in the
+sense that in an environment where religious influences are powerful
+each person is normally exposed to it. Those on whom the religious
+influence fails to operate experience the change from childhood to
+adolescence, on to complete maturity, without their nature evincing any
+lack of completeness. This is the vital truth of which Professor James
+loses sight, and it is ignored by the vast majority of writers who treat
+of the subject.
+
+Leaving, for a while, the statistical view of conversion, we may turn to
+its other aspects. By the more advanced of religious teachers to-day the
+developments attendant on adolescence are taken as supplying no more
+than a favourable occasion for directing mind and emotion to definite
+religious conviction. Here the connection is admittedly more or less
+accidental. But by the great majority of theologians there is assumed a
+direct supernatural influence in the states of mind developed during
+adolescence. In more primitive times the connection is of a yet closer
+character. Puberty does not at this stage represent what a modern would
+call an awakening of the religious consciousness, but a direct
+impingement of supernatural influence. From one point of view this
+conception still remains part of all religious systems, however overlaid
+it may be with modern ideas concerning sexual maturity. And we have, as
+a mere matter of historic fact, a whole series of customs commencing
+with the initiatory customs of savages and running right on to the
+modern practice of confirmation.
+
+In a previous chapter it was pointed out what is the savage state of
+mind in relation to the beginnings of sex life as it is manifested in
+both boys and girls. Adolescence does not, to the primitive mind, serve
+as an occasion for the creation of an interest in the religious life, it
+is the sign of direct supernatural influence. One consequence of this is
+the rise of more or less elaborate ceremonials marking the initiation of
+youth into direct communion with the spiritual forces that govern tribal
+life.[148] Among the Polynesians tattooing forms part of the religious
+ceremony, and during the time the marks are healing the boy is taboo to
+the rest of the tribe, owing to his having been touched by the gods.
+With the North American Indians the following ceremony seems
+characteristic:--
+
+"When a boy has attained the age of fourteen or fifteen years he absents
+himself from his father's lodge, lying on the ground in some remote or
+secluded spot, crying to the Great Spirit, and fasting the whole time.
+During this period of peril and abstinence, when he falls asleep, the
+first animal, bird, or reptile, of which he dreams, he considers the
+Great Spirit has designated for his mysterious protector through
+life."[149] Similar ceremonies are described by Livingstone as existing
+among the South African tribes. These customs are too widespread, and
+bear too great a similarity to be described with reference to many
+races. The variations are unimportant, and such as they are they may be
+studied in the pages of Hall, Frazer, and numerous other writers. With
+girls the measures adopted are of a more elaborate character than is the
+case with boys, because, for reasons already stated, the occurrence of
+puberty in girls gives the supernatural act a more startling and
+significant character. Hence the strict seclusion of girls almost
+universally practised among uncivilised peoples. The precautions taken
+indicate, as Hartland points out, that they are at this period not
+merely charged with a malign influence, but are peculiarly susceptible
+to the onset of powers other than human. And with a modification of
+language the same idea has persisted down to our time, even amongst
+those who would reject with indignation the statement that savage ideas
+concerning the nature of puberty form the real basis of their own mental
+attitude.
+
+This truth cannot be too strongly emphasised. To ignore it is to miss
+the whole significance of continuity in human institutions and ideas.
+The ceremonies described do, of course, gather round the fact of sexual
+development, but they are not concerned with the sexual life, as such.
+It is sex as a supernatural manifestation that is the vital feature of
+the situation. The governing idea is that puberty marks the direct
+association of the individual with a spiritual world to the influence of
+which the functional changes are due. As more accurate conceptions are
+formed, the older and inaccurate one is not altogether discarded. It has
+become incarnate in ceremonies, it is part of the traditional psychic
+life of the people, and the change is one of transformation rather than
+of eradication. In later cultural stages the physiological nature of the
+changes are seen, but they are expressed in terms of religion. Such
+expressions as "the soul's awareness of God," "the dawning consciousness
+of religion," etc., take the place of the earlier and more direct
+animistic interpretation. But the essential misinterpretation is
+retained, disguised from careless or uninformed people by the use of a
+modified terminology. But in substance the use made of puberty by
+organised religious forces remains the same throughout. We have the same
+absence of a rational explanation in both instances. In the one because
+the state of knowledge makes any other impossible; in the other because
+tradition, self-interest, and prejudice prevent its use. It is not only
+in his physical structure that man carries reminiscences of a lower form
+of life; such reminders are quite as plentiful in his mental life, and
+in social institutions.
+
+Even with many who perceive the mechanism of conversion its real
+significance is often missed. For the important thing is, not that some
+people express the changes incident to adolescence in terms of religion,
+but that many do not, and also that these find complete satisfaction
+along lines of æsthetic, intellectual, or social interest. Yet one often
+finds it assumed that the difference between the two classes is
+explained by assuming a certain lack of 'spiritual' development in the
+non-religious class. As stated, this is often perilously near to
+impertinence, and in any case is little better than the language of a
+charlatan. In the same way, the use of amatory phraseology is often
+treated as the intrusion of the sex element in a sphere in which it has
+no proper place. Enough has already been said to furnish good grounds
+for believing that there is much more than this in the phenomenon, and
+that one is justified in treating it as symptomatic of the operation of
+forces of the nature of which the subject is quite unaware. The only
+explanation of the facts already cited is that a misinterpretation of
+sexual states lies at the heart of the question. No other hypothesis
+covers the facts; no other hypothesis will explain why the larger number
+of people should find complete development in activities that lie
+outside the field of religion.
+
+How easy it is to see the truth and distort it in the stating may be
+seen in the following passage:--
+
+"Passing over the fact that the period of adolescence is noticeably a
+period of 'susceptibility,' we may take as an example of the intrusion
+or the persistence of the sexual elements in conditions of a non-sexual
+kind the frequent association of sexual with religious excitement. The
+appeal made during a religious revival to an unconverted person has
+psychologically some resemblance to the attempt of the male to overcome
+the hesitancy of the female. In each case the will has to be set aside,
+and strong suggestive means are used; and in both cases the appeal is
+not of the conflict type, but of an intimate, sympathetic, and pleading
+kind. In the effort to make a moral adjustment, it consequently turns
+out that a technique is used which was derived originally from sexual
+life, and the use, so to speak, of the sexual machinery for a moral
+adjustment involves, in some cases, the carrying over into the general
+process of some sexual manifestations."[150]
+
+The important questions, why religion should so powerfully appeal to
+people at adolescence, why its strength should reside so largely in the
+appeal to feelings associated with sexual development, and why
+conversion should be so rarely experienced when the period of sexual
+crisis is past, are quite ignored by Mr. Thomas. Yet it is precisely
+these questions that call most loudly for answers, and which, I believe,
+contain the key of the situation.
+
+From many points of view adolescence is perhaps the most important epoch
+in the life of every individual. It is a time of great and significant
+organic growth, with the development of new organs and functions, and a
+corresponding transformation of both the emotional and intellectual
+output. So far as the brain, the most important organ of all, is
+concerned, one may safely say that before puberty its main function has
+been acquisition. After puberty vast tracts of brain tissue become
+active, and an era of rapid development sets in. There is a rapid growth
+of new nerve connections which occasions both physiological and
+psychological unrest.[151] An important point to bear in mind, also, is
+that all periods of rapid development involve conditions of relative
+instability--one is, in fact, only the obverse side of the other. Dr.
+Mercier says that with girls "more or less decided manifestations of
+hysteria are the rule," and with both sexes this instability involves a
+peculiar susceptibility to suggestions and impressions. Accompanying the
+purely physical changes the mental and emotional nature undergoes what
+is little less than a transformation. There is less direct concern with
+self, and a more conscious concern with others. There is a craving for
+sympathy, for fellowship, a tendency to look at oneself from the
+outside, so to speak, a susceptibility to sights and sounds and
+impressions that formerly had little influence. Each one is conscious of
+new desires, new attractions, expressed often only in a vague feeling of
+unrest, with a desire, half shy because half conscious, for the company
+of the opposite sex. The childish desire for protection weakens; the
+more mature desire to protect others begins to express itself.
+
+Now, the whole significance of these changes, physical and mental, is
+fundamentally sexual and social. Human life, it may be said, has a
+twofold aspect. As a mere animal organism, there is the perpetuation of
+the species, which nature secures by the mere force of the sex impulse.
+As a human being, he is part of a social structure, cell in the social
+tissue, to use Leslie Stephen's expressive phrase. And in this direction
+nature secures what is necessary by the presence of impulses and
+cravings as imperious as, and even more permanent than, those of mere
+sex. Of course, in practice these two things operate together. By a
+process of selection, the anti-social character is weeded out, and the
+two sets of feelings work together in harmony for the furtherance and
+the development of the life of the species. The species is perpetuated
+in the interests of society; society is perpetuated in the interests of
+the species. Further, it is part of the natural 'plan' that there shall
+be developed impulses and capacities suitable to each phase of life as
+it emerges. Thus it has been shown that the lengthening of infancy--that
+is, the prolongation of the time during which the young human being is
+dependent upon its parents for support and protection--is nature's
+method of developing to a greater degree the capacity of the human
+animal for more complex adjustment. Instead of being launched on the
+world with a number of instincts practically fully developed, and so
+capable of attending to its own needs almost as soon as born, man is
+born with few instincts, and a great capacity for education enabling him
+to adjust his conduct to the demands of an environment constantly
+increasing in complexity. In the same way it has been shown that the
+instinct for play, practically universal throughout the whole of the
+animal world, is nature's method of preparing the young for the more
+serious business of nature.[152] It is, therefore, only in line with
+what is found to be true elsewhere that the changes incident to puberty
+should receive their rational interpretation in the necessities of
+social life. That these necessities should be met largely by the play of
+unreasoning impulse is, again, quite in line with what occurs in other
+directions. The insistent pressure of social life for thousands of
+generations secures the emergence of needs of the true nature of which
+the individual may be ignorant. In no other way, in fact, could the
+persistence of the species and of human society be secured.
+
+The whole significance, then, of puberty and adolescence is the entry of
+the individual into the larger life of the race. It is, too, a statement
+beyond reasonable dispute that if we eliminate religion altogether from
+the environment there is not a single feeling experienced at
+adolescence, not a single intellectual craving, that would not undergo
+full development and receive complete satisfaction. The proof of the
+truth of this is that it occurs in a large number of cases. Sacrifice,
+the craving for the ideal, with every other feeling associated by many
+with religion, exist in connection with non-religious phases of life. It
+is idle to argue that some people have a craving for religion, and
+nothing but religion will satisfy them. Where an individual is in
+complete ignorance of the nature and significance of his own
+development, and those around him no better informed; where, moreover,
+there are others in a position of authority ready with a special
+interpretation, it is not surprising if the religious explanation is
+accepted as the genuine and only one. But in reality a sound judgment is
+formed, not on the basis of what some declare they cannot do without,
+but on the basis of what others actually do without, and suffer no
+observable loss in consequence. We do not estimate the value of alcohol
+on the basis of those who declare they cannot do without it. The true
+test is found in those who abstain from its use. So, also, in the case
+of religion. That some, even the majority, declare that religious belief
+is essential to their welfare, proves little or nothing. Human nature
+being what it is, and the history of society being what it is, it would
+be surprising were it otherwise. There is much greater significance in
+so large a number of people finding complete satisfaction in purely
+secular activities.
+
+After what has been said of the misinterpretation of mental and
+emotional states in terms of religious belief, it is not surprising to
+find a writer, a clergyman, and one with experience of growing boys,
+express himself as follows:--
+
+"My experience confirms the opinion of the psychologists that most boys
+of the public school age have a strongly mystical tendency. This is to
+be expected, on account of the great emotional development of that
+period of life. But it is obscured by the fact that the boy is both
+unwilling and unable to give any verbal expression to this tendency. He
+is unwilling because it is something very new and curious in his
+experience; he is often a little frightened of it, and he is exceedingly
+frightened of other people's contempt for it. And he is unable, because
+the words he is accustomed to use are valueless in this connection, and
+he feels priggish if he tries to use others.... But, though unexplained,
+the mystical tendency is there, and should be appealed to and
+developed."[153]
+
+Now, clearly, all that can be reasonably meant by saying that a boy of,
+apparently, from 12 to 16 has a mystical tendency, is that the
+physiological changes incident to puberty are accompanied by a mass of
+feeling of a vague and formless character. Naturally, his boyish
+experience is unable to furnish him with the means of giving adequate
+expression to his feelings. That can only come with the experience of
+maturity. And with equal inevitability he is at the mercy of the
+explanation furnished him by those whom he regards as his teachers and
+guides. When he is told that this element of 'mysticism' is the
+awakening of religion in his soul, he accepts the explanation precisely
+as he accepts explanations of other things. That this 'mystical
+tendency' should be appealed to and developed is a statement open to
+very great doubt. It should rather be explained, not perhaps in a
+brutally frank manner, but in a way that would lead the boy to see
+himself as an organic part of society, with definite duties and
+obligations. If this were done, adolescence might provide us with the
+raw material for a much greater number of useful and intelligent
+citizens than it does at present. The true nature of the process, so
+elaborately misunderstood by Dr. Temple, is clearly outlined by Dr.
+Mercier:--
+
+"In connection with normal development, a large body of vague and
+formless feeling arises, and, until experience gives it shape, the
+possessor remains ignorant of the source and nature of the feeling. If
+the circumstances are appropriate for the natural outlet and expression
+of the activities, they are expressed in affection, and are a source of
+health and strength to the possessor. But if no such outlet exists, the
+vague, voluminous, formless feelings are referred to an occasion that is
+vague, voluminous, and wanting in definite form, they are ascribed to
+the direct influence of the Deity, and assume a place in religious
+emotion."[154]
+
+Leaving this aspect of the subject for a time, let us look more closely
+at the process of conversion. It has already been pointed out that one
+great feature of adolescence is susceptibility to impressions and
+suggestions. One is not surprised to find, therefore, that in
+Starbuck's collection of cases 34 per cent. of the females and 29 per
+cent. of the males described their conversion as being directly due to
+imitation, social pressure, and example. If we were to add to these the
+cases where unconscious imitation and suggestion is at work, the
+proportion would be much greater. Religion, like dress, has its modes,
+and imitation will occur in the one direction as readily as in the
+other. Nothing is more striking in the records of conversion than the
+monotony of the language used to describe the feelings experienced. It
+is exactly as though the converts had been learning a regular catechism,
+as in a way they have been. Young boys and girls will confess their
+sinful state in language identical with that used by one who has
+actually lived a career of vice and crime. Others of an aggressively
+commonplace character will use the language of exalted mysticism
+suitable to an Augustine or a Jacob Boehme. In these cases we have not
+identity of feeling finding expression in identity of language; it is
+pure imitation and suggestion without the least regard to the fitness of
+the language employed.
+
+The full power of suggestion would be more fitly considered in
+connection with waves of religious feeling that have assumed an epidemic
+form; but it will not be out of place here to call attention to this
+factor in such a recent case as the outbreaks in Wales under the
+leadership of persons such as Evan Roberts. Quite apart from the
+suggestion and imitation operating in the gatherings themselves, it is
+plain that many went to the meetings quite prepared to act in accordance
+with what had gone before. Newspapers had published elaborate reports
+of the 'scenes,' certain manifestations were recognised as signs of the
+"workings of the Spirit," with the result that all these operated as
+powerful suggestions, particularly with those of a hysterical
+disposition. And behind this particular revival there were the
+traditions of other revivals, all of which had created a heritage as
+coercive as any purely social tradition. A crowd of people in a state of
+eager expectancy, exposed to the assaults of a preacher skilled in
+rousing their emotion to fever pitch, is naturally ready to see and hear
+things that none would see and hear in their normal moments. No better
+field for the study of crowd psychology, particularly at the point at
+which it merges into the abnormal, could be imagined than the ordinary
+revival.
+
+In America these revival out breaks seem to assume a much more
+extravagant form than with us. Mr. Stanley Hall, for example, thus
+describes a Kentucky camp meeting in which the prevailing term of
+spiritual manifestation was that of 'jerking.' Quoting from an
+eye-witness, he says:--
+
+"The crowd swarmed all night round the preacher, singing, shouting,
+laughing, some plunging wildly over stumps and benches into the forest,
+shouting 'Lost, lost!' others leaping and bounding about like live fish
+out of water; others rolling over and over on the ground for hours;
+others lying on the ground and talking when they could not move; and yet
+others beating the ground with their heels. As the excitement increased,
+it grew more morbid and took the form of 'jerkings,' or in others the
+holy laugh. The jerks began with the head, which was thrown violently
+from side to side so rapidly that the features were blurred and the
+hair almost seemed to snap, and when the sufferer struck an obstacle and
+fell he would bounce about like a ball. Saplings were sometimes cut
+breast high for the people to jerk by. In one place the earth about the
+roots of one of them was kicked about as though by the feet of a horse
+stamping flies. One sufferer mounted his horse to ride away when the
+jerks threw him to the earth, whence he rose a Christian. A lad, who
+feigned illness to stay away, was dragged there by the spirit and his
+head dashed against the wall till he had to pray. A sceptic who cursed
+and swore was crushed by a falling tree. Men fancied themselves dogs,
+and gathered round a tree barking and 'treeing the devil.' They saw
+visions and dreamed dreams, and as the revival waned, it left a crop of
+nervous and hysterical disorders in its wake."[155]
+
+We have nothing quite so extreme as this in British revivals, but the
+home phenomena are not substantially different in nature. A medical
+observer of some of the earliest Methodist revivals thus describes the
+symptoms of those who were subject to 'divine' seizures under the
+influence of Wesley and his immediate followers:--
+
+"There came on first a feeling of faintness, with rigor and a sense of
+weight at the pit of the stomach; soon after which the patient cried out
+as though in the agonies of labour. The convulsions then began, first
+showing themselves in the muscles of the eyelids, though the eyes
+themselves were fixed and staring. The most frightful contortions of the
+countenance followed, and the convulsions now took their course
+downwards, so that the muscles of the trunk and neck were affected,
+causing a sobbing respiration, which was performed with great effort.
+Tremors and agitations ensued, and the patients screamed out violently,
+and tossed their heads from side to side. As the complaint increased, it
+seized the arms, and its victims beat their breasts, clasped their
+hands, and made all sorts of strange noises."
+
+To the non-medical religious observer the scenes produced a different
+impression, thus:--
+
+"When the power of religion began to be spoken of, the presence of God
+really filled the place.... The greatest number of them who cried or
+fell were men; but some women and several children felt the power of the
+same Almighty Spirit, and seemed just sinking into hell. This occasioned
+a mixture of sounds, some shrieking, some roaring aloud. The most
+general was a loud breathing, like that of people half strangled and
+gasping for life; and, indeed, almost all the cries were like those of
+human creatures dying in bitter anguish.... I stood on a pew seat, as
+did a young man in the opposite pew, an able-bodied, fresh, healthy
+countryman; but in a moment, while he seemed to think of nothing less,
+down he dropt with a violence inconceivable. The adjoining pews seemed
+shook with his fall. I heard afterwards the stamping of his feet ready
+to break the boards as he lay in strong convulsions at the bottom of the
+pew.... Among the children who felt the arrows of the Almighty, I saw a
+sturdy boy, about eight years old, who roared above his fellows, and
+seemed, in his agony, to struggle with the strength of a grown man. His
+face was red as scarlet; and almost all on whom God laid His hand turned
+either very red or almost black."[156]
+
+In other instances connected with the same movement, a girl is described
+as "lying on the floor as one dead." One woman "tore up the ground with
+her hands, filling them with dust and with the hard-trodden grass";
+another "roared and screamed in dreadful agony." A child, seven years
+old, "saw visions, and astonished the neighbours with her awful manner
+of relating them." John Wesley personally interviewed a number of the
+people seized in this manner, and was quite convinced of the
+supernatural nature of the attacks. He said that he had "generally
+observed more or less of these outward symptoms to attend the beginning
+of a general work of God," although he admitted that in some cases
+"Satan mimicked God's work in order to discredit the whole work." But
+whether of God or Satan there was no question of their supernatural
+character. Moreover, whatever may be one's opinion of these outbreaks,
+there is one fact that stands out clear and indisputable. This is that
+the Methodist revival owed a great deal of its vitality--as is also the
+case with other religious movements--to phenomena of a distinctly
+pathologic nature. Subtract from these movements all phenomena of the
+class indicated, and such phrases as 'the revival fire' become
+meaningless. Right through history religious conviction has been gained
+in innumerable cases by the operation of factors that a more accurate
+knowledge finds can be explained without any reference whatever to
+supernatural forces.
+
+Lest the above examples be dismissed as belonging to an old order of
+things, I subjoin the following account--from a missionary--of a recent
+revival scene in India:--
+
+"There were people ... on the floor fairly writhing over the realisation
+of sin as it came over them.... Saturday we were favoured with a
+wonderful manifestation of the Spirit. One of the older girls who had
+had a remarkable experience, went into a trance, with her head thrown
+back, her arms folded, and motionless, except for a slight movement of
+her foot. She seemed to be seeing something wonderful, for she would
+marvel at it, and then laugh excitedly.... One girl rushed to the back
+of the vestibule and, lying across a bench, with her head and hands
+against the wall, she fairly writhed in agony for two hours before peace
+came to her."[157]
+
+I do not know on what grounds we are justified in calling civilised
+people who chronicle these outbreaks as "a wonderful manifestation of
+the Spirit." Civilised in other respects, in relation to other matters,
+they may be. Civilised in relation to this particular matter they
+certainly are not. Their viewpoint is precisely that of the lowest tribe
+of savages. Savages, indeed, could not do more; our 'civilised'
+missionaries do no less. Tylor well says that "such descriptions carry
+us far back in the history of the human mind, showing modern men still
+in ignorant sincerity producing the very fits and swoons to which for
+untold ages savage tribes have given religious import. These
+manifestations in modern Europe indeed form part of a revival of
+religion, the religion of mental disease."[158]
+
+The truth is that the appeals usually made to induce conversion, and the
+methods adopted, tend to develop a morbid state of mind, which very
+easily passes into the pathological. A too insistent habit of
+introspection is always dangerous, and the danger is heightened when it
+takes the form of religious brooding. In Dr. Starbuck's collection of
+cases, seventy-five per cent. of the males and sixty per cent. of the
+females confessed to feelings of depression, anxiety, and sadness before
+conversion. This may be attributed partly to the harping upon a
+conviction of sinfulness, which in itself is wholly of an unhealthy
+character. It does not indicate moral health, and it is very far from
+indicating physiological health. The following confessions are
+pertinent, and will illustrate both points. I give in brackets the ages
+of the subjects where stated:--
+
+"I felt the wrath of God resting on me. I called on Him for aid, and
+felt my sins forgiven" (13).
+
+"I couldn't eat, and would lie awake all night."
+
+"Often, very often, I cried myself to sleep" (19).
+
+"Hymns would sound in my ears as if sung" (10).
+
+"I had visions of Christ saying to me, Come to Me, My child" (15).
+
+"Just before conversion I was walking along a pathway, thinking of
+religious matters, when suddenly the word H-e-l-l was spelled out five
+yards ahead of me" (17).
+
+"I felt a touch of the Divine One, and a voice said 'Thy sins are
+forgiven thee; arise and go in peace'" (12).
+
+"The thoughts of my condition were terrible" (13).
+
+"For three months it seemed as if God's Spirit had withdrawn from me.
+Fear took hold of me. For a week I was on the border of despair" (16).
+
+"A sense of sinfulness and estrangement from God grew daily" (15).
+
+"Everything went wrong with me; it felt like Sunday all the time" (12).
+
+"I felt that something terrible was going to happen" (14).
+
+"I fell on my face by a bench and tried to pray. Every time I would call
+on God something like a man's hand would strangle me by choking. I
+thought I would surely die if I could not get help. I made one final
+effort to call on God for mercy if I did strangle and die, and the last
+I remember at that time was falling back on the ground with that unseen
+hand on my throat. When I came to myself there was a crowd around
+praising God."
+
+A crowd around praising God! For all substantial purposes this last
+might be the description of a state of affairs in Central Africa instead
+of an occurrence in a country that claims to be civilised. It is not
+surprising that so great an authority as Sir T. S. Clouston gives an
+emphatic warning against revival services and unusual religious
+meetings, which should "on no account be attended by persons with weak
+heads, excitable dispositions, and neurotic constitutions."[159]
+Unfortunately it is precisely these classes for whom they possess the
+greatest attractions, and from whom the larger number of chronicled
+cases are drawn. The excitement of the revival meeting is as fatal an
+attraction to them as the dram is to the confirmed alcoholist; and if
+the ill-consequences are neither so immediately discernible nor as
+repulsive in character, they are none the less present in a large number
+of cases. The emotional strain to which the organism is subjected
+occurs, as the ages of the converts show, precisely at the time when it
+is least able to bear it safely. The main characteristic of adolescence
+is instability, physical, emotional, and intellectual. It is a time of
+stress and strain, of the formation of new feelings and associations and
+desires that crave for expression and gratification. The instability of
+the organic conditions is evidenced by the large proportion of nervous
+disorders that occur during adolescence. Adolescent insanity is a
+well-known form of mania, although it is usually of brief duration. Sir
+T. S. Clouston, in his _Neuroses of Development_, gives a long list of
+complaints attendant on adolescence, and Sir W. R. Gowers, dealing with
+1450 cases of epilepsy, points out that "three-quarters of the cases of
+epilepsy begin under twenty years, and nearly half (46 per cent.)
+between ten and twenty, the maximum being at fourteen, fifteen, and
+sixteen." Of hysteria, the same writer points out that of the total
+cases 50 per cent. occurs from ten to twenty years of age, 20 per cent.
+from twenty to thirty, and only 10 per cent. from thirty to forty.[160]
+
+The peculiar danger, then, of the modern appeal for conversion is that
+it is couched in a form likely to do the minimum of good and the maximum
+of harm. Where religion exists as a normally operative factor of the
+environment--as in lower stages of culture--the danger is avoided,
+because no special machinery is required to bring about religious
+conviction. The general social life secures this. But at a later stage,
+when the religious and secular aspects of life become separated, with a
+growing preponderance of the latter, religion must be, as it were,
+specially and forcibly introduced. Whether for good or ill, it is a
+disturbing force. It strives to divert the developing organic energies
+into a new channel. To effect this, it plays upon the emotions to an
+altogether dangerous extent, in complete ignorance of the nature of the
+passions excited. In the older form of the religious appeal, that in
+which fear was the chief emotion aroused, it is now generally conceded
+that the consequences were wholly bad. But under any form the emotional
+appeal is fraught with danger, since the tendency is for it to bring out
+unsuspected weaknesses in other directions. Sir W. R. Gowers wisely
+points out that "mental emotion--fright, excitement, anxiety--is the
+most potent cause of epilepsy," which is accounted for by bearing in
+mind "the profoundly disturbing effect of alarm on the nervous system,
+deranging as it does almost every function of the nervous system."
+Persons with predispositions to nervous disorders may pass with safety
+through the period of adolescence so long as their circumstances provide
+opportunities for healthy occupation with no undue emotional strain. But
+let the former be lacking, and the latter danger is always present. The
+hidden weakness develops, and injury more or less permanent follows.
+There is hardly a qualified medical authority in the country who would
+deny the truth of what has been said, although many do not care to speak
+out in relation to religious matters. But all would doubtless agree with
+Dr. Mercier that "every revival is attended by its crop of cases of
+insanity, which are the more numerous as the revival is more fervent and
+long continued."[161]
+
+Something must be said on the moral character of conversions in
+general. This is, naturally, greatly exaggerated, often deliberately so.
+In the first place, confessions of 'sinfulness' in a pre-conversion
+state, when made by youths of both sexes, may be dismissed as quite
+worthless. They are merely using the language placed in their mouths by
+professional evangelists, and the similarity of the confessions carry
+their own condemnation. Leading a sinful, or even a vicious life,
+usually means no more than visiting a theatre, or a music hall, or
+playing cards, or non-attendance at church, or not troubling about
+religious doctrines. Very often the vague feeling of restlessness
+incident to adolescence is interpreted as due to sin or estrangement
+from God, and after conversion the convert is, for purposes of
+self-glorification, given to magnify the benefits and comforts derived
+from his religious convictions. The magnitude of the change increases
+the value of the convert, and with well-known characters there has been
+as great an exaggeration of vices before conversion as of virtues
+subsequently. The way in which evangelical Christianity has created a
+life of the wildest dissipation for the earlier years of John Bunyan is
+an instructive instance of this procedure.
+
+So far as older converts are concerned, everyone of balanced judgment
+will regard stories of conversion from extreme vice to extreme virtue
+with the greatest suspicion. Character does not change suddenly,
+although there may be cases of 'sports' in the moral world as elsewhere.
+Where some modification of conduct, but hardly of character, results,
+the machinery is very obvious, and does not in the least necessitate an
+appeal to the intrusion of a supernatural influence for an explanation.
+The religious gathering opens--as any non-religious meeting may open--a
+new circle of associates with different ideals and standards of value.
+So long as the newcomer is desirous of retaining the respect of his
+fresh associates, so long he will try to act as they act and think as
+they think. There will be a change of conduct, but not, as I have said,
+of character. Those who look closely will find the same character still
+active. The mean character remains mean, the untruthful one remains
+untruthful. The only difference is that these qualities will be
+expressed in a different form. Moreover, the same thing may be seen
+occurring quite apart from religion. Every association of men and women
+exerts precisely the same influence. In the army, a regiment that has a
+reputation for steadiness and sobriety develops these qualities in all
+who enter it. Regiments with a reputation for opposite qualities do not
+fail to convert newcomers. A workshop, a club, a profession, exerts a
+precisely similar influence. One man finds inspiration in the Bible and
+another in the Newgate Calendar. A man will usually be guided by the
+ideals of his associates, whether these ideals be those of a thieves'
+kitchen or of a philanthropic institution. This only means that each
+individual is subject to the influence of the group spirit. For good and
+evil this is one of the deepest and most pregnant facts of human nature.
+The utilisation and distortion of this fact in the interests of
+religious organisations has served to prevent its general recognition
+and the wise use of it by the community at large.
+
+Finally, it has to be borne in mind, in view of the data given above,
+that conversion is experienced by the individual at that period of life
+when the more social side of human nature is beginning to find
+expression. In this way the natural growth from the small world of
+childhood to the larger world of adult humanity is taken advantage of by
+religion, and the process of inevitable growth is attributed to the
+influence of religious belief. In itself the phenomenon is in no degree
+religious, but wholly social. The process is well enough described by
+Starbuck in the following passage--although there are certain quite
+unnecessary theological implications:--
+
+"Conversion is the surrender of the personal will to be guided by the
+larger forces of which it is a part. These two aspects are often
+mingled. In both there is much in common. There is a sudden revelation
+and recognition of a higher order than that of the personal will. The
+sympathies follow the direction of the new insight, and the convert
+transfers the centre of life and activity from the part to the whole.
+With new insight comes new beauty. Beauty and worth awaken love--love
+for parents, kindred, kind, society, cosmic order, truth, and spiritual
+life. The individual learns to transfer himself from a centre of
+self-activity into an organ of revelation of universal being, and to
+live a life of affection for and oneness with the larger life outside.
+As a necessary condition of the spiritual awakening is the birth of
+fresh activity and of a larger self-consciousness, which often assert
+themselves as the dominant element in consciousness."[162]
+
+Adolescence is the golden period of life, because it is the age in which
+the formative influences effect their strongest and most permanent
+impressions. But this susceptibility, while pregnant with promise, is
+because of this susceptibility likewise fraught with the possibilities
+of danger. The developing qualities of mind need to be wisely and
+carefully guided; and it is little short of criminal that at this
+critical juncture so many young people should be handed over to the
+ignorant ministrations of professional evangelism. The true sociological
+significance of the development is ignored, and it is small wonder that,
+having wasted this impressionable period, so many people should go
+through life with a quite rudimentary sense of social responsibility and
+duty. An American author, speaking of the connection between certain
+brutal manifestations in social life in the United States and religious
+teaching, says:--
+
+"It is well known that lynching in the South is carried on largely by
+the ignorant and baser elements of the white population. It is also well
+known that the chief method of religious influence and training of the
+black man and the ignorant white man is impulsive and emotional
+revivalism. It is a highly dangerous situation, and deserves the earnest
+consideration of the ecclesiastical statesmen of all denominations which
+work in the South. It will be impossible to protect that part of the
+nation, or any other, from the epidemic madness of the lynching mob if
+the seeds of it are sown in the sacred soil of religion.... Their
+preachers are great 'soul-savers,' but they lack the practical sense to
+build up their emotionalised converts into anything that approaches a
+higher life."[163]
+
+The truth of this passage has a very wide implication. It is not alone
+true that so long as the lower kind of revivalism is encouraged, we are
+unconsciously perpetuating certain very ugly manifestations of social
+life; it is also true that while we give a supernaturalistic
+interpretation of phenomena that are wholly physiological and
+sociological in character, we can never make the most of the human
+material we possess. On the one side we have a deplorable encouragement
+of unhealthy emotionalism, and on the other a sheer misdirection and
+misuse of human faculty. The increase of self-consciousness, the craving
+for sympathy and communion with one's fellows, the impulse to service in
+the common life of the State, have no genuine connection with religion,
+although all these qualities are classified as religious, and are
+utilised by religious organisations. Actually and fundamentally they
+belong to the social side of human nature. As our hands are developed
+for grasping, and the various organs of the body for their respective
+functions, so mental and emotional qualities are developed in their due
+course for a rational social life. Biologically and psychologically,
+male and female are at adolescence entering into a deeper and more
+enduring relationship with the life of the race. There is no other
+meaning to the process.
+
+Naturally enough, the vast majority of people express their developing
+nature in accordance with the fashion of their environment. If this
+environmental influence were rationally non-religious, the language
+would be that of a non-religious philosophy. As, however,
+supernaturalism, in some form or other, is still a potent force we have
+a contrary result. It is only here and there that one is found with the
+inclination or the wit to analyse his or her impulses, and few possess
+enough knowledge to make the analysis profitable. There is no wonder
+that concerning many of the most important phenomena of human life we
+are still little above the level of the fetish worshipper. We may have a
+more elaborate phraseology, but the old ideas are still operative. The
+consequence is that each newcomer finds certain ideas and forms of
+speech ready for his acceptance, and is handed over, bound hand and
+foot, to influences that are the least capable of sane direction. We do
+not merely sacrifice our first-born; we immolate the whole of our
+progeny. The ignorant past plays into the hands of the designing
+present; the present conspires with the past to rob the future of the
+good that might result from the growth of a wiser and a better race.
+
+Were society really enlightened and genuinely civilised, the truth of
+what has been said would be recognised as soon as stated. It would,
+indeed, be unnecessary to labour what would then be a generally
+recognised truth. But the mass of the people are not genuinely
+enlightened, our civilisation is largely a veneer, and numerous agencies
+prevent our reaping the full benefit of our available knowledge. Thus it
+happens that in place of an explanation of human qualities in terms of
+biologic and social evolution, we find current an explanation that is
+based upon pre-scientific ideas. Because our less instructed ancestors
+accounted for various manifestations of human qualities as due to a
+supernatural influence, we continue to perpetuate the delusion. We teach
+youth to express itself in terms of supernaturalism, and then treat the
+language and the fact as inseparable. In this respect, sociology is
+passing through a phase from which some of the sciences have finally
+emerged. In physics and astronomy, for instance, the fact has been
+separated from the supernatural explanation, and shown to be
+independent of it. An exploitation of social life in the interests of
+supernaturalism is still in active operation. It is this that is really
+the central truth of the situation. And in ignoring this truth we expose
+a growing generation to the worst possible of educative influences, at a
+time when a wiser control would be preparing it for an intelligent
+participation in the serious and enduring work of social organisation.
+
+
+FOOTNOTES:
+
+[142] Dr. G. B. Cutten, _The Psychological Phenomena of Christianity_,
+pp. 7-8.
+
+[143] The most elaborate study of this character known to the present
+writer is Mr. G. Stanley Hall's _Adolescence_, in two volumes. The bulk
+of the work is, however, terrifying to some, and the cost prohibitive to
+many. For the general reader of limited leisure and means, Professor
+Starbuck's smaller volume, _The Psychology of Religion_, presents the
+salient facts in a brief and satisfactory manner. It is lacking,
+however, on the anthropological side, a view that is well presented by
+Dr. Stanley Hall.
+
+[144] See _Adolescence_, i. p. 528.
+
+[145] Vol. iii. p. 279.
+
+[146] _Psychology of Religion_, chap. iii. Hall's figures are given in
+the second volume of his work, pp. 288-92.
+
+[147] _Varieties_, p. 199.
+
+[148] An elaborate list of these ceremonies in both the savage and
+civilised worlds has been compiled by Mr. Hall, ii. chap. xiii.
+
+[149] Catlin, _North American Indians_, i. p. 36; see also ii. p. 347.
+
+[150] W. I. Thomas, _Sex and Society_, pp. 115-6.
+
+[151] For a good summary, see Donaldson's _Growth of the Brain_, pp.
+241-48.
+
+[152] See on this subject the two fine works by Karl Groos, _The Play of
+Animals_, _The Play of Man_.
+
+[153] W. Temple, _Repton School Sermons_.
+
+[154] _Sanity and Insanity_, p. 281.
+
+[155] _Adolescence_, ii. pp. 286-7.
+
+[156] Southey's _Life of Wesley_, chap. xxiv.
+
+[157] From _The Examiner_ of September 6, 1906, cited by Cutten, p. 185.
+
+[158] _Primitive Culture_, ii. p. 422.
+
+[159] _Clinical Lectures_, p. 39.
+
+[160] _Manual of Diseases of the Nervous System_, 1893, pp. 732 and 785.
+
+[161] _Sanity and Insanity_, p. 282.
+
+[162] _Psychology of Religion_, pp. 146-7.
+
+[163] _Primitive Traits in Religious Revivals._
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER EIGHT
+
+RELIGIOUS EPIDEMICS
+
+
+Under pressure of scientific analysis the old distinction between the
+individual and society bids fair to break down, or to maintain itself as
+no more than a convenience of classification. It is now being recognised
+that a society is something more than a mere aggregate of self-contained
+units, and that the individual is quite inexplicable apart from the
+social group. It is the latter which gives the former his individuality.
+His earliest impressions are derived from the life of the group, and as
+he grows so he comes more and more under the influence of social forces.
+The consequence is that the key to a very large part of the phenomena of
+human nature is to be found in a study of group life. We may abstract
+the individual for purposes of examination, much as a physiologist may
+study the heart or the liver apart from the body from which it has been
+taken. But ultimately it is in relation to the whole that the true
+significance and value of the part is to be discerned.
+
+In this corporate life imitation and suggestion play a powerful part.
+With children, by far the larger part of their education consists of
+sheer imitation, nor do adults ever develop beyond its influence.
+Suggestion is a factor that is more operative in youth and maturity than
+in early childhood, and is exhibited in a thousand and one subtle and
+unexpected ways. Both these forces are essential to an orderly, and to a
+progressive, social life; but they may just as easily become the cause
+of movements that are retrogressive, and even anti-social in character.
+An epidemic of suicide or of murder is as easily initiated as an
+epidemic of philanthropy. Let a person commit suicide in a striking and
+unusual manner, and there will soon be others following his example.
+Given a favourable environment, there is no idea, however unreal, that
+will not find advocates; no example, however strange or disgusting, that
+will not find imitators. The more uniform the society, the more powerful
+the suggestion, the easier the imitation. That is why a crowd, acting as
+a crowd, is nearly always made up of people drawn from the same social
+stratum, each unit already familiar with certain ideals and belief.
+Under such conditions a crowd will assume all the characteristics of a
+psychological entity. As Gustave Le Bon has pointed out, a crowd will do
+collectively what none of its constituent units would ever dream of
+doing singly.[164] It becomes capable of deeds of heroism or of savage
+cruelty. It will sacrifice itself or others with indifference. Above
+all, the mere fact of moving in a mass gives the individual a sense of
+power, a certainty of being in the right that he can--save under
+exceptional circumstances--never acquire while alone. The intellect is
+subdued, inhibition is inoperative, the instincts are given free play,
+and their movement is determined in turn by suggestions not unlike those
+with which a trained hypnotist influences his subject.
+
+In the phenomena of contagion words and symbols play a powerful part.
+They are both a rallying-point and an outlet for the emotions of a
+crowd. These words or symbols may be wholly incongruous with the real
+needs of a people, but provided they are sufficiently familiar they will
+serve their purpose. And the more primitive the type of mind represented
+by the mass of the people the more powerfully these symbols operate.
+Shakespeare's portrayal of the crowd in _Julius Cæsar_ remains eternally
+true. The skilled orator, playing on old feelings, using familiar terms,
+and invoking familiar ideas, finds a crowd quite plastic to his hands.
+It is for these reasons that there is so keen a struggle with political
+and social parties for a monopoly of good rallying cries, and a
+readiness to fix objectionable titles on their opponents. Patriotism,
+Little Englander, Jingo, The Church in Danger, Godless Education, etc.
+etc. Causes are materially helped or injured by these means. There is
+little or no consideration given to their justice or reasonableness; it
+is the image aroused that does the work.
+
+Psychological epidemics may in some cases be justly called normal in
+character. That is, they depend upon factors that are always in
+operation and which form a part of every social structure. A war fever
+or a commercial panic falls under this head. In other instances they
+depend upon abnormal conditions, upon the workings, perhaps, of some
+obscure nervous disease, and are of a pathological description. In yet
+other cases they represent a mixture of both. In such cases, for
+example, as that of the Medieval Flagellants or of the Dancing Mania,
+the presence of pathological elements is unmistakable. But neither of
+these epidemics could have occurred without a certain social
+preparation, and unless they had called into operation those principles
+of crowd psychology to which science has within recent years turned its
+attention, and which are normal factors in every society. These three
+classes of epidemics may be found in connection with subjects other than
+religious, but I am at present concerned with them only in that
+relation, and to point out that, in spite of their undesirable or
+admittedly pathologic character, they have yet served to keep
+supernaturalism alive and active.
+
+During the Christian period of European history by far the most
+important of all epidemics, as it was indeed the earliest, was
+monasticism. This takes front rank because of its extent, the degree to
+which it prepared the ground for subsequent outbreaks, and because of
+its indirect, and, I think, too little noticed, social consequences. It
+may safely be said that no other movement has so powerfully affected
+European society as has the monasticism of the early Christian
+centuries. It cannot, of course, be urged that Christianity originated
+monasticism. India and Egypt had its ascetic practices and celibate
+priesthood long before the birth of Christianity, and indeed gave
+Christianity the pattern from which to work. But the main stream of
+social life remained unaffected to any considerable extent by this
+asceticism. The social and domestic virtues received full recognition
+from the upholders of the monastic life, and there is no evidence that
+asceticism ever assumed an epidemic form. It has often been the lot of
+the Christian Church to give a more intense expression to religious
+tendencies already existing, and this was so in the case before us. At
+any rate, it was left for the Christian Church to give to monasticism
+the character of an epidemic, to treat the purely social and domestic
+virtues as a positive hindrance to the religious life, seriously to
+disturb national well-being, and to come perilously near destroying
+civilisation.
+
+The origin of ascetic practices has already been indicated in a previous
+chapter. It has there been pointed out that the deliberate torture of
+mind and body arose from the belief that the induced states brought man
+into direct communion with supernatural powers, and that this element
+has continued in almost every religion in the world. Says
+Baring-Gould:--
+
+"The ascetic instinct is intimately united with the religious instinct.
+There is scarcely a religion of ancient and modern times, certain forms
+of Protestantism excepted, that does not recognise asceticism as an
+element in its system.... Brahmanism has its order of ascetics....
+Mohammedanism has its fakirs, subduing the flesh by their austerities,
+and developing the spirit by their contemplation and prayers. Fasting
+and self-denial were observances required of the Greeks, who desired
+initiation into the mysteries.... The scourge was used before the altars
+of Artemis and over the tomb of Pelops. The Egyptian priests passed
+their novitiate in the deserts, and when not engaged in their religious
+functions were supposed to spend their time in caves. They renounced all
+commerce with the world, and lived in contemplation, temperance, and
+frugality, and in absolute poverty.... The Peruvians were required to
+fast before sacrificing to the gods, and to bind themselves by vows of
+chastity and abstinence from nourishing food.... There were ascetic
+orders for old men and nunneries for widows among the Totomacs, monastic
+orders among Toltecs dedicated to the service of Quetzalcoatl, and
+others among the Aztecs consecrated to Tezcatlipoca."[165]
+
+It was argued by Bingham, a learned eighteenth-century ecclesiastical
+historian, that although asceticism was known and practised in
+individual cases from the earliest period of Christian history, it did
+not establish itself within the Church until the fourth century. It is
+not a matter of great consequence to the subject under discussion
+whether this be so or not. It is at least certain that Christian
+teaching contained within itself all the elements for such a
+development, which was bound, sooner or later, to transpire. The
+antithesis between the flesh and the spirit, the conception of the world
+as given over to Satan, the ascetic teaching of Paul, with the value
+placed upon suffering and privation as spiritually disciplinary forces,
+could not but create in a society permeated with a special type of
+supernaturalism, that asceticism which became so marked a feature of
+medieval Christianity. And it is certain also that in no other instance
+has asceticism proved itself so grave a danger to social order and
+security. Allowing for what Lecky calls the 'glaring mendacity' of the
+lives of the saints, a description that applies more or less to all the
+ecclesiastical writings of the early centuries, it is evident that the
+number of monks, their ferocity, and general practices, were enough to
+constitute a grave social danger. It is said that St. Pachomius had 7000
+monks under his direct rule; that in the time of Jerome 50,000 monks
+gathered together at the Easter festival; that one Egyptian city
+mustered 20,000 nuns and 10,000 monks, and that the monastic population
+of Egypt at one time equalled in number the rest of the inhabitants. At
+a later date, within fifty years of its institution, the Franciscan
+Order possessed 8000 houses, with 200,000 members. In the twelfth
+century the Cluniacs had 2000 monasteries in France. In England, as late
+as 1546, Hooper, afterwards Bishop of Gloucester, declared that there
+were no less than 10,000 nuns in England. Every country in Europe
+possessed a larger or smaller army of men and women whose ideals were in
+direct conflict with nearly all that makes for a sane and progressive
+civilisation.
+
+The general character of the monk during the full swing of the ascetic
+epidemic has been well sketched by Lecky. His summary here will save a
+more extended exposition:--
+
+"There is perhaps no phase in the moral history of mankind of a deeper
+and more painful interest than this ascetic epidemic. A hideous, sordid,
+and emaciated maniac, without knowledge, without patriotism, without
+natural affection, passing his life in a long routine of useless and
+atrocious self-torture, and quailing before the ghastly phantoms of his
+delirious brain, had become the ideal of the nations which had known the
+writings of Plato and Cicero, and the lives of Socrates and Cato. For
+about two centuries, the hideous maceration of the body was regarded as
+the highest proof of excellence. St. Jerome declares, with a thrill of
+admiration, how he had seen a monk, who for thirty years had lived
+exclusively on a small portion of barley bread and of mouldy water;
+another who lived in a hole and never ate more than five figs for his
+daily repast; a third who cut his hair only on Easter Sunday, who never
+washed his clothes, who never changed his tunic till it fell to pieces,
+who starved himself till his eyes grew dim, and his skin like a pumice
+stone.... For six months, it is said, St. Macarius of Alexandria slept
+in a marsh, and exposed his naked body to the stings of venomous
+flies.... His disciple, St. Eusebius, carried one hundred and fifty
+pounds of iron, and lived for three years in a dried-up well.... St.
+Besarion spent forty days and nights in the middle of thorn bushes, and
+for forty days and nights never lay down when he slept.... Some saints,
+like St. Marcian, restricted themselves to one meal a day, so small that
+they continually suffered the pangs of hunger.... Some of the hermits
+lived in deserted dens of wild beasts, others in dried-up wells, while
+others found a congenial resting-place among the tombs. Some disdained
+all clothes, and crawled abroad like the wild beasts, covered only by
+their matted hair. The cleanliness of the body was regarded as a
+pollution of the soul, and the saints who were most admired had become
+one hideous mass of clotted filth. St. Athanasius relates with
+enthusiasm how St. Antony, the patriarch of monachism, had never, to
+extreme old age, been guilty of washing his feet.... St. Abraham, the
+hermit, however, who lived for fifty years after his conversion, rigidly
+refused from that date to wash either his face or his feet.... St. Ammon
+had never seen himself naked. A famous virgin, named Sylvia, though she
+was sixty years old, and though bodily sickness was a consequence of her
+habits, resolutely refused, on religious principles, to wash any part of
+her body except her fingers. St. Euphraxia joined a convent of one
+hundred and thirty nuns, who never washed their feet, and who shuddered
+at the mention of a bath."[166]
+
+It is difficult to realise what it is exactly that some writers have in
+their minds when they praise the purity of the ascetic ideal, and lament
+its degradation as though society lost something of great value thereby.
+The examples cited realised that ideal as well as it could be realised,
+and its anti-social character is unmistakable. If it is intended to
+imply that an element of self-denial or self-discipline is essential to
+healthy development, that is admitted, but this is not the ascetic
+ideal; it is that of temperance as taught by the best of the ancient
+philosophers. What the ascetic aimed at was not self-development, but
+self-suppression. The discipline of the monk was only another name for
+the cultivation of a frame of mind unhealthy and anti-social.
+Eventually, the rapidity with which this mania spread, the fact that for
+several centuries it raged as a veritable epidemic, carried with it the
+germs of a corrective. The more numerous monks and nuns became, the more
+certain it became that many of them would develop passions and
+propensities they professed to despise. The love of ease and wealth, the
+lust of power and pride of place, was sure to find expression, and if by
+the degradation of the ascetic ideal is meant the fact that the
+preachers of poverty, and humility, and meekness, became the wealthiest,
+the most powerful, the most corrupt, and the most tyrannical order in
+Christendom, the reason is that not even monasticism could prevent
+ordinary human passions from finding expression. They might be
+suppressed in the case of a few; it became impossible with a multitude.
+That they found expression in so disastrous a form was due to the fact
+that the disciplinary agent of these passions, a developed social
+consciousness, played so small a part in the life of the monk.
+
+It is no part of my present purpose to trace the full consequences of
+the ascetic epidemic. Some of these consequences, however, have a more
+or less direct bearing upon this enquiry, and it is necessary to say
+something upon them. One enduring and inevitable consequence of
+monasticism has not, I think, been adequately noted by many writers.
+This is its influence on the ideal of marriage, on the family, and on
+the domestic virtues. In India and Egypt celibacy had been closely
+associated with the religious life, but the ascetic was regarded as a
+man peculiarly apart from his fellows, and the family continued to be
+held in great honour, even by religious writers. Christianity provided
+for the first time a body of writers who made a direct attack upon
+marriage as obstructing the supreme duty of spiritual development. The
+Rev. Principal Donaldson, in his generally excellent book on _Woman_,
+professes to find some difficulty in accounting for the growth among the
+early Christians of the feeling in favour of celibacy. He remarks that
+"no one with the New Testament as his guide could venture to assert that
+marriage was wrong." Not wrong, certainly; but anyone with the New
+Testament before him would be justified in asserting marriage to be
+inferior to celibacy. It is at most taken for granted; it is neither
+commended nor recommended, and of its social value there is never a
+glimpse. And there is much on the other side. Paul's teaching is
+strongly in favour of celibacy, and marriage is only advised to avoid a
+greater evil. In the Book of _Revelation_ there is a reference to the
+144,000 saints who wait on "the Lamb," and who "were not defiled with
+women, but were virgins." Certainly the New Testament does not condemn
+marriage, but it is idle to pretend that those who preached the celibate
+ideal failed to find therein a warranty for their teaching.
+
+The historic fact is, however, that the early Christian leaders were, in
+the main, ardent advocates of celibacy. The social importance of
+marriage being ignored, its functions became those of ministering to
+sexual passion and the perpetuation of the race. In view of the supposed
+approaching end of the world, the desirability of this last was
+questioned, and in the name of purity the former was strongly denounced.
+It is from these points of view that Tertullian describes children as
+"burdens which are to most of us perilous as being unsuitable to faith,"
+and wives as women of the second degree of modesty who had fallen into
+wedlock. Jerome said that marriage was at best a sin, and all that could
+be done was to excuse and purify it. Epiphanius said that the Church was
+based upon virginity as upon a corner-stone. Augustine was of opinion
+that celibates would shine in heaven like dazzling stars. Married people
+were declared, by another authority, to be incapable of salvation. The
+most powerful and most influential of writers concurred that the sexual
+relation was an almost fatal obstacle to religious salvation.
+
+Hardly any movement ever struck so hard against social well-being as
+did this teaching of celibacy. Wives were encouraged to desert their
+husbands, husbands to forsake their wives, children their parents.
+Parents, in turn, were exhorted to devote their children to the monastic
+life; and although at first children who had been so condemned were
+allowed to return to the world, should they desire it, on reaching
+maturity, this liberty was taken from them by the fourth Council of
+Toledo in 633.[167] Some few of the Christian writers protested against
+children being taught to forsake their parents in this manner, but the
+general spirit of the time was in its favour.
+
+"Children were nursed and trained to expect at every instant more than
+human interferences; their young energies had ever before them examples
+of asceticism, to which it was the glory, the true felicity of life, to
+aspire. The thoughtful child had all his mind thus preoccupied ...
+wherever there was gentleness, modesty, the timidity of young passion,
+repugnance to vice, an imaginative temperament, a consciousness of
+unfitness to wrestle with the rough realities of life, the way lay
+invitingly open.... It lay through perils, but was made attractive by
+perpetual wonders. It was awful, but in its awfulness lay its power over
+the young mind. It learned to trample down that last bond which united
+the child to common humanity, filial reverence; the fond and mysterious
+attachment of the child and the mother, the inborn reverence of the son
+to the father. It is the highest praise of St. Fulgentius that he
+overcame his mother's tenderness by religious cruelty."[168]
+
+The full warranty for Dean Milman's stricture is seen in the following
+passage from St. Jerome:--
+
+"Though your little nephew twine his arms around your neck; though your
+mother, with dishevelled hair, and tearing her robe asunder, point to
+the breast with which she suckled you; though your father fall down on
+the threshold before you, pass on over your father's body. Fly with
+tearless eyes to the banner of the cross. In this matter cruelty is the
+only piety.... Your widowed sister may throw her gentle arms around
+you.... Your father may implore you to wait but a short time to bury
+those near to you, who will soon be no more; your weeping mother may
+recall your childish days, and may point to her shrunken breast and to
+her wrinkled brow. Those around you may tell you that all the household
+rests upon you. Such chains as these the love of God and the fear of
+hell can easily break. You say that Scripture orders you to obey your
+parents, but he who loves them more than Christ loses his soul. The
+enemy brandishes a sword to slay me. Shall I think of a mother's
+tears?"[169]
+
+Gibbon said of the ascetic movement that the Pagan world regarded with
+astonishment a society that perpetuated itself without marriage.
+Unfortunately this perpetuation was secured by the sacrifice of some of
+the dearest interests of the race. For, in general, one may say that
+idealistic teaching of any kind appeals most powerfully to those who are
+least in need of it. The world would at any time lose little, and might
+possibly gain much, were it possible to restrain a certain class from
+parentage. But there is no evidence that monasticism ever had its effect
+on that kind of people; the presumption is indeed in the contrary
+direction. The careless and brutal hear and are unaffected. The more
+thoughtful and desirable alone are influenced. And there can be little
+doubt that the Church in appealing to certain aspects of human nature
+dissuaded from parentage those who were most fitted for the task. There
+was a practical survival of the unfittest. Nothing is more striking, in
+fact, in the early history of Christianity than the comparative absence
+of home life and of the domestic ideals. Dean Milman remarked that in
+all the discussion concerning celibacy he could not recall a single
+instance where the social aspects appear to have occurred to the
+disputants. The Dean's remark applies to some extent to a much later
+period of Christian history than the one to which he refers. That
+much-admired evangelical classic, Bunyan's _Pilgrim's Progress_, for
+example, shows a curious obliviousness to the value of family and social
+life. But neglect of the socialising and refining influence of family
+life leads inevitably to a hardening of character and a brutalising of
+life in general. The ferocious nature of the theological disputes of the
+early Christian period never fail to arouse the comments of historians.
+But there was really nothing to soften or restrain them. Everything was
+dominated by the theological interest. And we owe it in no small measure
+to the vogue of the monk that the tolerance of Pagan times, with its
+widespread respect for truth-seeking, was replaced by the narrow
+intolerance of the medieval period, an intolerance which has never
+really been eradicated from any part of Christian Europe.
+
+In counting this as one of the consequences of the Christian preaching
+of celibacy, I am supported by no less an authority than the late Sir
+Francis Galton. In his epoch-marking work, _Hereditary Genius_, this
+writer says:--
+
+"The long period of the Dark Ages under which Europe has lain is due, I
+believe, in a very considerable degree, to the celibacy enjoined by the
+religious orders on their votaries. Whenever a man or woman was
+possessed of a gentle nature that fitted him or her to deeds of charity,
+to meditation, to literature, or to art, the social condition of the
+time was such that they had no refuge elsewhere than in the bosom of the
+Church. But she chose to preach and exact celibacy. The consequence was
+that these gentle natures had no continuance, and thus by a policy so
+singularly unwise and suicidal that I am hardly able to speak of it
+without impatience, the Church brutalised the breed of our forefathers.
+She acted precisely as if she had aimed at selecting the rudest portion
+of the community to be alone the parents of future generations. She
+practised the arts that breeders would use, who aimed at creating
+ferocious, currish, and stupid nature. No wonder that club law prevailed
+for centuries over Europe; the wonder rather is that enough good
+remained in the veins of Europeans to enable their race to rise to its
+very moderate level of natural morality."[170]
+
+The consequences of asceticism on morals were almost wholly disastrous.
+There is no intention of endorsing the vulgar Protestant prejudice of
+every convent being a brothel, and all monks and nuns as given over to a
+vicious life, but there is no question that a very widespread
+demoralisation existed amongst the religious orders, that this existed
+from the very earliest times, and that it was an inevitable consequence
+of so large a number of people professing the ascetic life. This is not
+a history of morals, and it is needless to enter into a detailed account
+of the state of morality during the prevalence of asceticism. But the
+absence of any favourable influence exerted by asceticism on conduct is
+well illustrated in the description of Salvianus, Bishop of Marseilles
+at the close of the fifth century, of the condition of society in his
+day. Gaul, Spain, Italy, and Africa are depicted as sunk in an
+overmastering sensuality. Rome is represented as the sewer of the
+nations, and in the African Church, he says, the most diligent search
+can scarce discover one chaste among thousands. And this, it must be
+borne in mind, was the African Church, which under the care of Augustine
+had been specially nurtured in the most rigid asceticism. Four hundred
+years later the state of monastic morals is sufficiently indicated by a
+regulation of St. Theodore Studita prohibiting the entrance of female
+animals into monasteries.[171] A regulation passed in Paris at a Council
+held in 1212 enforces the same lesson by forbidding monks or nuns
+sleeping two in a bed. The avowed object of this was to repress offences
+of the most disgusting description.[172] In 1208 an order was issued
+prohibiting mothers or other female relatives residing with priests, on
+account of the frequent scandals arising. Offences became so numerous
+and so open that it was with relief that laymen saw priests openly
+select concubines. That at least gave a promise of some protection to
+domestic life. In some of the Swiss cantons it actually became the
+practice to compel a new pastor, on taking up his charge, to select a
+concubine as a necessary protection to the females under his care. The
+same practice existed in Spain.[173]
+
+There is, as Lea rightly says, no injustice in holding the Church mainly
+responsible for the laxity of morals which is characteristic of medieval
+society. It had unbounded and unquestioned power, and this with its
+wealth and privileges might have made medieval society the purest in the
+world. As it was, "the period of its unquestioned domination over the
+conscience of Europe was the very period in which licence among the
+Teutonic races was most unchecked. A church which, though founded on the
+Gospel, and wielding the illimitable power of the Roman hierarchy, could
+yet allow the feudal principle to extend to the _jus primæ noctis_ or
+_droit de marquette_, and whose ministers in their character of temporal
+seigneurs could even occasionally claim the disgusting right, was
+evidently exercising its influence, not for good, but for evil."
+
+On civic life and the civic virtues the influence of asceticism was
+equally disastrous. "A candid examination," says Lecky, "will show that
+the Christian civilisation has been as inferior to the Pagan ones in
+civic and intellectual virtues as it has been superior to them in the
+virtues of humanity and chastity." One may reasonably question the
+latter part of this statement, bearing in mind the facts just pointed
+out, but the first part admits of overwhelming proof. Celibacy is not
+chastity, and it is difficult to see how the coarsening of character
+described by Lecky himself can be consistent with a heightened
+humanity. But there can be small doubt that the growth of the Christian
+Church spelt disaster to the civic life and institutions of the Empire.
+Nothing the Romans did was more admirable than their organisation of
+municipal life. They avoided the common blunder of imposing on all a
+uniform organisation, and so gave free play to local feeling and custom
+so far as was consistent with imperial order and peace. Civic life
+became, as a consequence, well ordered and persistent. It was far less
+corrupt than administration in the capital, and freedom persisted in the
+provincial towns for long after its practical disappearance in Rome
+itself. Indeed, but for the antagonism of Christianity, it is probable
+that the urban municipalities might have provided the impetus for the
+rejuvenation of the Empire.[174]
+
+From the outset, the early Christian movement stood as a whole apart
+from the civic life of the Empire, while the ascetic waged a constant
+warfare against it. "According to monastic view of Christianity," says
+Milman, "the total abandonment of the world, with all its ties and
+duties, as well as its treasures, its enjoyments, and objects of
+ambition, advanced rather than diminished the hopes of salvation." The
+object was individual salvation, not social regeneration. When people
+were praised for breaking the closest of family ties in their desire for
+salvation, it would be absurd to suppose that social duties and
+obligations would remain exempt. The Christian ascetic was ready enough
+to risk his own life, or to take the life of others, on account of
+minute points of doctrinal difference, but he was deaf to the call of
+patriotism or the demands of civic life. Theology became the one
+absorbing topic; and as monasticism assumed more menacing proportions,
+the monk became the dominating figure, paralysing by his presence the
+healthful activities of masses of the people. Speaking of the Eastern
+Empire, although his words apply with almost equal truth wherever the
+Church was supreme, Milman says:--
+
+"That which is the characteristic sign of the times as a social and
+political, as well as a religious, phenomenon, is the complete dominion
+assumed by the monks in the East over the public mind.... The monks, in
+fact, exercise the most complete tyranny, not merely over the laity, but
+over bishops and patriarchs, whose rule, though nominally subject to it,
+they throw off whenever it suits their purposes.... Monks in Alexandria,
+monks in Antioch, monks in Constantinople, decide peremptorily on
+orthodoxy and heterodoxy.... Persecution is universal; persecution by
+every means of violence and cruelty; the only question is in whose hands
+is the power to persecute.... Bloodshed, murder, treachery,
+assassination, even during the public worship of God--these are the
+frightful means by which each party strives to maintain its opinions and
+to defeat its adversary. Ecclesiastical and civil authority are alike
+paralysed by combinations of fanatics ready to suffer or to inflict
+death, utterly unapproachable by reason."[175]
+
+Against such combinations of ignorance, fanaticism, and ferocity, the
+few remaining lovers of secular progress were powerless. Patriotism
+became a mere name, and organised civic life an almost forgotten
+aspiration. What the Pagan world had understood by a 'good man' was one
+who spent himself in the service of his country. The Christian
+understood by it one who succeeded in saving his own soul, even at the
+sacrifice of family and friends. Vampire-like, monasticism fed upon the
+life-blood of the Empire. The civic life and patriotism of old Rome
+became a mere tradition, to inspire long after the men of the
+Renaissance and of the French Revolution.
+
+Finally, asceticism exerted a powerful influence on religion itself.
+That it served to strengthen and perpetuate the life of religion there
+can be little doubt. However strongly some people may have resented the
+monastic ideal, it nevertheless gave increased strength and vitality to
+the religious idea. To begin with, it offered for centuries a very
+powerful obstacle to the development of those progressive and scientific
+ideas that have made such advances in all centres of civilisation during
+the past two or three centuries. To the common mind it brought home the
+supremacy of religion in a way that nothing else could. The mere sight
+of monarch and noble yielding homage to the monk, acknowledging his
+supremacy in what was declared to be the chief interest in life, the
+interference of the monk in every department of life, saturated society
+with supernaturalism. And although at a later period the rapacity,
+dissoluteness, and tyranny of the monkish orders led to revolt, by that
+time the imagination of all had been thoroughly impressed with the value
+of religion. Even to-day current theology is permeated with the monkish
+notions of self-denial, self-sacrifice, and contempt of the world's
+comfort and beauty as belonging to the essence of pure religion. The
+lives of the saints still remain the storehouse of ideals for the
+religious preacher. In spite of their absurd practices and disgusting
+penances, later generations have not failed to hold them up as examples.
+They have been used to impress the imagination of their successors, as
+they were used to impress the minds of their contemporaries. The fact of
+Thomas à Beckett wearing a hair shirt running with vermin has not
+prevented his being held up as an example of the power of religion.
+People fear ghosts long after they cease to believe in them; they pay
+unreasoning homage to a crown long after intellectual development has
+robbed the kingly office of its primitive significance; all the recent
+developments of democracy have not abolished the Englishman's
+constitutional crick in the neck at the sight of a nobleman. Nor is
+supernaturalism expunged from a society because the conditions that gave
+it birth have passed away. A religious epidemic is not analogous to
+those physical disorders which deposit an antitoxin and so protect
+against future attacks. It resembles rather those disorders that
+permanently weaken, and so invite repeated assaults. The ascetic
+epidemic passed away; but, before doing so, it thoroughly saturated with
+supernaturalism the social atmosphere and impressed its power upon the
+public mind. It gave supernaturalism a new and longer lease of life, and
+paved the way for other outbreaks, of a less general, but still of a
+thoroughly epidemic character.
+
+
+FOOTNOTES:
+
+[164] See _The Psychology of Peoples_ and _The Crowd_.
+
+[165] _Origin and Development of Religious Belief_, i. pp. 343-8.
+
+[166] _History of European Morals_, ii. pp. 107-10. For a careful
+description of the monastic discipline in its more normal aspects, see
+Bingham's Works, vol. ii. bk. vi. Gibbon gives his usual brilliant
+summary of the movement in chapter xxxvii. of the _Decline and Fall_. A
+host of facts similar to those cited by Lecky will be found in _The Book
+of Paradise_, 2 vols., trans. by Wallis Budge. Lea's _History of
+Sacerdotal Celibacy_ gives the classical and authoritative account of
+the moral consequences of the practice of celibacy. For a vivid picture
+of the psychology of the ascetic, see Flaubert's great romance, _St.
+Antony_.
+
+[167] Cited by Lecky, ii. p. 131.
+
+[168] Dean Milman, _Hist. of Latin Christianity_, ii. pp. 81-2.
+
+[169] Lecky, ii. pp. 134-5.
+
+[170] _Hereditary Genius_, 1869, p. 357.
+
+[171] Lea, p. 109.
+
+[172] Lea, p. 332.
+
+[173] See Lea, pp. 353-4.
+
+[174] For a fine sketch of Roman municipal life, see Dill's _Roman
+Society from Nero to Marcus Aurelius_, chap. ii.
+
+[175] _Hist. of Latin Christianity_, i. pp. 317-8.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER NINE
+
+RELIGIOUS EPIDEMICS--(_CONCLUDED_)
+
+
+It is not easy to overestimate the influence of monasticism on
+subsequent religious history. The lives of its votaries provided
+examples of almost every conceivable kind of self-torture or
+semi-maniacal behaviour. It had made the world thoroughly familiar with
+extravagance of action as the symptom of intense religious conviction.
+And its influence on social development had been such that the
+susceptibility of the public mind to suggestions was as a raw wound in
+the presence of a powerful irritant. Such an institution as the
+Inquisition could only have maintained itself among a people thoroughly
+familiar with supernaturalism, and to whom its preservation was the
+first and most sacred of duties.
+
+A society habituated to the commanding presence of the monk, fed upon
+stories of their miraculous encounters with celestial and diabolic
+visitants, and so accustomed to regard the priesthood as in a very
+peculiar sense the mouthpiece of divinity, was well prepared for such a
+series of events as the crusades for the recovery of the Holy Land.
+Pilgrimages to the burial-places of saints, and to spots connected, by
+legend or otherwise, with Christian history, had long been in vogue, and
+formed a source of both revenue to the Church and of inspiration to the
+faithful. As early as 833 a guide-book had been prepared called the
+_Itinerary from Bordeaux to Jerusalem_, and along the route marked
+convents and shelters for the pilgrims were established. A lucrative
+traffic in relics of every description had also been established, and
+any interference with this touched the Church in its tenderest point.
+Added to which the expected end of the world in the year 1000 had the
+effect of still further increasing the crowd of pilgrims to the Holy
+Land, where it was firmly believed the second advent would take place.
+
+In the eleventh century a tax was imposed on all Christians visiting
+Jerusalem. There were also reports of Christian pilgrims being
+ill-treated. Recent events in Europe have shown with what ease Christian
+feeling may be roused against a Mohammedan power, and it was
+considerably easier to do this in the eleventh century. Between them,
+Pope Urban II. and Peter the Hermit--the former acting mainly from
+political motives; the latter from a spirit of sheer fanaticism--
+succeeded in rousing Europe to a maniacal desire for the recovery
+of the Holy Land. And for nearly two hundred years the world saw
+a series of crusades on as absurd an errand as ever engaged the
+energies of mankind. Every class of society participated, and it is
+calculated that no less than two millions of lives were sacrificed.
+
+Ordinary histories lean to representing the crusades as a series of
+armed expeditions, led by princes, nobles, and kings. But this gives a
+quite inaccurate conception of the movement, during its early stages, at
+all events. In reality it was a true psychological epidemic. No custom,
+however ancient, no duty, no law, was allowed to stand before the
+crusading mania. In every village the clergy fed the mania, promising
+eternal rewards to all who took up the burden of the cross. Old and
+young, the strong and the sick, the rich and the poor were enrolled.
+Urban had told them that "under their General, Jesus Christ," they would
+march to certain victory. Absolution for all sins was promised to all
+who joined; and, as Gibbon says, "at the voice of their pastor, the
+robber, the incendiary, the homicide, arose by thousands to redeem their
+souls by repeating on the infidels the same deeds which they had
+exercised against their Christian brethren." Until experience had taught
+them better, little precautions were taken to provide food or arms. Huge
+concourses of people,[176] some led by a goose and a goat, into which it
+was believed the Holy Ghost had entered, set out for the Holy Land, so
+ignorant that at every large town or city they enquired, "Is this Zion?"
+Although a religious expedition, small regard was paid to decency or
+humanity. Defenceless cities _en route_ were sacked. Women were
+outraged, men and children killed. The Jews were murdered wholesale.
+Almost universally the slaughter of Jews at home were preparatory to
+crusading abroad. Germany, Hungary, and Bulgaria, although providing
+contingents for the crusading army, suffered heavily by the passage of
+these undisciplined, lawless crowds. As one writer says:--
+
+"If they had devoted themselves to the service of God, they convinced
+the inhabitants on their line of march that they had ceased to regard
+the laws of man. They considered themselves privileged to gratify every
+wish and every lust as it arose. They recognised no rights of property,
+they felt no gratitude for hospitality, and they possessed no sense of
+honour. They violated the wives and daughters of their hosts when they
+were kindly treated, they devastated the lands of friends whom they had
+converted into enemies, they resorted to wanton robbery and destruction
+in revenge for calamities which they had brought upon themselves. They
+believed that they proved their superiority to the Mohammedans by
+torturing the defenceless Jews; and this was the only exploit in which
+the first divisions of the crusaders could boast of success.... To the
+leaders, who could not write their own names, deception and treachery
+were as familiar as force; to their followers rapine and murder were so
+congenial that, in the absence of Saracens, Jews, or townsfolk, it
+seemed but a professional pastime to kill or to rob a companion in
+arms."[177]
+
+And of the behaviour of the crusaders on the first capture of Jerusalem,
+1099, Dean Milman writes:--
+
+"No barbarian, no infidel, no Saracen, ever perpetrated such wanton and
+cold-blooded atrocities of cruelty as the wearers of the Cross of Christ
+(who, it is said, had fallen on their knees and burst into a pious hymn
+at the first view of the Holy City) on the capture of that city. Murder
+was mercy, rape tenderness, simple plunder the mere assertion of the
+conqueror's right. Children were seized by their legs, some of them
+plucked from their mother's breasts, and dashed against the walls, or
+whirled from the battlements. Others were obliged to leap from the
+walls; some tortured, roasted by slow fires. They ripped up prisoners to
+see if they had swallowed gold. Of 70,000 Saracens there were not left
+enough to bury the dead; poor Christians were hired to perform the
+office. Everyone surprised in the Temple was slaughtered, till the reek
+from the dead drove away the slayers. The Jews were burned alive in
+their synagogue."[178]
+
+The most remarkable of all the crusades, and the one that best shows
+the character of the epidemic, was the children's crusade of 1212. It
+was said that the sins of the crusaders had caused their failure, and
+priests went about France and Germany calling upon the children to do
+what the sins of their fathers had prevented them accomplishing. The
+children were told that the sea would dry up to give them passage, and
+the infidels be stricken by the Lord on their approach. A peasant lad,
+Stephen of Cloyes, received the usual vision, and was ordered to lead
+the crusade. Commencing with the children around Paris, he collected
+some 30,000 followers, and without money or food commenced the march. At
+the same time an army of children, 40,000 strong, was gathered together
+at Cologne. The result of the crusade may be told in a few words. About
+6000 of the French contingent, having reached Marseilles, were offered a
+passage by some shipowners. Several of the ships foundered, others
+reached shore, and the boys were sold into slavery. The girls were
+reserved for a more sinister fate. Thousands of the children died in
+attempting a march over the Alps. A mere remnant succeeded in reaching
+home, ruined in both mind and body. Well might Fuller say: "This crusade
+was done by the instinct of the devil, who, as it were, desired a
+cordial of children's blood, to comfort his weak stomach, long cloyed
+with murdering of men."[179]
+
+On both the social and the religious side the consequences were
+important. For the first time large bodies of men, taught to regard all
+those who were outside Christendom as beneath consideration, came into
+contact with a people possessing an art, an industry, a culture far
+superior to their own. As Draper says: "Even down to the meanest camp
+follower, everyone must have recognised the difference between what they
+had anticipated and what they had found. They had seen undaunted
+courage, chivalrous bearing, intellectual culture far higher than their
+own. They had been in lands filled with prodigies of human skill. They
+did not melt down into the populations to whom they returned without
+imparting to them a profound impression destined to make itself felt in
+the course of time."[180] Hitherto Mohammedan culture had only
+influenced Christendom through the medium of the Spanish schools and
+universities. Now the influence became more general. A taste for greater
+comfort developed. Commerce grew; literature improved. We approach the
+period of the Renaissance, and to that new birth the crusades, despite
+their intolerance and brutality, offered a contribution of no small
+value.
+
+On the other hand, and for a time, the power of the Church grew greater.
+The impetus given to superstitious hopes and fears made on all hands for
+the wealth of the Church. Much was made over to the Church as a free
+gift. Much was pawned to it. Much also was entrusted by those who went
+to the Holy Land, never to return, in which case the Church became the
+designated or undesignated heir. "In every way the all-absorbing Church
+was still gathering in wealth, encircling new land within her hallowed
+pale, the one steady merchant who in this vast traffic and sale of
+personal and of landed property never made a losing venture, but went on
+accumulating and still accumulating, and for the most part withdrawing
+the largest portion of the land in every kingdom into a separate
+estate, which claimed exemption from all burthens of the realm, until
+the realm was compelled into measures, violent often and iniquitous in
+their mode, but still inevitable."[181]
+
+Next, the crusades set their seal upon the justice of religious wars,
+and established an enduring alliance between militarism and religion.
+The military profession became surrounded with all the ceremonies and
+paraphernalia of religion, without being in the least humanised by the
+alliance. The knight received his arms blessed by the Church, he was
+sworn to defend the Church, and he was as ready to turn his weapons
+against heretics in Europe as against infidels in Syria. Military
+persecutions of heretics assumed the form of a mania. There were
+crusades against the Moors in Spain, against the Albigenses, and against
+other heretics. As Bryce remarks: "The religious feeling which the
+crusades evoked--a feeling which became the origin of the great orders
+of chivalry, and somewhat later of the two great orders of mendicant
+friars--turned wholly against the opponents of ecclesiastical claims,
+and was made to work the will of the Holy See, which had blessed and
+organised the project."[182] The expedition against King John by Philip
+of France was undertaken at the behest of the Pope, and was called a
+crusade. The attempt of Spain to crush the Netherlands was called a
+crusade. So was the Armada that was fitted out against England.
+
+More than all, a stamp of permanency was given to popular superstition.
+For two centuries people had seen expedition after expedition fitted out
+to accomplish an avowedly religious purpose. They had been taught that
+to die in defence of religion, or in the attempt to achieve a religious
+object, was the noblest of deaths. They had seen the greatest in Europe
+setting forth at the command of the Church. Signs and wonders had
+abounded to prove the heaven-blessed character of the crusades. They had
+seen the Church growing steadily in power, and every possible means had
+been utilised to increase the flame of religious fanaticism. Expeditions
+might fail, but failure did not cure fanaticism. It fed it; the
+crusaders returned, chastened in some respects, but still sufficiently
+full of religious zeal to be ready to battle against the unbeliever and
+the heretic at the behest of the Church. And it was not the policy of
+the Church to allow this fanaticism to remain unemployed. Even though it
+might ultimately lose, the Church and superstition profited enormously
+by the crusading spirit. It strengthened the general sense of the
+supernatural, even while creating tendencies that were destined to limit
+its sway. Above all, it prepared the way for other religious epidemics.
+These were more circumscribed in area, and less lengthy in their
+duration; but their existence was made possible and easy by the
+centuries during which, first monasticism, and later the crusading
+mania, had dominated the public mind.
+
+The crusades had hardly been brought to a close before continental
+Europe witnessed an outbreak, in epidemic form, of a practice that had
+been long associated with monastic discipline. The use of the whip as a
+form of religious discipline had always played a part in conventual and
+monastic life. On the one hand, it formed part of that insensate desire
+to torture the body which went to make up the ascetic ideal; on the
+other hand, the fondness for whipping bare flesh and for being whipped
+has a distinctly pathologic character. The subject is rather too
+unsavoury to dwell upon, but it has long been established that there is
+a close connection between the whipping of certain parts of the body and
+the production of intense sexual pleasure.[183] And it is also clear
+that the life led by monks and nuns was such as to encourage sexual
+aberrations of various forms. Moreover, when once the practice of
+whipping became a public spectacle, and assumed an epidemic form,
+imitation, combined with intense religious faith, would operate very
+powerfully.
+
+In the fourteenth century Europe was visited by the Black Plague. In
+countries utterly devoid of sanitation, where baths were practically
+unknown and personal habits of the filthiest, the plague found a
+fruitful soil. Nearly a quarter of the population died, and corpses were
+so numerous that huge pits were dug and hundreds buried together. It was
+amid the general terror and demoralisation caused by this visitation
+that the sect of the Flagellants arose. Calling themselves the
+Brotherhood of the Flagellants, or the Brethren of the Cross, wearing
+dark garments with red crosses front and back, they traversed the cities
+of the Continent carrying whips to which small pieces of iron were
+fixed. England appears to have been the only country in which they
+failed to establish themselves. Elsewhere their numbers grew with
+formidable rapidity. At Spires two hundred boys, under twelve years of
+age, influenced probably by the example of the children's crusade,
+formed themselves into a brotherhood and marched through some of the
+German cities. In Italy over 20,000 people marched from Florence in one
+of these processions; from Modena, over 25,000. Some of them professed
+to work miracles. Everywhere, while the mania lasted, they were warmly
+welcomed, the inhabitants of towns and cities ringing the bells and
+flocking in crowds to hear the preaching and witness the whippings.
+
+The proceedings of the Flagellants in all countries were very similar.
+They marched from town to town, men and women and children stripped to
+the waist--sometimes entirely naked--praying incessantly and whipping
+each other. "Not only during the day, but even by night, and in the
+severest winter, they traversed the cities with torches and banners, in
+thousands and tens of thousands, headed by their priests, and prostrated
+themselves before the altars." At other times they proceeded to the
+market-place, arranged themselves on the ground in circles, assuming
+attitudes in accordance with their real or supposed crimes. After each
+had been whipped, "one of them, in conclusion, stood up to read a
+letter, which it was pretended an angel had brought from heaven to St.
+Peter's Church, at Jerusalem, stating that Christ, who was sore
+displeased at the sins of man, had granted, at the intercession of the
+Holy Virgin and of the angels, that all who should wander about for
+thirty-four days and scourge themselves should be partakers of the
+Divine grace." In the end the movement became so obnoxious to the
+Church, and so troublesome to the civil authorities, that both combined
+to secure its suppression.
+
+Equally significant in the history of religion is the dancing mania,
+which broke out as the mania for flagellation was subsiding. The
+function of dancing in primitive religious ceremonial has been pointed
+out in a previous chapter. It is there a common and obvious method of
+both creating and expressing a high state of nervous excitability. In
+later times religious dancing becomes more purely hypnotic in character,
+and suggestion plays a powerful part. During the medieval period the
+conditions were peculiarly favourable to the prevalence of psychological
+epidemics. Plagues, more or less severe, were of frequent occurrence.
+Between 1119 and 1340, Italy alone had no less than sixteen such
+visitations. Smallpox and leprosy were also common. The public mind was
+morbidly sensitive to signs and portents and saturated to an almost
+incredible degree with superstition. The public processions of the
+Church, its penances, and practices were all calculated to fire the
+imagination, and produce a mixed and dangerous condition of fear and
+expectancy. Moreover, dancing mania, on a small scale, had made its
+appearance on several previous occasions, and the public mind was thus
+in a way prepared for a more serious outbreak.
+
+The great dancing mania of 1374 occurred immediately after the revels
+connected with the semi-Pagan festival of St. John. Bacchanalian dances
+formed one of the accompaniments of the festival of St. John, and made,
+so to speak, a natural starting-point for the epidemic. Hecker, who
+gives a very elaborate account of the dancing mania as it appeared in
+various countries, thus describes the behaviour of those afflicted:--
+
+"They formed circles, hand in hand, and, appearing to have lost control
+over their senses, continued dancing, regardless of all bystanders, for
+hours together, in wild delirium, until at length they fell to the
+ground in a state of exhaustion.... While dancing, they neither saw nor
+heard, being insensible to external impressions, but were haunted by
+visions, their fancies conjuring up spirits whose names they shrieked
+out; and some of them afterwards asserted that they felt as if they had
+been immersed in a stream of blood, which obliged them to leap so high.
+Others, during the paroxysm, saw the heavens open and the Saviour
+enthroned with the Virgin Mary."[184]
+
+At Aix-la-Chapelle, Cologne, and Metz, says the same writer:--
+
+"Peasants left their ploughs, mechanics their workshops, housewives
+their domestic duties, to join the wild revels. Secret desires were
+excited, and but too often found opportunities for wild enjoyment; and
+numerous beggars, stimulated by vice and misery, availed themselves of
+this new complaint to gain a temporary livelihood. Girls and boys
+quitted their parents, and servants their masters, to amuse themselves
+at the dances of those possessed, and greedily imbibed the poison of
+mental infection. Above a hundred unmarried women were seen raving about
+in consecrated and unconsecrated places, and the consequences were soon
+perceived."[185]
+
+Once attacked, the hypnotic character of the complaint was shown by its
+annual recurrence. Again to quote Hecker:--
+
+"Most of those affected were only annually visited by attacks; and the
+occasion of them was so manifestly referable to the prevailing notions
+of that period that, if the unqualified belief in the agency of saints
+could have been abolished, they would not have had any return of the
+complaint. Throughout the whole of June, prior to the festival of St.
+John, patients felt a disquietude and restlessness which they were
+unable to overcome. They were dejected, timid, and anxious; wandered
+about in an unsettled state, being tormented with twitching pains, which
+seized them suddenly in different parts, and eagerly expected the eve of
+St. John's Day, in the confident hope that by dancing at the altars of
+this saint they would be freed from all their sufferings. This hope was
+not disappointed; and they remained, for the rest of the year, exempt
+from any further attack."[186]
+
+In addition to John the Baptist, the dancing disease was also connected
+with another saint--St. Vitus. He is said to have been martyred about
+303, and a body, reputed to be his, was transported to France in the
+ninth century. It is said that just before he was killed he prayed that
+all who would commemorate the day of his death should be protected from
+the dancing mania. Whereupon a voice from heaven was heard to say,
+"Vitus, thy prayer is accepted." The fact that the prayer was offered a
+thousand years before the dancing mania appeared is a circumstance that
+to the eye of faith merely heightened its value.
+
+Within recent times epidemics of dancing have been more local, less
+persistent, and of necessity not so public in their display, but nearly
+always their appearance has been in connection with displays of
+religious fervour. In most cases the dancing has tended more to a
+species of 'jumping,' and--although this may be due to more careful
+observation--has been accompanied by actions of a clearly epileptoid
+nature. One of the most famous of these outbreaks was that of the French
+Convulsionnaires, which lasted from 1727 to the Revolution. In 1727, a
+popular, but half-crazy priest, François de Paris, died. During his life
+Paris had fasted and scourged himself, lived in a hut that was seldom or
+never cleansed, showed the same lack of cleanliness in his person, and
+often went about half naked. Very shortly after his death, it was said
+that miracles began to take place at his grave in the cemetery of St.
+Médard. People gathered round the tomb day after day, and one young girl
+was seized with convulsions. (She is called a girl in the narrative, but
+she was a mature virgin of forty-two years of age.) Afterwards other
+miracles followed in rapid succession. Some fell in fits, others
+swallowed pieces of coal or flint, some were cured of diseases. From the
+description of the behaviour of some of these devotees there seems to
+have been a considerable amount of sexual feeling mixed up with the
+display. Sometimes, we are told, those seized "bounded from the ground
+like fish out of water; this was so frequently imitated at a later
+period that the women and girls, when they expected such violent
+contortions, not wishing to appear indecent, put on gowns made like
+sacks, closed at the feet. If they received any bruises by falling down,
+they were healed with earth taken from the grave of the uncanonised
+saint. They usually, however, showed great agility in this respect; and
+it is scarcely necessary to remark that the female sex especially was
+distinguished by all kinds of leaping, and almost inconceivable
+contortions of body. Some spun round on their feet with incredible
+rapidity, as is related of the dervishes. Others ran with their heads
+against walls, or curved their bodies like rope dancers, so that their
+heels touched their shoulders."
+
+Women figured very prominently among the Convulsionnaires, particularly
+when the epidemic passed from convulsive dancing to prophecy, and thence
+to various forms of self-torture. Women stretched themselves on the
+floor, while other women, and even men, jumped upon their bodies. Others
+were beaten with clubs and bars of iron. Some actually underwent
+crucifixion on repeated occasions. They were stretched on wooden
+crosses, and nails three inches long driven through hands and feet. Some
+of the occurrences remind one of what is now seen to take place under
+hypnotic influence. People labouring under strong excitement, it is
+known, become insensible to pain.
+
+Outbreaks of jumping and dancing followed the introduction of Methodist
+preachers into country districts in the eighteenth century. In Wales, a
+sect of 'Jumpers' originated from this cause, and many of the American
+'Jumpers' and 'Dancers' seem to have had their origin from this Welsh
+outbreak. In all such cases the spread of the mania was helped, if not
+made possible, by the preachers. They themselves looked upon these
+exhibitions as manifestations of the power of God, and so encouraged
+their hearers in their behaviour. Not every minister has the common
+sense of the Shetland preacher cited by Hecker. An epileptic woman had a
+fit in church, which a number of others hailed as a manifestation of
+the power of God. Sunday after Sunday the same thing occurred with other
+women, the number of the sufferers steadily increasing. The thing
+threatened to assume such proportions, and to become so great a
+nuisance, he announced that attendants would be at hand who would dip
+women in the lake who happened to be seized. This threat proved a most
+powerful form of exorcism. Not one woman was affected. Similar conduct
+might have been quite as efficacious in preventing many religious
+manifestations that have assumed epidemic proportions.
+
+Unfortunately, the influence of preachers and religious teachers was
+most usually cast in the other direction. Very often, of course, they
+were no better informed than their congregations; at other times they
+undoubtedly encouraged the delusion for interested reasons. The most
+striking recent illustration of this latter behaviour was seen in the
+Welsh revival led by Evan Roberts. Of this man's mental condition there
+could be little doubt. Just as little doubt could there be that the
+behaviour of the congregations was wholly due to the power of
+suggestions upon weak and excitable natures. Yet scarcely a preacher in
+Britain said a word in disapproval. Hundreds of them used the outbreak
+to illustrate the power of religion. Many prominent preachers travelled
+down to Wales and returned telling of the great manifestations of
+'spiritual power' they had witnessed. How little removed such behaviour
+is from that of the savage watching with awe the actions of one
+suffering from epilepsy or insanity, readers of the foregoing pages will
+be in a position to judge.
+
+From the middle of the third century onward, Europe had been subject to
+wave after wave of religious fanaticism. All along, religious belief had
+been verified and strengthened by the occurrence of phenomena that now
+admittedly fall within the purview of the pathologist. And from one
+point of view the secularisation of life served but to emphasise the
+dependence of religion upon the occurrence of these abnormal conditions.
+For the more surely the phenomena of nature and of social life were
+brought within the scope of a scientific generalisation, the more people
+began to look for the life of religion in conditions that were removed
+from the normal. But, above all, this long succession of waves of
+fanaticism served to permeate the general mind with supernaturalism.
+Each one cleared the way for a successor. And in the next chapter we
+have to deal with one that, in some respects, is the most remarkable of
+all, viz., that of the belief in witchcraft.
+
+
+FOOTNOTES:
+
+[176] It is estimated that 275,000 people formed the van of the first
+crusade.
+
+[177] L. O. Pike, _History of Crime in England_, i. pp. 164-9.
+
+[178] _History of Latin Christianity_, iv. p. 188.
+
+[179] _History of the Holy War_, bk. iii.
+
+[180] _Intellectual Development of Europe_, 1872, p. 425.
+
+[181] Milman, iv. p. 199.
+
+[182] _Holy Roman Empire_, p. 164.
+
+[183] See Bloch, _Sexual Life of our Time_, pp. 568-74.
+
+[184] _Epidemics of the Middle Ages_, pp. 87-8.
+
+[185] Hecker, p. 91.
+
+[186] _Epidemics_, p. 105.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER TEN
+
+THE WITCH MANIA
+
+
+In all stages of religious history the witch and the wizard are familiar
+figures. It is of no importance to our present enquiry whether magic
+precedes religion or not. It is at all events certain that they are very
+closely connected, and that conditions which foster the belief in magic
+likewise serve to strengthen religious belief. Witchcraft, as Tylor
+says, is part and parcel of savage life. Death is very frequently
+attributed to the magical action of wizards, and the savage lives in
+perpetual fear lest some of his belongings, or some part of his person,
+should be bewitched by malevolent sorcerers. Sir Richard Burton says
+that in East Africa his experience taught him that among the negroes,
+what with slavery and what with black magic, no one, especially in old
+age, is safe from being burnt at a day's notice. When from savage life
+we mount to societies enjoying a higher culture, we still find the witch
+and the wizard in evidence. Both in Greece and Rome the belief in
+witchcraft existed. There were made direct laws against its practice,
+although neither the Greeks nor the Romans stained their civilisation
+with the judicial murder of thousands of victims such as occurred later
+in Christian Europe.
+
+But the belief in witchcraft is continuous. So also are the methods
+practised, and the modes of detection. The proofs offered in support of
+sorcery in the seventeenth century are precisely similar to those
+credited by savages in the lowest stage of human culture. The power of
+transformation possessed by the accused, the ability to bewitch through
+the possession of hairs belonging to the afflicted person, the making of
+little effigies and driving sharp instruments into them, and so
+affecting the corresponding parts of people, transportation through the
+air, etc., all belong to the belief in and practice of witchcraft
+wherever found. Had a Fijian been transported to a seat on the judicial
+bench by the side of Sir Matthew Hale, when that judge condemned two old
+women to death for witchcraft, he would have found himself in a quite
+congenial atmosphere. Allowing for difference in language, he would have
+found the evidence similar to that with which he was familiar, and he
+would have been able to endorse the judge's remarks with tales of his
+own experience. On this point, the level of culture attained by savages,
+and that of the inhabitants of the overwhelming majority of European
+countries little more than two hundred years ago, were substantially the
+same. Even to-day cases are continually occurring which prove that
+advances in knowledge and civilisation have not left this ancient
+superstition without supporters.
+
+In subscribing to the belief in witchcraft, the Christian Church thus
+fell into line with earlier forms of religious belief. The peculiar
+feature it represents is that it came into existence when the belief in
+witchcraft was losing its hold on the more cultured classes. Had it not
+allied itself with this tendency, no such thing as the witch mania of
+the medieval period could have existed. In sober truth, it brought about
+a veritable renaissance of the cruder theories of demonism, while its
+intolerance of opposition succeeded in stifling the voice of criticism
+for centuries. The primitive theory which holds that man is surrounded
+by hosts of spiritual agencies, mostly of a malevolent nature, was
+revived and fully endorsed by all Christian teachers. In the commonest,
+as well as in the rarest events of life, this supernatural activity was
+manifest. In both the Old and New Testament the belief in demoniacal
+agency was endorsed. Moreover, the fact that Christianity was not a
+creed seeking to live as one of many others, but a religion struggling
+for complete mastery, gave further impetus to the belief. An easy
+explanation for the miracles and marvels that occurred in connection
+with non-Christian beliefs was that they were the work of demons. The
+Christian felt himself to be fighting not so much human antagonists as
+so many embodiments of satanic power. And after the establishment of
+Christianity it is probable that much that went on under cover of witch
+assemblies, a more detailed knowledge than we possess would prove to be
+really the clandestine exercise of prescribed forms of faith. The old
+saying, "The sin of witchcraft is as the sin of rebellion," has more in
+it than meets the eye. There is little real difference between the magic
+that appears as piety and the magic that is denounced as sorcery, except
+that one is permitted and the other is not. And it is almost a law of
+religious development that the gods of one religion become the demons of
+its successor.
+
+But while witchcraft has existed in all ages, it existed in a much
+milder form than that which we find in the sixteenth and seventeenth
+centuries. First of all, there is the fact to which attention has
+already been directed, namely, the concentration of the public mind upon
+various forms of supernaturalism. Every aspect of life was more or less
+under the direct influence of the Church, and no teaching was tolerated
+that conflicted with her doctrines. And it was to the interest of the
+Church perpetually to emphasise the reality of either angelic or
+diabolic activity. Even in the case of those who showed a tendency to
+revolt against Church rule there was no exception to this. If anything,
+the belief was more pronounced. Next, the fifteenth and sixteenth
+centuries saw a rising tide of heresy against which the Church was
+compelled to battle; and to ascribe this alleged perversion of Christian
+doctrines to the malevolence of Satan offered the line of least
+resistance--just as the heretics attributed the power of the Church
+itself to the same source. Whatever diminution ensued in the general
+flood of superstition, as a consequence of the quarrel between
+Protestant and Catholic, was, so far as the disputants were concerned,
+incidental and even undesired. On the one point of demonism there
+existed complete unanimity, and the sceptic fared equally hard with both
+parties. In such an environment the wildest tales of sorcery became
+credible; and nothing illustrates this more forcibly than the fact that
+many of those tortured and condemned for sorcery actually believed
+themselves capable of performing the marvels laid to their charge. Added
+to these factors, we have to note that social conditions were also
+extremely favourable. Moral ties were as loose as they could reasonably
+be; and the attitude of the Church towards the sexual relation had
+forced both the religious and the non-religious mind into wholly
+unhealthy channels. This last aspect of the subject has been little
+dealt with, but it is unquestionably a very real one. A German writer
+says:--
+
+"Whilst in the fifteenth and the beginning of the sixteenth centuries,
+as those well acquainted with the state of morals during this period can
+all confirm, a most unbounded freedom was dominant in sexual relations,
+the State and the Church were desirous of compelling the people to keep
+better order by the use of actual force, and by religious compulsion. So
+forced a transformation in so vital a matter necessarily resulted in a
+reaction of the worst kind, and forced into secret channels the impulse
+which it had attempted to suppress. This reaction occurred, moreover,
+with an elemental force. There resulted widespread sexual violence and
+seduction, hesitating at nothing, often insanely daring, in which
+everywhere the devil was supposed to help; everyone's head was turned in
+this way; the uncontrolled lust of debauchees found vent in secret
+bacchanalian associations and orgies, wherein many, with or without
+masquerade, played the part of Satan; shameful deeds were perpetrated by
+excited women and by procuresses and prostitutes ready for any kind of
+immoral abomination; add to these sexual orgies the most widely diffused
+web of a completely developed theory of witchcraft, and the systematic
+strengthening of the widely prevalent belief in the devil--all these
+things, woven in a labyrinthine connection, made it possible for
+thousands upon thousands to be murdered by a disordered justice and to
+be sacrificed to delusion."[187]
+
+To those who look closely into the subject of medieval witchcraft the
+presence of a strong sexual element is undeniable. When we examine
+contemporary accounts of the 'Sabbath,' some of which are so gross as to
+be unprintable, we find a portion of the proceedings to be of a marked
+erotic character. The figure of Satan often enough reminds one of the
+pagan Priapus, and the ceremonies bear a strong resemblance to the
+ancient ones, with the mixture of Christian language and symbolism
+inevitable under such circumstances. Promiscuous intercourse between the
+sexes was said to occur at the witches' gatherings; and, indeed, unless
+some sort of sexual extravagance occurred, it is hard to account for
+both the persistency of the gatherings and of the reports concerning
+them. The most probable theory is, as I have just said, that these
+gatherings were covers for a continuance of the older sex worship. Many
+customs connected therewith lingered on in the Church itself, and it is
+not a wild assumption that they existed in a less adulterated and more
+extravagant form outside.
+
+Universal as the belief in witchcraft has been, it was not until the
+close of the fifteenth century that it assumed what may be justly called
+an epidemic form. The famous Bull of Pope Innocent VIII. was not
+unconnected in its origin with the growth of heresy. This precious
+document, issued in 1484, declares:--
+
+"It has come to our ears that very many persons of both sexes, deviating
+from the Catholic Faith, abuse themselves with demons, Incubus and
+Succubus; and by incantations, charms, and conjurations, and other
+wicked superstitions, by criminal acts and offences, have caused the
+offspring of women and of the lower animals, the fruits of the earth,
+the grape, and the products of various plants, men, women, and other
+animals of different kinds, vineyards, meadows, pasture land, corn and
+other vegetables of the earth, to perish, be oppressed, and utterly
+destroyed; that they torture men and women with cruel pains and
+torments, internal as well as external; that they hinder the proper
+intercourse of the sexes, and the propagation of the human species.
+Moreover, they are in the habit of denying the very faith itself. We,
+therefore, willing to provide by opportune remedies, according as it
+falls to our office, by our apostolical authority, by the tenor of these
+presents, do appoint and decree that they be convicted, imprisoned,
+punished, and mulcted according to their offences."
+
+It was this Pope who commissioned the inquisitor, Sprenger, to root out
+witches. Sprenger, with two others, acting on the authority of the
+Popes, drew up the famous work, _The Witch Hammer_, which provided the
+basis for all subsequent works on the detection and punishment of
+witches.[188] The folly and iniquity of the book is almost unbelievable,
+although it is quite matched by subsequent productions. It even provides
+for the silence of people under torture. If they confess when tortured,
+the case is complete. But if they do not confess, this diabolic
+production lays it down that this is because witches who have given
+themselves up to the devil are insensible to pain. Even the evidence of
+children was admitted. And although in ordinary trials the evidence of
+criminals was barred, it was to be freely allowed in trials for sorcery.
+Everything that ingenuity could suggest or brutality execute was
+provided for.
+
+From the issue of _The Witch Hammer_ until the middle of the seventeenth
+century, a period of about one hundred and fifty years, an epidemic of
+witchcraft raged. People of all ages and of all classes of society
+became implicated, and for some time, at least, accusation meant
+conviction. An almost unbelievably large number were executed. Says
+Lecky:--
+
+"In almost every province of Germany, but especially in those where
+clerical influence predominated, the persecution raged with a fearful
+intensity. Seven thousand witches are said to have been burned at
+Trèves, six hundred by a single bishop in Bamberg, and nine hundred in a
+single year in the bishopric of Würzburg.... At Toulouse, the seat of
+the Inquisition, four hundred persons perished for sorcery at a single
+execution, and fifty at Douay in a single year. Remy, a judge of Nancy,
+boasted that he put to death eight hundred witches in sixteen years....
+In Italy, a thousand persons were executed in a single year in the
+province of Como; and in other parts of the country the severity of the
+inquisitors at last created an absolute rebellion.... In Geneva, which
+was then ruled by a bishop, five hundred alleged witches were executed
+in three months; forty-eight were burned at Constance or Ravensburg, and
+eighty in the little town of Valery in Saxony. In 1670, seventy persons
+were condemned in Sweden, and a large proportion of them burnt."[189]
+
+In England, from 1603 to 1680, it is estimated that seventy thousand
+persons were put to death for sorcery.[190] Grey, the editor of
+_Hudibras_, says that he had himself seen a list of three thousand who
+were put to death during the Long Parliament. The celebrated
+witch-finder, Mathew Hopkins, hung sixty in one year in the county of
+Suffolk. In Scotland, for thirty-nine years, the number killed annually
+averaged about two hundred. This, of course, does not take into account
+the number who were hounded to death by persecution of a popular kind,
+or whose lives were made so wearisome that death must have come as a
+release. But the most remarkable, and the most horrible, of witchcraft
+executions occurred in Würzburg in February 1629. No less than one
+hundred and sixty-two witches were burned in a succession of
+_autos-da-fé_. Among these, the reports disclose that there were
+actually thirty-four children. The following details give the actual
+ages of some of them:--
+
+  +----------+---------+---------------------------------+
+  | Burning. | Number. |      Children.                  |
+  +----------+---------+---------------------------------+
+  |   7th    |   7     |  1 Girl, aged 12.               |
+  |  13th    |   4     |  1 Girl of 10 and another.      |
+  |  15th    |   2     |  1 Boy of 12.                   |
+  |  18th    |   6     |  2 Boys of 10, girl of 14.      |
+  |  19th    |   6     |  2 Boys, 10 and 12.             |
+  |  20th    |   6     |  2 Boys.                        |
+  |  23rd    |   9     |  3 Boys, 9, 10, and 14.         |
+  |  24th    |   7     |  2 Boys, brought from hospital. |
+  |  26th    |   8     |  Little boy and girl.           |
+  |  27th    |   7     |  2 Boys, 8 and 9.               |
+  |  28th    |   6     |  Blind girl and infant.[191]    |
+  +----------+---------+---------------------------------+
+
+The vast majority of those executed for sorcery were women. At all times
+witches have been more numerous than wizards, owing to their assumed
+closer connection with the world of supernatural beings. It was said,
+"For one sorcerer, ten thousand sorceresses," and Christian writers were
+ready to explain why. Woman had a greater affinity with the devil from
+the outset. It was through woman that Satan had seduced Adam, and it
+was only to be expected that he would employ the same instrument on
+subsequent occasions. _The Witch Hammer_ has a special chapter devoted
+to the consideration of why women are more given to sorcery than men,
+and quotes freely from the Fathers to prove that this follows from her
+nature. James I. in his _Demonologia_ follows Sprenger in accounting for
+the number of witches. "The reason is easy. For as that sex is frailer
+than man is, so it is easier to be entrapped in the gross snares of the
+devil, as was over-well proved to be true by the serpent's deceiving of
+Eve at the beginning, which makes him the homelier with the sex
+sensine." To be old, or ugly, or unpopular, to have any peculiar
+deformity or mark, was to invite persecution, and, in an overwhelming
+majority of instances, conviction followed accusation.
+
+It is a significant comment upon the popular belief that Protestantism,
+as a form of religious belief, was the product of an enlightened
+rational life, that it was only with the advance of Protestantism that
+the belief in witchcraft assumed an epidemic form. This may be partly
+due to the greater direct dependence upon the Bible, in which satanic
+influence--particularly in the New Testament--plays so large a part. In
+the Roman Church, exorcism remained a regular part of the functions of
+the priest; the Church was filled with accounts of satanic conflicts,
+but diabolic intercourse seems to have been mainly limited to saintly
+characters and priests. Protestantism which, theoretically, made every
+man his own priest, raised the belief in satanic agency to an obsession.
+And wherever Protestantism established itself there was an immediate
+and marked increase in the number of cases of witchcraft. In England, if
+we omit a doubtful law of the tenth century, there existed no regular
+law against witchcraft until 1541. It remained a purely ecclesiastical
+offence. Seventeen years later, the year of Elizabeth's accession,
+Bishop Jewell, preaching before the Queen, drew attention to the
+increase of sorcery. "It may please Your Grace," he said, "to understand
+that witches and sorcerers, within these last few years, are
+marvellously increased within Your Grace's realm. Your Grace's subjects
+pine away even to the death, their colour fadeth, their flesh rotteth,
+their senses are bereft. I pray God they never practise further than
+upon the subject." And he added, "These eyes have seen most evident and
+manifest marks of their wickedness." A measure was passed through
+Parliament the same year, making enchantments and witchcraft felony. The
+first year of James I. saw the passing of the 'Witch Act,' under which
+subsequent executions took place, and which remained in force until
+nearly the middle of the eighteenth century.
+
+With scarce an exception, the leaders of Protestantism encouraged the
+belief in witches and urged their extermination as a religious and civil
+duty. With Luther, in spite of the sturdy common sense he manifested in
+some directions, belief in the activity of Satan amounted to an
+obsession. He saw Satan everywhere in everything. The devil appeared to
+him while writing, disturbed his rest by the rattling of pans, and
+prevented his pursuing his studies by hammering on his skull. When a
+storm arose, Luther declared, "'Tis the devil who has done this; the
+winds are nothing else but good or bad spirits." Suicides, he said, were
+often those strangled by the devil. Moreover, "The devil can so
+completely assume the human form when he wants to deceive us, that we
+may very well lie with what seems to be a woman of real flesh and blood,
+and yet all the while 'tis only the devil in the shape of a woman." The
+devil could also become the father of children. Luther says that he knew
+of one such case, and added, "I would have that child thrown into the
+Moldau at the risk of being held its murderer."[192]
+
+In America, Protestantism manifested the same influence. Of course, the
+settlers took the superstition of witchcraft with them, but it underwent
+no diminution in a new land. Increase Mather and his celebrated son,
+Cotton Mather, were the principal agents in stirring up the belief to
+frenzy point, and a commission was appointed to rout out witches and
+suppress their practices. There was soon a plentiful supply of victims.
+One woman was charged with "giving a look towards the great
+meeting-house of Salem, and immediately a demon entered the house and
+tore down part of it." It seems that a bit of the wooden wainscotting
+had fallen down. In the case of Giles Corey, who refused to plead
+guilty, torture was used. He was pressed to death, and when his tongue
+protruded from his mouth the sheriff thrust it back with his
+walking-stick. Many people were executed, and the ministers of Boston
+and Charlestown drew up an address warmly thanking the commission for
+its zeal, and expressing the hope that it would never be relaxed.
+
+Certainly the commission did what it could to earn the thanks given. A
+shipmaster making for Maryland with emigrants encountered unusually
+rough weather. An old woman, one Mary Lee, was accused of raising the
+storm, and drowned as a witch. A woman walked a long distance over muddy
+roads without soiling her dress. "I scorn to be drabbled," she said, and
+was hanged as a reward. George Burroughs could lift a barrel by
+inserting his finger in the bunghole. He was hanged for a wizard.
+Bridget Bishop was charged with appearing before John Louder at midnight
+and grievously oppressing him. Louder's evidence against the woman also
+included the fact that he saw a black pig approach his door, and when he
+went to kick it the pig vanished. He was also tempted by a black thing
+with the body of a monkey, the feet of a cock, and the face of a man. On
+going out of his back door he saw the said Bridget Bishop going towards
+her house. The evidence was deemed quite conclusive. Another witness
+said that being in bed on the Lord's Day, he saw a woman, Susanna
+Martin, come in at the window and jump down on the floor. She took hold
+of the witness's foot, and drawing his body into a heap, lay upon him
+for nearly two hours, so that he could neither move nor hear. In most of
+these cases torture was applied, and confessions were obtained. These
+confessions often implicated others, but when the witches took to
+accusing those in high places, and even ministers of religion, the need
+for discrimination was realised. Once a critical judgment was aroused,
+the mania began to subside--Cotton Mather fighting manfully for the
+belief to the end.
+
+The impetus given by Protestantism to witch-hunting in Scotland was most
+marked. Scotch witchcraft, says Lecky, was the offspring of Scotch
+Puritanism, and faithfully reflected the character of its parent. The
+clergy nowhere possessed greater power, and nowhere used it more
+assiduously to fan the flame against witchcraft. Buckle says:--
+
+"Of all the means of intimidation employed by the Scotch clergy, none
+was more efficacious than the doctrines they propounded respecting evil
+spirits and future punishments. On these subjects they constantly
+uttered the most appalling threats. The language which they used was
+calculated to madden men with fear, and to drive them to the depths of
+despair.... It was generally believed that the world was overrun by evil
+spirits, who not only went up and down the earth, but also lived in the
+air, and whose business it was to tempt mankind. Their number was
+infinite, and they were to be found in all places, and in all seasons.
+At their head was Satan himself, whose delight it was to appear in
+person, ensnaring or terrifying everyone he met. With this object he
+assumed various forms. One day he would visit the earth as a black dog;
+another day, as a raven; on another, he would be heard in the distance
+roaring like a bull. He appeared sometimes as a white man in black
+clothes, and sometimes he appeared as a black man in black clothes, when
+it was remarked that his voice was ghostly, and that one of his feet was
+cloven. His stratagems were endless. For, in the opinion of divines, his
+cunning increased with his age, and, having been studying for more than
+5000 years, he had now attained to unexampled dexterity."[193]
+
+Witchcraft was declared by the Scotch Parliament in 1563 to be
+punishable by death. And, naturally, the more zealous and active the
+search for witches, the more numerous they became. In the search the
+clergy and the kirk-sessions led the way. In 1587 the General Assembly,
+having before them a case of witchcraft in which the evidence was
+insufficient, deputed James Melville to travel on the coast side and
+collect evidence in favour of the prosecution. It also ordered that the
+presbyteries should proceed in all severity against such magistrates as
+liberated convicted witches. As in England so here, a body of men came
+into existence whose business it was to travel the country and detect
+witches. Anonymous accusations were invited, the clergy "placing an
+empty box in church, to receive a billet with the sorcerer's name, and
+the date and description of his deeds."[194] In 1603 "at the College of
+Auld Abirdene" every minister was ordered to make "subtill and privie
+inquisition," concerning the number of witches in his parish, and report
+the same forthwith. Nothing that could whet the appetite for the hunt
+was neglected. William Johnston, baron, bailie "of the regalitie and
+barronie of Broughton," was awarded the goods of all who should be
+"lawfullie convict be assyses of notorious and common witches, haunting
+and resorting devilles and witches."[195] The lives of thousands of
+people were rendered unbearable, and the complaint of one, Margaret
+Miall, that "she desyres not to live, because nobody will converse with
+her, seeing she is under the reputation of a witch," must have
+represented the feelings of many.
+
+It was not only for working ill that people were accused of witchcraft
+and executed; ill or well made little difference. In Edinburgh in 1623
+it was charged against Thomas Grieve that he had relieved many
+sicknesses and grievous diseases by sorcery and witchcraft. "He took
+sickness off a woman in Fife, and put it upon a cow, which thereafter
+ran mad and died." He also cured a child of a disease "by straiking back
+the hair of his head, and wrapping him in an anointed cloth, and by that
+means putting him asleep," and thus through his devilry and witchcraft,
+cured the child. Other charges of a similar kind were brought against
+Grieve, who was found guilty and hanged on the Castle Hill.[196] At the
+same place, a year previous, Margaret Wallace was also sentenced to be
+hanged and burned, on the same kind of charge, and for "practising
+devilry, incantation, and witchcraft, especially forbidden by the laws
+of Almighty God, and the municipal laws of this realm."
+
+The following bill of costs for burning two women, Jane Wischert and
+Isabel Cocker, in Aberdeen, has a certain melancholy interest:--
+
+                                              £  _s._ _d._
+
+  Item for 20 loads of Peatts to burn them    2    0   0
+    "  for ane boll of colles                 1    4   0
+    "  for four tar barrells                  0    6   8
+    "  for fir and win barrells               0   16   8
+    "  for a staick and the dressing of it    0   16   0
+    "  for four fathoms of towis              4    0   0
+    "  to Jon Justice for their execution     0   13   4
+
+In England, no less than in Scotland, America, and on the Continent,
+much learned testimony might be cited in defence of witchcraft. The
+great Sir Thomas Browne said in the most famous of his writings: "For my
+part I have ever believed, and do now know, that there are witches. They
+that doubt of these do not only deny them, but spirits; and are
+obliquely and upon consequence, a sort, not of infidels, but
+atheists."[197] Henry More, the great Platonist, asserted that they who
+deny the agency of witches are "puffed up with nothing but ignorance,
+vanity, and stupid infidelity." Ralph Cudworth, one of the greatest
+scholars of the latter part of the seventeenth century, said that they
+who denied the possibility of satanic intercourse "can hardly escape the
+suspicion of some hankering towards atheism."[198] Writing nearly a
+century later, when the English law merely prosecuted as rogues and
+vagabonds those who pretended to witchcraft, Blackstone thought it
+necessary to point out that this alteration did not deny the possibility
+of the offence, and added:--
+
+"To deny this would be to contradict the revealed word of God in various
+passages both of the Old and New Testaments; and the thing itself is a
+truth in which every nation in the world hath in its turn borne
+testimony; either by examples seemingly well attested, or by prohibitory
+laws which at least suppose the possibility of a commerce with evil
+spirits."[199]
+
+About the same time Wesley gave the world his famous declaration on the
+subject:--
+
+"It is true likewise that the English in general, and indeed most of the
+men of learning in Europe, have given up all accounts of witches and
+apparitions as mere old wives' fables. I am sorry for it, and I
+willingly take this opportunity of entering my solemn protest against
+this violent compliment which so many who believe the Bible pay to those
+who do not believe it. I owe them no such service. I take knowledge
+that these are at the bottom of the outcry which has been raised and
+with such insolence spread through the land in direct opposition, not
+only to the Bible, but to the suffrage of the wisest and best of men in
+all ages and nations. They well know (whether Christians know it or not)
+that the giving up of witchcraft is in effect giving up the Bible."[200]
+
+The evidence upon which the convictions for witchcraft rested were
+almost incredibly stupid, as the punishments were almost unbelievably
+brutal. If the crops failed, or the milk turned sour; if the head of a
+local magnate ached, or a minister of the gospel fell sick; if a woman
+was childless, or a child taken with a fit; if a cow sickened, or sheep
+died suddenly, some poor woman was pretty certain to be seized, and
+tortured until she confessed her alleged crime. A mole or wart on any
+part of the body was a sure sign of commerce with the devil. It was
+believed that on the body of every witch was a spot insensible to pain.
+To discover this she was stripped, pins were run into the body, and when
+excess of pain had produced numbness, some such spot was pretty certain
+to be found. Men regularly took up with this work in both England and
+Scotland, and their fame as 'prickers' depended upon the number of
+witches they unearthed. If a suspected witch kept a black cat, did not
+shed tears, or could not repeat the Lord's Prayer correctly, these were
+pretty sure signs of guilt. A more serious test was the ordeal by water.
+This was a favourite and general test, and was highly recommended by
+that learned fool, James the First. In this the right hand was tied to
+the left foot, the left hand to the right foot. She was then thrown
+into a pond. If she floated she was a witch, and was either hanged or
+burned. If she sank, she was innocent--and was drowned. Another test was
+to tie a woman's legs across, and she was so seated on them that they
+bore the entire weight of her body. In this position she was kept for
+hours, and on the first sign of pain condemned as a witch.
+
+If none of these tests were adopted, torture was used. There was the
+boot--a frame of iron or wood in which the leg was placed and wedges
+driven in until the limb was smashed. A variation of this was to place
+the leg in an iron boot and slowly heat it over a fire. There was the
+thumbscrew, an instrument which smashed the thumb to pulp by the turning
+of a screw. More barbarous still was the bridle. This was an iron hoop
+passing over the head, with four prongs, two pointing to the tongue and
+palate, and one to either cheek. The suspected witch was then chained to
+the wall, and watchers appointed to prevent her sleeping. The slightest
+movement caused the greatest torture, and in the vast majority of cases
+a confession was secured. In obstinate cases pressing between heavy
+stones was adopted.
+
+One of the most famous of these witch-finders was the celebrated Mathew
+Hopkins before referred to. He was appointed to the work by Parliament
+during the time of the Commonwealth, and styled himself 'witch-finder
+general.' Hopkins travelled round the country, much like an assize
+judge, putting up at the principal inns, and at the expense of the local
+authorities. His charge was twenty shillings a visit, whether he found
+witches or not. If he discovered any, there was a further charge of
+twenty shillings for every witch brought to execution. His favourite
+method of detection was that of floating. But another of Hopkins's tests
+was the following: The suspected witch was placed cross-legged on a
+stool in the centre of the room. She was closely watched and kept
+without food for four-and-twenty hours. Doors and windows remained open
+to watch for the entrance of some of the devil's imps. These might come
+in the form of a fly, a wasp, a moth, or some other insect. The work of
+the watchers was to kill every insect that came into the room. But if
+one escaped, it was clear proof that this was one of the witch's
+familiars.
+
+Wherever Hopkins travelled numerous convictions followed. These were so
+numerous that suspicion was aroused, not of the genuineness of the
+convictions, but of Hopkins's knowledge concerning the locality of the
+witches. In defence he published in 1647 a tract entitled "The Discovery
+of Witches; in answer to several Queries lately delivered to the Judge
+of Assize for the County of Norfolk; and now published by Mathew
+Hopkins, Witchfinder, for the benefit of the whole Kingdom." The charge
+against Hopkins was that he had been supplied by the devil with a
+memorandum of all the witches, and so was able to find them where others
+failed. Absurd as the charge was, it found credence, and although his
+end is wrapped in obscurity, it is said that he was finally seized
+himself on a charge of sorcery, tried by his own favourite water
+test--and floated. One cannot but hope that tradition is in this case
+trustworthy.
+
+It is difficult, nowadays, to realise the gravity with which these
+trials were undertaken. An outline of a very famous witch trial, before
+an eminent judge in the latter part of the seventeenth century, will
+best serve as an illustration. Before me there lies a little tract of
+some sixty pages, printed "for William Shrewsbury at the Bible in Duck
+Lane," and bearing on the title page the following description:--
+
+"At the Assizes and general gaol delivery, held at Bury St. Edmunds for
+the County of Suffolk, the Tenth day of March, in the Sixteenth Year of
+the Reign of our Sovereign, Lord King Charles II., before Mathew Hale,
+Knight, Lord Chief Baron of His Majesties Court of Exchequer; Rose
+Callender and Amy Duny, Widows, both of Leystoff, in the county
+aforesaid, were severally indicted for bewitching Elizabeth and Anne
+Durent, Jane Bocking, Susan Chandler, William Durent, Elizabeth and
+Deborah Pacy and the said Callender and Duny, being arrainged upon the
+same indictments, pleaded not guilty; and afterwards upon a long
+evidence, were found guilty, and thereupon had judgment to dye for the
+same."
+
+Both the women charged were old. The charges were as follows: The mother
+of the infant, William Durent, sworn and examined in open court, deposed
+that about the 10th of March, having special occasion to go from home,
+left her child in the care of Amy Duny, giving her special occasion not
+to give her child the breast. Nevertheless, Amy Duny did acquaint her
+mother on her return that she had given the child the breast, and on
+being reprimanded "used many high expressions and threatening speeches
+towards her; telling her that she had as good have done otherwise than
+to have found fault with her ... and that very night her son fell into
+strange fits of swounding ... and so continued for several weeks." Much
+troubled, the mother consulted a Dr. Jacob, of Yarmouth, who advised
+her to hang up the child's blanket, at night to wrap the child in it,
+and if she found anything therein to throw it in the fire. A very large
+toad was found, which on being put in the fire "made a great and
+horrible noise, and after a space there was a flashing in the fire like
+gunpowder ... and thereupon the toad was no more seen or heard." More
+wonderful still, "the next day there came a young woman and told this
+deponnent that her aunt (meaning the said Amy) was in a most lamentable
+condition, having her face all scorched with fire." And on the mother
+enquiring of Amy Duny how this had happened, Amy replied, "she might
+thank her for it, for that she was the cause thereof, but that she
+should live to see some of her children dead, or else upon crutches." It
+was further alleged "that not long after this deponnent was taken with
+lameness in both her legges, from the knees downwards, and that she was
+fain to go upon crutches ... and so continued till the time of the
+Assizes, that the witch came to be tried."
+
+Concerning the bewitching of Elizabeth and Deborah Pacy, aged eleven and
+nine, their father declared that Deborah was suddenly taken with
+lameness. One day while the girl was resting outside the house, "Amy
+Duny came to the deponnent's house to buy some herrings; but, being
+denied, she went away discontented.... But at the very same instant of
+time, the said child was taken with most violent fits, feeling extreme
+pain in her stomach, like the pricking of pins, and shrieking out in a
+dreadful manner like unto a whelp." As the result of this and other
+ailments from which the child suffered, the father accused Amy Duny of
+being a witch, and she was placed in the stocks. Being placed in the
+stocks, further threats were uttered, and both children were afflicted
+with fits. Upon recovery they "would cough extremely, and bring up much
+phlegm and crooked pins, and one time a twopenny nail with a very broad
+head; which pins (amounting to forty or more), together with the
+twopenny nail, were produced in court, with the affirmation of the said
+deponnent that he was present when the said nail was vomited up, and
+also most of the pins.... In this manner the said children continued for
+the space of two months, during which time, in their intervals, this
+deponnent would cause them to read some chapters from the New Testament.
+Whereupon he observed that they would read till they came to the name of
+Lord or Jesus or Christ, and then, before they could pronounce either of
+the said words, they would suddenly fall into their fits. But when they
+came to the name of Satan or Devil, they would clap their fingers upon
+the book, crying out, 'This bites, but makes me speak right well!'"
+
+Much more evidence of a similar kind was offered during the course of
+the trial, with details of a too indelicate character for reproduction
+concerning the search made on the women's bodies for devil's marks.
+During the whole of the trial there were present in court a number of
+distinguished people, amongst them Sir Thomas Browne. The latter, being
+"desired to give his opinion, what he did conceive of him; was clearly
+of opinion that the persons were bewitched, and said that in Denmark
+there had lately been a great discovery of witches, who used the very
+same way of afflicting persons, by conveying pins into them, and crooked
+as these pins were, with needles and nails. And his opinion was that
+the devil in such cases did work upon the bodies of men and women as on
+a natural foundation, to stir up and excite such humours superabounding
+in their bodies to a great excess, whereby he did in an extraordinary
+manner afflict them with such distempers as their bodies were most
+subject to, as particularly appeared in these children."
+
+Sir Mathew Hale, one of the greatest lawyers of his day, in directing
+the jury, told them "he would not repeat the evidence unto them, lest by
+so doing he should wrong the evidence one way or the other. Only this
+acquainted them. First, whether or no these children were bewitched?
+Secondly, whether the prisoners at the bar were guilty of it? That there
+were such creatures he made no doubt at all. For, first, the Scriptures
+had affirmed as much. Secondly, the wisdom of all nations had provided
+laws against such persons, which is an argument of their confidence of
+such a crime. And such had been the judgment of this kingdom, as appears
+by that Act of Parliament which had provided punishments proportionable
+to the quality of the offence. And desired them strictly to observe
+their evidence, and desired the great God of Heaven to direct their
+hearts in this weighty thing they had in hand; for to condemn the
+innocent and let the guilty go free were both an abomination before the
+Lord." The jury took no more than half an hour to consider their
+verdict, and brought in both women guilty upon all counts. The judge
+expressed his complete satisfaction with the verdict, and sentenced them
+to be hanged--a sentence duly carried out a fortnight later.
+
+This is the last notable trial in English history. A witch was burned
+later than the date of this trial, and the last one actually condemned
+was in 1712. But in this case, on the representation of the judge who
+tried the issue, the verdict was formally set aside. By that time people
+were beginning to realise the wisdom of Montaigne's counsel, written at
+the commencement of the witch epidemic:--
+
+"How much more natural and more likely do I find it that two men should
+lie than one in twelve hours should pass with the winds from east to
+west? How much more natural that our understanding may, by the
+volubility of our loose, capering mind, be transported from its place
+than one of us should, flesh and bones as we are, by a strange spirit be
+carried upon a broom through a tunnel or a chimney."
+
+In England the Witch Act of 1604 was not formally repealed until 1736.
+In Scotland the last witch legally executed was in 1722. Captain Ross,
+Sheriff of Sutherland, has the doubtful honour of having condemned her
+to the stake. But fifty years later than this--1773--the Associated
+Presbytery passed a resolution deploring the fact that witchcraft was
+falling into disrepute. In Germany the last witch was executed in 1749,
+by decapitation. The last trial for witchcraft in Massachusetts was as
+late as 1793. These dates refer, of course, to legal proceedings.
+Examples of the existence of this belief are continually being recorded
+in newspapers, although they now only rank as solitary reminiscences of
+one of the most degrading and brutalising beliefs that European history
+records.
+
+I have not aimed at giving a history of the witch mania--indeed, a
+scientific history of witchcraft, one that will make plain the nature of
+the various factors involved, has yet to be written. I have only dwelt
+upon it for the purpose of enforcing the lesson of how materially such
+an epidemic must have contributed to give permanence to religious belief
+in general. It is certain that such an epidemic could not occur save in
+a society saturated with supernaturalism. It is equally certain that
+once such an epidemic occurs it must in turn strengthen the tendency
+towards supernaturalistic beliefs. Thanks to the long reign of the
+religious idea, and to the overwhelming influence of the Church, the
+people of Europe were prepared for such an outbreak. And it should be
+clear that the prevalence of such beliefs, even though they may be
+afterwards discarded, favours the perpetuation of religious belief as a
+whole. The particular form of a belief that is prevalent for a time may
+disappear, but the temper of mind induced by its reign remains. And
+absurd as the belief in witches capering through the air on broomsticks,
+changing themselves into black cats, raising storms, and causing
+sickness--absurd though all this may be, it yet serves to keep alive the
+temper of mind on which supernaturalism lives.
+
+
+FOOTNOTES:
+
+[187] Cited by Bloch, _Sexual Life of our Time_, p. 120. Michelet has
+also dealt with this matter in his vivid and picturesque work, _The
+Sorceress_.
+
+[188] A lengthy account of this work is given by Ennemoser in his
+_History of Magic_, vol. ii.
+
+[189] _Rise and Influence of Rationalism_, i. pp. 3-6.
+
+[190] H. Williams, _The Superstitions of Witchcraft_, p. 214.
+
+[191] T. Wright, _Narratives of Sorcery and Magic_.
+
+[192] Michelet, _Life of Luther_, chap. vi.
+
+[193] _History of Civilisation_, chap. xix.
+
+[194] Dalyell, _Darker Superstitions of Scotland_, p. 623.
+
+[195] Dalyell, p. 628.
+
+[196] Pitcairn's _Criminal Trials_, vol. iii.
+
+[197] _Religio Medici_, pt. i. sec. 30.
+
+[198] _True Intellectual System_, ii. p. 650.
+
+[199] _Commentaries_, Stephen's Edition, i. p. 238.
+
+[200] _Journal_, 1768.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER ELEVEN
+
+SUMMARY & CONCLUSION
+
+
+The study of religion falls naturally and easily into two parts. The
+first is a question of origin. Under what conditions did the hypothesis
+that supernatural beings control the life of man come into existence? We
+know that in civilised times religious beliefs are in the nature of an
+inheritance. A member of any civilised society finds them here when he
+is born, he grows up with them, generally accepting them without
+question, or effecting certain modifications in the form in which he
+continues to hold them. If we treat religion as a hypothesis, advanced
+as other hypotheses are advanced, to account for a certain class of
+facts, then we can safely say that religion is one of the earliest in
+the history of human thought. And its antiquity and universality
+preclude us from seeking an explanation of its origin in the mental life
+of civilised humanity. Whether the religious hypothesis can or cannot be
+justified by an appeal to civilised intelligence, it is plain it did not
+begin there. Its beginnings are earlier than any existing civilisation;
+and in its most general form may be said to be as old as mankind itself.
+Consequently, if any satisfactory explanation of the origin of the
+religious idea is to be found, it must be sought amid the very earliest
+conditions of human society.
+
+Now whatever the differences of opinion concerning matters of detail,
+there is substantial agreement amongst European anthropologists upon one
+important point. They all agree that the conception of supernatural, or
+'spiritual,' beings owes its beginning to the ignorance of primitive man
+concerning both his own nature and the nature of the world around him.
+The beginnings of human experience suggest questions that can only be
+satisfactorily answered by the accumulated experience of many
+generations. These questions do not materially differ from those that
+face men to-day. The why and wherefore of things are always with us;
+life propounds the same problem to all; it is the replies alone that
+vary, and the nature of these replies is determined by the knowledge at
+our disposal. The difference is not in nature but in man. The answers
+given by primitive man to these eternal questions are a complete
+inversion of those of his better informed descendants. The conception of
+natural force, of mechanical necessity, is as yet unborn, and the
+primitive thinker everywhere assumes the operation of personal beings as
+responsible for all that occurs. This is not so much the product of
+careful and elaborate philosophising, it is closer akin to the _naive_
+thinking of a child concerning a thunderstorm. Primitive thought accepts
+the universal operation of living and intelligent forces as an
+unquestionable fact. Modern thought tends more and more surely in the
+direction of regarding the universe as a complex of self-adjusting,
+non-conscious forces. Primitive thought assumes a supernatural agency as
+the cause of disease, and seeks, logically, to placate it by prayer or
+coerce it by magic. Modern thought turns to test-tube and microscope,
+searches for the malignant germ, and manufactures an antitoxin. The
+history of human thought is, as Huxley said, a record of the
+substitution of mechanical for vitalistic processes. The beginning of
+religion is found in connection with the latter. A genuine science
+commences with the emergence of the former.
+
+With this aspect of the matter I have not, however, been specially
+concerned. It has been left on one side in order to concentrate
+attention upon another and a more neglected aspect of the subject--that
+of the conditions that have served to perpetuate the religious idea.
+Grant, what cannot be well denied in the face of modern investigation,
+that ideas of the supernatural began in primitive delusion. How comes it
+that this idea has not by now disappeared from civilised society? What
+are the causes that have given it such a lengthy lease of life?
+Experience has shown that all really verifiable knowledge counts as an
+asset of naturalism, and is so far opposed to supernaturalism. Moreover,
+the history of science has been such that one feels justified in the
+assumption that, given time and industry, there are no phenomena that
+are not susceptible to a naturalistic explanation. Why, then, has not
+supernaturalism died out? Even the religious idea cannot persist without
+evidence of some kind being offered in its behalf. This evidence may be
+to a better instructed mind inconclusive or irrelevant, but evidence of
+some sort there must have been all along, and must still be. Granted
+that the religious idea began with primitive mankind, granted also that
+it was based on a mistaken interpretation of natural phenomena, these
+reasons are quite insufficient to explain why thousands of generations
+later that idea is still with us. "Our fathers have told us" offers to
+the average mind a strong appeal, but surely the children will require
+some further proof than this. What kind of evidence is it that
+throughout the ages religious people have accepted as conclusive? A
+study of primitive psychology shows clearly enough how the religious
+idea vitalised the facts. What we next have to discern is the class of
+facts that have kept the religious idea alive.
+
+The foregoing pages constitute an attempt to answer this question. The
+need for some such investigation was clearly shown by the publication of
+the late Professor William James's _Varieties of Religious Experience_
+and its reception by the religious press of the country as an
+epoch-marking work. As a mere collection of documents, the work is
+interesting enough. But its critical value is extremely small. How
+religious visionaries have felt, or what has been their experiences, can
+only furnish the mere data of an enquiry, and _their explanation of the
+cause of their experiences is a part of the data_. This, apparently,
+Professor James overlooked; and it will be noted by critical readers of
+his book that it proceeds on the assumption that the statements of
+religious visionaries are to be taken, not only as true concerning their
+subjective experiences at a given time, but also as approximately true
+as to the causes of their mental states. This, of course, by no means
+follows. A scientific enquiry cannot separate mental conditions from the
+subject's interpretation of their causation. Whether this interpretation
+is genuine or not must be decided finally by an appeal to what is known
+of the laws of mental life, under both normal and abnormal conditions.
+If these are adequate to explain the "Varieties of Religious
+Experience," there is no need whatever to assume the operation of a
+supernatural agency. Nor does calling this agency 'transcendent' or
+'supermundane' make any substantial difference. For, in this connection,
+these are only names that serve to disguise a visitant of a highly
+undesirable character.
+
+The evidence on behalf of a naturalistic explanation of religious
+phenomena has been purposely stated in a suggestive rather than in an
+exhaustive manner. The main lines of evidence are threefold. First,
+there is the indisputable fact that in the lower stages of culture all
+mental and bodily diseases are universally attributed to spiritual
+agency. This explanation holds the field; it is the only one possible at
+the time, and it is not replaced until a comparatively late stage of
+human history. But of special importance is the fact that a belief does
+not die out suddenly. It is only destroyed very slowly, and even after
+the facts upon which the belief was originally based have been otherwise
+interpreted, the attitude of mind engendered by the long reign of a
+belief remains. It has by that time become part of the intellectual
+environment. Theories of a quasi-philosophic or quasi-scientific
+character are elaborated, and give to the original belief something of a
+rational air. Even to-day the extent to which superstitious practices
+still gather round the subject of disease is known only to the curious
+in such matters. Not that the original reason is given for the practice.
+In nearly every case a different one is invented. To take only a single
+example. We still find saffron tea largely used in cases of measles. All
+medical men are aware that it possesses not the slightest curative
+value. Students of folklore are aware that it has its origin in the
+theory of sympathetic cures. Its redeeming feature is that it is
+harmless; so we find it still in common use, and the recovery of a child
+from measles is often enough attributed to the potency of the
+concoction. So with the relation of disease to the persistence of the
+belief in the supernatural. The conclusion that disease--whether bodily
+or mental--is due to the agency of spirits is one that follows from the
+existence of the religious idea; but in turn the observed facts react
+and strengthen the religious belief. Every case of disease becomes to
+the primitive mind an unanswerable proof in favour of the original
+hypothesis. The disease is there, and the only explanation possible is
+in terms of the animistic idea. And all the time the religious idea is
+becoming more deeply embedded in the social consciousness, more firmly
+established as a social fact.
+
+The next line of evidence is that furnished by what I have called the
+culture of the supernatural. By some means or other--probably by
+accident in the first instance--it is discovered that certain herbs and
+vegetable drugs have a peculiar effect on one's mental state. Those who
+use them see or hear things other people do not normally hear or see.
+Abstention from food and other bodily privations produce similar
+results. What is the inevitable conclusion? The only one possible under
+the existing conditions is that communication has been set up with an
+invisible world from which one is shut off under normal conditions. From
+this to the next step is obvious and easy. If a drug, or a fast, brings
+one into communication with the supernatural world, one has only to
+repeat the conditions in order to repeat the experience. And repeated
+they are in all religions, with, at most, those modifications induced by
+changed times and circumstances. This is why fasting and other forms of
+'fleshly mortification' play so large a part in the history of religion.
+The savage medicine man, the Hindu fakir, the medieval saint, all create
+their ecstasies by the simple plan of disturbing the normal operations
+of the nervous system. It is not, of course, implied that this is done
+with a full consciousness of all that is involved in the practice. The
+derangement is to them the condition of the supernatural manifestation,
+not the physiological and psychological cause of the experience.
+
+The third main line of evidence is connected with the phenomena of
+sexuality. It has been shown that in early stages of culture man
+everywhere connects the phenomena of the sexual life with the activity
+of supernatural forces. Following the lines of investigation indicated
+by Mr. Sidney Hartland, we saw reason to believe that the primitive
+conception of procreation is not that afterwards prevalent, but that of
+assuming the birth of a child to be due to the direct action of
+spiritual beings on the mother. Proofs of this are found in existing
+beliefs among primitive peoples, in the magical practices so widely
+current to obtain children, and in numerous other customs connected with
+childbirth. The phenomenon of puberty in the male and of menstruation in
+the female gives a terrifying reality to this belief. But still more
+important is the fact that a great deal of assumed religious feeling is
+found on analysis to be little more than masked sexuality. The
+connection between eroticism and piety has been noted over and over
+again by medical observers in the cases that have been brought
+professionally under their notice. And it is hardly less marked in a
+large number of instances that are usually classed as normal. Thus great
+religious teachers have often emphasised the value of a celibate life as
+a means of furthering religious devotion, and nearly all have treated it
+with marked respect. The reason given for this is that marriage involves
+a greater absorption in material or worldly cares, while celibacy
+leaves one free to full devotion to the spiritual. But the bottom reason
+for it is that sexual and domestic feelings, lacking their proper outlet
+in marriage and family life, run with greater force in the outlet
+provided by religion. So it happens that we find unmarried men and
+women, devoted to the religious life, expressing themselves towards
+Jesus or the Virgin in language which, separated from its religious
+associations, leaves no doubt as to its origin in unsatisfied sexual
+feeling. In these cases we are dealing with a perversion of one of the
+deepest of human instincts. And it is one of the commonest of
+observations in psychology that when a feeling is denied outlet through
+its proper channel it finds vent in some other direction, and is to that
+extent masked or disguised.
+
+Allied to the fact of perversion is that of misinterpretation. In the
+chapter on _Conversion_ we have seen how largely this occurs at the
+period of adolescence. The significant features of adolescence are a
+development of the sexual nature and an awakening of a consciousness of
+race kinship. Connected with these, and flowing from them, is a more or
+less rapid development of what are called the altruistic feelings, the
+individual becoming less self-centred and more concerned for the
+well-being of others. From an evolutionary point it is easy to read the
+fundamental meaning of these transformations, although in the course of
+social development they have become overlaid with a number of secondary
+characteristics. Still, in a completely rationalised social life, with
+adequate knowledge concerning the nature of adolescence, every care
+would be taken to direct these developing energies into purely social
+channels. Adolescence is the great formative period; it is then that
+imitation and suggestion play their most important parts, and it is then
+that the foundations may be laid of a really good and useful
+citizenship. If we fail then, we fail completely.
+
+In a society where supernaturalism still exerts considerable power
+another, and a more disastrous, policy is pursued. Every endeavour is
+made by religious organisations to exploit adolescence in their own
+interest. Thousands of priests, often, no doubt, with the best of
+motives, are engaged in impressing upon the youthful mind an entirely
+erroneous notion of the character and the direction of the feelings
+experienced. The sense of restlessness, consequent upon a period of
+great physiological disturbance, is utilised to create an unhealthy
+'conviction of sin,' or the need of 'getting right with God.' Social
+duties and obligations are made incidental rather than fundamental.
+Activities that should be consciously directed to a social end are
+diverted into religious channels, and one consequence of this, as we
+have seen, is a large crop of nervous disorders that might be avoided
+were a healthier outlet provided. In this the modern priest is acting
+precisely as his savage forerunner acted. As the savage medicine man
+associates sexual phenomena with the activity of the tribal ghosts, so
+the modern priest often associates the psychological conditions that
+accompany adolescence with a supernatural influence. The distinction
+between the two is a purely verbal one. In neither case is there a
+recognition of the nature of the processes actually at work; in both
+cases the phenomena are used to emphasise the reality and activity of
+the supernatural. In both cases the social feelings are disguised by
+the religious interpretation given, with the result that instead of
+adolescence being, as it should be, the period of a conscious entry into
+the larger social life, it only too often marks the beginning of a
+lifelong servitude to retrogressive forces.
+
+These are the main lines along which, I conceive, the study of the
+pathologic elements that enter into the history of religion must be
+studied. And so long as we restrict our study to the lower culture
+stages the evidence is clear and unmistakable. It is when we reach the
+higher stages of civilisation that the problem becomes more difficult.
+For although it is possible to detect the same factors at work they are
+expressed in a different way, and affiliated to current philosophic and
+even scientific ideas. Thus, it would be readily admitted by most people
+nowadays that visions seen by a fasting man, or by a taker of drugs, or
+by one suffering from some nervous disorder, were wholly inadmissible as
+evidence. So far we have advanced beyond the point of view of primitive
+races. But the testimony of one who by constantly dwelling upon a single
+idea, and by excluding rational and corrective influences, has brought
+about a quite abnormal state of mind, is still counted of value by
+theologians. Much of the current cant concerning 'mysticism' may be
+cited in illustration of this. Exactly what mysticism is no one appears
+to know. Definitions are numerous and varied. So far as most mystics are
+concerned the definition of Harnack--"Mysticism is rationalism applied
+to a sphere beyond reason"--appears to hit the mark, although how reason
+can be used in a sphere to which it does not apply is precisely one of
+those unintelligible statements that so delights those with yearnings
+after the ineffable. The normal mind will probably find more
+satisfaction in John Stuart Mill's description of mysticism as being
+"neither more nor less than ascribing objective existence to the
+subjective creations of the mind, and believing that by watching and
+contemplating these ideas of its own making, it can read what takes
+place in the world without."
+
+But the general claim of 'mystics,' and, indeed, of supernaturalists
+generally, is that they are, in virtue of the exercise of certain
+qualities or 'faculties,' either inoperative at certain times, or absent
+in the case of normal folk, able to perceive a truth not perceptible to
+people less fortunately endowed. And these claims, I have no hesitation
+in saying, are wholly false. There are all degrees of development of
+human faculty, but it is substantially the same with all. There is no
+royal road to truth in this direction more than in others. Truth is
+reached in the same way by all, and although an induction may in the
+case of certain well-dowered individuals be so rapid as to rank as an
+'intuition,' a careful analysis destroys the illusion.
+
+When we clear away from the claims of the 'mystic' all the superfluities
+of language that are there, and so reduce these claims to their lowest
+and plainest terms, we find ourselves face to face with the claim of the
+supernaturalist as it has existed from savage times onward. The method
+remains true to itself. In the first instance, we have the claim to
+illumination based upon direct interference with the normal workings of
+the mind. In the next stage, we find this interference still marked, but
+less direct. Finally, we have the unhealthy operation of fixed ideas,
+and the exclusion of all conditions that would prevent the operation of
+hallucination or illusion. But the method remains the same throughout,
+and it is equally sterile throughout. In all history these mystical
+states of illumination have discovered no verifiable truth; they have
+never at any time advanced human knowledge in the smallest degree. And
+the reason for this is plain: The brain of the mystic, like that of the
+non-mystic, can only work on the basis of its acquired knowledge or
+experience. It can create nothing new; it can declare no truth that is
+not in the nature of an induction from existing knowledge. All that the
+religious mystic can accomplish after brooding upon inherited religious
+beliefs is to create new combinations, or effect certain modifications
+or developments of them, and by continued contemplation endow his
+subjective creations with an objective existence. That is why the
+Christian mystic remains a Christian. The Mohammedan mystic remains a
+Mohammedan. The 'supersensible reality' is always of the kind consonant
+with their inherited beliefs and their social environment. That is also
+why mysticism has its fashions like all other forms of religious
+extravagance. And as he is "applying rationalism to a sphere above
+reason," the mystic may give full vent to his imaginative powers. That
+which is above reason may defy reasonable disproof. To some, however, it
+has the disadvantage of not admitting of reasonable verification. There
+is nothing here but the primitive delusion operating under changed
+conditions.
+
+In addition, to the lines of investigation followed in the foregoing
+pages, a great deal might be said as to how far the religious idea has
+been perpetuated by an exploitation of purely social qualities. It must
+be obvious to even the cursory student that a great deal of what is now
+being put forward as religious is really no more than a sociology with a
+religious label. The feeling for truth, beauty, justice, the desire for
+social intercourse, are all treated as expressions of religious
+conviction. All sorts of social reforms are urged in the name of
+religion, and the degree of success achieved dwelt upon as fruits of the
+religious spirit. But in no legitimate sense of the word can these
+things be called religious. They may or may not be consonant with the
+existing religion, but in themselves they are very clearly the outcome
+of man's social nature, and would exist even though religion disappeared
+entirely. The appeals made to man's moral sense, to his sense of
+justice, to his sympathies, are thus fundamentally appeals made to his
+social nature, and so far as the religious appeal is placed upon this
+basis it becomes an exploitation of the social consciousness.
+Unfortunately, the long association of religious forms with social life
+and institutions, due ultimately to the immense power of supernaturalism
+in early society, this, combined with early education, makes it a matter
+of no small difficulty for the average man or woman to separate the two
+things.
+
+Finally, let us imagine for a moment that the course of human history
+had been different to what it actually has been. Suppose that by some
+miracle humanity had started its career in full possession of that
+knowledge of nature which has been so laboriously accumulated. In that
+case, would the belief in the supernatural have ever existed? Would the
+thousand and one 'spiritual beings' of primitive society have ever had
+being? And if not called into being then, from what other source could
+they have been derived? Is there anything in later scientific knowledge
+that would ever have suggested the supernatural? We know there is not;
+we know that the whole of modern science is an emphatic protest against
+its existence. Unfortunately the scientist does not come first, but
+last; and by the time he appears, the supernatural has made good its
+foothold; it has permeated human institutions, and has bitten so deeply
+into habits of thought as to make its eradication the most difficult of
+all tasks.
+
+Let us carry our imagining yet a step further. Imagine that even after
+primitive ignorance had created the supernatural, it had come to an
+abrupt stop when man had emerged from the purely savage stage. Suppose a
+generation born, not without knowledge of what their progenitors
+believed, but with a sufficient knowledge of their own to correct their
+ancestor's errors. Suppose that generation in a position to recognise
+disease, insanity, delusion, hysteria, hallucination for what they are.
+Assume them to be under no delusion concerning the nature of man,
+physically or mentally. Would the religious idea have persisted in the
+way that it has done? Granted religion would still have continued to
+exist as an ultimate philosophy of nature that appealed to some minds,
+as other systems of philosophy number their disciples, would it have
+been the dominating power it has been? What under such conditions would
+have become of that evidence for the supernatural, accepted generation
+after generation, but which is now rejected by all educated minds? Where
+would have been that long array of seers, prophets, illuminants, whose
+credentials have been found in states of mind that are now seen to have
+been pathological in character? For remember it was not always--very
+seldom, in fact--the justice, or the reasonableness of the teachings set
+forth, that won support, but generally the 'signs and wonders' that were
+pointed to as evidence of the divine commission of the teachers. Assume,
+then, that these 'signs and wonders' had been wanting, and that for
+thousands of years people had looked at natural phenomena from the point
+of view of the educated mind of to-day, what would have been the present
+position of the religious idea? Would it not have been like a tree
+divorced from the soil?
+
+Well, we know that the course of history has been far different from
+what I have assumed to be the case. We know that the savage dies out
+very slowly, and that even in civilised States to-day he is honoured in
+the existence of a whole army of representatives. Each generation moves
+along the road marked out by its predecessors, and broadens or lengthens
+it to but a small extent. For many, many generations people went on
+adopting the conclusions of the savage concerning man and the universe,
+and finding proofs of the soundness of those conclusions in exactly the
+same kind of experiences. The beliefs thus engendered were wild and
+absurd--admittedly so, and many of such a nature that educated people
+are now ashamed of them. But such as they were, they served the purpose
+of perpetuating the belief in the supernatural, and so served to
+strengthen the general religious idea. Of that there can be no
+reasonable doubt. For the influence of beliefs that have been long held
+does not end with the intellectual perception of their falsity. A belief
+such as witchcraft dies out, but by that time it has done its work in
+familiarising the general mind with the reality of the supernatural, and
+so prepares the ground for other harvests. These long centuries of
+superstitious beliefs have left behind in society a psychological
+residuum that is at all times an obstacle and is sometimes fatal to
+scientific thinking. We are like men who have obtained freedom after
+almost a lifetime of slavery. We may be no longer in any real danger of
+the lash, but fear of the whip has become part of our nature, and we
+shrink without cause. So with all those now admitted delusions that have
+been described in the foregoing pages, and which for generations were
+asserted without question. They bit deeply in to social institutions;
+the temper of mind they induced became part of our social heritage. They
+perpetuated the long reign of supernaturalism, and still interpose a
+serious obstacle to sane and helpful conceptions of man and the
+universe.
+
+
+
+
+INDEX
+
+
+Adolescence and Religion, 177-8, 181, 276-7.
+
+Adolescence and Primitive Customs, 178.
+
+Adolescence and Nervous Disorders, 196-7.
+
+Adolescence, Social Significance of, 183-5.
+
+Agapæ, 152.
+
+Asceticism, 121, 125, 146, 208-13.
+
+Asceticism and Purity, 213.
+
+Asceticism, Influence on Religion, 224-5.
+
+Augustine, 157.
+
+Authority, Conflict with Science, viii.
+
+
+Baring-Gould, S., 147, 153, 209.
+
+Baring-Gould, S., on Mysticism and Sexualism, 125, 151.
+
+Brinton, D. G., on Origin of Religion, 14.
+
+Bryce, J., 232.
+
+Buckle, T. H., 256.
+
+
+Catherine of Sienna, 85, 129.
+
+Celibacy, 214-5.
+
+Celibacy, Results on Morals, 220-3.
+
+Celibacy, Social Consequences of, 216-9, 220-3.
+
+Clouston, Sir T. S., on Revivals, 195.
+
+Clouston, Sir T. S., on the Connection between Sexualism and Religion,
+140.
+
+Conversion, Pathological Nature of, 194.
+
+Conversion and Adolescence, 32, 176-7, 276.
+
+Conversion, Theological Notions of, 169-71.
+
+Conversion, Ages of Converts, 174-5, 194-5.
+
+Conversion, Statistics of, 173-5.
+
+Conversion and Imitation, 188.
+
+Conversion, Social Aspects of, 200.
+
+Convulsionnaires (The), 239.
+
+Crowd Psychology, 206.
+
+Crusades, Character of, 227-9.
+
+Crusades, Children's, 230.
+
+Crusades, Consequences of, 232-3.
+
+Cudworth, R., 259.
+
+
+Dalyell, J. G., 257.
+
+Dancing and Religious Ecstasy, 60-1.
+
+Dancing Epidemics, 236-40.
+
+Death, Savage Ideas of, 44.
+
+Demoniacs, 77.
+
+Disease, Theory of, amongst Primitive Peoples, 46.
+
+Disease, Theory of, amongst the Early Christians, 47.
+
+D'Israeli, I., on Sexualism and Religion, 17, 135.
+
+Draper, J. W., 231.
+
+Drugs, their use in the history of Religion, 57.
+
+
+Environment, 36, 38.
+
+Environment, Nature of Primitive, 39.
+
+Epilepsy, Influence of, in fostering Supernaturalism, 74-9.
+
+Epilepsy, Opinion of Dr. Hollander, 75.
+
+Epilepsy, Opinion of Sir T. S. Clouston, 75.
+
+Epilepsy, Opinion of Dr. C. Norman, 76.
+
+Epilepsy, Opinion of Emanuel Deutsch, 77, 79.
+
+Epilepsy in New Testament, 77.
+
+Erotic Sects, 155-60, 165.
+
+Eroticism and Supernaturalism, 126-8, 132, 136-9.
+
+Evidence for the Supernatural, 2, 271.
+
+
+Fasting, 61-5.
+
+Flagellation, 234-5.
+
+Forlong, Maj.-Gen., 109 _n._
+
+Fox, George, Account of Visions, 82.
+
+Frazer, J. G., 39, 46, 97, 99, 111.
+
+Free Love--Religious, 150, 161-4.
+
+
+Galton, Francis, on Religious and Morbid States, 86.
+
+Galton, Francis, 219.
+
+Gibbon, E., 227.
+
+Gowers, Sir W. R., 197.
+
+Granger, Prof., 84, 141-3.
+
+
+Hallucinations, 23-4-5, 62, 84.
+
+Hecker, J. F. C., 236-7.
+
+Hopkins, Mathew, 261-2.
+
+Human Qualities, Identity of, 6.
+
+
+Interpretation, Growth of Scientific, xiii.
+
+Ireland, Dr. W. W., on Hallucinations, 23-4.
+
+
+James, W., 10, 11, 14, 15, 16, 17, 21, 81, 83, 130, 131, 145, 175-6,
+272.
+
+
+Kingsley, Mary, on Primitive Thought, 42.
+
+
+Lea, H. C., 220-1.
+
+Le Bon, Gustave, on Crowd Psychology, 206.
+
+Lecky, W. E. H., 154, 212, 221.
+
+Luther and Demonism, 25, 58, 82, 253.
+
+
+Maudsley, H., on the Relation between Nervous States and Ecstasy, 66,
+76, 133.
+
+Medicine and the Church, 70-1.
+
+Menstruation, 95-6-7-8.
+
+Mental States, Reality of, xi, 7, 22.
+
+Mercier, C., Connection between Sexualism and Religion, 124, 140-1, 187,
+197.
+
+Milman, H. H., 219, 222-3, 225-6, 229, 232.
+
+Mind, Theories of, x.
+
+Mistletoe, Origin of Kissing under, 109 _n._
+
+Mohammed, his Account of Inspiration, 78, 81.
+
+Monasticism, 225.
+
+Monasticism and the Family, 216-7, 219, 222-3.
+
+Monasticism and Morals, 220.
+
+Mysticism, 131, 279-80.
+
+Mysticism and the Abnormal, 55.
+
+Mysticism and Puberty, 186.
+
+Mysticism, Definitions of, 278-9.
+
+Mystics, Claims of, xi.
+
+
+Opium, Effects of, 58.
+
+
+Pathological States and Religious Belief, 5, 49.
+
+Pathological Aspects of Revivals, 190-1-2-3, 201.
+
+Pathology of Religion, Need of, 3.
+
+Phallicism, 104-5-6-7-8-9.
+
+Pike, L. O., on Character of Crusaders, 229.
+
+Procreation, Primitive Beliefs concerning, 93-4.
+
+Psychological Epidemics, 207.
+
+Psychology, Normal and Abnormal, 3.
+
+Psychology as a Social Force, 37-8.
+
+Puberty, 180-6.
+
+Puberty Customs, 62, 95, 96.
+
+
+Religion, Definition of, 1.
+  Association of, with Non-religious Forces, 4.
+  and Intuition, 51.
+  and Puberty, 180.
+  and Dancing, 60-1-2.
+  and Fasting, 63-4-5.
+  and Environment, 199, 202.
+  in Primitive Life, 40, 44-5-6, 53.
+  its Connection with Pathological Conditions, 8, 14, 68-9, 70-1-2-3-4.
+
+Religious Faculty, Fallacy of, 7, 19, 20.
+
+Religious Idea and Modern Thought, vii.
+
+Renan, E., 145.
+
+Revivalistic Religion, 163, 172, 189, 190, 193, 201.
+
+Russian Sects, 164-7.
+
+
+Saints, Medical Uses of, 70.
+
+Santa Teresa, 85.
+
+Science, Function of, xi-xii.
+
+Sexualism and Religious Belief, 9, 11-2, 89-90, 120, 121, 125-9, 145,
+275.
+
+Sexualism and Religious Belief, Opinion of Dr. Norman, 122;
+  of Dr. Forel, 123;
+  of Dr. Mercier, 124;
+  of Dr. Krafft-Ebing, 125;
+  of Dr. Maudsley, 133-4.
+
+Smith, W. R., on the Meaning of 'Unclean,' 101.
+
+Sociability, Significance of, 35.
+
+Social Life and Religious Theories, 13, 281.
+
+Spencer, H., 37, 46.
+
+Spiritual Wifehood, 148-9.
+
+Spiritualism, 53-4.
+
+Starbuck, E. D., on Conversion, 174, 200.
+
+Sully, J., 20.
+
+Supernaturalism, Causes of Persistence of, 271, 273, 277, 282.
+
+Supernaturalism, Consequences of, 283-4.
+
+Supernaturalism, Persistence of, 2.
+
+Suso, Austerities of, 85.
+
+Swedenborg, E., 80.
+
+Symonds, J. A., Experience under Chloroform, 29.
+
+
+Theologians, Attitude towards Science, ix.
+
+Thomas, W. I., 182.
+
+Tylor, E. B., 1, 49, 54, 55, 71, 182, 193.
+
+
+Unclean, Religious Significance of, 100-1.
+
+
+Whittaker, T., on the Effects of Opium, 58.
+
+Williams, A., 250.
+
+Witchcraft, 27, 243.
+  Pathology of, 246-7.
+  and Christian Church, 244.
+  Bull of Innocent VIII., 248.
+  Extent of Epidemic, 250.
+  and Sir Thomas Browne, 265.
+  and Montaigne, 267.
+  and Sir M. Hale, 266.
+  and John Wesley, 259.
+  and Luther, 253.
+  and Protestantism, 252-3.
+  Scottish, 255-6-7-8, 267.
+  American, 254-5.
+  Children burned for, 251.
+  Description of Trial, 263-6.
+  Legislation in England, 253, 267.
+
+Witches, Methods of Detection, 260-1.
+
+Witches, Number killed, 250-1.
+
+Woman, Christian Church and, 102.
+
+Woman, why considered religiously unclean, 103.
+
+Woman, a Source of Spiritual Infection, 99.
+
+Woman, Influence of Religious Beliefs in determining her Social
+Position, 102-3, 110-9.
+
+Woman, Position among Primitive Peoples, 115.
+
+Wright, T., 251.
+
+
+[Transcriber's Note:
+
+The following corrections were made:
+
+p. 21: extra open quote removed (In what sense)
+
+p. 24: Dr. W. H. Ireland to Dr. W. W. Ireland (as given by Dr. W. W.
+Ireland)
+
+p. 25: Nuremburg to Nuremberg (came from Nuremberg), to match cited text
+
+p. 46: Crook to Crooke (says Mr. W. Crooke)
+
+p. 46: Ahmadnager to Ahmadnagar (Mahadeo Kolis of Ahmadnagar)
+
+p. 57: DeCandolle to De Candolle (says De Candolle)
+
+p. 58 (Footnote 26): Pharmæcology to Pharmacology (Text-Book of
+Pharmacology)
+
+p. 70: Persel to Pernel (St. Pernel for agues), to match cited text
+
+p. 75: everyone to every one (every one of the senses)
+
+p. 76: Connolly to Conolly (Dr. Conolly Norman)
+
+pp. 86 (Footnote 63), and 130 (Footnote 107): Joli to Joly (H. Joly)
+
+p. 101 (Footnote 76): on to in (Studies in the Psychology of Sex)
+
+p. 114: is to are (Nor are the substantial facts)
+
+p. 123 (Footnote 96): Problem to Question (The Sexual Question)
+
+pp. 125, 128 (Footnote 105), and 287 (Index): Kraft-Ebing to
+Krafft-Ebing
+
+p. 127: Loudon to Loudun (Convent of Ursulines of Loudun)
+
+p. 127 (Footnote 104): of America to in North America (Jesuits in North
+America)
+
+p. 128: Alacocque to Alacoque (The blessed Mary Alacoque)
+
+p. 149 (Footnote 123): Life of St. Paul to Study of St. Paul
+
+p. 166 (Footnote 140): Churches to Church (Heard's description, Russian
+Church)
+
+p. 178: tatooing to tattooing (tattooing forms part of the religious
+ceremony)
+
+p. 182 (Footnote 151): missing 4 added in 241 (pp. 241-48)
+
+p. 209: Brahminism to Brahmanism (Brahmanism has its order of ascetics),
+to match cited text
+
+p. 209: missing close quote added (consecrated to Tezcatlipoca.")
+
+p. 249 (Footnote 188): Enenmoser to Ennemoser (is given by Ennemoser)
+
+p. 250 (Footnote 190): A. Williams, The Superstition of Witchcraft to H.
+Williams, The Superstitions of Witchcraft
+
+p. 251 (Footnote 191): History to Narratives (Narratives of Sorcery and
+Magic)
+
+p. 255: Burroughes to Burroughs (George Burroughs)
+
+pp. 263, 264: Tacy to Pacy (Elizabeth and Deborah Pacy)
+
+p. 286 (Index): Ireland, Dr. W. H. to Ireland, Dr. W. W.
+
+p. 286 (Index): Millman, H. H. to Milman, H. H.
+
+Irregularities in hyphenation (e.g. supernormal vs. super-normal) and
+misquotations have not been corrected. Unless it was found that the
+error also occurred in the cited text, misspellings have been corrected.
+
+Although Footnote 81 (originally on p. 104) refers to a "note at the end
+of this chapter," the "NOTE TO PAGE 104" begins on p. 110, several pages
+before the chapter ends. This has not been changed.
+
+Footnotes markers have been changed from symbols (in the original) to
+numerals.
+
+For the plain text versions, an oe-ligature has been changed to oe
+(Coelestia).]
+
+
+
+
+
+End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of Religion & Sex, by Chapman Cohen
+
+*** END OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK 30306 ***
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+<div>*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK 30306 ***</div>
+
+<p class="u center med">THE OPEN MIND LIBRARY</p>
+
+<p class="center sm">BEING A SERIES OF WORKS DEALING WITH<br />
+  QUESTIONS AS HANDLED BY DIFFERENT<br />
+  SCHOOLS OF THOUGHT, IN RELIGION,<br />
+  ETHICS, PHILOSOPHY &amp; PSYCHOLOGY</p>
+
+<div class="tp">
+<h1><span class="wide">RELIGION<br />
+ &amp; SEX</span><br />
+
+<span class="tpsub">STUDIES IN THE PATHOLOGY<br />
+OF RELIGIOUS DEVELOPMENT</span></h1>
+<p class="auth">BY CHAPMAN COHEN</p>
+
+<p class="center pub"><span class="med">T. N. FOULIS, PUBLISHER</span><br />
+<span class="sm">LONDON, EDINBURGH, &amp; BOSTON</span></p>
+</div>
+
+<p class="center"><i>Published October 1919</i></p>
+
+<p class="center"><i>Printed by</i> <span class="smcap">Morrison &amp; Gibb Limited</span>, <i>Edinburgh</i></p>
+
+<h2>THE LIST OF CHAPTERS</h2>
+
+<table class="toc" summary="Table of Contents">
+<tr><td class="top">I.</td> <td align="left" class="smcap">Science &amp; the Supernatural</td>              <td><i>page</i>&nbsp;<a href="#Page_1">1</a></td></tr>
+
+<tr><td class="top">II.</td> <td align="left" class="smcap">The Primitive Mind &amp; its Environment</td>              <td><a href="#Page_35">35</a></td></tr>
+
+<tr><td class="top">III.</td> <td align="left" class="smcap">The Religion of Mental Disease</td>                   <td><a href="#Page_51">51</a></td></tr>
+
+<tr><td class="top">IV.</td> <td align="left" class="smcap">Sex &amp; Religion in Primitive Life</td>                  <td><a href="#Page_89">89</a></td></tr>
+
+<tr><td class="top">V.</td> <td align="left" class="smcap">The Influence of Sexual &amp; Pathologic
+   States on Religious Belief</td>                            <td><a href="#Page_120">120</a></td></tr>
+
+<tr><td class="top">VI.</td> <td align="left" class="smcap">The Stream of Tendency</td>                           <td><a href="#Page_145">145</a></td></tr>
+
+<tr><td class="top">VII.</td> <td align="left" class="smcap">Conversion</td>                                      <td><a href="#Page_169">169</a></td></tr>
+
+<tr><td class="top">VIII.</td> <td align="left" class="smcap">Religious Epidemics</td>                            <td><a href="#Page_205">205</a></td></tr>
+
+<tr><td class="top">IX.</td> <td align="left"><span class="smcap">Religious Epidemics</span>&mdash;(<i>concluded</i>)</td>     <td><a href="#Page_226">226</a></td></tr>
+
+<tr><td class="top">X.</td> <td align="left" class="smcap">The Witch Mania</td>                                   <td><a href="#Page_243">243</a></td></tr>
+
+<tr><td class="top">XI.</td> <td align="left" class="smcap">Summary &amp; Conclusion</td>                         <td><a href="#Page_269">269</a></td></tr>
+</table>
+
+<p><!-- Page vii --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_vii" id="Page_vii">[vii]</a></span></p>
+
+<h2>PREFACE</h2>
+
+<p>In spite of all that has been done
+in the way of applying scientific principles to religious
+ideas, there is much that yet remains to be accomplished.
+Generally speaking science has only dealt
+with the subject of religion in its more normal
+and more regularised forms. The last half-century
+has produced many elaborate and fruitful studies of
+the origin of religious ideas, while comparative mythology
+has shown a close and suggestive relationship
+between creeds and symbols that were once believed
+to have nothing in common. But beyond these fields
+of research there is at least one other that has hitherto
+been denied the attention it richly deserves. When
+the anthropologist has described those conditions of
+primitive culture amid which he believes religious
+ideas took their origin, and the comparative mythologist
+has shown us the similarities and inter-relations
+of widely separated creeds, religious beliefs have yet
+to submit to the test of a scientific psychology, the
+function of which is to determine how far the same principles
+apply to all phases of mental life whether religious
+or non-religious. Moreover, in addition to the
+normal psychical life of man, there is that vast borderland
+in which the normal merges into the abnormal,
+and the healthy state into a pathologic one. That
+there is a physiology of religion is now generally admitted;
+but that there is also a pathology of religion
+is not so generally recognised. The present work seeks
+to emphasise this last aspect. It does not claim to be
+more than an outline of the subject&mdash;a sketch map of
+a territory that others may fill in more completely.</p>
+
+<p><!-- Page viii --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_viii" id="Page_viii">[viii]</a></span>
+From another point of view the following pages
+may be regarded as an attempt more completely to
+apply scientific principles to religious beliefs. And it
+would be idle to hope that such an attempt could be
+made without incurring much hostile criticism. In
+connection with most other subjects the help of science
+is welcomed; in connection with religion science is
+still regarded as more or less of an intruder, profaning
+a sacred subject with vulgar tests and impertinent enquiries.
+This must almost inevitably follow when one
+has to face the opposition of thousands of men who
+have been trained to regard themselves as the authorised
+exponents of all that pertains to religion, but
+whose training fails to supply them with a genuine
+scientific equipment. It should, however, be clear that
+an attitude of hostility to science, veiled or open, cannot
+be maintained. Mere authority has fallen on evil
+days, and in all directions is being freely challenged.
+There is increasing dislike to systems of thought that
+shrink from examination, and to conclusions that cannot
+withstand the most rigorous investigation. And
+if science really has anything of value to say on this
+question it cannot be held to silence for ever. Sooner
+or later the need for its assistance will be felt, and the
+self-elected authority of an order must give way. It is,
+moreover, impossible for science with its claim, sometimes
+avowed, but always implied, to cover the whole
+of life, to forego so large a territory as that of religion.
+For there can be no reasonable question that religion
+has played, and still plays a large part in the life of the
+race. Whatever be the nature of religion, science is
+bound either to deal with it or confess its main task to
+be hopeless.</p>
+
+<p>Whether or not it is possible to apply known scientific<!-- Page ix --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_ix" id="Page_ix">[ix]</a></span>
+principles to the whole of religion will be a matter
+of opinion; but the attempt is at least worth making.
+So much that appeared to be beyond the reach of
+science has been ultimately brought within its ken, so
+many things that seemed to stand in a class by themselves
+have been finally brought under some more
+comprehensive generalisation, and so become part of
+the 'cosmic machine,' that one is impelled to believe
+that given time and industry the same will result here.
+And it should never be forgotten that one aspect of
+scientific progress has been the taking over of large
+tracts of territory that religion once regarded as peculiarly
+its own; and just as psychology and pathology
+were found to hold the key to an understanding of
+such a phenomenon as witchcraft, so we may yet realise
+that a true explanation of religious phenomena is
+to be found, not in some supernatural world, but in the
+workings of natural forces imperfectly understood.</p>
+
+<p>The defences set up by theologians against the
+scientific advance may be summarised under two
+heads. It is claimed that the 'facts' of the religious life
+belong to a world of inner experience, to a state of spiritual
+development which brings the subject into touch
+with a super-sensuous world not open to the normal
+human being, and with which science, as ordinarily
+understood, is incompetent to deal. In essence this is
+a very old position, and contains the kernel of 'mysticism'
+in all ages, from the savage state onward. This
+position involves a very obvious begging of the question
+at issue. It assumes that all attempts to correlate
+religious phenomena with phenomena in general
+have failed, and that all future attempts are similarly
+doomed to failure. Of course nothing of the kind has<!-- Page x --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_x" id="Page_x">[x]</a></span>
+been shown. On the contrary, the aim of the present
+work is to show that no dividing line can be drawn between
+those states of mind that have been and are
+classed as religious, and those that are admittedly
+non-religious. For various reasons I have dealt almost
+entirely with those conditions that are admittedly
+pathological, but I believe it would be possible
+to prove the same of all normal frames of mind and
+emotional states. Any human quality may be enlisted
+in the service of religion, but there are none that are
+specifically religious. It is a pure assumption that the
+religious visionary possesses qualities that are either
+absent or rudimentary in other persons. Human faculty
+is everywhere identical although the form in which
+it is expressed differs according to education, the presence
+of certain dominating ideas, and the general influence
+of one's environment. To admit the claim of
+the mystic is to surrender all hope of a scientific co-ordination
+of life. It is quite fatal to the scientific ideal
+and involves the re-introduction into nature of a dualism
+the removal of which has been one of the most
+marked advantages of scientific thinking.</p>
+
+<p>Moreover, whatever views we may hold as to the ultimate
+nature of 'mind' the dependence of all frames
+of mind upon the brain and nervous system is now
+generally accepted. We may hold various theories
+as to the nature of mind, we may, with the late William
+James, treat the brain as merely a 'transmissive' organ,
+but even on that assumption&mdash;on behalf of which
+not a shred of positive evidence has been offered&mdash;the
+frames of mind expressed are determined by the nervous
+mechanism, and thus the laws of mental phenomena
+become ultimately the laws of the operation<!-- Page xi --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_xi" id="Page_xi">[xi]</a></span>
+of the nervous system. The 'facts' of the religious
+life thus become part of the facts of psychology as a
+whole. Its 'laws' will form part of psychological
+laws as a whole, and religious experiences must be
+handed over for examination and classification to the
+psychologist who in turn relies for help and understanding
+on various associated branches of science.</p>
+
+<p>Closely allied to the claim of the 'mystic' that his
+experiences bring him into touch with a world of
+super-sensuous reality, is the attempt to prove that
+science is incapable of dealing with anything but "in
+the first place, the endless ascertainment of facts and
+the physical conditions under which they occur, and
+in the second place to the criticism of error." Well,
+no one denies that it is part of the work of science to
+ascertain facts, or even that its work consists in ascertaining
+facts and framing 'laws' that will explain
+them. But why are we to limit science to <em>physical</em> facts
+only? All facts are not physical. If I have a head-ache,
+the unpleasant feeling is a fact. If I feel hot or
+cold, angry or pleased, think one thing ugly or another
+beautiful, my feelings are as much 'facts' as anything
+else that exists. Nay, if I fancy I see a ghost,
+or a vision, these also are 'facts' so far as my mental
+state at the time is concerned. So also are my beliefs
+about all manner of things, and often the most important
+facts with which I am connected. Facts may be
+objective or subjective. They may exist in relation
+to all minds normally constituted, or they may exist
+in relation to my own mind only; or, yet again, they
+may exist only in relation to certain states of mind,
+but they do not, nevertheless, cease to be facts.</p>
+
+<p>Now the business of science is to collect facts&mdash;all<!-- Page xii --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_xii" id="Page_xii">[xii]</a></span>
+facts&mdash;classify them, and frame generalisations that
+will explain their groupings and modes of operation.
+It talks of the facts of the physical world, the facts of
+the biological world, the facts of the psychological
+world, and so forth. This last group comprises all
+sorts of feelings and ideas, beliefs and experiences.
+Some of these facts it calls false, others it calls true&mdash;that
+is, they are true when they hold good of all men
+and women normally constituted, they are not true
+when they hold good of isolated individuals only, and
+can be seen to be the product of misinterpreted experience,
+or arise from a derangement&mdash;permanent
+or temporary&mdash;of the nervous system. But true or
+false they remain facts of the mental life. They must
+be collected, grouped, and explained exactly as other
+facts are collected, grouped, and explained. They
+fall within the scope of science, to be dealt with by
+scientific methods.</p>
+
+<p>There is really no escape from the position that so
+far as religious 'facts' are parts of mental life, religion
+becomes logically a department of psychology. The
+substantial identity of all mental facts is quite unaffected
+by their being directed to this or that special object.
+As mental facts they are part of the material that it is
+the work of science to reduce to order. And as mental
+facts religious phenomena are seen to follow the same
+'laws' that govern mental phenomena in general. It
+is perfectly true that we cannot test and measure the
+material of psychology with the same definiteness and
+accuracy that the chemist applies to the subject-matter
+of his department; but that may be due to want of
+knowledge, or to the extreme complexity and variability
+of the matter with which we are dealing. And<!-- Page xiii --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_xiii" id="Page_xiii">[xiii]</a></span>
+if it were true that the same tests could not be applied
+in psychology that are applied elsewhere, this would
+be no cause for scientific despair. It would only mean
+that fresh tests would have to be devised for a new
+group of facts, as every other science has already, as a
+matter of fact, created its own special standard of value.</p>
+
+<p>The second of the two lines of defence consists in
+the bold assertion that the religious interpretation of
+subjective phenomena is itself in the nature of a true
+scientific induction. The methods of science are not repudiated,
+but welcomed. But it is argued that the non-religious
+explanation of religious phenomena breaks
+down hopelessly, while the religious explanation fully
+covers and explains the facts. If this were true, nothing
+more remains to be said, and we must accept this
+dualistic scheme, however repugnant it may be to orthodox
+scientific ideas. But is it true? Is it a fact that
+the non-religious explanation breaks down so completely?
+Hitherto the course of events has been in the
+contrary direction. It is the religious explanation that
+has, over and over again, been shown to be unreliable,
+the non-religious explanation that has been finally
+established. Insanity and epilepsy, once universally
+ascribed to a supernatural order of being, have been
+reduced to the level of nervous disorders. All the phenomena
+of 'possession' are still with us, it is only our
+understanding of them that has altered. And before
+it is admitted that the phenomena described as religious
+can never be affiliated to the phenomena described
+as non-religious, it must be shown&mdash;beyond all possibility
+of doubt&mdash;that their explanation in terms of
+known forces is impossible. As I have said in the body
+of this work, the question at issue is essentially one of<!-- Page xiv --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_xiv" id="Page_xiv">[xiv]</a></span>
+interpretation. The 'facts' of the religious life are admitted.
+Science no more questions the reality of the
+visions of the medieval mystic than it questions the
+visions of the non-mystic admittedly suffering from
+neural derangement. The crucial question is whether
+we have any good reason for separating the two, and
+while we dismiss the one as hallucination accept the
+other as introducing us to another order of being? I
+do not think there is the slightest ground for any such
+differentiation, and I have given in the following pages
+what I conceive to be good reasons for so thinking.
+And I hope that the fact of the explanations there
+offered running counter to the traditional one will not
+prevent readers weighing with the utmost care the
+proofs that are offered.</p>
+
+<p><!-- Page 1 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_1" id="Page_1">[1]</a></span></p>
+
+<h2><span class="lg wide2">RELIGION AND SEX</span><br />
+CHAPTER <span class="cgap">ONE</span><br />
+SCIENCE AND THE SUPERNATURAL</h2>
+
+<p>Accepting Professor Tylor's famous
+minimum definition of religion as "the belief in
+Spiritual Beings," it is safe to say that religious belief
+constitutes one of the largest facts in human history.
+No other single subject has occupied so large a share
+of man's conscious life, no other subject has absorbed
+so much of his energy. In very early stages of culture
+religious belief is universal in the fullest sense of the
+word. It shapes all primitive institutions; it dominates
+life from the cradle to the grave, and creates a
+shadow-land beyond the grave from which the dead
+continue to influence the actions of the living. At a
+later stage of culture we see a distinction being drawn
+between the natural and the supernatural, the secular
+and the spiritual, and the beginning of an antagonism
+that is still with us. Of all antagonisms conceived by
+the brain of man this is the deepest and the most irreconcilable.
+Each feels that the growth of the other
+threatens its own supremacy, with the result that advance
+from either side has been contested with the
+greatest obstinacy and determination. And although
+it is true that at present the supernatural is very
+largely "suspect," it is still powerful. Nor is its influence
+confined to the lower strata of European society.
+It has very many representatives among the higher
+culture, disguised it may be under various pseudo-philosophic
+forms. Altogether we may say that the
+supernatural has never been without its "cloud of
+witnesses." At all times there have been individuals,<!-- Page 2 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_2" id="Page_2">[2]</a></span>
+or groups of individuals, who have believed themselves,
+and have been believed by others, to be in
+touch with another order of existence than that with
+which people are normally in contact. And apart from
+these specially favoured persons, the wide vogue of
+the belief in good and evil portents, in lucky and unlucky
+days, the attraction of the "occult" in fiction and
+in fact, all serve as evidence that belief in the supernatural
+is still a force with which one has to reckon.</p>
+
+<p>To what causes are we to attribute the persistence
+of this belief in the supernatural? It is useless replying
+that its persistence is evidence of its truth. That
+clearly begs the whole question at issue. Mere social
+heredity will doubtless count for much in this direction.
+Men do not start their thinking afresh with each
+generation. It is based upon that of preceding generations;
+it follows set forms, and is generally influenced
+by that network of ideas and beliefs into which we
+are born and from which none of us ever completely
+escapes. Still that is hardly enough in itself to account
+for the persistence of supernaturalism. Assuming
+that originally there existed what was accepted as
+good evidence for the existence of a supernatural, it
+is hardly credible that every subsequent generation
+went on accepting it merely because one generation
+received evidence of its existence. As organs atrophy
+for want of exercise, so do beliefs die out in time for
+want of proof. Some kind of evidence must have been
+continually forthcoming in order to keep the belief
+alive and active. It is not a question of whether the
+evidence was good or bad. All evidence, it is important
+to bear in mind, is good to some one. The "facts"
+upon which thousands of people were put to death<!-- Page 3 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_3" id="Page_3">[3]</a></span>
+for witchcraft would not be considered evidence to
+anyone nowadays, but they were once accepted as
+good ground for conviction.</p>
+
+<p>What kind of evidence is it, then, that has been accepted
+as proof of the supernatural? Or, to return to
+Tylor's definition of religion, seeing that the belief in
+spiritual beings has persisted in every generation, upon
+what kind of evidence has this belief been nourished?
+Various replies might be given to this question,
+all of which may contain some degree of truth, or
+an aspect of a general truth. In the present enquiry
+I am concerned with one line of investigation only,
+one that has been strangely neglected, but which yet,
+I am convinced, promises fruitful results. In other
+directions it has been established that a great aid to
+an understanding of the human organism in times of
+health is to study its activities under conditions of
+disease. Abnormal psychology is now a recognised
+branch of psychology in general, and a glance through
+almost any recent text-book will show that the two
+form parts of a natural whole. The normal and the
+abnormal are in turn used to throw light on each other.
+And it appears to the present writer that in the matter
+of religious beliefs a much clearer understanding of
+their nature, and also of some of the conditions of their
+perpetuation, may be gained by a study of what has
+happened, and is happening, in the light of mental
+pathology.</p>
+
+<p>To some, of course, the bare idea of there being a
+pathology of religion will appear an entirely unwarrantable
+assumption. On the other hand, the scientific
+study of all phases of religions having made so great
+headway it is hoped that a larger number will be prepared<!-- Page 4 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_4" id="Page_4">[4]</a></span>
+for a discussion of the subject from a point of
+view which, if not quite new, is certainly not common.
+Of course, such a discussion, even if the author quite
+succeeds in demonstrating the truth of his thesis, will
+still leave the origin of the religious idea an open question.
+For the present we are not concerned directly
+with the origin of the religious idea, but with an examination
+of some of the causes that have served to perpetuate
+it, and to trace the influence in the history of
+religion of states of mind, both personal and collective,
+that are now admittedly abnormal or pathological in
+character. The legitimacy of the enquiry cannot be
+questioned. As to its value and significance, that every
+reader must determine for himself.</p>
+
+<p>One may put the essential idea of the following
+pages in a sentence:&mdash;Given the religious idea as already
+existing, in what way, and to what extent has its
+development been affected by forces that are not in
+themselves religious, and which modern thought definitely
+separates from religion?</p>
+
+<p>Under civilised and uncivilised conditions we find
+religious beliefs constantly associated with various
+forces&mdash;social, ethical, and psychological. Very seldom
+is there any serious attempt to separate them and
+assign to each their respective value; nor, indeed, is
+the task at any time an easy one. The difficulty is
+made the greater by the way in which writers so enlarge
+the meaning of "religion" that it is made to include
+almost everything for which one feels admiration
+or respect. This practice is neither helpful nor accurate.
+Human nature under all aspects of intellectual
+conviction presents the same fundamental characteristics,
+and a definition to be of value, while of necessity<!-- Page 5 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_5" id="Page_5">[5]</a></span>
+inclusive, must also be decisively exclusive. It must
+unite, but it must also separate. And many current
+definitions of religion, while they may bear testimony
+to the amiability of those who frame them, are quite
+destitute of scientific value. In any case, the association
+of the religious idea with non-religious forces is a
+fact too patent to admit of denial; and the important
+task is to determine their reciprocal influence. In actual
+life this separation has been secured by the development
+of the various branches of positive thought&mdash;ethics,
+psychology, etc., all of which were once directly
+under the control of religion. What remains to be
+done is to separate in theory what has already been
+separated in fact, with such additions as a more critical
+knowledge may suggest as advisable.</p>
+
+<p>Far more suggestive, however, than the association
+of religion with what we may call the normal social
+forces, is its connection with conditions that are now
+clearly recognised as abnormal. From the earliest
+times we find the use of drugs and stimulants, the practice
+of fasting and self-torture, with other methods of
+depressing or stimulating the action of the nervous
+system, accepted as well-recognised methods of inducing
+a sense of religious illumination, or the feeling
+that one is in direct communion with a supernatural
+order of existence. Equally significant is the world-wide
+acceptance&mdash;right up to recent times&mdash;of purely
+pathological states as evidence of supernatural intercourse.
+About these two sets of facts there can be no
+reasonable doubt. Over and over again we can observe
+how the promptings of disease are taken for the voice
+of divinity, and men and women who to-day would be
+handed over to the care of the physician hailed as an<!-- Page 6 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_6" id="Page_6">[6]</a></span>
+incarnation of deity. In modern asylums we find one
+of the commonest of delusions to be that of the insane
+person who imagines himself to be a specially selected
+instrument of deity. In such instances the causal influence
+of pathological conditions is admitted. On
+the other hand, we have belonging to the more normal
+type the person who claims a supernatural origin for
+many of his actions and states of mind. And between
+these two extremes lie a whole series of gradations.
+They exist in all stages of culture, and it is difficult to
+see by what rule of logic or of experience one can say
+where the normal ends and the abnormal begins. If
+we assume the inference of the normal person concerning
+the origin of his mental states to be correct, it
+seems difficult to deny the possibility of those of the
+insane person having a similar origin, although distorted
+by the influence of disease. If, on the other
+hand, we say the insane person is wholly wrong as to
+the origin of his mental states, may we not also assume
+that the normal person has likewise erred as to the
+cause of his emotions or ideas?</p>
+
+<p>Two considerations may be urged in support of this
+conclusion. In the first place, there is the fact of the
+fundamental identity of human qualities under all
+conditions of their manifestation. It is too often assumed&mdash;sometimes
+it is explicitly claimed&mdash;that one
+with what is called "a strong religious nature" possesses
+some quality of mind absent or undeveloped in
+those of an opposite type. This assumption is quite
+unwarrantable. The religious man is marked off from
+the non-religious man, not by the possession of distinct
+mental qualities, but solely by holding different
+ideas concerning the cause and significance of his mental<!-- Page 7 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_7" id="Page_7">[7]</a></span>
+states. There is no such thing as a religious "faculty,"
+but only qualities of mind expressed in terms of
+the religious idea. If I am conscious of a strong desire
+to work on behalf of the social betterment of my
+fellows, I may account for this either by attributing
+it to having inherited a nature modified by generations
+of social intercourse, or on the hypothesis that I
+am an instrument in the hands of a superhuman personality.
+But in either case the qualities manifested
+remain the same. Love and hatred, fear and courage,
+honesty and roguery, with all other human qualities,
+may be expressed in terms of religion, or they may be
+expressed in non-religious terms. It is the cause to
+which they are attributed, or the object to which they
+are directed, that marks off the religious from the non-religious
+person.</p>
+
+<p>The second point is that the whole issue arises on a
+conflict of interpretations. If I question the reality of
+the visions or states of illumination experienced by
+Santa Teresa, I am not questioning that, so far as the
+saint herself was concerned, these states of exaltation
+were real. All mental states&mdash;whether arising under
+normal or abnormal conditions&mdash;are quite real to those
+who experience them. The visions of the hashish-eater
+are real, while they last; so are those of the victim
+of delirium tremens. All I question is their genuineness
+as corresponding to an objective reality. Over
+the mind of the subject these visions may exercise
+an absolute sway. As to their occurrence, he or she
+is the final and absolute authority. There can be no
+question here. But when we proceed from the occurrence
+of these visions to the question of their causation,
+then we are on entirely different ground. Here<!-- Page 8 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_8" id="Page_8">[8]</a></span>
+it is not a question of their genuineness, or of their
+power, but a question of how we are to interpret
+them. The honesty and singlemindedness of these
+"inspired" characters may be admitted, but honesty
+or singlemindedness is no guarantee of accuracy. We
+do not need to ask whether the peasant girl of Lourdes
+experienced a vision of the Madonna, but we do need
+to ask whether there was anything in her mental history,
+social surroundings, or nervous state that would
+account for the vision. All the "facts" of the religious
+life may be admitted; the sole question at issue is
+whether an adequate interpretation of at least some
+of them may not be found in terms of a purely scientific
+psychology.</p>
+
+<p>Taking, then, the religious idea as already existing,
+the following pages will be devoted to an examination
+of the extent to which this idea has been associated
+with forces and conditions that were plainly pathological.
+In very many individual cases it will not be
+difficult to trace a vivid sense of the supernatural to
+the presence of abnormal nervous states, sometimes
+deliberately induced, at other times arising of themselves.
+And it is a matter of mere historical observation
+that such individual cases have operated most
+powerfully to strengthen the belief in the supernatural
+with others. The example of Lourdes is a case in
+point. All Protestants will agree that the peasant
+girl's vision was a sheer hallucination. And yet there
+can be no question that this vision has served to strengthen
+the faith of many thousands of others in the nearness
+of the supernatural. And it needs but little effort
+of the imagination to realise how powerful such examples
+must have been in ages when medical science was<!-- Page 9 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_9" id="Page_9">[9]</a></span>
+in its infancy, and the more subtle operations of the
+nervous system completely unknown.</p>
+
+<p>This question, I repeat, is distinct from the much
+larger and wider enquiry of the origin of religion. A
+fairly lengthy experience of the capacity of the general
+mind for missing the real point at issue prevents my
+being too sanguine as to the efficiency of the most explicit
+avowal of one's purpose, but the duty of taking
+precautions nevertheless remains. And in elaborating
+an unfamiliar view of the nature of much of the
+world's so-called religious phenomena, the possibility
+of misconception is multiplied enormously. Still, a
+writer must do what he can to guard against misunderstanding,
+and in the most emphatic manner it must
+be said that it is not my purpose to prove, nor is it my
+belief, that religion springs from perverted sexuality,
+nor that the study of religion is no more than an
+exercise in pathology. Nothing is further from the
+writer's mind than so essentially preposterous a claim.
+Neither sexuality, no matter how powerful, nor disease,
+no matter how pronounced, can account for the
+religious idea. That has an entirely separate and independent
+origin. This should be plain to anyone
+who has but a merely casual acquaintance with the
+history of religion. It is, however, a very different
+thing to enquire as to the part played in the history
+of religion by morbid nervous states or perverted sexual
+feeling. That is an enquiry both legitimate and
+desirable; and it is one that promises to shed light on
+aspects of the subject otherwise very obscure. And
+certainly, if so-called religious feelings do not admit of
+explanation in terms of a scientific psychology, nothing
+remains but to recognise religion as something<!-- Page 10 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_10" id="Page_10">[10]</a></span>
+quite apart from normal life, to hand it over to the
+custody of word-spinning "Mystics," and so surrender
+all possibility of a rational understanding of either
+its nature or its history.</p>
+
+<p>In saying what I have concerning the probability
+of misconception, I have had specially in mind the
+attack made by the late Professor William James on
+what he called the "medical materialists." In that
+remarkable piece of religious yellow-journalism, <cite>The
+Varieties of Religious Experience</cite>, Professor James
+says of those who take up the position that a great
+deal of what has been accepted by the world as religious
+inspiration or exaltation can be accounted for
+as the products of disordered nervous states or perverted
+sexual feeling, "We are surely all familiar in a
+general way with this method of discrediting states
+of mind for which we have an antipathy. We all use
+it in some degree in criticising persons whose states
+of mind we regard as overstrained. But when other
+people criticise our own exalted soul-flights by calling
+them 'nothing but' expressions of our organic
+disposition, we feel outraged and hurt, for we know
+that, whatever be our organism's peculiarities, our mental
+states have their substantive value as revelations
+of the living truth; and we wish that all this medical
+materialism could be made to hold its tongue."
+Again, "Few conceptions are less instructive than this
+re-interpretation of religion as perverted sexuality....
+It is true that in the vast collection of religious phenomena,
+some are undisguisedly amatory&mdash;<i>e.g.</i> sex
+deities and obscene rites in polytheism, and ecstatic
+feelings of union with the Saviour in a few Christian
+Mystics. But then why not equally call religion an<!-- Page 11 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_11" id="Page_11">[11]</a></span>
+aberration of the digestive functions, and prove one's
+point by the worship of Bacchus and Ceres, or by the
+ecstatic feelings of some other saints about the Eucharist?"
+Or, seeing that the Bible is full of the language
+of respiratory oppression, "one might almost
+as well interpret religion as a perversion of the respiratory
+function." And if it is pointed out that
+active interest in religion synchronises with adolescence,
+"the retort again is easy.... The interest in
+mechanics, physics, chemistry, logic, philosophy, and
+sociology, which springs up during adolescent years
+along with that in poetry and religion, is also a perversion
+of the sexual instinct."<a name="FNanchor_1_1" id="FNanchor_1_1"></a><a href="#Footnote_1_1" class="fnanchor">[1]</a></p>
+
+<p>Excellent fooling, this, but little else. I do not
+know that anyone has ever claimed that religion took
+its origin in sexual feeling, or that this would alone
+provide an explanation of historical religion. All
+that anyone has ever urged is that a deal of so-called
+religious feeling, past and present, can be shown to
+be due to unsatisfied or perverted sexual feeling&mdash;which
+is a very different statement, and one of
+which the truth may be demonstrated from Professor
+James's own pages. But between saying that certain
+feelings are wrongly interpreted in terms of an already
+existing idea, and saying that the idea itself is
+nothing but these same feelings transformed, there is
+an obvious and important difference. In every case
+the religious idea is taken for granted. Its origin is
+a quite different subject of enquiry. But once the idea
+is in existence there is always the probability of evidence
+for its truth being found in the wrong direction.
+The analogy of the digestive and respiratory organs<!-- Page 12 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_12" id="Page_12">[12]</a></span>
+is clever, but futile. The belief that much which has
+passed for religious feeling is perverted sexuality is
+not based merely upon the language employed. The
+language is only symptomatic. The terminology of
+respiration and digestion when used in connection
+with religion is frankly and palpably symbolic. That
+of sexual love is as often frankly literal, and can be
+correlated with the actual state of the person using it.
+Digestion and respiration must go on in any case;
+but it is precisely the point at issue whether with a
+different sexual life these so-called religious ecstatic
+states would have been experienced. When we find
+religious characters of strongly marked amorous dispositions,
+but leading an ascetic life, using toward
+the object of their adoration terms usually associated
+with strong sexual feeling, it does not seem extravagant
+to find here a little more than what may be covered
+by mere symbolism. Would the medieval monk
+have been tempted by Satan in the form of beautiful
+women had he been happily married? Would
+Santa Teresa or Catherine of Sienna have used the
+language they did use to express their relations to
+Jesus had they been wives and mothers? Such questions
+admit of one answer, which is, in its way, decisive.
+Professor James admits that modern psychology
+holds as a general postulate "there is not a single one
+of our states of mind, high or low, healthy or morbid,
+that has not some organic process as its condition."<a name="FNanchor_2_2" id="FNanchor_2_2"></a><a href="#Footnote_2_2" class="fnanchor">[2]</a>
+The 'medical materialist' can ask for no more
+than this. But this being granted, on what ground
+are we to be forbidden finding in these same organic
+processes the condition of the visions and ecstatic<!-- Page 13 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_13" id="Page_13">[13]</a></span>
+states with which <cite>The Varieties of Religious Experience</cite>
+is so largely concerned?</p>
+
+<p>Again, it may be granted that adolescence brings
+with it an awakening of the whole mental life, not of
+religion alone. But the analogy goes no further, and,
+in any case, it begs the question. The full significance
+of the connection will be seen when we come to deal
+with initiation in primitive times and conversion in
+the modern period. At present it suffices to point out
+that the interest in art, in science, in literature, in
+sociology, are ends in themselves, and one need go no
+further than the developing mental life for an explanation.
+But the essential question here is whether this
+growing life can or cannot find complete satisfaction
+quite apart from religion. A developing interest in
+the larger social life is common to all, and to some
+extent this is secured by the pressure of forces that are
+simply inescapable. On the other hand, an interest
+in religion only exists with some, and then it may
+usually be traced to a conscious direction of their energies.
+Moreover, those who show no special interest
+in religion evince no lack of anything&mdash;save in religious
+terms. In every respect they exhibit the same
+mental and emotional qualities as their fellows. The
+only discernible difference is that while in the one case
+adolescent nature is expressed in terms of religion, in
+the other case it is expressed in terms of a larger social
+life.</p>
+
+<p>The question here might be put thus: Given a
+generation not taught to express its growing life in
+terms of religion, could adequate and satisfactory
+expression be found in the social life to which adolescence
+is unquestionably an introduction? Many<!-- Page 14 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_14" id="Page_14">[14]</a></span>
+would answer unhesitatingly, yes. They would argue
+that what are called the religious feelings, are normal
+social feelings exploited in the interests of the religious
+idea. They would deny that there is any such thing
+as a religious quality of mind. Any mental quality
+may be directed to a religious end, but all may find
+complete expression and satisfaction in a non-religious
+social life. This is the real question at issue, and
+yet Professor James never once, in the whole of his
+500 pages, addresses himself to it.</p>
+
+<p>Apart from sex, there is the important question of
+the relation between abnormal and morbid nervous
+states and religious illumination. How far has the one
+been mistaken for the other? To what extent have
+people accepted the outcome of pathological conditions
+as proofs of intercourse with an unseen spiritual
+world? There is no doubt that among uncivilised
+people this is usually, if not invariably, the case. And
+our knowledge of the relations between the nervous
+system and mental states&mdash;imperfect as it still is&mdash;is
+so recent, that it is not surprising that fasting, self-torture,
+solitary meditation, etc., because of the states
+of mind to which they give rise, have been universally
+valued as aids to the religious life. Dr. D. G. Brinton
+says:&mdash;</p>
+
+<p>"When I say that all religions depend for their origin
+and continuation directly upon inspiration, I state
+an historic fact. It may be known under other names,
+of credit or discredit, as mysticism, ecstasy, rhapsody,
+demoniac possession, the divine afflatus, the gnosis,
+or, in its latest christening, 'cosmic consciousness.'
+All are but expressions of a belief that knowledge
+arises, words are uttered or actions performed not<!-- Page 15 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_15" id="Page_15">[15]</a></span>
+through conscious ideation or reflective purpose, but
+through the promptings of a power above or beyond
+the individual mind."<a name="FNanchor_3_3" id="FNanchor_3_3"></a><a href="#Footnote_3_3" class="fnanchor">[3]</a></p>
+
+<p>The connection between very many, at least, of
+these inspirational moods and pathological states is
+too obvious to be ignored. Professor James admits
+that "we cannot possibly ignore these pathological
+aspects of the subject." His notice of them, however,
+reminds one of the preacher who advised his hearers
+to look a certain difficulty boldly in the face&mdash;and pass
+on. No serious attempt is made to deal with them.
+A huge mass of "religious experiences" is thrown at
+the reader's head without any adequate explanation.
+It is a glorified revival meeting in an expensive volume.
+The testimony of a crowd of religious enthusiasts of
+all ages is accepted at practically face value. Thus, a
+religious writer who experiences the fairly common
+feeling of exaltation during a storm at sea, and explains
+his carelessness of danger as resulting from his
+"certainty of eternal life,"<a name="FNanchor_4_4" id="FNanchor_4_4"></a><a href="#Footnote_4_4" class="fnanchor">[4]</a> is gravely cited as evidence
+of the working of the religious consciousness. What,
+then, are we to make of those who experience a similar
+feeling, but who are without the certainty of eternal
+life? The declaration of St. Ignatius that a single
+hour of meditation taught him more of the truth of
+"heavenly things than all the teachings of the doctors"
+is given as evidence of mystic illumination.<a name="FNanchor_5_5" id="FNanchor_5_5"></a><a href="#Footnote_5_5" class="fnanchor">[5]</a> So with
+numerous other cases. We are even informed that
+"nitrous oxide and ether, especially nitrous oxide,
+when sufficiently diluted with air, stimulate the mystical
+consciousness in an extraordinary degree."<a name="FNanchor_6_6" id="FNanchor_6_6"></a><a href="#Footnote_6_6" class="fnanchor">[6]</a>
+<!-- Page 16 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_16" id="Page_16">[16]</a></span>
+There seems no reason why the same claim should
+not be made on behalf of whisky. If one were not
+assured to the contrary, one might conclude that Professor
+James wrote this volume to poke fun at the
+whole tribe of mystics and their followers.</p>
+
+<p>The use made by Professor James of his long list of
+cases is the more remarkable, since he quite correctly
+points out that there are no religious feelings, only
+feelings directed towards a religious end. But if this
+be so, how are we justified in taking the accounts of
+religious visionaries as correct descriptions of the nature
+of their own mental states? Clearly, we need a
+study of these cases quite apart from the mystical interpretation
+of them. Instead of a study Professor
+James presents us with a catalogue&mdash;useful from a
+documentary point of view, but useless to any other
+end. And he is so averse to subjecting his examples to
+analysis that, when the extravagance of certain cases
+are glaring, he warns us that it is unfair to impute narrowness
+of mind as a vice of the individual, because
+in "religious and theological matters he probably absorbs
+his narrowness from his generation."<a name="FNanchor_7_7" id="FNanchor_7_7"></a><a href="#Footnote_7_7" class="fnanchor">[7]</a> Granted;
+only one would like to know what reason there is for
+not deriving virtues as well as vices from the same
+source? And, deeper enquiry still, may not the religious
+interpretation itself be a product of the special
+environment of the period?</p>
+
+<p>The study of religious phenomena from the point
+of view above indicated is of first-rate importance.
+But although much has been said, parenthetically and
+inferentially, on the subject by various writers, the
+enquiry has never been exhaustively or systematically<!-- Page 17 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_17" id="Page_17">[17]</a></span>
+pursued. This is not due to any lack of material;
+that is abundant among both savage and civilised
+peoples. Perhaps it is because, while it has been considered
+permissible to point out that certain individuals
+have mistaken their own morbid states for
+evidence of divine illumination, too much ill-will would
+have been aroused had the powerful part played by
+this factor in religious development as a whole been
+pointed out. Still less admissible would it have been
+to point out, as will be done in succeeding chapters,
+that the deliberate culture of abnormal states of mind
+has been a part of the ritual of religions from the most
+primitive to the most recent times. In this connection
+it is worth noting that a very clear and shrewd essay on
+the connection between love and religious devotion
+by Isaac d'Israeli, which appeared in the first issue
+of the <cite>Miscellanies of Literature</cite>, was quietly eliminated
+from subsequent editions.</p>
+
+<p>My purpose, therefore, is to give Professor James's
+query&mdash;"Under just what biographic conditions did
+the sacred writers bring forth their contributions to
+the holy volume? and what had they exactly in their
+several individual minds, when they delivered their utterances?"<a name="FNanchor_8_8" id="FNanchor_8_8"></a><a href="#Footnote_8_8" class="fnanchor">[8]</a>&mdash;a
+wider scope. What are the conditions,
+biographic and social, under which certain persons
+have imagined themselves, and have been believed by
+others, to be specially favoured with divine illumination?
+The majority of people, it may safely be said, are
+conscious of no such experience. In what respect, then,
+do the favoured few differ from their fellows? Must
+we assume that by some rare quality of natural endowment,
+or by some unusual development of faculty,<!-- Page 18 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_18" id="Page_18">[18]</a></span>
+they are brought into touch with a wider and deeper
+reality? Or are we to seek a less romantic explanation
+with the aid of known tendencies and forces in human
+nature? And, further, as this minority are not conscious
+of divine illumination all the time, what is it
+that differentiates their normal state from their abnormal
+condition?</p>
+
+<p>These are pertinent questions, and demand answer.
+But no answer of real value will be found in ordinary
+religious writings. Rhapsodical eulogies of religion
+tell us nothing; less than nothing that is useful, since
+theories that obtain in such quarters are based upon
+the absolute veracity of the phenomena under consideration.
+We may gather from this direction what
+religious people say or do, but not why they say or do
+these things. A description of the states of mind of
+religious people, such as is given by Professor James,
+is interesting enough, but it is their causation that is
+of fundamental importance. And their causation is
+only to be understood by associating them with other
+and more fundamental processes. Within recent years
+psychology owes much of the advance made to a
+closer study of the physiology of the nervous system,
+and if genuine advance is to be made in our understanding
+of religious phenomena we must adopt the
+same plan of investigation. We do not, for example,
+understand the nature of demoniacal possession by a
+mere collation of cases. It is only when we put them
+side by side with similar cases that now come under
+the control of the physician, and associate them with
+certain peculiar nervous conditions, and a particular
+social environment, that we find ourselves within sight
+of a rational explanation. Without adopting this plan<!-- Page 19 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_19" id="Page_19">[19]</a></span>
+we are in the position of one trying to determine the
+nature of a locomotive in complete ignorance of its
+internal mechanism. Yet this is precisely the position
+of the professional exponent of religion. As a student
+the budding divine has his head filled with historic
+creeds, and texts, and dogmas, and doctrines, none
+of which can possibly tell him anything of the real
+nature of religion. On the contrary, they act as so
+many obstacles to his acquiring real knowledge in
+later life. And it is a striking fact that while the professional
+astronomer, biologist, or physicist each adds
+to our knowledge of the subject that falls within his
+respective department, we owe little or nothing of
+our knowledge of the nature of religion to the professional
+theologian.</p>
+
+<p>To put the whole matter in a sentence, the study of
+religion must be affiliated to the study of life as a
+whole. If possible, we must get at the determining
+factors that lead one person to expend his energy on
+religion and see supernatural influence in a thousand
+and one details of his life, while another person, with
+apparently the same mental qualities, finds complete
+satisfaction in another direction, and is conscious of
+no such supernatural influence. It is scientifically inadmissible
+to posit a "religious faculty" organically
+ear-marked for religious use. Something of this kind
+is evidently in the minds of those who explain Darwin's
+agnosticism as due to atrophy of his religious
+sense, consequent on over-absorption in scientific pursuits,
+and who also argue that the "religious faculty,"
+like a physiological structure, increases in efficiency
+with use and atrophies with disuse. There is no reason
+for believing that, had Darwin been profoundly religious,<!-- Page 20 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_20" id="Page_20">[20]</a></span>
+his mental qualities would have been different
+to what they were. They would have been expressed
+in a different form, that is all. As I have already said,
+there are no such things as specifically religious qualities
+of the mind. There may be hope or fear or love
+or hatred or terror or devotion or wonder in relation
+to religion, but they are precisely the same mental
+qualities that meet us in relation to other things. The
+old "faculty" psychology is dead, and the religious
+faculty must go with it.<a name="FNanchor_9_9" id="FNanchor_9_9"></a><a href="#Footnote_9_9" class="fnanchor">[9]</a> Mental qualities may be
+roused to activity in connection with a belief in the
+supernatural, or they may be expressed in connection
+with mundane associations. Even the belief in the
+supernatural is only an expression of the same qualities
+of mind that with fuller knowledge result in a
+scientific generalisation. Whatever be the exciting
+cause, mental qualities themselves remain unchanged.</p>
+
+<p>In the present enquiry we are not concerned with a
+disproval of the religious idea, but with an examination
+of the conditions of its expression; less with the
+varieties of religious experience than with the nature
+of its manifestations. How far may religious experience
+be explained as a misinterpretation of normal
+non-religious life? To what extent have pathological<!-- Page 21 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_21" id="Page_21">[21]</a></span>
+nervous states influenced the building up of the religious
+consciousness? There can be no question that the
+last-named factor is an important one. This is admitted
+by Professor James in the following passage:&mdash;</p>
+
+<p>"You will in point of fact hardly find a religious
+leader of any kind in whose life there is no record of
+automatisms. I speak not merely of savage priests
+and prophets, whose followers regard automatic utterance
+and action as by itself tantamount to inspiration,
+I speak of leaders of thought and subjects of intellectualised
+experience. St. Paul had his visions, his
+ecstasies, his gifts of tongues, small as was the importance
+he attached to the latter. The whole array
+of Christian saints and heresiarchs, including the
+greatest, the Bernards, the Loyolas, the Luthers, the
+Foxes, the Wesleys, had their visions, voices, rapt
+conditions, guiding impressions, and 'openings.' They
+had these things because they had exalted sensibility,
+and to such things persons of exalted sensibility are
+liable."<a name="FNanchor_10_10" id="FNanchor_10_10"></a><a href="#Footnote_10_10" class="fnanchor">[10]</a></p>
+
+<p>The fact is unquestionable, but the question remains,
+In what sense were these people exalted? Did
+their exalted sensibility really bring them into touch
+with a form of existence hidden from persons of a
+coarser fibre? Or did it belong to a class of cases which
+in a more violent form comes within the province of
+the physician? The subjects, says Professor James,
+"actually feel themselves played upon by powers beyond
+their will. The evidence is dynamic; the god or
+spirit moves the very organs of their body.... We
+have distinct professions of being under the direction
+of a foreign power, and serving as its mouthpiece."<!-- Page 22 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_22" id="Page_22">[22]</a></span>
+Of course we have, but for diagnostic purposes such
+professions are quite valueless. What these people
+are conscious of, and all they are conscious of, is a
+series of feelings of a more or less unusual kind.
+Equally convinced was the medieval demoniac that
+a spirit moved the very organs of his body. Equally
+convinced is the modern spiritualist medium that his
+body is controlled by a disembodied spirit. It is not
+a question of the actuality of certain states, but of
+their origin. The intense conviction of the subject of
+the seizure is, as evidence, quite irrelevant. The subjective
+state is always real, whether it belongs to a
+saint in ecstasy or a drunkard in delirium tremens.
+There are no states of mind more "real" while they
+last than those due to opium or hashish. But it is
+never suggested that this is evidence of their veracity.
+In such cases the testimony of a skilled outsider is of
+far greater value than the conviction of the visionary.
+We are bound to appeal to Paul, and Loyola, and
+Fox, and Wesley to know what their feelings were,
+because here they are the supreme authorities. But
+we must consult others to discover why they experienced
+these feelings. An illusion is no more than a
+false interpretation of a real subjective experience;
+although many are inclined to treat the rejection of
+the interpretation as equivalent to a charge of imposture
+or deliberate lying.</p>
+
+<p>It is also a matter of demonstration that these religious
+experiences are strictly determined by environmental
+conditions. Thousands of Christians have
+been favoured with visions of Jesus or of the Christian
+heaven in their dying moments. Millions of Jews and
+Mohammedans have lived and died without any such<!-- Page 23 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_23" id="Page_23">[23]</a></span>
+experience&mdash;the very persons to whom, from an evidential
+point of view&mdash;such visions would be most useful.
+The spiritual experience is determined by the pre-existing
+religious belief. When belief in a personal devil
+was general, visions of Satan were common. The evidence
+for personal conflicts with Satan is of precisely the
+same nature and strength as is the evidence for intercourse
+with deity. When the belief in Satan died out,
+visions and conflicts with him ceased. How can we
+discriminate between the two classes of cases? Why
+should the testimony of a great Christian character
+that he is conscious of intercourse with deity be more
+authoritative than the testimony of, perhaps, the same
+person on other occasions, of conflict with a personal
+devil? Moreover, visions and a sense of contact with
+a super-normal world are not peculiar to the religious
+character. It is a common feature of a general psychopathic
+condition. Medical works are filled with
+such instances. And it is only to be expected that
+when the psychopath is of a deeply religious nature
+the affection will find a religious expression. What is
+clearly needed is an explanation that will cover the
+phenomenon as it appears in both a religious and a
+non-religious form.</p>
+
+<p>We may take as illustrative of what has been said
+the following case as given by Dr. W. W. Ireland. It
+is that of a Berlin bookseller who placed on record a
+clear description of his impressions while in ill-health,
+and which entirely ceased on recovery. His delusions
+mostly took the form of human figures; of these he
+says:&mdash;</p>
+
+<p>"I saw, in the full use of my senses, and (after I had
+got the better of the fright which at first seized me,<!-- Page 24 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_24" id="Page_24">[24]</a></span>
+and the disagreeable effects which it caused) even
+in the greatest composure of mind, for almost two
+months, constantly and involuntarily, a number of
+human and other apparitions&mdash;nay, I even heard
+their voices. For the most part I saw human figures
+of both sexes; they commonly passed to and fro, as
+if they had no connection with each other, like people
+at a fair where all is bustle. Sometimes they appeared
+to have business with one another. Once or twice I
+saw amongst them persons on horseback, and dogs
+and birds; these figures all appeared to me in their
+natural size, as distinctly as if they had existed in real
+life, with the several tints on the uncovered parts of
+the body, and with all the different kinds and colours
+of clothes."<a name="FNanchor_11_11" id="FNanchor_11_11"></a><a href="#Footnote_11_11" class="fnanchor">[11]</a></p>
+
+<p>Here we have the case of a man who was under no
+misconception as to the nature of his visions. But it is
+safe to say that had he been of a less practical and analytic
+turn of mind, had he been, moreover, deeply
+interested in religious matters, we might have had an
+altogether different presentation of the facts.</p>
+
+<p>In the next instance, also given by Dr. Ireland, we
+have a religious explanation given of somewhat similar
+experiences:&mdash;</p>
+
+<p>"A poor woman complained to me that she was continually
+persecuted by the devils who let loose at her
+all sorts of blasphemies, and, indeed, all the worse the
+more she exerted herself not to attend to them; but
+often, also, when she was talking and active. She had
+already been to a clergyman who should exorcise the
+devil, and who had judiciously directed her to me. I
+asked in which ear the devil always talked to her. She<!-- Page 25 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_25" id="Page_25">[25]</a></span>
+was surprised at the question, which she had never
+started for herself, but now recognised that it always
+occurred in the left ear. I explained to her that it was
+an affection of the ear which now and then occurs, but
+she was doubtful."<a name="FNanchor_12_12" id="FNanchor_12_12"></a><a href="#Footnote_12_12" class="fnanchor">[12]</a></p>
+
+<p>Here we have a distinctly physical affection ascribed
+to supernatural agency. In this case the inference
+is promptly corrected by the physician. But given
+a different environment, an atmosphere permeated
+with a belief in the supernatural, an absence of adequate
+scientific advice, and the more primitive explanation
+is certain to prevail. In the next instance&mdash;that
+of Martin Luther&mdash;we have just this conjuncture
+of circumstances, with the inevitable result. Writing
+of his experience in 1530, Luther says:&mdash;</p>
+
+<p>"When I was in Coburg in 1530, I was tormented
+with a noise in my ear, just as though there was some
+wind tearing through my head. The devil had something
+to do with it.... When I try to work, my head
+becomes filled with all sorts of whizzing, buzzing,
+thundering noises, and if I did not leave off on the instant
+I should faint away. For the last two or three
+days I have not been able to even look at a letter.
+My head has lessened down to a very short chapter;
+soon it will be only a paragraph, then only a syllable,
+then nothing at all. The day your letter came from
+Nuremberg I had another visit from the devil....
+This time the evil one got the better of me, drove me
+out of my bed, and compelled me to seek the face of
+man."<a name="FNanchor_13_13" id="FNanchor_13_13"></a><a href="#Footnote_13_13" class="fnanchor">[13]</a></p>
+
+<p>There is no need to quote more of this class of cases,<!-- Page 26 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_26" id="Page_26">[26]</a></span>
+at least for the present. Their name is legion. One
+could, in fact, construct an ascending series of cases,
+all agreeing in their symptom, and differing only in
+the explanation offered. The series would commence
+with the explanation of a possessing spirit, and end
+with that of a deranged nervous system. Ignorant of
+the nature, or even of the existence, of a nervous system,
+primitive man explains abnormal mental states
+as due to a malignant spirit. Martin Luther, George
+Fox, or John Bunyan, living at a time when the activity
+of evil spirits was a firmly held doctrine, attribute
+their infirmities to satanic influence. We are in
+the true line of descent. To-day we have with us every
+one of the phenomena on which the satanic theory
+rested, but they are described, and prescribed for, in
+medical works instead of manuals of exorcism. The
+supernaturalist theory gives way to that of the expert
+neurologist. The exorcist is replaced by the physician.
+Instead of expelling an intruding demon, we have to
+repair a deranged system. We cannot argue that
+while these affections remain constant in character
+their causes may have been different in other ages
+from what they are now. That is pure absurdity. To
+claim that the religious mystic is in moments of exaltation
+brought into contact with a "deeper reality"
+is to invite the retort that one might make a similar
+claim on behalf of the inmates of a lunatic asylum.
+We cannot, with any pretence to rationality, accept
+the verdicts of both the neurologist and the exorcist. If
+we agree that certain states of mind to-day have their
+origin in neural disorder, on what ground can we believe
+that similar mental states occurring a thousand
+or two thousand years ago were due to supernatural<!-- Page 27 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_27" id="Page_27">[27]</a></span>
+stimulation? We may be told that there are more
+things in heaven and earth than are dreamed of in our
+philosophy. This may be true, and while it is an observation
+that would not occur to a fool, it needs no
+supreme wisdom for its excogitation, and as generally
+used it is an excuse for idle speculation and grotesque
+theory. Far more useful is the lesson, sadly needed,
+that there are few things in heaven or earth that will
+not yield their secret to a method of investigation that
+is sanely conceived and diligently employed.</p>
+
+<p>The utter uselessness of accepting at its face value
+anyone's explanation of the nature of his subjective
+experience, is well shown by the once universal belief
+in witchcraft. If there is a single belief on behalf of
+which a mass of apparently unimpeachable evidence
+could be produced, it is this one. It has run its course
+throughout the whole world. It is still accepted by
+probably half the human race. In our own country
+eminent men, not alone theologians, but doctors, lawyers,
+statesmen, and men of letters, have given their
+solemn testimony in its favour. Thousands of people
+have been bewitched, and their symptoms described
+by thousands of others. More remarkable still, those
+accused have often enough confessed their guilt. Every
+possible corroboration has been given to this belief,
+and yet it is now scouted by educated persons all
+over the civilised world. Even religious teachers accept
+the explanation that these witchcraft cases were
+due to distinctly pathological conditions, and to the
+power of suggestion operating upon uninformed minds
+during an unenlightened age. But communications
+with spiritual beings rest on no better foundation
+than communication with Satan. Whether the alleged<!-- Page 28 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_28" id="Page_28">[28]</a></span>
+illumination be diabolic or angelic, the evidence
+for either, or both, is the same. The testimony of a man
+like the Rev. R. J. Campbell that he is conscious of a
+divine influence in his life is of no greater value than
+that of the medieval peasant who felt himself tormented
+by Satan. The one person is no better authority
+than is the other on such a topic. Both are the
+heirs of the ages, inheritors of a superstition that goes
+back to the most primitive ages of mankind, only
+modified in its expression by the culture of contemporary
+life.</p>
+
+<p>There is nothing new under the sun, and human
+nature remains substantially unchanged generation
+after generation. All the phenomena on which the
+belief in witchcraft was based, remain. Cases of delusion
+are common, and the power of suggestion is an
+established fact in psychology. All that has happened
+is this: taking the facts on which the belief was
+based, modern science has shown them to be explainable
+without the slightest reference to the supernatural.
+And this is the principle that must be applied
+in other directions. Old occurrences must be explained
+in the light of new knowledge. This is the accepted
+rule in other directions, and it is of peculiar value in
+relation to religious beliefs. To know what religious
+people have thought and felt and said gives us no
+more than the data for a scientific study of the subject.
+To know <em>why</em> they thought and felt and spoke thus
+is what we really need to understand. But if we are to
+do this we must relate phases of mind that are called
+religious to other phases of a non-religious character.
+I believe it is quite possible to do this. From medical
+records and from numerous biographies it is possible<!-- Page 29 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_29" id="Page_29">[29]</a></span>
+to parallel all the experiences of the religious mystic.
+We can see the same sense of exaltation, the same
+conviction of illumination, the same belief that one is
+the tool of a superior power. Take, as merely illustrative
+of this, the case of J. Addington Symonds, as
+narrated by Professor James, who cites it as an example
+of a "mystical experience with chloroform."
+Symonds tells us that until he was twenty-eight years
+of age he was liable to extreme states of exaltation
+concerning the nature of self. (It is worth while pointing
+out that Sir James Crichton-Browne expresses
+the opinion that Symonds's higher nerve centres were
+in some degree enfeebled by these abnormal states.)
+In addition to this confession he placed on record an
+interesting experience while under the influence of
+chloroform. He says:&mdash;</p>
+
+<p>"After the choking and stifling had passed away, I
+seemed at first in a state of utter blankness; then came
+flashes of intense light, alternating with blankness,
+and with a keen sense of vision of what was going on
+in the room around me, but no sensation of touch. I
+thought that I was near death; when suddenly my
+soul became aware of God who was manifestly dealing
+with me, handling me, so to speak, in an intense
+personal reality. I felt him streaming in like light
+upon me.... I cannot describe the ecstasy I felt. Then,
+as I gradually awoke from the influence of the anæsthetic,
+the old sense of my relation with the world
+began to return, the new sense of my relation to God
+began to fade.... Only think of it. To have felt for
+that long dateless ecstasy of vision the very God, in
+all purity, tenderness, and truth, and absolute love,
+and then to find that I had after all had no revelation,<!-- Page 30 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_30" id="Page_30">[30]</a></span>
+but that I had been tricked by the abnormal excitement
+of my brain."</p>
+
+<p>With a slight variation of expression this confession
+might have come direct from the lips of the most
+pronounced mystic. There is no question of the intense
+reality of the experience. That was as vivid as
+anything that ever occurred to any saint in the calendar.
+Still, no one will dream of claiming that the
+way to get <i>en rapport</i> with the higher mysteries is by
+way of a dose of chloroform. The distinction here is
+that Symonds knew and described the cause of his
+experience. And no one will question that the phrase
+"tricked by the abnormal excitement of my brain"
+covers the ground. Of course, there is always the easy
+retort that saints and mystics did not use chloroform
+to produce their visions. True, but chloroform is not
+the only agent by means of which a person may be
+thrown into an abnormal state. Other means may be
+used; and as a matter of fact, the use of herbs and
+drugs, as methods of producing ecstatic states, have
+obtained in religious ceremonies from the most primitive
+times. As we shall see later, tobacco, hashish,
+coca, laurel water, and similar agents have been
+largely utilised for this purpose. And when this plan
+is not adopted&mdash;although very often the two things
+run side by side&mdash;we find fasting and other forms of
+self-torture practised because of the abnormal conditions
+produced.</p>
+
+<p>It is not argued or implied that in all this there was
+of necessity deliberate imposture. That would imply
+the possession of greater knowledge than actually
+existed. But it was known that ecstatic states followed
+the use of certain drugs, or were consequent on<!-- Page 31 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_31" id="Page_31">[31]</a></span>
+certain austerities, and they were valued because they
+were believed to bring people into communion with a
+hidden spiritual world. In this way there has always
+been going on a more or less deliberate culture of the
+supernatural, in more primitive times by crude and
+easily recognisable means, later by methods that are
+more subtle in character and more difficult of detection.
+But the method of inducing a sense of "spiritual"
+illumination by means of practices alien to the
+normal life of man remains unchanged throughout.
+The collation of the conditions under which mystical
+states of mind are experienced among savages with
+similar experiences among the higher races, proves
+at once that this statement contains no exaggeration
+of the facts.</p>
+
+<p>The continuity of the phenomena is, indeed, of profound
+significance, and is too often ignored. It is often
+asserted that we have to explain the lower by the
+higher, and we can only understand the significance of
+religion in its lower forms by bearing in mind the higher
+manifestations. This is sheer fallacy. In nature the
+higher develops out of the lower, of which it is compounded.
+In biology, for example, it is now generally
+conceded that the secret of animal life lies in the cell.
+This may be modified in all kinds of directions, the resulting
+organic structure may be of the utmost complexity,
+but the basis remains unchanged. So, too, with
+a great deal of so-called religious phenomena. The
+story is not only continuous, but the same elements
+remain unchanged with only those modifications initiated
+by a changed environment. And just as we
+are driven back to the cell to explain organic structure,
+so for an understanding of the phenomena under consideration<!-- Page 32 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_32" id="Page_32">[32]</a></span>
+we must study their primitive elements.
+Analysis must precede synthesis here as elsewhere.</p>
+
+<p>A survey of the subject is not at all exhausted by
+a study of abnormal conditions, so far as these have entered
+into the life of religion. There still remains the
+study of perfectly normal frames of mind that are misinterpreted
+and diverted into religious channels. The
+importance of this will be seen more clearly when we
+come to deal with the subject of conversion. That
+"conversion" is a phenomenon of adolescence is now
+settled beyond all reasonable doubt. Statistics are
+conclusive on this point. But the advocate of revivalism
+quite misses the true significance of the fact. Current
+religious literature is full of quite meaningless
+chatter concerning the change of view, the larger and
+more unselfish activities, that arise as a consequence
+of conversion. There is really no evidence that the
+changes indicated have any connection with conversion.
+All that does happen can be more simply and
+more adequately explained as resulting from physiological
+and psychological changes in terms of racial and
+social evolution. The whole significance of adolescence
+lies in the bursting into activity of feelings hitherto
+dormant, and the quickening of a desire for communion
+with a larger social life. The individual becomes less
+self-centred, more alive to, and more responsive to
+the claims of others; he displays tendencies towards
+what the world calls self-sacrifice, but which mean, in
+the truest sense, self-realisation. That these changes
+are often expressed in terms of religion is undeniable.
+This, however, may be no more than an environmental
+accident, quite as much so as was the case when epilepsy
+was explained in terms of possession.</p>
+
+<p><!-- Page 33 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_33" id="Page_33">[33]</a></span>
+So far as one can see, there are no feelings or impulses
+characteristic of adolescence that could not receive
+complete satisfaction in a rationally ordered social
+life. To-day it usually happens that the strongest
+expressed influences brought to bear upon the individual
+are of a religious kind, with the result that adolescent
+human nature is most apt to express itself in
+religious language. It must always be borne in mind
+that we are all as dependent upon our environment
+for the form in which our explanation of things is
+cast, as we are for the language in which we express
+those ideas. The whole enquiry opened is a very wide
+one, with which I can only deal parenthetically. It is
+really an enquiry as to how far the religious theory of
+human nature rests upon a wrong interpretation of
+perfectly normal feelings, or to what extent supernaturalistic
+ideas are perpetuated by the exploitation&mdash;innocent
+exploitation, maybe&mdash;of man's social nature.
+It is extremely probable that a deeper knowledge,
+a more accurate analysis of human qualities,
+will disclose the truth that man is a social animal in a
+much more profound sense than has usually attached
+to that phrase, and the expression of these qualities
+in terms of religious beliefs, or in terms of non-religious
+beliefs, is wholly determined by the knowledge
+current in the society in which he moves.</p>
+
+<p>I conclude this chapter with one more attempt to
+avoid misunderstanding. For purposes of clarity it
+will be necessary to consider various factors out of
+relation to other factors. But it should hardly need
+pointing out that in actual life such a separation does
+not obtain. The organism functions as a whole; each
+part acts upon and is acted upon by every other part.<!-- Page 34 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_34" id="Page_34">[34]</a></span>
+Life in action is a synthesis, and one resorts to analysis
+only for the purpose of more adequate comprehension.
+It is not, moreover, pretended that any
+one of the factors described in the following pages
+will explain religion, nor even that all of them combined
+will do so. The origin of the religious idea is a
+quite different enquiry, and is adequately dealt with
+in the writings of men like Tylor, Frazer, Spencer,
+and other representatives of the various schools of
+anthropologists. My present purpose is of a more
+restricted kind. It is that of tracing the operation of
+various processes, some normal, but most of them
+abnormal, that have in all ages been accepted as evidence
+for the supernatural. That the religious idea
+has been associated with these processes, and that for
+multitudes they have served as strong evidence of its
+truth, cannot be denied. And an examination of this
+aspect of the history of religion ought not to be ignored,
+however unpalatable such a study may be to
+certain supersensitive minds.</p>
+
+<div class="footnotes">
+<h3>Footnotes:<br />
+<span class="skip">[<a href="#Page_35">Skip</a>]</span>
+</h3>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_1_1" id="Footnote_1_1"></a><a href="#FNanchor_1_1"><span class="label">[1]</span></a> <cite>Varieties of Religious Experience</cite>, pp. 11-3.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_2_2" id="Footnote_2_2"></a><a href="#FNanchor_2_2"><span class="label">[2]</span></a> <cite>Varieties</cite>, p. 14.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_3_3" id="Footnote_3_3"></a><a href="#FNanchor_3_3"><span class="label">[3]</span></a> <cite>Religions of Primitive Peoples</cite>, p. 50.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_4_4" id="Footnote_4_4"></a><a href="#FNanchor_4_4"><span class="label">[4]</span></a> Page 288.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_5_5" id="Footnote_5_5"></a><a href="#FNanchor_5_5"><span class="label">[5]</span></a> Page 410.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_6_6" id="Footnote_6_6"></a><a href="#FNanchor_6_6"><span class="label">[6]</span></a> Page 387.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_7_7" id="Footnote_7_7"></a><a href="#FNanchor_7_7"><span class="label">[7]</span></a> Page 370.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_8_8" id="Footnote_8_8"></a><a href="#FNanchor_8_8"><span class="label">[8]</span></a> <cite>Varieties</cite>, p. 4.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_9_9" id="Footnote_9_9"></a><a href="#FNanchor_9_9"><span class="label">[9]</span></a> "The hypothesis of faculties ... must be regarded as productive
+of much error in psychology. It has led to the false
+supposition that mental activity, instead of being one and the
+same throughout its manifold phases, is a juxtaposition of totally
+distinct activities, answering to a bundle of detached powers,
+somehow standing side by side, and exerting no influence on one
+another. Sometimes this absolute separation of the parts of
+mind has gone so far as to personify the several faculties as
+though they were distinct entities."&mdash;Sully, <cite>Outlines of Psychology</cite>,
+p. 26.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_10_10" id="Footnote_10_10"></a><a href="#FNanchor_10_10"><span class="label">[10]</span></a> <cite>Varieties</cite>, p. 478.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_11_11" id="Footnote_11_11"></a><a href="#FNanchor_11_11"><span class="label">[11]</span></a> <cite>The Blot upon the Brain</cite>, p. 4.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_12_12" id="Footnote_12_12"></a><a href="#FNanchor_12_12"><span class="label">[12]</span></a> <cite>The Blot upon the Brain</cite>, p. 16.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_13_13" id="Footnote_13_13"></a><a href="#FNanchor_13_13"><span class="label">[13]</span></a> Cited by Dr. Ireland, p. 49.</p></div>
+</div>
+
+<p><!-- Page 35 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_35" id="Page_35">[35]</a></span></p>
+
+<h2>CHAPTER <span class="cgap">TWO</span><br />
+THE PRIMITIVE MIND &amp; ITS ENVIRONMENT</h2>
+
+<p>Ever since the time of Aristotle
+it has been an accepted truth that man is a social
+animal. Not only is individual human nature such
+that it craves for intercourse with its kind, but it can
+only be effectively understood in the light of those
+thousands of generations of associated life that lie behind
+us all. As an isolated object, considered, that is,
+apart from his fellows, man is more or less of a myth.
+At any rate, he would not be the man we know and so
+may well be left out of account. Man as we know him
+is essentially a member of a group; he is a part of a
+really organic structure inasmuch as the characteristics
+of each part are determined by its relations to
+the whole, and the characteristics of the whole determined
+by a synthesis of the qualities of the parts.</p>
+
+<p>But while there is agreement in the fact, there is
+a considerable divergence of opinion as to its nature.
+What is the nature of this fact of sociability? What is
+the character of the force that binds the members of a
+group so closely together? By some, the cause of
+sociability is found in the pressure exerted upon all
+by purely external forces. The need for protection, it
+is said, drives human beings together, and thus in
+course of time the feeling of sociability is developed.
+This seems much like mistaking a consequence for
+a cause. It certainly leaves unanswered the question
+<em>Why</em> should people have drawn together in the face of
+danger? Most certainly collective action strengthens
+the capacity for defence; and it also increases the certainty
+of obtaining the means of subsistence. Such
+consequences furnish a justification, so to speak, of
+group life, but they disclose neither its nature nor its<!-- Page 36 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_36" id="Page_36">[36]</a></span>
+cause. And most certainly they do not bring us into
+touch with the fundamental qualities of <em>human</em> society.
+The need for food, shelter, or protection will not differentiate
+the gregarious from the non-gregarious forms
+of life, nor the social from the merely gregarious. All
+forms of life require food, protection, and shelter; they
+are part of animal economics. There is nothing specifically
+human about them.</p>
+
+<p>We may reach what I conceive to be the truth in
+another way. Environment is to-day almost a cant
+word. It is very largely used, and, as one might expect,
+largely misunderstood. Without actually saying it in
+so many words, a vast number of people seem to conceive
+the environment as consisting of the purely
+material surroundings of man. This is to overlook a
+most important fact. Even in the lowest stages of
+human society, where man's power over natural forces
+is of the poorest kind, it is not an exact statement of
+the case, and it is profoundly untrue when we take
+society in its higher developments. If we take the
+lowest existing savage race we find that its attitude
+towards life, what it does, and what it refrains from doing,
+is the product of a certain mental attitude, which
+is itself the outcome of a number of inherited ideas and
+customs. A number of white people, placed in exactly
+the same material environment and faced with exactly
+the same external circumstances, bring a different
+psychological inheritance into play, and act in an entirely
+different manner. If we transport a Chinaman
+into England, or an Englishman into China, we find
+that both of them possess the same biological and
+material needs whether in their native country or elsewhere.
+Yet this community of needs does not make<!-- Page 37 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_37" id="Page_37">[37]</a></span>
+the Chinaman a member of English society, nor an
+Englishman a member of Chinese society. They are
+one in virtue of certain broad human characteristics;
+they are divided by certain qualities characteristic of
+their special groups. Each society is marked by the
+possession of certain psychological characteristics&mdash;a
+number of specific beliefs and emotional developments&mdash;without
+which its distinctive group character
+disappears. This is true of groups within the State; it
+is true of the State as a whole; it is true, on the most
+general scale of all, of the race.</p>
+
+<p>In other words, the distinguishing feature of human
+society is the possession of a psychological medium.
+The adaptations that the human being must make are
+mainly of a psychological character. Their <em>form</em> may
+be partly determined by external conditions, but this
+does not affect the general truth. Whether we take
+man in a civilised or in an uncivilised state we find the
+important thing about him to be his relations to his
+fellows. He is not merely a member of a tribe or a
+society, but he thinks that society's thoughts, he feels
+their emotions, his individual life is an expression of
+the psychical life of the group to which he belongs.
+And his transactions with nature are an expression of
+the ideas and beliefs current in the society of which he
+is a part.</p>
+
+<p>The recognition of this truth was one of the outstanding
+contributions of Herbert Spencer to the science of
+sociology. Whereas other writers had stressed the
+power of the environment, as a purely material thing,
+in shaping human institutions, Spencer placed chief
+stress upon the emotional and intellectual life of primitive
+man as determining their beginnings. He showed<!-- Page 38 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_38" id="Page_38">[38]</a></span>
+how man's feelings and beliefs about himself, and
+about his fellows, and about the world of living forces
+with which he believed himself to be surrounded, were
+the all-important factors of social evolution. And the
+subsequent history of society has been such that scientific
+sociology is very largely the study of the growth
+and elaboration of an essentially psychical environment.
+The lower animal world&mdash;except so far as we
+allow for the operation of instincts&mdash;has, broadly, only
+the existence of other animals and the physical surroundings
+for its environment. With man it is vastly
+different. Owing primarily to language, the environment
+of the man of to-day is made up in part of the
+ideas of men who lived and died thousands of years
+ago. The use of clothing and the invention of tools
+would alone make mind a dominant fact in human
+life. But apart from these things, the great fact of social
+heredity, in virtue of which one generation enjoys the
+acquired culture of preceding generations, and without
+which civilisation would have no existence, is a
+great and dominant <em>mental</em> fact. Our institutions, our
+customs, are transmitted to us as so many psychic facts.
+Every new invention, every fresh culture acquisition,
+is helping to strengthen and broaden the psychical
+environment of man. Each newcomer is born into it;
+it moulds his nature and determines his life, as his own
+career and his own acquisition help to mould the life
+of his successors. Whether the phenomena be simple
+or complex, whether we are dealing with man in a civilised
+or in an uncivilised state, there is no escape from
+the general truth that man is everywhere under the
+domination of his mental life.</p>
+
+<p>So far as this enquiry is concerned, we need only<!-- Page 39 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_39" id="Page_39">[39]</a></span>
+deal with one aspect of the psychological medium in
+which primitive human life moves. And so far as
+primitive mankind seeks to control the movements
+of social life, there can be no question that this is done
+under the impulsion of that class of beliefs which we
+call religious. The operation of religious belief in
+savage society is neither spasmodic nor local. It is,
+on the contrary, universal and persistent. It influences
+every event of daily life with a force that the
+modern mind finds very difficult to appreciate. In almost
+every action the savage feels himself to be in
+touch with a supersensual world of living beings that
+exert a direct and inescapable influence. And any
+study of human evolution that is to be of real value
+must take this circumstance into consideration to a far
+greater extent than is usually done. Professor Frazer,
+dealing with the origin of various social institutions,
+rightly observes that "we are only beginning to understand
+the mind of the savage, and therefore the mind
+of our savage forefathers who created these institutions
+and handed them down to us," and warns us that
+"a knowledge of the truth may involve a reconstruction
+of society such as we can hardly dream of." He also
+warns us that we have at all times, in dealing with
+social origins, to "reckon with the influence of superstition,
+which pervades the life of the savage and has
+contributed to build up the social organism to an incalculable
+extent."<a name="FNanchor_14_14" id="FNanchor_14_14"></a><a href="#Footnote_14_14" class="fnanchor">[14]</a></p>
+
+<p>In emphasising this it must not be taken to imply
+that because social institutions and human actions are
+in primitive times moulded by religious beliefs, they
+stand to them in a relation of complete dependence.
+<!-- Page 40 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_40" id="Page_40">[40]</a></span>
+It only means that the psychological medium is of such
+a character that supernaturalistic reasons are found
+for doings things that are susceptible to a totally different
+explanation. The facts of life are expressed in
+terms of supernaturalism. Birth, marriage, death, social
+cohesion, leadership, health and disease, are all
+natural facts, and the mere play of social selection determines
+the weeding out of practices that are sufficiently
+adverse to tribal well-being to threaten its security.
+But in primitive times all these facts are allied
+with religious beliefs, and to the primitive mind the
+religious belief becomes the chief feature connected
+with them. As a matter of fact, this is far from an uncommon
+feature of social life to-day. The amount of
+supernaturalism current is still very large; and one still
+finds people explaining some of the plainest facts of
+social life in terms of supernaturalistic beliefs. It is all
+part of the truth that man is always under the domination
+of the psychological forces.</p>
+
+<p>This being granted, the enquiry immediately presents
+itself, How comes it that the facts of social life
+should be expressed in terms of supernaturalism? Why
+do these facts not immediately present themselves in
+their true nature? To answer this question one must
+bear in mind a yet further truth. This is that the explanation
+which man offers to himself or to others of
+phenomena must always be in terms of current knowledge.
+A modern called upon to explain a storm, an
+eclipse, or a disease, does so in terms of current physical
+or biological science. This is done in virtue of a
+mass of prepared knowledge, slowly accumulated by
+preceding generations, and which forms part of his social
+heritage. Primitive man likewise explains things<!-- Page 41 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_41" id="Page_41">[41]</a></span>
+in terms of current knowledge, but in his case the amount
+of reliable information is of a very scanty and
+generally erroneous description. The inherited knowledge
+which enables a modern schoolboy to start life
+with what would have been an outfit to an ancient philosopher,
+had yet to be created. Instead of finding, as
+we find, tools ready to hand, replies prepared to questions
+that may arise, primitive mankind must create
+its own tools and prepare its own answers. And in consequence
+of this the social environment, which at all
+times determines the form of man's mental output, is
+with primitive man radically different from our own.
+But however the form varies there is agreement on
+this one point&mdash;in both cases phenomena are explained
+in terms of known forces; the reasoning of each is
+determined by the knowledge of each. The laws of
+mental life remain the same in all stages of culture.
+The brain functions identically whether we take the
+savage or the scientist. In a general way the savage
+intelligence is as rational as that of a modern thinker.
+The difference is dependent upon the accuracy and extent
+of the information possessed by each. Hence the
+vital difference in the conclusions reached. Hence, too,
+the dominance of supernaturalism in primitive times.</p>
+
+<p>The great distinction between primitive and scientific
+thinking may be expressed in a sentence&mdash;the
+modern mind explains man by the world, primitive
+thought explained the world by man. In the one case
+we move from within outward, in the other from without
+inward. We are not now concerned with semi-metaphysical
+idealistic theories that would reduce the
+"whole choir of heaven and furniture of earth" to the
+creation of mental activity, but with the plain, understandable<!-- Page 42 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_42" id="Page_42">[42]</a></span>
+truth that the human organism is fashioned
+by the environment in which it dwells. And there is
+amongst those capable of expressing an authoritative
+opinion&mdash;an agreement supported by evidence that
+has simply nothing against it&mdash;that the world of primitive
+man is overpoweringly animistic. In the absence
+of that mass of scientifically verified knowledge which
+forms part of our social heritage, humanity commences
+its intellectual career by endowing natural forces with
+the qualities possessed by itself. The forces conceived
+are living ones. They are to be dreaded exactly as
+human beings are to be dreaded; to be appeased or
+circumvented by the same methods that man applies
+to his fellows. The problem before the savage is thus
+a very real one. In essence it is the problem that is
+ever before humanity&mdash;that of subjugating forces to
+its own welfare. Primitive man is not, however, concerned
+with the elaboration of theories; nor is he consumed
+with vague 'spiritual yearnings.' His difficulty
+is how to control or placate those invisible but very
+real powers upon which he believes everything depends.
+He would willingly ignore them if he could,
+and would cheerfully dispense with their presence altogether
+if he believed that things would proceed as
+well in their absence. But there they are, inescapable
+facts that have to be reckoned with.</p>
+
+<p>The general outlook of the primitive mind is well
+put by Miss Mary Kingsley in the following passage:&mdash;</p>
+
+<p>"To the African the Universe is made up of matter
+permeated by spirit. Everything happens by the direct
+action of spirit. The thing he does himself is done by
+<!-- Page 43 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_43" id="Page_43">[43]</a></span>
+the spirit within him acting on his body ... everything
+that is done by other things is done by their spirit associated
+with their particular mass of matter.... The native
+will point out to you a lightning-stricken tree and
+tell you that its spirit has been killed. He will tell you,
+when the earthen cooking pot is broken, it has lost its
+spirit. If his weapon fails him, it is because someone
+has stolen its spirit or made it weak by means of his
+influence on spirits of the same class.... In every action
+of his life he shows you how he lives with a great spirit
+world around him. You see him before he starts out
+to fight rubbing stuff into his weapon to strengthen the
+spirit that is in it; telling it the while what care he has
+taken of it.... You see him leaning over the face of the
+water talking to its spirit with proper incantations,
+asking it when it meets an enemy of his to upset his
+canoe and destroy him.... If a man is knocked on the
+head with a club, or shot by an arrow or a bullet, the
+cause of death is clearly the malignity of persons using
+these weapons; and so it is easy to think that a man
+killed by the falling of a tree, or by the upsetting of a
+canoe in the surf, or in a whirlpool in the river is also a
+victim of some being using these things as weapons.
+For a man holding this view, it seems both natural and
+easy to regard disease as a manifestation of the wrath
+of some invisible being, and to construct that intricate
+system which we find among the Africans, and agree
+to call Witchcraft, Fetish, or Juju."<a name="FNanchor_15_15" id="FNanchor_15_15"></a><a href="#Footnote_15_15" class="fnanchor">[15]</a></p>
+
+<p>Miss Kingsley is here dealing specifically with
+West Africa, but her description applies in a general
+way to uncivilised people all over the world. There
+is much closer resemblance between the beliefs of uncivilised
+peoples than between civilised ones, because<!-- Page 44 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_44" id="Page_44">[44]</a></span>
+the conditions are much more alike. And under substantially
+identical conditions the human mind has
+everywhere reached substantially identical conclusions.
+The philosophy of the savage is simple, comprehensive,
+and, given the data, logical. He does not
+divide the world into the natural and the supernatural;
+it is all one. At most, he has only the seen and the
+unseen. The supernatural, as a distinct category,
+only appears when a definite knowledge of the natural
+has arisen to which it can be opposed. He has no such
+distinction as that of the material and the immaterial;
+so far as he thinks of these things, the invisible is only
+a finer form of the visible. Of one thing, however, he
+is perfectly convinced, and this is that he is at all times
+surrounded by a host of invisible agencies to which all
+occurrences are due, and with whom he must come to
+terms. Even death wears a different aspect to the
+primitive mind from that which it presents to the
+modern. To us death puts a sharp and abrupt termination
+to life. To the primitive mind death involves
+no such ending.<a name="FNanchor_16_16" id="FNanchor_16_16"></a><a href="#Footnote_16_16" class="fnanchor">[16]</a> Death is no more of a break than is
+sleep; and at all times the conception of an annihilation
+of personality requires a marked degree of
+mental power. So with the savage&mdash;the 'dead' man
+simply goes on living. He may be incarnated in some
+natural object, or he may simply go on living as one
+of the innumerable company of tribal ghosts. But he
+remains a force to be reckoned with, and the need for
+dealing with these ghostly personages is one of the
+ever-present problems of primitive sociology, and<!-- Page 45 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_45" id="Page_45">[45]</a></span>
+brings us very near the beginnings of all religious
+beliefs and ceremonies&mdash;if it does not form their real
+starting-point.</p>
+
+<p>On one point all modern schools of anthropologists
+are agreed. This is that man's first conception of the
+supernatural&mdash;or what afterwards ranks as such&mdash;is
+derived from a purely mistaken interpretation of
+natural phenomena. In this they have returned to
+the standpoint of Hobbes, that "fear of things invisible"
+forms the "natural seed of religion." One source
+of origin of this belief in a supernatural world is certainly
+found in the phenomena of dreaming. To the
+savage his dreams are as real as his waking experiences.
+He does not <em>dream</em> he goes to distant places;
+he goes there during his sleep. He does not <em>dream</em>
+that people visit him; they actually come. If a West
+African wakes up in the morning with a tired, bruised
+feeling, this arises, as Miss Kingsley says, from his
+'soul' having been out fighting and got ill-treated.
+The only philosophy of dreaming amongst savage
+races is that of the excursions and incursions of a
+'soul' or double.</p>
+
+<p>Another powerful factor in the development of belief
+in the supernatural is that of man's attempt to
+explain natural happenings. Why do things happen?
+Why does the sun rise and set, why does rain fall,
+thunder crash, rivers flow? Note the way in which
+a child answers similar questions, and one is on the
+track of the primitive intelligence. If man's own
+movements are caused by a 'soul' or double, then
+other things must also move because they possess a
+'soul.' If an answer is to be found at all, it is only
+along these lines that the primitive mind is able to<!-- Page 46 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_46" id="Page_46">[46]</a></span>
+find it. And, once the answer is given, there are a
+thousand and one things occurring that lend it apparent
+support. Resemblances in nature, coincidences,
+echoes, shadows, etc., all give their support to this
+primitive hypothesis&mdash;the only one possible in the
+circumstances, and the one still endorsed by the majority
+of the world's population.</p>
+
+<p>Particularly strong endorsement of this belief is supplied
+by disease and abnormal nervous states. Instances
+to illustrate this are innumerable, but from the numerous
+cases cited by Spencer I select the following:
+Among the Amazulus convulsions are believed to be
+caused by ancestral spirits. With Asiatic races epileptics
+are regarded as possessed by demons. With
+the Kirghiz the involuntary muscular movements of
+a woman in childbirth are believed to be caused by a
+spirit taking possession of the body. The Samoans
+attribute all madness to possession. The Congo people
+have the same notion of epilepsy. The East Africans
+believe that falling sickness is due to spirits.<a name="FNanchor_17_17" id="FNanchor_17_17"></a><a href="#Footnote_17_17" class="fnanchor">[17]</a> In
+Rajputana, says Mr. W. Crooke, disease is generally
+attributed to Khor or the agency of offended spirits.
+The Mahadeo Kolis of Ahmadnagar believe that every
+malady or disease that seizes man, woman, or child, or
+cattle, is caused either by evil spirits or by an angry
+god. The Bijapur Veddas have a yearly feast to their
+ancestors to prevent the dead bringing sickness into
+the house.<a name="FNanchor_18_18" id="FNanchor_18_18"></a><a href="#Footnote_18_18" class="fnanchor">[18]</a> "A Catholic missionary," says Professor
+Frazer, "observes that in New Guinea the <i>nepir</i>, or
+sorcerer, is everywhere.... Nothing happens without
+the sorcerer's intervention; wars, marriage, death, expeditions,<!-- Page 47 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_47" id="Page_47">[47]</a></span>
+fishing, hunting, always and everywhere
+the sorcerer."<a name="FNanchor_19_19" id="FNanchor_19_19"></a><a href="#Footnote_19_19" class="fnanchor">[19]</a></p>
+
+<p>In Ancient Egypt, Chaldea, and Assyria there is
+ample evidence that the same belief flourished. Everywhere
+we find the exorcist and the witch-doctor existing
+as natural consequents of the belief that disease
+has a supernatural origin. We see it in both the teaching
+and practice of the early Christian Church. That
+great father of the Church, Origen, says: "It is demons
+which produce famine, unfruitfulness, corruption of
+the air, and pestilence." St. Augustine said that "All
+diseases of Christians are to be ascribed to demons."
+The Church of England still retains in its Articles an
+authorisation for the expulsion of demons; and a
+number of charms yet in wide use amongst civilised
+nations show how persistent is this belief. For centuries
+there existed all over Europe sacred pools, wells,
+grottos, etc., all bearing eloquent witness to the deep-seated
+belief that disease was of supernatural origin,
+and was to be conquered by supernatural means.</p>
+
+<p>Enough has been said to indicate the kind of environment
+in which primitive man moves, and also to
+understand why ideas concerning the supernatural
+exert such an enormous influence in early society. In
+a world where everything was yet to be learned, man's
+first attempts at understanding himself and his fellows
+were necessarily blundering and tentative. His
+first attempts at explanation are expressed in terms
+of his own nature. He sees himself, his own passions,
+strengths, and weaknesses reflected in the nature
+around him. This is the outstanding, dominating fact
+in primitive life. Leave out this consideration and<!-- Page 48 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_48" id="Page_48">[48]</a></span>
+primitive sociology becomes a chaos. Admit it, and
+we see the reason why social institutions assumed
+the form they took, and also a key to much that happens
+in subsequent human history. In primitive life
+religious beliefs are not something separate from other
+forms of social life; so far as man seeks consciously
+to shape that life they are to him an essential part
+of it. And the mistake once made is perpetuated.
+The initial blunder once committed, daily experience
+seems to give it constant justification. In the absence
+of knowledge concerning natural forces every event,&mdash;particularly
+if unusual,&mdash;every case of disease, endorses
+and strengthens the mistake made. A psychological
+fatality drives the human race along the wrong
+path of investigation, and only very slowly is the mistake
+rectified. One cannot see how it could have been
+otherwise. The only corrective is knowledge, and
+knowledge is a plant of slow growth. This psychological
+first step was man's first attempt to frame a
+theory of things satisfactory to his intellect&mdash;an
+attempt that, beginning in the crude animism of the
+savage, ends in the verifiable laws of modern science.</p>
+
+<p>From the point of view of our present enquiry two
+things are to be noted. The first is that man's conviction
+of the nearness of a supernatural world began
+in his lack of knowledge concerning the nature of
+natural forces. Of this there can be little doubt. One
+can take all the facts upon which primitive mankind
+built, and still builds, its theories of supernaturalism,
+and show that they may be explained in a quite different
+manner. The movements of the planets, the
+rush of comets, the presence of disaster, the thousand
+and one operations of natural forces no longer suggest<!-- Page 49 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_49" id="Page_49">[49]</a></span>
+to educated minds the action of personal beings. The
+whole data of the primitive theory of things have been
+rejected. The premises were false, and the conclusions
+necessarily false also.</p>
+
+<p>The second point is that from the earliest times one
+of the strongest proofs of human contact with a supernatural
+world has been found in the existence of abnormal
+or pathological states of mind. These may
+have sometimes arisen quite naturally; at other times
+they have been deliberately induced. How much the
+perpetuation of religious beliefs as a whole owes to this
+factor has never yet been adequately realised. That
+it has had a very great influence seems beyond dispute.
+For it seems certain that had not "proofs" of
+a supernatural world been offered in the shape of
+visions, ecstatic states, etc., religious beliefs would
+hardly have exercised the power that has been theirs.
+The number of people who are able to maintain a
+strong consciousness of the truth of religion, merely
+looking at it as a philosophy of existence, is naturally
+very few. The great majority require more tangible
+evidence if their belief is to be kept alive and active.
+And curiously enough, the very growth of a naturalistic
+explanation has driven a great many to find the
+evidence they desired in those abnormal states of mind
+that seemed to defy scientific analysis. In succeeding
+chapters evidence will be given to show to what extent
+this kind of evidence for the supernatural has been
+offered and accepted. It will be seen, as Professor
+Tylor points out, that the line of religious development
+is continuous. The latest forms stretch back in
+an unbroken line to the earliest. And if this proves
+nothing else, it at least proves that consequences do<!-- Page 50 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_50" id="Page_50">[50]</a></span>
+not always die out with the conditions that gave them
+birth. It was the world of the savage that gave birth
+to the supernatural. But the supernatural is still with
+us, even though the world that gave it birth has disappeared.
+We retain conclusions based on admittedly
+false premises.</p>
+
+<div class="footnotes">
+<h3>Footnotes:<br />
+<span class="skip">[<a href="#Page_51">Skip</a>]</span>
+</h3>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_14_14" id="Footnote_14_14"></a><a href="#FNanchor_14_14"><span class="label">[14]</span></a> <cite>Lectures on the Early History of the Kingship</cite>, pp. 36-7.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_15_15" id="Footnote_15_15"></a><a href="#FNanchor_15_15"><span class="label">[15]</span></a> <cite>West African Studies</cite>, pp. 394-6.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_16_16" id="Footnote_16_16"></a><a href="#FNanchor_16_16"><span class="label">[16]</span></a> See an interesting article on this point by W. H. R. Rivers
+on "The Primitive Conception of Death," in <cite>The Hibbert Journal</cite>
+for Jan. 1912.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_17_17" id="Footnote_17_17"></a><a href="#FNanchor_17_17"><span class="label">[17]</span></a> <cite>Principles of Sociology</cite>, vol. i.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_18_18" id="Footnote_18_18"></a><a href="#FNanchor_18_18"><span class="label">[18]</span></a> <cite>Popular Religion and Folklore of Northern India</cite>, i. p. 124.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_19_19" id="Footnote_19_19"></a><a href="#FNanchor_19_19"><span class="label">[19]</span></a> <cite>Golden Bough</cite>, 3rd ed., i. 337.</p></div>
+</div>
+
+<p><!-- Page 51 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_51" id="Page_51">[51]</a></span></p>
+<h2>CHAPTER <span class="cgap">THREE</span><br />
+THE RELIGION OF MENTAL DISEASE</h2>
+
+<p>"It is an interesting problem,"
+says Professor J. H. Leuba, "to determine what influences
+have led theologians to anchor their beliefs
+upon the proposition that religious experience differs
+from other forms of consciousness in that it gives one
+an <em>immediate</em> knowledge of the external existence of
+certain objects of belief, although they do not fall under
+the senses, and an immediate knowledge of the
+truth of certain historical facts."<a name="FNanchor_20_20" id="FNanchor_20_20"></a><a href="#Footnote_20_20" class="fnanchor">[20]</a> This is, indeed, an
+interesting problem, and, we may add, one of growing
+importance, since there is a pronounced tendency on
+the part of present-day exponents of religion to rest
+their case almost entirely upon the immediacy of
+their religious consciousness. This conception of a
+certain order of experience, however, is not and cannot
+have always existed. A belief may be so widely
+and so generally diffused that it is accepted without
+resistance, and, as it would almost seem, in the
+absence of evidence. But its intuitive character is
+only superficial, and disappears on careful examination.
+The mere vogue of a belief constitutes in itself
+a kind of evidence, and for many people the most
+powerful kind of evidence. But the conviction itself
+has a history, and it is in the unravelling of that history,
+in the discovery of the class of facts upon which
+the conviction has been built, that the work lies. And
+when this is done it will be found that our intuitions
+are invariably based upon a continuous&mdash;even though
+partly unconscious&mdash;appeal to facts. Sometimes it
+will, of course, be found that a renewed and deliberate
+appeal to the facts in question will justify the conviction.<!-- Page 52 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_52" id="Page_52">[52]</a></span>
+At other times it will be found that the facts
+demand an altogether new interpretation. For centuries
+all the observed facts supported a conviction
+that the earth was flat. It was a fresh scrutiny of the
+facts in the light of a new conception that revolutionised
+human opinion on the subject.</p>
+
+<p>What, then, is the history, and what are the facts
+upon which the belief that religious experience brings
+man into contact with a kind of existence not given
+in ordinary experience, is based? The kind of answer
+that will be given to this question has already been
+indicated. Religious beliefs are in their origin of the
+nature of an induction from an observed order. The
+induction is not the result of that careful collection
+of facts, leading up to an equally careful generalisation
+and subsequent verification, which is a characteristic
+of modern science, but it is an induction none
+the less. The primitive mind is not so much engaged
+in seeking an explanation of certain experiences, as
+it has an explanation forced upon it. To picture the
+savage as inventing a theory in the sense in which
+Darwin propounded the theory of Natural Selection
+is to quite misconceive the nature of the savage intelligence.
+But to conceive the savage as having a certain
+explanation suggested by the pressure of repeated
+experiences, and that this explanation subsequently
+assumes the character of a fixed belief, is well
+within the scope of the facts known to us. In this
+stage of culture the existence of supernatural beings
+is as much a deduction from experience as any modern
+scientific generalisation. Certain things are seen,
+certain feelings are experienced, and the conclusion
+is that they are the products of supernatural agency.<!-- Page 53 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_53" id="Page_53">[53]</a></span>
+From this point of view religion is no more than a
+primitive science. It is the first stage of that long
+series of generalisations which, beginning with crude
+animism, ends with the discoveries of a Copernicus,
+a Newton, a Darwin, or a Spencer. It is a history that
+begins with vitalism and ends with mechanism. We
+commence with a world in which there exists a chaotic
+assemblage of independent personal forces, and
+end with a universe that is self-acting, self-adjusting,
+self-contained, and in which science makes no allowance
+for the operation of intelligence save such as
+meets us in animal organisation.</p>
+
+<p>Now amongst the facts that suggest to the primitive
+intelligence the operation of 'spiritual' forces are
+those connected with the human organism itself in
+both its normal and abnormal states. But it is important
+to note&mdash;particularly so for the understanding
+of the part played by ecstatic religious phenomena
+in comparatively recent times&mdash;that once the
+occurrence of a certain state of mind is conceived as
+the product of intercourse between man and spirits,
+there is every inducement to cultivate these frames
+of mind whenever renewed intercourse is desired.
+This does not imply, at least in the earlier stages,
+conscious imposture. Generally the operator imposes
+on himself as much as he imposes on others. Noting
+that privation of body, or torture of mind, or the use of
+certain herbs is followed by visions or ecstasy, it is believed,
+not that the vision is the product of the practice,
+but that the practice is the condition of illumination.</p>
+
+<p>This attitude of mind is fairly paralleled by what
+takes place at the ordinary spiritualistic <i>seance</i>. Those
+attending are advised that the chief condition of a<!-- Page 54 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_54" id="Page_54">[54]</a></span>
+communication with the inhabitants of the other
+world is a passive state of mind. This passivity cannot
+exclude expectancy, since it is only assumed in
+order that something may occur. If nothing occurs,
+if no communications are received, it is because the
+requisite conditions have not been fulfilled, and the
+sceptic is met with much semi-scientific jargon as to
+conditions being necessary to every scientific investigation.
+The fact that this passivity and expectancy,
+with other attendant circumstances, not the least of
+which is the contagious influence of a number of
+people with a similar mental disposition, opens the
+way to self-delusion is ignored. Then when the expected
+and desired result follows, the mental attitude
+cultivated is taken as the condition of communication
+with the spiritual world, instead of its being, in
+all probability, the true cause of what is experienced.
+In this way the story of supernatural intercourse runs
+clear and unbroken from primitive savagery to its
+survival in modern civilisation. When Professor Tylor
+says, "The conception of the human soul is, as
+to its most essential nature, continuous from the philosophy
+of the savage thinker to that of the modern
+professor of theology,"<a name="FNanchor_21_21" id="FNanchor_21_21"></a><a href="#Footnote_21_21" class="fnanchor">[21]</a> he makes a statement that is
+true of the whole story of supernatural intercourse in
+all its varied manifestations.</p>
+
+<p>The chief distinction between primitive and modern
+man lies in the consideration that in the first case the
+blunder is inevitable, in the latter case the remedy lies
+to hand. How could primitive man be aware of the
+real connection between the use of certain drugs or
+herbs and an excitation or depression of the activities<!-- Page 55 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_55" id="Page_55">[55]</a></span>
+of the nervous system? He does observe consequences,
+but he is quite ignorant of causes. Even to-day
+their full consequences are unknown; and it is absurd
+to expect that savage humanity should have been
+better informed. And even when a more rational theory
+exists, the practice persists under various forms.
+This is a principle that receives vivid illustration from
+the history of religions. The modern believer in
+mystical states of consciousness no longer advocates
+the use of drugs, and even fasting is going out of
+fashion. But we still have a continuation of the primitive
+practice in the shape of insistence on the cultivation
+of abnormal frames of mind if we are to experience
+a consciousness of communion with an alleged
+supersensible reality. That is, we are to achieve by a
+mental discipline what the savage or the medieval
+monk achieved by coarser and more obvious methods.
+To withdraw the mind from the normal influence of
+everyday life is to expose it to the play of hallucination
+and delusion. There is really no vital difference
+between unhealthy, solitary brooding on a given subject
+and drugging the mind with hashish. This class of
+modern mystic is one with the savage in an inability
+to recognise that the illumination is the product of
+the discipline, not the mere condition of its possession.
+Between the drug of the savage, the fasting and self-torture
+of the medieval monk and the prayerful meditation
+of the modern mystic, the difference is only
+that of changed times and altered conditions. The
+method is the same throughout.</p>
+
+<p>The truth of this has been well put by Tylor:&mdash;</p>
+
+<p>"The religious beliefs of the lower races are in no
+small measure based on the evidence of visions and<!-- Page 56 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_56" id="Page_56">[56]</a></span>
+dreams, regarded as actual intercourse with spiritual
+being. From the earliest stages of culture we find religion
+in close alliance with ecstatic physical conditions.
+These are brought on by various means of interference
+with the healthy action of body and mind, and it
+is scarcely needful to remind the reader that, according
+to philosophic theories antecedent to those of
+modern medicine, such morbid disturbances are explained
+as symptoms of divine visitation, or at least of
+superhuman spirituality. Among the strongest means
+of disturbing the functions of the mind so as to produce
+ecstatic vision, is fasting, accompanied, as it
+usually is, with other privations, and with prolonged
+solitary contemplation in the desert or in the forest.
+Among the ordinary vicissitudes of savage life, the
+wild hunter has many a time to try involuntarily the
+effects of such a life for days together, and under these
+circumstances he soon comes to see and talk with
+phantoms which are to him invisible spirits. The secret
+of spiritual intercourse thus learnt, he has thence-forth
+but to reproduce the cause in order to renew the
+effects."<a name="FNanchor_22_22" id="FNanchor_22_22"></a><a href="#Footnote_22_22" class="fnanchor">[22]</a></p>
+
+<p>As a means, then, of strengthening and perpetuating
+a consciousness of intercourse with the spiritual
+world, we have to reckon with, not merely the accidental
+occurrence of abnormal nervous conditions, but with
+their deliberate cultivation. The practice is world-wide,
+and persists in some form or other in all ages.
+Thus we find the Australians and many tribes of North
+American Indians use tobacco for this purpose. In
+Western Siberia a species of fungi, the 'fly Agaric,' so
+called because it is often steeped and the solution used<!-- Page 57 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_57" id="Page_57">[57]</a></span>
+to destroy house flies, is used to produce religious
+ecstasy. Its action on the muscular system is stimulatory,
+and it greatly excites the nervous system.<a name="FNanchor_23_23" id="FNanchor_23_23"></a><a href="#Footnote_23_23" class="fnanchor">[23]</a> An
+early Spanish observer says of the ancient Mexicans
+that they used a kind of mushroom, "which are eaten
+raw, and on account of being bitter, they drink after
+them, or eat with them a little honey of bees, and shortly
+after they see a thousand visions."<a name="FNanchor_24_24" id="FNanchor_24_24"></a><a href="#Footnote_24_24" class="fnanchor">[24]</a> The mushroom
+was called the "bread of the gods." The Californian
+Indians give children tobacco, in order to receive instruction
+from the resulting visions. North American
+Indians held intoxication by tobacco to be supernatural
+ecstasy, and the dreams of men in this state to
+be inspired. The Darien Indians use the seeds of the
+Datura Sanguinea to induce visions. In Peru the
+priests prepared themselves for intercourse with the
+gods by partaking of a narcotic drink from the same
+plant. In Guiana the priest was prepared for his functions
+by fasting and flagellation, and was afterwards
+dosed with tobacco juice.<a name="FNanchor_25_25" id="FNanchor_25_25"></a><a href="#Footnote_25_25" class="fnanchor">[25]</a> In India the Laws of Manu
+give explicit instructions as to the means of producing
+visions. Chief of these is the use of the 'Soma' drink.
+This is prepared from the flower of the lotus. The sap
+of this, says De Candolle, would be poisonous if taken
+in large quantities, but in small doses merely induces
+hallucination. Opium and hashish, a preparation of the
+hemp plant, have been in general use among Eastern
+peoples, as a means of producing ecstasy from remote
+antiquity. Opium, it is well known, produces an<!-- Page 58 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_58" id="Page_58">[58]</a></span>
+extraordinary state of exaltation, intensifying the sense
+of one's personality, and inducing a pleasurable consciousness
+of mental strength and clarity. Under its
+influence, as De Quincey said, time lengthens to infinity
+and space swells to immensity.<a name="FNanchor_26_26" id="FNanchor_26_26"></a><a href="#Footnote_26_26" class="fnanchor">[26]</a> Belladonna, a
+drug much used by medieval witches and sorcerers,
+has also had its vogue for purely religious purposes.<!-- Page 59 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_59" id="Page_59">[59]</a></span>
+With the Greeks the laurel was sacred to Æsculapius.
+Those who wished to ask counsel of the god appeared
+before the altar crowned with laurel and chewing its
+leaves. Before prophesying, the Greek priestesses
+drank a preparation of laurel water. This contains, although
+it was, of course, unknown to them, two toxic
+substances&mdash;prussic acid and the volatile oil of laurel.
+The first would induce convulsions, the second,
+hallucinatory visions. The two combined were calculated
+to produce with both subject and observer a
+profound impression of spiritual illumination and
+possession.</p>
+
+<p>It is unnecessary to multiply examples of the action
+of various drugs or herbs on the nervous system, or to
+cite the people who use them. Enough has been said
+to indicate how widespread is the practice, and the
+consequences are not hard to foresee. A very moderate
+development of intelligence would enable men to associate
+certain consequences with the use of particular
+drugs, but a very considerable amount of knowledge
+would be required to explain why these consequences
+were produced. In a social environment saturated
+with superstition the explanation lies ready to hand,
+and is accepted without question. A people that sees
+spiritual agency in all the familiar phenomena of nature
+are certainly not less likely to trace its influence in
+the mysterious and unaccountable effects of narcotics
+and stimulants. And each repeated experiment provides
+additional proof. Man thus not only believes
+himself to be surrounded by a spiritual world; he is
+actually able to enter into communication with it by
+methods that are defined in the clearest possible manner.
+Every repetition strengthens the delusion and<!-- Page 60 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_60" id="Page_60">[60]</a></span>
+even when the delusion, as such, is exploded, the temper
+of mind induced by it persists.</p>
+
+<p>Various other methods are employed to induce
+a feeling of religious exaltation. Prominent among
+these are dancing and singing. Dancing in connection
+with religious ceremonies is now generally outgrown
+in the civilised world, but singing is still the vogue. That
+is, singing is not, it must be remembered, practised
+from any desire to cultivate a love of music, although it
+may appeal to music-lovers. Still, its avowed purpose
+is to induce a feeling of devoutness in the congregation.
+The hypnotic consequences of a body of people singing
+in unison, or the soothing, mystical effect of certain
+airs from a choir upon a congregation, are recognised
+in practice if not in theory. This is a phenomenon that
+is not, of course, exclusively associated with religion.
+In this as in other instances religion only utilises the
+ordinary qualities of human nature. But in all cases
+the purpose and the result are the same. That is, the
+subject is placed for the time being in a supernormal
+condition, and the mild state of passivity or enthusiasm
+created makes him more susceptible to the influence
+brought to bear upon him. This is true of religious
+singing and chanting, from the forest gatherings of the
+primitive savage down to the more sedate and elaborate
+assemblages in church or chapel.</p>
+
+<p>Primitive dancing had both a sexual and religious
+significance, although, as will be seen later, in the
+primitive mind the sexual functions themselves are
+very closely associated with supernatural agency.
+Tylor is of opinion that originally men and women
+dance in order to express their feelings and wishes,<a name="FNanchor_27_27" id="FNanchor_27_27"></a><a href="#Footnote_27_27" class="fnanchor">[27]</a>
+<!-- Page 61 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_61" id="Page_61">[61]</a></span>
+but it is certain it very early and universally became
+associated with religious ceremonies, and that because
+of the ecstasy induced. In some cases drug-taking
+and dancing go together. In others, reliance is placed
+on dancing alone. This latter is the case with the
+'devil dancers' of Ceylon. In Africa the witch doctor
+discovers who has been guilty of sorcery by the aid
+of inspiration furnished during a dance. The whirling
+dance of the Eastern dervish is well known. Dancing
+also figures in the Bible. The Jews danced around the
+golden calf (Ex. xxxii. 19) in a state of nudity. David,
+too, danced naked before the Lord. Dancing was also
+part of the religious ceremonies attendant on the
+worship of Dionysos or Bacchus.<a name="FNanchor_28_28" id="FNanchor_28_28"></a><a href="#Footnote_28_28" class="fnanchor">[28]</a> Along with the
+drinking of certain vegetable decoctions, dancing
+formed an important part of the witches' saturnalia
+during the medieval period. When in a state of frenzy,
+partly drug induced and partly the product of exhilaration
+caused by wild dancing, visions of Satan followed.
+In the dancing mania of the fourteenth century,
+the sufferers saw visions of heaven opened, with Jesus
+and the Virgin enthroned. Dancing was one of the
+prominent characteristics of the French Convulsionnaires
+in the eighteenth century. In more recent times
+we have the dancing and singing connected with the
+Methodist revival. In modern instances the dancing
+seems to have been consequent on religious excitement
+rather than precedent to it, but in earlier times
+there is no doubt that it was deliberately practised as
+a means of producing a state of exaltation.</p>
+
+<p>Among the commonest methods of inducing a sense<!-- Page 62 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_62" id="Page_62">[62]</a></span>
+of religious exaltation is the practice of fasting. In
+various guises, this is the most persistent form of religious
+self-torture. Amongst more civilised people
+the reason given for fasting is that it is a form of repentance,
+the genuineness of which is attested by
+voluntary punishment. But originally there seems
+little reason to doubt that it was adopted for a different
+purpose. It was valued not because the fasting
+person felt that he had done anything for which it was
+necessary to repent, but because it was believed to
+bring people into closer touch with the spiritual world.
+There is, of course, a very obvious reason for this belief.
+A lowered vitality is favourable to hallucinations
+of every description. A shipwrecked sailor is placed,
+by no act of his own, in precisely the same condition
+as is the primitive medicine man or the medieval saint
+by his own volition. It has always been recognised,
+and by none more readily than by the great religious
+teachers of the world, that a well-nourished body is
+inimical to what they chose to term "spiritual development."
+The historic Christian outcry against
+fleshly indulgence has much more in it than a revolt
+against mere sensualism. A well-fed body has been
+deprecated because it closed the avenue to spiritual
+illumination. Hence it is that fasting has found such
+favour in all religious systems. The ascetic saw more
+because, by reducing the body to an abnormal state,
+he provided the conditions for seeing more. The Zulu
+maxim, "A stuffed body cannot see secret things,"
+really expresses in a sentence the philosophy of the
+matter.</p>
+
+<p>Among the Blackfoot Indians of North America,
+when a boy reaches puberty he is sent away from<!-- Page 63 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_63" id="Page_63">[63]</a></span>
+his father's lodge in search of a spiritual protector
+or totem. Seeking a secluded spot, he abstains from
+food until he is favoured in a dream with a vision of
+some animal or bird, which is at once adopted by
+him.<a name="FNanchor_29_29" id="FNanchor_29_29"></a><a href="#Footnote_29_29" class="fnanchor">[29]</a> This custom obtains with most of the North
+American tribes. Among these tribes, also, the soothsayer
+prepares himself by fasting for the ecstatic state
+in which the spirits give their messages through him.
+The ordinary member of the tribe who wants anything
+will fast until he is assured in a dream that it
+will be granted him. Similarly, the Malay, to procure
+supernatural intercourse, retires to the jungle and abstains
+from food. The Zulu doctor prepares for intercourse
+with the tribal spirits by spare diet or solitary
+fasts. Fasting is part of the ordinary regimen of the
+Hindu yogi. Of certain Indian tribes we are told that
+before proceeding on an expedition they "observe a
+rigorous fast, or rather abstain from every kind of food
+for four days. In this interval their imagination is
+exalted to delirium; whether it be through bodily
+weakness or the natural effect of delirium, they pretend
+to have strange visions. The elders and sages of
+the tribe, being called upon to interpret these dreams,
+draw from them omens more or less favourable to the
+success of the enterprise; and their explanations are
+received as oracles, by which the expedition will be
+faithfully regulated."<a name="FNanchor_30_30" id="FNanchor_30_30"></a><a href="#Footnote_30_30" class="fnanchor">[30]</a> Amongst the Samoans, when
+rain was required, the priests blackened themselves
+all over, exhumed a dead body, took the skeleton to a
+cave and poured water over it. They had to fast and
+remain in the cave until it rained. Sometimes they<!-- Page 64 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_64" id="Page_64">[64]</a></span>
+died under the experiment, but they generally chose
+the showery months for their rain-making.<a name="FNanchor_31_31" id="FNanchor_31_31"></a><a href="#Footnote_31_31" class="fnanchor">[31]</a></p>
+
+<p>In both the Old and New Testaments fasting figures
+largely. The encounter of Jesus with Satan is preceded
+by a forty days' fast. St. Catherine of Sienna
+began regular fasts at a very early age. Santa Teresa
+kept lengthy fasts every year. The fasting of the
+monks and nuns during the epidemic period of monasticism
+is too well known to call for more than a mere
+reference. Perhaps the most curious religious reason
+given for fasting is that cited by a writer from a monkish
+chronicler:&mdash;</p>
+
+<p>"As a coach goes faster when it is empty, a man by
+fasting can be better united to God; for it is a principle
+with geometers that a round body can never touch a
+plane except in one point.... A belly too well filled
+becomes round, it cannot touch God except in one
+point; but fasting flattens the belly until it is united
+with the surface of God at all points."<a name="FNanchor_32_32" id="FNanchor_32_32"></a><a href="#Footnote_32_32" class="fnanchor">[32]</a></p>
+
+<p>George Fox, the founder of the Society of Friends,
+confesses that he "fasted much" and "walked abroad
+in solitary places," and "frequently in the night walked
+about mournfully by myself." After much brooding
+and fasting, he heard a voice which said, "There is one,
+even Jesus Christ, that can speak to thy condition."
+Such an experience is not at all surprising, seeing the
+method pursued to acquire it. Less fasting and brooding,
+with more genial intercourse with his fellows,
+might easily have prevented Fox, as it has prevented
+others, hearing heavenly voices proffering him counsel.
+Such an experience is well within the reach of anyone<!-- Page 65 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_65" id="Page_65">[65]</a></span>
+who cares to acquire it. Tylor has well said that
+"So long as fasting is continued as a religious rite, so
+long the consequences in morbid mental exaltation
+will continue the old savage doctrine that morbid
+phantasy is supernatural experience. Bread and meat
+would have robbed the ascetic of many an angel's
+visit; the opening of the refectory door must many a
+time have closed the gate of heaven to his gaze." No
+one will question the truth of this principle, so long as
+we are dealing with uncivilised mankind. Many, however,
+shrink from acknowledging that the practices
+current in more civilised times are disguised illustrations
+of the same principle of interpretation, which
+descends direct from savages, and but for them would
+never have existed.</p>
+
+<p>Commenting on the practices of certain savage
+medicine-men, a missionary remarks:&mdash;</p>
+
+<p>"It always appeared probable to me that these
+rogues, from long fasting, contract a weakness of brain,
+a giddiness, a kind of delirium, which makes them
+imagine that they are gifted with superior wisdom,
+and give themselves out for physicians. They impose
+upon themselves first, and afterwards upon others."<a name="FNanchor_33_33" id="FNanchor_33_33"></a><a href="#Footnote_33_33" class="fnanchor">[33]</a></p>
+
+<p>This is shrewdly said, and is a good example of the
+readiness with which obvious truths are recognised
+when they do not clash with religious prepossessions.
+The difficulty for others is to discern any real line of
+demarcation between the practices of civilised and
+uncivilised. So far as one can see, the only real distinction
+is that the method employed by savages is
+open. That followed by civilised people is more or less
+disguised. But derangement of function is derangement<!-- Page 66 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_66" id="Page_66">[66]</a></span>
+of function, no matter how produced. And if we
+decline to believe that a savage holds genuine intercourse
+with a spiritual world, as a consequence of this
+derangement, in what way are we justified in accepting
+the testimony of a Christian visionary to similar
+intercourse, when the derangement is in his case no
+less clear? It is a case of accepting both, or neither.
+The sane and scientific conclusion seems to lie in the
+following from Dr. Henry Maudsley:&mdash;</p>
+
+<p>"Now that the mental functions are known to be
+inseparably connected with nervous substrata, disposed
+and united in the brain in the most orderly
+fashion, superordinate, co-ordinate, and subordinate&mdash;the
+whole a complex organisation of confederate
+nerve centres, each capable of more or less independent
+action&mdash;a natural interpretation presents itself.
+The extraordinary states of mental disintegration
+evince the separate and irregular function of certain
+mental nerve tracts, or grouped nerve tracts with which
+goes necessarily a coincident suspension, partial or
+complete, of the functions of all the rest; the supernatural
+incubus, therefore, neither demoniac nor divine,
+only morbid. Thus the strange nervous seizures, with
+their mental concomitants, not being outside the range
+of positive research, but interesting events within it,
+become useful natural experiments to throw an instructive
+light upon the intricate functions of the most
+complex organ in the world&mdash;the human brain. Steadily
+are the researches of pathology driving the supernatural
+back into its last and most obscure retreat;
+for they prove that in the extremest ecstasies there
+is neither <em>theolepsy</em> nor <em>diabolepsy</em>, nor any other
+<em>lepsy</em> in the sense of possession of the individual by<!-- Page 67 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_67" id="Page_67">[67]</a></span>
+an external power; what there is truly is a <em>psycholepsy</em>."<a name="FNanchor_34_34" id="FNanchor_34_34"></a><a href="#Footnote_34_34" class="fnanchor">[34]</a></p>
+
+<p>States of exaltation produced by the aid of drugs,
+fasting, or other forms of self-torture come naturally
+under the category of deliberately induced states of
+mind, owing to the conviction that spiritual knowledge
+may be gained in this way. But there are other
+states that arise naturally and which foster the same
+conviction. It has already been pointed out that the
+generally accepted theory with uncivilised peoples is
+that all disease is due to the action of malevolent spirits.
+There is no need now to repeat proof of this, and
+in any case it lies to hand in any work that deals with
+uncivilised life. Nor need we go back to uncivilised
+times for evidence. One requires only to look but a
+very little way into the history of any country to find
+the supernaturalistic theory of disease in full swing,
+and even to-day one may discover indications of its
+once general rule. Its importance to the present enquiry
+lies in the part it has played in building up in
+the religious consciousness a general conviction of
+religious truth that does not disappear even when it
+is seen that the evidence upon which it rests is faulty.
+Just as the inhabitants of a Welsh village have their
+general belief in religion strengthened by the semi-hysterical
+speeches of an Evan Roberts, and the convulsive
+capers of a whole congregation, so in all ages
+people have found endorsement of their belief in a supernatural
+world in the existence of cases the pathological
+nature of which admits of no doubt. Belief in
+the supernatural character of specific nervous conditions
+or mental states may disappear, but the fact<!-- Page 68 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_68" id="Page_68">[68]</a></span>
+that this belief has been general for a time leaves behind
+a certain psychological residuum in favour of supernaturalism
+in general.</p>
+
+<p>The connection between the priest and the physician
+is naturally a very ancient one. The priest, indeed,
+is the primitive physician, the belief that diseases
+are supernaturally caused indicating him as the
+agent of their cure. And it is only to be expected that
+when the attempt is made to divert the treatment of
+disease from priestly hands the effort should be met
+with determined opposition. Quite naturally, too, the
+first gropings after a scientific theory of disease show
+a curious mixture of rationalism and superstition.
+Thus, in Greece, the temple hospitals devoted to the
+mythical Æsculapius, which were situated at Epidaurus,
+Pergamus, Cyrene, Corinth, and many other
+places, served as colleges, hospitals, and places of worship.
+Sufferers slept in the temples in the hopes of receiving messages
+from the gods, and the priests themselves
+professed to have ecstatic visions which enabled
+them to prescribe for those afflicted.<a name="FNanchor_35_35" id="FNanchor_35_35"></a><a href="#Footnote_35_35" class="fnanchor">[35]</a> Great emphasis
+was placed on bathing, light, air, and food, and it
+is pretty clear that the priests had begun to mix both
+faith and physic in a most perplexing manner.</p>
+
+<p>The definite separation of medicine from magic and
+religion begins with Hippocrates. His theory of disease
+was simple. He did not deny that there might be
+a supernatural side to disease; he insisted that there
+was always a natural one, and that this was the side
+with which we should be concerned. Each disorder,<!-- Page 69 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_69" id="Page_69">[69]</a></span>
+he said, had its own physical conditions, and he laid
+down the rule that we "ought to study the nature of
+man, what he is with reference to that which he eats
+and drinks, and to all his other occupations and habits,
+and to the consequences resulting from each."<a name="FNanchor_36_36" id="FNanchor_36_36"></a><a href="#Footnote_36_36" class="fnanchor">[36]</a> In
+Egypt, also, very considerable advance was made in
+the same direction. Probably a good deal of their
+knowledge resulted from the practice of embalming,
+in spite of the priestly interdict on dissection. At all
+events, there is no doubt that considerable advance
+had been made. Herophilus and Erasistratus wrote of
+the structure of the heart, and described its connection
+with the veins and arteries. The two kinds of
+nerves, motor and sensory, were described, and the influence
+of foods, etc., as influencing health, dwelt on.
+Insanity was also dealt with as due to natural and
+controllable causes, and the effects of colour and music
+in dealing with mania noted.<a name="FNanchor_37_37" id="FNanchor_37_37"></a><a href="#Footnote_37_37" class="fnanchor">[37]</a> Had this advance
+been followed, the history of European civilisation
+might have been different from what it was. Plagues,
+epidemics, and diseases, with their far-reaching social
+and political consequences,&mdash;consequences that are
+too little noted, or even understood, by historians,&mdash;might
+have met with adequate resistance, and some
+would never have occurred.</p>
+
+<p><!-- Page 70 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_70" id="Page_70">[70]</a></span>
+The Pagan schools of medicine came to an untimely,
+although in some cases a lingering, end. "The introduction
+of Christianity," says a medical writer,
+"had an undoubted influence on the course of medical
+science; for the Christian was taught to recognise,
+in every bodily infirmity, the dispensation of the
+Almighty, and in the calm, abstracted pursuits of
+those holy men who passed their time in prayer and
+meditation, a propitiation: hence medicine fell into
+the hands of monks and anchorites, who assumed
+to themselves, exclusively, the power of interpreting
+all natural phenomena as indications of the Divine
+Will, and pretended to possess some occult and supernatural
+means of curing disease."<a name="FNanchor_38_38" id="FNanchor_38_38"></a><a href="#Footnote_38_38" class="fnanchor">[38]</a> Reversing the
+natural order of things, the physician was replaced by
+the priest. The supernaturalistic theory was revived,
+and held its own for well on a thousand years. For
+every complaint the Church provided a specific in the
+shape of a charm, an incantation, or a saint. St. Apollonia
+for toothache, St. Avertin for lunacy, St.
+Benedict for stone, St. Clara for sore eyes, St. Herbert
+for hydrophobia, St. John for epilepsy, St. Maur for
+gout, St. Pernel for agues, St. Genevieve for fevers, St.
+Sebastian for plague, etc.<a name="FNanchor_39_39" id="FNanchor_39_39"></a><a href="#Footnote_39_39" class="fnanchor">[39]</a> The height of absurdity
+was reached when, in spite of the monopoly of the
+treatment of disease by the priesthood, the Council
+of Rheims (1119) actually forbade monks to study
+medicine. This was followed by the Council of Beziers
+(1246) prohibiting Christians applying for relief to
+Jewish physicians, at a time when practically the only
+doctors of ability in Christendom were Jews. In 1243<!-- Page 71 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_71" id="Page_71">[71]</a></span>
+the Dominicans banished all books on medicine from
+their monasteries. Innocent <span class="ucsmcap">III.</span> forbade physicians
+practising except under the supervision of an ecclesiastic.
+Honorius (1222) forbade priests the study of
+medicine; and at the end of the thirteenth Century
+Boniface <span class="ucsmcap">VIII.</span> interdicted surgery as atheistical. The
+ill-treatment and opposition experienced by the great
+Vesalius at the hands of the Church, on account of his
+anatomical researches, is one of the saddest chapters
+in the history of science.<a name="FNanchor_40_40" id="FNanchor_40_40"></a><a href="#Footnote_40_40" class="fnanchor">[40]</a></p>
+
+<p>When the sight of bodily disease strengthened and
+confirmed belief in the supernatural, mental disease
+must have offered still more convincing evidence.
+Among uncivilised people we know that this is so.
+To quote again from the indispensable Tylor:&mdash;</p>
+
+<p>"The possessed man ... rationally finds a spiritual
+cause for his sufferings.... Especially when the mysterious
+unseen power throws him helpless on the
+ground, jerks and writhes him in convulsions, makes
+him leap upon the bystanders with a giant's strength
+and a wild beast's ferocity, impels him with distorted
+face and frantic gesture, and voice not his own nor
+seemingly even human, to pour forth wild incoherent
+raving, or with thought and eloquence beyond his
+sober faculties to command, to counsel, to foretell&mdash;such
+a one seems to those who watch him, and even
+to himself, to have become the mere instrument of a
+spirit which has seized him or entered into him, a
+possessing demon in whose personality the patient
+believes so implicitly that he often imagines a personal
+name for it, which it can declare when it speaks in<!-- Page 72 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_72" id="Page_72">[72]</a></span>
+its own voice and character through his organs of
+speech."<a name="FNanchor_41_41" id="FNanchor_41_41"></a><a href="#Footnote_41_41" class="fnanchor">[41]</a></p>
+
+<p>It was this conception of insanity, universally current
+in the uncivilised world, that was revived with
+fearful intensity in the early Christian Church, and
+which certainly served its purpose in intensifying the
+genuine belief in supernaturalism. Jesus had given
+His followers power to expel demons "In My name,"
+and this power of exorcism was one upon which the
+early Christians specially prided themselves. It is with
+unconscious sarcasm that Dean Trench puts the question,
+If one of the disciples "were to enter a madhouse
+now, how many of the sufferers there he might recognise
+as 'possessed'?"<a name="FNanchor_42_42" id="FNanchor_42_42"></a><a href="#Footnote_42_42" class="fnanchor">[42]</a> One may safely say that he would
+regard all as under the dominion of evil spirits. No
+other cause of insanity appears to have been recognised,
+and the Church devised the most elaborate
+formulæ for casting out demons. The assumed demoniac
+was prayed over, incensed, and evil-smelling
+drugs burned under his nose. A set form of objurgation
+then followed:&mdash;</p>
+
+<p>"Thou lustful and stupid one.... Thou lean sow,
+famine-stricken and most impure.... Thou wrinkled
+beast, of all beasts the most beastly.... Thou bestial
+and foolish drunkard.... Thou sooty spirit from
+Tartarus.... I cast thee down, O Tartarean boor, into
+the infernal kitchen.... Loathsome cobbler ...
+filthy sow ... envious crocodile.... Malodorous
+drudge ... swollen toad ... lousy swineherd," etc.
+etc.<a name="FNanchor_43_43" id="FNanchor_43_43"></a><a href="#Footnote_43_43" class="fnanchor">[43]</a></p>
+
+<p><!-- Page 73 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_73" id="Page_73">[73]</a></span>
+Then followed the exorcism proper:&mdash;</p>
+
+<p>"By the Apocalypse of Jesus Christ, which God
+hath given to make known unto His servants those
+things which are shortly to be ... I exorcise you, ye
+angels of untold perversity.... May all the devils
+that are thy foes rush forth upon thee and drag thee
+down to hell!... May the Holy One trample on thee
+and hang thee up in an infernal fork, as was done to
+the five kings of the Amorites!... May God set a
+nail to your skull, and pound it with a hammer as Jael
+did to Sisera!... May Sother break thy head and
+cut off thy hands, as was done to the cursed Dagon!...
+May God hang thee in a hellish yoke, as seven
+men were hanged by the sons of Saul!"<a name="FNanchor_44_44" id="FNanchor_44_44"></a><a href="#Footnote_44_44" class="fnanchor">[44]</a></p>
+
+<p>Marcus Aurelius mentions as one of his debts to
+the philosopher Diognetus that he had taught him
+"not to give credit to vulgar tales of prodigies and incantations,
+and evil spirits cast out by magicians or
+pretenders to sorcery, and such kind of impostors."<a name="FNanchor_45_45" id="FNanchor_45_45"></a><a href="#Footnote_45_45" class="fnanchor">[45]</a>
+What would have been the thoughts of the great
+emperor, could he have revisited the earth two centuries
+after his death and seen the then civilised world
+enveloped in a mental atmosphere in which such ideas
+as those above described could live?</p>
+
+<p>All over Europe for centuries lunatics were whipped,
+and otherwise ill-treated, in the hopes of expelling
+the demons that were troubling them. The
+seventy-second Canon of the Church of England still
+provides that no unlicensed person shall "cast out any
+devil or devils" under pain of penalties prescribed.
+A Bishop of Beauvais, in the fifteenth century, not
+only caused five devils to come out of one person, but<!-- Page 74 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_74" id="Page_74">[74]</a></span>
+actually induced them to sign a document promising
+not to molest this particular sufferer again. Tremendous,
+again, were the labours of the Jesuit Fathers of
+Vienna, who boasted that they had cast out no less
+than 12,652 'living devils.' Such arithmetical exactitude
+silences all hostile comment. In some parts
+of Scotland, as late as 1783, lunatics were left all night
+in the churchyard, with a holy bell over their heads.
+In Cornwall, St. Nun's pool was famous for the cure
+of lunatics. The poor devils were tied hand and foot
+and doused in the water until they were cured&mdash;or
+killed. Even the embraces of prostitutes, for some
+peculiar reason, were recommended as a cure for
+insanity.<a name="FNanchor_46_46" id="FNanchor_46_46"></a><a href="#Footnote_46_46" class="fnanchor">[46]</a> In 1788, in Bristol, a drunken epileptic,
+one George Larkins, was brought into church, and
+seven clergymen solemnly set themselves to the
+task of exorcising the possessing demon. Whereupon
+Satan swore 'by his infernal den'&mdash;an oath, says
+the chronicler, nowhere to be found but in Bunyan.
+Under date of October 25, 1739, John Wesley
+also relates how he was sent for and assisted at
+the expulsion of a demon from the body of a young girl.</p>
+
+<p>Of all nervous diseases that of epilepsy appears to
+have been most favourable to the encouragement of
+a belief in spiritual agency. One medical authority
+whose experience enables him to speak with a peculiar
+degree of authority has pointed out that with epilepsy
+there is often an exaltation of the religious
+sentiments.<a name="FNanchor_47_47" id="FNanchor_47_47"></a><a href="#Footnote_47_47" class="fnanchor">[47]</a>
+A more recent writer, Dr. Bernard Hollander,<!-- Page 75 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_75" id="Page_75">[75]</a></span>
+asserts that epileptics are "highly religious."<a name="FNanchor_48_48" id="FNanchor_48_48"></a><a href="#Footnote_48_48" class="fnanchor">[48]</a>
+Sir T. S. Clouston also points out that strong religious
+emotionalism often accompanies epilepsy.<a name="FNanchor_49_49" id="FNanchor_49_49"></a><a href="#Footnote_49_49" class="fnanchor">[49]</a> Another
+eminent physician, while pointing out that "a
+high degree of intelligence, amounting even to genius,
+has in some cases been associated with epilepsy,"
+observes that "the epileptic is apt to be influenced
+greatly by the mystical and awe-inspiring, and he is
+disposed to morbid piety."<a name="FNanchor_50_50" id="FNanchor_50_50"></a><a href="#Footnote_50_50" class="fnanchor">[50]</a></p>
+
+<p>Every medical man is acquainted with the close relation
+that exists between epilepsy and all kinds of
+hallucinations and delusions, and it would be more
+than surprising if in an environment where the religious
+interpretation of things is paramount, or with a
+patient of strong religious convictions, these delusions
+did not take a religious form. And of all nervous
+disorders epilepsy seems most favourable for producing
+this. Under its influence hallucination attacks
+every one of the senses with a varying degree of intensity.
+"The patient hears voices, and generally
+words expressing definite ideas, though he is often
+unable to properly refer them to any speaking person.
+Sometimes instead of external sounds or voices,
+the patient has a consciousness of an internal voice
+that may be as real to him as any external auditory
+perception. At first the voices may be indistinct, but
+upon constant repetition and evolution from sub-conscious
+thought they acquire intensity, eventually
+dominating the life of the individual."<a name="FNanchor_51_51" id="FNanchor_51_51"></a><a href="#Footnote_51_51" class="fnanchor">[51]</a> Dr. Ball says:
+<!-- Page 76 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_76" id="Page_76">[76]</a></span>
+"One patient perceives at the beginning of the attack
+a toothed wheel, in the middle of which there appears
+a human face making strange contortions; another
+sees a series of smiling landscapes. In some cases it
+is the sense of hearing which is affected;&mdash;the patient
+hears voices or strange noises. Others are warned
+by the sense of smell that the fit is going to commence."<a name="FNanchor_52_52" id="FNanchor_52_52"></a><a href="#Footnote_52_52" class="fnanchor">[52]</a></p>
+
+<p>Sometimes these hallucinations of sight and hearing
+are in curious contrast with each other. "Not
+rarely," says Dr. Conolly Norman, "a patient has
+visual hallucinations of a cheering kind&mdash;as of God
+or angels; yet his auditory hallucinations are full of
+blasphemy, mockery, and insult."<a name="FNanchor_53_53" id="FNanchor_53_53"></a><a href="#Footnote_53_53" class="fnanchor">[53]</a></p>
+
+<p>Dr. Maudsley thus describes the general symptoms
+accompanying an epileptic attack:&mdash;</p>
+
+<p>"The patient's senses are possessed with hallucinations,
+his ganglionic central cells being in a
+state of what may be called convulsive action; before
+the eyes are blood-red flames of fire, amidst
+which whoever happens to present himself appears
+as a devil or otherwise horribly transformed; the
+ears are filled with a terribly roaring noise, or resound
+with a voice imperatively commanding him
+to save himself; the smell is one of sulphurous
+stifling, and the desperate and violent actions are
+the convulsive reaction to such fearful hallucinations."<a name="FNanchor_54_54" id="FNanchor_54_54"></a><a href="#Footnote_54_54" class="fnanchor">[54]</a></p>
+
+<p>If anyone will bear in mind the numerous descriptions<!-- Page 77 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_77" id="Page_77">[77]</a></span>
+of religious visions, written in all good faith, and
+the behaviour of many an assumed 'inspired' character,
+he will have little difficulty in realising how
+easily, to a people unacquainted with the real character
+of such phenomena, epilepsy lends itself to a
+religious interpretation. It must also be borne in
+mind that the consequences of vivid hallucinations
+experienced during epilepsy do not always disappear
+with the attack to which they were originally
+due.</p>
+
+<p>It is certain that from the earliest times cases of
+what are undoubtedly epilepsy have been taken as
+positive indications of supernatural influence. "There
+is," says Emanuel Deutsch, "a peculiar something
+supposed to inhere in epilepsy. The Greeks called
+it a divine disease. Bacchantic and chorybantic furor
+were God-inspired stages. The Pythia uttered her
+oracles under the most distressing signs. Symptoms
+of convulsion were ever needed as a sign of the divine."<a name="FNanchor_55_55" id="FNanchor_55_55"></a><a href="#Footnote_55_55" class="fnanchor">[55]</a>
+Much of the evidence for the supernatural in
+the New Testament rests upon cases that are obviously
+pathological in character. A man brings his
+son to Jesus and describes how "ofttimes he falleth
+into the fire, and oft into the water" (Matt. xvii. 15),
+and in another place (Mark ix. 18) the same patient is
+described as having a dumb spirit, "and wheresoever
+he taketh him, he teareth him; and he foameth, and
+gnasheth with his teeth, and pineth away." The response
+to the father's appeal for help is an exorcism
+of the possessing spirit such as one meets with in all
+savage culture. Between possession by a malignant
+spirit and domination by a god, the difference is clearly<!-- Page 78 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_78" id="Page_78">[78]</a></span>
+one of terminology alone. And at the side of the
+New Testament case just cited one may place this
+account from Polynesia, written by a very competent
+observer, and a missionary:&mdash;</p>
+
+<p>"As soon as the god was supposed to have entered
+the priest, the latter became violently agitated and
+worked himself up to the highest pitch of apparent
+frenzy; the muscles of the limbs seemed convulsed,
+the body swelled, the countenance became terrific,
+the features distorted, the eyes wild and strained. In
+this state he often rolled on the earth, foaming at
+the mouth, as if labouring under the influence of the
+divinity by whom he was possessed, and in shrill cries,
+and often violent and indistinct sounds, revealed the
+will of the god."<a name="FNanchor_56_56" id="FNanchor_56_56"></a><a href="#Footnote_56_56" class="fnanchor">[56]</a></p>
+
+<p>Advancing to a higher culture stage than that
+indicated in the last passage, there is much evidence
+that Mohammed was subject to hallucinations,
+and many authorities have indicated epilepsy as
+their source. There is a tradition that someone
+who saw Mohammed while he was receiving one
+of his revelations observed that he seemed unconscious
+and was red in the face. Mohammed himself
+said:&mdash;</p>
+
+<p>"Inspiration descendeth upon me in two ways.
+Sometimes Gabriel cometh and communicateth the
+revelation unto me, as one man unto another, and this
+is easy; at other times it affecteth me like the ringing
+of a bell, penetrating my very heart, and rending
+me as it were in pieces; and this it is which grievously
+afflicteth me."</p>
+
+<p>Emanuel Deutsch, although, in a passage already<!-- Page 79 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_79" id="Page_79">[79]</a></span>
+cited, recognising the religious significance
+attached to epilepsy, has the following curious comment:&mdash;</p>
+
+<p>"Mohammed was epileptic; and vast ingenuity
+and medical knowledge have been lavished upon this
+point as explanatory of Mohammed's mission and
+success. We, for our own part, do not think that epilepsy
+ever made a man appear a prophet to himself
+or even to the people of the East; or, for the matter of
+that, inspired him with the like heart-moving words
+and glorious pictures. Quite the contrary. It was
+taken as a sign of demons within&mdash;demons, 'Devs,'
+devils to whom all manner of diseases were ascribed
+throughout the antique world."</p>
+
+<p>This seems very largely to miss the point at issue.
+Of course, no one would claim that Mohammed's success
+was due to epilepsy, or even that the very severe
+forms of epilepsy were favourable to inducing a conviction
+of revelation. But the disease assumes various
+forms, and in some cases it is expressed in the form
+of a period of mental excitement and general irritability.
+All that is claimed is that, given the complaint
+in its less severe forms in one with whom religious beliefs
+are strong, there are present all the conditions
+for attributing the resulting hallucinations to personal
+revelation or ecstatic vision. And it is also true that
+while some patients after emerging from a fit of epilepsy
+are in a dazed or confused condition, others have
+a very clear recollection of all they have seen and
+heard. Mohammed simply took the current explanation
+of cases of nervous derangement, and being a
+man of strong religious feeling, naturally gave his visions
+a religious interpretation. All the rest has to be<!-- Page 80 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_80" id="Page_80">[80]</a></span>
+explained in terms of the innate genius of the man
+and of the circumstances of his time.</p>
+
+<p>A similar case to the above is that of Emanuel
+Swedenborg. His followers naturally resent the ascription
+of his visions and voices to a pathologic origin,
+and point to his pronounced mental ability. And
+certainly no one who is at all acquainted with the
+writings of Swedenborg will question his great mental
+power, amounting at times to positive genius. But
+here, again, we have strong religious conviction in
+alliance with pathological conditions. Swedenborg's
+communications with celestial beings were of a more
+frequent and more ordered character than Mohammed's,
+but there is the same general likeness between
+them. Of his first revelation he writes:&mdash;</p>
+
+<p>"At ten o'clock I lay down in bed and was somewhat
+better; half an hour after I heard a clamour
+under my head; I thought that then the tempter went
+away; immediately there came over me a rigor so
+strong from the head and the whole body, with some
+din, and this several times. I found that something
+holy was over me. I thereupon fell asleep, and at about
+twelve, one, or two o'clock in the night there came over
+me so strong a shivering from head to foot, as if many
+winds rushed together, which shook me, was indescribable,
+and prostrated me upon my face. Then, while I
+was prostrated, I was in a moment quite awake, and saw
+that I was cast down, and wondered what it meant.
+And I spoke as if I was awake, but found that the
+word was put into my mouth, and I said, 'Omnipotent
+Jesus Christ, as of Thy great grace Thou condescendest to
+come to so great a sinner, make me worthy
+of this grace!' I held my hands together and prayed,<!-- Page 81 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_81" id="Page_81">[81]</a></span>
+and then came a hand which squeezed my hands
+hard; immediately thereupon I continued in prayer."<a name="FNanchor_57_57" id="FNanchor_57_57"></a><a href="#Footnote_57_57" class="fnanchor">[57]</a></p>
+
+<p>Swedenborg confessed to repeated walks and talks
+with celestial visitants, and, of course, all thought of
+imposture must be put on one side. What one has to
+consider is whether we are to accept these experiences
+as hallucinations or not. On the one side no further evidence
+seems possible than the profound faith of the
+man himself, his recognised mental ability, and the belief
+of his followers. And against this it must be urged
+that the most complete honesty is no guarantee against
+self-deception, while ability and even genius are not
+at all incompatible with a pathologic strain. And in
+addition it must be borne in mind that these hallucinations
+are, after all, part of a very large class. Men of
+very little ability and influence experience substantially
+the same visions; they occur all over the world,
+under all conditions of culture, and always express
+the personal idiosyncrasies of the subject and reflect
+the character of his social environment. One may safely
+say that had Swedenborg lived a century later, while
+he might still have gone through the same mental and
+physical experiences, he himself would have given a
+very different interpretation of them.</p>
+
+<p>St. Paul, Professor James points out, "certainly had
+once an epileptoid, if not an epileptic seizure." One
+needs to add to this that the seizure occurred at the one
+critical moment of his life which eventuated in his conversion
+from Judaism to Christianity. Mary Magdalene,
+the first who brought tidings of the resurrection,<!-- Page 82 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_82" id="Page_82">[82]</a></span>
+had been delivered of seven devils. Luther's religious
+opinions were, of course, quite apart from his physical
+state, sound or unsound. Still, even with him the reality
+of supernatural intercourse became intensely vivid
+as a result of nervous affections. His latest biographer
+points out that as a youth while in the monastery he
+was seized with something that might well have been
+an epileptic fit, and that although there is no record
+of a return of this, he did suffer from ordinary fits of
+fainting.<a name="FNanchor_58_58" id="FNanchor_58_58"></a><a href="#Footnote_58_58" class="fnanchor">[58]</a> He confesses to have been much troubled,
+at twenty-two years of age, with giddiness and noises
+in the ear, which he attributed to the devil. And right
+through his life he attributed similar experiences to
+the same source. Bunyan confesses that even during
+childhood the Lord "did scare and affright me with
+fearful dreams, and did terrify me with dreadful
+visions." George Fox, founder of the Society of
+Friends, describes how, in the middle of winter, when
+approaching Lichfield, "the Word of the Lord was
+like a fire in me," and as he went through the town,
+"there seemed to me to be a channel of blood running
+down the streets, and the market-place appeared like
+a pool of blood." Reflecting on the meaning of the
+vision, he remembered that, "In the Emperor Diocletian's
+time a thousand Christians were martyred at
+Lichfield. So I was to go without my shoes through
+the channel of their blood in the market-place, that I
+might raise up the blood of these martyrs which had
+been shed above a thousand years before."<a name="FNanchor_59_59" id="FNanchor_59_59"></a><a href="#Footnote_59_59" class="fnanchor">[59]</a></p>
+
+<p><!-- Page 83 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_83" id="Page_83">[83]</a></span>
+In none of these cases could it be fairly claimed that
+the religious conviction, as such, was the consequence
+of the hallucinations experienced. But it can scarcely
+be questioned that these served to strengthen it to an
+enormous extent. These trances, ecstasies, visions,
+were accepted by the subjects as proofs of their 'divine
+mission,' and were so accepted by multitudes of their
+followers. In their absence religion would most probably
+have failed to be the fiercely irruptive force in life
+that it has been. The religious idea has, so to speak
+given hallucination a standing and an authority in life
+it would not have possessed in its absence. In the case
+of men of ordinary capacity these visions possess little
+authority. But in the case of men of extraordinary
+capacity, men like Luther, Mohammed, Fox, Swedenborg,&mdash;who
+must in any case have stood superior to
+their fellows,&mdash;these hallucinations are then under
+favouring social conditions invested with enormous
+authority. And there is no doubt about the fact that
+religious leaders have been peculiarly subject to these
+psychical variations. This is pointed out by Professor
+James in the following passage:&mdash;</p>
+
+<p>"Even more perhaps than other kinds of genius,
+religious leaders have been subject to abnormal psychical
+visitations. Invariably they have been creatures
+of exalted emotional sensibility. Often they have led
+a discordant inner life, and had melancholy during a
+part of their career. They have known no measure,
+been liable to obsessions and fixed ideas; and frequently
+they have fallen into trances, heard voices, seen
+visions, and presented all sorts of peculiarities which
+are ordinarily classed as pathological. Often, moreover,
+these pathological features in their career have<!-- Page 84 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_84" id="Page_84">[84]</a></span>
+helped to give them their religious authority and influence."<a name="FNanchor_60_60" id="FNanchor_60_60"></a><a href="#Footnote_60_60" class="fnanchor">[60]</a></p>
+
+<p>Well, in what way are we to discriminate between
+the visions of a religious person, admittedly of an abnormal
+disposition, subject to fits of melancholy, etc.,
+and presenting "all sorts of peculiarities ordinarily
+classed as pathological," and the hallucinations of an
+admittedly pathologic subject? Why should the ordinary
+classification break down at this point? Dr.
+Granger, dealing with this aspect of the question, says:
+"The religious genius is not proved to be morbid by
+the extent to which he diverges from the average
+type."<a name="FNanchor_61_61" id="FNanchor_61_61"></a><a href="#Footnote_61_61" class="fnanchor">[61]</a> Quite so, genius <em>must</em> depart from the average
+type in order to be genius. But the statement is quite
+beside the point at issue. It is not a mere divergence
+from the average type that warrants one in assuming
+that much passing for divine illumination owes its
+origin to pathological conditions, but the fact that it is
+possible to affiliate certain cases of religious exaltation
+with these conditions. Hallucinations are common to
+all forms of ecstasy, and ecstasy is not confined to religion.
+Given a one-sided mental activity, intense concentration
+on one or a few analogous ideas, combined
+with a lowered nervous sensibility, and we have all
+the conditions present favourable to hallucination.<a name="FNanchor_62_62" id="FNanchor_62_62"></a><a href="#Footnote_62_62" class="fnanchor">[62]</a>
+These hallucinations may occur in connection with
+any topic that engrosses the subject's mind. In every
+other direction their true nature is recognised and admitted.
+In connection with religious belief alone, it is
+held that they bring the subject into touch with a<!-- Page 85 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_85" id="Page_85">[85]</a></span>
+supersensual world of reality. What possible scientific
+warranty is there for any such distinction?</p>
+
+<p>Let us take, as an example, one of James's own
+cases, which he admits is 'distinctly pathological,'
+but without allowing this admission to disturb his
+general conclusion. The case is that of Suso, a famous
+fourteenth-century mystic. As a young man he wore
+a hair shirt and an iron chain next the skin. Later he
+had made a leathern garment studded with one hundred
+and fifty nails, points inward. The garment was
+made very tight, and he used it to sleep in. To prevent
+himself throwing it off during sleep he procured a
+pair of leather gloves studded with tacks, so that if he
+attempted to get rid of the dress the tacks would penetrate
+his flesh. Next he had made a wooden cross,
+with thirty protruding nails, to emulate the sufferings
+of Jesus. He procured an old door to sleep on. In winter
+he suffered from the frost. His feet were full of
+sores, his legs became dropsical, his knees bloody and
+seared, his loins covered with scars, his hands tremulous.
+During twenty years he fed scantily upon the
+coarsest food, slept in the most uncomfortable places,
+and during the whole of the time never took a bath.
+No wonder that after his fortieth year he was favoured
+with a series of visions from God. Would not one
+be surprised if any other result than this had been
+achieved? And Suso's case is only one of thousands,
+many of not so extreme a character, others quite as
+bad.</p>
+
+<p>In the case of Catherine of Sienna the austerities began
+earlier than with Suso. As a child she flogged herself,
+and was favoured with visions before she reached
+her teens. Santa Teresa, as a young woman, prayed<!-- Page 86 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_86" id="Page_86">[86]</a></span>
+to God to send her an illness, and describes how she
+remained for days in a trance, during which time her
+tongue was bitten in many places. She describes how,
+during these trances, her body became to her light,
+and she remained rigid. "It was altogether impossible
+for me to hinder it; for my world would be carried
+absolutely away, and ordinarily even my head,
+as it were, after it."<a name="FNanchor_63_63" id="FNanchor_63_63"></a><a href="#Footnote_63_63" class="fnanchor">[63]</a> These are typical examples from
+a very large number of cases. The annals of monasticism
+are filled with accounts of self-inflicted tortures,
+with the one end in view, and in serious belief that their
+experiences brought them into touch with a reality
+denied them under normal conditions. The practice
+not only quickened their own sense of the reality of
+religion, it served the same purpose for thousands of
+others pursuing the course of ordinary social existence.
+"Religious teachers," says Francis Galton, "by
+enforcing celibacy, fasting, and solitude, have done
+their best towards making men mad, and they have
+always largely succeeded in inducing morbid mental
+conditions among their followers."<a name="FNanchor_64_64" id="FNanchor_64_64"></a><a href="#Footnote_64_64" class="fnanchor">[64]</a></p>
+
+<p>The phenomenon is thus continuous and, in its
+essentials, unchanging. From the most primitive
+times there has been a close association between the
+belief in divine illumination and spiritual intercourse,
+and mental states that are unquestionably pathological.
+Following this there has been a more or less deliberate
+cultivation of these states in the desire to
+renew communion with a spiritual world hidden
+from man's normal senses. In this there need be no
+deliberate imposture. When imposture does occur, it<!-- Page 87 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_87" id="Page_87">[87]</a></span>
+would be at a later culture stage. At the beginning
+there is nothing but misunderstanding. First in order
+of time comes the crude animistic interpretation of almost
+every phase of human activity. So far as primitive
+life is concerned, the evidence of this is simply
+overwhelming. Next, as Tylor has pointed out, from
+believing that the occurrence of certain mental states
+provides the conditions of communication with an unseen
+world to the deliberate creation of those states is
+a natural and an easy step. There is thus set on foot a
+deliberate culture of the supernatural. This cultivation
+of abnormal states of mind once initiated persists,
+now in one form, now in another, but is substantially
+the same throughout. Whether we are dealing with
+the crude practices of the savage, the less crude, but
+still obvious methods of solitary living and bodily
+maceration of the medieval monk, or the morbid and
+unhealthy dwelling upon a single idea which remains
+one of the conditions of 'illumination' to-day, we are
+confronted with the same thing. In every case the object&mdash;unconscious,
+maybe&mdash;is the provision of conditions
+that render hallucination and illusion a practical
+certainty. In connection with non-religious matters
+the unhealthiness of mind, distortion of vision, and unreliability
+of judgment induced by methods akin to
+those named is now generally recognised. We have
+yet to see the same thing as generally recognised in
+connection with religious beliefs. We see in addition
+that a great many of those experiences, once accepted
+as clear evidence of supernatural communication, are
+more properly explainable in terms of nervous derangement.
+In such cases there is neither celestial
+illumination nor diabolic communion, neither&mdash;to use<!-- Page 88 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_88" id="Page_88">[88]</a></span>
+Maudsley's phrase&mdash;theolepsy nor diabolepsy, only
+psycholepsy. In the present chapter we have been
+striving to apply this principle to a little wider field
+than is usual. We have been studying the misinterpretation,
+in terms of religion, of abnormal or pathological
+states of mind, and observing how far these
+have contributed to building up and perpetuating a
+conviction of the possibility of supernatural intercourse.
+We have yet to trace the same principle of misinterpretation
+in the sexual and social life of mankind.</p>
+
+<div class="footnotes">
+<h3>Footnotes:<br />
+<span class="skip">[<a href="#Page_89">Skip</a>]</span>
+</h3>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_20_20" id="Footnote_20_20"></a><a href="#FNanchor_20_20"><span class="label">[20]</span></a> <cite>A Psychological Study of Religion</cite>, p. 234.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_21_21" id="Footnote_21_21"></a><a href="#FNanchor_21_21"><span class="label">[21]</span></a> <cite>Primitive Culture</cite>, i. p. 501.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_22_22" id="Footnote_22_22"></a><a href="#FNanchor_22_22"><span class="label">[22]</span></a> <cite>Primitive Culture</cite>, ii. p. 410.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_23_23" id="Footnote_23_23"></a><a href="#FNanchor_23_23"><span class="label">[23]</span></a> Some very curious information concerning the use of this
+and other fungi is given by Dr. J. G. Bourke in his <cite>Scatologic
+Rites</cite>, pp. 69-75.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_24_24" id="Footnote_24_24"></a><a href="#FNanchor_24_24"><span class="label">[24]</span></a> Cited by Bourke, p. 90.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_25_25" id="Footnote_25_25"></a><a href="#FNanchor_25_25"><span class="label">[25]</span></a> Tylor, ii. pp. 417-9.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_26_26" id="Footnote_26_26"></a><a href="#FNanchor_26_26"><span class="label">[26]</span></a> For a clear account of the effects of hemp preparations, calculated
+to produce a feeling of religious ecstasy, the reader should
+consult Dr. Hale White's <cite>Text-Book of Pharmacology</cite>, 1901,
+pp. 318-22. The effects of opium are thus described by another
+writer: "Opium, in those who are capable of stimulation by it,
+gives rise to a pleasurable feeling, something like that which is
+produced by wine in not excessive doses; but the excitement derived
+from it, instead of tending to some highest point, remains
+stationary for hours, and in place of the slight incoherence of
+thought always present in those who are exhilarated with wine,
+the most perfect harmony is established among all the conceptions.
+There is an extraordinary stimulation of the pure intellect,
+and not merely of the power of expression. The opium-eater
+seems to have had the eyes of his spirit opened, to have acquired
+a gift of insight into things that to mere mortals are inexplicable.
+The most remote parts of consciousness come into clear light;
+the finer shades of personality, those that had been unknown
+even to the opium-eater himself, are brought into view and become
+distinct; the smallest details of the things around take new
+significance, and are seen to be profoundly important; their
+analogies with other phenomena of nature are revealed. It is
+the same with the moral as with the intellectual being; that also
+becomes indefinitely exalted. An absolute balance of the faculties
+seems to have been attained. The whole man <em>is</em> what in his
+ordinary state he only tends to be; he has realised the highest
+perfection of which he is capable; only his 'best self' now remains;
+his lower self has been left behind without need of the
+purgatorial fire of contention with the environment to destroy
+it."&mdash;T. Whittaker, <cite>Essays and Notices, Psychological and Philosophical</cite>,
+p. 367.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_27_27" id="Footnote_27_27"></a><a href="#FNanchor_27_27"><span class="label">[27]</span></a> <cite>Anthropology</cite>, p. 296.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_28_28" id="Footnote_28_28"></a><a href="#FNanchor_28_28"><span class="label">[28]</span></a> For a general account of religious dances, see Major-General
+Forlong's <cite>Faiths of Man</cite>, art. "Dancing."</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_29_29" id="Footnote_29_29"></a><a href="#FNanchor_29_29"><span class="label">[29]</span></a> Catlin, <cite>North American Indians</cite>, i. p. 36.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_30_30" id="Footnote_30_30"></a><a href="#FNanchor_30_30"><span class="label">[30]</span></a> Cited by Frazer, <cite>Taboo and the Perils of the Soul</cite>, p. 161.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_31_31" id="Footnote_31_31"></a><a href="#FNanchor_31_31"><span class="label">[31]</span></a> Turner's <cite>Samoa</cite>, p. 345-6.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_32_32" id="Footnote_32_32"></a><a href="#FNanchor_32_32"><span class="label">[32]</span></a> Brady, <cite>Clavis Calendaria</cite>, vol. i. p. 223.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_33_33" id="Footnote_33_33"></a><a href="#FNanchor_33_33"><span class="label">[33]</span></a> Cited by Tylor, <cite>Primitive Culture</cite>, ii. pp. 412-3.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_34_34" id="Footnote_34_34"></a><a href="#FNanchor_34_34"><span class="label">[34]</span></a> <cite>Natural Causes and Supernatural Seemings</cite>, p. 277.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_35_35" id="Footnote_35_35"></a><a href="#FNanchor_35_35"><span class="label">[35]</span></a> A very good account of the methods followed in these places
+will be found in Miss Hamilton's <cite>Incubation, or the Cure of Diseases
+in Pagan Temples and Christian Churches</cite>, 1906.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_36_36" id="Footnote_36_36"></a><a href="#FNanchor_36_36"><span class="label">[36]</span></a> Grote, <cite>History of Greece</cite>, vol. i. p. 359 and vol. v. p. 232.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_37_37" id="Footnote_37_37"></a><a href="#FNanchor_37_37"><span class="label">[37]</span></a> "The ancient Egyptians and Greeks," says Dr. Maudsley,
+"used humane and rational methods of treatment; it was only after
+the Christian doctrine of possession by devils had taken hold
+of the minds of men that the worst sort of treatment, of which
+history gives account, came into force" (<cite>Pathology of Mind</cite>, p.
+523). For a general account of Egyptian medicine see the chapter
+on Egypt in Dr. Berdoe's <cite>Origin and Growth of the Healing
+Art</cite>.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_38_38" id="Footnote_38_38"></a><a href="#FNanchor_38_38"><span class="label">[38]</span></a> Meryon, <cite>The History of Medicine</cite>, vol. i. p. 67.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_39_39" id="Footnote_39_39"></a><a href="#FNanchor_39_39"><span class="label">[39]</span></a> <cite>Ibid.</cite>, vol. i. p. 104.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_40_40" id="Footnote_40_40"></a><a href="#FNanchor_40_40"><span class="label">[40]</span></a> See Sir Michael Foster's <cite>Lectures on the History of Physiology</cite>,
+chap. i.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_41_41" id="Footnote_41_41"></a><a href="#FNanchor_41_41"><span class="label">[41]</span></a> <cite>Primitive Culture</cite>, ii. 124.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_42_42" id="Footnote_42_42"></a><a href="#FNanchor_42_42"><span class="label">[42]</span></a> <cite>On the Miracles</cite>, p. 168.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_43_43" id="Footnote_43_43"></a><a href="#FNanchor_43_43"><span class="label">[43]</span></a> Cited by White, who gives original authorities, <cite>Warfare
+of Science with Theology</cite>, ii. 107.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_44_44" id="Footnote_44_44"></a><a href="#FNanchor_44_44"><span class="label">[44]</span></a> White, ii. 108.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_45_45" id="Footnote_45_45"></a><a href="#FNanchor_45_45"><span class="label">[45]</span></a> <cite>Meditations</cite>, bk. i.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_46_46" id="Footnote_46_46"></a><a href="#FNanchor_46_46"><span class="label">[46]</span></a> Fort's <cite>Medical Economy during the Middle Ages</cite>, p. 345.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_47_47" id="Footnote_47_47"></a><a href="#FNanchor_47_47"><span class="label">[47]</span></a> Dr. Howden, Medical Superintendent of the Montrose
+Lunatic Asylum, in <cite>Journal of Mental Science</cite>, 1873.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_48_48" id="Footnote_48_48"></a><a href="#FNanchor_48_48"><span class="label">[48]</span></a> <cite>First Signs of Insanity</cite>, p. 293.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_49_49" id="Footnote_49_49"></a><a href="#FNanchor_49_49"><span class="label">[49]</span></a> <cite>Clinical Lectures on
+Mental Diseases</cite>, p. 428. The whole of chapter xi. is very pertinent.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_50_50" id="Footnote_50_50"></a><a href="#FNanchor_50_50"><span class="label">[50]</span></a> Dr. R. Jones, in Allbutt's <cite>System of Medicine</cite>, vol.
+viii. p. 335</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_51_51" id="Footnote_51_51"></a><a href="#FNanchor_51_51"><span class="label">[51]</span></a> Dr. Hollander, <cite>First Signs of Insanity</cite>, pp. 64-5.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_52_52" id="Footnote_52_52"></a><a href="#FNanchor_52_52"><span class="label">[52]</span></a> Cited by Ireland, <cite>The Blot on the Brain</cite>, p. 39.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_53_53" id="Footnote_53_53"></a><a href="#FNanchor_53_53"><span class="label">[53]</span></a> Allbutt's
+<cite>System of Medicine</cite>, viii. 395.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_54_54" id="Footnote_54_54"></a><a href="#FNanchor_54_54"><span class="label">[54]</span></a> <cite>Physiology of Mind</cite>,
+p. 251. See also Dr. Mercier's <cite>The Nervous System and the
+Mind</cite>, p. 55.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_55_55" id="Footnote_55_55"></a><a href="#FNanchor_55_55"><span class="label">[55]</span></a> <cite>Literary Remains</cite>, p. 83.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_56_56" id="Footnote_56_56"></a><a href="#FNanchor_56_56"><span class="label">[56]</span></a> W. Ellis, <cite>Polynesian Researches</cite>, ii. 235-6.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_57_57" id="Footnote_57_57"></a><a href="#FNanchor_57_57"><span class="label">[57]</span></a> Dr. H. Maudsley has gone fully into the case of Swedenborg
+in an article in the <cite>Journal of Mental Science</cite> for July and October
+1869, since reprinted in his <cite>Body and Mind</cite>.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_58_58" id="Footnote_58_58"></a><a href="#FNanchor_58_58"><span class="label">[58]</span></a> See <cite>Luther</cite>, by H. Grisar, 1913, vol. i. pp. 16-7.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_59_59" id="Footnote_59_59"></a><a href="#FNanchor_59_59"><span class="label">[59]</span></a> For other cases, and a general account of the relations between
+pathologic states and religious delusion, see Lombroso,
+<cite>Man of Genius</cite>, chap. iv. pt. iii.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_60_60" id="Footnote_60_60"></a><a href="#FNanchor_60_60"><span class="label">[60]</span></a> <cite>Varieties of Religious Experience</cite>, pp. 6-7.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_61_61" id="Footnote_61_61"></a><a href="#FNanchor_61_61"><span class="label">[61]</span></a> <cite>The Soul
+of a Christian</cite>, p. 13.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_62_62" id="Footnote_62_62"></a><a href="#FNanchor_62_62"><span class="label">[62]</span></a> See Parish's <cite>Hallucinations and
+Illusions</cite>, pp. 38-9.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_63_63" id="Footnote_63_63"></a><a href="#FNanchor_63_63"><span class="label">[63]</span></a> <cite>Saint Teresa</cite>, by H. Joly, pp. 25, 26, and 58.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_64_64" id="Footnote_64_64"></a><a href="#FNanchor_64_64"><span class="label">[64]</span></a> <cite>Inquiries into Human Faculty</cite>, 1883, p. 68.</p></div>
+</div>
+
+<p><!-- Page 89 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_89" id="Page_89">[89]</a></span></p>
+<h2>CHAPTER <span class="cgap">FOUR</span><br />
+SEX &amp; RELIGION IN PRIMITIVE LIFE</h2>
+
+<p>The connection between sexual
+feeling and religious belief is ancient, intimate, and
+sustained. It has impressed itself on many observers
+who have approached the subject from widely different
+points of view. Some have treated the connection
+as purely accidental, and as having no more than a
+mere historical interest. Others have used it as illustrating
+the way in which so sacred a subject as religion
+may suffer degradation in degenerate hands.
+Others of a more scientific temper have dealt with the
+relations between sexualism and religion as illustrations
+of a mere perversion. A deal may be said in
+favour of this last point of view. We know, as a matter
+of fact, that such cases of perversion do exist, in what
+form and to what extent will be discussed later. We
+are also aware that strong feeling which cannot find
+vent in one direction will secure expression in another.
+The annals of Roman Catholicism contain accounts
+of numerous persons who have sought refuge
+in a monastery or a nunnery as the result of disappointment
+in love, and it would be foolish to conclude
+that strong amorous feelings are annihilated because
+there is a change in the object to which they are directed.
+Paul was not a different man from the Saul of
+pre-conversion days, but the same person with his
+energies directed into a new channel. Protestantism
+is without the obvious outlets for unsatisfied sexual
+feeling such as is provided by Roman Catholicism,
+but it provides other outlets. Religious service as a
+whole remains, and intense religious devotion may
+very often owe its origin to sources undreamt of by
+the devotee.</p>
+
+<p><!-- Page 90 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_90" id="Page_90">[90]</a></span>
+Between religious beliefs and sexual feelings the
+connection is, however, wider and deeper, than the
+relation expressed by mere perversion. Neither is the
+relation one of mere accident. An examination of the
+facts in the light of adequate scientific knowledge,
+combined with a due perception of primitive human
+psychology and sociology, have shown that the two
+things are united at their source. One eminent medical
+writer asserts that "in a certain sense, the history
+of religion can be regarded as a peculiar mode of manifestation
+of the human sexual instinct."<a name="FNanchor_65_65" id="FNanchor_65_65"></a><a href="#Footnote_65_65" class="fnanchor">[65]</a> Another
+writer substantially endorses this by the remark that
+"in a certain sense the religious life is an irradiation
+of the reproductive instinct."<a name="FNanchor_66_66" id="FNanchor_66_66"></a><a href="#Footnote_66_66" class="fnanchor">[66]</a> How easily one glides
+into the other very little observation of life or study
+of history will show. The language of devotion and of
+amatory passion is often identical, and seems to serve
+equally well for either purpose. The significance of
+this fact is often obscured by our having etherealised
+the conception of love, and so losing sight of its physiological
+basis. And, having hidden it from sight,
+we, not unnaturally, fail to give it due consideration.
+This is, in its way, a fatal blunder. The sex life of man
+and woman is too large a fact and too pervasive a force
+to be ignored with safety. Ignorance combined with
+prudery conspires to perpetuate what ignorance alone
+began; and the sex life, in both its normal and abnormal
+manifestations, has been perpetually exploited
+in the interests of supernaturalism.</p>
+
+<p>The evidence that may be adduced in favour of
+what has been said is vast, and covers a wide range.<!-- Page 91 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_91" id="Page_91">[91]</a></span>
+Historically it covers such facts as the relations between
+primitive religious beliefs and the sexual life,
+and the multiplication of sects of a markedly erotic
+character during periods of religious enthusiasm.
+"Even the most casual students of religion," says Professor
+G. B. Cutten, "must have observed an apparently intimate
+connection between religious and sexual
+emotions, and not a few have read with amazement
+the abnormal cults which have had the sexual
+element as a foundation for their denominational dissent."<a name="FNanchor_67_67" id="FNanchor_67_67"></a><a href="#Footnote_67_67" class="fnanchor">[67]</a>
+A phenomenon so striking as to force itself on
+the notice of the most 'casual students' raises the presumption
+that the relation between the two sets of
+facts is rather more than that of 'apparent' intimacy.
+When in the course of history two things appear together
+over and over again, one is surely justified in
+assuming that there is some underlying principle responsible
+for the association. The search for this principle
+leads to the next class of evidence&mdash;the psychological.
+In this we are concerned with the relation
+between the sexual feelings and the religious idea, an
+association not always expressed through the comparatively
+harmless medium of language. And, finally,
+we have the evidence derived from pathology,
+where we are able to discern a perverted sexuality
+masquerading as religious fervour.</p>
+
+<p>In a previous chapter there has been pointed out
+the kind of mental environment in which primitive
+man moves. As one of the earliest forms of systematised
+thinking, religion dominates all other forms of
+mental activity. In savage culture there is hardly a
+single event into which religious considerations do<!-- Page 92 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_92" id="Page_92">[92]</a></span>
+not enter. The savage does not merely believe in a
+supernatural world, he lives in it; it is as real to him as
+anything around him, and far more potent in its action.
+Above all, it is important to bear in mind that although
+one is compelled to speak of the natural and the
+supernatural when dealing with early beliefs, no such
+separation is present to the primitive intelligence.
+The division between the natural and the supernatural
+in the external world is the reflection of a corresponding
+division in the world of thought, and this
+arises only at a subsequent stage. What is afterwards
+recognised as the supernatural pervades everything.
+In a sense it is everything, since most of what occurs
+is by the agency or connivance of animistic
+forces.</p>
+
+<p>In such a world, where even the ordinary events of
+life have a supernatural significance, the strange and
+sometimes terrifying phenomena of sexual life carry
+peculiarly strong evidences of supernatural activity.
+Events which are to the modern mind the most obvious
+consequences of sex life are to the primitive
+mind proofs of supernatural or ghostly agency. Nothing,
+for example, would appear less open to misconception
+than the connection between sexual relations
+and the birth of children. Yet, on this head, Mr. Sidney
+Hartland has produced a mass of evidence, gathered
+from all parts of the world, and leading to the
+conclusion that in the most primitive stages of human
+culture, conception and birth are ascribed to direct
+supernatural influence. Setting out from a study of the
+world-wide vogue of the belief in supernatural birth&mdash;contained
+in the author's earlier work, <cite>The Legend of
+Perseus</cite>&mdash;Mr. Hartland finds in this a survival of a<!-- Page 93 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_93" id="Page_93">[93]</a></span>
+culture stage in which all birth is believed to be supernatural.
+Survivals of this belief that birth is a phenomenon
+independent of the union of the sexes are found
+in the existence of numerous semi-magical devices to
+obtain children, still practised in many parts of Europe,
+and which were practised on a much more extensive
+scale during the medieval period; in the ignorance
+of man concerning physiological functions in
+general, the existence of Motherright which appears
+to have universally antedated Fatherright&mdash;the origin
+of which he traces to economic causes, and to the animistic
+nature of primitive beliefs in general.<a name="FNanchor_68_68" id="FNanchor_68_68"></a><a href="#Footnote_68_68" class="fnanchor">[68]</a></p>
+
+<p>Such a conclusion is not without verification from
+the beliefs of existing savages. The Bahau of Central
+Borneo have no notion of the real duration of pregnancy,
+and date its commencement only from the
+time of its becoming visible. The Niol-Niol of Dampier
+Land in North-Western Australia hold birth to
+be independent of sexual intercourse. It is engendered
+by a pre-existing spirit through the agency of a
+medicine man. The North Queenslanders have a similar
+belief. They believe a child to be sent in answer to
+the husband's prayer as a punishment to his wife
+when he is vexed with her. On the Proserpine River
+the Blacks believe that a child is the gift of a supernatural
+being called Kunya. In South Queensland
+the Euahlayi believe that spirits congregate at certain
+spots and pounce on passing women, and so are born.
+On the Slave Coast of West Africa the Awunas say
+that a child derives the lower jaw from the mother; all
+the rest comes from the spirits. Among these people
+and others that might be named paternity exists in<!-- Page 94 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_94" id="Page_94">[94]</a></span>
+name, but it implies something entirely different to
+what it afterwards connotes. Mr. Hartland gives numerous
+instances of this curious fact, and points out that
+"the attention of mankind would not be early or easily
+fastened upon the procreative process. It is lengthy,
+extending over months during which the observer's
+attention would be inevitably diverted by a variety
+of objects, most of them of far more pressing import....
+The sexual passion would be gratified instinctively
+without any thought of the consequences, and
+in an overwhelming proportion of cases without the
+consequence of pregnancy at all. When that consequence
+occurred it would not be visible for weeks or
+months after the act which produced it. A hundred
+other events might have taken place in the interval
+which would be likely to be credited with the result
+by one wholly ignorant of natural laws."</p>
+
+<p>There seems, therefore, fair grounds for Mr. Hartland's
+conclusion that:&mdash;</p>
+
+<p>"for generations and æons the truth that a child is only
+born in consequence of an act of sexual union, that the
+birth of a child is the natural consequence of such an
+act performed in favouring circumstances, and that
+every child must be the result of such an act and of no
+other cause, was not realised by mankind, that down
+to the present day it is imperfectly realised by some
+peoples, and that there are still others among whom
+it is unknown."</p>
+
+<p>This, however, is but one of the ways in which supernatural
+beliefs become associated with sexual phenomena.
+In truth, there is not a stage of any importance
+in the sexual life of men and women where the same
+association does not transpire. There is, for example,<!-- Page 95 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_95" id="Page_95">[95]</a></span>
+the important phenomenon of puberty&mdash;important
+from both a physiological and sociological point of
+view. Pubic ceremonies of some kind are found all
+over the world, and in all forms, from those current
+amongst savages up to the contemporary practice of
+confirmation in the Christian Church. At all stages
+the period of puberty is the time of initiation. With
+uncivilised peoples a very general rule is the separation
+of the sexes, with fasting. Mr. Stanley Hall in his elaborate
+work on <cite>Adolescence</cite> has dealt very exhaustively
+with these customs, with which we shall be more
+closely concerned when we come to deal with the subject
+of conversion. At present it is only necessary to
+point out that the governing idea is that at puberty
+the boy and the girl are brought into special relationship
+with the tribal spirits, the proof of which relationship
+lies in the sexual functions originated.</p>
+
+<p>With boys, once puberty is attained, the sexual development
+is orderly and unobtrusive. In the case of
+girls certain recurring phenomena make the essential
+fact of sex much more impressive to the primitive
+mind, with far-reaching sociological consequences.
+"Ignorance of the nature of female periodicity," says
+A. E. Crawley, "leads man to consider it as the flow of
+blood from a wound, naturally, or more usually, supernaturally
+produced."<a name="FNanchor_69_69" id="FNanchor_69_69"></a><a href="#Footnote_69_69" class="fnanchor">[69]</a> In Siam an evil spirit is believed
+to be the cause of the wound. Amongst the
+Chiriguanas the girl fasts, while women beat the floor
+with sticks in order to drive away "the snake that has
+wounded the girl." Similar beliefs are found very
+generally among people in a low stage of culture, and
+customs and beliefs still surviving among people more<!-- Page 96 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_96" id="Page_96">[96]</a></span>
+advanced point to the conclusion that convictions of
+the same kind were once fairly universal. It is this
+function, combined with the function of childbirth,
+that brings woman into close contact with the supernatural
+world, makes her an object of fear and wonder
+to primitive man, accounts for a number of the customs
+and beliefs associated with her, and finally helps to
+determine her social position. It is because her periodicity
+is taken as evidence of her communion with
+spiritual forces that special precautions have to be
+taken concerning her. She becomes spiritually contagious.
+Thus, the natives of New Britain, while engaged
+in making fish-traps, carefully avoid all women.
+They believe that if a woman were even to touch a fish-trap,
+it would catch nothing. Amongst the Maoris, if
+a man touched a menstruous woman, he would be taboo
+'an inch thick.' An Australian black fellow, who
+discovered that his wife had lain on his blanket at her
+menstrual period, killed her, and died of terror himself
+within a fortnight. In Uganda the pots which a woman
+touches while the impurity of childbirth or menstruation
+is on her, are destroyed. With many North American
+Indians the use of weapons touched by women
+during these times would bring misfortune. A menstruating
+woman is with them the object they dread
+most. In Tahiti women are secluded. In some cases
+she is too dangerous to be even touched by others, and
+food is given her at the end of a stick. With the Pueblo
+Indians contact with a woman at these times exposes
+a man to attacks from an evil spirit, and he may pass
+on the infection to others.<a name="FNanchor_70_70" id="FNanchor_70_70"></a><a href="#Footnote_70_70" class="fnanchor">[70]</a></p>
+
+<p><!-- Page 97 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_97" id="Page_97">[97]</a></span>
+It is needless to multiply instances; the same general
+reason governs all, and this has been clearly expressed
+by Dr. Frazer:&mdash;</p>
+
+<p>"The object of secluding women at menstruation is
+to neutralise the dangerous influence which is supposed
+to emanate from them at such times. The general
+effect of these rules is to keep the women suspended,
+so to say, between heaven and earth. Whether
+enveloped in her hammock and slung up to the roof,
+as in South America, or elevated above the ground in
+a dark and narrow cage, as in New Zealand, she may
+be considered to be out of the way of doing mischief,
+since being shut off both from the earth and from the
+sun, she can poison neither of these great sources of life
+by her deadly contagion. The precautions thus taken
+to isolate and insulate the girl are dictated by regard
+for her own safety as well as for the safety of others....
+In short, the girl is viewed as charged with a powerful
+force which, if not kept within bounds, may prove the
+destruction both of the girl herself and all with whom
+she comes in contact. To repress this force within the
+limits necessary for the safety of all concerned is the
+object of the taboos in question."</p>
+
+<p>The savage is far too logical in his methods to allow
+such an idea to end here. If a woman is so highly
+charged with spiritual infection as to be dangerous at
+certain frequently recurring periods, she may be more
+or less dangerous between these periods. As Havelock
+Ellis says: "Instead of being regarded as a being who
+at periodic intervals becomes the victim of a spell of
+impurity, the conception of impurity becomes amalgamated
+with the conception of woman; she is, as
+Tertullian puts it, <i>Janua diaboli</i>; and this is the attitude<!-- Page 98 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_98" id="Page_98">[98]</a></span>
+which still persisted in medieval days."<a name="FNanchor_71_71" id="FNanchor_71_71"></a><a href="#Footnote_71_71" class="fnanchor">[71]</a> This is
+to be expected from what one knows of the workings
+of the primitive intelligence, but it is surprising to find
+Mr. Ellis continue by saying, on apparently good
+grounds, that "the belief in the periodically recurring
+impurity of women has by no means died out to-day.
+Among a very large section of the women of the middle
+and lower classes of England and other countries
+it is firmly believed that the touch of a menstruating
+woman will contaminate; only a few years since, in
+the course of a correspondence on this subject in the
+<cite>British Medical Journal</cite> (1878), even medical men
+were found to state from personal observation that
+they had no doubt whatever on this point. Thus, one
+doctor, who expressed surprise that any doubt could
+be thrown on the point, wrote, after quoting cases of
+spoiled hams, etc., presumed to be due to this cause,
+which had come under his own personal observation:
+'For two thousand years the Italians have had this
+idea of menstruating women. We English hold to it,
+the Americans have it, also the Australians. Now, I
+should like to know the country where the evidence
+of any such observation is unknown.'" Evidently
+animism is a more persistent frame of mind than
+most people are inclined to believe.</p>
+
+<p>It is certain, however, that this conception of woman's
+nature is dominant in the lower stages of culture.
+She is spiritually dangerous, and the principle of 'taboo'
+is made to cover a great many of her relations to
+man. In Tahiti a woman was not allowed to touch the
+weapons or fishing implements of men. Amongst the
+Todas women are not permitted to touch the cattle. If<!-- Page 99 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_99" id="Page_99">[99]</a></span>
+a wife touches the food of her husband, among the
+Hindus, the food is unfit to be eaten. An Eskimo
+wife dare not eat with her husband. In New Zealand
+wives were not allowed to eat with the males lest their
+taboo should kill them. Many tribes are careful to refrain
+from contact with women before going to fight.
+They believe that this would rob them and their weapons
+of strength. Other practices followed by savages
+before going to war forbid one assuming that this abstention
+is due to any rational fear of dissipating their
+energies. Instead of conserving their strength they
+weaken themselves by the many privations they undergo
+before fighting, in order to ensure victory. Professor
+Frazer well says:&mdash;</p>
+
+<p>"When we observe what pains these misguided
+savages took to unfit themselves for the business of
+war by abstaining from food, denying themselves
+rest, and lacerating their bodies, we shall probably
+not be disposed to attribute their practice of continence
+in war to a rational fear of dissipating their
+bodily energies by indulgence in the lusts of the
+flesh."<a name="FNanchor_72_72" id="FNanchor_72_72"></a><a href="#Footnote_72_72" class="fnanchor">[72]</a></p>
+
+<p>The conception of woman as one heavily charged
+with supernatural potentialities, and, therefore, a
+source of danger to the community, seems to lie at the
+basis of the widespread belief in the religious 'uncleanness'
+of women. The real significance of the
+word 'unclean' in religious ritual has been obscured
+by our modern use of it in a hygienic or ethical sense.
+In reality it is but an illustration of the principle of
+'taboo,' and 'taboo' may extend to anything, good
+or bad, useful or useless, hygienically clean or unclean.<!-- Page 100 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_100" id="Page_100">[100]</a></span>
+The primary meaning of 'taboo,' a Polynesian word,
+is something that is set aside or forbidden. The field
+covered by this word among savage and semi-savage
+races is, as Robertson Smith points out, "very wide,
+for there is no part of life in which the savage does not
+feel himself surrounded by mysterious agencies and
+recognise the need of walking warily."<a name="FNanchor_73_73" id="FNanchor_73_73"></a><a href="#Footnote_73_73" class="fnanchor">[73]</a> Anything
+may thus become the object of a 'taboo.' Weapons,
+food, animals, places, special relations of one person
+to another at certain times and under certain conditions.
+It is enough that some special or particular degree
+of supernatural influence is associated with the
+object in question. The ancient Jews, for example, in
+prohibiting the eating of swine's flesh, were as far as
+possible removed in their thought from any connection
+with dietetics. They were simply following the well-known
+savage custom that the totem of a tribe is
+sacred. The pig was a totem with many of the Semitic
+tribes, and must not, therefore, be eaten.<a name="FNanchor_74_74" id="FNanchor_74_74"></a><a href="#Footnote_74_74" class="fnanchor">[74]</a> It was not
+an unclean animal, in the modern sense, it was a 'holy'
+animal. With the Syrians the dove was so holy that
+even to touch it made a man 'unclean' for a whole day.
+No North American Indian will eat of the flesh of an
+animal that is a tribal totem, except under grave
+necessity, and even then with elaborate religious ceremonies.
+So, "a prohibition to eat the flesh of an animal
+of a certain species, that has its ground not in natural
+loathing but in religious horror and reverence, implies
+that something divine is ascribed to every animal of the<!-- Page 101 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_101" id="Page_101">[101]</a></span>
+species. And what seems to us to be a natural loathing often
+turns out, in the case of primitive peoples, to
+be based on a religious <em>taboo</em>, and to have its origin not
+in feelings of contemptuous disgust, but of reverential
+dread."<a name="FNanchor_75_75" id="FNanchor_75_75"></a><a href="#Footnote_75_75" class="fnanchor">[75]</a></p>
+
+<p>The real significance of 'unclean' in connection
+with religious ritual is 'holy', something that partakes
+in a special manner of supernatural influence and
+therefore involves a certain danger in contact. As the
+writer just cited observes:&mdash;</p>
+
+<p>"The acts that cause uncleanness are exactly the
+same which among savage nations place a man under
+taboo.... These acts are often involuntary, and often
+innocent, or even necessary to society. The savage,
+accordingly, imposes a taboo on a woman in childbed,
+or during her courses ... simply because birth and
+everything connected with the propagation of the
+species on the one, and disease and death on the other
+hand, seem to involve the action of supernatural agencies
+of a dangerous kind. If he attempts to explain,
+he does so by supposing that on these occasions spirits
+of deadly power are present; at all events the persons
+involved seem to him to be sources of mysterious danger,
+which has all the characters of an infection, and
+may extend to other people unless due precautions
+are observed.... It has nothing to do with respect
+for the gods, but springs from mere terror of the supernatural
+influences associated with the woman's physical
+condition."<a name="FNanchor_76_76" id="FNanchor_76_76"></a><a href="#Footnote_76_76" class="fnanchor">[76]</a></p>
+
+<p><!-- Page 102 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_102" id="Page_102">[102]</a></span>
+It is interesting to observe the manner in which this
+notion of the sacramentally 'unclean' nature of woman
+has affected her religious status, and by inference,
+her social status likewise. Among the Australians
+women are shut out from any part in the religious
+ceremonies. In the Sandwich Isles a woman's
+touch made a sacrifice unclean. If a Hindu woman
+touches a sacred image the divinity is destroyed. In
+Fiji women are excluded from the temples. The Papuans
+have the same custom. The Ainus of Japan allow
+a woman to prepare the sacrifice, but not to offer
+it. Women are excluded from many Mohammedan
+mosques. Among the Jews women have no part in
+the religious ceremonies. In the Christian Church
+women were excluded from the priestly office. A
+Council held at Auxerre at the end of the sixth century
+forbade women touching the Eucharist with their bare
+hands, and in various churches they were forbidden
+to approach the altar during Mass.<a name="FNanchor_77_77" id="FNanchor_77_77"></a><a href="#Footnote_77_77" class="fnanchor">[77]</a> In the gospels
+Jesus forbids the woman to touch Him, after the resurrection,
+although Thomas was allowed to feel His
+wounds. "The Church of the Middle Ages did not
+hesitate to provide itself with eunuchs in order to
+supply cathedral choirs with the soprano tones inhering
+by nature in women alone."<a name="FNanchor_78_78" id="FNanchor_78_78"></a><a href="#Footnote_78_78" class="fnanchor">[78]</a> The 'Churching' of
+women still in vogue has its origin in the same superstition
+that childbirth endows woman with a supernatural
+influence which must be removed in the interests
+of others. This ceremony was formerly called
+"The Order of the Purification of Women," and was
+read at the church door before the woman entered the<!-- Page 103 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_103" id="Page_103">[103]</a></span>
+building. Its connection with the ideas indicated
+above is obvious. The Tahitian practice of excluding
+women from intercourse with others for two or three
+weeks after childbirth, with similar practices amongst
+uncivilised peoples all over the world, led with various
+modifications up to the current practice of churching.
+They show that in the opinion of primitive
+peoples "a woman at and after childbirth is pervaded
+by a certain dangerous influence which can infect anything
+and anybody she touches; so that in the interests
+of the community it becomes necessary to
+seclude her from society for a while, until the virulence
+of the infection has passed away, when, after submitting
+to certain rites of purification, she is again free to
+mingle with her fellows."<a name="FNanchor_79_79" id="FNanchor_79_79"></a><a href="#Footnote_79_79" class="fnanchor">[79]</a> The gradual change of
+this ceremony, from a getting rid of a dangerous supernatural
+infection to returning thanks for a natural
+danger passed, is on all fours with what takes place in
+other directions in relation to religious ideas and
+practices.</p>
+
+<p>The important part played by this conception of
+woman's nature may be traced in the fierce invective
+directed against her in the early Christian writings.
+Of course, by that time society had reached a stage
+when the primitive form of this belief had been outgrown,
+but ideas and attitudes of mind persist long
+after their originating conditions have disappeared.
+In this particular case we have the primitive idea expressed
+in a form suitable to altered circumstances, and
+the primitive feeling seeking new warranty in ethical or
+social considerations. But in the main the old notion
+is there. Woman is a creature threatening danger<!-- Page 104 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_104" id="Page_104">[104]</a></span>
+to man's spiritual welfare.<a name="FNanchor_80_80" id="FNanchor_80_80"></a><a href="#Footnote_80_80" class="fnanchor">[80]</a> In this connection we may
+note an observation of Westermarck's during his residence
+among the country people of Morocco. He
+was struck, he says, with the superstitious fear the
+men had of women. They are supposed to be much
+better versed in magic, and therefore one ran greater
+danger in offending them. The curses of women are,
+generally, much more feared than those of men. To
+this we have a parallel in Christianity which so often
+revived and strengthened the lower religious beliefs.
+During the witch mania an overwhelming proportion
+of those charged with and executed for sorcery were
+women. As a matter of fact, women were more prone
+than men to credit themselves with possessing supernatural
+power. But the theological explanation was
+that the devil had more power over women than men.
+This was, obviously, a heritage from the primitive belief
+above described.<a name="FNanchor_81_81" id="FNanchor_81_81"></a><a href="#Footnote_81_81" class="fnanchor">[81]</a></p>
+
+<p>Another way in which religion becomes closely
+associated with sexualism is through the widely diffused
+phallic worship. The worship of the generative
+power in the form of stones, pillars, and carved representations
+of the male and female sexual organs plays
+an unquestionably important part in the history of
+religion, however hardly pressed it may have been by
+some enthusiastic theorisers. "The farther back we
+go," says Mr. Hargrave Jennings, "in the history of
+every country, the deeper we explore into all religions,<!-- Page 105 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_105" id="Page_105">[105]</a></span>
+ancient as well as modern, we stumble the more frequently
+upon the incessantly intensifying distinct
+traces of this supposedly indecent mystic worship."<a name="FNanchor_82_82" id="FNanchor_82_82"></a><a href="#Footnote_82_82" class="fnanchor">[82]</a>
+On the lower Congo, says Sir H. H. Johnston:&mdash;</p>
+
+<p>"Phallic worship in various forms prevails. It is not
+associated with any rites that might be called particularly
+obscene; and on the coast, where manners and
+morals are particularly corrupt, the phallus cult is no
+longer met with. In the forests between Manyanga
+and Stanley Pool it is not rare to come upon a little
+rustic temple, made of palm fronds and poles, within
+which male and female figures, nearly or quite life size,
+may be seen, with disproportionate genital organs,
+the figures being intended to represent the male and
+female principle. Around these carved and painted
+statues are many offerings, plates, knives, and cloth,
+and frequently also the phallic symbol may be seen
+dangling from the rafters. There is not the slightest
+suspicion of obscenity in all this, and anyone qualifying
+this worship of the generative power as obscene
+does so hastily and ignorantly. It is a solemn mystery
+to the Congo native, a force but dimly understood,
+and, like all mysterious natural manifestations, it is
+a power that must be propitiated and persuaded to his
+good."<a name="FNanchor_83_83" id="FNanchor_83_83"></a><a href="#Footnote_83_83" class="fnanchor">[83]</a></p>
+
+<p>The Egyptian religion was permeated with phallicism.
+In India phallic worship is widely scattered.
+In Benares, the sacred city, "everywhere, in the temples,
+in the little shrines in the street, the emblem of the
+Creator is phallic." Symbols of the male and female
+sexual organs, the Lingam and the Yoni, have been objects<!-- Page 106 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_106" id="Page_106">[106]</a></span>
+of worship in India from the earliest times. With
+the Sakti ceremonies, Hindu religion dispenses with
+symbols, and devotion is paid to a naked woman selected
+for the occasion.<a name="FNanchor_84_84" id="FNanchor_84_84"></a><a href="#Footnote_84_84" class="fnanchor">[84]</a> This worship of a nude female
+is a very familiar phenomenon in the history of
+religion. Some of the early Christian sects were said
+to have practised it, and it is a feature of some Russian
+religious sects to-day. The subject will be dealt with
+more fully hereafter.</p>
+
+<p>In ancient Rome, in the month of April, "when the
+fertilising powers of nature begin to operate, and its
+powers to be visibly developed, a festival in honour of
+Venus took place; in it the phallus was carried in a
+cart, and led in procession by the Roman ladies to the
+temple of Venus outside the Colline gate, and then
+presented by them to the sexual part of the goddess."<a name="FNanchor_85_85" id="FNanchor_85_85"></a><a href="#Footnote_85_85" class="fnanchor">[85]</a>
+In the Greek Bacchic religious processions
+huge phalli were carried in a chariot drawn by bulls,
+and surrounded by women and girls singing songs of
+praise. Phallic worship was also associated with the
+cults of Dionysos and Eleusis. It is met with among
+the ancient Mexicans and Peruvians, and also among
+the North American tribes. The famous Black Stone
+of Mecca, to which religious honours are paid, is also
+said by authorities to be a phallic symbol. The stone
+set up by Jacob (Gen. xxviii. 18-9) falls into the same
+category. References to phallic worship may be found
+in many parts of the Bible, and authoritative writers
+like Mr. Hargrave Jennings and Major-General Forlong
+have not hesitated to assert that the god of the<!-- Page 107 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_107" id="Page_107">[107]</a></span>
+Jewish Ark was a sexual symbol. Seeing the extent
+to which phallic worship exists in other religions, it
+would be surprising did this not also exist in the early
+Jewish religion.</p>
+
+<p>In Christendom we have evidence of the perpetuation
+of the phallic cult in the decree of Mans, 1247,
+and of the Synod of Tours, 1396, against its practice.
+Quite unsuccessfully, however. Indeed, the architecture
+of medieval churches bear in their ornamentation
+numerous evidences of the failure at suppression.
+Of course, much of this ornamentation may have been
+due to mere imitation, but often enough it was deliberate.
+"The scholar," says Bonwick, "who gazed
+to-day at the roof of Temple Church, London, had the
+illustration before him. A symbol there, repeatedly
+displayed, is the popular Hindu one to express sex
+worship."<a name="FNanchor_86_86" id="FNanchor_86_86"></a><a href="#Footnote_86_86" class="fnanchor">[86]</a> The belief found expression in other ways
+than ornamentation. When Sir William Hamilton
+visited Naples in 1781 he found in Isernia a Christian
+custom in vogue which he described in a letter to Sir
+William Banks, and which admitted of no doubt as
+to its Priapic character. Every September was celebrated
+a festival in the Church of SS. Cosmus and Damianus.
+During the progress of the festival vendors
+paraded the streets offering small waxen phalli, which
+were bought by the devout and placed in the church,
+much as candles are still purchased and given. At the
+same time, prayers are offered to St. Como by those
+who desire children. In Midlothian, in 1268, the clergy
+instructed their flock to sprinkle water with a dog's
+phallus in order to avert a murrain. The same practice
+existed in Inverkeithing, and in Easter week<!-- Page 108 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_108" id="Page_108">[108]</a></span>
+priest and people danced round a wooden phallus.<a name="FNanchor_87_87" id="FNanchor_87_87"></a><a href="#Footnote_87_87" class="fnanchor">[87]</a>
+Mr. Westropp, quoting an eighteenth-century writer,<a name="FNanchor_88_88" id="FNanchor_88_88"></a><a href="#Footnote_88_88" class="fnanchor">[88]</a>
+says: "When the Huguenots took Embrun, they found
+among the relics of the principal church a Priapus, of
+three pieces in the ancient fashion, the top of which
+was worn away from being constantly washed with
+wine." The temple of St. Eutropius, destroyed by the
+Huguenots, is said to have contained a similar figure.
+From Mr. Sidney Hartland's collection of practices
+for obtaining children I take the following:&mdash;</p>
+
+<p>"At Bourg-Dieu, in the diocese of Bourges, a similar
+saint" (similar to the priapean figure previously described)
+"was called Guerlichon or Greluchon. There
+after nine days' devotions women stretched themselves
+on the horizontal figure of the saint, and then
+scraped the phallus for mixture in water as a drink.
+Other saints were worshipped elsewhere in France
+with equivalent rites. Down to the Revolution there
+stood at Brest a chapel of Saint Guignolet containing
+a priapean statue of the holy man. Women who were,
+or feared to be, sterile used to go and scrape a little of
+the prominent member, which they put into a glass
+of water from the well and drank. The same practice
+was followed at the Chapel of Saint Pierre-à-Croquettes
+in Brabant until 1837, when the archæologist
+Schayes called attention to it, and thereupon the ecclesiastical
+authorities removed the cause of scandal.
+Women have, however, still continued to make votive
+offerings of pins down almost, if not quite, to the
+present day. At Antwerp stood at the gateway to the
+Church of Saint Walburga in the Rue des Pêcheurs a<!-- Page 109 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_109" id="Page_109">[109]</a></span>
+statue, the sexual organ of which had been entirely
+scraped away by women for the same purpose."<a name="FNanchor_89_89" id="FNanchor_89_89"></a><a href="#Footnote_89_89" class="fnanchor">[89]</a></p>
+
+<p>From what has been said, it will not be difficult to
+understand the existence of the custom of religious
+prostitution. Considering the sexual impulse as specially
+connected with a supernatural force, man pays it
+religious honour, and comes to identify its manifestations
+as an expression of the supernatural and also as
+an act of worship towards it. In India the practice
+existed, when most temples had their 'bayadères.'
+In ancient Chaldea every woman was compelled to
+prostitute herself once in her life in the temple of the
+goddess Mylitta&mdash;the Chaldean Venus. This custom
+existed elsewhere, and by it the woman was compelled
+to remain within the temple enclosures until some man
+chose her, from whom she received a piece of money.
+The money, of course, belonged to the temple.<a name="FNanchor_90_90" id="FNanchor_90_90"></a><a href="#Footnote_90_90" class="fnanchor">[90]</a> In
+Greece, Carthage, Syria, etc., we find the same custom.
+Among the Jews, so orthodox a commentary as
+Smith's <cite>Bible Dictionary</cite> admits that the 'Kadechim'
+attached to the temple were prostitutes. The frequent
+references to the service of the 'groves' surrounding
+the temple irresistibly suggest their likeness to the
+groves around the temples of Mylitta, and their use
+for the same purpose.</p>
+
+<p><!-- Page 110 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_110" id="Page_110">[110]</a></span>
+There is no necessity to prolong the subject,<a name="FNanchor_91_91" id="FNanchor_91_91"></a><a href="#Footnote_91_91" class="fnanchor">[91]</a> nor
+is it necessary to my purpose to discuss the origin of
+phallic worship. It is enough to have shown the manner
+in which, from the very earliest times, religious
+belief and sexual phenomena have been connected in
+the closest possible manner. In this respect it is only
+on all fours with the relation of religion to phenomena
+in general, but here the attitude of mind is accentuated
+and prolonged by the startling facts of
+sexual development. The connection becomes consequently
+so close it is not surprising to find that the
+association has persisted down to the present time,
+and moods that have their origin in the sexual life
+are frequently attributed to religious influences. The
+primitive intelligence, frankly seeing in the phenomena
+of sex a manifestation of the supernatural, sees
+here a continuous endorsement of religious life. The
+more sophisticated mind raised above this point of
+view continues, with modifications, the primitive practices,
+and in ignorance of the physiological causes of its
+own states is only too ready to interpret ebullitions
+of sex feeling as evidence of the divine.</p>
+
+<div class="note">
+<h3><a name="NOTE_TO_PAGE_104" id="NOTE_TO_PAGE_104"></a>NOTE TO <a href="#Page_104">PAGE 104</a>.</h3>
+
+<p>It is strange that so little attention has been paid to these primitive
+beliefs as important factors in determining the social
+position of women. It is too generally assumed that because
+woman is physically weaker than man it is her weakness that<!-- Page 111 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_111" id="Page_111">[111]</a></span>
+has determined her subordination. Both the advocates and the
+opponents of 'Woman's Rights' appear to have reached a common
+agreement on this point. During some of the debates in
+the House of Commons, for example, it was openly stated by
+prominent politicians, as an axiom of political philosophy, that
+all laws rest upon a basis of force, and if men say they will not
+obey woman-made laws there is no power that can compel them
+to do so. On the other side, women, while appealing to what they
+properly call higher considerations, themselves dwell upon the
+physical weakness of woman as the reason for her subordination
+in the past. Both parties are helped in their arguments by
+the facile division of social history into two periods, an earlier
+one in which club law plays the chief part, and a later period
+when mental and moral qualities assume a dominating position.
+The consequence is, runs the argument, that each sex has to
+battle with the dead weight of tradition and custom. The woman
+is oppressed by the tradition of subordination to the male;
+the man is inspired by that of dominance over the female.</p>
+
+<p>It is when we ask for evidence of this that we see how flimsy
+the case is. Social phenomena in either civilised or uncivilised
+society furnishes no proof that institutions and customs rest upon
+a basis of physical force. The rulership of a tribe often rests
+with the old men of a tribe; with some tribes the women are consulted,
+and invariably custom and tradition plays a powerful
+part. The notion that the primitive chief is the primitive strong
+man of the tribe is as baseless as the belief in an original social
+contract, and owes its existence to the same kind of fanciful
+speculation. As Frazer says, "it is one of those facile theories
+which the arm-chair philosopher concocts with his feet on the
+fender without taking the trouble to consult the facts." The
+primitive chief may be a strong man. The tribal council or chief
+may use force or rely upon physical force to enforce certain decrees,
+just as the modern king or parliament may call on the
+help of policeman or soldier, but this no more proves that their
+rule is based upon force than Mr. Asquith's premiership proves
+his physical superiority to the rest of the Cabinet.</p></div>
+
+<p>All political life, and to a smaller degree all social
+life, involves the direction of force, but neither appeal<!-- Page 112 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_112" id="Page_112">[112]</a></span>
+to force for an ultimate justification, nor do social
+institutions originate in an act of force. It is one of
+the commonplaces of historical study that when an
+institution is actually forced upon a people it very
+quickly becomes inoperative. Other things equal,
+one group of people may overcome another group
+because of physical superiority, but the conquest over,
+the question as to which group shall really rule, or
+which set of institutions shall survive, is settled on
+quite different grounds. The history of almost any
+country will give examples of the absorption of the
+conqueror by the conquered, and the bringing of imported
+institutions into line with native life and feeling.
+Fundamentally the relations binding people
+together into a society are not physical, but psychological.
+Society rests upon the foundations of a
+common mental life&mdash;upon sympathy, beliefs, the desire
+for companionship, etc. As Professor J. M. Baldwin
+puts it, the fundamental social facts are not <em>things</em>,
+but <em>thoughts</em>.<a name="FNanchor_92_92" id="FNanchor_92_92"></a><a href="#Footnote_92_92" class="fnanchor">[92]</a> As a member of a social group man is
+born into an environment that is essentially psychological,
+and his attitude not only towards his fellow
+human beings, but towards nature in general, is determined
+by the psychological contents of the society to
+which he belongs.</p>
+
+<p>Now if the relation of one man to another is not determined
+by physical superiority and inferiority, if the
+relations of classes within a society are not determined
+in this manner, why should it be assumed that as a sex
+woman's position is fixed by this means? It seems
+more reasonable to assume that some other principle<!-- Page 113 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_113" id="Page_113">[113]</a></span>
+than that of club law, a principle set in operation very
+early in the history of civilisation, fixed the main lines
+upon which the relations of the sexes were to develop,
+however much other forces helped its operation. I believe
+this desired factor is to be found in the superstitious
+notions savages develop concerning the nature
+and function of woman, and which society only very
+slowly outgrows. For, as Frazer says: "The continuity
+of human development has been such that most,
+if not all, of the great institutions which still form the
+framework of a civilised society have their roots in
+savagery, and have been handed down to us in these
+later days through countless generations, assuming
+new outward forms in the process of transmission,
+but remaining in their inmost core substantially unchanged."</p>
+
+<p>In considering the play of primitive ideas as determining
+the lines of human evolution several things
+must be kept clearly in mind. One is that the course
+of biological development has made woman, as a sex,
+dependent upon man, as a sex, for protection and
+support. This is true quite apart from economic considerations
+or from those arising from the relative
+physical strength of the sexes. The prime function of
+woman, biologically, is that of motherhood. She is,
+so to speak, mother in a much more important and
+more pervasive sense than man is father. In the case
+of woman, her functions are of necessity subordinated
+to this one. With man this is not the case. It is with
+the woman that the nutrition of the child rests before
+birth, and a large portion of her strength is expended
+in the discharge of this function. The same is true for
+some period immediately after birth. Again to use a<!-- Page 114 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_114" id="Page_114">[114]</a></span>
+biological illustration, during the period of child-bearing
+and child-rearing the relation of the man to the
+woman may be likened to that which exists between
+the germ cells and the somatic cells. As the latter is
+the medium of protection and the conveyer of nutrition
+in relation to the former, so it falls to the male to
+protect and in some degree to provide for the woman
+as child-bearer. It would not, of course, be impossible
+for woman to provide for herself, but it would detract
+so considerably from social efficiency that any group
+in which it was done would soon disappear. It is the
+nature and supreme function of woman that makes
+her dependent upon man. And even though the
+dreams of some were realised, and society as a whole
+cared for woman in the discharge of this function, the
+issue would not be changed. It would mean that instead
+of a woman being dependent upon one man she
+would be dependent upon all men. Nor are the substantial
+facts of the situation changed by anyone
+pointing out that all women do not and cannot under
+ordinary circumstances become wives and mothers.
+Human nature will always develop on the lines of the
+normal functions of men and women, and there can be
+no question in this case as to what these are.</p>
+
+<p>I have used the word 'dependence,' but this does
+not, of necessity, involve either subordination or subjection.
+It may provide the condition of either or of
+both, but the dependence of the woman on the man
+is, as I have said, biologically inescapable. Her subjection
+is quite another question. Dependence may
+be mutual. One class of society may be dependent
+upon another class, but the two may move on a perfect
+level of equality. And with uncivilised peoples<!-- Page 115 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_115" id="Page_115">[115]</a></span>
+the evidence goes to prove that, while the spheres of
+the sexes are more clearly differentiated than with us,
+this difference is seldom if ever expressed in terms of
+superior and inferior. Savages would say, as civilised
+people still say, there are many things that it is wrong
+for a woman to do, and they would add there are also
+things that a man must not do. They would be as
+shocked at woman doing certain things as some people
+among ourselves were when women first began to
+speak at public meetings. Their disapproval would
+not rest on the ground that these things were 'unwomanly',
+nor upon any question of weakness or strength,
+of inferiority or superiority, but for another and, to
+the savage, very urgent reason.</p>
+
+<p>One can very easily exaggerate the extent of the
+subjection of women among uncivilised people. As a
+matter of fact, it usually is exaggerated. Not all travellers
+are capable of accurate observation, and very
+many are led astray by what are really superficial aspects
+of savage life. They are so impressed by the contemplation
+of a state of affairs different from our own
+that they mistake mere lines of demarcation for a
+moral valuation. Many travellers, for example, observing
+that women are strictly forbidden to do this
+or that, conclude that the woman has no rights as
+against the man. As in nearly all these cases the man
+is as strictly forbidden to encroach on the woman's
+sphere, one might as reasonably reverse the statement
+and dwell upon male subjection. As a matter of fact,
+both furnish examples of the all-powerful principle of
+'taboo.' Some things are taboo to the man, others to
+the woman. And the key to the problem lies in the
+nature and origin of these taboos. But taboo does not<!-- Page 116 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_116" id="Page_116">[116]</a></span>
+extinguish rights; it confirms them. Under its operation, far
+from its being the truth that women are without
+status or rights or power, her position and rights
+are clearly marked, generally recognised, and quickly
+enforced. Some examples of this may be noted.</p>
+
+<p>A Kaffir woman when ill-treated possesses the
+right of asylum with her parents, and remains there
+until the husband makes atonement. The same thing
+holds of the West African Fulahs. In the Marquesas
+a woman is prohibited the use of canoes; on the other
+hand, men are prohibited frequenting certain places
+belonging to the women. In Nicaragua no man may
+enter the woman's market-place under penalty of a
+beating. With most of the North-American tribes a
+woman has supreme power inside the lodge. The
+husband possesses no power of interference. In most
+cases the husband cannot give away anything belonging
+to the lodge without first getting the consent of
+his wife. With the Nootkas, women are consulted on
+all matters of business. Livingstone relates his surprise
+on finding that a native would not accompany
+him on a journey because he could not get his wife's
+consent. He found this to be one of the customs of the
+tribe to which the man belonged. Among the Kandhs
+of India nothing public is done without consulting the
+women. In the Pellew Islands the head of the family
+can do nothing of importance without consulting the
+oldest female relative. Among the Hottentots women
+have supreme rule in the house. If a man oversteps
+the line, his female relatives inflict a fine, which is paid
+to the wife. With the Bechuanas the mother of the
+chief is present at all councils, and he can hardly decide
+anything without her consent. These are only a<!-- Page 117 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_117" id="Page_117">[117]</a></span>
+few of the cases that might be cited, but they are sufficient
+to show that the common view of women among
+savages as without recognised status, or power, needs
+very serious qualification. Of course, ill-treatment of
+women does occur with uncivilised as with civilised
+people, and she may suffer from the expression of
+brutal passion or superior strength, but an examination
+of the facts justifies Starcke's opinion that "we
+are not justified in assuming that the savage feels a
+contempt for women in virtue of her sex."</p>
+
+<p>In primitive life, in short, the dominant idea is not
+that of superiority in relation to woman, but that of
+difference. She is different from man, and this difference
+involves consequences of the gravest character,
+and against which due precautions must be taken.
+Superiority and inferiority are much later conceptions;
+they belong to a comparatively civilised period,
+and their development offers an admirable example
+of the way in which customs based on sheer superstitions
+become transformed into a social prejudice,
+with the consequent creation of numerous excuses
+for their perpetuation. What that initial prejudice is&mdash;a
+prejudice so powerful that it largely determines
+the future status of woman&mdash;has already been pointed
+out. Her place in society is marked out in uncivilised
+times by the powerful superstitions connected with
+sexual functions. Not that she is weaker&mdash;although
+that is, of course, plain&mdash;nor that she is inferior, a
+thought which scarcely exists with uncivilised peoples,
+but that she is dangerous, particularly so during
+her functional crises and in childbirth. And being
+dangerous, because charged with a supernatural influence
+inimical to others, she is excluded from<!-- Page 118 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_118" id="Page_118">[118]</a></span>
+certain occupations, and contact with her has to be
+carefully regulated. I agree with Mr. Andrew Lang
+that in the regulations concerning women amongst
+uncivilised people we have another illustration of the
+far-reaching principle of taboo (<cite>Social Origins and
+Primal Law</cite>, p. 239) she suffers because of her sex,
+and because of the superstitious dread to which her
+sex nature gives birth.</p>
+
+<p>Of course, at a later stage other considerations begin
+to operate. Where, for example, as amongst the
+Kaffirs, women are not permitted to touch cattle because
+of this assumed spiritual infection, and where a
+man's wealth is measured by the cattle he possesses,
+it is easy to see that this would constitute a force
+preventing the political and social equality of the
+sexes. The pursuits from which women were primarily
+excluded for purely religious reasons would in
+course of time come to be looked upon as man's inalienable
+possessions. And here her physical weakness
+would play its part; for she could not take, as man
+could withhold, by force. Even when the primitive
+point of view is discarded, the social prejudices engendered
+by it long remains. And social prejudices,
+as we all know, are the hardest of all things to destroy.</p>
+
+<p>A final consideration needs to be stated. This is
+that the customs determined by the views of woman
+(above outlined) fall into line, in a rough-and-ready
+fashion, with the biological tendency to consecrate
+the female to the function of motherhood and conserve
+her energies to that end, leaving other kinds of
+work to the male. It would be an obvious advantage
+to a tribe in which woman, relieved from the necessity
+of physical struggle for food and defence, was<!-- Page 119 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_119" id="Page_119">[119]</a></span>
+able to attend to children and the more peaceful side
+of family life. Children would not only benefit thereby,
+but the home with all its civilising, humanising
+influences would develop more rapidly. Assuming
+variations in tribal life in this direction, there is no
+question as to which tribe that would stand the better
+chance of survival. The development of life has proceeded
+here as elsewhere by differentiation and specialisation;
+and while the tasks demanding the more
+sustained physical exertions were left to man, and to
+the performance of which his sexual nature offered no
+impediment, woman became more and more specialised
+for maternity and domestic occupations. This, I
+hasten to add, is not at all intended as a plea for denying
+to women the right to participate in the wider
+social life of the species. I am trying to explain a
+social phase, and neither justifying nor condemning
+its perpetuation.</p>
+
+<div class="footnotes">
+<h3>Footnotes:<br />
+<span class="skip">[<a href="#Page_120">Skip</a>]</span>
+</h3>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_65_65" id="Footnote_65_65"></a><a href="#FNanchor_65_65"><span class="label">[65]</span></a> Dr. Iwan Bloch, <cite>The Sexual Life of Our Time</cite>, p. 97.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_66_66" id="Footnote_66_66"></a><a href="#FNanchor_66_66"><span class="label">[66]</span></a> E. D. Starbuck, <cite>The Psychology of Religion</cite>, p. 401.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_67_67" id="Footnote_67_67"></a><a href="#FNanchor_67_67"><span class="label">[67]</span></a> <cite>The Psychological Phenomena of Christianity</cite>, p. 419.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_68_68" id="Footnote_68_68"></a><a href="#FNanchor_68_68"><span class="label">[68]</span></a> <cite>Primitive Paternity</cite>, 2 vols., 1909-10.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_69_69" id="Footnote_69_69"></a><a href="#FNanchor_69_69"><span class="label">[69]</span></a> <cite>The Mystic Rose</cite>, p. 191.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_70_70" id="Footnote_70_70"></a><a href="#FNanchor_70_70"><span class="label">[70]</span></a> See Frazer's <cite>Taboo and the Perils of the Soul</cite>, pp. 145-63,
+and Crawley's <cite>Mystic Rose</cite>.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_71_71" id="Footnote_71_71"></a><a href="#FNanchor_71_71"><span class="label">[71]</span></a> <cite>Man and Woman</cite>, p. 15.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_72_72" id="Footnote_72_72"></a><a href="#FNanchor_72_72"><span class="label">[72]</span></a> <cite>Taboo</cite>, pp. 163-4.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_73_73" id="Footnote_73_73"></a><a href="#FNanchor_73_73"><span class="label">[73]</span></a> <cite>Religion of the Semites</cite>, p. 142.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_74_74" id="Footnote_74_74"></a><a href="#FNanchor_74_74"><span class="label">[74]</span></a> A long list of animals that were sacred to various Semitic
+tribes has been compiled by Robertson Smith, <cite>Kinship and
+Marriage in Early Arabia</cite>, pp. 194-201.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_75_75" id="Footnote_75_75"></a><a href="#FNanchor_75_75"><span class="label">[75]</span></a> Robertson Smith, <cite>Kinship and Marriage in Early Arabia</cite>,
+pp. 306-7.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_76_76" id="Footnote_76_76"></a><a href="#FNanchor_76_76"><span class="label">[76]</span></a> <cite>Religion of the Semites</cite>, pp. 427-9. For a fuller
+discussion of the subject, see <cite>Studies in the Psychology of Sex</cite>,
+by Havelock Ellis, 1901.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_77_77" id="Footnote_77_77"></a><a href="#FNanchor_77_77"><span class="label">[77]</span></a> Westermarck, <cite>Origin and Development of the Moral Ideas</cite>,
+p. 666.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_78_78" id="Footnote_78_78"></a><a href="#FNanchor_78_78"><span class="label">[78]</span></a> Westermarck, p. 666.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_79_79" id="Footnote_79_79"></a><a href="#FNanchor_79_79"><span class="label">[79]</span></a> Frazer, <cite>Taboo</cite>, p. 150.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_80_80" id="Footnote_80_80"></a><a href="#FNanchor_80_80"><span class="label">[80]</span></a> See the Rev. Principal Donaldson's <cite>Woman: her Position
+and Influence in Ancient Greece and Rome, and among the Early
+Christians</cite>, bk. iii.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_81_81" id="Footnote_81_81"></a><a href="#FNanchor_81_81"><span class="label">[81]</span></a> For the general influence of these beliefs
+about woman in determining her social position, see <a href="#NOTE_TO_PAGE_104">note
+at the end of this chapter</a>.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_82_82" id="Footnote_82_82"></a><a href="#FNanchor_82_82"><span class="label">[82]</span></a> <cite>The Worship of Priapus</cite>, Pref. p. 9.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_83_83" id="Footnote_83_83"></a><a href="#FNanchor_83_83"><span class="label">[83]</span></a> <cite>The River Congo</cite>, p. 405.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_84_84" id="Footnote_84_84"></a><a href="#FNanchor_84_84"><span class="label">[84]</span></a> A description of the Sakti ceremony is given by Major-General
+Forlong, <cite>Faiths of Man</cite>, iii. pp. 228-9.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_85_85" id="Footnote_85_85"></a><a href="#FNanchor_85_85"><span class="label">[85]</span></a> Westropp, <cite>Primitive Symbolism</cite>, p. 30.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_86_86" id="Footnote_86_86"></a><a href="#FNanchor_86_86"><span class="label">[86]</span></a> <cite>Egyptian Belief and Modern Thought</cite>, p. 256.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_87_87" id="Footnote_87_87"></a><a href="#FNanchor_87_87"><span class="label">[87]</span></a> Forlong, <cite>Faiths of Man</cite>, iii. p. 66.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_88_88" id="Footnote_88_88"></a><a href="#FNanchor_88_88"><span class="label">[88]</span></a> <cite>Primitive Symbolism</cite>, p. 36.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_89_89" id="Footnote_89_89"></a><a href="#FNanchor_89_89"><span class="label">[89]</span></a> <cite>Primitive Paternity</cite>, i. pp. 63-4.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_90_90" id="Footnote_90_90"></a><a href="#FNanchor_90_90"><span class="label">[90]</span></a> Major-General Forlong agrees with many other authorities
+in tracing our custom of kissing under the mistletoe to this ancient
+practice. "The mistletoe," he says, "marks in one sense
+Venus's temple, for any girl may be kissed if caught under its
+sprays&mdash;a practice, though modified, which recalls to us that
+horrid one mentioned by Herodotus, where all women were for
+once at least the property of the man who sought them in Mylitta's
+temple."&mdash;<cite>Rivers of Life</cite>, i. p. 91.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_91_91" id="Footnote_91_91"></a><a href="#FNanchor_91_91"><span class="label">[91]</span></a> Those who desire further and more detailed information may
+consult Forlong's great work, <cite>The Rivers of Life</cite>, Payne Knight's
+<cite>Worship of Priapus</cite>, Westropp and Wake's <cite>Phallicism in Ancient
+Religion</cite>, Brown's <cite>Dionysiak Myth</cite>, Westropp's <cite>Primitive
+Symbolism</cite>, R. A. Campbell's <cite>Phallic Worship</cite>, Hargrave Jennings's
+<cite>Worship of Priapus</cite>, etc.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_92_92" id="Footnote_92_92"></a><a href="#FNanchor_92_92"><span class="label">[92]</span></a> A good discussion of the topic will be found in this author's
+<cite>Social and Ethical Interpretations in Mental Development</cite>.</p></div>
+</div>
+
+<p><!-- Page 120 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_120" id="Page_120">[120]</a></span></p>
+
+<h2>CHAPTER <span class="cgap">FIVE</span><br />
+THE INFLUENCE OF SEXUAL AND PATHOLOGIC
+STATES ON RELIGIOUS BELIEF</h2>
+
+<p>In the preceding chapter we have
+been concerned with the various ways in which the
+phenomena attendant on the sexual life of man and
+woman become associated with religious beliefs. As
+a force that arises in the life of each individual, and
+intrudes, as it were, into consciousness, the phenomena
+of sex fill primitive man with an amazement
+that is not unmixed with terror. In strict accord with
+primitive psychology sexual phenomena are conceived
+as more or less connected with the supernatural
+world, and becoming thus entwined with religious
+convictions are made the nucleus of a number of superstitious
+ceremonies. The connection is close and
+obvious so long as we restrict our survey to uncivilised
+humanity. The only room for doubt or discussion
+is the exact meaning of certain ceremonies, or the
+order of certain phases of development. It is when
+we take man in a more advanced stage that obscurity
+gathers and difficulties arise. The sexual life is no
+longer lived, as it were, openly. Symbolism and mysticism
+develop; a more complex social life provides
+disguised outlets for primitive and indestructible feelings.
+Sexualism, instead of being something to be
+glorified, and, so to speak, annotated by religious
+ceremonies, becomes something to be hidden or decried.
+Ignored it may be. Decried it may be; but it
+will not be denied. That is a practical impossibility in
+the case of so powerful and so pervasive a fact as sex.
+We may disguise its expression, but only too often
+the disguise is the equivalent of undesirable and unhealthy
+manifestations.</p>
+
+<p><!-- Page 121 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_121" id="Page_121">[121]</a></span>
+The modern history of religion offers a melancholy
+illustration of the truth of the last sentence, and it is
+quite clearly exhibited in the history of Christianity
+itself. From the beginning it strove to suppress the
+power of sexual feeling. It was an enemy against
+whom one had to be always on guard, one that had to
+be crushed, or at least kept in subjection in the interests
+of spiritual development. And yet the very
+intensity of the efforts at suppression defeated the
+object aimed at. With some of the leaders of early
+Christianity sex became an obsession. Long dwelling
+upon its power made them unduly and unhealthily
+conscious of its presence. Instead of sex taking its
+place as one of the facts of life, which like most other
+facts might be good or bad as circumstances determined,
+it was so much dwelt upon as to often dwarf
+everything else. Asceticism is, after all, mainly a reversed
+sensualism, or at least confesses the existence
+of a sensualism that must not be allowed expression
+lest its manifestation becomes overpowering. Mortification
+confesses the supremacy of sense as surely
+as gratification. Moreover, mortification of sense as
+preached by the great ascetics does not prevent that
+most dangerous of all forms of gratification, the sensualism
+of the imagination. That remains, and is apt
+to gain in strength since the fundamentally healthful
+energies are denied legitimate and natural modes
+of expression. Thus it is that we find developing
+social life not always providing a healthy outlet for
+the sexual life, and thus it is that the intense striving
+of religious leaders against the power of the sexual
+impulse has often forced it into strange and harmful
+forms of expression. So we find throughout the<!-- Page 122 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_122" id="Page_122">[122]</a></span>
+history of religion, not only that a deal of what
+has passed for supernatural illumination to have
+undoubtedly had its origin in perverted sexual feeling,
+but the constant emergence of curious religio-erotic
+sects whose strange mingling of eroticism
+and religion has scandalised many, and offered a
+lesson to all had they but possessed the wit to discern
+it.</p>
+
+<p>Although there is an understandable disinclination,
+amounting with some to positive revulsion, to recognise
+the sexual origin of much that passes for religious
+fervour, the fact is well known to competent medical
+observers, as the following citations will show.
+More than a generation since a well-known medical
+authority said:&mdash;</p>
+
+<p>"I know of no fact in pathology more striking and
+more terrifying than the way in which the phenomena
+of the ecstatic&mdash;which have often been seized upon by
+sentimental theorisers as proofs of spiritual exaltation&mdash;may
+be plainly seen to bridge the gulf between
+the innocent foolery of ordinary hypnotic patients and
+the degraded and repulsive phenomena of nymphomania
+and satyriasis."<a name="FNanchor_93_93" id="FNanchor_93_93"></a><a href="#Footnote_93_93" class="fnanchor">[93]</a></p>
+
+<p>Dr. C. Norman also observes:&mdash;</p>
+
+<p>"Ecstasy, as we see in cases of acute mental disease,
+is probably always connected with sexual excitement,
+if not with sexual depravity. The same association
+is seen in less extreme cases, and one of the
+commonest features in the conversation of acutely
+maniacal women is the intermingling of erotic and
+religious ideas."<a name="FNanchor_94_94" id="FNanchor_94_94"></a><a href="#Footnote_94_94" class="fnanchor">[94]</a></p>
+
+<p><!-- Page 123 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_123" id="Page_123">[123]</a></span>
+This opinion is fully endorsed by Sir Francis Galton:&mdash;</p>
+
+<p>"It has been noticed that among the morbid organic
+conditions which accompany the show of excessive
+piety and religious rapture in the insane, none are so
+frequent as disorders of the sexual organisation. Conversely,
+the frenzies of religious revivals have not infrequently ended
+in gross profligacy. The encouragement
+of celibacy by the fervent leaders of most creeds, utilises
+in an unconscious way the morbid connection
+between an over-restraint of the sexual desires and
+impulses towards extreme devotion."<a name="FNanchor_95_95" id="FNanchor_95_95"></a><a href="#Footnote_95_95" class="fnanchor">[95]</a></p>
+
+<p>Dr. Auguste Forel, the eminent German specialist,
+points out that&mdash;</p>
+
+<p>"When we study the religious sentiment profoundly,
+especially in the Christian religion, and Catholicism
+in particular, we find at each step its astonishing
+connection with eroticism. We find it in the exalted
+adoration of holy women, such as Mary Magdalene,
+Marie de Bethany, for Jesus, in the holy legends, in
+the worship of the Virgin Mary in the Middle Ages,
+and especially in art. The ecstatic Madonnas in our
+art galleries cast their fervent regards on Jesus or on
+the heavens. The expression in Murillo's 'Immaculate
+Conception' may be interpreted by the highest
+voluptuous exaltation of love as well as by holy transfiguration.
+The 'saints' of Correggio regard the Virgin
+with an amorous ardour which may be celestial, but
+appears in reality extremely terrestrial and human."<a name="FNanchor_96_96" id="FNanchor_96_96"></a><a href="#Footnote_96_96" class="fnanchor">[96]</a></p>
+
+<p>Another German authority remarks:&mdash;</p>
+
+<p>"I venture to express my conviction that we<!-- Page 124 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_124" id="Page_124">[124]</a></span>
+should rarely err if, in a case of religious melancholy,
+we assumed the sexual apparatus to be implicated."<a name="FNanchor_97_97" id="FNanchor_97_97"></a><a href="#Footnote_97_97" class="fnanchor">[97]</a></p>
+
+<p>Dr. Bevan Lewis points out how frequently religious
+exaltation occurs with women at puberty, and religious
+melancholia at the period of sexual decline.
+And Dr. Charles Mercier puts the interchangeability
+of sexual and religious feelings in the following passage:&mdash;</p>
+
+<p>"Religious observances provide an alternative, into
+which the amatory instinct can be easily and naturally
+diverted. The emotions and instinctive desires,
+which finds expression in courtship, is a vast body of
+vague feeling, which is at first undirected.... It is a
+voluminous state of exaltation that demands enthusiastic
+action. This is the state antecedent to falling
+in love, and if an object presents himself or herself, the
+torrent of emotion is directed into amatory passion.
+But if no object appears, or if the selected object is denied,
+then religious observances yield a very passable
+substitute for the expression of the emotion. Religious
+observances provide the sensuous atmosphere, the
+call for self-renunciation, the means of expressing
+powerful and voluminous feeling, that the potential
+or disappointed lover needs. The madrigal is transformed
+into the hymn; the adornment of the person
+that should have gone to allure the beloved now takes
+the shape of ecclesiastical vestments; the reverence
+that should have been paid to the loved one is transformed
+to a higher object; the enthusiasm that would
+have expanded in courtship is expressed in worship;
+the gifts that would have been made, the services that<!-- Page 125 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_125" id="Page_125">[125]</a></span>
+would have been rendered to the loved one, are transferred
+to the Church."<a name="FNanchor_98_98" id="FNanchor_98_98"></a><a href="#Footnote_98_98" class="fnanchor">[98]</a></p>
+
+<p>Dr. Krafft-Ebing, after dwelling upon the substantial
+identity of sexual love and religious emotion, summarises
+his conclusions by saying:&mdash;</p>
+
+<p>"Religious and sexual hyperæsthesia at the acme of
+development show the same volume of intensity and
+the same quality of excitement, and may, therefore,
+under given circumstances interchange. Both will in
+certain pathologic states degenerate into cruelty."<a name="FNanchor_99_99" id="FNanchor_99_99"></a><a href="#Footnote_99_99" class="fnanchor">[99]</a></p>
+
+<p>Even so orthodox a writer as the Rev. S. Baring-Gould
+points out that&mdash;</p>
+
+<p>"The existence of that evil, which, knowing the constitution
+of man, we should expect to find prevalent
+in mysticism, the experience of all ages has shown following,
+dogging its steps inevitably. So slight is the
+film that separates religion from sensual passion, that
+uncontrolled spiritual fervour roars readily into a blaze
+of licentiousness."<a name="FNanchor_100_100" id="FNanchor_100_100"></a><a href="#Footnote_100_100" class="fnanchor">[100]</a></p>
+
+<p>No useful purpose would be served by lengthening
+this list of citations. Enough has been said to show
+that the point of view expressed is one endorsed by
+many sober, competent, and responsible observers.
+There exists among them a general, and one may add
+a growing, recognition of the important truth that the
+connection between religious and sexual feeling is of
+the closest character, and that one is very often mistaken
+for the other. Asceticism, usually taken as evidence
+to the reverse, is on the contrary, confirmative.
+The ascetic often presents us with a flagrant case of
+eroto-mania, expressing itself in terms of religion.<!-- Page 126 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_126" id="Page_126">[126]</a></span>
+It is highly significant that the biographies of Christian
+saints should furnish so many cases of men and
+women of strong sensual passions, and whose ascetic
+devotion was only the reaction from almost unbridled
+sensualism. No wonder that in the temptations experienced
+by the monks the figures of nude women so
+often appeared before their heated imaginations. Sexual
+feeling suppressed in one direction broke out in
+another. Feelings, in themselves perfectly normal, became,
+as a consequence of repression and misdirection,
+pathologic. And one consequence of this was that
+many of the early Christian writers brought to the
+consideration of the subject of sex a concentration of
+mind that resulted in disquisitions of such a nature
+that it is impossible to do more than refer to them. The
+sexual relation instead of being refined was coarsened.
+Marriage was viewed in its lowest form, more as a
+concession to the weakness of the flesh than as a desirable
+state for all men and women. Nor can it be
+said, after many centuries, that these ideas are quite
+eradicated from present-day life.</p>
+
+<p>A field of investigation that yields much illuminating
+information is the biographies of the saints and
+of other religious characters. In many of these cases
+the acceptance of sexual feeling for religious illumination
+is very clear. Thus of St. Gertrude, a Benedictine
+nun of the thirteenth century, we read:&mdash;</p>
+
+<p>"One day at chapel she heard supernaturally sung
+the words, '<i>Sanctus, Sanctus, Sanctus</i>.' The Son of
+God, leaning towards her like a sweet lover, and giving
+to her soul the softest kiss, said to her at the second
+<i>Sanctus</i>, 'In the <i>Sanctus</i> addressed to My person, receive
+with this all the sanctity of My divinity and of<!-- Page 127 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_127" id="Page_127">[127]</a></span>
+My humanity.'... And the following Sunday, while
+she was thanking God for this favour, behold the
+Son of God, more beauteous than thousands of
+angels, takes her to His arms as if He were proud
+of her, and presents her to God the Father, and in
+that perfection of sanctity with which He had endowed
+her."<a name="FNanchor_101_101" id="FNanchor_101_101"></a><a href="#Footnote_101_101" class="fnanchor">[101]</a></p>
+
+<p>Of Juliana of Norwich, who was granted a revelation
+in 1373, we are told that she had for long 'ardently
+desired' a bodily sight of the Lord upon the
+cross; and that finally Jesus appeared to her and said,
+"I love thee and thou lovest Me, and our love shall
+never be disparted in two."<a name="FNanchor_102_102" id="FNanchor_102_102"></a><a href="#Footnote_102_102" class="fnanchor">[102]</a> So, again, in the case of
+Sister Jeanne des Anges, Superior of the Convent of
+Ursulines of Loudun, and the principal character in
+the famous Grandier witchcraft case, we have a detailed
+account, in her own words, of the lascivious
+dreams, unclean suggestions, etc.&mdash;all attributed to
+Satan&mdash;and alternating with impressions of bodily
+union with Jesus.<a name="FNanchor_103_103" id="FNanchor_103_103"></a><a href="#Footnote_103_103" class="fnanchor">[103]</a> Marie de L'Incarnation addresses
+Jesus as follows:&mdash;</p>
+
+<p>"Oh, my love, when shall I embrace you? Have you
+no pity on the torments that I suffer? Alas! alas! My
+love! My beauty! My life! Instead of healing my pain,
+you take pleasure in it. Come, let me embrace you, and
+die in your sacred arms."<a name="FNanchor_104_104" id="FNanchor_104_104"></a><a href="#Footnote_104_104" class="fnanchor">[104]</a></p>
+
+<p>Veronica Juliani, beatified by Pope Pius <span class="ucsmcap">II.</span>, took a
+real lamb to bed with her, kissed it, and suckled it at
+her breasts. St. Catherine of Genoa threw herself on
+the ground to cool herself, crying out, "Love, love, I<!-- Page 128 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_128" id="Page_128">[128]</a></span>
+can bear it no longer." She also confessed to a peculiar
+longing towards her confessor.<a name="FNanchor_105_105" id="FNanchor_105_105"></a><a href="#Footnote_105_105" class="fnanchor">[105]</a></p>
+
+<p>The blessed Mary Alacoque, foundress of the
+Sacred Heart, was subject from early life to a number
+of complaints&mdash;rheumatism, palsy, pains in the side,
+ulceration of the legs&mdash;and experienced visions early
+in her career. As a child she had so vivid a sense of
+modesty that the mere sight of a man offended her.
+At seventeen she took to wearing a knotted cord
+drawn so tightly that she could neither eat nor breathe
+without pain. She compressed her arms so tightly with
+iron chains that she could not remove them without
+anguish. "I made," she says, "a bed of potsherds, on
+which I slept with extreme pleasure." She fasted and
+tortured herself in a variety of ways, and the more her
+physical disorders increased the more numerous became
+her visions. Before she was eighteen years of
+age, in 1671, she entered a nunnery. From the time
+she donned the habit of a novice she was 'blessed'
+with visions. "Our Lord showed me that that day was
+the day of our spiritual wedding; He forthwith gave me
+to understand that He wished to make me taste all the
+sweetness of the caresses of His love. In reality, those
+divine caresses were from that moment so excessive,
+that they often put me out of myself." "Once," says
+one of her biographers, "having retired into her chamber,
+she threw off the clothes with which she had bedecked
+herself during the day, when the Son of God
+showed Himself to her in the state in which He was
+after His cruel flagellation&mdash;that is, with His body all
+wounded, torn, gory&mdash;and He said to her that it was
+her vanities that had brought Him into that condition."<!-- Page 129 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_129" id="Page_129">[129]</a></span>
+In one of these visions Jesus took the head
+of Mary, pressed it to His bosom, spoke to her in
+passionate words, opened her side and took out her
+heart, plunged it into His own, and then replaced
+it. He then explained His design of founding the
+Order of the Sacred Heart. Ever after, Mary was
+conscious of a pain in her side and a burning
+sensation in her chest&mdash;two plain symptoms of hysteria.<a name="FNanchor_106_106" id="FNanchor_106_106"></a><a href="#Footnote_106_106" class="fnanchor">[106]</a></p>
+
+<p>Santa Teresa, who died at the early age of thirty-three,
+and in whose family more than one case of well-developed
+neurasthenia can be traced, was favoured
+with 'messages' at a very early age. She believed some
+of these were temptations from the devil suggesting
+an 'honourable alliance.' A nervous breakdown followed
+directly after entrance into a convent. She was
+then twenty years of age, was subject to fainting fits
+and longed for illness as a sign of divine favour. She
+was subject to convulsions, and soon after taking the
+veil fell into a cataleptic trance, which lasted three
+days. She was thought to be dead, but at the end
+of the time sat up and told those around that
+she had visited both heaven and hell, and seen the
+joys of the blessed and the torments of the damned.
+It is at least suggestive that, in spite of the longing
+for personal communion with Jesus, her first
+experience of the ecstasy of divine love was experienced
+after discovering a 'very realistic' picture
+of a martyred saint&mdash;St. Joseph. The significance
+of the intense contemplation of a tortured body&mdash;possibly
+made by one whose sexual nature was<!-- Page 130 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_130" id="Page_130">[130]</a></span>
+undergoing a process of suppression&mdash;is unmistakable.<a name="FNanchor_107_107" id="FNanchor_107_107"></a><a href="#Footnote_107_107" class="fnanchor">[107]</a></p>
+
+<p>On these and similar cases Professor William James
+makes the following comment:&mdash;</p>
+
+<p>"To the medical mind these ecstasies signify nothing
+but suggested hypnoid states, on an intellectual
+basis of superstition, and a corporeal one of degeneration
+and hysteria. Undoubtedly these pathological
+conditions have existed in many and possibly in all
+the cases, but that fact tells us nothing about the value
+for knowledge of the consciousness which they induce.
+To pass a spiritual judgment upon these states, we
+must not content ourselves with superficial medical
+talk, but enquire into their fruits for life."<a name="FNanchor_108_108" id="FNanchor_108_108"></a><a href="#Footnote_108_108" class="fnanchor">[108]</a></p>
+
+<p>Now the question is really not what these ecstasies
+suggest to the 'medical mind,' as though that were a
+type of mind quite unfitted to pass judgment. It is a
+question of what the facts suggest to any mind judging
+the behaviour of a person under the influence of
+strong religious emotion exactly as it would judge
+anyone under any other strong emotional pressure.
+And if it be possible to explain these states in terms
+of known physiological and mental action, what warranty
+have we for rejecting this and preferring in its
+stead an explanation that is both unprovable and
+unnecessary? And one would be excused for thinking
+that cases which certainly involve some sort of
+abnormal nervous action are precisely those in which
+the medical mind should be called on to express an
+opinion. What is meant by passing 'a spiritual judgment'<!-- Page 131 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_131" id="Page_131">[131]</a></span>
+upon these states is not exactly clear, unless
+it means judging them in terms of the historic supernatural
+interpretation. But that is precisely the interpretation
+which is challenged by the 'medical mind.'</p>
+
+<p>I do not see how any enquiry "into their fruits for
+life" can affect a rational estimate of the nature of
+these mystical states. Mysticism adds nothing to the
+native disposition of a person. It merely gives their
+energies a new turn, a new direction. What they were
+before the experience they remain, substantially,
+afterwards. That is why we find religious mystics of
+every variety. Some energetically practical; others
+dreamily unpractical. Professor James admits this in
+saying that "the other-worldliness encouraged by the
+mystical consciousness makes this over-abstraction
+from practical life peculiarly liable to befall mystics in
+whom the character is naturally passive and the intellect
+feeble; but in natively strong minds and characters
+we find quite opposite results."<a name="FNanchor_109_109" id="FNanchor_109_109"></a><a href="#Footnote_109_109" class="fnanchor">[109]</a> And when it
+is further admitted that "the mystical feeling of enlargement,
+union, and emancipation has no specific
+intellectual content whatever of its own," but "is capable
+of forming matrimonial alliances with material
+furnished by the most diverse philosophies and theologies,
+provided only they can find a place in their
+framework for its peculiar emotional mood," mysticism
+seems reduced to an emotional development on
+all fours with emotional development in other directions.
+It is not peculiar to religious minds because "it
+has no specific intellectual content." It is amorphous,
+so to speak. And it may form diverse 'matrimonial
+alliances' precisely because it does not point to a<!-- Page 132 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_132" id="Page_132">[132]</a></span>
+hidden world of reality, but is merely indicative of
+tense emotional moods. In the face of nature the non-theistic
+Richard Jeffries experiences all the feelings
+of mental enlargement and emotional transports that
+Mary Alacoque or Santa Teresa experienced in their
+visions of the 'Risen Christ.'</p>
+
+<p>It is idle, then, to sneer at 'medical materialism,'
+and stigmatise it as superficial. Many people are constitutionally
+afraid of words, and there is nothing that
+arouses prejudice so quickly as a name. But it is really
+not a question of materialism, medical or non-medical.
+It is a mere matter of applying knowledge and
+common sense to the cases before us. Are we to take
+the subject's explanation of his or her mental states as
+authoritative, so far as their nature is concerned; or
+are we to treat them as symptoms demanding the
+skilled analysis of the specialist? If the former, how
+can we differentiate between the mystic and the admittedly
+hysterical patient? If the latter, what ground
+is there for placing the mystic in a category of his own?
+Rational and scientific analysis will certainly take far
+more notice of the nature of the feelings excited than
+of the object towards which they are directed. Here
+is the case of a young lady, given by Dr. Moreau, in his
+<cite>Morbid Psychology</cite>:&mdash;</p>
+
+<p>"During my long hours of sleeplessness in the night
+my beloved Saviour began to make Himself manifest
+to me. Pondering over the meditations of St. François
+de Sales on the <cite>Song of Songs</cite>, I seemed to feel all my
+faculties suspended, and crossing my arms upon my
+chest, I awaited in a sort of dread what might be revealed
+to me.... I saw the Redeemer veritably in the
+flesh.... He extended Himself beside me, pressed me<!-- Page 133 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_133" id="Page_133">[133]</a></span>
+so closely that I could feel His crown of thorns, and
+the nails in His feet and hands, while He pressed His
+lips over mine, giving me the most ravishing kiss of a
+divine Spouse, and sending a delicious thrill through
+my entire body."<a name="FNanchor_110_110" id="FNanchor_110_110"></a><a href="#Footnote_110_110" class="fnanchor">[110]</a></p>
+
+<p>Get rid of the narcotising effect of theological associations
+by eliminating the name of Jesus and other
+religious terms from this case, and from the others already
+cited, and no one would have the least doubt as
+to their real nature. Given a condition of physical
+health in these cases, with conditions that favoured
+social activity, healthy intercourse with the opposite
+sex, culminating in marriage and parenthood, can
+there be any doubt that this species of religious ecstasy
+would have been non-existent? If, as Tylor says,
+the refectory door would many a time have closed the
+gates of heaven, happy family life would in a vast
+number of cases have prevented those religio-erotic
+trances which have played so powerful a part in the
+history of supernaturalism. Most people will agree
+with Dr. Maudsley:&mdash;</p>
+
+<p>"The ecstatic trances of such saintly women as
+Catherine Sienne and St. Theresa, in which they believed
+themselves to be visited by their Saviour and
+to be received as veritable spouses into His bosom,
+were, though they knew it not, little better than vicarious
+sexual orgasm; a condition of things which the intense
+contemplation of the naked male figure, carved
+or sculptured in all its proportions on a cross, is more
+fitted to produce in young women of susceptible nervous
+temperament than people are apt to consider.
+Every experienced physician must have met with instances<!-- Page 134 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_134" id="Page_134">[134]</a></span>
+of single and childless women who have devoted
+themselves with extraordinary zeal to habitual
+religious exercises, and who, having gone insane as a
+culmination of their emotional fervour, have straightway
+exhibited the saddest mixture of religious and
+erotic symptoms&mdash;a boiling over of lust in voice, face,
+gestures, under the pitiful degradation of disease....
+The fanatical religious sects, such as the Shakers and
+the like, which spring up from time to time in communities
+and disgust them by the offensive way in
+which they mingle love and religion, are inspired in
+great measure by sexual feeling; on the one hand,
+there is probably the cunning of a hypocritical knave,
+or the self-deception of a half-insane one, using the
+weaknesses of weak women to minister to his vanity
+or his lust under a religious guise; on the other hand,
+there is an exaggerated self-feeling, often rooted in
+the sexual passion, which is unwittingly fostered under
+the cloak of religious emotion, and which is apt to conduct
+to madness or to sin. In such cases the holy kiss
+owes its warmth to the sexual impulse, which inspires
+it, consciously or unconsciously, and the mystical religious
+union of the sexes is fitted to issue in a less
+spiritual union."<a name="FNanchor_111_111" id="FNanchor_111_111"></a><a href="#Footnote_111_111" class="fnanchor">[111]</a></p>
+
+<p>Many manuals of devotion will be found to furnish
+the same kind of evidence as biographical narratives
+concerning the intimate relations that exists between
+sexuality and religious feeling. What has just been
+said may be repeated here, namely, that if the religious
+associations were dispelled, there would be no
+mistaking the nature of feelings that originated much<!-- Page 135 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_135" id="Page_135">[135]</a></span>
+of this class of writing, or the feelings to which they
+appeal. The serious fact is that the appeal is there
+whether we recognise it or not, and it is a question
+worthy of serious consideration whether the unwary
+imagination of the young may be not as surely debauched
+by certain books of devotion as by a frankly
+erotic production. It is not without reason that
+d'Israeli the elder, in an essay omitted from all editions
+of his book after the first, remarked that "poets
+are amorous, lovers are poetical, but saints are both."<a name="FNanchor_112_112" id="FNanchor_112_112"></a><a href="#Footnote_112_112" class="fnanchor">[112]</a>
+Take, for example, the following from a collection of
+old English homilies, dating from the thirteenth and
+fourteenth centuries:&mdash;</p>
+
+<p>"Jesus, my holy love, my sure sweetness! Jesus, my
+heart, my joy, my soul-heal! Jesus, sweet Jesus, my
+darling, my life, my light, my balm, my honey-drop!...
+Kindle me with the blaze of Thy enlightening love.
+Let me be Thy leman, and teach me to love Thee....
+Oh, that I might behold how Thou stretchedst Thyself
+for me on the cross. Oh, that I might cast myself<!-- Page 136 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_136" id="Page_136">[136]</a></span>
+between those same arms, so very wide outspread....
+Oh, that I were in Thy arms, in Thy arms so stretchedst
+and outspread on the cross."</p>
+
+<p>Or this, from the same collection:&mdash;</p>
+
+<p>"Sweet Jesus, my love, my darling, my Lord, my
+Saviour, my balm, sweeter is the remembrance of Thee
+than honey in the mouth. Who is there that may not
+love Thy lovely face? Whose heart is so hard that may
+not melt at the remembrance of Thee? Oh! who may
+not love Thee, lovely Jesus? Jesus, my precious darling,
+my love, my life, my beloved, my most worthy of
+love, my heart's balm, Thou art lovesome in countenance,
+Thou art altogether bright. All angels' life is to
+look upon Thy face, for Thy cheer is so marvellously
+lovesome and pleasant to look upon.... Thou art so
+bright, and so white that the sun would be pale if compared
+to Thy blissful countenance. If I, then, love any
+man for beauty, I will love Thee, my dear life, my
+mother's fairest son."<a name="FNanchor_113_113" id="FNanchor_113_113"></a><a href="#Footnote_113_113" class="fnanchor">[113]</a></p>
+
+<p>The language of erotic piety figures much more
+prominently in Roman Catholic medieval writings
+than in Protestant literature. This is not because an
+appeal to the same feelings is absent from the religious
+literature of Protestantism, it is mainly due to the
+fact that more modern conditions leads to a less intense
+religious appeal, while the broadening of social
+life encourages a more natural outlet for all aspects
+of human nature. Still, the following expression of a
+young lady convert of Wesley's offers a fair parallel to
+the specimen given above. It is taken from Southey's
+<cite>Life of Wesley</cite>:&mdash;</p>
+
+<p><!-- Page 137 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_137" id="Page_137">[137]</a></span>
+"Oh, mighty, powerful, happy change! The love
+of God was shed abroad in my heart, and a flame
+kindled there with pains so violent, and yet so very
+ravishing, that my body was almost torn asunder. I
+sweated, I trembled, I fainted, I sang. Oh, I thought
+my head was a fountain of water. I was dissolved in
+love. My beloved is mine, and I am His. He has all
+charms; He has ravished my heart; He is my comforter,
+my friend, my all. Oh, I am sick of love. He is
+altogether lovely, the chiefest among ten thousand.
+Oh, how Jesus fills, Jesus extends, Jesus overwhelms
+the soul in which He lives."</p>
+
+<p>The <cite>Imitation of Christ</cite> has been described by more
+than one writer as a manual of eroticism, and certainly
+the chapters "The Wonderful Effects of Divine
+Love," and "Of the Proof of a True Lover," might
+well be cited in defence of this view. In the following
+canticle of St. Francis of Assisi it does not seem possible
+to distinguish a substantial difference between it
+and a frankly avowed love poem:&mdash;</p>
+
+<div class="poem"><div class="stanza">
+<span class="i0">"Into love's furnace I am cast,<br /></span>
+<span class="i1">Into love's furnace I am cast,<br /></span>
+<span class="i1">I burn, I languish, pine, and waste.<br /></span>
+<span class="i1">Oh, love divine, how sharp thy dart!<br /></span>
+<span class="i1">How deep the wound that galls my heart!<br /></span>
+<span class="i1">As wax in heat, so, from above,<br /></span>
+<span class="i1">My smitten soul dissolves in love.<br /></span>
+<span class="i1">I live, yet languishing I die,<br /></span>
+<span class="i1">While in thy furnace bound I lie."<a name="FNanchor_114_114" id="FNanchor_114_114"></a><a href="#Footnote_114_114" class="fnanchor">[114]</a><br /></span>
+</div></div>
+
+<p>It would certainly be possible to furnish exact parallels
+from volumes of secular verse that would be strictly
+'taboo' among those who fail to see anything objectionable
+in verses like the above when written in connection<!-- Page 138 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_138" id="Page_138">[138]</a></span>
+with religion. Such people fail to recognise
+that their attractiveness lies in the hidden appeal to
+amatory feeling, and owe their origin to the suppressed
+or perverted sexual passion of their author. We
+must not allow ourselves to be blinded by the consideration
+as to whether the object of adoration be an
+earthly or a heavenly one. Men and women have not
+distinct feelings that are aroused as their objective differs,
+but the same feelings directed now in one direction,
+now in another. The direction of these feelings,
+their exciting cause, are sheer environmental accidents.
+How can one resist the implications of the following,
+from a devotional work widely circulated amongst
+the women of France:&mdash;</p>
+
+<div class="poem"><div class="stanza">
+<span class="i0">"Praise to Jesus, praise His power,<br /></span>
+<span class="i1">Praise His sweet allurements.<br /></span>
+<span class="i1">Praise to Jesus, when His goodness<br /></span>
+<span class="i1">Reduces me to nakedness;<br /></span>
+<span class="i1">Praise to Jesus when He says to me,<br /></span>
+<span class="i1">My sister, my dove, my beautiful one!<br /></span>
+<span class="i1">Praise to Jesus in all my steps,<br /></span>
+<span class="i1">Praise to His amorous charms.<br /></span>
+<span class="i1">Praise to Jesus when His loving mouth<br /></span>
+<span class="i1">Touches mine in a loving kiss.<br /></span>
+<span class="i1">Praise to Jesus when His gentle caresses<br /></span>
+<span class="i1">Overwhelm me with chaste joys.<br /></span>
+<span class="i1">Praise to Jesus when at His leisure<br /></span>
+<span class="i1">He allows me to kiss Him."<a name="FNanchor_115_115" id="FNanchor_115_115"></a><a href="#Footnote_115_115" class="fnanchor">[115]</a><br /></span>
+</div></div>
+
+<p>Against this we may place the following hymn, sung
+at an American camp meeting of some thousands of
+persons between the ages of fourteen and twenty-five:&mdash;</p>
+
+<p><!-- Page 139 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_139" id="Page_139">[139]</a></span></p>
+<div class="poem"><div class="stanza">
+<span class="i0">"Blessed Lily of the Valley, oh, how fair is He;<br /></span>
+<span class="i3">He is mine, I am His.<br /></span>
+<span class="i1">Sweeter than the angels' music is His voice to me;<br /></span>
+<span class="i3">He is mine, I am His.<br /></span>
+<span class="i1">Where the lilies fair are blooming by the waters calm<br /></span>
+<span class="i1">There He leads me and upholds me by His strong right arm.<br /></span>
+</div><div class="stanza">
+<span class="i1">All the air is love around me&mdash;I can feel no harm;<br /></span>
+<span class="i3">He is mine, I am His."<a name="FNanchor_116_116" id="FNanchor_116_116"></a><a href="#Footnote_116_116" class="fnanchor">[116]</a><br /></span>
+</div></div>
+
+<p>Special significance is given to this reference by the
+age of those who composed the gathering. This period
+embraces the years during which sexual maturity is
+attained, and the organism experiences important
+physiological and psychological changes. The consequence
+is that the atmosphere is, so to say, charged
+with unsuspected sex feeling, and it is not surprising
+that many complaints have been made of immorality
+following such gatherings. The organism is then peculiarly
+liable to suggestion in all forms. Along with
+the imitativeness of early years there is something of
+the decisive initiative of maturity. These qualities
+wisely guided might be turned to the great advantage
+of both the individual and of the community. Mere
+incitement by religious revivalism can result in little
+else than misdirection and injury. It should be the most
+obvious of truths that the attractiveness of hymns such
+as the one given, with the keen delight in the suggested
+pictures, lies in their yielding&mdash;all unknown, perhaps,
+to those participating&mdash;satisfaction to feelings that
+are very frequently imperious in their demands, and
+are at all times astonishingly pervasive in their influence.</p>
+
+<p>Much valuable light is thrown upon this aspect of<!-- Page 140 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_140" id="Page_140">[140]</a></span>
+the subject by a study of human behaviour under the
+influence of actual disease. Of late years much useful
+work has been done in this direction, and our knowledge
+of normal psychology greatly helped by a study
+of abnormal mental states.<a name="FNanchor_117_117" id="FNanchor_117_117"></a><a href="#Footnote_117_117" class="fnanchor">[117]</a> This is mainly because
+in disease we are able to observe the operation of tendencies
+that are unobscured by the restraints and inhibitions
+created by education and social convention.
+And one of the most striking, and to many startling,
+things observed is the close relation existing between
+erotic mania and religious delusion. The person who
+at one time feels himself under direct religious inspiration,
+or who imagines himself to be the incarnation
+of a divine personage, will at another time exhibit the
+most shocking obscenity in action and language. Sir
+T. S. Clouston furnishes a very striking case of this
+character, which he cites in order to show "the common
+mixture of religious and sexual emotion."<a name="FNanchor_118_118" id="FNanchor_118_118"></a><a href="#Footnote_118_118" class="fnanchor">[118]</a> I do not
+reproduce it here because of its grossly obscene
+character; but, save for coarseness of language, it
+does not differ materially from illustrations already
+given. Almost any of the text-books will supply cases
+illustrating the connection between sexualism and religion,
+a connection generally recognised as the opinions
+cited already clearly show.</p>
+
+<p>Dr. Mercier, in dealing with the connection between
+sexualism and religion, which he says "has long been
+recognised, but never accounted for," traces it to a
+feeling of, or desire for self-sacrifice common to both.<!-- Page 141 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_141" id="Page_141">[141]</a></span>
+Certainly sacrifice in some form&mdash;of food, weapons,
+land, money, or bodily inconvenience&mdash;is a feature
+present in every religion more or less. And it is quite
+certain that not merely the fact, but the desire for some
+amount of sacrifice, forms "an integral, fundamental,
+and preponderating element" in the sexual emotion.
+Dr. Mercier further believes that the benevolence
+founded on religious emotion has its origin in sexual
+emotion, which is, again, extremely likely. This community
+of origin would allow for the transformation of
+one into the other, and supplies a key to the language
+of lover-like devotion and self-abnegation which is so
+prominent in religious devotional literature. The importance
+attached to dress is also very suggestive;
+for here, again, the element of sacrifice expresses itself
+in the cultivation of a studied repulsiveness to
+the normal attractiveness of costume. "Thus," says
+Dr. Mercier, "we find that the self-sacrificial vagaries
+of the rejected lover and of the religious devotee own
+a common origin and nature. The hook and spiny
+kennel of the fakir, the pillar of St. Simeon Stylites,
+the flagellum of the monk, the sombre garments of the
+nun, the silence of the Trappists, the defiantly hideous
+costume of the hallelujah lass, and the mortified sobriety
+of the district visitor, have at bottom the same
+origin as the rags of Cardenio, the cage of Don Quixote
+de la Mancha, and the yellow stockings and crossed
+garters of Malvolio."<a name="FNanchor_119_119" id="FNanchor_119_119"></a><a href="#Footnote_119_119" class="fnanchor">[119]</a></p>
+
+<p>Professor Granger, who at times comes very near
+the truth, says:&mdash;</p>
+
+<p>"There is something profoundly philosophical in
+the use of <cite>The Song of Songs</cite> to typify the communion<!-- Page 142 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_142" id="Page_142">[142]</a></span>
+of the soul with its ideal. The passion which is expressed
+by the Shulamite for her earthly lover in such
+glowing phrases becomes the type of the love of the
+soul towards God."<a name="FNanchor_120_120" id="FNanchor_120_120"></a><a href="#Footnote_120_120" class="fnanchor">[120]</a></p>
+
+<p>One fails to see the profoundly philosophic nature
+of the selection. The <cite>Song of Songs</cite> is a frankly erotic
+love poem, written with no other aim than is common
+to such poetry, and its spiritualisation is due to the
+same process of reinterpretation that is applied to
+other parts of the Bible in order to make them agreeable
+to modern thought. Had it not been in the Bible,
+Christians would have found it neither profoundly
+philosophical nor spiritually illuminating; and, as a
+matter of fact, similar effusions are selected by Christians
+from non-Christian writings as proofs of their
+sensual character. The real significance of its use in
+religious worship is that it gives a marked expression
+to feelings that crave an outlet. And the lesson is that
+sexual feeling cannot be eliminated from life; it can
+only be diverted or disguised. Some expression it will
+find&mdash;here in open perversion resulting in positive
+vice, there in obsession that leads to a half-insane asceticism,
+and elsewhere the creation of the unconsciously
+salacious with an unhealthy fondness for dabbling
+in questions that refer to the illicit relations of
+the sexes.</p>
+
+<p>"One of the reasons why popular religion in England,"
+says Professor Granger, "seems to be coming
+to the limits of its power, is that it has contented itself
+so largely with the commonplace motives which, after
+all, find sufficient exercise in the ordinary duties of
+life." Here, again, is a curious obtuseness to a plain<!-- Page 143 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_143" id="Page_143">[143]</a></span>
+but important truth. With what else should a healthy
+religion associate itself but the ordinary motives or
+feelings of human life? With what else has religion
+always associated itself? Far from that being the
+source of the weakness of modern religion, it is its only
+genuine source of strength. If religion can so associate
+itself with the ordinary facts and feelings of life that
+these are unintelligible or poorer without religion,
+then religious people have nothing to fear. But if it
+be true, as Professor Granger implies, that life in its
+normal moods can receive complete gratification apart
+from religion, then the outlook is very different. From
+a merely historic point of view it is true that as men
+have found explanations of phenomena, and gratifications
+of feelings apart from religion, the latter has lost
+a deal of its power. This is seen in the growth of the
+physical sciences, and also, although in a smaller measure,
+in sociology and morals.</p>
+
+<p>This, however, opens up the enquiry, previously
+indicated, as to how far the whole range of human
+life may be satisfactorily explained in the complete
+absence of religion or supernaturalism. And with this
+we are not now directly concerned. What we are concerned
+with is to show that from one direction at least
+supernaturalism has derived strength from a misinterpretation
+of the facts. These facts, once interpreted as
+clear evidence for supernaturalism, are now seen to be
+susceptible to a different explanation. But they have
+nevertheless played their part in creating as part of
+the social heritage a diffused sense of the reality of
+supernatural intercourse. It is not, then, a question of
+religion losing power because it has contented itself
+with commonplace motives, and because these have<!-- Page 144 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_144" id="Page_144">[144]</a></span>
+now found satisfaction in ordinary life. It is rather a
+question of the adequacy of science to deal with facts
+that have been taken to lie outside the scientific order.
+Has science the knowledge or the ability to deal with
+the extraordinary as well as with the ordinary facts of
+life? I believe it has. The facts we have passed in
+review <em>are</em> amenable to scientific treatment, for the
+reason that they belong to a class with which the
+physician of to-day finds himself in constant contact.
+And it is too often overlooked that the belief in the
+existence and influence of a supersensible world is
+itself only a theory put forward in explanation of
+certain classes of facts, and like all theories it becomes
+superfluous once a simpler theory is made possible.</p>
+
+<div class="footnotes">
+<h3>Footnotes:<br />
+<span class="skip">[<a href="#Page_145">Skip</a>]</span>
+</h3>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_93_93" id="Footnote_93_93"></a><a href="#FNanchor_93_93"><span class="label">[93]</span></a> Article in <cite>The Lancet</cite>, Jan. 11, 1873.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_94_94" id="Footnote_94_94"></a><a href="#FNanchor_94_94"><span class="label">[94]</span></a> Article in Tuke's <cite>Dictionary of Psychological Medicine</cite>.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_95_95" id="Footnote_95_95"></a><a href="#FNanchor_95_95"><span class="label">[95]</span></a> <cite>Inquiries into Human Faculty</cite>, pp. 66-7.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_96_96" id="Footnote_96_96"></a><a href="#FNanchor_96_96"><span class="label">[96]</span></a> <cite>The Sexual Question</cite>, pp. 354-5.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_97_97" id="Footnote_97_97"></a><a href="#FNanchor_97_97"><span class="label">[97]</span></a> Cited by Havelock Ellis, <cite>Psychology of Sex</cite>, pp. 233-4.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_98_98" id="Footnote_98_98"></a><a href="#FNanchor_98_98"><span class="label">[98]</span></a> <cite>Conduct and its Disorders</cite>, pp. 368-9.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_99_99" id="Footnote_99_99"></a><a href="#FNanchor_99_99"><span class="label">[99]</span></a> <cite>Psychopathia-Sexualis</cite>, pp. 9-11.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_100_100" id="Footnote_100_100"></a><a href="#FNanchor_100_100"><span class="label">[100]</span></a> <cite>Lost and Hostile Gospels</cite>, Preface.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_101_101" id="Footnote_101_101"></a><a href="#FNanchor_101_101"><span class="label">[101]</span></a> Cited by James, <cite>Varieties</cite>, pp. 345-6.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_102_102" id="Footnote_102_102"></a><a href="#FNanchor_102_102"><span class="label">[102]</span></a> Inge, <cite>Christian Mysticism</cite>, pp. 201-9.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_103_103" id="Footnote_103_103"></a><a href="#FNanchor_103_103"><span class="label">[103]</span></a> See Ellis, <cite>Psychology of Sex</cite>, pp. 240-2.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_104_104" id="Footnote_104_104"></a><a href="#FNanchor_104_104"><span class="label">[104]</span></a> Parkman's <cite>Jesuits in North America</cite>, p. 175.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_105_105" id="Footnote_105_105"></a><a href="#FNanchor_105_105"><span class="label">[105]</span></a> Krafft-Ebing, <cite>Psychopathia-Sexualis</cite>, p. 8.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_106_106" id="Footnote_106_106"></a><a href="#FNanchor_106_106"><span class="label">[106]</span></a> See L. Asseline's <cite>Mary Alacoque and the Worship of the
+Sacred Heart of Jesus</cite>.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_107_107" id="Footnote_107_107"></a><a href="#FNanchor_107_107"><span class="label">[107]</span></a> See <cite>St. Teresa of Spain</cite>, by H. H. Colvill, and <cite>Saint Teresa</cite>,
+by H. Joly.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_108_108" id="Footnote_108_108"></a><a href="#FNanchor_108_108"><span class="label">[108]</span></a> <cite>Varieties</cite>, p. 413.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_109_109" id="Footnote_109_109"></a><a href="#FNanchor_109_109"><span class="label">[109]</span></a> <cite>Varieties</cite>, p. 413.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_110_110" id="Footnote_110_110"></a><a href="#FNanchor_110_110"><span class="label">[110]</span></a> Cited by J. F. Nisbet, <cite>The Insanity of Genius</cite>, p. 248.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_111_111" id="Footnote_111_111"></a><a href="#FNanchor_111_111"><span class="label">[111]</span></a> <cite>Pathology of Mind</cite>, p. 144. Also Mercier, <cite>Sanity and Insanity</cite>,
+pp. 223, 281.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_112_112" id="Footnote_112_112"></a><a href="#FNanchor_112_112"><span class="label">[112]</span></a> <cite>Miscellanies</cite>, 1796, p. 365. From the same essay I take the
+following: "Even the ceremonies of religion, both in ancient
+and in modern times, have exhibited the grossest indecencies.
+Priests in all ages have been the successful panders of the human
+heart, and have introduced in the solemn worship of the divinity,
+incitements, gratifications, and representations, which the
+pen of the historian must refuse to describe. Often has the
+sensible Catholic blushed amidst his devotions, and I have seen
+chapels surrounded by pictures of lascivious attitudes, and the
+obsolete amours of saints revived by the pencil of some Aretine....
+Their homilies were manuals of love, and the more religious
+they became, the more depraved were their imaginations. In
+the nunnery the love of Jesus was the most abandoned of passions,
+and the ideal espousal was indulged at the cost of the
+feeble heart of many a solitary beauty" (pp. 369-70).</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_113_113" id="Footnote_113_113"></a><a href="#FNanchor_113_113"><span class="label">[113]</span></a> From a collection published by the Early English Text
+Society, 1868, pp. 182-4, 268.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_114_114" id="Footnote_114_114"></a><a href="#FNanchor_114_114"><span class="label">[114]</span></a> G. A. Coe, <cite>The Spiritual Life</cite>, p. 210.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_115_115" id="Footnote_115_115"></a><a href="#FNanchor_115_115"><span class="label">[115]</span></a> <cite>Les Perles de Saint François de Sales</cite>, 1871. Cited by Bloch,
+p. 111.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_116_116" id="Footnote_116_116"></a><a href="#FNanchor_116_116"><span class="label">[116]</span></a> Davenport's <cite>Primitive Traits in Religious Revivals</cite>, p. 29.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_117_117" id="Footnote_117_117"></a><a href="#FNanchor_117_117"><span class="label">[117]</span></a> See, for example, <cite>Conduct and its Disorders</cite>, by Dr. C.
+Mercier; <cite>Psycho-Pathological Researches</cite>, by Dr. Boris Sidis;
+and <cite>Abnormal Psychology</cite>, by I. H. Coriat.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_118_118" id="Footnote_118_118"></a><a href="#FNanchor_118_118"><span class="label">[118]</span></a> <cite>Clinical Lectures on Mental Diseases</cite>, p. 584.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_119_119" id="Footnote_119_119"></a><a href="#FNanchor_119_119"><span class="label">[119]</span></a> <cite>Sanity and Insanity</cite>, chap. viii.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_120_120" id="Footnote_120_120"></a><a href="#FNanchor_120_120"><span class="label">[120]</span></a> <cite>The Soul of a Christian</cite>, p. 178.</p></div>
+</div>
+
+<p><!-- Page 145 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_145" id="Page_145">[145]</a></span></p>
+
+<h2>CHAPTER <span class="cgap">SIX</span><br />
+THE STREAM OF TENDENCY</h2>
+
+<p>It should hardly need pointing
+out that the facts presented in the last chapter are not
+offered as an attempt at the&mdash;to use Professor William
+James's expression&mdash;"reinterpretation of religion as
+perverted sexuality." Nor, so far as the present writer
+is aware, has anyone ever so presented them. The expression,
+indeed, seems almost a deliberate mis-statement
+of a position in order to make its rebuttal easier.
+Obviously the idea of religion must be already in existence
+before it could be utilised for the purpose of
+explaining any group of phenomena. But if the biographic
+and other facts described have any value whatever,
+they are at least strong presumptive evidence in
+favour of the position that in very many cases a perverted
+or unsatisfied sexuality has been at the root of
+a great deal of the world's emotional piety. Of course,
+the strong religious belief must be in existence before-hand.
+But given this, and add thereto a sexual nature
+imperious in its demands and yet denied legitimate
+outlet, and we have the conditions present for its promptings
+being interpreted as the fruits of supernatural
+influence. It is not a reinterpretation of <em>religion</em> that is
+attempted, but a reinterpretation of phenomena that
+have been erroneously called religious. And on all
+sides the need for this reinterpretation is becoming
+clear. Over sixty years ago Renan wrote, "A rigorous
+psychological analysis would class the innate religious
+instinct of women in the same category with the sexual
+instinct,"<a name="FNanchor_121_121" id="FNanchor_121_121"></a><a href="#Footnote_121_121" class="fnanchor">[121]</a> and since then a very much more detailed
+knowledge of both physiology and psychology<!-- Page 146 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_146" id="Page_146">[146]</a></span>
+has furnished a multitude of data for an exhaustive
+study of the whole question.</p>
+
+<p>In the present chapter our interest is mainly historical.
+And for various reasons, chief amongst which is
+that interested readers may the more easily follow up
+the study should they feel so inclined, the survey has
+been restricted to the history of that religion with which
+we are best acquainted&mdash;Christianity. Moreover, if we
+are to form a correct judgment of the part played in the
+history of religions by the misinterpretations already
+noted, it is necessary to trace the extent to which they
+have influenced men and women in a collective capacity.
+For the striking fact is that, in spite of the purification
+of the sexual relations being one of the avowed
+objects of Christianity, in spite, too, of the attempts of
+the official churches to suppress them, the history of
+Christianity has been dogged by outbreaks of sexual
+extravagance, by the continuous emergence of erotico-religious
+sects, claiming Christian teachings as the
+authority for their actions. We need not discuss the
+legitimacy of their inferences. We are concerned solely
+with a chronicle of historic facts so far as they can be
+ascertained; and these have a certain significance of
+their own, as events, quite apart from their reasonableness
+or desirability.</p>
+
+<p>A part cause of the movements we are about to describe
+may have been a violent reaction against an
+extravagant asceticism. Something may also be due
+to the fact that over-concentration of mind upon a
+particular evil is apt to defeat its end by the mere force
+of unconscious suggestion in the contrary direction.
+But in all probability much was due to the presence
+of certain elements inherited by Christianity from the<!-- Page 147 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_147" id="Page_147">[147]</a></span>
+older religions. At any rate, those whose minds are
+filled with the idea that sexual extravagance on a collective
+scale and under the cloak of religion is either a
+modern phenomenon, or was unknown to the early history
+of Christianity, would do well to revise their opinions in the
+light of ascertainable facts. No less a person
+than the Rev. S. Baring-Gould has reminded us that
+criticism discloses "on the shining face of primitive
+Christianity rents and craters undreamt of in our old
+simplicity," and also asserts "that there was in the
+breast of the newborn Church an element of antinomianism,
+not latent, but in virulent activity, is a fact as
+capable of demonstration as any conclusion in a science
+which is not exact."<a name="FNanchor_122_122" id="FNanchor_122_122"></a><a href="#Footnote_122_122" class="fnanchor">[122]</a></p>
+
+<p>There would be little value in a study of these erotico-religious
+movements if they involved only a detection
+of individual lust consciously using religion as
+a cloak for its gratification. Such a conclusion is a
+fatally easy one, but it does little justice to the chief
+people concerned, and it is quite lacking in historical
+perspective. In most cases the initiators of these
+strange sects have put forward a philosophy of religion
+as a justification of their teaching, and only a slight
+knowledge of this is enough to prove that we are face
+to face with a phenomenon of much greater significance
+than mere immorality. This may be recognised
+even in the pages of the New Testament itself. It is
+not a practice that is there denounced; it is a teaching
+that is repudiated. And one sees the same thing
+at later periods. The conviction on the one side that
+certain actions are unlawful, is met on the other side
+with the conviction that they are perfectly legitimate.<!-- Page 148 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_148" id="Page_148">[148]</a></span>
+Conviction is met with conviction. Each side expresses
+itself in terms of religion; the ethical aspect is incidental
+or subordinate. It is a contest of opposing religious
+beliefs and practices.</p>
+
+<p>The real nature of the conflict is often obscured by
+the fact of social opinion and the social forces generally
+being on the side of the more normal expression
+of sexual life. This, however, is no more than a necessity
+of the situation. The continuance of a healthful
+social life is dependent upon the maintenance of a
+certain balance in the relations of the sexes, and anything
+that strikes at this strikes at social life as a whole.
+In such cases we have, therefore, to allow for the operation
+of social selection, which is always on the side of
+the more normal type. From this it follows that although
+a small body of people may exemplify a variation
+that is in itself socially disastrous, the main forces
+of social life will prevent its ever assuming large dimensions.
+Moreover, a large body of people, such as is
+represented by a church holding a commanding position
+in society, will be forced to come to terms with the
+permanent tendencies of social life, and will either suppress
+undesirable variations or expel them. It thus
+happens that while the larger and more dominant
+churches have been on the side of normal, regularised
+expressions of the sexual life, abnormal variations have
+constantly arisen and have been denounced by them.
+But the significant feature is that they have arisen
+within the churches, and most commonly during periods
+of great religious stress or excitement.</p>
+
+<p>These tendencies, as the Rev. S. Baring-Gould has
+pointed out, existed in the very earliest days of Christianity.
+It is quite apparent from Paul's writings that<!-- Page 149 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_149" id="Page_149">[149]</a></span>
+as early as the date of the First Epistle to the Corinthians
+some of the more objectionable features of the
+older Pagan worship had shown themselves in the
+Church. The doctrine of 'spiritual wifehood' appeared
+at a very early date in the Church, and its teachers
+cited even St. Paul himself as their authority. Their
+claim was based upon Paul's declaration (1 Cor. ix. 5)
+that he had power to lead about "a sister, a wife, as
+well as other apostles, and as the brethren of the Lord
+and Cephas." Curiously enough, commentators have
+never agreed as to what Paul meant by this expression.
+The word translated may mean either wife, or sister,
+or woman. Had it been wife in the ordinary sense, it
+does not appear that at that date there would have
+been any room for scandal. The clear fact is, however,
+that others claimed a like privilege; the privilege was
+not always restricted to one woman, and the practice,
+if not general, became not uncommon, and furnished
+the ground for scandal for a long period. Two epistles,
+wrongly attributed to St. Clement of Rome, and dating
+from some time in the second century, condemn
+the practice of young people living together under the
+cloak of religion, and specially warns virgins against
+cohabiting with the clergy and so giving offence. That
+the practice was difficult to suppress is shown by its
+being condemned by several church councils&mdash;Antioch
+in 210, Nicea in 325, and Elvira in 350.<a name="FNanchor_123_123" id="FNanchor_123_123"></a><a href="#Footnote_123_123" class="fnanchor">[123]</a> At a
+later date a much more elaborate theory has been
+built on Paul's claim. The Pauline Church has found
+several expressions both in England and America
+within recent times.<a name="FNanchor_124_124" id="FNanchor_124_124"></a><a href="#Footnote_124_124" class="fnanchor">[124]</a> These sects have claimed that<!-- Page 150 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_150" id="Page_150">[150]</a></span>
+both St. Paul and the woman with whom he travelled
+were in a state of grace, and, therefore, above all law.
+We do not mean the maintenance of an ascetic relationship,
+but the normal relation of husband and wife.
+It is really the doctrine of 'Free Love' with a spiritual
+warranty instead of a secular one.</p>
+
+<p>This doctrine of religious 'Free Love' rests upon
+a twofold basis. First, it was held that, apart from a
+wife after the flesh, one might also have a wife after the
+spirit, and this spiritual union might exist side by side
+with the fleshly one, and with different persons. A
+great impetus appears to have been given to this theory
+from Germany, many of the originators of the American
+sects of Free Lovers being Germans. Secondly,
+it was held that a Christian in a state of grace was absolved
+from laws that were binding upon other people.
+His actions were no longer subject to the categories
+of right and wrong; as it was said, to one in a state of
+grace all things were lawful, even though all things
+might not be expedient. Some went the length of
+teaching that not only were all things lawful, but all
+things were desirable. Separating by a sharp division
+things that influenced the soul from things that influenced
+the body, it was openly taught by some of the
+early sects that nothing done by the body could injure
+the soul, and so could not affect its salvation.
+Reversing the practice of asceticism, which sought to
+crush bodily passions by a course of deprivation, it
+was taught that all kinds of forbidden conduct might
+be practised in order to demonstrate the soul's superiority.
+There is no question whatever that this tendency
+was very prominent in the early Christian
+Church. It was not there as something hidden, some<!-- Page 151 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_151" id="Page_151">[151]</a></span>thing
+of which men ought to be ashamed; it was an
+avowed teaching, claiming full religious sanction.
+"The Church," says Baring-Gould, "trembled on the
+verge of becoming an immoral sect." The same writer
+also says:&mdash;</p>
+
+<p>"This <em>teaching</em> of immorality in the Church is a
+startling feature, and it seems to have been pursued by
+some who called themselves apostles as well as by
+those who assumed to be prophets. In the Corinthian
+Church even the elders encouraged incest. Now, it is
+not possible to explain this phenomenon except on
+the ground that Paul's argument as to the Law being
+overridden had been laid hold of and elevated into a
+principle. These teachers did not wink at lapses into
+immorality, but defiantly urged on the converts to
+the Gospel to commit adultery, fornication, and all
+uncleanness ... as a protest against those who contended
+that the moral law as given on the tables was
+still binding upon the Church."<a name="FNanchor_125_125" id="FNanchor_125_125"></a><a href="#Footnote_125_125" class="fnanchor">[125]</a></p>
+
+<p>A certain detachment from modern conditions,
+and from modern frames of mind, is essential to an
+adequate appreciation of what has been said. Looking
+at these events through the distorting medium of
+an altogether different social atmosphere, one is apt
+to attribute them to the operation of lawless desire,
+and so have done with it. This, however, is to overlook
+the fact that we are dealing with a society in which
+sexual symbols were common in religious worship,
+and in which theories of the religious life were propounded
+and accepted which to-day would be regarded
+as little less than maniacal. Unquestionably
+even then, once the situation had established itself it<!-- Page 152 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_152" id="Page_152">[152]</a></span>
+would be utilised by those of a coarser nature for mere
+sensual gratification. But practices such as we know
+existed, on the scale we have every reason for believing
+they were, could never have been had they not
+taken the form of an intense conviction. To assume
+otherwise is equal to arguing that because men have
+entered the Church from mere love of power or lust for
+wealth, the Church owed its establishment to the
+play of these motives. It is true that those who opposed
+these religio-erotic sects accused them of immorality,
+but it is the form these teachings assumed
+to the members of the impeached sects, not how they
+appeared to their enemies, that is important. Eroticism
+taught and practised as a religious conviction&mdash;that is
+the essential and significant feature of the situation.
+Not to grasp this is to fail to realise the vital fact embodied
+in the phenomena under consideration. We
+are not dealing with mere sensualists, even though
+we may be dealing with what is largely an expression
+of sensualism. It is sensualism expressed as, and sanctioned
+by, religious conviction that is the vital fact of
+the situation.</p>
+
+<p>One of the earliest Christian institutions around
+which scandals gathered was that of the Agapæ, or
+love-feasts. From the outset the Pagan writers asserted
+that these love-feasts were new versions of
+various old orgiastic practices, some of which were
+still current, others of which had been suppressed by
+the Roman government. There is no doubt that they
+were the grounds of very serious accusations against
+the Christians. On the other hand, it must be remembered
+that, at the outset at least, these charges were
+indignantly rejected by the Christians. The Agapæ<!-- Page 153 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_153" id="Page_153">[153]</a></span>
+were called indiscriminately Feasts of Love and
+Feasts of Charity. Each member, male and female,
+greeted each other with a holy kiss, and the institution
+was described by Tertullian as "a support of love, a
+solace of purity, a check on riches, a discipline of weakness."
+These love-feasts were held on important occasions,
+such as a marriage, a death, or the anniversary
+of a martyrdom. Some churches celebrated them
+weekly. From the Acts of the Apostles we learn that
+the feasts began about nightfall, and continued till after
+midnight, or even till daybreak. It was only natural
+that mixed assemblies of men and women that
+gathered in this manner, and where there was eating
+and drinking, should create scandal. It is absolutely
+certain that some of this scandal had a basis in fact.
+The Rev. S. Baring-Gould confesses that "at Corinth,
+and certainly elsewhere, among excitable people, the
+wine, the heat, the exaltation of emotion, led to orgiastic
+ravings, the jabbering of disconnected, unintelligible
+words, to fits, convulsions, pious exclamations,
+and incoherent ravings." And unless St. Paul was deliberately
+slandering his fellow-believers worse things
+than these occurred.</p>
+
+<p>Generally, even by non-Christian writers, it has been
+assumed that the Agapæ commenced as a perfectly
+harmless, even admirable institution, and afterwards
+degenerated, and so gave genuine cause for scandal.
+It is not easy to see that this opinion rests on anything
+better than a mere prejudice. It is true that there is no
+unmistakable evidence to the contrary, but no clear
+evidence is to be found in its behalf. The Agapæ was
+not, after all, an essentially Christian institution. Similar
+gatherings existed among the Pagans, more or less<!-- Page 154 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_154" id="Page_154">[154]</a></span>
+orgiastic in character. And even though at first some
+of the more extreme forms were avoided amongst the
+Christians, it is not improbable, on the face of it, that
+some kind of sexual extravagance or symbolism was
+present from the outset. At any rate, as I have said,
+the charges were made, first by Pagans, afterwards by
+Christians against other Christians. The charges were
+persistent, and were made in districts far removed
+from each other. Says Lecky: "When the Pagans accused
+the Christians of indulging in orgies of gross licentiousness,
+the first apologist, while repudiating the
+charge, was careful to add, of the heretics, 'Whether
+or not these people commit those shameful acts ...
+I know not.' In a few years the language of doubt
+and insinuation was exchanged for that of direct assertion;
+and if we may believe St. Irenæus and St.
+Clement of Alexandria, the followers of Carpocrates,
+the Marcionites, and some other gnostic sects habitually
+indulged, in their secret meetings, in acts of impurity
+and licentiousness as hideous and as monstrous
+as can be conceived, and their conduct was one of the
+causes of the persecution of the orthodox."<a name="FNanchor_126_126" id="FNanchor_126_126"></a><a href="#Footnote_126_126" class="fnanchor">[126]</a> Tertullian
+accused some of the sects of practising incestuous
+intercourse at the Agapæ. Ambrose compared
+the institution to the Pagan Parentalia. Clement says,
+probably referring to the Agapæ, "the shameless use
+of the rite occasions foul suspicion and evil reports."
+The first epistle on Virginity by the Pseudo-Clement
+(probably written in the second century) admits the
+existence of immorality by saying, "Others eat and
+drink with them (<i>i.e.</i> the virgins) at feasts, and indulge
+in loose behaviour and much uncleanness, such<!-- Page 155 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_155" id="Page_155">[155]</a></span>
+as ought not to be among those who have elected holiness
+for themselves." Justin Martyr, referring to certain
+sects, says more cautiously: "Whether or not these
+people commit these shameful acts (the putting out of
+lights, and indulging in promiscuous intercourse) I
+know not." Others are more precise in their charges.
+That the Agapæ became the legitimate cause of complaint
+is admitted by all. The only question is whether
+it was the institution itself or the public mind in relation
+to it that underwent a change. Eventually, on the
+avowed ground of evil conduct, the Agapæ were forbidden
+by the Council of Carthage, 391, of Orleans,
+541, and of Constantinople, 680.</p>
+
+<p>The whole subject is obscure, but the one certain
+and significant thing is that charges of licentiousness
+were connected with the Agapæ from the outset.
+These may at first have been unfounded or exaggerated.
+On the other hand, it is quite probable that just
+as Christianity continued Pagan ceremonies in other
+directions, so there was also a carrying over into the
+Church of some of the sexual rites and ceremonies
+connected with earlier forms of worship. And we know
+that the principle of Antinomianism, a prolific cause
+of evil at all times, was active amongst the Christians
+from the outset.</p>
+
+<p>It is almost impossible to say at this distance how
+many sects exhibiting marked erotic tendencies appeared
+in the early Christian centuries. Many must
+have disappeared and left no trace of their existence.
+But there can be no question that they were fairly numerous.
+The extensive sect, or sects, of the gnostics
+contained in its teachings elements that at least paved
+the way for the conduct with which other Christians<!-- Page 156 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_156" id="Page_156">[156]</a></span>
+charged them, although the charges made may not
+have been true of all. To some of the gnostic sects belongs
+the teaching&mdash;quite in accord with the doctrine
+of the evil nature of the world, that liberation from the
+'Law' was one of the first conditions of spiritual freedom.
+From this came the teaching, subsequently held
+by numerous other sects, that those born of the Spirit
+could not be defiled by any acts of the flesh, and that
+so-called vicious actions were rather to be encouraged
+as providing experience useful to spiritual welfare.
+Some branches of the gnostics had 'spiritual marriages,'
+similar to what existed in India in the Sakti
+rites already described. Thus the Adamites, a rather
+obscure gnostic sect of the second century, attempted
+to imitate the Edenic state by condemning marriage
+and abandoning clothing. Their assemblies were held
+underground, and on entering the place of worship
+both sexes stripped themselves naked, and in that
+state performed their ceremonies. They called their
+church Paradise, from which all dissentients were
+promptly expelled. The Adamites themselves claimed
+that their object was to extirpate desire by familiarising
+the senses to strict control. Their religious opponents
+gave a very different account of the practice,
+and it is not difficult to realise, whatever may have
+been the motive of the founders, the consequences of
+such a practice. It is curious, by the way, to observe
+how strong religious excitement seems to lead people
+to discard clothing. Thus, during the Crusade of 1203-42
+the women crusaders rushed about the streets in
+a state of nudity.<a name="FNanchor_127_127" id="FNanchor_127_127"></a><a href="#Footnote_127_127" class="fnanchor">[127]</a> During the wars of the League in
+France, men and women walked naked in procession<!-- Page 157 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_157" id="Page_157">[157]</a></span>
+headed by the clergy.<a name="FNanchor_128_128" id="FNanchor_128_128"></a><a href="#Footnote_128_128" class="fnanchor">[128]</a> Other examples of this curious
+practice might be given.</p>
+
+<p>The Nicolaitanes, a second-century sect referred to
+in the New Testament (Rev. ii. 14), were accused of
+practising religious prostitution. So also were the
+Manichæans, a very numerous sect, against whom
+the charges were of a much more detailed character.
+With them the ceremonial violation of a virgin is said
+to have formed a part of their regular ritual, and that
+their meetings frequently ended in an orgy of promiscuous
+intercourse.<a name="FNanchor_129_129" id="FNanchor_129_129"></a><a href="#Footnote_129_129" class="fnanchor">[129]</a> As both these acts are found in
+connection with other religious ceremonies, and, as
+will be seen later, have persisted until recent times,
+the story does not sound so incredible as otherwise
+it might. The difficulty of deciding definitely is intensified
+by the fact of the Manichæans being split into a
+number of sects, and statements true of some might
+be untrue of others. So we find St. Augustine, who had
+been a Manichæan, declaring that if all did not practise
+licentious rites, one sect (the Catharists) did, believing
+that they could only mortify the flesh by the exercise
+of bad instincts, since the flesh proceeded from demons.
+St. Augustine himself confesses to have taken part in
+various phallic ceremonies before his conversion. "I
+myself," he says, "when a young man used to go sometimes
+to the sacrilegious entertainments and spectacles;
+I saw the priests raving in religious excitement,
+and heard the choristers; I took pleasure in the shameful
+games which were celebrated in honour of gods
+and goddesses, of the Virgin C&#339;lestia, and of Berecynthia,
+the mother of all gods. And on the day consecrated<!-- Page 158 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_158" id="Page_158">[158]</a></span>
+to her purification, there were sung before
+her couch productions so obscene and filthy to the ear&mdash;I
+do not say of the mother of the gods, but of the
+mother of any senator or honest man&mdash;nay, so impure
+that not even the mother of the foul-mouthed
+players themselves could have formed one of the audience."<a name="FNanchor_130_130" id="FNanchor_130_130"></a><a href="#Footnote_130_130" class="fnanchor">[130]</a></p>
+
+<p>The Carpocratians, who claimed to be a branch of
+the Gnostics, taught that faith and charity were alone
+necessary virtues: all others were useless. There is
+nothing evil in itself, and life only becomes complete
+when all so-called blemishes are fully displayed in
+conduct. Their leader "not only allowed his disciples
+a full liberty to sin, but recommended a vicious course
+of life as a matter of obligation and necessity; asserting
+that eternal salvation was only attainable by those
+who had committed all sorts of crimes.... It was the
+will of God that all things should be possessed in common,
+the female sex not excepted."<a name="FNanchor_131_131" id="FNanchor_131_131"></a><a href="#Footnote_131_131" class="fnanchor">[131]</a></p>
+
+<p>A little later we have the sect of the Agapetæ. They
+rejected marriage as an institution, and permitted
+unrestrained intercourse between the sexes. St. Jerome,
+alluding to this sect, says: "It is a shame even to
+allude to the true facts. Whence did the pest of the
+Agapetæ creep into the Church? Whence is this new
+title of wives without marriage rites? Whence this
+new class of concubines? I will infer more. Whence
+these harlots cleaving to one man? They occupy the
+same house, a single chamber, often a single bed, and
+call us suspicious if we think anything of it. The
+brother deserts his virgin sister, the virgin despises
+her unmarried brother, and seeks a stranger, and since<!-- Page 159 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_159" id="Page_159">[159]</a></span>
+they pretend to be aiming at the same object, they ask
+for the spiritual consolation of each other that they
+may enjoy the pleasures of the flesh."<a name="FNanchor_132_132" id="FNanchor_132_132"></a><a href="#Footnote_132_132" class="fnanchor">[132]</a></p>
+
+<p>This form of extravagance does not appear to have
+been limited to a single sect. It was more or less general
+during the ascendancy of asceticism. Tertullian
+says that the desire to enjoy the reputation of virginity
+led to much immorality, the effects of which were concealed
+by infanticide. The Council of Antioch lamented
+the practice of unmarried men and women sharing
+the same room. In 450, the Anchorites of Palestine are
+described as herding together without distinction of
+sex, and with no garments but a breech-clout.<a name="FNanchor_133_133" id="FNanchor_133_133"></a><a href="#Footnote_133_133" class="fnanchor">[133]</a> The
+practice of priests travelling about with women,
+mothers and wives, and the scandals created thereby,
+is referred to in regulation after regulation. Although
+legislated against, it never entirely disappeared, and
+eventually led to a recognised priestly concubinage&mdash;recognised,
+that is, by public opinion, although condemned
+by the Church.</p>
+
+<p>There is no need to go over even the names of all the
+numerous sects that appeared during the early centuries
+manifesting curious features concerning sexual
+relations. When suppressed in one form they reappeared
+in another, and were unusually prominent during
+seasons of religious unrest. Many of the teachings
+already noted made their appearance again with the
+"Brethren of the Free Spirit" in the thirteenth, fourteenth,
+and fifteenth centuries. Some of these sects
+took their stand on the Pauline teaching, "The law of
+the spirit of life in Jesus Christ hath made me free from<!-- Page 160 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_160" id="Page_160">[160]</a></span>
+the law of sin and death," and claimed freedom from
+sin, no matter what their actions. The "Brethren of
+the Free Spirit" carried women about with them,
+held midnight assemblies, and, according to Mosheim,
+attended these meetings in a state of nudity. The
+Ranters, the Spirituels of Geneva, the Berghards, the
+Flagellants, the Molinists, were all accused of sexual
+misconduct in their assemblies. One of the specific
+teachings of the last-named body, as condemned by the
+Inquisition, ran as follows: "God, to humble us, permits
+in certain perfect souls that the devil should make
+them commit certain acts. In this case, and in others,
+which without the permission of God, would be guilty,
+there is no sin because there is no consent. It may
+happen, that this violent movement, which excites to
+carnal acts, may take place in two persons, a man and
+a woman, at the same instant."<a name="FNanchor_134_134" id="FNanchor_134_134"></a><a href="#Footnote_134_134" class="fnanchor">[134]</a></p>
+
+<p>It has been pointed out that the dominant Church
+made continuous efforts to suppress these sects, but
+the remarkable thing is that they should so often reappear,
+and always with strong claims to existence
+on the basis of religious conviction. That a number
+of men and women should seek gratification of their
+sensual feelings in ways not countenanced by the laws
+of normal life need not excite surprise. There always
+have been and always will be such. But to do this in the
+name of religion, and with a persistency as great as
+that of the religious idea itself, is a phenomenon that
+surely deserves more attention than it ordinarily receives.
+Nor can it be said with justice that these sects
+began in mere conscious lust. They ended there, true;
+more or less disguised, it may always have been present,<!-- Page 161 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_161" id="Page_161">[161]</a></span>
+but those who initiated them believed that they
+were justified in doing so by religious principles, and
+appealed to those principles to justify their conduct.
+Why should this have been the case? Why should conduct
+of which men and women are ashamed in the social
+sphere, and which their social sense promptly condemns,
+in the religious sphere be crowned with the
+dignity of lofty principles and fought for with the fervour
+of intense conviction? So long as theologians
+leave that question unanswered, their arguments are
+simply wide of the real issue.</p>
+
+<p>Naturally, the closer we get to our own day, and to
+times when religious feeling is more vigorously controlled
+by purely social forces, these manifestations of
+sexuality become less frequent, less widely spread,
+and more transient in character. Still they do occur.
+For reasons that do not concern us here, America has
+in recent years been a favourable ground for these
+religio-sexual developments. A sympathetic account
+of many of these American sects will be found in Hepworth
+Dixon's <cite>Spiritual Wives</cite>, with accounts of similar
+sects in Germany and England. In some cases
+many of the features of the early Christian sects were
+reproduced, even to the length of young women sharing
+the bedrooms of their spiritual guides. All took
+Paul as their principal authority. J. H. Noyes, one
+of the best known and most representative of these
+teachers, laid down the main principles of his teachings
+thus:&mdash;</p>
+
+<p>"When the will of God is done on earth as it is in
+heaven, there will be no marriage. The marriage supper
+of the Lamb is a feast at which every dish is free
+to every guest. Exclusiveness, jealousy, quarrelling,<!-- Page 162 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_162" id="Page_162">[162]</a></span>
+have no place there, for the same reason as that which
+forbids the guests at a thanksgiving dinner to claim
+each his separate dish, and quarrel with the rest for his
+rights. In a holy community there is no more reason
+why sexual intercourse should be restrained by law,
+than why eating and drinking should be; and there is
+as little occasion for shame in the one case as in the
+other.... The guests of the marriage supper may have
+each his favourite dish, each a dish of his own procuring,
+and that without the jealousy of exclusiveness.
+I call a certain woman my wife; she is yours; she is
+Christ's; and in Him she is the bride of all saints. She
+is dear in the hands of a stranger, and according to my
+promise to her I rejoice."<a name="FNanchor_135_135" id="FNanchor_135_135"></a><a href="#Footnote_135_135" class="fnanchor">[135]</a></p>
+
+<p>In a letter to Mr. Hepworth Dixon, J. H. Noyes
+claims the "right of religious inspiration to shape
+society and dictate the form of family life," and with
+probable accuracy says that the origin of these American
+sects is to be found in revivals:&mdash;</p>
+
+<p>"The philosophy of the matter seems to be this:
+Revivals are theocratic in their very nature; they introduce
+God into human affairs.... In the conservative
+theory of revivals, this power is restricted to the
+conversion of souls; but in actual experience it goes,
+or tends to go, into all the affairs of life.... Religious
+love is very near neighbour to sexual love, and they
+always get mixed in the intimacies and social excitements
+of revivals. The next thing a man wants, after
+he has found the salvation of his soul, is to find his Eve
+and his Paradise.... The course of things may be restated
+thus: Revivals lead to religious love; religious
+love excites the passions; the converts, finding themselves<!-- Page 163 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_163" id="Page_163">[163]</a></span>
+in theocratic liberty, begin to look about for
+their mates and their liberty."<a name="FNanchor_136_136" id="FNanchor_136_136"></a><a href="#Footnote_136_136" class="fnanchor">[136]</a></p>
+
+<p>With regard to the beginnings of these modern
+movements of "Spiritual Wifehood," all involving the
+abrogation of the normal relations of the sexes, Hepworth
+Dixon writes:&mdash;</p>
+
+<p>"It has not, I think, been noticed by any writer that
+three of the most singular movements in the churches
+of our generation seem to have been connected, more
+or less closely, with the state of mind produced by
+revivals; one in Germany, one in England, and one in
+the United States; movements which resulted, among
+other things, in the establishment of three singular
+societies&mdash;the congregation of Pietists, vulgarly called
+the Mucker, at Königsberg; the brotherhood of Princeites
+at Spaxton; and the Bible Communists at Oneida
+Creek.... They had these chief things in common:
+they began in colleges, they affected the form of family
+life, and they were carried on by clergymen; each
+movement in a place of learning and of theological
+study: that in Germany at the Luther-Kirch of Königsberg,
+that in England at St. David's College, that in
+the United States at Yale College.... These three
+divines, one Lutheran, one Anglican, one Congregational,
+began their work in perfect ignorance of each
+other.... Each movement was regarded by its votaries
+as the most perfect fruit of the revival spirit. In
+truth, the change which came upon the saints from
+their close experience of revival passion, was regarded
+by themselves as in some degree miraculous, equal in
+divine significance to a new creation of the world."<a name="FNanchor_137_137" id="FNanchor_137_137"></a><a href="#Footnote_137_137" class="fnanchor">[137]</a></p>
+
+<p><!-- Page 164 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_164" id="Page_164">[164]</a></span>
+For an almost exact replica of the erotic extravagances
+of some of the early Christian sects, one may
+turn to Russia. The difficulties and dangers of political
+life in Russia are doubtless responsible for having
+made religion such a power among the mass of the
+people, and this will also explain the diversion into
+religious channels of energy that under more favourable
+conditions is expended in social agitation and
+activity. Many of these sects are, of course, of a harmless
+character, mostly originating in an even greater
+love for the past and a more slavish adherence to
+ancient formulas than is displayed by the orthodox
+Church. Some, however, present the wildest excesses
+of sexual theory and practice. Nothing seems too wild
+or too extravagant to become the originating point
+of a new sect. Theories of marriage and sexual relations
+generally are developed with a logical fearlessness
+peculiarly Russian. Among the Bezpopovtsi, a
+numerous sect split up into several branches, opinions
+on marriage vary between regarding it as a mere conventional
+affair, and denouncing it as a hindrance
+to spiritual development. "Between these two extremes,"
+says Mr. Heard, "there is room for the wildest
+and most repulsive theories. Carnal sensuality is
+allied in monstrous union with religious mysticism.
+Free love, independence of the sexes, possession of
+women in common, have been preached and practised.
+Debauchery, as an incidental weakness of human
+nature, has been advocated as the lesser evil;
+libertinism as preferable to concubinage, and the latter
+as better than marriage. One of their most austere
+teachers cynically declares that 'it is wiser to live
+with beasts than to be joined to a wife; to frequent<!-- Page 165 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_165" id="Page_165">[165]</a></span>
+many women in secret, rather than to live with one
+openly.'"<a name="FNanchor_138_138" id="FNanchor_138_138"></a><a href="#Footnote_138_138" class="fnanchor">[138]</a></p>
+
+<p>Another sect called 'Eunuchs' take their stand on
+Matt. xix. 12: "There are some eunuchs, which were
+so born from their mother's womb: and there are some
+eunuchs, which were made eunuchs of men: and there
+be eunuchs, which have made themselves eunuchs for
+the kingdom of heaven's sake. He that is able to receive
+it, let him receive it." This sect believes in and
+practises emasculation as the surest way of attaining
+perfection. Man, they say, should be like the angels,
+without sex and without desire. This practice reminds
+one of an early Christian sect, the Valesians,
+which not only emasculated members of their own
+sect, but performed the same operation forcibly on
+those who fell into their hands.<a name="FNanchor_139_139" id="FNanchor_139_139"></a><a href="#Footnote_139_139" class="fnanchor">[139]</a> The Khlysti, a sect
+which derives its name from the practice of flagellation,
+denounce marriage as unclean, and part of their
+religious ritual is, according to some writers, the worship
+of a naked woman. Baron Von Haxthausen,
+writing in 1856, gives the following description of
+their ceremonies on Easter night:&mdash;</p>
+
+<p>"On this night the Khlysti all assemble for a great
+solemnity, the worship of the mother of God. A virgin,
+fifteen years of age, whom they have induced to act
+the part by tempting promises, is bound and placed
+in a tub of warm water; some old women come, and
+first make a large incision in the left breast, then cut
+it off, and staunch the blood in a wonderfully short
+time. During the operation a mystical picture of the
+Holy Spirit is put into the victim's hand, in order that<!-- Page 166 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_166" id="Page_166">[166]</a></span>
+she may be absorbed in regarding it. The breast
+which has been removed is laid upon a plate and cut
+into small pieces, which are eaten by all the members
+of the sect present; the girl in the tub is then raised
+upon an altar which stands near, and the whole congregation
+dance wildly round it, singing at the same
+time. The jumping then grows madder and wilder,
+till the lights are suddenly extinguished and horrible
+orgies commence."<a name="FNanchor_140_140" id="FNanchor_140_140"></a><a href="#Footnote_140_140" class="fnanchor">[140]</a></p>
+
+<p>The 'Jumpers,' an offshoot of the Khlysti, are much
+more pronounced in their sexual extravagances.
+They openly profess debauchery, for the usual reason,
+that of conquering the flesh by exhaustion and satiety.
+They meet usually by night, and after prayers are
+chanted and hymns sung, the leader commences a
+slow jumping movement, keeping time with a song.
+Then:&mdash;</p>
+
+<p>"The audience, arranged in couples, engaged to
+each other in advance, imitate his example and join
+the strain; the bounds and the singing grow faster
+and louder as it spreads, until, at its height, the elder
+shouts that he hears the voices of angels; the lights
+are extinguished, the jumping ceases, and the scene
+that follows in the darkness defies description. Each
+one yields to his desires, born of inspiration, and therefore
+righteous, and to be gratified; all are brethren
+in Christ, all promptings of the inner spirit are holy;
+incest, even, is no sin. They repudiate marriage,
+and justify their abominations by the Biblical legends<!-- Page 167 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_167" id="Page_167">[167]</a></span>
+of Lot's daughters, Solomon's harem, and the
+like."<a name="FNanchor_141_141" id="FNanchor_141_141"></a><a href="#Footnote_141_141" class="fnanchor">[141]</a></p>
+
+<p>There are many other curious sects in Russia, many
+of which bring us back to the religious atmosphere of
+the European dark ages. But without pursuing a description
+of these to any greater extent, enough has
+been said to show the persistence of the stream of sexualism
+in the history of Christianity. Of course, this
+feature did not enter religion with Christianity. On
+the contrary, I have shown that it was present from
+the earliest times. The association of religion with
+sexual phenomena does not commence as a sexual
+aberration; it only assumes that form at a comparatively
+late stage in religious history. The origin of the
+connection has to be found in that atmosphere of the
+supernatural which envelops primitive life, moulds
+primitive conceptions, and more or less fashions all
+primitive institutions. The sexual side of religious belief
+and religious symbolism only becomes abnormal,
+and even morbid, when the development of social life
+makes possible a truer view of sexuality. In this the
+great churches have, perhaps, unconsciously assisted.
+Their position of social control has compelled them
+to set their faces against the sexual symbolism which
+is so closely associated with early religious history,
+while at the same time countenancing religious fervour
+in general. The consequence has been that small
+bodies of men and women, freed from the restraining
+influence of social responsibility, have developed to
+extravagant length certain phases of religious belief
+that have been generally discountenanced elsewhere.
+Their so doing certainly helps the present-day student<!-- Page 168 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_168" id="Page_168">[168]</a></span>
+to make a more complete survey of all the factors that
+have played their part in religious history than would
+otherwise have been possible. Repulsive as some of
+these features now are, they have helped in their time
+to nourish the general belief in a supernatural order,
+and so to strengthen the general idea to which they
+were affiliated.</p>
+
+<div class="footnotes">
+<h3>Footnotes:<br />
+<span class="skip">[<a href="#Page_169">Skip</a>]</span>
+</h3>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_121_121" id="Footnote_121_121"></a><a href="#FNanchor_121_121"><span class="label">[121]</span></a> <cite>The Future of Science</cite>, p. 465.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_122_122" id="Footnote_122_122"></a><a href="#FNanchor_122_122"><span class="label">[122]</span></a> <cite>Lost and Hostile Gospels</cite>, Preface, p. 7.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_123_123" id="Footnote_123_123"></a><a href="#FNanchor_123_123"><span class="label">[123]</span></a> See Baring-Gould's <cite>Study of St. Paul</cite>, pp. 450-1.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_124_124" id="Footnote_124_124"></a><a href="#FNanchor_124_124"><span class="label">[124]</span></a> See
+Hepworth Dixon's curious work, <cite>Spiritual Wives</cite>, 1888, 2 vols.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_125_125" id="Footnote_125_125"></a><a href="#FNanchor_125_125"><span class="label">[125]</span></a> <cite>Study of St. Paul</cite>, p. 458.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_126_126" id="Footnote_126_126"></a><a href="#FNanchor_126_126"><span class="label">[126]</span></a> <cite>History of European Morals</cite>, i. p. 417.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_127_127" id="Footnote_127_127"></a><a href="#FNanchor_127_127"><span class="label">[127]</span></a> Cutten, <cite>Psychological Christianity</cite>, p. 157.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_128_128" id="Footnote_128_128"></a><a href="#FNanchor_128_128"><span class="label">[128]</span></a> Sanger, <cite>History of Prostitution</cite>, p. 116.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_129_129" id="Footnote_129_129"></a><a href="#FNanchor_129_129"><span class="label">[129]</span></a> See Blunt's <cite>Dictionary of Sects</cite>, art. "Manichæans."</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_130_130" id="Footnote_130_130"></a><a href="#FNanchor_130_130"><span class="label">[130]</span></a> <cite>De Civitate Dei</cite>, ii. 4.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_131_131" id="Footnote_131_131"></a><a href="#FNanchor_131_131"><span class="label">[131]</span></a> Mosheim, <cite>Cent. 2</cite>, chap. v. sec. 4.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_132_132" id="Footnote_132_132"></a><a href="#FNanchor_132_132"><span class="label">[132]</span></a> <cite>Dictionary of Sects</cite>, p. 13.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_133_133" id="Footnote_133_133"></a><a href="#FNanchor_133_133"><span class="label">[133]</span></a> Lea, <cite>Hist. of Sacerdotal Celibacy</cite>, 1884, p. 42.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_134_134" id="Footnote_134_134"></a><a href="#FNanchor_134_134"><span class="label">[134]</span></a> Cited by Michelet, <cite>Priests, Women, and Families</cite>, p. 130.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_135_135" id="Footnote_135_135"></a><a href="#FNanchor_135_135"><span class="label">[135]</span></a> <cite>Spiritual Wives</cite>, ii. pp. 55-6.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_136_136" id="Footnote_136_136"></a><a href="#FNanchor_136_136"><span class="label">[136]</span></a> <cite>Spiritual Wives</cite>, pp. 176-7, 181.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_137_137" id="Footnote_137_137"></a><a href="#FNanchor_137_137"><span class="label">[137]</span></a> <i>Ibid.</i>, pp. 84-6.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_138_138" id="Footnote_138_138"></a><a href="#FNanchor_138_138"><span class="label">[138]</span></a> <cite>The Russian Church and Russian Dissent</cite>, p. 201.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_139_139" id="Footnote_139_139"></a><a href="#FNanchor_139_139"><span class="label">[139]</span></a> Lea, <cite>Hist. of Sacerdotal Celibacy</cite>, p. 40.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_140_140" id="Footnote_140_140"></a><a href="#FNanchor_140_140"><span class="label">[140]</span></a> <cite>Visit to the Russian Empire</cite>, i. p. 254. Merejkowski, in his
+historical novel, <cite>Peter and Alexis</cite>, gives a more detailed account
+of the sexual ceremonies of this sect. See also Heard's description,
+<cite>Russian Church</cite>, p. 258.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_141_141" id="Footnote_141_141"></a><a href="#FNanchor_141_141"><span class="label">[141]</span></a> <cite>Russian Church and Russian Dissent</cite>, p. 262.</p></div>
+</div>
+
+<p><!-- Page 169 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_169" id="Page_169">[169]</a></span></p>
+
+<h2>CHAPTER <span class="cgap">SEVEN</span><br />
+CONVERSION</h2>
+
+<p>From what has been already said,
+it should be clear that a complete understanding of religious
+phenomena&mdash;whether legitimately or wrongly
+so called&mdash;involves acquaintance with a number of
+factors that are not usually called religious. Man's religious
+beliefs are usually a very composite product;
+they are built up from a number of states of feeling
+and mental convictions, some of which have only an
+accidental connection with the religious idea itself.
+Unfortunately, the training given to professional religious
+teachers rarely equips them for dealing with
+religion from the scientific point of view. Their training
+gives them a knowledge of several ancient languages,
+makes them acquainted with the rise and fall of
+certain doctrines, the nature of Church ritual and the
+like, all of which, while interesting enough in themselves,
+give little more genuine enlightenment than a
+knowledge of the dates of English monarchs provides
+of the character of genuine historic processes. One
+writer pertinently asks:&mdash;</p>
+
+<p>"What does the ordinary seminary graduate know
+of the histology, anatomy, and physiology of the soul?
+Absolutely nothing. He must stumble along through
+years of trying experience and look back over countless
+mistakes before he understands these things even
+in a general way. What does the ordinary graduate
+understand about doubt? It is all classed together,
+whether in adolescents or in hardened sinners, and
+one dose is applied. What does the graduate know
+about sexuality, so closely allied with certain forms
+of religious manifestations? What about ecstasy,
+in its various forms, the numerous methods of faith
+cure thrust upon an illiterate but credulous people,<!-- Page 170 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_170" id="Page_170">[170]</a></span>
+or the significance or insignificance of visions and
+dreams?"<a name="FNanchor_142_142" id="FNanchor_142_142"></a><a href="#Footnote_142_142" class="fnanchor">[142]</a></p>
+
+<p>It is, indeed, not too much to say that a theological
+training tends to prevent a rational comprehension of
+religion in both its normal and abnormal manifestations.
+Religious phenomena are not affiliated to phenomena
+as a whole; they are treated as quite distinct
+from the rest of life, possessing both an independent
+origin and justification. The consequence is that what
+are usually called studies of religion move round and
+round the same circle of ideas, and a revolution is mistaken
+for progress. Genuine enlightenment has come
+to us from men who have attacked the subject from a
+quite different point of view. They recognised that
+whether the religious idea was accepted as true or rejected
+as false, it could not be separated from that host
+of ideas and beliefs which make up the psychological
+side of the social structure. It was to be studied as a
+piece of natural history first of all. Whether it involved
+more than this they left to be settled later. It cannot
+be said that they belittled the <em>power</em> of religion; on
+the contrary, the investigations showed it to be one of
+the most potent of the forces that shape social institutions.
+But they demonstrated the absurdity of placing
+religion in a category of its own. As an objective fact,
+they showed that religion was subject to the same forces
+that determine the form of other objective facts. As
+a culture fact, they traced its connection with corresponding
+phases of social development; and as a psychological
+fact, they demonstrated its workings to be
+in harmony with workings of normal psychological<!-- Page 171 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_171" id="Page_171">[171]</a></span>
+laws. Five thousand years of theological study had
+left the world as ignorant of the nature of religious
+phenomena as it was in the days of ancient Chaldea.
+Fifty years of scientific study has served to make at
+least a broad path through what was hitherto an impenetrable
+jungle.</p>
+
+<p>What has been said holds with peculiar force of the
+subject of conversion. This is not a phenomenon peculiar
+to Christianity, for initiation and conversion accompanies
+religion in all its phases. I do not think
+that it is peculiar to religion even as a whole. A sudden
+discharge of feeling in a special direction leading to a
+changed attitude, more or less permanent towards life,
+may be seen in connection with the non-religious life,
+although it fails to receive the attention bestowed on
+changes that are connected with religion. But if conversion
+is not a peculiarly Christian phenomenon, one
+school of theologians, at least, has raised it to a position
+of peculiar eminence in connection with Christianity.
+They have taken it to be the mark of a person who
+has attained spiritual manhood, and have laid down
+elaborate rules for its achievement. Many theologians
+will agree that this has been almost wholly disastrous.
+On the one side, conversion has been dwelt upon as a
+cataclysmal epoch in a person's life, produced, negatively,
+by an act of self-surrender, and, positively, by
+a supernatural act of grace. This has had the effect of
+blinding people to the real nature of the process, and
+has led to certain evil consequences that must always
+accompany attempts at wholesale conversion. On the
+other hand, it has given rise to a class of professional
+evangelists who count their trophies in 'souls' as a
+Red Indian might count scalps, and who are ignorant<!-- Page 172 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_172" id="Page_172">[172]</a></span>
+of nearly everything except the art of working upon
+the emotions of a crowd of more or less uncultured
+people. Here, for instance, is an account of an American
+evangelist and ex-prize fighter, and evidently a
+great favourite with certain sections of the religious
+public in America. The account is cited by Dr. Cutten
+from a local paper, Illinois:&mdash;</p>
+
+<p>"5843 converts, 683 in a day. Total gift to Mr.
+Sunday, $10,431. Greatest revival in history. Will attract
+the attention of the religious world. Sermon on
+'Booze,' the great effort of the revival! These are all
+headlines to the report of the meeting, which covers
+six columns&mdash;evidently a response to the interest
+shown in 'Billy' Sunday's meetings. The sermon on
+'Booze' is given in full, and the physical exertions of
+the preacher described in detail. He began with his
+coat, vest, tie, and collar off. In a few moments his shirt
+and undershirt were gaping open to the waist, and the
+muscles of his neck and chest were seen working like
+those in the arm of a blacksmith, while perspiration
+poured from every pore. His clothing was soaked, as
+if a hose had been turned on him. He strained, and
+twisted, and reached up and down. Once he was on
+the floor for just a second, in the attitude of crawling,
+to show that all crime crawled out of the saloon; then
+he was on his feet as quickly as a cat could jump. At
+the end of forty-five minutes he mounted a chair,
+reached high, as he shouted, then again was on the
+floor, and dropped prostrate to illustrate a story of a
+drunken man, bounded to his feet again as if steel
+springs filled that lithe, slender, lightning-like body.
+He generally breaks a common kitchen chair in this
+sermon, and this came after a terrible effort, with eyes<!-- Page 173 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_173" id="Page_173">[173]</a></span>
+flashing, face scowling, the picture of hate. He whirled
+the chair over his head, smashed the chair to the platform
+floor, whirled the shattered wreck in the air again,
+and threw it to the ground in front of the pulpit. In
+two minutes men from the front row were tearing the
+wreck to pieces and dividing it up&mdash;a round here, a
+leg there, a piece of the back to another, and so on.
+Later, men carried away in cheering could be seen in
+the audience waving those chair fragments in the air."</p>
+
+<p>This is, of course, an extreme case, although it is but
+an exaggeration of methods in common use among
+these professional revivalists. The whole aim and
+purpose of these men is to arouse in the audience a
+high emotional tension, and any means is acceptable
+that succeeds in doing this. On the part of the congregation
+a large portion go for the express purpose
+of indulging in an emotional debauch. Many attend
+revival after revival, living over again the debauch
+of the last, and treasuring lively expectations of the
+next. Between these and the victim of alcohol tasting
+again his last 'burst,' and seeking opportunities for
+another, there is really little moral or psychological
+distinction. The social consequences of these engineered
+revivals have never been fully worked out, but
+when it is done by some competent person, the conclusions
+will be a revelation to many. One thing is certain:
+to expect really useful social results from such methods
+is verily to look to gather grapes from thistles.</p>
+
+<p>During recent years the phenomena of religious
+conversion have been studied in a more scientific spirit.<a name="FNanchor_143_143" id="FNanchor_143_143"></a><a href="#Footnote_143_143" class="fnanchor">[143]</a>
+Statistics have been compiled and analysed, the<!-- Page 174 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_174" id="Page_174">[174]</a></span>
+frames of mind attendant on conversion arranged
+and studied, with the result that the salient features
+are to be discerned by all who approach the study of
+the subject with a little detachment of mind. One
+outstanding feature of this more scientific enquiry into
+the nature of conversion has been to demonstrate
+that it is almost exclusively a phenomenon of puberty
+and adolescence. Mr. Hall has compiled a lengthy
+list of the ages at which noted religious characters
+experienced what is known as conversion.<a name="FNanchor_144_144" id="FNanchor_144_144"></a><a href="#Footnote_144_144" class="fnanchor">[144]</a> From this
+I take the following examples. Religious conviction
+came to St. Thekla at the age of 18, to St. Agnes at
+13, St. Antony at 18, Martin of Tours at 18, Euphrasia
+at 12, Benedict at 14, Cuthbert at 15, St. Bernard
+at 12, St. Dominic at 15, St. Collette at 20, St.
+Catherine at 7, St. Teresa at 12, St. Francis of Sales
+at 11. In his <cite>Life of Jesus</cite>, Keim also remarks that
+although some of the disciples may have been married,
+most of them were probably about twenty years
+of age.<a name="FNanchor_145_145" id="FNanchor_145_145"></a><a href="#Footnote_145_145" class="fnanchor">[145]</a></p>
+
+<p>Professor Starbuck, placing on one side both historical
+and anthropological aspects, set himself the
+task of examining cases of the present day. A paper
+was sent out asking various questions as to age, state
+of health, frame of mind, before, during, and following
+conversion. The questions were sent to male and female<!-- Page 175 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_175" id="Page_175">[175]</a></span>
+members of different religious denominations.
+In reply, 1265 papers were filled up and returned.
+One result of a scrutiny of these returns was to show
+that the age at which religious conversion was experienced
+began as early as 7 or 8 years, it increased gradually
+till 10 or 11, then a more rapid increase till 18
+or 20, a decline increasing in rapidity to the age
+of 25, and its practical disappearance beyond the age
+of 30. In girls, the period of conversion antedates
+that of boys by about two years.<a name="FNanchor_146_146" id="FNanchor_146_146"></a><a href="#Footnote_146_146" class="fnanchor">[146]</a> Starbuck's conclusion
+is the perfectly valid one that conversion "belongs
+almost exclusively to the years between 10
+and 25," and is distinctly a phenomenon of adolescence.</p>
+
+<p>This conclusion would be borne out by a study of
+almost any revival crusade. Thus a few years ago&mdash;1904&mdash;England
+received a visit from the American
+evangelist, Dr. Torrey. At the conclusion of his visit,
+Sir Robertson Nicol invited opinions from ministers
+in the towns visited by Torrey, and published the
+replies in his paper, <cite>The British Weekly</cite>, on October
+27. There was no attempt whatever to elicit the ages
+of the reported converts; the enquiry was directed to
+the point of ascertaining whether these engineered
+missions had a beneficial effect on church life, or the
+reverse. But incidentally the ages of the converts
+were given in some cases, and one may safely assume
+that in the reports where no age was mentioned the
+facts, if disclosed, would not run counter to the generalisation
+above given. The Rev. T. Towers, Birmingham,
+noted that 16 out of 25 reported converts were<!-- Page 176 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_176" id="Page_176">[176]</a></span>
+children. Rev. A. Le Gros, Rugby, reported: "A number
+of our youngest members, especially amongst
+the young girls, were amongst those who professed
+conversion." Rev. H. Singleton, Smethwick, says:
+"The bulk of the names sent to me were those of children
+under thirteen years of age." Rev. W. G. Percival,
+Lozells Congregational Church, says of the 'inquiry'
+meeting held after the preaching: "The dear little
+things followed one another for inquiry until the place
+was a scene of utter confusion." Reports of a similar
+nature came from other places. The ages were pointed
+out quite incidentally; conversions of youths of 17
+or 18 would not excite comment with these. Were the
+ages of all given, we should, without doubt, find them
+fall into line with Starbuck's and Hall's figures.</p>
+
+<p>Professor James quite accepts this view of conversion.
+The conclusion, he says, "would seem to be the
+only sound one: conversion is in its essence a normal
+adolescent phenomenon, incidental to the passage
+from the child's small universe to the wider intellectual
+and spiritual life of maturity."<a name="FNanchor_147_147" id="FNanchor_147_147"></a><a href="#Footnote_147_147" class="fnanchor">[147]</a> Conversion,
+in the sense of a change from "the child's small universe"
+to the large world of human society, may be a
+normal fact in life, but the really essential fact in the
+enquiry is not the fact of growth, but growth in a
+specific direction. Why should this normal change
+from childhood to maturity be the period during which
+<em>religious</em> conversion is experienced? This question is
+not only ignored by Professor James, it is made more
+confused by his method of stating it. Of course, if all
+people experienced this religious conviction, as all
+people undergo other changes at adolescence, the<!-- Page 177 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_177" id="Page_177">[177]</a></span>
+question would be simplified. But this is obviously
+not the case. A large number of people never experience
+it so long as they are only brought into contact
+with ordinary social forces. Special circumstances
+seem usually to be required to rouse this sense of religious
+conviction. Nearly every story of conversion
+turns upon something unusual, unexpected, or dramatic
+occurring as the exciting cause. The question is,
+therefore, why should the line of growth, general with
+all at adolescence, be, in the case of some, diverted into
+religious channels? A study of the subject from this
+point of view will, I think, show that conversion is
+only normal in the sense that in an environment where
+religious influences are powerful each person is normally
+exposed to it. Those on whom the religious influence
+fails to operate experience the change from
+childhood to adolescence, on to complete maturity,
+without their nature evincing any lack of completeness.
+This is the vital truth of which Professor James
+loses sight, and it is ignored by the vast majority of
+writers who treat of the subject.</p>
+
+<p>Leaving, for a while, the statistical view of conversion,
+we may turn to its other aspects. By the more
+advanced of religious teachers to-day the developments
+attendant on adolescence are taken as supplying
+no more than a favourable occasion for directing
+mind and emotion to definite religious conviction.
+Here the connection is admittedly more or less accidental.
+But by the great majority of theologians there is
+assumed a direct supernatural influence in the states
+of mind developed during adolescence. In more primitive
+times the connection is of a yet closer character.
+Puberty does not at this stage represent what a<!-- Page 178 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_178" id="Page_178">[178]</a></span>
+modern would call an awakening of the religious
+consciousness, but a direct impingement of supernatural
+influence. From one point of view this conception
+still remains part of all religious systems,
+however overlaid it may be with modern ideas concerning
+sexual maturity. And we have, as a mere
+matter of historic fact, a whole series of customs
+commencing with the initiatory customs of savages
+and running right on to the modern practice of confirmation.</p>
+
+<p>In a previous chapter it was pointed out what is the
+savage state of mind in relation to the beginnings of
+sex life as it is manifested in both boys and girls.
+Adolescence does not, to the primitive mind, serve as
+an occasion for the creation of an interest in the religious
+life, it is the sign of direct supernatural influence.
+One consequence of this is the rise of more
+or less elaborate ceremonials marking the initiation
+of youth into direct communion with the spiritual
+forces that govern tribal life.<a name="FNanchor_148_148" id="FNanchor_148_148"></a><a href="#Footnote_148_148" class="fnanchor">[148]</a> Among the Polynesians
+tattooing forms part of the religious ceremony,
+and during the time the marks are healing the boy
+is taboo to the rest of the tribe, owing to his having
+been touched by the gods. With the North American
+Indians the following ceremony seems characteristic:&mdash;</p>
+
+<p>"When a boy has attained the age of fourteen or fifteen
+years he absents himself from his father's lodge,
+lying on the ground in some remote or secluded spot,
+crying to the Great Spirit, and fasting the whole time.
+During this period of peril and abstinence, when he<!-- Page 179 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_179" id="Page_179">[179]</a></span>
+falls asleep, the first animal, bird, or reptile, of which
+he dreams, he considers the Great Spirit has designated
+for his mysterious protector through life."<a name="FNanchor_149_149" id="FNanchor_149_149"></a><a href="#Footnote_149_149" class="fnanchor">[149]</a>
+Similar ceremonies are described by Livingstone
+as existing among the South African tribes. These
+customs are too widespread, and bear too great a
+similarity to be described with reference to many
+races. The variations are unimportant, and such as
+they are they may be studied in the pages of Hall,
+Frazer, and numerous other writers. With girls the
+measures adopted are of a more elaborate character
+than is the case with boys, because, for reasons already
+stated, the occurrence of puberty in girls gives the
+supernatural act a more startling and significant character.
+Hence the strict seclusion of girls almost universally
+practised among uncivilised peoples. The
+precautions taken indicate, as Hartland points out,
+that they are at this period not merely charged with
+a malign influence, but are peculiarly susceptible to
+the onset of powers other than human. And with a
+modification of language the same idea has persisted
+down to our time, even amongst those who would reject
+with indignation the statement that savage ideas
+concerning the nature of puberty form the real basis
+of their own mental attitude.</p>
+
+<p>This truth cannot be too strongly emphasised. To
+ignore it is to miss the whole significance of continuity
+in human institutions and ideas. The ceremonies described
+do, of course, gather round the fact of sexual
+development, but they are not concerned with the
+sexual life, as such. It is sex as a supernatural manifestation
+that is the vital feature of the situation. The<!-- Page 180 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_180" id="Page_180">[180]</a></span>
+governing idea is that puberty marks the direct association
+of the individual with a spiritual world to the
+influence of which the functional changes are due.
+As more accurate conceptions are formed, the older
+and inaccurate one is not altogether discarded. It has
+become incarnate in ceremonies, it is part of the traditional
+psychic life of the people, and the change is one
+of transformation rather than of eradication. In later
+cultural stages the physiological nature of the changes
+are seen, but they are expressed in terms of religion.
+Such expressions as "the soul's awareness of God,"
+"the dawning consciousness of religion," etc., take the
+place of the earlier and more direct animistic interpretation.
+But the essential misinterpretation is retained,
+disguised from careless or uninformed people by the
+use of a modified terminology. But in substance the
+use made of puberty by organised religious forces remains
+the same throughout. We have the same absence
+of a rational explanation in both instances. In
+the one because the state of knowledge makes any
+other impossible; in the other because tradition,
+self-interest, and prejudice prevent its use. It is not
+only in his physical structure that man carries reminiscences
+of a lower form of life; such reminders are
+quite as plentiful in his mental life, and in social institutions.</p>
+
+<p>Even with many who perceive the mechanism of
+conversion its real significance is often missed. For
+the important thing is, not that some people express
+the changes incident to adolescence in terms of religion,
+but that many do not, and also that these find
+complete satisfaction along lines of æsthetic, intellectual,
+or social interest. Yet one often finds it assumed<!-- Page 181 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_181" id="Page_181">[181]</a></span>
+that the difference between the two classes is explained
+by assuming a certain lack of 'spiritual' development
+in the non-religious class. As stated, this is often perilously
+near to impertinence, and in any case is little
+better than the language of a charlatan. In the same
+way, the use of amatory phraseology is often treated
+as the intrusion of the sex element in a sphere
+in which it has no proper place. Enough has already
+been said to furnish good grounds for believing that
+there is much more than this in the phenomenon, and
+that one is justified in treating it as symptomatic of
+the operation of forces of the nature of which the subject
+is quite unaware. The only explanation of the
+facts already cited is that a misinterpretation of sexual
+states lies at the heart of the question. No other
+hypothesis covers the facts; no other hypothesis will
+explain why the larger number of people should find
+complete development in activities that lie outside the
+field of religion.</p>
+
+<p>How easy it is to see the truth and distort it in the
+stating may be seen in the following passage:&mdash;</p>
+
+<p>"Passing over the fact that the period of adolescence
+is noticeably a period of 'susceptibility,' we may take
+as an example of the intrusion or the persistence of
+the sexual elements in conditions of a non-sexual
+kind the frequent association of sexual with religious
+excitement. The appeal made during a religious revival
+to an unconverted person has psychologically
+some resemblance to the attempt of the male to overcome
+the hesitancy of the female. In each case the
+will has to be set aside, and strong suggestive means
+are used; and in both cases the appeal is not of the
+conflict type, but of an intimate, sympathetic, and<!-- Page 182 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_182" id="Page_182">[182]</a></span>
+pleading kind. In the effort to make a moral adjustment,
+it consequently turns out that a technique is
+used which was derived originally from sexual life, and
+the use, so to speak, of the sexual machinery for a
+moral adjustment involves, in some cases, the carrying
+over into the general process of some sexual manifestations."<a name="FNanchor_150_150" id="FNanchor_150_150"></a><a href="#Footnote_150_150" class="fnanchor">[150]</a></p>
+
+<p>The important questions, why religion should so
+powerfully appeal to people at adolescence, why its
+strength should reside so largely in the appeal to
+feelings associated with sexual development, and why
+conversion should be so rarely experienced when the
+period of sexual crisis is past, are quite ignored by Mr.
+Thomas. Yet it is precisely these questions that call
+most loudly for answers, and which, I believe, contain
+the key of the situation.</p>
+
+<p>From many points of view adolescence is perhaps the
+most important epoch in the life of every individual.
+It is a time of great and significant organic growth,
+with the development of new organs and functions,
+and a corresponding transformation of both the emotional
+and intellectual output. So far as the brain, the
+most important organ of all, is concerned, one may
+safely say that before puberty its main function has
+been acquisition. After puberty vast tracts of brain
+tissue become active, and an era of rapid development
+sets in. There is a rapid growth of new nerve connections
+which occasions both physiological and psychological
+unrest.<a name="FNanchor_151_151" id="FNanchor_151_151"></a><a href="#Footnote_151_151" class="fnanchor">[151]</a> An important point to bear in mind,
+also, is that all periods of rapid development involve<!-- Page 183 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_183" id="Page_183">[183]</a></span>
+conditions of relative instability&mdash;one is, in fact, only
+the obverse side of the other. Dr. Mercier says that with
+girls "more or less decided manifestations of hysteria
+are the rule," and with both sexes this instability involves
+a peculiar susceptibility to suggestions and impressions.
+Accompanying the purely physical changes
+the mental and emotional nature undergoes what is
+little less than a transformation. There is less direct
+concern with self, and a more conscious concern with
+others. There is a craving for sympathy, for fellowship,
+a tendency to look at oneself from the outside, so
+to speak, a susceptibility to sights and sounds and
+impressions that formerly had little influence. Each
+one is conscious of new desires, new attractions, expressed
+often only in a vague feeling of unrest, with a
+desire, half shy because half conscious, for the company
+of the opposite sex. The childish desire for protection
+weakens; the more mature desire to protect
+others begins to express itself.</p>
+
+<p>Now, the whole significance of these changes, physical
+and mental, is fundamentally sexual and social.
+Human life, it may be said, has a twofold aspect. As
+a mere animal organism, there is the perpetuation of
+the species, which nature secures by the mere force of
+the sex impulse. As a human being, he is part of a
+social structure, cell in the social tissue, to use Leslie
+Stephen's expressive phrase. And in this direction
+nature secures what is necessary by the presence of
+impulses and cravings as imperious as, and even more
+permanent than, those of mere sex. Of course, in practice
+these two things operate together. By a process of
+selection, the anti-social character is weeded out, and
+the two sets of feelings work together in harmony for<!-- Page 184 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_184" id="Page_184">[184]</a></span>
+the furtherance and the development of the life of the
+species. The species is perpetuated in the interests of
+society; society is perpetuated in the interests of the
+species. Further, it is part of the natural 'plan' that
+there shall be developed impulses and capacities suitable
+to each phase of life as it emerges. Thus it has
+been shown that the lengthening of infancy&mdash;that is,
+the prolongation of the time during which the young
+human being is dependent upon its parents for support
+and protection&mdash;is nature's method of developing
+to a greater degree the capacity of the human animal
+for more complex adjustment. Instead of being launched
+on the world with a number of instincts practically
+fully developed, and so capable of attending to
+its own needs almost as soon as born, man is born with
+few instincts, and a great capacity for education enabling
+him to adjust his conduct to the demands of an
+environment constantly increasing in complexity. In
+the same way it has been shown that the instinct for
+play, practically universal throughout the whole of
+the animal world, is nature's method of preparing the
+young for the more serious business of nature.<a name="FNanchor_152_152" id="FNanchor_152_152"></a><a href="#Footnote_152_152" class="fnanchor">[152]</a> It is,
+therefore, only in line with what is found to be true
+elsewhere that the changes incident to puberty should
+receive their rational interpretation in the necessities
+of social life. That these necessities should be met
+largely by the play of unreasoning impulse is, again,
+quite in line with what occurs in other directions. The
+insistent pressure of social life for thousands of generations
+secures the emergence of needs of the true nature
+of which the individual may be ignorant. In no other<!-- Page 185 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_185" id="Page_185">[185]</a></span>
+way, in fact, could the persistence of the species and of
+human society be secured.</p>
+
+<p>The whole significance, then, of puberty and adolescence
+is the entry of the individual into the larger life
+of the race. It is, too, a statement beyond reasonable
+dispute that if we eliminate religion altogether from
+the environment there is not a single feeling experienced
+at adolescence, not a single intellectual craving,
+that would not undergo full development and receive
+complete satisfaction. The proof of the truth of this
+is that it occurs in a large number of cases. Sacrifice,
+the craving for the ideal, with every other feeling associated
+by many with religion, exist in connection
+with non-religious phases of life. It is idle to argue that
+some people have a craving for religion, and nothing
+but religion will satisfy them. Where an individual is
+in complete ignorance of the nature and significance
+of his own development, and those around him no better
+informed; where, moreover, there are others in a
+position of authority ready with a special interpretation, it
+is not surprising if the religious explanation is
+accepted as the genuine and only one. But in reality
+a sound judgment is formed, not on the basis of what
+some declare they cannot do without, but on the basis
+of what others actually do without, and suffer no observable
+loss in consequence. We do not estimate the
+value of alcohol on the basis of those who declare they
+cannot do without it. The true test is found in those
+who abstain from its use. So, also, in the case of religion.
+That some, even the majority, declare that religious
+belief is essential to their welfare, proves little
+or nothing. Human nature being what it is, and the
+history of society being what it is, it would be surprising<!-- Page 186 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_186" id="Page_186">[186]</a></span>
+were it otherwise. There is much greater significance
+in so large a number of people finding complete
+satisfaction in purely secular activities.</p>
+
+<p>After what has been said of the misinterpretation
+of mental and emotional states in terms of religious
+belief, it is not surprising to find a writer, a clergyman,
+and one with experience of growing boys, express
+himself as follows:&mdash;</p>
+
+<p>"My experience confirms the opinion of the psychologists
+that most boys of the public school age have
+a strongly mystical tendency. This is to be expected,
+on account of the great emotional development of that
+period of life. But it is obscured by the fact that the
+boy is both unwilling and unable to give any verbal
+expression to this tendency. He is unwilling because
+it is something very new and curious in his experience;
+he is often a little frightened of it, and he is exceedingly
+frightened of other people's contempt for it.
+And he is unable, because the words he is accustomed
+to use are valueless in this connection, and he feels
+priggish if he tries to use others.... But, though unexplained, the
+mystical tendency is there, and should be
+appealed to and developed."<a name="FNanchor_153_153" id="FNanchor_153_153"></a><a href="#Footnote_153_153" class="fnanchor">[153]</a></p>
+
+<p>Now, clearly, all that can be reasonably meant by
+saying that a boy of, apparently, from 12 to 16 has a
+mystical tendency, is that the physiological changes
+incident to puberty are accompanied by a mass of
+feeling of a vague and formless character. Naturally,
+his boyish experience is unable to furnish him with
+the means of giving adequate expression to his feelings.
+That can only come with the experience of maturity.
+And with equal inevitability he is at the mercy<!-- Page 187 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_187" id="Page_187">[187]</a></span>
+of the explanation furnished him by those whom he regards
+as his teachers and guides. When he is told that
+this element of 'mysticism' is the awakening of religion
+in his soul, he accepts the explanation precisely
+as he accepts explanations of other things. That this
+'mystical tendency' should be appealed to and developed
+is a statement open to very great doubt. It
+should rather be explained, not perhaps in a brutally
+frank manner, but in a way that would lead the boy to
+see himself as an organic part of society, with definite
+duties and obligations. If this were done, adolescence
+might provide us with the raw material for a
+much greater number of useful and intelligent citizens
+than it does at present. The true nature of the process,
+so elaborately misunderstood by Dr. Temple, is
+clearly outlined by Dr. Mercier:&mdash;</p>
+
+<p>"In connection with normal development, a large
+body of vague and formless feeling arises, and, until
+experience gives it shape, the possessor remains ignorant
+of the source and nature of the feeling. If the circumstances
+are appropriate for the natural outlet and
+expression of the activities, they are expressed in
+affection, and are a source of health and strength to
+the possessor. But if no such outlet exists, the vague,
+voluminous, formless feelings are referred to an occasion
+that is vague, voluminous, and wanting in definite
+form, they are ascribed to the direct influence of the
+Deity, and assume a place in religious emotion."<a name="FNanchor_154_154" id="FNanchor_154_154"></a><a href="#Footnote_154_154" class="fnanchor">[154]</a></p>
+
+<p>Leaving this aspect of the subject for a time, let us
+look more closely at the process of conversion. It has
+already been pointed out that one great feature of adolescence
+is susceptibility to impressions and suggestions.<!-- Page 188 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_188" id="Page_188">[188]</a></span>
+One is not surprised to find, therefore, that in
+Starbuck's collection of cases 34 per cent. of the females
+and 29 per cent. of the males described their conversion
+as being directly due to imitation, social pressure,
+and example. If we were to add to these the
+cases where unconscious imitation and suggestion is
+at work, the proportion would be much greater. Religion, like
+dress, has its modes, and imitation will occur
+in the one direction as readily as in the other. Nothing
+is more striking in the records of conversion than
+the monotony of the language used to describe the
+feelings experienced. It is exactly as though the converts
+had been learning a regular catechism, as in a
+way they have been. Young boys and girls will confess
+their sinful state in language identical with that used
+by one who has actually lived a career of vice and
+crime. Others of an aggressively commonplace character
+will use the language of exalted mysticism suitable
+to an Augustine or a Jacob Boehme. In these
+cases we have not identity of feeling finding expression
+in identity of language; it is pure imitation and
+suggestion without the least regard to the fitness of
+the language employed.</p>
+
+<p>The full power of suggestion would be more fitly
+considered in connection with waves of religious feeling
+that have assumed an epidemic form; but it will
+not be out of place here to call attention to this factor
+in such a recent case as the outbreaks in Wales under
+the leadership of persons such as Evan Roberts. Quite
+apart from the suggestion and imitation operating in
+the gatherings themselves, it is plain that many went
+to the meetings quite prepared to act in accordance
+with what had gone before. Newspapers had published<!-- Page 189 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_189" id="Page_189">[189]</a></span>
+elaborate reports of the 'scenes,' certain manifestations
+were recognised as signs of the "workings of the
+Spirit," with the result that all these operated as powerful
+suggestions, particularly with those of a hysterical
+disposition. And behind this particular revival there
+were the traditions of other revivals, all of which had
+created a heritage as coercive as any purely social tradition.
+A crowd of people in a state of eager expectancy,
+exposed to the assaults of a preacher skilled in
+rousing their emotion to fever pitch, is naturally ready
+to see and hear things that none would see and hear in
+their normal moments. No better field for the study
+of crowd psychology, particularly at the point at which
+it merges into the abnormal, could be imagined than
+the ordinary revival.</p>
+
+<p>In America these revival out breaks seem to assume
+a much more extravagant form than with us. Mr.
+Stanley Hall, for example, thus describes a Kentucky
+camp meeting in which the prevailing term of spiritual
+manifestation was that of 'jerking.' Quoting from
+an eye-witness, he says:&mdash;</p>
+
+<p>"The crowd swarmed all night round the preacher,
+singing, shouting, laughing, some plunging wildly
+over stumps and benches into the forest, shouting
+'Lost, lost!' others leaping and bounding about like
+live fish out of water; others rolling over and over on
+the ground for hours; others lying on the ground and
+talking when they could not move; and yet others beating
+the ground with their heels. As the excitement
+increased, it grew more morbid and took the form of
+'jerkings,' or in others the holy laugh. The jerks began
+with the head, which was thrown violently from
+side to side so rapidly that the features were blurred<!-- Page 190 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_190" id="Page_190">[190]</a></span>
+and the hair almost seemed to snap, and when the sufferer
+struck an obstacle and fell he would bounce about
+like a ball. Saplings were sometimes cut breast high
+for the people to jerk by. In one place the earth about
+the roots of one of them was kicked about as though by
+the feet of a horse stamping flies. One sufferer mounted
+his horse to ride away when the jerks threw him to the
+earth, whence he rose a Christian. A lad, who feigned
+illness to stay away, was dragged there by the spirit
+and his head dashed against the wall till he had to pray.
+A sceptic who cursed and swore was crushed by a falling
+tree. Men fancied themselves dogs, and gathered
+round a tree barking and 'treeing the devil.' They saw
+visions and dreamed dreams, and as the revival waned,
+it left a crop of nervous and hysterical disorders in its
+wake."<a name="FNanchor_155_155" id="FNanchor_155_155"></a><a href="#Footnote_155_155" class="fnanchor">[155]</a></p>
+
+<p>We have nothing quite so extreme as this in British
+revivals, but the home phenomena are not substantially
+different in nature. A medical observer of some of
+the earliest Methodist revivals thus describes the
+symptoms of those who were subject to 'divine'
+seizures under the influence of Wesley and his immediate
+followers:&mdash;</p>
+
+<p>"There came on first a feeling of faintness, with rigor
+and a sense of weight at the pit of the stomach; soon
+after which the patient cried out as though in the
+agonies of labour. The convulsions then began, first
+showing themselves in the muscles of the eyelids,
+though the eyes themselves were fixed and staring.
+The most frightful contortions of the countenance
+followed, and the convulsions now took their course
+downwards, so that the muscles of the trunk and neck<!-- Page 191 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_191" id="Page_191">[191]</a></span>
+were affected, causing a sobbing respiration, which
+was performed with great effort. Tremors and agitations
+ensued, and the patients screamed out violently,
+and tossed their heads from side to side. As the
+complaint increased, it seized the arms, and its victims
+beat their breasts, clasped their hands, and made all
+sorts of strange noises."</p>
+
+<p>To the non-medical religious observer the scenes
+produced a different impression, thus:&mdash;</p>
+
+<p>"When the power of religion began to be spoken of,
+the presence of God really filled the place.... The greatest
+number of them who cried or fell were men; but some
+women and several children felt the power of the same
+Almighty Spirit, and seemed just sinking into hell.
+This occasioned a mixture of sounds, some shrieking,
+some roaring aloud. The most general was a loud breathing,
+like that of people half strangled and gasping for
+life; and, indeed, almost all the cries were like those of
+human creatures dying in bitter anguish.... I stood on
+a pew seat, as did a young man in the opposite pew, an
+able-bodied, fresh, healthy countryman; but in a moment,
+while he seemed to think of nothing less, down
+he dropt with a violence inconceivable. The adjoining
+pews seemed shook with his fall. I heard afterwards
+the stamping of his feet ready to break the boards as he
+lay in strong convulsions at the bottom of the pew....
+Among the children who felt the arrows of the Almighty,
+I saw a sturdy boy, about eight years old, who
+roared above his fellows, and seemed, in his agony, to
+struggle with the strength of a grown man. His face
+was red as scarlet; and almost all on whom God laid
+His hand turned either very red or almost black."<a name="FNanchor_156_156" id="FNanchor_156_156"></a><a href="#Footnote_156_156" class="fnanchor">[156]</a></p>
+
+<p><!-- Page 192 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_192" id="Page_192">[192]</a></span>
+In other instances connected with the same movement,
+a girl is described as "lying on the floor as one
+dead." One woman "tore up the ground with her
+hands, filling them with dust and with the hard-trodden
+grass"; another "roared and screamed in dreadful
+agony." A child, seven years old, "saw visions, and
+astonished the neighbours with her awful manner of
+relating them." John Wesley personally interviewed
+a number of the people seized in this manner, and was
+quite convinced of the supernatural nature of the attacks.
+He said that he had "generally observed more
+or less of these outward symptoms to attend the beginning
+of a general work of God," although he admitted
+that in some cases "Satan mimicked God's work
+in order to discredit the whole work." But whether of
+God or Satan there was no question of their supernatural
+character. Moreover, whatever may be one's
+opinion of these outbreaks, there is one fact that stands
+out clear and indisputable. This is that the Methodist
+revival owed a great deal of its vitality&mdash;as is also
+the case with other religious movements&mdash;to phenomena
+of a distinctly pathologic nature. Subtract from
+these movements all phenomena of the class indicated,
+and such phrases as 'the revival fire' become meaningless.
+Right through history religious conviction
+has been gained in innumerable cases by the operation
+of factors that a more accurate knowledge finds
+can be explained without any reference whatever to
+supernatural forces.</p>
+
+<p>Lest the above examples be dismissed as belonging
+to an old order of things, I subjoin the following account&mdash;from
+a missionary&mdash;of a recent revival scene
+in India:&mdash;</p>
+
+<p><!-- Page 193 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_193" id="Page_193">[193]</a></span>
+"There were people ... on the floor fairly writhing
+over the realisation of sin as it came over them....
+Saturday we were favoured with a wonderful manifestation
+of the Spirit. One of the older girls who had
+had a remarkable experience, went into a trance, with
+her head thrown back, her arms folded, and motionless,
+except for a slight movement of her foot. She
+seemed to be seeing something wonderful, for she
+would marvel at it, and then laugh excitedly.... One
+girl rushed to the back of the vestibule and, lying across
+a bench, with her head and hands against the wall, she
+fairly writhed in agony for two hours before peace
+came to her."<a name="FNanchor_157_157" id="FNanchor_157_157"></a><a href="#Footnote_157_157" class="fnanchor">[157]</a></p>
+
+<p>I do not know on what grounds we are justified in
+calling civilised people who chronicle these outbreaks
+as "a wonderful manifestation of the Spirit." Civilised
+in other respects, in relation to other matters, they
+may be. Civilised in relation to this particular matter
+they certainly are not. Their viewpoint is precisely
+that of the lowest tribe of savages. Savages, indeed,
+could not do more; our 'civilised' missionaries do no
+less. Tylor well says that "such descriptions carry
+us far back in the history of the human mind, showing
+modern men still in ignorant sincerity producing the
+very fits and swoons to which for untold ages savage
+tribes have given religious import. These manifestations
+in modern Europe indeed form part of a revival
+of religion, the religion of mental disease."<a name="FNanchor_158_158" id="FNanchor_158_158"></a><a href="#Footnote_158_158" class="fnanchor">[158]</a></p>
+
+<p>The truth is that the appeals usually made to induce
+conversion, and the methods adopted, tend to
+develop a morbid state of mind, which very easily<!-- Page 194 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_194" id="Page_194">[194]</a></span>
+passes into the pathological. A too insistent habit of
+introspection is always dangerous, and the danger is
+heightened when it takes the form of religious brooding.
+In Dr. Starbuck's collection of cases, seventy-five
+per cent. of the males and sixty per cent. of the females
+confessed to feelings of depression, anxiety, and sadness
+before conversion. This may be attributed partly
+to the harping upon a conviction of sinfulness, which
+in itself is wholly of an unhealthy character. It does
+not indicate moral health, and it is very far from indicating
+physiological health. The following confessions
+are pertinent, and will illustrate both points. I give
+in brackets the ages of the subjects where stated:&mdash;</p>
+
+<p>"I felt the wrath of God resting on me. I called on
+Him for aid, and felt my sins forgiven" (13).</p>
+
+<p>"I couldn't eat, and would lie awake all night."</p>
+
+<p>"Often, very often, I cried myself to sleep" (19).</p>
+
+<p>"Hymns would sound in my ears as if sung" (10).</p>
+
+<p>"I had visions of Christ saying to me, Come to Me,
+My child" (15).</p>
+
+<p>"Just before conversion I was walking along a
+pathway, thinking of religious matters, when suddenly
+the word H-e-l-l was spelled out five yards ahead of
+me" (17).</p>
+
+<p>"I felt a touch of the Divine One, and a voice said
+'Thy sins are forgiven thee; arise and go in peace'"
+(12).</p>
+
+<p>"The thoughts of my condition were terrible" (13).</p>
+
+<p>"For three months it seemed as if God's Spirit had
+withdrawn from me. Fear took hold of me. For a week
+I was on the border of despair" (16).</p>
+
+<p>"A sense of sinfulness and estrangement from God
+grew daily" (15).</p>
+
+<p><!-- Page 195 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_195" id="Page_195">[195]</a></span>
+"Everything went wrong with me; it felt like Sunday
+all the time" (12).</p>
+
+<p>"I felt that something terrible was going to happen"
+(14).</p>
+
+<p>"I fell on my face by a bench and tried to pray.
+Every time I would call on God something like a
+man's hand would strangle me by choking. I thought
+I would surely die if I could not get help. I made one
+final effort to call on God for mercy if I did strangle
+and die, and the last I remember at that time was falling
+back on the ground with that unseen hand on my
+throat. When I came to myself there was a crowd
+around praising God."</p>
+
+<p>A crowd around praising God! For all substantial
+purposes this last might be the description of a state
+of affairs in Central Africa instead of an occurrence
+in a country that claims to be civilised. It is not surprising
+that so great an authority as Sir T. S. Clouston
+gives an emphatic warning against revival services
+and unusual religious meetings, which should
+"on no account be attended by persons with weak
+heads, excitable dispositions, and neurotic constitutions."<a name="FNanchor_159_159" id="FNanchor_159_159"></a><a href="#Footnote_159_159" class="fnanchor">[159]</a>
+Unfortunately it is precisely these classes for
+whom they possess the greatest attractions, and from
+whom the larger number of chronicled cases are drawn.
+The excitement of the revival meeting is as fatal an attraction
+to them as the dram is to the confirmed alcoholist;
+and if the ill-consequences are neither so immediately
+discernible nor as repulsive in character, they are
+none the less present in a large number of cases. The
+emotional strain to which the organism is subjected
+occurs, as the ages of the converts show, precisely at<!-- Page 196 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_196" id="Page_196">[196]</a></span>
+the time when it is least able to bear it safely. The main
+characteristic of adolescence is instability, physical,
+emotional, and intellectual. It is a time of stress and
+strain, of the formation of new feelings and associations
+and desires that crave for expression and gratification.
+The instability of the organic conditions is evidenced
+by the large proportion of nervous disorders
+that occur during adolescence. Adolescent insanity
+is a well-known form of mania, although it is usually
+of brief duration. Sir T. S. Clouston, in his <cite>Neuroses of
+Development</cite>, gives a long list of complaints attendant
+on adolescence, and Sir W. R. Gowers, dealing with
+1450 cases of epilepsy, points out that "three-quarters
+of the cases of epilepsy begin under twenty years, and
+nearly half (46 per cent.) between ten and twenty, the
+maximum being at fourteen, fifteen, and sixteen." Of
+hysteria, the same writer points out that of the total
+cases 50 per cent. occurs from ten to twenty years
+of age, 20 per cent. from twenty to thirty, and only 10
+per cent. from thirty to forty.<a name="FNanchor_160_160" id="FNanchor_160_160"></a><a href="#Footnote_160_160" class="fnanchor">[160]</a></p>
+
+<p>The peculiar danger, then, of the modern appeal for
+conversion is that it is couched in a form likely to do
+the minimum of good and the maximum of harm.
+Where religion exists as a normally operative factor
+of the environment&mdash;as in lower stages of culture&mdash;the
+danger is avoided, because no special machinery
+is required to bring about religious conviction. The
+general social life secures this. But at a later stage,
+when the religious and secular aspects of life become
+separated, with a growing preponderance of the latter,
+religion must be, as it were, specially and forcibly<!-- Page 197 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_197" id="Page_197">[197]</a></span>
+introduced. Whether for good or ill, it is a disturbing
+force. It strives to divert the developing organic
+energies into a new channel. To effect this, it plays
+upon the emotions to an altogether dangerous extent,
+in complete ignorance of the nature of the passions
+excited. In the older form of the religious appeal,
+that in which fear was the chief emotion aroused, it is
+now generally conceded that the consequences were
+wholly bad. But under any form the emotional appeal
+is fraught with danger, since the tendency is for it to
+bring out unsuspected weaknesses in other directions.
+Sir W. R. Gowers wisely points out that "mental
+emotion&mdash;fright, excitement, anxiety&mdash;is the most
+potent cause of epilepsy," which is accounted for by
+bearing in mind "the profoundly disturbing effect of
+alarm on the nervous system, deranging as it does
+almost every function of the nervous system." Persons
+with predispositions to nervous disorders may
+pass with safety through the period of adolescence so
+long as their circumstances provide opportunities for
+healthy occupation with no undue emotional strain.
+But let the former be lacking, and the latter danger
+is always present. The hidden weakness develops,
+and injury more or less permanent follows. There is
+hardly a qualified medical authority in the country
+who would deny the truth of what has been said, although
+many do not care to speak out in relation to
+religious matters. But all would doubtless agree with
+Dr. Mercier that "every revival is attended by its crop
+of cases of insanity, which are the more numerous as
+the revival is more fervent and long continued."<a name="FNanchor_161_161" id="FNanchor_161_161"></a><a href="#Footnote_161_161" class="fnanchor">[161]</a></p>
+
+<p>Something must be said on the moral character of<!-- Page 198 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_198" id="Page_198">[198]</a></span>
+conversions in general. This is, naturally, greatly
+exaggerated, often deliberately so. In the first place,
+confessions of 'sinfulness' in a pre-conversion state,
+when made by youths of both sexes, may be dismissed
+as quite worthless. They are merely using the language
+placed in their mouths by professional evangelists,
+and the similarity of the confessions carry their
+own condemnation. Leading a sinful, or even a vicious
+life, usually means no more than visiting a theatre, or
+a music hall, or playing cards, or non-attendance at
+church, or not troubling about religious doctrines.
+Very often the vague feeling of restlessness incident
+to adolescence is interpreted as due to sin or estrangement
+from God, and after conversion the convert is,
+for purposes of self-glorification, given to magnify the
+benefits and comforts derived from his religious convictions.
+The magnitude of the change increases the
+value of the convert, and with well-known characters
+there has been as great an exaggeration of vices before
+conversion as of virtues subsequently. The way in
+which evangelical Christianity has created a life of
+the wildest dissipation for the earlier years of John
+Bunyan is an instructive instance of this procedure.</p>
+
+<p>So far as older converts are concerned, everyone of
+balanced judgment will regard stories of conversion
+from extreme vice to extreme virtue with the greatest
+suspicion. Character does not change suddenly, although
+there may be cases of 'sports' in the moral
+world as elsewhere. Where some modification of conduct,
+but hardly of character, results, the machinery
+is very obvious, and does not in the least necessitate
+an appeal to the intrusion of a supernatural influence
+for an explanation. The religious gathering opens<!-- Page 199 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_199" id="Page_199">[199]</a></span>&mdash;as
+any non-religious meeting may open&mdash;a new circle
+of associates with different ideals and standards of
+value. So long as the newcomer is desirous of retaining
+the respect of his fresh associates, so long he will
+try to act as they act and think as they think. There
+will be a change of conduct, but not, as I have said, of
+character. Those who look closely will find the same
+character still active. The mean character remains
+mean, the untruthful one remains untruthful. The only
+difference is that these qualities will be expressed in a
+different form. Moreover, the same thing may be seen
+occurring quite apart from religion. Every association
+of men and women exerts precisely the same influence.
+In the army, a regiment that has a reputation for steadiness
+and sobriety develops these qualities in all who
+enter it. Regiments with a reputation for opposite
+qualities do not fail to convert newcomers. A workshop,
+a club, a profession, exerts a precisely similar
+influence. One man finds inspiration in the Bible and
+another in the Newgate Calendar. A man will usually
+be guided by the ideals of his associates, whether these
+ideals be those of a thieves' kitchen or of a philanthropic
+institution. This only means that each individual
+is subject to the influence of the group spirit. For good
+and evil this is one of the deepest and most pregnant
+facts of human nature. The utilisation and distortion
+of this fact in the interests of religious organisations
+has served to prevent its general recognition and the
+wise use of it by the community at large.</p>
+
+<p>Finally, it has to be borne in mind, in view of the
+data given above, that conversion is experienced by
+the individual at that period of life when the more
+social side of human nature is beginning to find expression.<!-- Page 200 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_200" id="Page_200">[200]</a></span>
+In this way the natural growth from the
+small world of childhood to the larger world of adult
+humanity is taken advantage of by religion, and the
+process of inevitable growth is attributed to the influence
+of religious belief. In itself the phenomenon is
+in no degree religious, but wholly social. The process
+is well enough described by Starbuck in the following
+passage&mdash;although there are certain quite unnecessary
+theological implications:&mdash;</p>
+
+<p>"Conversion is the surrender of the personal will to
+be guided by the larger forces of which it is a part.
+These two aspects are often mingled. In both there is
+much in common. There is a sudden revelation and
+recognition of a higher order than that of the personal
+will. The sympathies follow the direction of the new
+insight, and the convert transfers the centre of life and
+activity from the part to the whole. With new insight
+comes new beauty. Beauty and worth awaken love&mdash;love
+for parents, kindred, kind, society, cosmic order,
+truth, and spiritual life. The individual learns to transfer
+himself from a centre of self-activity into an organ
+of revelation of universal being, and to live a life of
+affection for and oneness with the larger life outside.
+As a necessary condition of the spiritual awakening
+is the birth of fresh activity and of a larger self-consciousness,
+which often assert themselves as the dominant
+element in consciousness."<a name="FNanchor_162_162" id="FNanchor_162_162"></a><a href="#Footnote_162_162" class="fnanchor">[162]</a></p>
+
+<p>Adolescence is the golden period of life, because it
+is the age in which the formative influences effect their
+strongest and most permanent impressions. But this
+susceptibility, while pregnant with promise, is because
+of this susceptibility likewise fraught with the possibilities<!-- Page 201 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_201" id="Page_201">[201]</a></span>
+of danger. The developing qualities of mind
+need to be wisely and carefully guided; and it is little
+short of criminal that at this critical juncture so many
+young people should be handed over to the ignorant
+ministrations of professional evangelism. The true
+sociological significance of the development is ignored,
+and it is small wonder that, having wasted this impressionable
+period, so many people should go through
+life with a quite rudimentary sense of social responsibility
+and duty. An American author, speaking of the
+connection between certain brutal manifestations in
+social life in the United States and religious teaching,
+says:&mdash;</p>
+
+<p>"It is well known that lynching in the South is
+carried on largely by the ignorant and baser elements
+of the white population. It is also well known that the
+chief method of religious influence and training of the
+black man and the ignorant white man is impulsive
+and emotional revivalism. It is a highly dangerous situation,
+and deserves the earnest consideration of the
+ecclesiastical statesmen of all denominations which
+work in the South. It will be impossible to protect
+that part of the nation, or any other, from the epidemic
+madness of the lynching mob if the seeds of it are
+sown in the sacred soil of religion.... Their preachers
+are great 'soul-savers,' but they lack the practical sense
+to build up their emotionalised converts into anything
+that approaches a higher life."<a name="FNanchor_163_163" id="FNanchor_163_163"></a><a href="#Footnote_163_163" class="fnanchor">[163]</a></p>
+
+<p>The truth of this passage has a very wide implication.
+It is not alone true that so long as the lower
+kind of revivalism is encouraged, we are unconsciously
+perpetuating certain very ugly manifestations of<!-- Page 202 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_202" id="Page_202">[202]</a></span>
+social life; it is also true that while we give a supernaturalistic
+interpretation of phenomena that are wholly
+physiological and sociological in character, we can
+never make the most of the human material we possess.
+On the one side we have a deplorable encouragement
+of unhealthy emotionalism, and on the other a sheer
+misdirection and misuse of human faculty. The increase
+of self-consciousness, the craving for sympathy
+and communion with one's fellows, the impulse to service
+in the common life of the State, have no genuine
+connection with religion, although all these qualities
+are classified as religious, and are utilised by religious
+organisations. Actually and fundamentally they belong
+to the social side of human nature. As our hands
+are developed for grasping, and the various organs of
+the body for their respective functions, so mental and
+emotional qualities are developed in their due course
+for a rational social life. Biologically and psychologically,
+male and female are at adolescence entering
+into a deeper and more enduring relationship with the
+life of the race. There is no other meaning to the process.</p>
+
+<p>Naturally enough, the vast majority of people express
+their developing nature in accordance with the
+fashion of their environment. If this environmental
+influence were rationally non-religious, the language
+would be that of a non-religious philosophy. As, however,
+supernaturalism, in some form or other, is still a
+potent force we have a contrary result. It is only here
+and there that one is found with the inclination or the
+wit to analyse his or her impulses, and few possess
+enough knowledge to make the analysis profitable.
+There is no wonder that concerning many of the most<!-- Page 203 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_203" id="Page_203">[203]</a></span>
+important phenomena of human life we are still little
+above the level of the fetish worshipper. We may have
+a more elaborate phraseology, but the old ideas are still
+operative. The consequence is that each newcomer
+finds certain ideas and forms of speech ready for his
+acceptance, and is handed over, bound hand and foot,
+to influences that are the least capable of sane direction.
+We do not merely sacrifice our first-born; we
+immolate the whole of our progeny. The ignorant
+past plays into the hands of the designing present; the
+present conspires with the past to rob the future of the
+good that might result from the growth of a wiser and
+a better race.</p>
+
+<p>Were society really enlightened and genuinely civilised,
+the truth of what has been said would be recognised
+as soon as stated. It would, indeed, be unnecessary
+to labour what would then be a generally recognised
+truth. But the mass of the people are not genuinely
+enlightened, our civilisation is largely a veneer,
+and numerous agencies prevent our reaping the full
+benefit of our available knowledge. Thus it happens
+that in place of an explanation of human qualities in
+terms of biologic and social evolution, we find current
+an explanation that is based upon pre-scientific ideas.
+Because our less instructed ancestors accounted for
+various manifestations of human qualities as due to a
+supernatural influence, we continue to perpetuate the
+delusion. We teach youth to express itself in terms
+of supernaturalism, and then treat the language and
+the fact as inseparable. In this respect, sociology is
+passing through a phase from which some of the sciences
+have finally emerged. In physics and astronomy,
+for instance, the fact has been separated from the supernatural<!-- Page 204 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_204" id="Page_204">[204]</a></span>
+explanation, and shown to be independent
+of it. An exploitation of social life in the interests of
+supernaturalism is still in active operation. It is this
+that is really the central truth of the situation. And
+in ignoring this truth we expose a growing generation
+to the worst possible of educative influences, at a time
+when a wiser control would be preparing it for an intelligent
+participation in the serious and enduring
+work of social organisation.</p>
+
+<div class="footnotes">
+<h3>Footnotes:<br />
+<span class="skip">[<a href="#Page_205">Skip</a>]</span>
+</h3>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_142_142" id="Footnote_142_142"></a><a href="#FNanchor_142_142"><span class="label">[142]</span></a> Dr. G. B. Cutten, <cite>The Psychological Phenomena of Christianity</cite>,
+pp. 7-8.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_143_143" id="Footnote_143_143"></a><a href="#FNanchor_143_143"><span class="label">[143]</span></a> The most elaborate study of this character known to the
+present writer is Mr. G. Stanley Hall's <cite>Adolescence</cite>, in two volumes.
+The bulk of the work is, however, terrifying to some, and
+the cost prohibitive to many. For the general reader of limited
+leisure and means, Professor Starbuck's smaller volume, <cite>The
+Psychology of Religion</cite>, presents the salient facts in a brief and
+satisfactory manner. It is lacking, however, on the anthropological
+side, a view that is well presented by Dr. Stanley Hall.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_144_144" id="Footnote_144_144"></a><a href="#FNanchor_144_144"><span class="label">[144]</span></a> See <cite>Adolescence</cite>, i. p. 528.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_145_145" id="Footnote_145_145"></a><a href="#FNanchor_145_145"><span class="label">[145]</span></a> Vol. iii. p. 279.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_146_146" id="Footnote_146_146"></a><a href="#FNanchor_146_146"><span class="label">[146]</span></a> <cite>Psychology of Religion</cite>, chap. iii. Hall's figures are given in
+the second volume of his work, pp. 288-92.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_147_147" id="Footnote_147_147"></a><a href="#FNanchor_147_147"><span class="label">[147]</span></a> <cite>Varieties</cite>, p. 199.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_148_148" id="Footnote_148_148"></a><a href="#FNanchor_148_148"><span class="label">[148]</span></a> An elaborate list of these ceremonies in both the savage and
+civilised worlds has been compiled by Mr. Hall, ii. chap. xiii.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_149_149" id="Footnote_149_149"></a><a href="#FNanchor_149_149"><span class="label">[149]</span></a> Catlin, <cite>North American Indians</cite>, i. p. 36; see also ii. p. 347.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_150_150" id="Footnote_150_150"></a><a href="#FNanchor_150_150"><span class="label">[150]</span></a> W. I. Thomas, <cite>Sex and Society</cite>, pp. 115-6.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_151_151" id="Footnote_151_151"></a><a href="#FNanchor_151_151"><span class="label">[151]</span></a> For a good summary, see Donaldson's <cite>Growth of the Brain</cite>,
+pp. 241-48.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_152_152" id="Footnote_152_152"></a><a href="#FNanchor_152_152"><span class="label">[152]</span></a> See on this subject the two fine works by Karl Groos, <cite>The
+Play of Animals</cite>, <cite>The Play of Man</cite>.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_153_153" id="Footnote_153_153"></a><a href="#FNanchor_153_153"><span class="label">[153]</span></a> W. Temple, <cite>Repton School Sermons</cite>.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_154_154" id="Footnote_154_154"></a><a href="#FNanchor_154_154"><span class="label">[154]</span></a> <cite>Sanity and Insanity</cite>, p. 281.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_155_155" id="Footnote_155_155"></a><a href="#FNanchor_155_155"><span class="label">[155]</span></a> <cite>Adolescence</cite>, ii. pp. 286-7.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_156_156" id="Footnote_156_156"></a><a href="#FNanchor_156_156"><span class="label">[156]</span></a> Southey's <cite>Life of Wesley</cite>, chap. xxiv.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_157_157" id="Footnote_157_157"></a><a href="#FNanchor_157_157"><span class="label">[157]</span></a> From <cite>The Examiner</cite> of September 6, 1906, cited by Cutten,
+p. 185.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_158_158" id="Footnote_158_158"></a><a href="#FNanchor_158_158"><span class="label">[158]</span></a> <cite>Primitive Culture</cite>, ii. p. 422.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_159_159" id="Footnote_159_159"></a><a href="#FNanchor_159_159"><span class="label">[159]</span></a> <cite>Clinical Lectures</cite>, p. 39.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_160_160" id="Footnote_160_160"></a><a href="#FNanchor_160_160"><span class="label">[160]</span></a> <cite>Manual of Diseases of the Nervous System</cite>, 1893, pp. 732
+and 785.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_161_161" id="Footnote_161_161"></a><a href="#FNanchor_161_161"><span class="label">[161]</span></a> <cite>Sanity and Insanity</cite>, p. 282.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_162_162" id="Footnote_162_162"></a><a href="#FNanchor_162_162"><span class="label">[162]</span></a> <cite>Psychology of Religion</cite>, pp. 146-7.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_163_163" id="Footnote_163_163"></a><a href="#FNanchor_163_163"><span class="label">[163]</span></a> <cite>Primitive Traits in Religious Revivals.</cite></p></div>
+</div>
+
+<p><!-- Page 205 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_205" id="Page_205">[205]</a></span></p>
+
+<h2>CHAPTER <span class="cgap">EIGHT</span><br />
+
+RELIGIOUS EPIDEMICS</h2>
+
+<p>Under pressure of scientific analysis
+the old distinction between the individual and
+society bids fair to break down, or to maintain itself as
+no more than a convenience of classification. It is now
+being recognised that a society is something more
+than a mere aggregate of self-contained units, and that
+the individual is quite inexplicable apart from the social
+group. It is the latter which gives the former his
+individuality. His earliest impressions are derived
+from the life of the group, and as he grows so he comes
+more and more under the influence of social forces.
+The consequence is that the key to a very large part
+of the phenomena of human nature is to be found in a
+study of group life. We may abstract the individual
+for purposes of examination, much as a physiologist
+may study the heart or the liver apart from the body
+from which it has been taken. But ultimately it is in
+relation to the whole that the true significance and
+value of the part is to be discerned.</p>
+
+<p>In this corporate life imitation and suggestion play
+a powerful part. With children, by far the larger part
+of their education consists of sheer imitation, nor do
+adults ever develop beyond its influence. Suggestion
+is a factor that is more operative in youth and maturity
+than in early childhood, and is exhibited in a
+thousand and one subtle and unexpected ways. Both
+these forces are essential to an orderly, and to a progressive,
+social life; but they may just as easily become
+the cause of movements that are retrogressive, and
+even anti-social in character. An epidemic of suicide
+or of murder is as easily initiated as an epidemic of
+philanthropy. Let a person commit suicide in a striking<!-- Page 206 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_206" id="Page_206">[206]</a></span>
+and unusual manner, and there will soon be others
+following his example. Given a favourable environment,
+there is no idea, however unreal, that will not
+find advocates; no example, however strange or disgusting,
+that will not find imitators. The more uniform
+the society, the more powerful the suggestion, the
+easier the imitation. That is why a crowd, acting as
+a crowd, is nearly always made up of people drawn
+from the same social stratum, each unit already familiar
+with certain ideals and belief. Under such conditions
+a crowd will assume all the characteristics of a
+psychological entity. As Gustave Le Bon has pointed
+out, a crowd will do collectively what none of its constituent
+units would ever dream of doing singly.<a name="FNanchor_164_164" id="FNanchor_164_164"></a><a href="#Footnote_164_164" class="fnanchor">[164]</a> It
+becomes capable of deeds of heroism or of savage
+cruelty. It will sacrifice itself or others with indifference.
+Above all, the mere fact of moving in a mass
+gives the individual a sense of power, a certainty of
+being in the right that he can&mdash;save under exceptional
+circumstances&mdash;never acquire while alone. The intellect
+is subdued, inhibition is inoperative, the instincts
+are given free play, and their movement is determined
+in turn by suggestions not unlike those with which a
+trained hypnotist influences his subject.</p>
+
+<p>In the phenomena of contagion words and symbols
+play a powerful part. They are both a rallying-point
+and an outlet for the emotions of a crowd. These
+words or symbols may be wholly incongruous with
+the real needs of a people, but provided they are sufficiently
+familiar they will serve their purpose. And
+the more primitive the type of mind represented by
+the mass of the people the more powerfully these symbols<!-- Page 207 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_207" id="Page_207">[207]</a></span>
+operate. Shakespeare's portrayal of the crowd
+in <cite>Julius Cæsar</cite> remains eternally true. The skilled
+orator, playing on old feelings, using familiar terms,
+and invoking familiar ideas, finds a crowd quite plastic
+to his hands. It is for these reasons that there is so
+keen a struggle with political and social parties for a
+monopoly of good rallying cries, and a readiness to
+fix objectionable titles on their opponents. Patriotism,
+Little Englander, Jingo, The Church in Danger,
+Godless Education, etc. etc. Causes are materially
+helped or injured by these means. There is little or
+no consideration given to their justice or reasonableness;
+it is the image aroused that does the work.</p>
+
+<p>Psychological epidemics may in some cases be justly
+called normal in character. That is, they depend
+upon factors that are always in operation and which
+form a part of every social structure. A war fever or a
+commercial panic falls under this head. In other instances
+they depend upon abnormal conditions, upon
+the workings, perhaps, of some obscure nervous disease,
+and are of a pathological description. In yet
+other cases they represent a mixture of both. In such
+cases, for example, as that of the Medieval Flagellants
+or of the Dancing Mania, the presence of pathological
+elements is unmistakable. But neither of these epidemics
+could have occurred without a certain social
+preparation, and unless they had called into operation
+those principles of crowd psychology to which science
+has within recent years turned its attention, and which
+are normal factors in every society. These three classes
+of epidemics may be found in connection with subjects
+other than religious, but I am at present concerned
+with them only in that relation, and to point out that,<!-- Page 208 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_208" id="Page_208">[208]</a></span>
+in spite of their undesirable or admittedly pathologic
+character, they have yet served to keep supernaturalism
+alive and active.</p>
+
+<p>During the Christian period of European history
+by far the most important of all epidemics, as it was
+indeed the earliest, was monasticism. This takes front
+rank because of its extent, the degree to which it prepared
+the ground for subsequent outbreaks, and because
+of its indirect, and, I think, too little noticed,
+social consequences. It may safely be said that no
+other movement has so powerfully affected European
+society as has the monasticism of the early Christian
+centuries. It cannot, of course, be urged that Christianity
+originated monasticism. India and Egypt had
+its ascetic practices and celibate priesthood long before
+the birth of Christianity, and indeed gave Christianity
+the pattern from which to work. But the main
+stream of social life remained unaffected to any considerable
+extent by this asceticism. The social and
+domestic virtues received full recognition from the upholders
+of the monastic life, and there is no evidence
+that asceticism ever assumed an epidemic form. It
+has often been the lot of the Christian Church to give
+a more intense expression to religious tendencies already
+existing, and this was so in the case before us.
+At any rate, it was left for the Christian Church to give
+to monasticism the character of an epidemic, to treat
+the purely social and domestic virtues as a positive
+hindrance to the religious life, seriously to disturb
+national well-being, and to come perilously near destroying
+civilisation.</p>
+
+<p>The origin of ascetic practices has already been
+indicated in a previous chapter. It has there been<!-- Page 209 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_209" id="Page_209">[209]</a></span>
+pointed out that the deliberate torture of mind and
+body arose from the belief that the induced states
+brought man into direct communion with supernatural
+powers, and that this element has continued
+in almost every religion in the world. Says Baring-Gould:&mdash;</p>
+
+<p>"The ascetic instinct is intimately united with the
+religious instinct. There is scarcely a religion of ancient
+and modern times, certain forms of Protestantism
+excepted, that does not recognise asceticism as
+an element in its system.... Brahmanism has its order
+of ascetics.... Mohammedanism has its fakirs, subduing
+the flesh by their austerities, and developing the
+spirit by their contemplation and prayers. Fasting
+and self-denial were observances required of the
+Greeks, who desired initiation into the mysteries....
+The scourge was used before the altars of Artemis
+and over the tomb of Pelops. The Egyptian priests
+passed their novitiate in the deserts, and when not engaged
+in their religious functions were supposed to
+spend their time in caves. They renounced all commerce
+with the world, and lived in contemplation,
+temperance, and frugality, and in absolute poverty....
+The Peruvians were required to fast before sacrificing
+to the gods, and to bind themselves by vows of chastity
+and abstinence from nourishing food.... There were
+ascetic orders for old men and nunneries for widows
+among the Totomacs, monastic orders among Toltecs
+dedicated to the service of Quetzalcoatl, and others
+among the Aztecs consecrated to Tezcatlipoca."<a name="FNanchor_165_165" id="FNanchor_165_165"></a><a href="#Footnote_165_165" class="fnanchor">[165]</a></p>
+
+<p>It was argued by Bingham, a learned eighteenth-century
+ecclesiastical historian, that although asceticism<!-- Page 210 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_210" id="Page_210">[210]</a></span>
+was known and practised in individual cases from
+the earliest period of Christian history, it did not establish
+itself within the Church until the fourth century.
+It is not a matter of great consequence to the subject
+under discussion whether this be so or not. It is at least
+certain that Christian teaching contained within itself
+all the elements for such a development, which was
+bound, sooner or later, to transpire. The antithesis between
+the flesh and the spirit, the conception of the
+world as given over to Satan, the ascetic teaching of
+Paul, with the value placed upon suffering and privation
+as spiritually disciplinary forces, could not but
+create in a society permeated with a special type of supernaturalism,
+that asceticism which became so marked
+a feature of medieval Christianity. And it is certain
+also that in no other instance has asceticism proved itself
+so grave a danger to social order and security. Allowing
+for what Lecky calls the 'glaring mendacity' of
+the lives of the saints, a description that applies more
+or less to all the ecclesiastical writings of the early
+centuries, it is evident that the number of monks, their
+ferocity, and general practices, were enough to constitute
+a grave social danger. It is said that St. Pachomius
+had 7000 monks under his direct rule; that in the
+time of Jerome 50,000 monks gathered together at the
+Easter festival; that one Egyptian city mustered
+20,000 nuns and 10,000 monks, and that the monastic
+population of Egypt at one time equalled in
+number the rest of the inhabitants. At a later date,
+within fifty years of its institution, the Franciscan
+Order possessed 8000 houses, with 200,000 members.
+In the twelfth century the Cluniacs had 2000 monasteries
+in France. In England, as late as 1546, Hooper,<!-- Page 211 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_211" id="Page_211">[211]</a></span>
+afterwards Bishop of Gloucester, declared that there
+were no less than 10,000 nuns in England. Every
+country in Europe possessed a larger or smaller army
+of men and women whose ideals were in direct conflict
+with nearly all that makes for a sane and progressive
+civilisation.</p>
+
+<p>The general character of the monk during the full
+swing of the ascetic epidemic has been well sketched
+by Lecky. His summary here will save a more extended
+exposition:&mdash;</p>
+
+<p>"There is perhaps no phase in the moral history of
+mankind of a deeper and more painful interest than
+this ascetic epidemic. A hideous, sordid, and emaciated
+maniac, without knowledge, without patriotism,
+without natural affection, passing his life in a
+long routine of useless and atrocious self-torture, and
+quailing before the ghastly phantoms of his delirious
+brain, had become the ideal of the nations which had
+known the writings of Plato and Cicero, and the lives
+of Socrates and Cato. For about two centuries, the
+hideous maceration of the body was regarded as the
+highest proof of excellence. St. Jerome declares, with
+a thrill of admiration, how he had seen a monk, who
+for thirty years had lived exclusively on a small portion
+of barley bread and of mouldy water; another
+who lived in a hole and never ate more than five figs
+for his daily repast; a third who cut his hair only on
+Easter Sunday, who never washed his clothes, who
+never changed his tunic till it fell to pieces, who
+starved himself till his eyes grew dim, and his skin
+like a pumice stone.... For six months, it is said,
+St. Macarius of Alexandria slept in a marsh, and exposed
+his naked body to the stings of venomous flies....<!-- Page 212 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_212" id="Page_212">[212]</a></span>
+His disciple, St. Eusebius, carried one hundred
+and fifty pounds of iron, and lived for three years in a
+dried-up well.... St. Besarion spent forty days and
+nights in the middle of thorn bushes, and for forty
+days and nights never lay down when he slept....
+Some saints, like St. Marcian, restricted themselves to
+one meal a day, so small that they continually suffered
+the pangs of hunger.... Some of the hermits lived in
+deserted dens of wild beasts, others in dried-up wells,
+while others found a congenial resting-place among
+the tombs. Some disdained all clothes, and crawled abroad
+like the wild beasts, covered only by their matted
+hair. The cleanliness of the body was regarded as a
+pollution of the soul, and the saints who were most admired
+had become one hideous mass of clotted filth. St.
+Athanasius relates with enthusiasm how St. Antony,
+the patriarch of monachism, had never, to extreme old
+age, been guilty of washing his feet.... St. Abraham,
+the hermit, however, who lived for fifty years after his
+conversion, rigidly refused from that date to wash either
+his face or his feet.... St. Ammon had never seen
+himself naked. A famous virgin, named Sylvia, though
+she was sixty years old, and though bodily sickness
+was a consequence of her habits, resolutely refused,
+on religious principles, to wash any part of her body
+except her fingers. St. Euphraxia joined a convent of
+one hundred and thirty nuns, who never washed their
+feet, and who shuddered at the mention of a bath."<a name="FNanchor_166_166" id="FNanchor_166_166"></a><a href="#Footnote_166_166" class="fnanchor">[166]</a></p>
+
+<p><!-- Page 213 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_213" id="Page_213">[213]</a></span>
+It is difficult to realise what it is exactly that some
+writers have in their minds when they praise the purity
+of the ascetic ideal, and lament its degradation as
+though society lost something of great value thereby.
+The examples cited realised that ideal as well as it
+could be realised, and its anti-social character is unmistakable.
+If it is intended to imply that an element of
+self-denial or self-discipline is essential to healthy
+development, that is admitted, but this is not the
+ascetic ideal; it is that of temperance as taught by the
+best of the ancient philosophers. What the ascetic
+aimed at was not self-development, but self-suppression.
+The discipline of the monk was only another
+name for the cultivation of a frame of mind
+unhealthy and anti-social. Eventually, the rapidity
+with which this mania spread, the fact that for several
+centuries it raged as a veritable epidemic, carried
+with it the germs of a corrective. The more numerous
+monks and nuns became, the more certain it became
+that many of them would develop passions and propensities
+they professed to despise. The love of ease
+and wealth, the lust of power and pride of place, was
+sure to find expression, and if by the degradation of
+the ascetic ideal is meant the fact that the preachers
+of poverty, and humility, and meekness, became the
+wealthiest, the most powerful, the most corrupt, and
+the most tyrannical order in Christendom, the reason
+is that not even monasticism could prevent ordinary<!-- Page 214 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_214" id="Page_214">[214]</a></span>
+human passions from finding expression. They might
+be suppressed in the case of a few; it became impossible
+with a multitude. That they found expression
+in so disastrous a form was due to the fact that the
+disciplinary agent of these passions, a developed social
+consciousness, played so small a part in the life of
+the monk.</p>
+
+<p>It is no part of my present purpose to trace the full
+consequences of the ascetic epidemic. Some of these
+consequences, however, have a more or less direct
+bearing upon this enquiry, and it is necessary to say
+something upon them. One enduring and inevitable
+consequence of monasticism has not, I think, been
+adequately noted by many writers. This is its influence
+on the ideal of marriage, on the family, and on
+the domestic virtues. In India and Egypt celibacy
+had been closely associated with the religious life, but
+the ascetic was regarded as a man peculiarly apart
+from his fellows, and the family continued to be held
+in great honour, even by religious writers. Christianity
+provided for the first time a body of writers who made
+a direct attack upon marriage as obstructing the supreme
+duty of spiritual development. The Rev. Principal
+Donaldson, in his generally excellent book on
+<cite>Woman</cite>, professes to find some difficulty in accounting
+for the growth among the early Christians of the
+feeling in favour of celibacy. He remarks that "no
+one with the New Testament as his guide could venture
+to assert that marriage was wrong." Not wrong,
+certainly; but anyone with the New Testament before
+him would be justified in asserting marriage to be inferior
+to celibacy. It is at most taken for granted; it
+is neither commended nor recommended, and of its<!-- Page 215 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_215" id="Page_215">[215]</a></span>
+social value there is never a glimpse. And there is
+much on the other side. Paul's teaching is strongly
+in favour of celibacy, and marriage is only advised to
+avoid a greater evil. In the Book of <cite>Revelation</cite> there
+is a reference to the 144,000 saints who wait on "the
+Lamb," and who "were not defiled with women, but
+were virgins." Certainly the New Testament does not
+condemn marriage, but it is idle to pretend that those
+who preached the celibate ideal failed to find therein a
+warranty for their teaching.</p>
+
+<p>The historic fact is, however, that the early Christian
+leaders were, in the main, ardent advocates of celibacy.
+The social importance of marriage being ignored, its
+functions became those of ministering to sexual passion
+and the perpetuation of the race. In view of the
+supposed approaching end of the world, the desirability
+of this last was questioned, and in the name of
+purity the former was strongly denounced. It is from
+these points of view that Tertullian describes children
+as "burdens which are to most of us perilous as being
+unsuitable to faith," and wives as women of the second
+degree of modesty who had fallen into wedlock. Jerome
+said that marriage was at best a sin, and all that
+could be done was to excuse and purify it. Epiphanius
+said that the Church was based upon virginity as upon
+a corner-stone. Augustine was of opinion that celibates
+would shine in heaven like dazzling stars. Married
+people were declared, by another authority, to
+be incapable of salvation. The most powerful and
+most influential of writers concurred that the sexual
+relation was an almost fatal obstacle to religious salvation.</p>
+
+<p>Hardly any movement ever struck so hard against<!-- Page 216 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_216" id="Page_216">[216]</a></span>
+social well-being as did this teaching of celibacy.
+Wives were encouraged to desert their husbands,
+husbands to forsake their wives, children their parents.
+Parents, in turn, were exhorted to devote their children
+to the monastic life; and although at first children
+who had been so condemned were allowed to return
+to the world, should they desire it, on reaching maturity,
+this liberty was taken from them by the fourth
+Council of Toledo in 633.<a name="FNanchor_167_167" id="FNanchor_167_167"></a><a href="#Footnote_167_167" class="fnanchor">[167]</a> Some few of the Christian
+writers protested against children being taught to forsake
+their parents in this manner, but the general
+spirit of the time was in its favour.</p>
+
+<p>"Children were nursed and trained to expect at
+every instant more than human interferences; their
+young energies had ever before them examples of
+asceticism, to which it was the glory, the true felicity
+of life, to aspire. The thoughtful child had all his mind
+thus preoccupied ... wherever there was gentleness,
+modesty, the timidity of young passion, repugnance
+to vice, an imaginative temperament, a consciousness
+of unfitness to wrestle with the rough realities of life,
+the way lay invitingly open.... It lay through perils,
+but was made attractive by perpetual wonders. It was
+awful, but in its awfulness lay its power over the young
+mind. It learned to trample down that last bond which
+united the child to common humanity, filial reverence;
+the fond and mysterious attachment of the child
+and the mother, the inborn reverence of the son to
+the father. It is the highest praise of St. Fulgentius
+that he overcame his mother's tenderness by religious
+cruelty."<a name="FNanchor_168_168" id="FNanchor_168_168"></a><a href="#Footnote_168_168" class="fnanchor">[168]</a></p>
+
+<p><!-- Page 217 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_217" id="Page_217">[217]</a></span>
+The full warranty for Dean Milman's stricture is
+seen in the following passage from St. Jerome:&mdash;</p>
+
+<p>"Though your little nephew twine his arms around
+your neck; though your mother, with dishevelled hair,
+and tearing her robe asunder, point to the breast with
+which she suckled you; though your father fall down
+on the threshold before you, pass on over your father's
+body. Fly with tearless eyes to the banner of the
+cross. In this matter cruelty is the only piety.... Your
+widowed sister may throw her gentle arms around
+you.... Your father may implore you to wait but a
+short time to bury those near to you, who will soon
+be no more; your weeping mother may recall your
+childish days, and may point to her shrunken breast
+and to her wrinkled brow. Those around you may
+tell you that all the household rests upon you. Such
+chains as these the love of God and the fear of hell can
+easily break. You say that Scripture orders you to
+obey your parents, but he who loves them more than
+Christ loses his soul. The enemy brandishes a sword
+to slay me. Shall I think of a mother's tears?"<a name="FNanchor_169_169" id="FNanchor_169_169"></a><a href="#Footnote_169_169" class="fnanchor">[169]</a></p>
+
+<p>Gibbon said of the ascetic movement that the Pagan
+world regarded with astonishment a society that
+perpetuated itself without marriage. Unfortunately
+this perpetuation was secured by the sacrifice of some
+of the dearest interests of the race. For, in general,
+one may say that idealistic teaching of any kind appeals
+most powerfully to those who are least in need
+of it. The world would at any time lose little, and
+might possibly gain much, were it possible to restrain
+a certain class from parentage. But there is no evidence
+that monasticism ever had its effect on that<!-- Page 218 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_218" id="Page_218">[218]</a></span>
+kind of people; the presumption is indeed in the contrary
+direction. The careless and brutal hear and are
+unaffected. The more thoughtful and desirable alone
+are influenced. And there can be little doubt that the
+Church in appealing to certain aspects of human nature
+dissuaded from parentage those who were most
+fitted for the task. There was a practical survival of
+the unfittest. Nothing is more striking, in fact, in the
+early history of Christianity than the comparative
+absence of home life and of the domestic ideals. Dean
+Milman remarked that in all the discussion concerning
+celibacy he could not recall a single instance where
+the social aspects appear to have occurred to the disputants.
+The Dean's remark applies to some extent
+to a much later period of Christian history than
+the one to which he refers. That much-admired evangelical
+classic, Bunyan's <cite>Pilgrim's Progress</cite>, for example,
+shows a curious obliviousness to the value of
+family and social life. But neglect of the socialising
+and refining influence of family life leads inevitably to
+a hardening of character and a brutalising of life in
+general. The ferocious nature of the theological disputes
+of the early Christian period never fail to arouse
+the comments of historians. But there was really
+nothing to soften or restrain them. Everything was
+dominated by the theological interest. And we owe
+it in no small measure to the vogue of the monk that
+the tolerance of Pagan times, with its widespread respect
+for truth-seeking, was replaced by the narrow
+intolerance of the medieval period, an intolerance
+which has never really been eradicated from any
+part of Christian Europe.</p>
+
+<p>In counting this as one of the consequences of the<!-- Page 219 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_219" id="Page_219">[219]</a></span>
+Christian preaching of celibacy, I am supported by
+no less an authority than the late Sir Francis Galton.
+In his epoch-marking work, <cite>Hereditary Genius</cite>, this
+writer says:&mdash;</p>
+
+<p>"The long period of the Dark Ages under which
+Europe has lain is due, I believe, in a very considerable
+degree, to the celibacy enjoined by the religious
+orders on their votaries. Whenever a man or woman
+was possessed of a gentle nature that fitted him or her
+to deeds of charity, to meditation, to literature, or to
+art, the social condition of the time was such that they
+had no refuge elsewhere than in the bosom of the
+Church. But she chose to preach and exact celibacy.
+The consequence was that these gentle natures had
+no continuance, and thus by a policy so singularly unwise
+and suicidal that I am hardly able to speak of it
+without impatience, the Church brutalised the breed
+of our forefathers. She acted precisely as if she had
+aimed at selecting the rudest portion of the community
+to be alone the parents of future generations. She
+practised the arts that breeders would use, who aimed
+at creating ferocious, currish, and stupid nature. No
+wonder that club law prevailed for centuries over Europe;
+the wonder rather is that enough good remained
+in the veins of Europeans to enable their race to
+rise to its very moderate level of natural morality."<a name="FNanchor_170_170" id="FNanchor_170_170"></a><a href="#Footnote_170_170" class="fnanchor">[170]</a></p>
+
+<p>The consequences of asceticism on morals were almost
+wholly disastrous. There is no intention of endorsing
+the vulgar Protestant prejudice of every convent
+being a brothel, and all monks and nuns as given
+over to a vicious life, but there is no question that a
+very widespread demoralisation existed amongst the<!-- Page 220 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_220" id="Page_220">[220]</a></span>
+religious orders, that this existed from the very earliest
+times, and that it was an inevitable consequence of so
+large a number of people professing the ascetic life.
+This is not a history of morals, and it is needless to
+enter into a detailed account of the state of morality
+during the prevalence of asceticism. But the absence
+of any favourable influence exerted by asceticism on
+conduct is well illustrated in the description of Salvianus,
+Bishop of Marseilles at the close of the fifth
+century, of the condition of society in his day. Gaul,
+Spain, Italy, and Africa are depicted as sunk in an
+overmastering sensuality. Rome is represented as
+the sewer of the nations, and in the African Church,
+he says, the most diligent search can scarce discover
+one chaste among thousands. And this, it must be
+borne in mind, was the African Church, which under
+the care of Augustine had been specially nurtured in
+the most rigid asceticism. Four hundred years later
+the state of monastic morals is sufficiently indicated
+by a regulation of St. Theodore Studita prohibiting
+the entrance of female animals into monasteries.<a name="FNanchor_171_171" id="FNanchor_171_171"></a><a href="#Footnote_171_171" class="fnanchor">[171]</a> A
+regulation passed in Paris at a Council held in 1212
+enforces the same lesson by forbidding monks or nuns
+sleeping two in a bed. The avowed object of this was
+to repress offences of the most disgusting description.<a name="FNanchor_172_172" id="FNanchor_172_172"></a><a href="#Footnote_172_172" class="fnanchor">[172]</a>
+In 1208 an order was issued prohibiting mothers or
+other female relatives residing with priests, on account
+of the frequent scandals arising. Offences became so
+numerous and so open that it was with relief that laymen
+saw priests openly select concubines. That at
+least gave a promise of some protection to domestic
+life. In some of the Swiss cantons it actually became<!-- Page 221 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_221" id="Page_221">[221]</a></span>
+the practice to compel a new pastor, on taking up his
+charge, to select a concubine as a necessary protection
+to the females under his care. The same practice existed
+in Spain.<a name="FNanchor_173_173" id="FNanchor_173_173"></a><a href="#Footnote_173_173" class="fnanchor">[173]</a></p>
+
+<p>There is, as Lea rightly says, no injustice in holding
+the Church mainly responsible for the laxity of morals
+which is characteristic of medieval society. It had
+unbounded and unquestioned power, and this with
+its wealth and privileges might have made medieval
+society the purest in the world. As it was, "the period
+of its unquestioned domination over the conscience of
+Europe was the very period in which licence among
+the Teutonic races was most unchecked. A church
+which, though founded on the Gospel, and wielding
+the illimitable power of the Roman hierarchy, could
+yet allow the feudal principle to extend to the <i>jus
+primæ noctis</i> or <i>droit de marquette</i>, and whose ministers
+in their character of temporal seigneurs could
+even occasionally claim the disgusting right, was evidently
+exercising its influence, not for good, but for
+evil."</p>
+
+<p>On civic life and the civic virtues the influence of
+asceticism was equally disastrous. "A candid examination,"
+says Lecky, "will show that the Christian civilisation
+has been as inferior to the Pagan ones in civic
+and intellectual virtues as it has been superior to them
+in the virtues of humanity and chastity." One may
+reasonably question the latter part of this statement,
+bearing in mind the facts just pointed out, but the first
+part admits of overwhelming proof. Celibacy is not
+chastity, and it is difficult to see how the coarsening of
+character described by Lecky himself can be consistent<!-- Page 222 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_222" id="Page_222">[222]</a></span>
+with a heightened humanity. But there can be
+small doubt that the growth of the Christian Church
+spelt disaster to the civic life and institutions of the
+Empire. Nothing the Romans did was more admirable
+than their organisation of municipal life. They
+avoided the common blunder of imposing on all a
+uniform organisation, and so gave free play to local
+feeling and custom so far as was consistent with imperial
+order and peace. Civic life became, as a consequence,
+well ordered and persistent. It was far less
+corrupt than administration in the capital, and freedom
+persisted in the provincial towns for long after its
+practical disappearance in Rome itself. Indeed, but
+for the antagonism of Christianity, it is probable that
+the urban municipalities might have provided the impetus
+for the rejuvenation of the Empire.<a name="FNanchor_174_174" id="FNanchor_174_174"></a><a href="#Footnote_174_174" class="fnanchor">[174]</a></p>
+
+<p>From the outset, the early Christian movement
+stood as a whole apart from the civic life of the Empire,
+while the ascetic waged a constant warfare against it.
+"According to monastic view of Christianity," says
+Milman, "the total abandonment of the world, with all
+its ties and duties, as well as its treasures, its enjoyments,
+and objects of ambition, advanced rather than
+diminished the hopes of salvation." The object was
+individual salvation, not social regeneration. When
+people were praised for breaking the closest of family
+ties in their desire for salvation, it would be absurd to
+suppose that social duties and obligations would remain
+exempt. The Christian ascetic was ready enough
+to risk his own life, or to take the life of others, on account
+of minute points of doctrinal difference, but<!-- Page 223 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_223" id="Page_223">[223]</a></span>
+he was deaf to the call of patriotism or the demands
+of civic life. Theology became the one absorbing
+topic; and as monasticism assumed more menacing
+proportions, the monk became the dominating figure,
+paralysing by his presence the healthful activities of
+masses of the people. Speaking of the Eastern Empire,
+although his words apply with almost equal
+truth wherever the Church was supreme, Milman
+says:&mdash;</p>
+
+<p>"That which is the characteristic sign of the times
+as a social and political, as well as a religious, phenomenon,
+is the complete dominion assumed by the
+monks in the East over the public mind.... The monks,
+in fact, exercise the most complete tyranny, not merely
+over the laity, but over bishops and patriarchs, whose
+rule, though nominally subject to it, they throw off
+whenever it suits their purposes.... Monks in Alexandria,
+monks in Antioch, monks in Constantinople,
+decide peremptorily on orthodoxy and heterodoxy....
+Persecution is universal; persecution by every
+means of violence and cruelty; the only question is in
+whose hands is the power to persecute.... Bloodshed,
+murder, treachery, assassination, even during the public
+worship of God&mdash;these are the frightful means by
+which each party strives to maintain its opinions and
+to defeat its adversary. Ecclesiastical and civil authority
+are alike paralysed by combinations of fanatics
+ready to suffer or to inflict death, utterly unapproachable
+by reason."<a name="FNanchor_175_175" id="FNanchor_175_175"></a><a href="#Footnote_175_175" class="fnanchor">[175]</a></p>
+
+<p>Against such combinations of ignorance, fanaticism,
+and ferocity, the few remaining lovers of secular
+progress were powerless. Patriotism became a mere<!-- Page 224 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_224" id="Page_224">[224]</a></span>
+name, and organised civic life an almost forgotten aspiration.
+What the Pagan world had understood by a
+'good man' was one who spent himself in the service
+of his country. The Christian understood by it one who
+succeeded in saving his own soul, even at the sacrifice
+of family and friends. Vampire-like, monasticism fed
+upon the life-blood of the Empire. The civic life and
+patriotism of old Rome became a mere tradition, to inspire
+long after the men of the Renaissance and of the
+French Revolution.</p>
+
+<p>Finally, asceticism exerted a powerful influence on
+religion itself. That it served to strengthen and perpetuate
+the life of religion there can be little doubt. However
+strongly some people may have resented the
+monastic ideal, it nevertheless gave increased strength
+and vitality to the religious idea. To begin with, it
+offered for centuries a very powerful obstacle to the
+development of those progressive and scientific ideas
+that have made such advances in all centres of civilisation
+during the past two or three centuries. To the
+common mind it brought home the supremacy of religion
+in a way that nothing else could. The mere sight
+of monarch and noble yielding homage to the monk,
+acknowledging his supremacy in what was declared to
+be the chief interest in life, the interference of the monk
+in every department of life, saturated society with
+supernaturalism. And although at a later period the
+rapacity, dissoluteness, and tyranny of the monkish
+orders led to revolt, by that time the imagination of all
+had been thoroughly impressed with the value of religion.
+Even to-day current theology is permeated with
+the monkish notions of self-denial, self-sacrifice, and
+contempt of the world's comfort and beauty as belonging<!-- Page 225 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_225" id="Page_225">[225]</a></span>
+to the essence of pure religion. The lives of the
+saints still remain the storehouse of ideals for the religious
+preacher. In spite of their absurd practices and
+disgusting penances, later generations have not failed
+to hold them up as examples. They have been used
+to impress the imagination of their successors, as they
+were used to impress the minds of their contemporaries.
+The fact of Thomas à Beckett wearing a hair shirt
+running with vermin has not prevented his being held
+up as an example of the power of religion. People fear
+ghosts long after they cease to believe in them; they
+pay unreasoning homage to a crown long after intellectual
+development has robbed the kingly office of its
+primitive significance; all the recent developments of
+democracy have not abolished the Englishman's constitutional
+crick in the neck at the sight of a nobleman.
+Nor is supernaturalism expunged from a society because
+the conditions that gave it birth have passed
+away. A religious epidemic is not analogous to those
+physical disorders which deposit an antitoxin and so
+protect against future attacks. It resembles rather
+those disorders that permanently weaken, and so invite
+repeated assaults. The ascetic epidemic passed
+away; but, before doing so, it thoroughly saturated with
+supernaturalism the social atmosphere and impressed
+its power upon the public mind. It gave supernaturalism
+a new and longer lease of life, and paved the way
+for other outbreaks, of a less general, but still of a thoroughly
+epidemic character.</p>
+
+<div class="footnotes">
+<h3>Footnotes:<br />
+<span class="skip">[<a href="#Page_226">Skip</a>]</span>
+</h3>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_164_164" id="Footnote_164_164"></a><a href="#FNanchor_164_164"><span class="label">[164]</span></a> See <cite>The Psychology of Peoples</cite> and <cite>The Crowd</cite>.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_165_165" id="Footnote_165_165"></a><a href="#FNanchor_165_165"><span class="label">[165]</span></a> <cite>Origin and Development of Religious Belief</cite>, i. pp. 343-8.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_166_166" id="Footnote_166_166"></a><a href="#FNanchor_166_166"><span class="label">[166]</span></a> <cite>History of European Morals</cite>, ii. pp. 107-10. For a careful
+description of the monastic discipline in its more normal aspects,
+see Bingham's Works, vol. ii. bk. vi. Gibbon gives his usual
+brilliant summary of the movement in chapter xxxvii. of the <cite>Decline
+and Fall</cite>. A host of facts similar to those cited by Lecky
+will be found in <cite>The Book of Paradise</cite>, 2 vols., trans. by Wallis
+Budge. Lea's <cite>History of Sacerdotal Celibacy</cite> gives the classical
+and authoritative account of the moral consequences of the
+practice of celibacy. For a vivid picture of the psychology of the
+ascetic, see Flaubert's great romance, <cite>St. Antony</cite>.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_167_167" id="Footnote_167_167"></a><a href="#FNanchor_167_167"><span class="label">[167]</span></a> Cited by Lecky, ii. p. 131.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_168_168" id="Footnote_168_168"></a><a href="#FNanchor_168_168"><span class="label">[168]</span></a> Dean Milman, <cite>Hist. of Latin Christianity</cite>, ii. pp. 81-2.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_169_169" id="Footnote_169_169"></a><a href="#FNanchor_169_169"><span class="label">[169]</span></a> Lecky, ii. pp. 134-5.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_170_170" id="Footnote_170_170"></a><a href="#FNanchor_170_170"><span class="label">[170]</span></a> <cite>Hereditary Genius</cite>, 1869, p. 357.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_171_171" id="Footnote_171_171"></a><a href="#FNanchor_171_171"><span class="label">[171]</span></a> Lea, p. 109.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_172_172" id="Footnote_172_172"></a><a href="#FNanchor_172_172"><span class="label">[172]</span></a> Lea, p. 332.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_173_173" id="Footnote_173_173"></a><a href="#FNanchor_173_173"><span class="label">[173]</span></a> See Lea, pp. 353-4.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_174_174" id="Footnote_174_174"></a><a href="#FNanchor_174_174"><span class="label">[174]</span></a> For a fine sketch of Roman municipal life, see Dill's <cite>Roman
+Society from Nero to Marcus Aurelius</cite>, chap. ii.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_175_175" id="Footnote_175_175"></a><a href="#FNanchor_175_175"><span class="label">[175]</span></a> <cite>Hist. of Latin Christianity</cite>, i. pp. 317-8.</p></div>
+</div>
+
+<p><!-- Page 226 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_226" id="Page_226">[226]</a></span></p>
+
+<h2>CHAPTER <span class="cgap">NINE</span><br />
+RELIGIOUS EPIDEMICS&mdash;(<i>CONCLUDED</i>)</h2>
+
+<p>It is not easy to overestimate the
+influence of monasticism on subsequent religious history.
+The lives of its votaries provided examples of
+almost every conceivable kind of self-torture or semi-maniacal
+behaviour. It had made the world thoroughly
+familiar with extravagance of action as the symptom
+of intense religious conviction. And its influence
+on social development had been such that the susceptibility
+of the public mind to suggestions was as a raw
+wound in the presence of a powerful irritant. Such an
+institution as the Inquisition could only have maintained
+itself among a people thoroughly familiar with
+supernaturalism, and to whom its preservation was the
+first and most sacred of duties.</p>
+
+<p>A society habituated to the commanding presence
+of the monk, fed upon stories of their miraculous encounters
+with celestial and diabolic visitants, and so
+accustomed to regard the priesthood as in a very peculiar
+sense the mouthpiece of divinity, was well prepared
+for such a series of events as the crusades for the
+recovery of the Holy Land. Pilgrimages to the burial-places
+of saints, and to spots connected, by legend or
+otherwise, with Christian history, had long been in
+vogue, and formed a source of both revenue to the
+Church and of inspiration to the faithful. As early as
+833 a guide-book had been prepared called the <cite>Itinerary
+from Bordeaux to Jerusalem</cite>, and along the route
+marked convents and shelters for the pilgrims were established.
+A lucrative traffic in relics of every description
+had also been established, and any interference
+with this touched the Church in its tenderest point.
+Added to which the expected end of the world in the<!-- Page 227 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_227" id="Page_227">[227]</a></span>
+year 1000 had the effect of still further increasing the
+crowd of pilgrims to the Holy Land, where it was firmly
+believed the second advent would take place.</p>
+
+<p>In the eleventh century a tax was imposed on all
+Christians visiting Jerusalem. There were also reports
+of Christian pilgrims being ill-treated. Recent events
+in Europe have shown with what ease Christian feeling
+may be roused against a Mohammedan power,
+and it was considerably easier to do this in the eleventh
+century. Between them, Pope Urban <span class="ucsmcap">II.</span> and Peter the
+Hermit&mdash;the former acting mainly from political motives;
+the latter from a spirit of sheer fanaticism&mdash;succeeded
+in rousing Europe to a maniacal desire for the
+recovery of the Holy Land. And for nearly two hundred
+years the world saw a series of crusades on as absurd
+an errand as ever engaged the energies of mankind.
+Every class of society participated, and it is calculated
+that no less than two millions of lives were sacrificed.</p>
+
+<p>Ordinary histories lean to representing the crusades
+as a series of armed expeditions, led by princes, nobles,
+and kings. But this gives a quite inaccurate conception
+of the movement, during its early stages, at all
+events. In reality it was a true psychological epidemic.
+No custom, however ancient, no duty, no law, was
+allowed to stand before the crusading mania. In every
+village the clergy fed the mania, promising eternal rewards
+to all who took up the burden of the cross. Old
+and young, the strong and the sick, the rich and the
+poor were enrolled. Urban had told them that "under
+their General, Jesus Christ," they would march to certain
+victory. Absolution for all sins was promised to
+all who joined; and, as Gibbon says, "at the voice of<!-- Page 228 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_228" id="Page_228">[228]</a></span>
+their pastor, the robber, the incendiary, the homicide,
+arose by thousands to redeem their souls by repeating
+on the infidels the same deeds which they had exercised
+against their Christian brethren." Until experience
+had taught them better, little precautions were
+taken to provide food or arms. Huge concourses of
+people,<a name="FNanchor_176_176" id="FNanchor_176_176"></a><a href="#Footnote_176_176" class="fnanchor">[176]</a> some led by a goose and a goat, into which it
+was believed the Holy Ghost had entered, set out for
+the Holy Land, so ignorant that at every large town or
+city they enquired, "Is this Zion?" Although a religious
+expedition, small regard was paid to decency or
+humanity. Defenceless cities <i>en route</i> were sacked.
+Women were outraged, men and children killed. The
+Jews were murdered wholesale. Almost universally
+the slaughter of Jews at home were preparatory to
+crusading abroad. Germany, Hungary, and Bulgaria,
+although providing contingents for the crusading
+army, suffered heavily by the passage of these undisciplined,
+lawless crowds. As one writer says:&mdash;</p>
+
+<p>"If they had devoted themselves to the service of
+God, they convinced the inhabitants on their line of
+march that they had ceased to regard the laws of man.
+They considered themselves privileged to gratify every
+wish and every lust as it arose. They recognised
+no rights of property, they felt no gratitude for hospitality,
+and they possessed no sense of honour. They
+violated the wives and daughters of their hosts when
+they were kindly treated, they devastated the lands of
+friends whom they had converted into enemies, they
+resorted to wanton robbery and destruction in revenge
+for calamities which they had brought upon themselves.<!-- Page 229 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_229" id="Page_229">[229]</a></span>
+They believed that they proved their superiority
+to the Mohammedans by torturing the defenceless
+Jews; and this was the only exploit in which the first
+divisions of the crusaders could boast of success....
+To the leaders, who could not write their own names,
+deception and treachery were as familiar as force; to
+their followers rapine and murder were so congenial
+that, in the absence of Saracens, Jews, or townsfolk, it
+seemed but a professional pastime to kill or to rob a
+companion in arms."<a name="FNanchor_177_177" id="FNanchor_177_177"></a><a href="#Footnote_177_177" class="fnanchor">[177]</a></p>
+
+<p>And of the behaviour of the crusaders on the first
+capture of Jerusalem, 1099, Dean Milman writes:&mdash;</p>
+
+<p>"No barbarian, no infidel, no Saracen, ever perpetrated
+such wanton and cold-blooded atrocities of cruelty
+as the wearers of the Cross of Christ (who, it is said, had
+fallen on their knees and burst into a pious hymn at
+the first view of the Holy City) on the capture of that
+city. Murder was mercy, rape tenderness, simple plunder
+the mere assertion of the conqueror's right. Children
+were seized by their legs, some of them plucked
+from their mother's breasts, and dashed against the
+walls, or whirled from the battlements. Others were
+obliged to leap from the walls; some tortured, roasted
+by slow fires. They ripped up prisoners to see if they
+had swallowed gold. Of 70,000 Saracens there were
+not left enough to bury the dead; poor Christians
+were hired to perform the office. Everyone surprised
+in the Temple was slaughtered, till the reek from the
+dead drove away the slayers. The Jews were burned
+alive in their synagogue."<a name="FNanchor_178_178" id="FNanchor_178_178"></a><a href="#Footnote_178_178" class="fnanchor">[178]</a></p>
+
+<p>The most remarkable of all the crusades, and the<!-- Page 230 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_230" id="Page_230">[230]</a></span>
+one that best shows the character of the epidemic, was
+the children's crusade of 1212. It was said that the sins
+of the crusaders had caused their failure, and priests
+went about France and Germany calling upon the
+children to do what the sins of their fathers had prevented
+them accomplishing. The children were told
+that the sea would dry up to give them passage, and
+the infidels be stricken by the Lord on their approach.
+A peasant lad, Stephen of Cloyes, received
+the usual vision, and was ordered to lead the crusade.
+Commencing with the children around Paris, he collected
+some 30,000 followers, and without money or
+food commenced the march. At the same time an
+army of children, 40,000 strong, was gathered together
+at Cologne. The result of the crusade may be told
+in a few words. About 6000 of the French contingent,
+having reached Marseilles, were offered a passage by
+some shipowners. Several of the ships foundered,
+others reached shore, and the boys were sold into
+slavery. The girls were reserved for a more sinister
+fate. Thousands of the children died in attempting a
+march over the Alps. A mere remnant succeeded in
+reaching home, ruined in both mind and body. Well
+might Fuller say: "This crusade was done by the instinct
+of the devil, who, as it were, desired a cordial of
+children's blood, to comfort his weak stomach, long
+cloyed with murdering of men."<a name="FNanchor_179_179" id="FNanchor_179_179"></a><a href="#Footnote_179_179" class="fnanchor">[179]</a></p>
+
+<p>On both the social and the religious side the consequences
+were important. For the first time large bodies
+of men, taught to regard all those who were outside
+Christendom as beneath consideration, came into contact
+with a people possessing an art, an industry, a<!-- Page 231 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_231" id="Page_231">[231]</a></span>
+culture far superior to their own. As Draper says:
+"Even down to the meanest camp follower, everyone
+must have recognised the difference between what
+they had anticipated and what they had found. They
+had seen undaunted courage, chivalrous bearing, intellectual
+culture far higher than their own. They had
+been in lands filled with prodigies of human skill.
+They did not melt down into the populations to whom
+they returned without imparting to them a profound
+impression destined to make itself felt in the course of
+time."<a name="FNanchor_180_180" id="FNanchor_180_180"></a><a href="#Footnote_180_180" class="fnanchor">[180]</a> Hitherto Mohammedan culture had only influenced
+Christendom through the medium of the
+Spanish schools and universities. Now the influence
+became more general. A taste for greater comfort developed.
+Commerce grew; literature improved. We
+approach the period of the Renaissance, and to that
+new birth the crusades, despite their intolerance and
+brutality, offered a contribution of no small value.</p>
+
+<p>On the other hand, and for a time, the power of the
+Church grew greater. The impetus given to superstitious
+hopes and fears made on all hands for the wealth
+of the Church. Much was made over to the Church as
+a free gift. Much was pawned to it. Much also was
+entrusted by those who went to the Holy Land, never
+to return, in which case the Church became the designated
+or undesignated heir. "In every way the all-absorbing
+Church was still gathering in wealth, encircling
+new land within her hallowed pale, the one steady
+merchant who in this vast traffic and sale of personal
+and of landed property never made a losing venture,
+but went on accumulating and still accumulating, and
+for the most part withdrawing the largest portion of<!-- Page 232 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_232" id="Page_232">[232]</a></span>
+the land in every kingdom into a separate estate, which
+claimed exemption from all burthens of the realm,
+until the realm was compelled into measures, violent
+often and iniquitous in their mode, but still inevitable."<a name="FNanchor_181_181" id="FNanchor_181_181"></a><a href="#Footnote_181_181" class="fnanchor">[181]</a></p>
+
+<p>Next, the crusades set their seal upon the justice
+of religious wars, and established an enduring alliance
+between militarism and religion. The military profession
+became surrounded with all the ceremonies and
+paraphernalia of religion, without being in the least
+humanised by the alliance. The knight received his
+arms blessed by the Church, he was sworn to defend
+the Church, and he was as ready to turn his weapons
+against heretics in Europe as against infidels in Syria.
+Military persecutions of heretics assumed the form of
+a mania. There were crusades against the Moors in
+Spain, against the Albigenses, and against other heretics.
+As Bryce remarks: "The religious feeling which
+the crusades evoked&mdash;a feeling which became the origin
+of the great orders of chivalry, and somewhat later
+of the two great orders of mendicant friars&mdash;turned
+wholly against the opponents of ecclesiastical claims,
+and was made to work the will of the Holy See, which
+had blessed and organised the project."<a name="FNanchor_182_182" id="FNanchor_182_182"></a><a href="#Footnote_182_182" class="fnanchor">[182]</a> The expedition
+against King John by Philip of France was undertaken
+at the behest of the Pope, and was called a
+crusade. The attempt of Spain to crush the Netherlands
+was called a crusade. So was the Armada that
+was fitted out against England.</p>
+
+<p>More than all, a stamp of permanency was given to
+popular superstition. For two centuries people had
+seen expedition after expedition fitted out to accomplish<!-- Page 233 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_233" id="Page_233">[233]</a></span>
+an avowedly religious purpose. They had been
+taught that to die in defence of religion, or in the attempt
+to achieve a religious object, was the noblest of
+deaths. They had seen the greatest in Europe setting
+forth at the command of the Church. Signs and wonders
+had abounded to prove the heaven-blessed character
+of the crusades. They had seen the Church
+growing steadily in power, and every possible means
+had been utilised to increase the flame of religious
+fanaticism. Expeditions might fail, but failure did
+not cure fanaticism. It fed it; the crusaders returned,
+chastened in some respects, but still sufficiently full of
+religious zeal to be ready to battle against the unbeliever
+and the heretic at the behest of the Church.
+And it was not the policy of the Church to allow this
+fanaticism to remain unemployed. Even though it
+might ultimately lose, the Church and superstition
+profited enormously by the crusading spirit. It strengthened
+the general sense of the supernatural, even
+while creating tendencies that were destined to limit
+its sway. Above all, it prepared the way for other religious
+epidemics. These were more circumscribed in
+area, and less lengthy in their duration; but their existence
+was made possible and easy by the centuries
+during which, first monasticism, and later the crusading
+mania, had dominated the public mind.</p>
+
+<p>The crusades had hardly been brought to a close
+before continental Europe witnessed an outbreak, in
+epidemic form, of a practice that had been long associated
+with monastic discipline. The use of the whip
+as a form of religious discipline had always played a
+part in conventual and monastic life. On the one
+hand, it formed part of that insensate desire to torture<!-- Page 234 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_234" id="Page_234">[234]</a></span>
+the body which went to make up the ascetic ideal;
+on the other hand, the fondness for whipping bare
+flesh and for being whipped has a distinctly pathologic
+character. The subject is rather too unsavoury to
+dwell upon, but it has long been established that there
+is a close connection between the whipping of certain
+parts of the body and the production of intense sexual
+pleasure.<a name="FNanchor_183_183" id="FNanchor_183_183"></a><a href="#Footnote_183_183" class="fnanchor">[183]</a> And it is also clear that the life led by
+monks and nuns was such as to encourage sexual
+aberrations of various forms. Moreover, when once
+the practice of whipping became a public spectacle,
+and assumed an epidemic form, imitation, combined
+with intense religious faith, would operate very powerfully.</p>
+
+<p>In the fourteenth century Europe was visited by
+the Black Plague. In countries utterly devoid of sanitation,
+where baths were practically unknown and
+personal habits of the filthiest, the plague found a
+fruitful soil. Nearly a quarter of the population died,
+and corpses were so numerous that huge pits were dug
+and hundreds buried together. It was amid the general
+terror and demoralisation caused by this visitation
+that the sect of the Flagellants arose. Calling
+themselves the Brotherhood of the Flagellants, or the
+Brethren of the Cross, wearing dark garments with
+red crosses front and back, they traversed the cities of
+the Continent carrying whips to which small pieces of
+iron were fixed. England appears to have been the
+only country in which they failed to establish themselves.
+Elsewhere their numbers grew with formidable
+rapidity. At Spires two hundred boys, under
+twelve years of age, influenced probably by the example<!-- Page 235 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_235" id="Page_235">[235]</a></span>
+of the children's crusade, formed themselves
+into a brotherhood and marched through some of the
+German cities. In Italy over 20,000 people marched
+from Florence in one of these processions; from Modena,
+over 25,000. Some of them professed to work
+miracles. Everywhere, while the mania lasted, they
+were warmly welcomed, the inhabitants of towns and
+cities ringing the bells and flocking in crowds to hear
+the preaching and witness the whippings.</p>
+
+<p>The proceedings of the Flagellants in all countries
+were very similar. They marched from town to town,
+men and women and children stripped to the waist&mdash;sometimes
+entirely naked&mdash;praying incessantly and
+whipping each other. "Not only during the day, but
+even by night, and in the severest winter, they traversed
+the cities with torches and banners, in thousands
+and tens of thousands, headed by their priests,
+and prostrated themselves before the altars." At other
+times they proceeded to the market-place, arranged
+themselves on the ground in circles, assuming attitudes
+in accordance with their real or supposed crimes.
+After each had been whipped, "one of them, in conclusion,
+stood up to read a letter, which it was pretended
+an angel had brought from heaven to St. Peter's
+Church, at Jerusalem, stating that Christ, who was
+sore displeased at the sins of man, had granted, at the
+intercession of the Holy Virgin and of the angels,
+that all who should wander about for thirty-four days
+and scourge themselves should be partakers of the
+Divine grace." In the end the movement became so
+obnoxious to the Church, and so troublesome to the
+civil authorities, that both combined to secure its suppression.</p>
+
+<p><!-- Page 236 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_236" id="Page_236">[236]</a></span>
+Equally significant in the history of religion is the
+dancing mania, which broke out as the mania for
+flagellation was subsiding. The function of dancing
+in primitive religious ceremonial has been pointed
+out in a previous chapter. It is there a common and
+obvious method of both creating and expressing a
+high state of nervous excitability. In later times religious
+dancing becomes more purely hypnotic in
+character, and suggestion plays a powerful part. During
+the medieval period the conditions were peculiarly
+favourable to the prevalence of psychological
+epidemics. Plagues, more or less severe, were of frequent
+occurrence. Between 1119 and 1340, Italy
+alone had no less than sixteen such visitations. Smallpox
+and leprosy were also common. The public mind
+was morbidly sensitive to signs and portents and saturated
+to an almost incredible degree with superstition.
+The public processions of the Church, its penances,
+and practices were all calculated to fire the imagination,
+and produce a mixed and dangerous condition
+of fear and expectancy. Moreover, dancing mania, on
+a small scale, had made its appearance on several previous
+occasions, and the public mind was thus in a
+way prepared for a more serious outbreak.</p>
+
+<p>The great dancing mania of 1374 occurred immediately
+after the revels connected with the semi-Pagan
+festival of St. John. Bacchanalian dances formed one
+of the accompaniments of the festival of St. John, and
+made, so to speak, a natural starting-point for the epidemic.
+Hecker, who gives a very elaborate account of
+the dancing mania as it appeared in various countries,
+thus describes the behaviour of those afflicted:&mdash;</p>
+
+<p>"They formed circles, hand in hand, and, appearing<!-- Page 237 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_237" id="Page_237">[237]</a></span>
+to have lost control over their senses, continued
+dancing, regardless of all bystanders, for hours together,
+in wild delirium, until at length they fell to the
+ground in a state of exhaustion.... While dancing,
+they neither saw nor heard, being insensible to external
+impressions, but were haunted by visions, their
+fancies conjuring up spirits whose names they shrieked
+out; and some of them afterwards asserted that
+they felt as if they had been immersed in a stream of
+blood, which obliged them to leap so high. Others,
+during the paroxysm, saw the heavens open and the
+Saviour enthroned with the Virgin Mary."<a name="FNanchor_184_184" id="FNanchor_184_184"></a><a href="#Footnote_184_184" class="fnanchor">[184]</a></p>
+
+<p>At Aix-la-Chapelle, Cologne, and Metz, says the
+same writer:&mdash;</p>
+
+<p>"Peasants left their ploughs, mechanics their workshops,
+housewives their domestic duties, to join the
+wild revels. Secret desires were excited, and but too
+often found opportunities for wild enjoyment; and
+numerous beggars, stimulated by vice and misery,
+availed themselves of this new complaint to gain a
+temporary livelihood. Girls and boys quitted their
+parents, and servants their masters, to amuse themselves
+at the dances of those possessed, and greedily
+imbibed the poison of mental infection. Above a hundred
+unmarried women were seen raving about in
+consecrated and unconsecrated places, and the consequences
+were soon perceived."<a name="FNanchor_185_185" id="FNanchor_185_185"></a><a href="#Footnote_185_185" class="fnanchor">[185]</a></p>
+
+<p>Once attacked, the hypnotic character of the complaint
+was shown by its annual recurrence. Again to
+quote Hecker:&mdash;</p>
+
+<p>"Most of those affected were only annually visited<!-- Page 238 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_238" id="Page_238">[238]</a></span>
+by attacks; and the occasion of them was so manifestly
+referable to the prevailing notions of that period that,
+if the unqualified belief in the agency of saints could
+have been abolished, they would not have had any
+return of the complaint. Throughout the whole of
+June, prior to the festival of St. John, patients felt a
+disquietude and restlessness which they were unable
+to overcome. They were dejected, timid, and anxious;
+wandered about in an unsettled state, being tormented
+with twitching pains, which seized them suddenly
+in different parts, and eagerly expected the eve of St.
+John's Day, in the confident hope that by dancing at
+the altars of this saint they would be freed from all
+their sufferings. This hope was not disappointed; and
+they remained, for the rest of the year, exempt from
+any further attack."<a name="FNanchor_186_186" id="FNanchor_186_186"></a><a href="#Footnote_186_186" class="fnanchor">[186]</a></p>
+
+<p>In addition to John the Baptist, the dancing disease
+was also connected with another saint&mdash;St. Vitus.
+He is said to have been martyred about 303, and a
+body, reputed to be his, was transported to France in
+the ninth century. It is said that just before he was
+killed he prayed that all who would commemorate
+the day of his death should be protected from the
+dancing mania. Whereupon a voice from heaven was
+heard to say, "Vitus, thy prayer is accepted." The
+fact that the prayer was offered a thousand years before
+the dancing mania appeared is a circumstance
+that to the eye of faith merely heightened its value.</p>
+
+<p>Within recent times epidemics of dancing have
+been more local, less persistent, and of necessity not
+so public in their display, but nearly always their appearance
+has been in connection with displays of religious<!-- Page 239 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_239" id="Page_239">[239]</a></span>
+fervour. In most cases the dancing has tended
+more to a species of 'jumping,' and&mdash;although this
+may be due to more careful observation&mdash;has been
+accompanied by actions of a clearly epileptoid nature.
+One of the most famous of these outbreaks was that
+of the French Convulsionnaires, which lasted from
+1727 to the Revolution. In 1727, a popular, but half-crazy
+priest, François de Paris, died. During his life
+Paris had fasted and scourged himself, lived in a hut
+that was seldom or never cleansed, showed the same
+lack of cleanliness in his person, and often went about
+half naked. Very shortly after his death, it was said
+that miracles began to take place at his grave in the
+cemetery of St. Médard. People gathered round the
+tomb day after day, and one young girl was seized
+with convulsions. (She is called a girl in the narrative,
+but she was a mature virgin of forty-two years of age.)
+Afterwards other miracles followed in rapid succession.
+Some fell in fits, others swallowed pieces of coal
+or flint, some were cured of diseases. From the description
+of the behaviour of some of these devotees
+there seems to have been a considerable amount of
+sexual feeling mixed up with the display. Sometimes,
+we are told, those seized "bounded from the ground
+like fish out of water; this was so frequently imitated
+at a later period that the women and girls, when they
+expected such violent contortions, not wishing to appear
+indecent, put on gowns made like sacks, closed
+at the feet. If they received any bruises by falling
+down, they were healed with earth taken from the
+grave of the uncanonised saint. They usually, however,
+showed great agility in this respect; and it is
+scarcely necessary to remark that the female sex especially<!-- Page 240 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_240" id="Page_240">[240]</a></span>
+was distinguished by all kinds of leaping, and
+almost inconceivable contortions of body. Some spun
+round on their feet with incredible rapidity, as is related
+of the dervishes. Others ran with their heads against
+walls, or curved their bodies like rope dancers, so that
+their heels touched their shoulders."</p>
+
+<p>Women figured very prominently among the Convulsionnaires,
+particularly when the epidemic passed
+from convulsive dancing to prophecy, and thence to
+various forms of self-torture. Women stretched themselves
+on the floor, while other women, and even men,
+jumped upon their bodies. Others were beaten with
+clubs and bars of iron. Some actually underwent
+crucifixion on repeated occasions. They were stretched
+on wooden crosses, and nails three inches long
+driven through hands and feet. Some of the occurrences
+remind one of what is now seen to take place
+under hypnotic influence. People labouring under
+strong excitement, it is known, become insensible to
+pain.</p>
+
+<p>Outbreaks of jumping and dancing followed the
+introduction of Methodist preachers into country districts
+in the eighteenth century. In Wales, a sect of
+'Jumpers' originated from this cause, and many of
+the American 'Jumpers' and 'Dancers' seem to have
+had their origin from this Welsh outbreak. In all such
+cases the spread of the mania was helped, if not made
+possible, by the preachers. They themselves looked
+upon these exhibitions as manifestations of the power
+of God, and so encouraged their hearers in their behaviour.
+Not every minister has the common sense
+of the Shetland preacher cited by Hecker. An epileptic
+woman had a fit in church, which a number of<!-- Page 241 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_241" id="Page_241">[241]</a></span>
+others hailed as a manifestation of the power of God.
+Sunday after Sunday the same thing occurred with
+other women, the number of the sufferers steadily increasing.
+The thing threatened to assume such proportions,
+and to become so great a nuisance, he announced
+that attendants would be at hand who would
+dip women in the lake who happened to be seized.
+This threat proved a most powerful form of exorcism.
+Not one woman was affected. Similar conduct might
+have been quite as efficacious in preventing many
+religious manifestations that have assumed epidemic
+proportions.</p>
+
+<p>Unfortunately, the influence of preachers and religious
+teachers was most usually cast in the other
+direction. Very often, of course, they were no better
+informed than their congregations; at other times they
+undoubtedly encouraged the delusion for interested
+reasons. The most striking recent illustration of this
+latter behaviour was seen in the Welsh revival led by
+Evan Roberts. Of this man's mental condition there
+could be little doubt. Just as little doubt could there
+be that the behaviour of the congregations was wholly
+due to the power of suggestions upon weak and excitable
+natures. Yet scarcely a preacher in Britain said
+a word in disapproval. Hundreds of them used the
+outbreak to illustrate the power of religion. Many
+prominent preachers travelled down to Wales and returned
+telling of the great manifestations of 'spiritual
+power' they had witnessed. How little removed such
+behaviour is from that of the savage watching with
+awe the actions of one suffering from epilepsy or insanity,
+readers of the foregoing pages will be in a position
+to judge.</p>
+
+<p><!-- Page 242 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_242" id="Page_242">[242]</a></span>
+From the middle of the third century onward, Europe
+had been subject to wave after wave of religious
+fanaticism. All along, religious belief had been verified
+and strengthened by the occurrence of phenomena
+that now admittedly fall within the purview
+of the pathologist. And from one point of view the
+secularisation of life served but to emphasise the dependence
+of religion upon the occurrence of these abnormal
+conditions. For the more surely the phenomena
+of nature and of social life were brought within
+the scope of a scientific generalisation, the more people
+began to look for the life of religion in conditions that
+were removed from the normal. But, above all, this
+long succession of waves of fanaticism served to permeate
+the general mind with supernaturalism. Each
+one cleared the way for a successor. And in the next
+chapter we have to deal with one that, in some respects,
+is the most remarkable of all, viz., that of the belief in
+witchcraft.</p>
+
+<div class="footnotes">
+<h3>Footnotes:<br />
+<span class="skip">[<a href="#Page_243">Skip</a>]</span>
+</h3>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_176_176" id="Footnote_176_176"></a><a href="#FNanchor_176_176"><span class="label">[176]</span></a> It is estimated that 275,000 people formed the van of the
+first crusade.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_177_177" id="Footnote_177_177"></a><a href="#FNanchor_177_177"><span class="label">[177]</span></a> L. O. Pike, <cite>History of Crime in England</cite>, i. pp. 164-9.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_178_178" id="Footnote_178_178"></a><a href="#FNanchor_178_178"><span class="label">[178]</span></a> <cite>History of Latin Christianity</cite>, iv. p. 188.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_179_179" id="Footnote_179_179"></a><a href="#FNanchor_179_179"><span class="label">[179]</span></a> <cite>History of the Holy War</cite>, bk. iii.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_180_180" id="Footnote_180_180"></a><a href="#FNanchor_180_180"><span class="label">[180]</span></a> <cite>Intellectual Development of Europe</cite>, 1872, p. 425.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_181_181" id="Footnote_181_181"></a><a href="#FNanchor_181_181"><span class="label">[181]</span></a> Milman, iv. p. 199.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_182_182" id="Footnote_182_182"></a><a href="#FNanchor_182_182"><span class="label">[182]</span></a> <cite>Holy Roman Empire</cite>, p. 164.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_183_183" id="Footnote_183_183"></a><a href="#FNanchor_183_183"><span class="label">[183]</span></a> See Bloch, <cite>Sexual Life of our Time</cite>, pp. 568-74.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_184_184" id="Footnote_184_184"></a><a href="#FNanchor_184_184"><span class="label">[184]</span></a> <cite>Epidemics of the Middle Ages</cite>, pp. 87-8.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_185_185" id="Footnote_185_185"></a><a href="#FNanchor_185_185"><span class="label">[185]</span></a> Hecker, p. 91.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_186_186" id="Footnote_186_186"></a><a href="#FNanchor_186_186"><span class="label">[186]</span></a> <cite>Epidemics</cite>, p. 105.</p></div>
+</div>
+
+<p><!-- Page 243 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_243" id="Page_243">[243]</a></span></p>
+
+<h2>CHAPTER <span class="cgap">TEN</span><br />
+THE WITCH MANIA</h2>
+
+<p>In all stages of religious history
+the witch and the wizard are familiar figures. It is of
+no importance to our present enquiry whether magic
+precedes religion or not. It is at all events certain that
+they are very closely connected, and that conditions
+which foster the belief in magic likewise serve to
+strengthen religious belief. Witchcraft, as Tylor says,
+is part and parcel of savage life. Death is very frequently
+attributed to the magical action of wizards,
+and the savage lives in perpetual fear lest some of his
+belongings, or some part of his person, should be bewitched
+by malevolent sorcerers. Sir Richard Burton
+says that in East Africa his experience taught him that
+among the negroes, what with slavery and what with
+black magic, no one, especially in old age, is safe from
+being burnt at a day's notice. When from savage life
+we mount to societies enjoying a higher culture, we
+still find the witch and the wizard in evidence. Both
+in Greece and Rome the belief in witchcraft existed.
+There were made direct laws against its practice,
+although neither the Greeks nor the Romans stained
+their civilisation with the judicial murder of thousands
+of victims such as occurred later in Christian
+Europe.</p>
+
+<p>But the belief in witchcraft is continuous. So also
+are the methods practised, and the modes of detection.
+The proofs offered in support of sorcery in the seventeenth
+century are precisely similar to those credited
+by savages in the lowest stage of human culture. The
+power of transformation possessed by the accused, the
+ability to bewitch through the possession of hairs belonging
+to the afflicted person, the making of little
+effigies and driving sharp instruments into them, and<!-- Page 244 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_244" id="Page_244">[244]</a></span>
+so affecting the corresponding parts of people, transportation
+through the air, etc., all belong to the belief
+in and practice of witchcraft wherever found. Had a
+Fijian been transported to a seat on the judicial bench
+by the side of Sir Matthew Hale, when that judge condemned
+two old women to death for witchcraft, he
+would have found himself in a quite congenial atmosphere.
+Allowing for difference in language, he would
+have found the evidence similar to that with which he
+was familiar, and he would have been able to endorse
+the judge's remarks with tales of his own experience.
+On this point, the level of culture attained by savages,
+and that of the inhabitants of the overwhelming majority
+of European countries little more than two hundred
+years ago, were substantially the same. Even to-day
+cases are continually occurring which prove that
+advances in knowledge and civilisation have not left
+this ancient superstition without supporters.</p>
+
+<p>In subscribing to the belief in witchcraft, the Christian
+Church thus fell into line with earlier forms of religious
+belief. The peculiar feature it represents is that
+it came into existence when the belief in witchcraft was
+losing its hold on the more cultured classes. Had it not
+allied itself with this tendency, no such thing as the
+witch mania of the medieval period could have existed.
+In sober truth, it brought about a veritable renaissance
+of the cruder theories of demonism, while
+its intolerance of opposition succeeded in stifling the
+voice of criticism for centuries. The primitive theory
+which holds that man is surrounded by hosts of spiritual
+agencies, mostly of a malevolent nature, was revived
+and fully endorsed by all Christian teachers. In
+the commonest, as well as in the rarest events of life,<!-- Page 245 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_245" id="Page_245">[245]</a></span>
+this supernatural activity was manifest. In both the
+Old and New Testament the belief in demoniacal
+agency was endorsed. Moreover, the fact that Christianity
+was not a creed seeking to live as one of many
+others, but a religion struggling for complete mastery,
+gave further impetus to the belief. An easy explanation
+for the miracles and marvels that occurred in connection
+with non-Christian beliefs was that they were
+the work of demons. The Christian felt himself to be
+fighting not so much human antagonists as so many
+embodiments of satanic power. And after the establishment
+of Christianity it is probable that much that
+went on under cover of witch assemblies, a more detailed
+knowledge than we possess would prove to be
+really the clandestine exercise of prescribed forms of
+faith. The old saying, "The sin of witchcraft is as the
+sin of rebellion," has more in it than meets the eye.
+There is little real difference between the magic that
+appears as piety and the magic that is denounced as
+sorcery, except that one is permitted and the other is
+not. And it is almost a law of religious development
+that the gods of one religion become the demons of its
+successor.</p>
+
+<p>But while witchcraft has existed in all ages, it existed
+in a much milder form than that which we find in
+the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries. First of all,
+there is the fact to which attention has already been
+directed, namely, the concentration of the public mind
+upon various forms of supernaturalism. Every aspect
+of life was more or less under the direct influence of
+the Church, and no teaching was tolerated that conflicted
+with her doctrines. And it was to the interest
+of the Church perpetually to emphasise the reality of<!-- Page 246 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_246" id="Page_246">[246]</a></span>
+either angelic or diabolic activity. Even in the case
+of those who showed a tendency to revolt against
+Church rule there was no exception to this. If anything,
+the belief was more pronounced. Next, the fifteenth
+and sixteenth centuries saw a rising tide of
+heresy against which the Church was compelled to
+battle; and to ascribe this alleged perversion of Christian
+doctrines to the malevolence of Satan offered the
+line of least resistance&mdash;just as the heretics attributed
+the power of the Church itself to the same source.
+Whatever diminution ensued in the general flood of
+superstition, as a consequence of the quarrel between
+Protestant and Catholic, was, so far as the disputants
+were concerned, incidental and even undesired. On
+the one point of demonism there existed complete
+unanimity, and the sceptic fared equally hard with
+both parties. In such an environment the wildest tales
+of sorcery became credible; and nothing illustrates
+this more forcibly than the fact that many of those
+tortured and condemned for sorcery actually believed
+themselves capable of performing the marvels laid to
+their charge. Added to these factors, we have to note
+that social conditions were also extremely favourable.
+Moral ties were as loose as they could reasonably be;
+and the attitude of the Church towards the sexual relation
+had forced both the religious and the non-religious
+mind into wholly unhealthy channels. This last
+aspect of the subject has been little dealt with, but it
+is unquestionably a very real one. A German writer
+says:&mdash;</p>
+
+<p>"Whilst in the fifteenth and the beginning of the
+sixteenth centuries, as those well acquainted with the
+state of morals during this period can all confirm, a<!-- Page 247 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_247" id="Page_247">[247]</a></span>
+most unbounded freedom was dominant in sexual relations,
+the State and the Church were desirous of
+compelling the people to keep better order by the use
+of actual force, and by religious compulsion. So forced
+a transformation in so vital a matter necessarily resulted
+in a reaction of the worst kind, and forced into
+secret channels the impulse which it had attempted to
+suppress. This reaction occurred, moreover, with an
+elemental force. There resulted widespread sexual
+violence and seduction, hesitating at nothing, often
+insanely daring, in which everywhere the devil was
+supposed to help; everyone's head was turned in this
+way; the uncontrolled lust of debauchees found vent
+in secret bacchanalian associations and orgies, wherein
+many, with or without masquerade, played the part
+of Satan; shameful deeds were perpetrated by excited
+women and by procuresses and prostitutes ready for
+any kind of immoral abomination; add to these sexual
+orgies the most widely diffused web of a completely
+developed theory of witchcraft, and the systematic
+strengthening of the widely prevalent belief in the
+devil&mdash;all these things, woven in a labyrinthine connection,
+made it possible for thousands upon thousands
+to be murdered by a disordered justice and to
+be sacrificed to delusion."<a name="FNanchor_187_187" id="FNanchor_187_187"></a><a href="#Footnote_187_187" class="fnanchor">[187]</a></p>
+
+<p>To those who look closely into the subject of medieval
+witchcraft the presence of a strong sexual element
+is undeniable. When we examine contemporary accounts
+of the 'Sabbath,' some of which are so gross as
+to be unprintable, we find a portion of the proceedings<!-- Page 248 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_248" id="Page_248">[248]</a></span>
+to be of a marked erotic character. The figure of Satan
+often enough reminds one of the pagan Priapus, and
+the ceremonies bear a strong resemblance to the ancient
+ones, with the mixture of Christian language and
+symbolism inevitable under such circumstances. Promiscuous
+intercourse between the sexes was said to
+occur at the witches' gatherings; and, indeed, unless
+some sort of sexual extravagance occurred, it is hard
+to account for both the persistency of the gatherings
+and of the reports concerning them. The most probable
+theory is, as I have just said, that these gatherings
+were covers for a continuance of the older sex worship.
+Many customs connected therewith lingered on in the
+Church itself, and it is not a wild assumption that they
+existed in a less adulterated and more extravagant
+form outside.</p>
+
+<p>Universal as the belief in witchcraft has been, it was
+not until the close of the fifteenth century that it assumed
+what may be justly called an epidemic form.
+The famous Bull of Pope Innocent <span class="ucsmcap">VIII.</span> was not unconnected
+in its origin with the growth of heresy. This
+precious document, issued in 1484, declares:&mdash;</p>
+
+<p>"It has come to our ears that very many persons of
+both sexes, deviating from the Catholic Faith, abuse
+themselves with demons, Incubus and Succubus; and
+by incantations, charms, and conjurations, and other
+wicked superstitions, by criminal acts and offences,
+have caused the offspring of women and of the lower
+animals, the fruits of the earth, the grape, and the products
+of various plants, men, women, and other animals
+of different kinds, vineyards, meadows, pasture land,
+corn and other vegetables of the earth, to perish, be
+oppressed, and utterly destroyed; that they torture<!-- Page 249 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_249" id="Page_249">[249]</a></span>
+men and women with cruel pains and torments, internal
+as well as external; that they hinder the proper
+intercourse of the sexes, and the propagation of the
+human species. Moreover, they are in the habit of denying
+the very faith itself. We, therefore, willing to
+provide by opportune remedies, according as it falls to
+our office, by our apostolical authority, by the tenor of
+these presents, do appoint and decree that they be convicted,
+imprisoned, punished, and mulcted according
+to their offences."</p>
+
+<p>It was this Pope who commissioned the inquisitor,
+Sprenger, to root out witches. Sprenger, with two
+others, acting on the authority of the Popes, drew up
+the famous work, <cite>The Witch Hammer</cite>, which provided
+the basis for all subsequent works on the detection
+and punishment of witches.<a name="FNanchor_188_188" id="FNanchor_188_188"></a><a href="#Footnote_188_188" class="fnanchor">[188]</a> The folly and iniquity
+of the book is almost unbelievable, although it is quite
+matched by subsequent productions. It even provides
+for the silence of people under torture. If they confess
+when tortured, the case is complete. But if they do not
+confess, this diabolic production lays it down that this
+is because witches who have given themselves up to
+the devil are insensible to pain. Even the evidence
+of children was admitted. And although in ordinary
+trials the evidence of criminals was barred, it was to be
+freely allowed in trials for sorcery. Everything that
+ingenuity could suggest or brutality execute was provided
+for.</p>
+
+<p>From the issue of <cite>The Witch Hammer</cite> until the
+middle of the seventeenth century, a period of about
+one hundred and fifty years, an epidemic of witchcraft<!-- Page 250 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_250" id="Page_250">[250]</a></span>
+raged. People of all ages and of all classes of society
+became implicated, and for some time, at least, accusation
+meant conviction. An almost unbelievably large
+number were executed. Says Lecky:&mdash;</p>
+
+<p>"In almost every province of Germany, but especially
+in those where clerical influence predominated,
+the persecution raged with a fearful intensity. Seven
+thousand witches are said to have been burned at
+Trèves, six hundred by a single bishop in Bamberg,
+and nine hundred in a single year in the bishopric of
+Würzburg.... At Toulouse, the seat of the Inquisition,
+four hundred persons perished for sorcery at a single
+execution, and fifty at Douay in a single year. Remy,
+a judge of Nancy, boasted that he put to death eight
+hundred witches in sixteen years.... In Italy, a thousand
+persons were executed in a single year in the province
+of Como; and in other parts of the country the
+severity of the inquisitors at last created an absolute
+rebellion.... In Geneva, which was then ruled by a
+bishop, five hundred alleged witches were executed
+in three months; forty-eight were burned at Constance
+or Ravensburg, and eighty in the little town of Valery
+in Saxony. In 1670, seventy persons were condemned
+in Sweden, and a large proportion of them burnt."<a name="FNanchor_189_189" id="FNanchor_189_189"></a><a href="#Footnote_189_189" class="fnanchor">[189]</a></p>
+
+<p>In England, from 1603 to 1680, it is estimated that
+seventy thousand persons were put to death for sorcery.<a name="FNanchor_190_190" id="FNanchor_190_190"></a><a href="#Footnote_190_190" class="fnanchor">[190]</a>
+Grey, the editor of <cite>Hudibras</cite>, says that he had
+himself seen a list of three thousand who were put to
+death during the Long Parliament. The celebrated
+witch-finder, Mathew Hopkins, hung sixty in one year
+in the county of Suffolk. In Scotland, for thirty-nine<!-- Page 251 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_251" id="Page_251">[251]</a></span>
+years, the number killed annually averaged about two
+hundred. This, of course, does not take into account
+the number who were hounded to death by persecution
+of a popular kind, or whose lives were made so
+wearisome that death must have come as a release.
+But the most remarkable, and the most horrible, of
+witchcraft executions occurred in Würzburg in February
+1629. No less than one hundred and sixty-two
+witches were burned in a succession of <i>autos-da-fé</i>.
+Among these, the reports disclose that there were actually
+thirty-four children. The following details give
+the actual ages of some of them:&mdash;</p>
+
+<table frame="box" rules="groups" summary="Children burned as witches at Würzburg in February 1629">
+<colgroup /><colgroup /><colgroup />
+<thead>
+<tr><th class="t1">Burning.</th>  <th class="t1">Number.</th>  <th class="t1">Children.</th></tr>
+</thead>
+<tbody>
+<tr><td class="pr">7th</td>       <td align="center">7</td>       <td>1 Girl, aged 12.</td></tr>
+<tr><td class="pr">13th</td>       <td align="center">4</td>       <td>1 Girl of 10 and another.</td></tr>
+<tr><td class="pr">15th</td>       <td align="center">2</td>       <td>1 Boy of 12.</td></tr>
+<tr><td class="pr">18th</td>       <td align="center">6</td>       <td>2 Boys of 10, girl of 14.</td></tr>
+<tr><td class="pr">19th</td>       <td align="center">6</td>       <td>2 Boys, 10 and 12.</td></tr>
+<tr><td class="pr">20th</td>       <td align="center">6</td>       <td>2 Boys.</td></tr>
+<tr><td class="pr">23rd</td>       <td align="center">9</td>       <td>3 Boys, 9, 10, and 14.</td></tr>
+<tr><td class="pr">24th</td>       <td align="center">7</td>       <td>2 Boys, brought from hospital.</td></tr>
+<tr><td class="pr">26th</td>       <td align="center">8</td>       <td>Little boy and girl.</td></tr>
+<tr><td class="pr">27th</td>       <td align="center">7</td>       <td>2 Boys, 8 and 9.</td></tr>
+<tr><td class="pr">28th</td>       <td align="center">6</td>       <td>Blind girl and infant.<a name="FNanchor_191_191" id="FNanchor_191_191"></a><a href="#Footnote_191_191" class="fnanchor">[191]</a></td></tr>
+</tbody>
+</table>
+
+<p>The vast majority of those executed for sorcery
+were women. At all times witches have been more numerous
+than wizards, owing to their assumed closer
+connection with the world of supernatural beings. It
+was said, "For one sorcerer, ten thousand sorceresses,"
+and Christian writers were ready to explain why.
+Woman had a greater affinity with the devil from the<!-- Page 252 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_252" id="Page_252">[252]</a></span>
+outset. It was through woman that Satan had seduced
+Adam, and it was only to be expected that he would
+employ the same instrument on subsequent occasions.
+<cite>The Witch Hammer</cite> has a special chapter devoted
+to the consideration of why women are more given to
+sorcery than men, and quotes freely from the Fathers
+to prove that this follows from her nature. James <span class="ucsmcap">I.</span> in
+his <cite>Demonologia</cite> follows Sprenger in accounting for
+the number of witches. "The reason is easy. For as
+that sex is frailer than man is, so it is easier to be entrapped
+in the gross snares of the devil, as was over-well
+proved to be true by the serpent's deceiving of Eve
+at the beginning, which makes him the homelier with
+the sex sensine." To be old, or ugly, or unpopular, to
+have any peculiar deformity or mark, was to invite
+persecution, and, in an overwhelming majority of instances,
+conviction followed accusation.</p>
+
+<p>It is a significant comment upon the popular belief
+that Protestantism, as a form of religious belief, was
+the product of an enlightened rational life, that it was
+only with the advance of Protestantism that the belief
+in witchcraft assumed an epidemic form. This may
+be partly due to the greater direct dependence upon
+the Bible, in which satanic influence&mdash;particularly in
+the New Testament&mdash;plays so large a part. In the
+Roman Church, exorcism remained a regular part of
+the functions of the priest; the Church was filled with
+accounts of satanic conflicts, but diabolic intercourse
+seems to have been mainly limited to saintly characters
+and priests. Protestantism which, theoretically,
+made every man his own priest, raised the belief in
+satanic agency to an obsession. And wherever Protestantism
+established itself there was an immediate<!-- Page 253 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_253" id="Page_253">[253]</a></span>
+and marked increase in the number of cases of witchcraft.
+In England, if we omit a doubtful law of the
+tenth century, there existed no regular law against
+witchcraft until 1541. It remained a purely ecclesiastical
+offence. Seventeen years later, the year of Elizabeth's
+accession, Bishop Jewell, preaching before the
+Queen, drew attention to the increase of sorcery. "It
+may please Your Grace," he said, "to understand that
+witches and sorcerers, within these last few years, are
+marvellously increased within Your Grace's realm.
+Your Grace's subjects pine away even to the death,
+their colour fadeth, their flesh rotteth, their senses are
+bereft. I pray God they never practise further than upon
+the subject." And he added, "These eyes have seen
+most evident and manifest marks of their wickedness."
+A measure was passed through Parliament the same
+year, making enchantments and witchcraft felony.
+The first year of James <span class="ucsmcap">I.</span> saw the passing of the
+'Witch Act,' under which subsequent executions took
+place, and which remained in force until nearly the
+middle of the eighteenth century.</p>
+
+<p>With scarce an exception, the leaders of Protestantism
+encouraged the belief in witches and urged their
+extermination as a religious and civil duty. With
+Luther, in spite of the sturdy common sense he manifested
+in some directions, belief in the activity of Satan
+amounted to an obsession. He saw Satan everywhere
+in everything. The devil appeared to him while writing,
+disturbed his rest by the rattling of pans, and prevented
+his pursuing his studies by hammering on his
+skull. When a storm arose, Luther declared, "'Tis the
+devil who has done this; the winds are nothing else
+but good or bad spirits." Suicides, he said, were often<!-- Page 254 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_254" id="Page_254">[254]</a></span>
+those strangled by the devil. Moreover, "The devil
+can so completely assume the human form when he
+wants to deceive us, that we may very well lie with
+what seems to be a woman of real flesh and blood, and
+yet all the while 'tis only the devil in the shape of a
+woman." The devil could also become the father of
+children. Luther says that he knew of one such case,
+and added, "I would have that child thrown into the
+Moldau at the risk of being held its murderer."<a name="FNanchor_192_192" id="FNanchor_192_192"></a><a href="#Footnote_192_192" class="fnanchor">[192]</a></p>
+
+<p>In America, Protestantism manifested the same influence.
+Of course, the settlers took the superstition
+of witchcraft with them, but it underwent no diminution
+in a new land. Increase Mather and his celebrated
+son, Cotton Mather, were the principal agents in stirring
+up the belief to frenzy point, and a commission
+was appointed to rout out witches and suppress their
+practices. There was soon a plentiful supply of victims.
+One woman was charged with "giving a look towards
+the great meeting-house of Salem, and immediately
+a demon entered the house and tore down part of it."
+It seems that a bit of the wooden wainscotting had
+fallen down. In the case of Giles Corey, who refused
+to plead guilty, torture was used. He was pressed to
+death, and when his tongue protruded from his mouth
+the sheriff thrust it back with his walking-stick. Many
+people were executed, and the ministers of Boston
+and Charlestown drew up an address warmly thanking
+the commission for its zeal, and expressing the
+hope that it would never be relaxed.</p>
+
+<p>Certainly the commission did what it could to earn
+the thanks given. A shipmaster making for Maryland
+with emigrants encountered unusually rough<!-- Page 255 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_255" id="Page_255">[255]</a></span>
+weather. An old woman, one Mary Lee, was accused
+of raising the storm, and drowned as a witch. A woman
+walked a long distance over muddy roads without
+soiling her dress. "I scorn to be drabbled," she said,
+and was hanged as a reward. George Burroughs
+could lift a barrel by inserting his finger in the bunghole.
+He was hanged for a wizard. Bridget Bishop
+was charged with appearing before John Louder at
+midnight and grievously oppressing him. Louder's
+evidence against the woman also included the fact
+that he saw a black pig approach his door, and when
+he went to kick it the pig vanished. He was also
+tempted by a black thing with the body of a monkey,
+the feet of a cock, and the face of a man. On going out
+of his back door he saw the said Bridget Bishop going
+towards her house. The evidence was deemed quite
+conclusive. Another witness said that being in bed
+on the Lord's Day, he saw a woman, Susanna Martin,
+come in at the window and jump down on the floor. She
+took hold of the witness's foot, and drawing his body
+into a heap, lay upon him for nearly two hours, so that
+he could neither move nor hear. In most of these cases
+torture was applied, and confessions were obtained.
+These confessions often implicated others, but when
+the witches took to accusing those in high places, and
+even ministers of religion, the need for discrimination
+was realised. Once a critical judgment was aroused,
+the mania began to subside&mdash;Cotton Mather fighting
+manfully for the belief to the end.</p>
+
+<p>The impetus given by Protestantism to witch-hunting
+in Scotland was most marked. Scotch witchcraft,
+says Lecky, was the offspring of Scotch Puritanism,
+and faithfully reflected the character of its parent.<!-- Page 256 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_256" id="Page_256">[256]</a></span>
+The clergy nowhere possessed greater power, and
+nowhere used it more assiduously to fan the flame
+against witchcraft. Buckle says:&mdash;</p>
+
+<p>"Of all the means of intimidation employed by the
+Scotch clergy, none was more efficacious than the doctrines
+they propounded respecting evil spirits and
+future punishments. On these subjects they constantly
+uttered the most appalling threats. The language
+which they used was calculated to madden men with
+fear, and to drive them to the depths of despair....
+It was generally believed that the world was overrun
+by evil spirits, who not only went up and down the
+earth, but also lived in the air, and whose business it
+was to tempt mankind. Their number was infinite,
+and they were to be found in all places, and in all
+seasons. At their head was Satan himself, whose delight
+it was to appear in person, ensnaring or terrifying
+everyone he met. With this object he assumed
+various forms. One day he would visit the earth as a
+black dog; another day, as a raven; on another, he
+would be heard in the distance roaring like a bull. He
+appeared sometimes as a white man in black clothes,
+and sometimes he appeared as a black man in black
+clothes, when it was remarked that his voice was
+ghostly, and that one of his feet was cloven. His
+stratagems were endless. For, in the opinion of divines,
+his cunning increased with his age, and, having been
+studying for more than 5000 years, he had now attained
+to unexampled dexterity."<a name="FNanchor_193_193" id="FNanchor_193_193"></a><a href="#Footnote_193_193" class="fnanchor">[193]</a></p>
+
+<p>Witchcraft was declared by the Scotch Parliament
+in 1563 to be punishable by death. And, naturally,
+the more zealous and active the search for witches,<!-- Page 257 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_257" id="Page_257">[257]</a></span>
+the more numerous they became. In the search the
+clergy and the kirk-sessions led the way. In 1587 the
+General Assembly, having before them a case of witchcraft
+in which the evidence was insufficient, deputed
+James Melville to travel on the coast side and collect
+evidence in favour of the prosecution. It also ordered
+that the presbyteries should proceed in all severity
+against such magistrates as liberated convicted witches.
+As in England so here, a body of men came into
+existence whose business it was to travel the country
+and detect witches. Anonymous accusations were invited,
+the clergy "placing an empty box in church, to
+receive a billet with the sorcerer's name, and the date
+and description of his deeds."<a name="FNanchor_194_194" id="FNanchor_194_194"></a><a href="#Footnote_194_194" class="fnanchor">[194]</a> In 1603 "at the College
+of Auld Abirdene" every minister was ordered to
+make "subtill and privie inquisition," concerning the
+number of witches in his parish, and report the same
+forthwith. Nothing that could whet the appetite for
+the hunt was neglected. William Johnston, baron,
+bailie "of the regalitie and barronie of Broughton,"
+was awarded the goods of all who should be "lawfullie
+convict be assyses of notorious and common witches,
+haunting and resorting devilles and witches."<a name="FNanchor_195_195" id="FNanchor_195_195"></a><a href="#Footnote_195_195" class="fnanchor">[195]</a> The
+lives of thousands of people were rendered unbearable,
+and the complaint of one, Margaret Miall, that
+"she desyres not to live, because nobody will converse
+with her, seeing she is under the reputation of a witch,"
+must have represented the feelings of many.</p>
+
+<p>It was not only for working ill that people were
+accused of witchcraft and executed; ill or well made
+little difference. In Edinburgh in 1623 it was charged<!-- Page 258 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_258" id="Page_258">[258]</a></span>
+against Thomas Grieve that he had relieved many
+sicknesses and grievous diseases by sorcery and witchcraft.
+"He took sickness off a woman in Fife, and put
+it upon a cow, which thereafter ran mad and died."
+He also cured a child of a disease "by straiking back
+the hair of his head, and wrapping him in an anointed
+cloth, and by that means putting him asleep," and thus
+through his devilry and witchcraft, cured the child.
+Other charges of a similar kind were brought against
+Grieve, who was found guilty and hanged on the Castle
+Hill.<a name="FNanchor_196_196" id="FNanchor_196_196"></a><a href="#Footnote_196_196" class="fnanchor">[196]</a> At the same place, a year previous, Margaret
+Wallace was also sentenced to be hanged and burned,
+on the same kind of charge, and for "practising devilry,
+incantation, and witchcraft, especially forbidden by
+the laws of Almighty God, and the municipal laws of
+this realm."</p>
+
+<p>The following bill of costs for burning two women,
+Jane Wischert and Isabel Cocker, in Aberdeen, has a
+certain melancholy interest:&mdash;</p>
+
+<table border="0" summary="Bill for the burning of two witches">
+<tr><td></td><td></td>       <th class="t2">£</th>  <th class="t2"><i>s.</i></th> <th class="t2"><i>d.</i></th></tr>
+
+<tr><td>Item</td> <td>for 20 loads of Peatts to burn them</td>             <td class="plr">2</td><td class="plr">0</td><td class="plr">0</td></tr>
+<tr><td align="center">"</td>  <td>for ane boll of colles</td>             <td class="plr">1</td><td class="plr">4</td><td class="plr">0</td></tr>
+<tr><td align="center">"</td>  <td>for four tar barrells</td>              <td class="plr">0</td><td class="plr">6</td><td class="plr">8</td></tr>
+<tr><td align="center">"</td>  <td>for fir and win barrells</td>           <td class="plr">0</td><td class="plr">16</td><td class="plr">8</td></tr>
+<tr><td align="center">"</td>  <td>for a staick and the dressing of it</td><td class="plr">0</td><td class="plr">16</td><td class="plr">0</td></tr>
+<tr><td align="center">"</td>  <td>for four fathoms of towis</td>          <td class="plr">4</td><td class="plr">0</td><td class="plr">0</td></tr>
+<tr><td align="center">"</td>  <td>to Jon Justice for their execution</td> <td class="plr">0</td><td class="plr">13</td><td class="plr">4</td></tr>
+</table>
+
+<p>In England, no less than in Scotland, America, and
+on the Continent, much learned testimony might be
+cited in defence of witchcraft. The great Sir Thomas
+Browne said in the most famous of his writings: "For
+my part I have ever believed, and do now know, that
+there are witches. They that doubt of these do not only<!-- Page 259 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_259" id="Page_259">[259]</a></span>
+deny them, but spirits; and are obliquely and upon
+consequence, a sort, not of infidels, but atheists."<a name="FNanchor_197_197" id="FNanchor_197_197"></a><a href="#Footnote_197_197" class="fnanchor">[197]</a>
+Henry More, the great Platonist, asserted that they
+who deny the agency of witches are "puffed up with
+nothing but ignorance, vanity, and stupid infidelity."
+Ralph Cudworth, one of the greatest scholars of the
+latter part of the seventeenth century, said that they
+who denied the possibility of satanic intercourse "can
+hardly escape the suspicion of some hankering towards
+atheism."<a name="FNanchor_198_198" id="FNanchor_198_198"></a><a href="#Footnote_198_198" class="fnanchor">[198]</a> Writing nearly a century later, when
+the English law merely prosecuted as rogues and vagabonds
+those who pretended to witchcraft, Blackstone
+thought it necessary to point out that this alteration
+did not deny the possibility of the offence, and
+added:&mdash;</p>
+
+<p>"To deny this would be to contradict the revealed
+word of God in various passages both of the Old and
+New Testaments; and the thing itself is a truth in which
+every nation in the world hath in its turn borne testimony;
+either by examples seemingly well attested, or
+by prohibitory laws which at least suppose the possibility
+of a commerce with evil spirits."<a name="FNanchor_199_199" id="FNanchor_199_199"></a><a href="#Footnote_199_199" class="fnanchor">[199]</a></p>
+
+<p>About the same time Wesley gave the world his
+famous declaration on the subject:&mdash;</p>
+
+<p>"It is true likewise that the English in general, and indeed
+most of the men of learning in Europe, have given
+up all accounts of witches and apparitions as mere old
+wives' fables. I am sorry for it, and I willingly take this
+opportunity of entering my solemn protest against this
+violent compliment which so many who believe the
+Bible pay to those who do not believe it. I owe them<!-- Page 260 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_260" id="Page_260">[260]</a></span>
+no such service. I take knowledge that these are at
+the bottom of the outcry which has been raised and
+with such insolence spread through the land in direct
+opposition, not only to the Bible, but to the suffrage
+of the wisest and best of men in all ages and nations.
+They well know (whether Christians know it or not)
+that the giving up of witchcraft is in effect giving up
+the Bible."<a name="FNanchor_200_200" id="FNanchor_200_200"></a><a href="#Footnote_200_200" class="fnanchor">[200]</a></p>
+
+<p>The evidence upon which the convictions for witchcraft
+rested were almost incredibly stupid, as the punishments
+were almost unbelievably brutal. If the crops
+failed, or the milk turned sour; if the head of a local
+magnate ached, or a minister of the gospel fell sick; if
+a woman was childless, or a child taken with a fit; if a
+cow sickened, or sheep died suddenly, some poor woman
+was pretty certain to be seized, and tortured until
+she confessed her alleged crime. A mole or wart on any
+part of the body was a sure sign of commerce with the
+devil. It was believed that on the body of every witch
+was a spot insensible to pain. To discover this she
+was stripped, pins were run into the body, and when
+excess of pain had produced numbness, some such
+spot was pretty certain to be found. Men regularly
+took up with this work in both England and Scotland,
+and their fame as 'prickers' depended upon the
+number of witches they unearthed. If a suspected
+witch kept a black cat, did not shed tears, or could not
+repeat the Lord's Prayer correctly, these were pretty
+sure signs of guilt. A more serious test was the ordeal
+by water. This was a favourite and general test, and
+was highly recommended by that learned fool, James
+the First. In this the right hand was tied to the left<!-- Page 261 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_261" id="Page_261">[261]</a></span>
+foot, the left hand to the right foot. She was then
+thrown into a pond. If she floated she was a witch,
+and was either hanged or burned. If she sank, she was
+innocent&mdash;and was drowned. Another test was to tie
+a woman's legs across, and she was so seated on them
+that they bore the entire weight of her body. In this
+position she was kept for hours, and on the first sign
+of pain condemned as a witch.</p>
+
+<p>If none of these tests were adopted, torture was used.
+There was the boot&mdash;a frame of iron or wood in which
+the leg was placed and wedges driven in until the limb
+was smashed. A variation of this was to place the leg
+in an iron boot and slowly heat it over a fire. There was
+the thumbscrew, an instrument which smashed the
+thumb to pulp by the turning of a screw. More barbarous
+still was the bridle. This was an iron hoop passing over
+the head, with four prongs, two pointing to the
+tongue and palate, and one to either cheek. The suspected
+witch was then chained to the wall, and watchers
+appointed to prevent her sleeping. The slightest movement
+caused the greatest torture, and in the vast majority
+of cases a confession was secured. In obstinate
+cases pressing between heavy stones was adopted.</p>
+
+<p>One of the most famous of these witch-finders was
+the celebrated Mathew Hopkins before referred to.
+He was appointed to the work by Parliament during
+the time of the Commonwealth, and styled himself
+'witch-finder general.' Hopkins travelled round the
+country, much like an assize judge, putting up at the
+principal inns, and at the expense of the local authorities.
+His charge was twenty shillings a visit, whether
+he found witches or not. If he discovered any, there
+was a further charge of twenty shillings for every witch<!-- Page 262 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_262" id="Page_262">[262]</a></span>
+brought to execution. His favourite method of detection
+was that of floating. But another of Hopkins's tests
+was the following: The suspected witch was placed
+cross-legged on a stool in the centre of the room.
+She was closely watched and kept without food for
+four-and-twenty hours. Doors and windows remained
+open to watch for the entrance of some of the devil's
+imps. These might come in the form of a fly, a wasp, a
+moth, or some other insect. The work of the watchers
+was to kill every insect that came into the room. But
+if one escaped, it was clear proof that this was one
+of the witch's familiars.</p>
+
+<p>Wherever Hopkins travelled numerous convictions
+followed. These were so numerous that suspicion was
+aroused, not of the genuineness of the convictions, but
+of Hopkins's knowledge concerning the locality of the
+witches. In defence he published in 1647 a tract entitled
+"The Discovery of Witches; in answer to several
+Queries lately delivered to the Judge of Assize for the
+County of Norfolk; and now published by Mathew
+Hopkins, Witchfinder, for the benefit of the whole
+Kingdom." The charge against Hopkins was that he
+had been supplied by the devil with a memorandum
+of all the witches, and so was able to find them where
+others failed. Absurd as the charge was, it found credence,
+and although his end is wrapped in obscurity, it
+is said that he was finally seized himself on a charge of
+sorcery, tried by his own favourite water test&mdash;and
+floated. One cannot but hope that tradition is in this
+case trustworthy.</p>
+
+<p>It is difficult, nowadays, to realise the gravity with
+which these trials were undertaken. An outline of a
+very famous witch trial, before an eminent judge in the<!-- Page 263 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_263" id="Page_263">[263]</a></span>
+latter part of the seventeenth century, will best serve
+as an illustration. Before me there lies a little tract of
+some sixty pages, printed "for William Shrewsbury
+at the Bible in Duck Lane," and bearing on the title
+page the following description:&mdash;</p>
+
+<p>"At the Assizes and general gaol delivery, held at
+Bury St. Edmunds for the County of Suffolk, the
+Tenth day of March, in the Sixteenth Year of the Reign
+of our Sovereign, Lord King Charles <span class="ucsmcap">II.</span>, before Mathew
+Hale, Knight, Lord Chief Baron of His Majesties
+Court of Exchequer; Rose Callender and Amy Duny,
+Widows, both of Leystoff, in the county aforesaid, were
+severally indicted for bewitching Elizabeth and Anne
+Durent, Jane Bocking, Susan Chandler, William Durent,
+Elizabeth and Deborah Pacy and the said Callender
+and Duny, being arrainged upon the same indictments,
+pleaded not guilty; and afterwards upon
+a long evidence, were found guilty, and thereupon had
+judgment to dye for the same."</p>
+
+<p>Both the women charged were old. The charges
+were as follows: The mother of the infant, William
+Durent, sworn and examined in open court, deposed
+that about the 10th of March, having special occasion
+to go from home, left her child in the care of Amy
+Duny, giving her special occasion not to give her child
+the breast. Nevertheless, Amy Duny did acquaint
+her mother on her return that she had given the child
+the breast, and on being reprimanded "used many
+high expressions and threatening speeches towards
+her; telling her that she had as good have done otherwise
+than to have found fault with her ... and that very
+night her son fell into strange fits of swounding ... and
+so continued for several weeks." Much troubled, the<!-- Page 264 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_264" id="Page_264">[264]</a></span>
+mother consulted a Dr. Jacob, of Yarmouth, who advised
+her to hang up the child's blanket, at night to
+wrap the child in it, and if she found anything therein
+to throw it in the fire. A very large toad was found,
+which on being put in the fire "made a great and horrible
+noise, and after a space there was a flashing in the
+fire like gunpowder ... and thereupon the toad was no
+more seen or heard." More wonderful still, "the next
+day there came a young woman and told this deponnent
+that her aunt (meaning the said Amy) was in a
+most lamentable condition, having her face all scorched
+with fire." And on the mother enquiring of Amy
+Duny how this had happened, Amy replied, "she might
+thank her for it, for that she was the cause thereof, but
+that she should live to see some of her children dead,
+or else upon crutches." It was further alleged "that
+not long after this deponnent was taken with lameness
+in both her legges, from the knees downwards, and that
+she was fain to go upon crutches ... and so continued
+till the time of the Assizes, that the witch came to be
+tried."</p>
+
+<p>Concerning the bewitching of Elizabeth and Deborah
+Pacy, aged eleven and nine, their father declared
+that Deborah was suddenly taken with lameness. One
+day while the girl was resting outside the house, "Amy
+Duny came to the deponnent's house to buy some herrings;
+but, being denied, she went away discontented....
+But at the very same instant of time, the said child
+was taken with most violent fits, feeling extreme pain
+in her stomach, like the pricking of pins, and shrieking
+out in a dreadful manner like unto a whelp." As the
+result of this and other ailments from which the child
+suffered, the father accused Amy Duny of being a<!-- Page 265 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_265" id="Page_265">[265]</a></span>
+witch, and she was placed in the stocks. Being placed
+in the stocks, further threats were uttered, and both
+children were afflicted with fits. Upon recovery they
+"would cough extremely, and bring up much phlegm
+and crooked pins, and one time a twopenny nail with
+a very broad head; which pins (amounting to forty or
+more), together with the twopenny nail, were produced
+in court, with the affirmation of the said deponnent
+that he was present when the said nail was vomited
+up, and also most of the pins.... In this manner the said
+children continued for the space of two months, during
+which time, in their intervals, this deponnent would
+cause them to read some chapters from the New Testament.
+Whereupon he observed that they would read
+till they came to the name of Lord or Jesus or Christ,
+and then, before they could pronounce either of the
+said words, they would suddenly fall into their fits.
+But when they came to the name of Satan or Devil,
+they would clap their fingers upon the book, crying
+out, 'This bites, but makes me speak right well!'"</p>
+
+<p>Much more evidence of a similar kind was offered
+during the course of the trial, with details of a too
+indelicate character for reproduction concerning the
+search made on the women's bodies for devil's marks.
+During the whole of the trial there were present in
+court a number of distinguished people, amongst them
+Sir Thomas Browne. The latter, being "desired to give
+his opinion, what he did conceive of him; was clearly
+of opinion that the persons were bewitched, and said
+that in Denmark there had lately been a great discovery
+of witches, who used the very same way of afflicting
+persons, by conveying pins into them, and crooked as
+these pins were, with needles and nails. And his<!-- Page 266 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_266" id="Page_266">[266]</a></span>
+opinion was that the devil in such cases did work upon
+the bodies of men and women as on a natural foundation,
+to stir up and excite such humours superabounding
+in their bodies to a great excess, whereby he did in
+an extraordinary manner afflict them with such distempers
+as their bodies were most subject to, as particularly
+appeared in these children."</p>
+
+<p>Sir Mathew Hale, one of the greatest lawyers of his
+day, in directing the jury, told them "he would not
+repeat the evidence unto them, lest by so doing he
+should wrong the evidence one way or the other. Only
+this acquainted them. First, whether or no these
+children were bewitched? Secondly, whether the prisoners
+at the bar were guilty of it? That there were
+such creatures he made no doubt at all. For, first, the
+Scriptures had affirmed as much. Secondly, the wisdom
+of all nations had provided laws against such
+persons, which is an argument of their confidence of
+such a crime. And such had been the judgment of this
+kingdom, as appears by that Act of Parliament which
+had provided punishments proportionable to the quality
+of the offence. And desired them strictly to observe
+their evidence, and desired the great God of
+Heaven to direct their hearts in this weighty thing they
+had in hand; for to condemn the innocent and let the
+guilty go free were both an abomination before the
+Lord." The jury took no more than half an hour to
+consider their verdict, and brought in both women
+guilty upon all counts. The judge expressed his complete
+satisfaction with the verdict, and sentenced them
+to be hanged&mdash;a sentence duly carried out a fortnight
+later.</p>
+
+<p>This is the last notable trial in English history. A<!-- Page 267 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_267" id="Page_267">[267]</a></span>
+witch was burned later than the date of this trial, and
+the last one actually condemned was in 1712. But in
+this case, on the representation of the judge who tried
+the issue, the verdict was formally set aside. By that
+time people were beginning to realise the wisdom of
+Montaigne's counsel, written at the commencement of
+the witch epidemic:&mdash;</p>
+
+<p>"How much more natural and more likely do I find
+it that two men should lie than one in twelve hours
+should pass with the winds from east to west? How
+much more natural that our understanding may, by
+the volubility of our loose, capering mind, be transported
+from its place than one of us should, flesh and
+bones as we are, by a strange spirit be carried upon a
+broom through a tunnel or a chimney."</p>
+
+<p>In England the Witch Act of 1604 was not formally
+repealed until 1736. In Scotland the last witch legally
+executed was in 1722. Captain Ross, Sheriff of Sutherland,
+has the doubtful honour of having condemned
+her to the stake. But fifty years later than this&mdash;1773&mdash;the
+Associated Presbytery passed a resolution deploring
+the fact that witchcraft was falling into disrepute.
+In Germany the last witch was executed in
+1749, by decapitation. The last trial for witchcraft in
+Massachusetts was as late as 1793. These dates refer,
+of course, to legal proceedings. Examples of the existence
+of this belief are continually being recorded in
+newspapers, although they now only rank as solitary
+reminiscences of one of the most degrading and brutalising
+beliefs that European history records.</p>
+
+<p>I have not aimed at giving a history of the witch
+mania&mdash;indeed, a scientific history of witchcraft, one
+that will make plain the nature of the various factors<!-- Page 268 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_268" id="Page_268">[268]</a></span>
+involved, has yet to be written. I have only dwelt
+upon it for the purpose of enforcing the lesson of how
+materially such an epidemic must have contributed
+to give permanence to religious belief in general. It is
+certain that such an epidemic could not occur save in
+a society saturated with supernaturalism. It is equally
+certain that once such an epidemic occurs it must in
+turn strengthen the tendency towards supernaturalistic
+beliefs. Thanks to the long reign of the religious
+idea, and to the overwhelming influence of the Church,
+the people of Europe were prepared for such an outbreak.
+And it should be clear that the prevalence of
+such beliefs, even though they may be afterwards discarded,
+favours the perpetuation of religious belief as
+a whole. The particular form of a belief that is prevalent
+for a time may disappear, but the temper of mind
+induced by its reign remains. And absurd as the
+belief in witches capering through the air on broomsticks,
+changing themselves into black cats, raising
+storms, and causing sickness&mdash;absurd though all this
+may be, it yet serves to keep alive the temper of mind
+on which supernaturalism lives.</p>
+
+<div class="footnotes">
+<h3>Footnotes:<br />
+<span class="skip">[<a href="#Page_269">Skip</a>]</span>
+</h3>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_187_187" id="Footnote_187_187"></a><a href="#FNanchor_187_187"><span class="label">[187]</span></a> Cited by Bloch, <cite>Sexual Life of our Time</cite>, p. 120. Michelet
+has also dealt with this matter in his vivid and picturesque work,
+<cite>The Sorceress</cite>.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_188_188" id="Footnote_188_188"></a><a href="#FNanchor_188_188"><span class="label">[188]</span></a> A lengthy account of this work is given by Ennemoser in his
+<cite>History of Magic</cite>, vol. ii.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_189_189" id="Footnote_189_189"></a><a href="#FNanchor_189_189"><span class="label">[189]</span></a> <cite>Rise and Influence of Rationalism</cite>, i. pp. 3-6.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_190_190" id="Footnote_190_190"></a><a href="#FNanchor_190_190"><span class="label">[190]</span></a> H. Williams, <cite>The Superstitions of Witchcraft</cite>, p. 214.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_191_191" id="Footnote_191_191"></a><a href="#FNanchor_191_191"><span class="label">[191]</span></a> T. Wright, <cite>Narratives of Sorcery and Magic</cite>.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_192_192" id="Footnote_192_192"></a><a href="#FNanchor_192_192"><span class="label">[192]</span></a> Michelet, <cite>Life of Luther</cite>, chap. vi.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_193_193" id="Footnote_193_193"></a><a href="#FNanchor_193_193"><span class="label">[193]</span></a> <cite>History of Civilisation</cite>, chap. xix.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_194_194" id="Footnote_194_194"></a><a href="#FNanchor_194_194"><span class="label">[194]</span></a> Dalyell, <cite>Darker Superstitions of Scotland</cite>, p. 623.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_195_195" id="Footnote_195_195"></a><a href="#FNanchor_195_195"><span class="label">[195]</span></a> Dalyell, p. 628.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_196_196" id="Footnote_196_196"></a><a href="#FNanchor_196_196"><span class="label">[196]</span></a> Pitcairn's <cite>Criminal Trials</cite>, vol. iii.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_197_197" id="Footnote_197_197"></a><a href="#FNanchor_197_197"><span class="label">[197]</span></a> <cite>Religio Medici</cite>, pt. i. sec. 30.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_198_198" id="Footnote_198_198"></a><a href="#FNanchor_198_198"><span class="label">[198]</span></a> <cite>True Intellectual System</cite>, ii. p. 650.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_199_199" id="Footnote_199_199"></a><a href="#FNanchor_199_199"><span class="label">[199]</span></a> <cite>Commentaries</cite>, Stephen's Edition, i. p. 238.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_200_200" id="Footnote_200_200"></a><a href="#FNanchor_200_200"><span class="label">[200]</span></a> <cite>Journal</cite>, 1768.</p></div>
+</div>
+
+<p><!-- Page 269 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_269" id="Page_269">[269]</a></span></p>
+
+<h2>CHAPTER <span class="cgap">ELEVEN</span><br />
+SUMMARY &amp; CONCLUSION</h2>
+
+<p>The study of religion falls naturally
+and easily into two parts. The first is a question
+of origin. Under what conditions did the hypothesis
+that supernatural beings control the life of man come
+into existence? We know that in civilised times religious
+beliefs are in the nature of an inheritance. A
+member of any civilised society finds them here when
+he is born, he grows up with them, generally accepting
+them without question, or effecting certain modifications
+in the form in which he continues to hold
+them. If we treat religion as a hypothesis, advanced as
+other hypotheses are advanced, to account for a certain
+class of facts, then we can safely say that religion is one
+of the earliest in the history of human thought. And
+its antiquity and universality preclude us from seeking
+an explanation of its origin in the mental life of
+civilised humanity. Whether the religious hypothesis
+can or cannot be justified by an appeal to civilised intelligence,
+it is plain it did not begin there. Its beginnings
+are earlier than any existing civilisation; and in
+its most general form may be said to be as old as mankind
+itself. Consequently, if any satisfactory explanation
+of the origin of the religious idea is to be found,
+it must be sought amid the very earliest conditions
+of human society.</p>
+
+<p>Now whatever the differences of opinion concerning
+matters of detail, there is substantial agreement
+amongst European anthropologists upon one important
+point. They all agree that the conception of supernatural,
+or 'spiritual,' beings owes its beginning to the
+ignorance of primitive man concerning both his own
+nature and the nature of the world around him. The<!-- Page 270 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_270" id="Page_270">[270]</a></span>
+beginnings of human experience suggest questions
+that can only be satisfactorily answered by the accumulated
+experience of many generations. These questions
+do not materially differ from those that face men
+to-day. The why and wherefore of things are always
+with us; life propounds the same problem to all; it is
+the replies alone that vary, and the nature of these replies
+is determined by the knowledge at our disposal.
+The difference is not in nature but in man. The answers
+given by primitive man to these eternal questions are
+a complete inversion of those of his better informed
+descendants. The conception of natural force, of mechanical
+necessity, is as yet unborn, and the primitive
+thinker everywhere assumes the operation of personal
+beings as responsible for all that occurs. This is
+not so much the product of careful and elaborate philosophising,
+it is closer akin to the <i>naive</i> thinking of a
+child concerning a thunderstorm. Primitive thought
+accepts the universal operation of living and intelligent
+forces as an unquestionable fact. Modern thought
+tends more and more surely in the direction of regarding
+the universe as a complex of self-adjusting, non-conscious
+forces. Primitive thought assumes a supernatural
+agency as the cause of disease, and seeks,
+logically, to placate it by prayer or coerce it by magic.
+Modern thought turns to test-tube and microscope,
+searches for the malignant germ, and manufactures
+an antitoxin. The history of human thought is, as
+Huxley said, a record of the substitution of mechanical
+for vitalistic processes. The beginning of
+religion is found in connection with the latter. A
+genuine science commences with the emergence of
+the former.</p>
+
+<p><!-- Page 271 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_271" id="Page_271">[271]</a></span>
+With this aspect of the matter I have not, however,
+been specially concerned. It has been left on one side
+in order to concentrate attention upon another and
+a more neglected aspect of the subject&mdash;that of the
+conditions that have served to perpetuate the religious
+idea. Grant, what cannot be well denied in the face of
+modern investigation, that ideas of the supernatural
+began in primitive delusion. How comes it that this
+idea has not by now disappeared from civilised society?
+What are the causes that have given it such a lengthy
+lease of life? Experience has shown that all really
+verifiable knowledge counts as an asset of naturalism,
+and is so far opposed to supernaturalism. Moreover,
+the history of science has been such that one feels justified
+in the assumption that, given time and industry,
+there are no phenomena that are not susceptible to a
+naturalistic explanation. Why, then, has not supernaturalism
+died out? Even the religious idea cannot
+persist without evidence of some kind being offered in
+its behalf. This evidence may be to a better instructed
+mind inconclusive or irrelevant, but evidence of some
+sort there must have been all along, and must still be.
+Granted that the religious idea began with primitive
+mankind, granted also that it was based on a mistaken
+interpretation of natural phenomena, these
+reasons are quite insufficient to explain why thousands
+of generations later that idea is still with us. "Our
+fathers have told us" offers to the average mind a
+strong appeal, but surely the children will require some
+further proof than this. What kind of evidence is it
+that throughout the ages religious people have accepted
+as conclusive? A study of primitive psychology
+shows clearly enough how the religious idea vitalised<!-- Page 272 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_272" id="Page_272">[272]</a></span>
+the facts. What we next have to discern is the class
+of facts that have kept the religious idea alive.</p>
+
+<p>The foregoing pages constitute an attempt to answer
+this question. The need for some such investigation
+was clearly shown by the publication of the late
+Professor William James's <cite>Varieties of Religious Experience</cite>
+and its reception by the religious press of the
+country as an epoch-marking work. As a mere collection
+of documents, the work is interesting enough. But
+its critical value is extremely small. How religious
+visionaries have felt, or what has been their experiences,
+can only furnish the mere data of an enquiry,
+and <em>their explanation of the cause of their experiences is
+a part of the data</em>. This, apparently, Professor James
+overlooked; and it will be noted by critical readers of
+his book that it proceeds on the assumption that the
+statements of religious visionaries are to be taken, not
+only as true concerning their subjective experiences
+at a given time, but also as approximately true as to
+the causes of their mental states. This, of course, by
+no means follows. A scientific enquiry cannot separate
+mental conditions from the subject's interpretation of
+their causation. Whether this interpretation is genuine
+or not must be decided finally by an appeal to what
+is known of the laws of mental life, under both normal
+and abnormal conditions. If these are adequate to explain
+the "Varieties of Religious Experience," there
+is no need whatever to assume the operation of a supernatural
+agency. Nor does calling this agency 'transcendent'
+or 'supermundane' make any substantial
+difference. For, in this connection, these are only
+names that serve to disguise a visitant of a highly undesirable
+character.</p>
+
+<p><!-- Page 273 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_273" id="Page_273">[273]</a></span>
+The evidence on behalf of a naturalistic explanation
+of religious phenomena has been purposely stated
+in a suggestive rather than in an exhaustive manner.
+The main lines of evidence are threefold. First, there
+is the indisputable fact that in the lower stages of culture
+all mental and bodily diseases are universally
+attributed to spiritual agency. This explanation holds
+the field; it is the only one possible at the time, and
+it is not replaced until a comparatively late stage of
+human history. But of special importance is the fact
+that a belief does not die out suddenly. It is only
+destroyed very slowly, and even after the facts upon
+which the belief was originally based have been otherwise
+interpreted, the attitude of mind engendered by
+the long reign of a belief remains. It has by that time
+become part of the intellectual environment. Theories
+of a quasi-philosophic or quasi-scientific character are
+elaborated, and give to the original belief something
+of a rational air. Even to-day the extent to which
+superstitious practices still gather round the subject
+of disease is known only to the curious in such matters.
+Not that the original reason is given for the practice.
+In nearly every case a different one is invented. To
+take only a single example. We still find saffron tea
+largely used in cases of measles. All medical men are
+aware that it possesses not the slightest curative value.
+Students of folklore are aware that it has its origin in
+the theory of sympathetic cures. Its redeeming feature
+is that it is harmless; so we find it still in common
+use, and the recovery of a child from measles is often
+enough attributed to the potency of the concoction.
+So with the relation of disease to the persistence of the
+belief in the supernatural. The conclusion that<!-- Page 274 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_274" id="Page_274">[274]</a></span>
+disease&mdash;whether bodily or mental&mdash;is due to the agency
+of spirits is one that follows from the existence of the
+religious idea; but in turn the observed facts react and
+strengthen the religious belief. Every case of disease
+becomes to the primitive mind an unanswerable proof
+in favour of the original hypothesis. The disease is
+there, and the only explanation possible is in terms of
+the animistic idea. And all the time the religious idea
+is becoming more deeply embedded in the social consciousness,
+more firmly established as a social fact.</p>
+
+<p>The next line of evidence is that furnished by what
+I have called the culture of the supernatural. By some
+means or other&mdash;probably by accident in the first instance&mdash;it
+is discovered that certain herbs and vegetable
+drugs have a peculiar effect on one's mental state.
+Those who use them see or hear things other people
+do not normally hear or see. Abstention from food
+and other bodily privations produce similar results.
+What is the inevitable conclusion? The only one possible
+under the existing conditions is that communication
+has been set up with an invisible world from which
+one is shut off under normal conditions. From this
+to the next step is obvious and easy. If a drug, or a
+fast, brings one into communication with the supernatural
+world, one has only to repeat the conditions
+in order to repeat the experience. And repeated they
+are in all religions, with, at most, those modifications
+induced by changed times and circumstances. This
+is why fasting and other forms of 'fleshly mortification'
+play so large a part in the history of religion.
+The savage medicine man, the Hindu fakir, the medieval
+saint, all create their ecstasies by the simple plan
+of disturbing the normal operations of the nervous<!-- Page 275 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_275" id="Page_275">[275]</a></span>
+system. It is not, of course, implied that this is done
+with a full consciousness of all that is involved in the
+practice. The derangement is to them the condition
+of the supernatural manifestation, not the physiological
+and psychological cause of the experience.</p>
+
+<p>The third main line of evidence is connected with
+the phenomena of sexuality. It has been shown that
+in early stages of culture man everywhere connects the
+phenomena of the sexual life with the activity of supernatural
+forces. Following the lines of investigation
+indicated by Mr. Sidney Hartland, we saw reason to
+believe that the primitive conception of procreation is
+not that afterwards prevalent, but that of assuming the
+birth of a child to be due to the direct action of spiritual
+beings on the mother. Proofs of this are found in
+existing beliefs among primitive peoples, in the magical
+practices so widely current to obtain children, and
+in numerous other customs connected with childbirth.
+The phenomenon of puberty in the male and of menstruation
+in the female gives a terrifying reality to this
+belief. But still more important is the fact that a great
+deal of assumed religious feeling is found on analysis
+to be little more than masked sexuality. The connection
+between eroticism and piety has been noted over
+and over again by medical observers in the cases that
+have been brought professionally under their notice.
+And it is hardly less marked in a large number of instances
+that are usually classed as normal. Thus great
+religious teachers have often emphasised the value of
+a celibate life as a means of furthering religious devotion,
+and nearly all have treated it with marked
+respect. The reason given for this is that marriage
+involves a greater absorption in material or worldly<!-- Page 276 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_276" id="Page_276">[276]</a></span>
+cares, while celibacy leaves one free to full devotion to
+the spiritual. But the bottom reason for it is that
+sexual and domestic feelings, lacking their proper outlet
+in marriage and family life, run with greater force
+in the outlet provided by religion. So it happens that
+we find unmarried men and women, devoted to the
+religious life, expressing themselves towards Jesus or
+the Virgin in language which, separated from its religious
+associations, leaves no doubt as to its origin in
+unsatisfied sexual feeling. In these cases we are dealing
+with a perversion of one of the deepest of human
+instincts. And it is one of the commonest of observations
+in psychology that when a feeling is denied outlet
+through its proper channel it finds vent in some
+other direction, and is to that extent masked or disguised.</p>
+
+<p>Allied to the fact of perversion is that of misinterpretation.
+In the chapter on <i>Conversion</i> we have seen
+how largely this occurs at the period of adolescence.
+The significant features of adolescence are a development
+of the sexual nature and an awakening of a consciousness
+of race kinship. Connected with these, and
+flowing from them, is a more or less rapid development
+of what are called the altruistic feelings, the individual
+becoming less self-centred and more concerned for the
+well-being of others. From an evolutionary point it
+is easy to read the fundamental meaning of these
+transformations, although in the course of social development
+they have become overlaid with a number
+of secondary characteristics. Still, in a completely
+rationalised social life, with adequate knowledge concerning
+the nature of adolescence, every care would
+be taken to direct these developing energies into<!-- Page 277 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_277" id="Page_277">[277]</a></span>
+purely social channels. Adolescence is the great formative
+period; it is then that imitation and suggestion
+play their most important parts, and it is then that
+the foundations may be laid of a really good and useful
+citizenship. If we fail then, we fail completely.</p>
+
+<p>In a society where supernaturalism still exerts considerable
+power another, and a more disastrous, policy
+is pursued. Every endeavour is made by religious
+organisations to exploit adolescence in their own interest.
+Thousands of priests, often, no doubt, with the
+best of motives, are engaged in impressing upon the
+youthful mind an entirely erroneous notion of the
+character and the direction of the feelings experienced.
+The sense of restlessness, consequent upon a period
+of great physiological disturbance, is utilised to create
+an unhealthy 'conviction of sin,' or the need of 'getting
+right with God.' Social duties and obligations are
+made incidental rather than fundamental. Activities
+that should be consciously directed to a social end
+are diverted into religious channels, and one consequence
+of this, as we have seen, is a large crop of nervous
+disorders that might be avoided were a healthier
+outlet provided. In this the modern priest is acting
+precisely as his savage forerunner acted. As the
+savage medicine man associates sexual phenomena
+with the activity of the tribal ghosts, so the modern
+priest often associates the psychological conditions
+that accompany adolescence with a supernatural influence.
+The distinction between the two is a purely
+verbal one. In neither case is there a recognition of
+the nature of the processes actually at work; in both
+cases the phenomena are used to emphasise the reality
+and activity of the supernatural. In both cases the<!-- Page 278 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_278" id="Page_278">[278]</a></span>
+social feelings are disguised by the religious interpretation
+given, with the result that instead of adolescence
+being, as it should be, the period of a conscious entry
+into the larger social life, it only too often marks the
+beginning of a lifelong servitude to retrogressive
+forces.</p>
+
+<p>These are the main lines along which, I conceive,
+the study of the pathologic elements that enter into
+the history of religion must be studied. And so long
+as we restrict our study to the lower culture stages the
+evidence is clear and unmistakable. It is when we
+reach the higher stages of civilisation that the problem
+becomes more difficult. For although it is possible to
+detect the same factors at work they are expressed in
+a different way, and affiliated to current philosophic
+and even scientific ideas. Thus, it would be readily
+admitted by most people nowadays that visions seen
+by a fasting man, or by a taker of drugs, or by one
+suffering from some nervous disorder, were wholly
+inadmissible as evidence. So far we have advanced
+beyond the point of view of primitive races. But the
+testimony of one who by constantly dwelling upon a
+single idea, and by excluding rational and corrective
+influences, has brought about a quite abnormal state
+of mind, is still counted of value by theologians. Much
+of the current cant concerning 'mysticism' may be
+cited in illustration of this. Exactly what mysticism
+is no one appears to know. Definitions are numerous
+and varied. So far as most mystics are concerned the
+definition of Harnack&mdash;"Mysticism is rationalism applied
+to a sphere beyond reason"&mdash;appears to hit the
+mark, although how reason can be used in a sphere to
+which it does not apply is precisely one of those unintelligible<!-- Page 279 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_279" id="Page_279">[279]</a></span>
+statements that so delights those with
+yearnings after the ineffable. The normal mind will
+probably find more satisfaction in John Stuart Mill's
+description of mysticism as being "neither more nor
+less than ascribing objective existence to the subjective
+creations of the mind, and believing that by watching
+and contemplating these ideas of its own making,
+it can read what takes place in the world without."</p>
+
+<p>But the general claim of 'mystics,' and, indeed, of
+supernaturalists generally, is that they are, in virtue
+of the exercise of certain qualities or 'faculties,' either
+inoperative at certain times, or absent in the case of
+normal folk, able to perceive a truth not perceptible
+to people less fortunately endowed. And these
+claims, I have no hesitation in saying, are wholly false.
+There are all degrees of development of human faculty,
+but it is substantially the same with all. There is no
+royal road to truth in this direction more than in others.
+Truth is reached in the same way by all, and although
+an induction may in the case of certain well-dowered
+individuals be so rapid as to rank as an 'intuition,' a
+careful analysis destroys the illusion.</p>
+
+<p>When we clear away from the claims of the 'mystic'
+all the superfluities of language that are there, and so
+reduce these claims to their lowest and plainest terms,
+we find ourselves face to face with the claim of the
+supernaturalist as it has existed from savage times onward.
+The method remains true to itself. In the first
+instance, we have the claim to illumination based upon
+direct interference with the normal workings of the
+mind. In the next stage, we find this interference still
+marked, but less direct. Finally, we have the unhealthy
+operation of fixed ideas, and the exclusion of all conditions<!-- Page 280 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_280" id="Page_280">[280]</a></span>
+that would prevent the operation of hallucination
+or illusion. But the method remains the same
+throughout, and it is equally sterile throughout. In
+all history these mystical states of illumination have
+discovered no verifiable truth; they have never at
+any time advanced human knowledge in the smallest
+degree. And the reason for this is plain: The brain of
+the mystic, like that of the non-mystic, can only work
+on the basis of its acquired knowledge or experience.
+It can create nothing new; it can declare no truth that
+is not in the nature of an induction from existing knowledge.
+All that the religious mystic can accomplish
+after brooding upon inherited religious beliefs is to
+create new combinations, or effect certain modifications
+or developments of them, and by continued
+contemplation endow his subjective creations with an
+objective existence. That is why the Christian mystic
+remains a Christian. The Mohammedan mystic remains
+a Mohammedan. The 'supersensible reality'
+is always of the kind consonant with their inherited
+beliefs and their social environment. That is also why
+mysticism has its fashions like all other forms of religious
+extravagance. And as he is "applying rationalism
+to a sphere above reason," the mystic may
+give full vent to his imaginative powers. That which is
+above reason may defy reasonable disproof. To some,
+however, it has the disadvantage of not admitting of
+reasonable verification. There is nothing here but
+the primitive delusion operating under changed conditions.</p>
+
+<p>In addition, to the lines of investigation followed in
+the foregoing pages, a great deal might be said as to
+how far the religious idea has been perpetuated by an<!-- Page 281 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_281" id="Page_281">[281]</a></span>
+exploitation of purely social qualities. It must be obvious
+to even the cursory student that a great deal of
+what is now being put forward as religious is really no
+more than a sociology with a religious label. The feeling
+for truth, beauty, justice, the desire for social intercourse,
+are all treated as expressions of religious conviction.
+All sorts of social reforms are urged in the
+name of religion, and the degree of success achieved
+dwelt upon as fruits of the religious spirit. But in no
+legitimate sense of the word can these things be called
+religious. They may or may not be consonant with
+the existing religion, but in themselves they are very
+clearly the outcome of man's social nature, and would
+exist even though religion disappeared entirely. The
+appeals made to man's moral sense, to his sense of justice,
+to his sympathies, are thus fundamentally appeals
+made to his social nature, and so far as the religious
+appeal is placed upon this basis it becomes an exploitation
+of the social consciousness. Unfortunately, the
+long association of religious forms with social life and
+institutions, due ultimately to the immense power of
+supernaturalism in early society, this, combined with
+early education, makes it a matter of no small difficulty
+for the average man or woman to separate the
+two things.</p>
+
+<p>Finally, let us imagine for a moment that the course
+of human history had been different to what it actually
+has been. Suppose that by some miracle humanity
+had started its career in full possession of that knowledge
+of nature which has been so laboriously accumulated.
+In that case, would the belief in the supernatural
+have ever existed? Would the thousand and one 'spiritual
+beings' of primitive society have ever had being?<!-- Page 282 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_282" id="Page_282">[282]</a></span>
+And if not called into being then, from what other
+source could they have been derived? Is there anything
+in later scientific knowledge that would ever have
+suggested the supernatural? We know there is not; we
+know that the whole of modern science is an emphatic
+protest against its existence. Unfortunately the scientist
+does not come first, but last; and by the time he
+appears, the supernatural has made good its foothold;
+it has permeated human institutions, and has bitten
+so deeply into habits of thought as to make its eradication
+the most difficult of all tasks.</p>
+
+<p>Let us carry our imagining yet a step further. Imagine
+that even after primitive ignorance had created
+the supernatural, it had come to an abrupt stop when
+man had emerged from the purely savage stage. Suppose
+a generation born, not without knowledge of
+what their progenitors believed, but with a sufficient
+knowledge of their own to correct their ancestor's
+errors. Suppose that generation in a position to recognise
+disease, insanity, delusion, hysteria, hallucination
+for what they are. Assume them to be under
+no delusion concerning the nature of man, physically
+or mentally. Would the religious idea have persisted
+in the way that it has done? Granted religion would still
+have continued to exist as an ultimate philosophy of
+nature that appealed to some minds, as other systems
+of philosophy number their disciples, would it have
+been the dominating power it has been? What under
+such conditions would have become of that evidence
+for the supernatural, accepted generation after generation,
+but which is now rejected by all educated minds?
+Where would have been that long array of seers, prophets,
+illuminants, whose credentials have been found<!-- Page 283 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_283" id="Page_283">[283]</a></span>
+in states of mind that are now seen to have been pathological
+in character? For remember it was not always&mdash;very
+seldom, in fact&mdash;the justice, or the reasonableness
+of the teachings set forth, that won support,
+but generally the 'signs and wonders' that were
+pointed to as evidence of the divine commission of
+the teachers. Assume, then, that these 'signs and
+wonders' had been wanting, and that for thousands
+of years people had looked at natural phenomena
+from the point of view of the educated mind of to-day,
+what would have been the present position of the religious
+idea? Would it not have been like a tree divorced
+from the soil?</p>
+
+<p>Well, we know that the course of history has been
+far different from what I have assumed to be the case.
+We know that the savage dies out very slowly, and that
+even in civilised States to-day he is honoured in the existence
+of a whole army of representatives. Each generation
+moves along the road marked out by its predecessors,
+and broadens or lengthens it to but a small
+extent. For many, many generations people went on
+adopting the conclusions of the savage concerning
+man and the universe, and finding proofs of the soundness
+of those conclusions in exactly the same kind of
+experiences. The beliefs thus engendered were wild
+and absurd&mdash;admittedly so, and many of such a nature
+that educated people are now ashamed of them.
+But such as they were, they served the purpose of perpetuating
+the belief in the supernatural, and so served
+to strengthen the general religious idea. Of that there
+can be no reasonable doubt. For the influence of beliefs
+that have been long held does not end with the
+intellectual perception of their falsity. A belief such<!-- Page 284 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_284" id="Page_284">[284]</a></span>
+as witchcraft dies out, but by that time it has done its
+work in familiarising the general mind with the reality
+of the supernatural, and so prepares the ground for
+other harvests. These long centuries of superstitious
+beliefs have left behind in society a psychological residuum
+that is at all times an obstacle and is sometimes
+fatal to scientific thinking. We are like men who have
+obtained freedom after almost a lifetime of slavery.
+We may be no longer in any real danger of the lash,
+but fear of the whip has become part of our nature,
+and we shrink without cause. So with all those now
+admitted delusions that have been described in the
+foregoing pages, and which for generations were
+asserted without question. They bit deeply in to social
+institutions; the temper of mind they induced became
+part of our social heritage. They perpetuated the
+long reign of supernaturalism, and still interpose a
+serious obstacle to sane and helpful conceptions of
+man and the universe.</p>
+
+<p><!-- Page 285 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_285" id="Page_285">[285]</a></span></p>
+<h2>INDEX</h2>
+
+<ul>
+<li>Adolescence and Religion, <a href="#Page_177">177-8</a>, <a href="#Page_181">181</a>, <a href="#Page_276">276-7</a>.</li>
+
+<li>Adolescence and Primitive Customs, <a href="#Page_178">178</a>.</li>
+
+<li>Adolescence and Nervous Disorders, <a href="#Page_196">196-7</a>.</li>
+
+<li>Adolescence, Social Significance of, <a href="#Page_183">183-5</a>.</li>
+
+<li>Agapæ, <a href="#Page_152">152</a>.</li>
+
+<li>Asceticism, <a href="#Page_121">121</a>, <a href="#Page_125">125</a>, <a href="#Page_146">146</a>, <a href="#Page_208">208-13</a>.</li>
+
+<li>Asceticism and Purity, <a href="#Page_213">213</a>.</li>
+
+<li>Asceticism, Influence on Religion, <a href="#Page_224">224-5</a>.</li>
+
+<li>Augustine, <a href="#Page_157">157</a>.</li>
+
+<li>Authority, Conflict with Science, <a href="#Page_viii">viii</a>.</li>
+</ul>
+
+<ul>
+<li>Baring-Gould, S., <a href="#Page_147">147</a>, <a href="#Page_153">153</a>, <a href="#Page_209">209</a>.</li>
+
+<li>Baring-Gould, S., on Mysticism and Sexualism, <a href="#Page_125">125</a>, <a href="#Page_151">151</a>.</li>
+
+<li>Brinton, D. G., on Origin of Religion, <a href="#Page_14">14</a>.</li>
+
+<li>Bryce, J., <a href="#Page_232">232</a>.</li>
+
+<li>Buckle, T. H., <a href="#Page_256">256</a>.</li>
+</ul>
+
+<ul>
+<li>Catherine of Sienna, <a href="#Page_85">85</a>, <a href="#Page_129">129</a>.</li>
+
+<li>Celibacy, <a href="#Page_214">214-5</a>.</li>
+
+<li>Celibacy, Results on Morals, <a href="#Page_220">220-3</a>.</li>
+
+<li>Celibacy, Social Consequences of, <a href="#Page_216">216-9</a>, <a href="#Page_220">220-3</a>.</li>
+
+<li>Clouston, Sir T. S., on Revivals, <a href="#Page_195">195</a>.</li>
+
+<li>Clouston, Sir T. S., on the Connection between Sexualism and Religion, <a href="#Page_140">140</a>.</li>
+
+<li>Conversion, Pathological Nature of, <a href="#Page_194">194</a>.</li>
+
+<li>Conversion and Adolescence, <a href="#Page_32">32</a>, <a href="#Page_176">176-7</a>, <a href="#Page_276">276</a>.</li>
+
+<li>Conversion, Theological Notions of, <a href="#Page_169">169-71</a>.</li>
+
+<li>Conversion, Ages of Converts, <a href="#Page_174">174-5</a>, <a href="#Page_194">194-5</a>.</li>
+
+<li>Conversion, Statistics of, <a href="#Page_173">173-5</a>.</li>
+
+<li>Conversion and Imitation, <a href="#Page_188">188</a>.</li>
+
+<li>Conversion, Social Aspects of, <a href="#Page_200">200</a>.</li>
+
+<li>Convulsionnaires (The), <a href="#Page_239">239</a>.</li>
+
+<li>Crowd Psychology, <a href="#Page_206">206</a>.</li>
+
+<li>Crusades, Character of, <a href="#Page_227">227-9</a>.</li>
+
+<li>Crusades, Children's, <a href="#Page_230">230</a>.</li>
+
+<li>Crusades, Consequences of, <a href="#Page_232">232-3</a>.</li>
+
+<li>Cudworth, R., <a href="#Page_259">259</a>.</li>
+</ul>
+
+<ul>
+<li>Dalyell, J. G., <a href="#Page_257">257</a>.</li>
+
+<li>Dancing and Religious Ecstasy, <a href="#Page_60">60-1</a>.</li>
+
+<li>Dancing Epidemics, <a href="#Page_236">236-40</a>.</li>
+
+<li>Death, Savage Ideas of, <a href="#Page_44">44</a>.</li>
+
+<li>Demoniacs, <a href="#Page_77">77</a>.</li>
+
+<li>Disease, Theory of, amongst Primitive Peoples, <a href="#Page_46">46</a>.</li>
+
+<li>Disease, Theory of, amongst the Early Christians, <a href="#Page_47">47</a>.</li>
+
+<li>D'Israeli, I., on Sexualism and Religion, <a href="#Page_17">17</a>, <a href="#Page_135">135</a>.</li>
+
+<li>Draper, J. W., <a href="#Page_231">231</a>.</li>
+
+<li>Drugs, their use in the history of Religion, <a href="#Page_57">57</a>.</li>
+</ul>
+
+<ul>
+<li>Environment, <a href="#Page_36">36</a>, <a href="#Page_38">38</a>.</li>
+
+<li>Environment, Nature of Primitive, <a href="#Page_39">39</a>.</li>
+
+<li>Epilepsy, Influence of, in fostering Supernaturalism, <a href="#Page_74">74-9</a>.</li>
+
+<li>Epilepsy, Opinion of Dr. Hollander, <a href="#Page_75">75</a>.</li>
+
+<li>Epilepsy, Opinion of Sir T. S. Clouston, <a href="#Page_75">75</a>.</li>
+
+<li>Epilepsy, Opinion of Dr. C. Norman, <a href="#Page_76">76</a>.</li>
+
+<li>Epilepsy, Opinion of Emanuel Deutsch, <a href="#Page_77">77</a>, <a href="#Page_79">79</a>.</li>
+
+<li>Epilepsy in New Testament, <a href="#Page_77">77</a>.</li>
+
+<li>Erotic Sects, <a href="#Page_155">155-60</a>, <a href="#Page_165">165</a>.</li>
+
+<li>Eroticism and Supernaturalism, <a href="#Page_126">126-8</a>, <a href="#Page_132">132</a>, <a href="#Page_136">136-9</a>.</li>
+
+<li>Evidence for the Supernatural, <a href="#Page_2">2</a>, <a href="#Page_271">271</a>.</li>
+</ul>
+
+<ul>
+<li>Fasting, <a href="#Page_61">61-5</a>.</li>
+
+<li>Flagellation, <a href="#Page_234">234-5</a>.</li>
+
+<li>Forlong, Maj.-Gen., <a href="#Footnote_90_90">109 <i>n.</i></a></li>
+
+<li>Fox, George, Account of Visions, <a href="#Page_82">82</a>.</li>
+
+<li>Frazer, J. G., <a href="#Page_39">39</a>, <a href="#Page_46">46</a>, <a href="#Page_97">97</a>, <a href="#Page_99">99</a>, <a href="#Page_111">111</a>.</li>
+
+<li><!-- Page 286 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_286" id="Page_286">[286]</a></span>
+Free Love&mdash;Religious, <a href="#Page_150">150</a>, <a href="#Page_161">161-4</a>.</li>
+</ul>
+
+<ul>
+<li>Galton, Francis, on Religious and Morbid States, <a href="#Page_86">86</a>.</li>
+
+<li>Galton, Francis, <a href="#Page_219">219</a>.</li>
+
+<li>Gibbon, E., <a href="#Page_227">227</a>.</li>
+
+<li>Gowers, Sir W. R., <a href="#Page_197">197</a>.</li>
+
+<li>Granger, Prof., <a href="#Page_84">84</a>, <a href="#Page_141">141-3</a>.</li>
+</ul>
+
+<ul>
+<li>Hallucinations, <a href="#Page_23">23-4-5</a>, <a href="#Page_62">62</a>, <a href="#Page_84">84</a>.</li>
+
+<li>Hecker, J. F. C., <a href="#Page_236">236-7</a>.</li>
+
+<li>Hopkins, Mathew, <a href="#Page_261">261-2</a>.</li>
+
+<li>Human Qualities, Identity of, <a href="#Page_6">6</a>.</li>
+</ul>
+
+<ul>
+<li>Interpretation, Growth of Scientific, <a href="#Page_xiii">xiii</a>.</li>
+
+<li>Ireland, Dr. W. W., on Hallucinations, <a href="#Page_23">23-4</a>.</li>
+</ul>
+
+<ul>
+<li>James, W., <a href="#Page_10">10</a>, <a href="#Page_11">11</a>, <a href="#Page_14">14</a>, <a href="#Page_15">15</a>, <a href="#Page_16">16</a>, <a href="#Page_17">17</a>, <a href="#Page_21">21</a>, <a href="#Page_81">81</a>, <a href="#Page_83">83</a>, <a href="#Page_130">130</a>, <a href="#Page_131">131</a>, <a href="#Page_145">145</a>, <a href="#Page_175">175-6</a>, <a href="#Page_272">272</a>.</li>
+</ul>
+
+<ul>
+<li>Kingsley, Mary, on Primitive Thought, <a href="#Page_42">42</a>.</li>
+</ul>
+
+<ul>
+<li>Lea, H. C., <a href="#Page_220">220-1</a>.</li>
+
+<li>Le Bon, Gustave, on Crowd Psychology, <a href="#Page_206">206</a>.</li>
+
+<li>Lecky, W. E. H., <a href="#Page_154">154</a>, <a href="#Page_212">212</a>, <a href="#Page_221">221</a>.</li>
+
+<li>Luther and Demonism, <a href="#Page_25">25</a>, <a href="#Page_58">58</a>, <a href="#Page_82">82</a>, <a href="#Page_253">253</a>.</li>
+</ul>
+
+<ul>
+<li>Maudsley, H., on the Relation between Nervous States and Ecstasy, <a href="#Page_66">66</a>, <a href="#Page_76">76</a>, <a href="#Page_133">133</a>.</li>
+
+<li>Medicine and the Church, <a href="#Page_70">70-1</a>.</li>
+
+<li>Menstruation, <a href="#Page_95">95-6-7-8</a>.</li>
+
+<li>Mental States, Reality of, <a href="#Page_xi">xi</a>, <a href="#Page_7">7</a>, <a href="#Page_22">22</a>.</li>
+
+<li>Mercier, C., Connection between Sexualism and Religion, <a href="#Page_124">124</a>, <a href="#Page_140">140-1</a>, <a href="#Page_187">187</a>, <a href="#Page_197">197</a>.</li>
+
+<li>Milman, H. H., <a href="#Page_219">219</a>, <a href="#Page_222">222-3</a>, <a href="#Page_225">225-6</a>, <a href="#Page_229">229</a>, <a href="#Page_232">232</a>.</li>
+
+<li>Mind, Theories of, <a href="#Page_x">x</a>.</li>
+
+<li>Mistletoe, Origin of Kissing under, <a href="#Footnote_90_90">109 <i>n.</i></a></li>
+
+<li>Mohammed, his Account of Inspiration, <a href="#Page_78">78</a>, <a href="#Page_81">81</a>.</li>
+
+<li>Monasticism, <a href="#Page_225">225</a>.</li>
+
+<li>Monasticism and the Family, <a href="#Page_216">216-7</a>, <a href="#Page_219">219</a>, <a href="#Page_222">222-3</a>.</li>
+
+<li>Monasticism and Morals, <a href="#Page_220">220</a>.</li>
+
+<li>Mysticism, <a href="#Page_131">131</a>, <a href="#Page_279">279-80</a>.</li>
+
+<li>Mysticism and the Abnormal, <a href="#Page_55">55</a>.</li>
+
+<li>Mysticism and Puberty, <a href="#Page_186">186</a>.</li>
+
+<li>Mysticism, Definitions of, <a href="#Page_278">278-9</a>.</li>
+
+<li>Mystics, Claims of, <a href="#Page_xi">xi</a>.</li>
+</ul>
+
+<ul>
+<li>Opium, Effects of, <a href="#Page_58">58</a>.</li>
+</ul>
+
+<ul>
+<li>Pathological States and Religious Belief, <a href="#Page_5">5</a>, <a href="#Page_49">49</a>.</li>
+
+<li>Pathological Aspects of Revivals, <a href="#Page_190">190-1-2-3</a>, <a href="#Page_201">201</a>.</li>
+
+<li>Pathology of Religion, Need of, <a href="#Page_3">3</a>.</li>
+
+<li>Phallicism, <a href="#Page_104">104-5-6-7-8-9</a>.</li>
+
+<li>Pike, L. O., on Character of Crusaders, <a href="#Page_229">229</a>.</li>
+
+<li>Procreation, Primitive Beliefs concerning, <a href="#Page_93">93-4</a>.</li>
+
+<li>Psychological Epidemics, <a href="#Page_207">207</a>.</li>
+
+<li>Psychology, Normal and Abnormal, <a href="#Page_3">3</a>.</li>
+
+<li>Psychology as a Social Force, <a href="#Page_37">37-8</a>.</li>
+
+<li>Puberty, <a href="#Page_180">180-6</a>.</li>
+
+<li>Puberty Customs, <a href="#Page_62">62</a>, <a href="#Page_95">95</a>, <a href="#Page_96">96</a>.</li>
+</ul>
+
+<ul>
+<li>Religion, Definition of, <a href="#Page_1">1</a>.
+<ul>
+  <li>Association of, with Non-religious Forces, <a href="#Page_4">4</a>.</li>
+  <li>and Intuition, <a href="#Page_51">51</a>.</li>
+  <li>and Puberty, <a href="#Page_180">180</a>.</li>
+  <li>and Dancing, <a href="#Page_60">60-1-2</a>.</li>
+  <li>and Fasting, <a href="#Page_63">63-4-5</a>.</li>
+  <li>and Environment, <a href="#Page_199">199</a>, <a href="#Page_202">202</a>.</li>
+  <li>in Primitive Life, <a href="#Page_40">40</a>, <a href="#Page_44">44-5-6</a>, <a href="#Page_53">53</a>.</li>
+  <li>its Connection with Pathological Conditions, <a href="#Page_8">8</a>, <a href="#Page_14">14</a>, <a href="#Page_68">68-9</a>, <a href="#Page_70">70-1-2-3-4</a>.</li>
+</ul></li>
+
+<li>Religious Faculty, Fallacy of, <a href="#Page_7">7</a>, <a href="#Page_19">19</a>, <a href="#Page_20">20</a>.</li>
+
+<li>Religious Idea and Modern Thought, <a href="#Page_vii">vii</a>.</li>
+
+<li><!-- Page 287 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_287" id="Page_287">[287]</a></span>
+Renan, E., <a href="#Page_145">145</a>.</li>
+
+<li>Revivalistic Religion, <a href="#Page_163">163</a>, <a href="#Page_172">172</a>, <a href="#Page_189">189</a>, <a href="#Page_190">190</a>, <a href="#Page_193">193</a>, <a href="#Page_201">201</a>.</li>
+
+<li>Russian Sects, <a href="#Page_164">164-7</a>.</li>
+</ul>
+
+<ul>
+<li>Saints, Medical Uses of, <a href="#Page_70">70</a>.</li>
+
+<li>Santa Teresa, <a href="#Page_85">85</a>.</li>
+
+<li>Science, Function of, <a href="#Page_xi">xi-xii</a>.</li>
+
+<li>Sexualism and Religious Belief, <a href="#Page_9">9</a>, <a href="#Page_11">11-2</a>, <a href="#Page_89">89-90</a>, <a href="#Page_120">120</a>, <a href="#Page_121">121</a>, <a href="#Page_125">125-9</a>, <a href="#Page_145">145</a>, <a href="#Page_275">275</a>.</li>
+
+<li>Sexualism and Religious Belief, Opinion of Dr. Norman, <a href="#Page_122">122</a>;
+<ul>
+  <li>of Dr. Forel, <a href="#Page_123">123</a>;</li>
+  <li>of Dr. Mercier, <a href="#Page_124">124</a>;</li>
+  <li>of Dr. Krafft-Ebing, <a href="#Page_125">125</a>;</li>
+  <li>of Dr. Maudsley, <a href="#Page_133">133-4</a>.</li>
+</ul></li>
+
+<li>Smith, W. R., on the Meaning of 'Unclean,' <a href="#Page_101">101</a>.</li>
+
+<li>Sociability, Significance of, <a href="#Page_35">35</a>.</li>
+
+<li>Social Life and Religious Theories, <a href="#Page_13">13</a>, <a href="#Page_281">281</a>.</li>
+
+<li>Spencer, H., <a href="#Page_37">37</a>, <a href="#Page_46">46</a>.</li>
+
+<li>Spiritual Wifehood, <a href="#Page_148">148-9</a>.</li>
+
+<li>Spiritualism, <a href="#Page_53">53-4</a>.</li>
+
+<li>Starbuck, E. D., on Conversion, <a href="#Page_174">174</a>, <a href="#Page_200">200</a>.</li>
+
+<li>Sully, J., <a href="#Page_20">20</a>.</li>
+
+<li>Supernaturalism, Causes of Persistence of, <a href="#Page_271">271</a>, <a href="#Page_273">273</a>, <a href="#Page_277">277</a>, <a href="#Page_282">282</a>.</li>
+
+<li>Supernaturalism, Consequences of, <a href="#Page_283">283-4</a>.</li>
+
+<li>Supernaturalism, Persistence of, <a href="#Page_2">2</a>.</li>
+
+<li>Suso, Austerities of, <a href="#Page_85">85</a>.</li>
+
+<li>Swedenborg, E., <a href="#Page_80">80</a>.</li>
+
+<li>Symonds, J. A., Experience under Chloroform, <a href="#Page_29">29</a>.</li>
+</ul>
+
+<ul>
+<li>Theologians, Attitude towards Science, <a href="#Page_ix">ix</a>.</li>
+
+<li>Thomas, W. I., <a href="#Page_182">182</a>.</li>
+
+<li>Tylor, E. B., <a href="#Page_1">1</a>, <a href="#Page_49">49</a>, <a href="#Page_54">54</a>, <a href="#Page_55">55</a>, <a href="#Page_71">71</a>, <a href="#Page_182">182</a>, <a href="#Page_193">193</a>.</li>
+</ul>
+
+<ul>
+<li>Unclean, Religious Significance of, <a href="#Page_100">100-1</a>.</li>
+</ul>
+
+<ul>
+<li>Whittaker, T., on the Effects of Opium, <a href="#Page_58">58</a>.</li>
+
+<li>Williams, A., <a href="#Page_250">250</a>.</li>
+
+<li>Witchcraft, <a href="#Page_27">27</a>, <a href="#Page_243">243</a>.
+<ul>
+  <li>Pathology of, <a href="#Page_246">246-7</a>.</li>
+  <li>and Christian Church, <a href="#Page_244">244</a>.</li>
+  <li>Bull of Innocent <span class="ucsmcap">VIII.</span>, <a href="#Page_248">248</a>.</li>
+  <li>Extent of Epidemic, <a href="#Page_250">250</a>.</li>
+  <li>and Sir Thomas Browne, <a href="#Page_265">265</a>.</li>
+  <li>and Montaigne, <a href="#Page_267">267</a>.</li>
+  <li>and Sir M. Hale, <a href="#Page_266">266</a>.</li>
+  <li>and John Wesley, <a href="#Page_259">259</a>.</li>
+  <li>and Luther, <a href="#Page_253">253</a>.</li>
+  <li>and Protestantism, <a href="#Page_252">252-3</a>.</li>
+  <li>Scottish, <a href="#Page_255">255-6-7-8</a>, <a href="#Page_267">267</a>.</li>
+  <li>American, <a href="#Page_254">254-5</a>.</li>
+  <li>Children burned for, <a href="#Page_251">251</a>.</li>
+  <li>Description of Trial, <a href="#Page_263">263-6</a>.</li>
+  <li>Legislation in England, <a href="#Page_253">253</a>, <a href="#Page_267">267</a>.</li>
+</ul>
+</li>
+
+<li>Witches, Methods of Detection, <a href="#Page_260">260-1</a>.</li>
+
+<li>Witches, Number killed, <a href="#Page_250">250-1</a>.</li>
+
+<li>Woman, Christian Church and, <a href="#Page_102">102</a>.</li>
+
+<li>Woman, why considered religiously unclean, <a href="#Page_103">103</a>.</li>
+
+<li>Woman, a Source of Spiritual Infection, <a href="#Page_99">99</a>.</li>
+
+<li>Woman, Influence of Religious Beliefs in determining her Social Position, <a href="#Page_102">102-3</a>, <a href="#Page_110">110-9</a>.</li>
+
+<li>Woman, Position among Primitive Peoples, <a href="#Page_115">115</a>.</li>
+
+<li>Wright, T., <a href="#Page_251">251</a>.</li>
+</ul>
+
+<div class="tn">
+<h3>Transcriber's Note:</h3>
+
+<p>The following corrections were made:</p>
+
+<ul>
+<li><a href="#Page_21">p. 21</a>: extra open quote removed (In what sense)</li>
+<li><a href="#Page_24">p. 24</a>: Dr. W. H. Ireland to Dr. W. W. Ireland (as given by Dr. W. W. Ireland)</li>
+<li><a href="#Page_25">p. 25</a>: Nuremburg to Nuremberg (came from Nuremberg), to match cited text</li>
+<li><a href="#Page_46">p. 46</a>: Crook to Crooke (says Mr. W. Crooke)</li>
+<li><a href="#Page_46">p. 46</a>: Ahmadnager to Ahmadnagar (Mahadeo Kolis of Ahmadnagar)</li>
+<li><a href="#Page_57">p. 57</a>: DeCandolle to De Candolle (says De Candolle)</li>
+<li>p. 58 (<a href="#Footnote_26_26">Footnote 26</a>): Pharmæcology to Pharmacology (Text-Book of Pharmacology)</li>
+<li><a href="#Page_70">p. 70</a>: Persel to Pernel (St. Pernel for agues), to match cited text</li>
+<li><a href="#Page_75">p. 75</a>: everyone to every one (every one of the senses)</li>
+<li><a href="#Page_76">p. 76</a>: Connolly to Conolly (Dr. Conolly Norman)</li>
+<li>pp. 86 (<a href="#Footnote_63_63">Footnote 63</a>), and 130 (<a href="#Footnote_107_107">Footnote 107</a>): Joli to Joly (H. Joly)</li>
+<li>p. 101 (<a href="#Footnote_76_76">Footnote 76</a>): on to in (Studies in the Psychology of Sex)</li>
+<li><a href="#Page_114">p. 114</a>: is to are (Nor are the substantial facts)</li>
+<li>p. 123 (<a href="#Footnote_96_96">Footnote 96</a>): Problem to Question (The Sexual Question)</li>
+<li>pp. <a href="#Page_125">125</a>, 128 (<a href="#Footnote_105_105">Footnote 105</a>), and <a href="#Page_287">287</a> (Index): Kraft-Ebing to Krafft-Ebing</li>
+<li><a href="#Page_127">p. 127</a>: Loudon to Loudun (Convent of Ursulines of Loudun)</li>
+<li>p. 127 (<a href="#Footnote_104_104">Footnote 104</a>): of America to in North America (Jesuits in North America)</li>
+<li><a href="#Page_128">p. 128</a>: Alacocque to Alacoque (The blessed Mary Alacoque)</li>
+<li>p. 149 (<a href="#Footnote_123_123">Footnote 123</a>): Life of St. Paul to Study of St. Paul</li>
+<li>p. 166 (<a href="#Footnote_140_140">Footnote 140</a>): Churches to Church (Heard's description, Russian Church)</li>
+<li><a href="#Page_178">p. 178</a>: tatooing to tattooing (tattooing forms part of the religious ceremony)</li>
+<li>p. 182 (<a href="#Footnote_151_151">Footnote 151</a>): missing 4 added in 241 (pp. 241-48)</li>
+<li><a href="#Page_209">p. 209</a>: Brahminism to Brahmanism (Brahmanism has its order of ascetics), to match cited text</li>
+<li><a href="#Page_209">p. 209</a>: missing close quote added (consecrated to Tezcatlipoca.")</li>
+<li>p. 249 (<a href="#Footnote_188_188">Footnote 188</a>): Enenmoser to Ennemoser (is given by Ennemoser)</li>
+<li>p. 250 (<a href="#Footnote_190_190">Footnote 190</a>): A. Williams, The Superstition of Witchcraft to H. Williams, The Superstitions of Witchcraft</li>
+<li>p. 251 (<a href="#Footnote_191_191">Footnote 191</a>): History to Narratives (Narratives of Sorcery and Magic)</li>
+<li>pp. <a href="#Page_263">263</a>, <a href="#Page_264">264</a>: Tacy to Pacy (Elizabeth and Deborah Pacy)</li>
+<li><a href="#Page_286">p. 286</a> (Index): Ireland, Dr. W. H. to Ireland, Dr. W. W.</li>
+<li><a href="#Page_286">p. 286</a> (Index): Millman, H. H. to Milman, H. H.</li>
+</ul>
+<p>Irregularities in hyphenation (e.g. supernormal vs. super-normal) and
+misquotations have not been corrected. Unless it was found that
+the error also occurred in the cited text, misspellings have been
+corrected.</p>
+<p>Although Footnote 81 (originally on p. 104) refers
+to a "note at the end of this chapter," the "NOTE TO PAGE 104" begins on
+p. 110, several pages before the chapter ends. This has not been
+changed.</p>
+<p>Footnotes markers have been changed from symbols (in the
+original) to numerals.</p>
+<p>The format of chapter headings has been standardized.</p>
+
+</div>
+
+<div>*** END OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK 30306 ***</div>
+</body>
+</html>
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+Project Gutenberg (https://www.gutenberg.org) public repository for
+eBook #30306 (https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/30306)
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+The Project Gutenberg EBook of Religion & Sex, by Chapman Cohen
+
+This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with
+almost no restrictions whatsoever.  You may copy it, give it away or
+re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included
+with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org
+
+
+Title: Religion & Sex
+       Studies in the Pathology of Religious Development
+
+Author: Chapman Cohen
+
+Release Date: October 21, 2009 [EBook #30306]
+
+Language: English
+
+Character set encoding: ISO-8859-1
+
+*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK RELIGION & SEX ***
+
+
+
+
+Produced by Marilynda Fraser-Cunliffe, S.D., and the Online
+Distributed Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+  THE OPEN MIND LIBRARY
+
+  BEING A SERIES OF WORKS DEALING WITH
+  QUESTIONS AS HANDLED BY DIFFERENT
+  SCHOOLS OF THOUGHT, IN RELIGION,
+  ETHICS, PHILOSOPHY & PSYCHOLOGY
+
+
+
+
+        RELIGION & SEX
+
+   STUDIES IN THE PATHOLOGY
+   OF RELIGIOUS DEVELOPMENT
+       BY CHAPMAN COHEN
+
+    T. N. FOULIS, PUBLISHER
+  LONDON, EDINBURGH, & BOSTON
+
+
+_Published October 1919_
+
+_Printed by_ MORRISON & GIBB LIMITED, _Edinburgh_
+
+
+
+
+THE LIST OF CHAPTERS
+
+
+     I. SCIENCE & THE SUPERNATURAL              _page_ 1
+
+    II. THE PRIMITIVE MIND & ITS ENVIRONMENT          35
+
+   III. THE RELIGION OF MENTAL DISEASE                51
+
+    IV. SEX & RELIGION IN PRIMITIVE LIFE              89
+
+     V. THE INFLUENCE OF SEXUAL & PATHOLOGIC
+         STATES ON RELIGIOUS BELIEF                  120
+
+    VI. THE STREAM OF TENDENCY                       145
+
+   VII. CONVERSION                                   169
+
+  VIII. RELIGIOUS EPIDEMICS                          205
+
+    IX. RELIGIOUS EPIDEMICS--(_concluded_)           226
+
+     X. THE WITCH MANIA                              243
+
+    XI. SUMMARY & CONCLUSION                         269
+
+
+
+
+PREFACE
+
+
+In spite of all that has been done in the way of applying scientific
+principles to religious ideas, there is much that yet remains to be
+accomplished. Generally speaking science has only dealt with the subject
+of religion in its more normal and more regularised forms. The last
+half-century has produced many elaborate and fruitful studies of the
+origin of religious ideas, while comparative mythology has shown a close
+and suggestive relationship between creeds and symbols that were once
+believed to have nothing in common. But beyond these fields of research
+there is at least one other that has hitherto been denied the attention
+it richly deserves. When the anthropologist has described those
+conditions of primitive culture amid which he believes religious ideas
+took their origin, and the comparative mythologist has shown us the
+similarities and inter-relations of widely separated creeds, religious
+beliefs have yet to submit to the test of a scientific psychology, the
+function of which is to determine how far the same principles apply to
+all phases of mental life whether religious or non-religious. Moreover,
+in addition to the normal psychical life of man, there is that vast
+borderland in which the normal merges into the abnormal, and the healthy
+state into a pathologic one. That there is a physiology of religion is
+now generally admitted; but that there is also a pathology of religion
+is not so generally recognised. The present work seeks to emphasise this
+last aspect. It does not claim to be more than an outline of the
+subject--a sketch map of a territory that others may fill in more
+completely.
+
+From another point of view the following pages may be regarded as an
+attempt more completely to apply scientific principles to religious
+beliefs. And it would be idle to hope that such an attempt could be made
+without incurring much hostile criticism. In connection with most other
+subjects the help of science is welcomed; in connection with religion
+science is still regarded as more or less of an intruder, profaning a
+sacred subject with vulgar tests and impertinent enquiries. This must
+almost inevitably follow when one has to face the opposition of
+thousands of men who have been trained to regard themselves as the
+authorised exponents of all that pertains to religion, but whose
+training fails to supply them with a genuine scientific equipment. It
+should, however, be clear that an attitude of hostility to science,
+veiled or open, cannot be maintained. Mere authority has fallen on evil
+days, and in all directions is being freely challenged. There is
+increasing dislike to systems of thought that shrink from examination,
+and to conclusions that cannot withstand the most rigorous
+investigation. And if science really has anything of value to say on
+this question it cannot be held to silence for ever. Sooner or later the
+need for its assistance will be felt, and the self-elected authority of
+an order must give way. It is, moreover, impossible for science with its
+claim, sometimes avowed, but always implied, to cover the whole of life,
+to forego so large a territory as that of religion. For there can be no
+reasonable question that religion has played, and still plays a large
+part in the life of the race. Whatever be the nature of religion,
+science is bound either to deal with it or confess its main task to be
+hopeless.
+
+Whether or not it is possible to apply known scientific principles to
+the whole of religion will be a matter of opinion; but the attempt is at
+least worth making. So much that appeared to be beyond the reach of
+science has been ultimately brought within its ken, so many things that
+seemed to stand in a class by themselves have been finally brought under
+some more comprehensive generalisation, and so become part of the
+'cosmic machine,' that one is impelled to believe that given time and
+industry the same will result here. And it should never be forgotten
+that one aspect of scientific progress has been the taking over of large
+tracts of territory that religion once regarded as peculiarly its own;
+and just as psychology and pathology were found to hold the key to an
+understanding of such a phenomenon as witchcraft, so we may yet realise
+that a true explanation of religious phenomena is to be found, not in
+some supernatural world, but in the workings of natural forces
+imperfectly understood.
+
+The defences set up by theologians against the scientific advance may be
+summarised under two heads. It is claimed that the 'facts' of the
+religious life belong to a world of inner experience, to a state of
+spiritual development which brings the subject into touch with a
+super-sensuous world not open to the normal human being, and with which
+science, as ordinarily understood, is incompetent to deal. In essence
+this is a very old position, and contains the kernel of 'mysticism' in
+all ages, from the savage state onward. This position involves a very
+obvious begging of the question at issue. It assumes that all attempts
+to correlate religious phenomena with phenomena in general have failed,
+and that all future attempts are similarly doomed to failure. Of course
+nothing of the kind has been shown. On the contrary, the aim of the
+present work is to show that no dividing line can be drawn between those
+states of mind that have been and are classed as religious, and those
+that are admittedly non-religious. For various reasons I have dealt
+almost entirely with those conditions that are admittedly pathological,
+but I believe it would be possible to prove the same of all normal
+frames of mind and emotional states. Any human quality may be enlisted
+in the service of religion, but there are none that are specifically
+religious. It is a pure assumption that the religious visionary
+possesses qualities that are either absent or rudimentary in other
+persons. Human faculty is everywhere identical although the form in
+which it is expressed differs according to education, the presence of
+certain dominating ideas, and the general influence of one's
+environment. To admit the claim of the mystic is to surrender all hope
+of a scientific co-ordination of life. It is quite fatal to the
+scientific ideal and involves the re-introduction into nature of a
+dualism the removal of which has been one of the most marked advantages
+of scientific thinking.
+
+Moreover, whatever views we may hold as to the ultimate nature of 'mind'
+the dependence of all frames of mind upon the brain and nervous system
+is now generally accepted. We may hold various theories as to the nature
+of mind, we may, with the late William James, treat the brain as merely
+a 'transmissive' organ, but even on that assumption--on behalf of which
+not a shred of positive evidence has been offered--the frames of mind
+expressed are determined by the nervous mechanism, and thus the laws of
+mental phenomena become ultimately the laws of the operation of the
+nervous system. The 'facts' of the religious life thus become part of
+the facts of psychology as a whole. Its 'laws' will form part of
+psychological laws as a whole, and religious experiences must be handed
+over for examination and classification to the psychologist who in turn
+relies for help and understanding on various associated branches of
+science.
+
+Closely allied to the claim of the 'mystic' that his experiences bring
+him into touch with a world of super-sensuous reality, is the attempt to
+prove that science is incapable of dealing with anything but "in the
+first place, the endless ascertainment of facts and the physical
+conditions under which they occur, and in the second place to the
+criticism of error." Well, no one denies that it is part of the work of
+science to ascertain facts, or even that its work consists in
+ascertaining facts and framing 'laws' that will explain them. But why
+are we to limit science to _physical_ facts only? All facts are not
+physical. If I have a head-ache, the unpleasant feeling is a fact. If I
+feel hot or cold, angry or pleased, think one thing ugly or another
+beautiful, my feelings are as much 'facts' as anything else that exists.
+Nay, if I fancy I see a ghost, or a vision, these also are 'facts' so
+far as my mental state at the time is concerned. So also are my beliefs
+about all manner of things, and often the most important facts with
+which I am connected. Facts may be objective or subjective. They may
+exist in relation to all minds normally constituted, or they may exist
+in relation to my own mind only; or, yet again, they may exist only in
+relation to certain states of mind, but they do not, nevertheless, cease
+to be facts.
+
+Now the business of science is to collect facts--all facts--classify
+them, and frame generalisations that will explain their groupings and
+modes of operation. It talks of the facts of the physical world, the
+facts of the biological world, the facts of the psychological world, and
+so forth. This last group comprises all sorts of feelings and ideas,
+beliefs and experiences. Some of these facts it calls false, others it
+calls true--that is, they are true when they hold good of all men and
+women normally constituted, they are not true when they hold good of
+isolated individuals only, and can be seen to be the product of
+misinterpreted experience, or arise from a derangement--permanent or
+temporary--of the nervous system. But true or false they remain facts of
+the mental life. They must be collected, grouped, and explained exactly
+as other facts are collected, grouped, and explained. They fall within
+the scope of science, to be dealt with by scientific methods.
+
+There is really no escape from the position that so far as religious
+'facts' are parts of mental life, religion becomes logically a
+department of psychology. The substantial identity of all mental facts
+is quite unaffected by their being directed to this or that special
+object. As mental facts they are part of the material that it is the
+work of science to reduce to order. And as mental facts religious
+phenomena are seen to follow the same 'laws' that govern mental
+phenomena in general. It is perfectly true that we cannot test and
+measure the material of psychology with the same definiteness and
+accuracy that the chemist applies to the subject-matter of his
+department; but that may be due to want of knowledge, or to the extreme
+complexity and variability of the matter with which we are dealing. And
+if it were true that the same tests could not be applied in psychology
+that are applied elsewhere, this would be no cause for scientific
+despair. It would only mean that fresh tests would have to be devised
+for a new group of facts, as every other science has already, as a
+matter of fact, created its own special standard of value.
+
+The second of the two lines of defence consists in the bold assertion
+that the religious interpretation of subjective phenomena is itself in
+the nature of a true scientific induction. The methods of science are
+not repudiated, but welcomed. But it is argued that the non-religious
+explanation of religious phenomena breaks down hopelessly, while the
+religious explanation fully covers and explains the facts. If this were
+true, nothing more remains to be said, and we must accept this dualistic
+scheme, however repugnant it may be to orthodox scientific ideas. But is
+it true? Is it a fact that the non-religious explanation breaks down so
+completely? Hitherto the course of events has been in the contrary
+direction. It is the religious explanation that has, over and over
+again, been shown to be unreliable, the non-religious explanation that
+has been finally established. Insanity and epilepsy, once universally
+ascribed to a supernatural order of being, have been reduced to the
+level of nervous disorders. All the phenomena of 'possession' are still
+with us, it is only our understanding of them that has altered. And
+before it is admitted that the phenomena described as religious can
+never be affiliated to the phenomena described as non-religious, it must
+be shown--beyond all possibility of doubt--that their explanation in
+terms of known forces is impossible. As I have said in the body of this
+work, the question at issue is essentially one of interpretation. The
+'facts' of the religious life are admitted. Science no more questions
+the reality of the visions of the medieval mystic than it questions the
+visions of the non-mystic admittedly suffering from neural derangement.
+The crucial question is whether we have any good reason for separating
+the two, and while we dismiss the one as hallucination accept the other
+as introducing us to another order of being? I do not think there is the
+slightest ground for any such differentiation, and I have given in the
+following pages what I conceive to be good reasons for so thinking. And
+I hope that the fact of the explanations there offered running counter
+to the traditional one will not prevent readers weighing with the utmost
+care the proofs that are offered.
+
+
+
+
+RELIGION AND SEX
+
+CHAPTER ONE
+
+SCIENCE AND THE SUPERNATURAL
+
+
+Accepting Professor Tylor's famous minimum definition of religion as
+"the belief in Spiritual Beings," it is safe to say that religious
+belief constitutes one of the largest facts in human history. No other
+single subject has occupied so large a share of man's conscious life, no
+other subject has absorbed so much of his energy. In very early stages
+of culture religious belief is universal in the fullest sense of the
+word. It shapes all primitive institutions; it dominates life from the
+cradle to the grave, and creates a shadow-land beyond the grave from
+which the dead continue to influence the actions of the living. At a
+later stage of culture we see a distinction being drawn between the
+natural and the supernatural, the secular and the spiritual, and the
+beginning of an antagonism that is still with us. Of all antagonisms
+conceived by the brain of man this is the deepest and the most
+irreconcilable. Each feels that the growth of the other threatens its
+own supremacy, with the result that advance from either side has been
+contested with the greatest obstinacy and determination. And although it
+is true that at present the supernatural is very largely "suspect," it
+is still powerful. Nor is its influence confined to the lower strata of
+European society. It has very many representatives among the higher
+culture, disguised it may be under various pseudo-philosophic forms.
+Altogether we may say that the supernatural has never been without its
+"cloud of witnesses." At all times there have been individuals, or
+groups of individuals, who have believed themselves, and have been
+believed by others, to be in touch with another order of existence than
+that with which people are normally in contact. And apart from these
+specially favoured persons, the wide vogue of the belief in good and
+evil portents, in lucky and unlucky days, the attraction of the "occult"
+in fiction and in fact, all serve as evidence that belief in the
+supernatural is still a force with which one has to reckon.
+
+To what causes are we to attribute the persistence of this belief in the
+supernatural? It is useless replying that its persistence is evidence of
+its truth. That clearly begs the whole question at issue. Mere social
+heredity will doubtless count for much in this direction. Men do not
+start their thinking afresh with each generation. It is based upon that
+of preceding generations; it follows set forms, and is generally
+influenced by that network of ideas and beliefs into which we are born
+and from which none of us ever completely escapes. Still that is hardly
+enough in itself to account for the persistence of supernaturalism.
+Assuming that originally there existed what was accepted as good
+evidence for the existence of a supernatural, it is hardly credible that
+every subsequent generation went on accepting it merely because one
+generation received evidence of its existence. As organs atrophy for
+want of exercise, so do beliefs die out in time for want of proof. Some
+kind of evidence must have been continually forthcoming in order to keep
+the belief alive and active. It is not a question of whether the
+evidence was good or bad. All evidence, it is important to bear in mind,
+is good to some one. The "facts" upon which thousands of people were put
+to death for witchcraft would not be considered evidence to anyone
+nowadays, but they were once accepted as good ground for conviction.
+
+What kind of evidence is it, then, that has been accepted as proof of
+the supernatural? Or, to return to Tylor's definition of religion,
+seeing that the belief in spiritual beings has persisted in every
+generation, upon what kind of evidence has this belief been nourished?
+Various replies might be given to this question, all of which may
+contain some degree of truth, or an aspect of a general truth. In the
+present enquiry I am concerned with one line of investigation only, one
+that has been strangely neglected, but which yet, I am convinced,
+promises fruitful results. In other directions it has been established
+that a great aid to an understanding of the human organism in times of
+health is to study its activities under conditions of disease. Abnormal
+psychology is now a recognised branch of psychology in general, and a
+glance through almost any recent text-book will show that the two form
+parts of a natural whole. The normal and the abnormal are in turn used
+to throw light on each other. And it appears to the present writer that
+in the matter of religious beliefs a much clearer understanding of their
+nature, and also of some of the conditions of their perpetuation, may be
+gained by a study of what has happened, and is happening, in the light
+of mental pathology.
+
+To some, of course, the bare idea of there being a pathology of religion
+will appear an entirely unwarrantable assumption. On the other hand, the
+scientific study of all phases of religions having made so great headway
+it is hoped that a larger number will be prepared for a discussion of
+the subject from a point of view which, if not quite new, is certainly
+not common. Of course, such a discussion, even if the author quite
+succeeds in demonstrating the truth of his thesis, will still leave the
+origin of the religious idea an open question. For the present we are
+not concerned directly with the origin of the religious idea, but with
+an examination of some of the causes that have served to perpetuate it,
+and to trace the influence in the history of religion of states of mind,
+both personal and collective, that are now admittedly abnormal or
+pathological in character. The legitimacy of the enquiry cannot be
+questioned. As to its value and significance, that every reader must
+determine for himself.
+
+One may put the essential idea of the following pages in a
+sentence:--Given the religious idea as already existing, in what way,
+and to what extent has its development been affected by forces that are
+not in themselves religious, and which modern thought definitely
+separates from religion?
+
+Under civilised and uncivilised conditions we find religious beliefs
+constantly associated with various forces--social, ethical, and
+psychological. Very seldom is there any serious attempt to separate them
+and assign to each their respective value; nor, indeed, is the task at
+any time an easy one. The difficulty is made the greater by the way in
+which writers so enlarge the meaning of "religion" that it is made to
+include almost everything for which one feels admiration or respect.
+This practice is neither helpful nor accurate. Human nature under all
+aspects of intellectual conviction presents the same fundamental
+characteristics, and a definition to be of value, while of necessity
+inclusive, must also be decisively exclusive. It must unite, but it must
+also separate. And many current definitions of religion, while they may
+bear testimony to the amiability of those who frame them, are quite
+destitute of scientific value. In any case, the association of the
+religious idea with non-religious forces is a fact too patent to admit
+of denial; and the important task is to determine their reciprocal
+influence. In actual life this separation has been secured by the
+development of the various branches of positive thought--ethics,
+psychology, etc., all of which were once directly under the control of
+religion. What remains to be done is to separate in theory what has
+already been separated in fact, with such additions as a more critical
+knowledge may suggest as advisable.
+
+Far more suggestive, however, than the association of religion with what
+we may call the normal social forces, is its connection with conditions
+that are now clearly recognised as abnormal. From the earliest times we
+find the use of drugs and stimulants, the practice of fasting and
+self-torture, with other methods of depressing or stimulating the action
+of the nervous system, accepted as well-recognised methods of inducing a
+sense of religious illumination, or the feeling that one is in direct
+communion with a supernatural order of existence. Equally significant is
+the world-wide acceptance--right up to recent times--of purely
+pathological states as evidence of supernatural intercourse. About these
+two sets of facts there can be no reasonable doubt. Over and over again
+we can observe how the promptings of disease are taken for the voice of
+divinity, and men and women who to-day would be handed over to the care
+of the physician hailed as an incarnation of deity. In modern asylums
+we find one of the commonest of delusions to be that of the insane
+person who imagines himself to be a specially selected instrument of
+deity. In such instances the causal influence of pathological conditions
+is admitted. On the other hand, we have belonging to the more normal
+type the person who claims a supernatural origin for many of his actions
+and states of mind. And between these two extremes lie a whole series of
+gradations. They exist in all stages of culture, and it is difficult to
+see by what rule of logic or of experience one can say where the normal
+ends and the abnormal begins. If we assume the inference of the normal
+person concerning the origin of his mental states to be correct, it
+seems difficult to deny the possibility of those of the insane person
+having a similar origin, although distorted by the influence of disease.
+If, on the other hand, we say the insane person is wholly wrong as to
+the origin of his mental states, may we not also assume that the normal
+person has likewise erred as to the cause of his emotions or ideas?
+
+Two considerations may be urged in support of this conclusion. In the
+first place, there is the fact of the fundamental identity of human
+qualities under all conditions of their manifestation. It is too often
+assumed--sometimes it is explicitly claimed--that one with what is
+called "a strong religious nature" possesses some quality of mind absent
+or undeveloped in those of an opposite type. This assumption is quite
+unwarrantable. The religious man is marked off from the non-religious
+man, not by the possession of distinct mental qualities, but solely by
+holding different ideas concerning the cause and significance of his
+mental states. There is no such thing as a religious "faculty," but
+only qualities of mind expressed in terms of the religious idea. If I am
+conscious of a strong desire to work on behalf of the social betterment
+of my fellows, I may account for this either by attributing it to having
+inherited a nature modified by generations of social intercourse, or on
+the hypothesis that I am an instrument in the hands of a superhuman
+personality. But in either case the qualities manifested remain the
+same. Love and hatred, fear and courage, honesty and roguery, with all
+other human qualities, may be expressed in terms of religion, or they
+may be expressed in non-religious terms. It is the cause to which they
+are attributed, or the object to which they are directed, that marks off
+the religious from the non-religious person.
+
+The second point is that the whole issue arises on a conflict of
+interpretations. If I question the reality of the visions or states of
+illumination experienced by Santa Teresa, I am not questioning that, so
+far as the saint herself was concerned, these states of exaltation were
+real. All mental states--whether arising under normal or abnormal
+conditions--are quite real to those who experience them. The visions of
+the hashish-eater are real, while they last; so are those of the victim
+of delirium tremens. All I question is their genuineness as
+corresponding to an objective reality. Over the mind of the subject
+these visions may exercise an absolute sway. As to their occurrence, he
+or she is the final and absolute authority. There can be no question
+here. But when we proceed from the occurrence of these visions to the
+question of their causation, then we are on entirely different ground.
+Here it is not a question of their genuineness, or of their power, but
+a question of how we are to interpret them. The honesty and
+singlemindedness of these "inspired" characters may be admitted, but
+honesty or singlemindedness is no guarantee of accuracy. We do not need
+to ask whether the peasant girl of Lourdes experienced a vision of the
+Madonna, but we do need to ask whether there was anything in her mental
+history, social surroundings, or nervous state that would account for
+the vision. All the "facts" of the religious life may be admitted; the
+sole question at issue is whether an adequate interpretation of at least
+some of them may not be found in terms of a purely scientific
+psychology.
+
+Taking, then, the religious idea as already existing, the following
+pages will be devoted to an examination of the extent to which this idea
+has been associated with forces and conditions that were plainly
+pathological. In very many individual cases it will not be difficult to
+trace a vivid sense of the supernatural to the presence of abnormal
+nervous states, sometimes deliberately induced, at other times arising
+of themselves. And it is a matter of mere historical observation that
+such individual cases have operated most powerfully to strengthen the
+belief in the supernatural with others. The example of Lourdes is a case
+in point. All Protestants will agree that the peasant girl's vision was
+a sheer hallucination. And yet there can be no question that this vision
+has served to strengthen the faith of many thousands of others in the
+nearness of the supernatural. And it needs but little effort of the
+imagination to realise how powerful such examples must have been in ages
+when medical science was in its infancy, and the more subtle operations
+of the nervous system completely unknown.
+
+This question, I repeat, is distinct from the much larger and wider
+enquiry of the origin of religion. A fairly lengthy experience of the
+capacity of the general mind for missing the real point at issue
+prevents my being too sanguine as to the efficiency of the most explicit
+avowal of one's purpose, but the duty of taking precautions nevertheless
+remains. And in elaborating an unfamiliar view of the nature of much of
+the world's so-called religious phenomena, the possibility of
+misconception is multiplied enormously. Still, a writer must do what he
+can to guard against misunderstanding, and in the most emphatic manner
+it must be said that it is not my purpose to prove, nor is it my belief,
+that religion springs from perverted sexuality, nor that the study of
+religion is no more than an exercise in pathology. Nothing is further
+from the writer's mind than so essentially preposterous a claim. Neither
+sexuality, no matter how powerful, nor disease, no matter how
+pronounced, can account for the religious idea. That has an entirely
+separate and independent origin. This should be plain to anyone who has
+but a merely casual acquaintance with the history of religion. It is,
+however, a very different thing to enquire as to the part played in the
+history of religion by morbid nervous states or perverted sexual
+feeling. That is an enquiry both legitimate and desirable; and it is one
+that promises to shed light on aspects of the subject otherwise very
+obscure. And certainly, if so-called religious feelings do not admit of
+explanation in terms of a scientific psychology, nothing remains but to
+recognise religion as something quite apart from normal life, to hand
+it over to the custody of word-spinning "Mystics," and so surrender all
+possibility of a rational understanding of either its nature or its
+history.
+
+In saying what I have concerning the probability of misconception, I
+have had specially in mind the attack made by the late Professor William
+James on what he called the "medical materialists." In that remarkable
+piece of religious yellow-journalism, _The Varieties of Religious
+Experience_, Professor James says of those who take up the position that
+a great deal of what has been accepted by the world as religious
+inspiration or exaltation can be accounted for as the products of
+disordered nervous states or perverted sexual feeling, "We are surely
+all familiar in a general way with this method of discrediting states of
+mind for which we have an antipathy. We all use it in some degree in
+criticising persons whose states of mind we regard as overstrained. But
+when other people criticise our own exalted soul-flights by calling them
+'nothing but' expressions of our organic disposition, we feel outraged
+and hurt, for we know that, whatever be our organism's peculiarities,
+our mental states have their substantive value as revelations of the
+living truth; and we wish that all this medical materialism could be
+made to hold its tongue." Again, "Few conceptions are less instructive
+than this re-interpretation of religion as perverted sexuality.... It is
+true that in the vast collection of religious phenomena, some are
+undisguisedly amatory--_e.g._ sex deities and obscene rites in
+polytheism, and ecstatic feelings of union with the Saviour in a few
+Christian Mystics. But then why not equally call religion an aberration
+of the digestive functions, and prove one's point by the worship of
+Bacchus and Ceres, or by the ecstatic feelings of some other saints
+about the Eucharist?" Or, seeing that the Bible is full of the language
+of respiratory oppression, "one might almost as well interpret religion
+as a perversion of the respiratory function." And if it is pointed out
+that active interest in religion synchronises with adolescence, "the
+retort again is easy.... The interest in mechanics, physics, chemistry,
+logic, philosophy, and sociology, which springs up during adolescent
+years along with that in poetry and religion, is also a perversion of
+the sexual instinct."[1]
+
+Excellent fooling, this, but little else. I do not know that anyone has
+ever claimed that religion took its origin in sexual feeling, or that
+this would alone provide an explanation of historical religion. All that
+anyone has ever urged is that a deal of so-called religious feeling,
+past and present, can be shown to be due to unsatisfied or perverted
+sexual feeling--which is a very different statement, and one of which
+the truth may be demonstrated from Professor James's own pages. But
+between saying that certain feelings are wrongly interpreted in terms of
+an already existing idea, and saying that the idea itself is nothing but
+these same feelings transformed, there is an obvious and important
+difference. In every case the religious idea is taken for granted. Its
+origin is a quite different subject of enquiry. But once the idea is in
+existence there is always the probability of evidence for its truth
+being found in the wrong direction. The analogy of the digestive and
+respiratory organs is clever, but futile. The belief that much which
+has passed for religious feeling is perverted sexuality is not based
+merely upon the language employed. The language is only symptomatic. The
+terminology of respiration and digestion when used in connection with
+religion is frankly and palpably symbolic. That of sexual love is as
+often frankly literal, and can be correlated with the actual state of
+the person using it. Digestion and respiration must go on in any case;
+but it is precisely the point at issue whether with a different sexual
+life these so-called religious ecstatic states would have been
+experienced. When we find religious characters of strongly marked
+amorous dispositions, but leading an ascetic life, using toward the
+object of their adoration terms usually associated with strong sexual
+feeling, it does not seem extravagant to find here a little more than
+what may be covered by mere symbolism. Would the medieval monk have been
+tempted by Satan in the form of beautiful women had he been happily
+married? Would Santa Teresa or Catherine of Sienna have used the
+language they did use to express their relations to Jesus had they been
+wives and mothers? Such questions admit of one answer, which is, in its
+way, decisive. Professor James admits that modern psychology holds as a
+general postulate "there is not a single one of our states of mind, high
+or low, healthy or morbid, that has not some organic process as its
+condition."[2] The 'medical materialist' can ask for no more than this.
+But this being granted, on what ground are we to be forbidden finding in
+these same organic processes the condition of the visions and ecstatic
+states with which _The Varieties of Religious Experience_ is so largely
+concerned?
+
+Again, it may be granted that adolescence brings with it an awakening of
+the whole mental life, not of religion alone. But the analogy goes no
+further, and, in any case, it begs the question. The full significance
+of the connection will be seen when we come to deal with initiation in
+primitive times and conversion in the modern period. At present it
+suffices to point out that the interest in art, in science, in
+literature, in sociology, are ends in themselves, and one need go no
+further than the developing mental life for an explanation. But the
+essential question here is whether this growing life can or cannot find
+complete satisfaction quite apart from religion. A developing interest
+in the larger social life is common to all, and to some extent this is
+secured by the pressure of forces that are simply inescapable. On the
+other hand, an interest in religion only exists with some, and then it
+may usually be traced to a conscious direction of their energies.
+Moreover, those who show no special interest in religion evince no lack
+of anything--save in religious terms. In every respect they exhibit the
+same mental and emotional qualities as their fellows. The only
+discernible difference is that while in the one case adolescent nature
+is expressed in terms of religion, in the other case it is expressed in
+terms of a larger social life.
+
+The question here might be put thus: Given a generation not taught to
+express its growing life in terms of religion, could adequate and
+satisfactory expression be found in the social life to which adolescence
+is unquestionably an introduction? Many would answer unhesitatingly,
+yes. They would argue that what are called the religious feelings, are
+normal social feelings exploited in the interests of the religious idea.
+They would deny that there is any such thing as a religious quality of
+mind. Any mental quality may be directed to a religious end, but all may
+find complete expression and satisfaction in a non-religious social
+life. This is the real question at issue, and yet Professor James never
+once, in the whole of his 500 pages, addresses himself to it.
+
+Apart from sex, there is the important question of the relation between
+abnormal and morbid nervous states and religious illumination. How far
+has the one been mistaken for the other? To what extent have people
+accepted the outcome of pathological conditions as proofs of intercourse
+with an unseen spiritual world? There is no doubt that among uncivilised
+people this is usually, if not invariably, the case. And our knowledge
+of the relations between the nervous system and mental states--imperfect
+as it still is--is so recent, that it is not surprising that fasting,
+self-torture, solitary meditation, etc., because of the states of mind
+to which they give rise, have been universally valued as aids to the
+religious life. Dr. D. G. Brinton says:--
+
+"When I say that all religions depend for their origin and continuation
+directly upon inspiration, I state an historic fact. It may be known
+under other names, of credit or discredit, as mysticism, ecstasy,
+rhapsody, demoniac possession, the divine afflatus, the gnosis, or, in
+its latest christening, 'cosmic consciousness.' All are but expressions
+of a belief that knowledge arises, words are uttered or actions
+performed not through conscious ideation or reflective purpose, but
+through the promptings of a power above or beyond the individual
+mind."[3]
+
+The connection between very many, at least, of these inspirational moods
+and pathological states is too obvious to be ignored. Professor James
+admits that "we cannot possibly ignore these pathological aspects of the
+subject." His notice of them, however, reminds one of the preacher who
+advised his hearers to look a certain difficulty boldly in the face--and
+pass on. No serious attempt is made to deal with them. A huge mass of
+"religious experiences" is thrown at the reader's head without any
+adequate explanation. It is a glorified revival meeting in an expensive
+volume. The testimony of a crowd of religious enthusiasts of all ages is
+accepted at practically face value. Thus, a religious writer who
+experiences the fairly common feeling of exaltation during a storm at
+sea, and explains his carelessness of danger as resulting from his
+"certainty of eternal life,"[4] is gravely cited as evidence of the
+working of the religious consciousness. What, then, are we to make of
+those who experience a similar feeling, but who are without the
+certainty of eternal life? The declaration of St. Ignatius that a single
+hour of meditation taught him more of the truth of "heavenly things than
+all the teachings of the doctors" is given as evidence of mystic
+illumination.[5] So with numerous other cases. We are even informed that
+"nitrous oxide and ether, especially nitrous oxide, when sufficiently
+diluted with air, stimulate the mystical consciousness in an
+extraordinary degree."[6] There seems no reason why the same claim
+should not be made on behalf of whisky. If one were not assured to the
+contrary, one might conclude that Professor James wrote this volume to
+poke fun at the whole tribe of mystics and their followers.
+
+The use made by Professor James of his long list of cases is the more
+remarkable, since he quite correctly points out that there are no
+religious feelings, only feelings directed towards a religious end. But
+if this be so, how are we justified in taking the accounts of religious
+visionaries as correct descriptions of the nature of their own mental
+states? Clearly, we need a study of these cases quite apart from the
+mystical interpretation of them. Instead of a study Professor James
+presents us with a catalogue--useful from a documentary point of view,
+but useless to any other end. And he is so averse to subjecting his
+examples to analysis that, when the extravagance of certain cases are
+glaring, he warns us that it is unfair to impute narrowness of mind as a
+vice of the individual, because in "religious and theological matters he
+probably absorbs his narrowness from his generation."[7] Granted; only
+one would like to know what reason there is for not deriving virtues as
+well as vices from the same source? And, deeper enquiry still, may not
+the religious interpretation itself be a product of the special
+environment of the period?
+
+The study of religious phenomena from the point of view above indicated
+is of first-rate importance. But although much has been said,
+parenthetically and inferentially, on the subject by various writers,
+the enquiry has never been exhaustively or systematically pursued. This
+is not due to any lack of material; that is abundant among both savage
+and civilised peoples. Perhaps it is because, while it has been
+considered permissible to point out that certain individuals have
+mistaken their own morbid states for evidence of divine illumination,
+too much ill-will would have been aroused had the powerful part played
+by this factor in religious development as a whole been pointed out.
+Still less admissible would it have been to point out, as will be done
+in succeeding chapters, that the deliberate culture of abnormal states
+of mind has been a part of the ritual of religions from the most
+primitive to the most recent times. In this connection it is worth
+noting that a very clear and shrewd essay on the connection between love
+and religious devotion by Isaac d'Israeli, which appeared in the first
+issue of the _Miscellanies of Literature_, was quietly eliminated from
+subsequent editions.
+
+My purpose, therefore, is to give Professor James's query--"Under just
+what biographic conditions did the sacred writers bring forth their
+contributions to the holy volume? and what had they exactly in their
+several individual minds, when they delivered their utterances?"[8]--a
+wider scope. What are the conditions, biographic and social, under which
+certain persons have imagined themselves, and have been believed by
+others, to be specially favoured with divine illumination? The majority
+of people, it may safely be said, are conscious of no such experience.
+In what respect, then, do the favoured few differ from their fellows?
+Must we assume that by some rare quality of natural endowment, or by
+some unusual development of faculty, they are brought into touch with a
+wider and deeper reality? Or are we to seek a less romantic explanation
+with the aid of known tendencies and forces in human nature? And,
+further, as this minority are not conscious of divine illumination all
+the time, what is it that differentiates their normal state from their
+abnormal condition?
+
+These are pertinent questions, and demand answer. But no answer of real
+value will be found in ordinary religious writings. Rhapsodical eulogies
+of religion tell us nothing; less than nothing that is useful, since
+theories that obtain in such quarters are based upon the absolute
+veracity of the phenomena under consideration. We may gather from this
+direction what religious people say or do, but not why they say or do
+these things. A description of the states of mind of religious people,
+such as is given by Professor James, is interesting enough, but it is
+their causation that is of fundamental importance. And their causation
+is only to be understood by associating them with other and more
+fundamental processes. Within recent years psychology owes much of the
+advance made to a closer study of the physiology of the nervous system,
+and if genuine advance is to be made in our understanding of religious
+phenomena we must adopt the same plan of investigation. We do not, for
+example, understand the nature of demoniacal possession by a mere
+collation of cases. It is only when we put them side by side with
+similar cases that now come under the control of the physician, and
+associate them with certain peculiar nervous conditions, and a
+particular social environment, that we find ourselves within sight of a
+rational explanation. Without adopting this plan we are in the position
+of one trying to determine the nature of a locomotive in complete
+ignorance of its internal mechanism. Yet this is precisely the position
+of the professional exponent of religion. As a student the budding
+divine has his head filled with historic creeds, and texts, and dogmas,
+and doctrines, none of which can possibly tell him anything of the real
+nature of religion. On the contrary, they act as so many obstacles to
+his acquiring real knowledge in later life. And it is a striking fact
+that while the professional astronomer, biologist, or physicist each
+adds to our knowledge of the subject that falls within his respective
+department, we owe little or nothing of our knowledge of the nature of
+religion to the professional theologian.
+
+To put the whole matter in a sentence, the study of religion must be
+affiliated to the study of life as a whole. If possible, we must get at
+the determining factors that lead one person to expend his energy on
+religion and see supernatural influence in a thousand and one details of
+his life, while another person, with apparently the same mental
+qualities, finds complete satisfaction in another direction, and is
+conscious of no such supernatural influence. It is scientifically
+inadmissible to posit a "religious faculty" organically ear-marked for
+religious use. Something of this kind is evidently in the minds of those
+who explain Darwin's agnosticism as due to atrophy of his religious
+sense, consequent on over-absorption in scientific pursuits, and who
+also argue that the "religious faculty," like a physiological structure,
+increases in efficiency with use and atrophies with disuse. There is no
+reason for believing that, had Darwin been profoundly religious, his
+mental qualities would have been different to what they were. They would
+have been expressed in a different form, that is all. As I have already
+said, there are no such things as specifically religious qualities of
+the mind. There may be hope or fear or love or hatred or terror or
+devotion or wonder in relation to religion, but they are precisely the
+same mental qualities that meet us in relation to other things. The old
+"faculty" psychology is dead, and the religious faculty must go with
+it.[9] Mental qualities may be roused to activity in connection with a
+belief in the supernatural, or they may be expressed in connection with
+mundane associations. Even the belief in the supernatural is only an
+expression of the same qualities of mind that with fuller knowledge
+result in a scientific generalisation. Whatever be the exciting cause,
+mental qualities themselves remain unchanged.
+
+In the present enquiry we are not concerned with a disproval of the
+religious idea, but with an examination of the conditions of its
+expression; less with the varieties of religious experience than with
+the nature of its manifestations. How far may religious experience be
+explained as a misinterpretation of normal non-religious life? To what
+extent have pathological nervous states influenced the building up of
+the religious consciousness? There can be no question that the
+last-named factor is an important one. This is admitted by Professor
+James in the following passage:--
+
+"You will in point of fact hardly find a religious leader of any kind in
+whose life there is no record of automatisms. I speak not merely of
+savage priests and prophets, whose followers regard automatic utterance
+and action as by itself tantamount to inspiration, I speak of leaders of
+thought and subjects of intellectualised experience. St. Paul had his
+visions, his ecstasies, his gifts of tongues, small as was the
+importance he attached to the latter. The whole array of Christian
+saints and heresiarchs, including the greatest, the Bernards, the
+Loyolas, the Luthers, the Foxes, the Wesleys, had their visions, voices,
+rapt conditions, guiding impressions, and 'openings.' They had these
+things because they had exalted sensibility, and to such things persons
+of exalted sensibility are liable."[10]
+
+The fact is unquestionable, but the question remains, In what sense were
+these people exalted? Did their exalted sensibility really bring them
+into touch with a form of existence hidden from persons of a coarser
+fibre? Or did it belong to a class of cases which in a more violent form
+comes within the province of the physician? The subjects, says Professor
+James, "actually feel themselves played upon by powers beyond their
+will. The evidence is dynamic; the god or spirit moves the very organs
+of their body.... We have distinct professions of being under the
+direction of a foreign power, and serving as its mouthpiece." Of course
+we have, but for diagnostic purposes such professions are quite
+valueless. What these people are conscious of, and all they are
+conscious of, is a series of feelings of a more or less unusual kind.
+Equally convinced was the medieval demoniac that a spirit moved the very
+organs of his body. Equally convinced is the modern spiritualist medium
+that his body is controlled by a disembodied spirit. It is not a
+question of the actuality of certain states, but of their origin. The
+intense conviction of the subject of the seizure is, as evidence, quite
+irrelevant. The subjective state is always real, whether it belongs to a
+saint in ecstasy or a drunkard in delirium tremens. There are no states
+of mind more "real" while they last than those due to opium or hashish.
+But it is never suggested that this is evidence of their veracity. In
+such cases the testimony of a skilled outsider is of far greater value
+than the conviction of the visionary. We are bound to appeal to Paul,
+and Loyola, and Fox, and Wesley to know what their feelings were,
+because here they are the supreme authorities. But we must consult
+others to discover why they experienced these feelings. An illusion is
+no more than a false interpretation of a real subjective experience;
+although many are inclined to treat the rejection of the interpretation
+as equivalent to a charge of imposture or deliberate lying.
+
+It is also a matter of demonstration that these religious experiences
+are strictly determined by environmental conditions. Thousands of
+Christians have been favoured with visions of Jesus or of the Christian
+heaven in their dying moments. Millions of Jews and Mohammedans have
+lived and died without any such experience--the very persons to whom,
+from an evidential point of view--such visions would be most useful. The
+spiritual experience is determined by the pre-existing religious belief.
+When belief in a personal devil was general, visions of Satan were
+common. The evidence for personal conflicts with Satan is of precisely
+the same nature and strength as is the evidence for intercourse with
+deity. When the belief in Satan died out, visions and conflicts with him
+ceased. How can we discriminate between the two classes of cases? Why
+should the testimony of a great Christian character that he is conscious
+of intercourse with deity be more authoritative than the testimony of,
+perhaps, the same person on other occasions, of conflict with a personal
+devil? Moreover, visions and a sense of contact with a super-normal
+world are not peculiar to the religious character. It is a common
+feature of a general psychopathic condition. Medical works are filled
+with such instances. And it is only to be expected that when the
+psychopath is of a deeply religious nature the affection will find a
+religious expression. What is clearly needed is an explanation that will
+cover the phenomenon as it appears in both a religious and a
+non-religious form.
+
+We may take as illustrative of what has been said the following case as
+given by Dr. W. W. Ireland. It is that of a Berlin bookseller who placed
+on record a clear description of his impressions while in ill-health,
+and which entirely ceased on recovery. His delusions mostly took the
+form of human figures; of these he says:--
+
+"I saw, in the full use of my senses, and (after I had got the better of
+the fright which at first seized me, and the disagreeable effects which
+it caused) even in the greatest composure of mind, for almost two
+months, constantly and involuntarily, a number of human and other
+apparitions--nay, I even heard their voices. For the most part I saw
+human figures of both sexes; they commonly passed to and fro, as if they
+had no connection with each other, like people at a fair where all is
+bustle. Sometimes they appeared to have business with one another. Once
+or twice I saw amongst them persons on horseback, and dogs and birds;
+these figures all appeared to me in their natural size, as distinctly as
+if they had existed in real life, with the several tints on the
+uncovered parts of the body, and with all the different kinds and
+colours of clothes."[11]
+
+Here we have the case of a man who was under no misconception as to the
+nature of his visions. But it is safe to say that had he been of a less
+practical and analytic turn of mind, had he been, moreover, deeply
+interested in religious matters, we might have had an altogether
+different presentation of the facts.
+
+In the next instance, also given by Dr. Ireland, we have a religious
+explanation given of somewhat similar experiences:--
+
+"A poor woman complained to me that she was continually persecuted by
+the devils who let loose at her all sorts of blasphemies, and, indeed,
+all the worse the more she exerted herself not to attend to them; but
+often, also, when she was talking and active. She had already been to a
+clergyman who should exorcise the devil, and who had judiciously
+directed her to me. I asked in which ear the devil always talked to her.
+She was surprised at the question, which she had never started for
+herself, but now recognised that it always occurred in the left ear. I
+explained to her that it was an affection of the ear which now and then
+occurs, but she was doubtful."[12]
+
+Here we have a distinctly physical affection ascribed to supernatural
+agency. In this case the inference is promptly corrected by the
+physician. But given a different environment, an atmosphere permeated
+with a belief in the supernatural, an absence of adequate scientific
+advice, and the more primitive explanation is certain to prevail. In the
+next instance--that of Martin Luther--we have just this conjuncture of
+circumstances, with the inevitable result. Writing of his experience in
+1530, Luther says:--
+
+"When I was in Coburg in 1530, I was tormented with a noise in my ear,
+just as though there was some wind tearing through my head. The devil
+had something to do with it.... When I try to work, my head becomes
+filled with all sorts of whizzing, buzzing, thundering noises, and if I
+did not leave off on the instant I should faint away. For the last two
+or three days I have not been able to even look at a letter. My head has
+lessened down to a very short chapter; soon it will be only a paragraph,
+then only a syllable, then nothing at all. The day your letter came from
+Nuremberg I had another visit from the devil.... This time the evil one
+got the better of me, drove me out of my bed, and compelled me to seek
+the face of man."[13]
+
+There is no need to quote more of this class of cases, at least for the
+present. Their name is legion. One could, in fact, construct an
+ascending series of cases, all agreeing in their symptom, and differing
+only in the explanation offered. The series would commence with the
+explanation of a possessing spirit, and end with that of a deranged
+nervous system. Ignorant of the nature, or even of the existence, of a
+nervous system, primitive man explains abnormal mental states as due to
+a malignant spirit. Martin Luther, George Fox, or John Bunyan, living at
+a time when the activity of evil spirits was a firmly held doctrine,
+attribute their infirmities to satanic influence. We are in the true
+line of descent. To-day we have with us every one of the phenomena on
+which the satanic theory rested, but they are described, and prescribed
+for, in medical works instead of manuals of exorcism. The
+supernaturalist theory gives way to that of the expert neurologist. The
+exorcist is replaced by the physician. Instead of expelling an intruding
+demon, we have to repair a deranged system. We cannot argue that while
+these affections remain constant in character their causes may have been
+different in other ages from what they are now. That is pure absurdity.
+To claim that the religious mystic is in moments of exaltation brought
+into contact with a "deeper reality" is to invite the retort that one
+might make a similar claim on behalf of the inmates of a lunatic asylum.
+We cannot, with any pretence to rationality, accept the verdicts of both
+the neurologist and the exorcist. If we agree that certain states of
+mind to-day have their origin in neural disorder, on what ground can we
+believe that similar mental states occurring a thousand or two thousand
+years ago were due to supernatural stimulation? We may be told that
+there are more things in heaven and earth than are dreamed of in our
+philosophy. This may be true, and while it is an observation that would
+not occur to a fool, it needs no supreme wisdom for its excogitation,
+and as generally used it is an excuse for idle speculation and grotesque
+theory. Far more useful is the lesson, sadly needed, that there are few
+things in heaven or earth that will not yield their secret to a method
+of investigation that is sanely conceived and diligently employed.
+
+The utter uselessness of accepting at its face value anyone's
+explanation of the nature of his subjective experience, is well shown by
+the once universal belief in witchcraft. If there is a single belief on
+behalf of which a mass of apparently unimpeachable evidence could be
+produced, it is this one. It has run its course throughout the whole
+world. It is still accepted by probably half the human race. In our own
+country eminent men, not alone theologians, but doctors, lawyers,
+statesmen, and men of letters, have given their solemn testimony in its
+favour. Thousands of people have been bewitched, and their symptoms
+described by thousands of others. More remarkable still, those accused
+have often enough confessed their guilt. Every possible corroboration
+has been given to this belief, and yet it is now scouted by educated
+persons all over the civilised world. Even religious teachers accept the
+explanation that these witchcraft cases were due to distinctly
+pathological conditions, and to the power of suggestion operating upon
+uninformed minds during an unenlightened age. But communications with
+spiritual beings rest on no better foundation than communication with
+Satan. Whether the alleged illumination be diabolic or angelic, the
+evidence for either, or both, is the same. The testimony of a man like
+the Rev. R. J. Campbell that he is conscious of a divine influence in
+his life is of no greater value than that of the medieval peasant who
+felt himself tormented by Satan. The one person is no better authority
+than is the other on such a topic. Both are the heirs of the ages,
+inheritors of a superstition that goes back to the most primitive ages
+of mankind, only modified in its expression by the culture of
+contemporary life.
+
+There is nothing new under the sun, and human nature remains
+substantially unchanged generation after generation. All the phenomena
+on which the belief in witchcraft was based, remain. Cases of delusion
+are common, and the power of suggestion is an established fact in
+psychology. All that has happened is this: taking the facts on which the
+belief was based, modern science has shown them to be explainable
+without the slightest reference to the supernatural. And this is the
+principle that must be applied in other directions. Old occurrences must
+be explained in the light of new knowledge. This is the accepted rule in
+other directions, and it is of peculiar value in relation to religious
+beliefs. To know what religious people have thought and felt and said
+gives us no more than the data for a scientific study of the subject. To
+know _why_ they thought and felt and spoke thus is what we really need
+to understand. But if we are to do this we must relate phases of mind
+that are called religious to other phases of a non-religious character.
+I believe it is quite possible to do this. From medical records and from
+numerous biographies it is possible to parallel all the experiences of
+the religious mystic. We can see the same sense of exaltation, the same
+conviction of illumination, the same belief that one is the tool of a
+superior power. Take, as merely illustrative of this, the case of J.
+Addington Symonds, as narrated by Professor James, who cites it as an
+example of a "mystical experience with chloroform." Symonds tells us
+that until he was twenty-eight years of age he was liable to extreme
+states of exaltation concerning the nature of self. (It is worth while
+pointing out that Sir James Crichton-Browne expresses the opinion that
+Symonds's higher nerve centres were in some degree enfeebled by these
+abnormal states.) In addition to this confession he placed on record an
+interesting experience while under the influence of chloroform. He
+says:--
+
+"After the choking and stifling had passed away, I seemed at first in a
+state of utter blankness; then came flashes of intense light,
+alternating with blankness, and with a keen sense of vision of what was
+going on in the room around me, but no sensation of touch. I thought
+that I was near death; when suddenly my soul became aware of God who was
+manifestly dealing with me, handling me, so to speak, in an intense
+personal reality. I felt him streaming in like light upon me.... I
+cannot describe the ecstasy I felt. Then, as I gradually awoke from the
+influence of the anæsthetic, the old sense of my relation with the world
+began to return, the new sense of my relation to God began to fade....
+Only think of it. To have felt for that long dateless ecstasy of vision
+the very God, in all purity, tenderness, and truth, and absolute love,
+and then to find that I had after all had no revelation, but that I had
+been tricked by the abnormal excitement of my brain."
+
+With a slight variation of expression this confession might have come
+direct from the lips of the most pronounced mystic. There is no question
+of the intense reality of the experience. That was as vivid as anything
+that ever occurred to any saint in the calendar. Still, no one will
+dream of claiming that the way to get _en rapport_ with the higher
+mysteries is by way of a dose of chloroform. The distinction here is
+that Symonds knew and described the cause of his experience. And no one
+will question that the phrase "tricked by the abnormal excitement of my
+brain" covers the ground. Of course, there is always the easy retort
+that saints and mystics did not use chloroform to produce their visions.
+True, but chloroform is not the only agent by means of which a person
+may be thrown into an abnormal state. Other means may be used; and as a
+matter of fact, the use of herbs and drugs, as methods of producing
+ecstatic states, have obtained in religious ceremonies from the most
+primitive times. As we shall see later, tobacco, hashish, coca, laurel
+water, and similar agents have been largely utilised for this purpose.
+And when this plan is not adopted--although very often the two things
+run side by side--we find fasting and other forms of self-torture
+practised because of the abnormal conditions produced.
+
+It is not argued or implied that in all this there was of necessity
+deliberate imposture. That would imply the possession of greater
+knowledge than actually existed. But it was known that ecstatic states
+followed the use of certain drugs, or were consequent on certain
+austerities, and they were valued because they were believed to bring
+people into communion with a hidden spiritual world. In this way there
+has always been going on a more or less deliberate culture of the
+supernatural, in more primitive times by crude and easily recognisable
+means, later by methods that are more subtle in character and more
+difficult of detection. But the method of inducing a sense of
+"spiritual" illumination by means of practices alien to the normal life
+of man remains unchanged throughout. The collation of the conditions
+under which mystical states of mind are experienced among savages with
+similar experiences among the higher races, proves at once that this
+statement contains no exaggeration of the facts.
+
+The continuity of the phenomena is, indeed, of profound significance,
+and is too often ignored. It is often asserted that we have to explain
+the lower by the higher, and we can only understand the significance of
+religion in its lower forms by bearing in mind the higher
+manifestations. This is sheer fallacy. In nature the higher develops out
+of the lower, of which it is compounded. In biology, for example, it is
+now generally conceded that the secret of animal life lies in the cell.
+This may be modified in all kinds of directions, the resulting organic
+structure may be of the utmost complexity, but the basis remains
+unchanged. So, too, with a great deal of so-called religious phenomena.
+The story is not only continuous, but the same elements remain unchanged
+with only those modifications initiated by a changed environment. And
+just as we are driven back to the cell to explain organic structure, so
+for an understanding of the phenomena under consideration we must study
+their primitive elements. Analysis must precede synthesis here as
+elsewhere.
+
+A survey of the subject is not at all exhausted by a study of abnormal
+conditions, so far as these have entered into the life of religion.
+There still remains the study of perfectly normal frames of mind that
+are misinterpreted and diverted into religious channels. The importance
+of this will be seen more clearly when we come to deal with the subject
+of conversion. That "conversion" is a phenomenon of adolescence is now
+settled beyond all reasonable doubt. Statistics are conclusive on this
+point. But the advocate of revivalism quite misses the true significance
+of the fact. Current religious literature is full of quite meaningless
+chatter concerning the change of view, the larger and more unselfish
+activities, that arise as a consequence of conversion. There is really
+no evidence that the changes indicated have any connection with
+conversion. All that does happen can be more simply and more adequately
+explained as resulting from physiological and psychological changes in
+terms of racial and social evolution. The whole significance of
+adolescence lies in the bursting into activity of feelings hitherto
+dormant, and the quickening of a desire for communion with a larger
+social life. The individual becomes less self-centred, more alive to,
+and more responsive to the claims of others; he displays tendencies
+towards what the world calls self-sacrifice, but which mean, in the
+truest sense, self-realisation. That these changes are often expressed
+in terms of religion is undeniable. This, however, may be no more than
+an environmental accident, quite as much so as was the case when
+epilepsy was explained in terms of possession.
+
+So far as one can see, there are no feelings or impulses characteristic
+of adolescence that could not receive complete satisfaction in a
+rationally ordered social life. To-day it usually happens that the
+strongest expressed influences brought to bear upon the individual are
+of a religious kind, with the result that adolescent human nature is
+most apt to express itself in religious language. It must always be
+borne in mind that we are all as dependent upon our environment for the
+form in which our explanation of things is cast, as we are for the
+language in which we express those ideas. The whole enquiry opened is a
+very wide one, with which I can only deal parenthetically. It is really
+an enquiry as to how far the religious theory of human nature rests upon
+a wrong interpretation of perfectly normal feelings, or to what extent
+supernaturalistic ideas are perpetuated by the exploitation--innocent
+exploitation, maybe--of man's social nature. It is extremely probable
+that a deeper knowledge, a more accurate analysis of human qualities,
+will disclose the truth that man is a social animal in a much more
+profound sense than has usually attached to that phrase, and the
+expression of these qualities in terms of religious beliefs, or in terms
+of non-religious beliefs, is wholly determined by the knowledge current
+in the society in which he moves.
+
+I conclude this chapter with one more attempt to avoid misunderstanding.
+For purposes of clarity it will be necessary to consider various factors
+out of relation to other factors. But it should hardly need pointing out
+that in actual life such a separation does not obtain. The organism
+functions as a whole; each part acts upon and is acted upon by every
+other part. Life in action is a synthesis, and one resorts to analysis
+only for the purpose of more adequate comprehension. It is not,
+moreover, pretended that any one of the factors described in the
+following pages will explain religion, nor even that all of them
+combined will do so. The origin of the religious idea is a quite
+different enquiry, and is adequately dealt with in the writings of men
+like Tylor, Frazer, Spencer, and other representatives of the various
+schools of anthropologists. My present purpose is of a more restricted
+kind. It is that of tracing the operation of various processes, some
+normal, but most of them abnormal, that have in all ages been accepted
+as evidence for the supernatural. That the religious idea has been
+associated with these processes, and that for multitudes they have
+served as strong evidence of its truth, cannot be denied. And an
+examination of this aspect of the history of religion ought not to be
+ignored, however unpalatable such a study may be to certain
+supersensitive minds.
+
+
+FOOTNOTES:
+
+[1] _Varieties of Religious Experience_, pp. 11-3.
+
+[2] _Varieties_, p. 14.
+
+[3] _Religions of Primitive Peoples_, p. 50.
+
+[4] Page 288.
+
+[5] Page 410.
+
+[6] Page 387.
+
+[7] Page 370.
+
+[8] _Varieties_, p. 4.
+
+[9] "The hypothesis of faculties ... must be regarded as productive of
+much error in psychology. It has led to the false supposition that
+mental activity, instead of being one and the same throughout its
+manifold phases, is a juxtaposition of totally distinct activities,
+answering to a bundle of detached powers, somehow standing side by side,
+and exerting no influence on one another. Sometimes this absolute
+separation of the parts of mind has gone so far as to personify the
+several faculties as though they were distinct entities."--Sully,
+_Outlines of Psychology_, p. 26.
+
+[10] _Varieties_, p. 478.
+
+[11] _The Blot upon the Brain_, p. 4.
+
+[12] _The Blot upon the Brain_, p. 16.
+
+[13] Cited by Dr. Ireland, p. 49.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER TWO
+
+THE PRIMITIVE MIND & ITS ENVIRONMENT
+
+
+Ever since the time of Aristotle it has been an accepted truth that man
+is a social animal. Not only is individual human nature such that it
+craves for intercourse with its kind, but it can only be effectively
+understood in the light of those thousands of generations of associated
+life that lie behind us all. As an isolated object, considered, that is,
+apart from his fellows, man is more or less of a myth. At any rate, he
+would not be the man we know and so may well be left out of account. Man
+as we know him is essentially a member of a group; he is a part of a
+really organic structure inasmuch as the characteristics of each part
+are determined by its relations to the whole, and the characteristics of
+the whole determined by a synthesis of the qualities of the parts.
+
+But while there is agreement in the fact, there is a considerable
+divergence of opinion as to its nature. What is the nature of this fact
+of sociability? What is the character of the force that binds the
+members of a group so closely together? By some, the cause of
+sociability is found in the pressure exerted upon all by purely external
+forces. The need for protection, it is said, drives human beings
+together, and thus in course of time the feeling of sociability is
+developed. This seems much like mistaking a consequence for a cause. It
+certainly leaves unanswered the question _Why_ should people have drawn
+together in the face of danger? Most certainly collective action
+strengthens the capacity for defence; and it also increases the
+certainty of obtaining the means of subsistence. Such consequences
+furnish a justification, so to speak, of group life, but they disclose
+neither its nature nor its cause. And most certainly they do not bring
+us into touch with the fundamental qualities of _human_ society. The
+need for food, shelter, or protection will not differentiate the
+gregarious from the non-gregarious forms of life, nor the social from
+the merely gregarious. All forms of life require food, protection, and
+shelter; they are part of animal economics. There is nothing
+specifically human about them.
+
+We may reach what I conceive to be the truth in another way. Environment
+is to-day almost a cant word. It is very largely used, and, as one might
+expect, largely misunderstood. Without actually saying it in so many
+words, a vast number of people seem to conceive the environment as
+consisting of the purely material surroundings of man. This is to
+overlook a most important fact. Even in the lowest stages of human
+society, where man's power over natural forces is of the poorest kind,
+it is not an exact statement of the case, and it is profoundly untrue
+when we take society in its higher developments. If we take the lowest
+existing savage race we find that its attitude towards life, what it
+does, and what it refrains from doing, is the product of a certain
+mental attitude, which is itself the outcome of a number of inherited
+ideas and customs. A number of white people, placed in exactly the same
+material environment and faced with exactly the same external
+circumstances, bring a different psychological inheritance into play,
+and act in an entirely different manner. If we transport a Chinaman into
+England, or an Englishman into China, we find that both of them possess
+the same biological and material needs whether in their native country
+or elsewhere. Yet this community of needs does not make the Chinaman a
+member of English society, nor an Englishman a member of Chinese
+society. They are one in virtue of certain broad human characteristics;
+they are divided by certain qualities characteristic of their special
+groups. Each society is marked by the possession of certain
+psychological characteristics--a number of specific beliefs and
+emotional developments--without which its distinctive group character
+disappears. This is true of groups within the State; it is true of the
+State as a whole; it is true, on the most general scale of all, of the
+race.
+
+In other words, the distinguishing feature of human society is the
+possession of a psychological medium. The adaptations that the human
+being must make are mainly of a psychological character. Their _form_
+may be partly determined by external conditions, but this does not
+affect the general truth. Whether we take man in a civilised or in an
+uncivilised state we find the important thing about him to be his
+relations to his fellows. He is not merely a member of a tribe or a
+society, but he thinks that society's thoughts, he feels their emotions,
+his individual life is an expression of the psychical life of the group
+to which he belongs. And his transactions with nature are an expression
+of the ideas and beliefs current in the society of which he is a part.
+
+The recognition of this truth was one of the outstanding contributions
+of Herbert Spencer to the science of sociology. Whereas other writers
+had stressed the power of the environment, as a purely material thing,
+in shaping human institutions, Spencer placed chief stress upon the
+emotional and intellectual life of primitive man as determining their
+beginnings. He showed how man's feelings and beliefs about himself, and
+about his fellows, and about the world of living forces with which he
+believed himself to be surrounded, were the all-important factors of
+social evolution. And the subsequent history of society has been such
+that scientific sociology is very largely the study of the growth and
+elaboration of an essentially psychical environment. The lower animal
+world--except so far as we allow for the operation of instincts--has,
+broadly, only the existence of other animals and the physical
+surroundings for its environment. With man it is vastly different. Owing
+primarily to language, the environment of the man of to-day is made up
+in part of the ideas of men who lived and died thousands of years ago.
+The use of clothing and the invention of tools would alone make mind a
+dominant fact in human life. But apart from these things, the great fact
+of social heredity, in virtue of which one generation enjoys the
+acquired culture of preceding generations, and without which
+civilisation would have no existence, is a great and dominant _mental_
+fact. Our institutions, our customs, are transmitted to us as so many
+psychic facts. Every new invention, every fresh culture acquisition, is
+helping to strengthen and broaden the psychical environment of man. Each
+newcomer is born into it; it moulds his nature and determines his life,
+as his own career and his own acquisition help to mould the life of his
+successors. Whether the phenomena be simple or complex, whether we are
+dealing with man in a civilised or in an uncivilised state, there is no
+escape from the general truth that man is everywhere under the
+domination of his mental life.
+
+So far as this enquiry is concerned, we need only deal with one aspect
+of the psychological medium in which primitive human life moves. And so
+far as primitive mankind seeks to control the movements of social life,
+there can be no question that this is done under the impulsion of that
+class of beliefs which we call religious. The operation of religious
+belief in savage society is neither spasmodic nor local. It is, on the
+contrary, universal and persistent. It influences every event of daily
+life with a force that the modern mind finds very difficult to
+appreciate. In almost every action the savage feels himself to be in
+touch with a supersensual world of living beings that exert a direct and
+inescapable influence. And any study of human evolution that is to be of
+real value must take this circumstance into consideration to a far
+greater extent than is usually done. Professor Frazer, dealing with the
+origin of various social institutions, rightly observes that "we are
+only beginning to understand the mind of the savage, and therefore the
+mind of our savage forefathers who created these institutions and handed
+them down to us," and warns us that "a knowledge of the truth may
+involve a reconstruction of society such as we can hardly dream of." He
+also warns us that we have at all times, in dealing with social origins,
+to "reckon with the influence of superstition, which pervades the life
+of the savage and has contributed to build up the social organism to an
+incalculable extent."[14]
+
+In emphasising this it must not be taken to imply that because social
+institutions and human actions are in primitive times moulded by
+religious beliefs, they stand to them in a relation of complete
+dependence. It only means that the psychological medium is of such a
+character that supernaturalistic reasons are found for doings things
+that are susceptible to a totally different explanation. The facts of
+life are expressed in terms of supernaturalism. Birth, marriage, death,
+social cohesion, leadership, health and disease, are all natural facts,
+and the mere play of social selection determines the weeding out of
+practices that are sufficiently adverse to tribal well-being to threaten
+its security. But in primitive times all these facts are allied with
+religious beliefs, and to the primitive mind the religious belief
+becomes the chief feature connected with them. As a matter of fact, this
+is far from an uncommon feature of social life to-day. The amount of
+supernaturalism current is still very large; and one still finds people
+explaining some of the plainest facts of social life in terms of
+supernaturalistic beliefs. It is all part of the truth that man is
+always under the domination of the psychological forces.
+
+This being granted, the enquiry immediately presents itself, How comes
+it that the facts of social life should be expressed in terms of
+supernaturalism? Why do these facts not immediately present themselves
+in their true nature? To answer this question one must bear in mind a
+yet further truth. This is that the explanation which man offers to
+himself or to others of phenomena must always be in terms of current
+knowledge. A modern called upon to explain a storm, an eclipse, or a
+disease, does so in terms of current physical or biological science.
+This is done in virtue of a mass of prepared knowledge, slowly
+accumulated by preceding generations, and which forms part of his social
+heritage. Primitive man likewise explains things in terms of current
+knowledge, but in his case the amount of reliable information is of a
+very scanty and generally erroneous description. The inherited knowledge
+which enables a modern schoolboy to start life with what would have been
+an outfit to an ancient philosopher, had yet to be created. Instead of
+finding, as we find, tools ready to hand, replies prepared to questions
+that may arise, primitive mankind must create its own tools and prepare
+its own answers. And in consequence of this the social environment,
+which at all times determines the form of man's mental output, is with
+primitive man radically different from our own. But however the form
+varies there is agreement on this one point--in both cases phenomena are
+explained in terms of known forces; the reasoning of each is determined
+by the knowledge of each. The laws of mental life remain the same in all
+stages of culture. The brain functions identically whether we take the
+savage or the scientist. In a general way the savage intelligence is as
+rational as that of a modern thinker. The difference is dependent upon
+the accuracy and extent of the information possessed by each. Hence the
+vital difference in the conclusions reached. Hence, too, the dominance
+of supernaturalism in primitive times.
+
+The great distinction between primitive and scientific thinking may be
+expressed in a sentence--the modern mind explains man by the world,
+primitive thought explained the world by man. In the one case we move
+from within outward, in the other from without inward. We are not now
+concerned with semi-metaphysical idealistic theories that would reduce
+the "whole choir of heaven and furniture of earth" to the creation of
+mental activity, but with the plain, understandable truth that the
+human organism is fashioned by the environment in which it dwells. And
+there is amongst those capable of expressing an authoritative
+opinion--an agreement supported by evidence that has simply nothing
+against it--that the world of primitive man is overpoweringly animistic.
+In the absence of that mass of scientifically verified knowledge which
+forms part of our social heritage, humanity commences its intellectual
+career by endowing natural forces with the qualities possessed by
+itself. The forces conceived are living ones. They are to be dreaded
+exactly as human beings are to be dreaded; to be appeased or
+circumvented by the same methods that man applies to his fellows. The
+problem before the savage is thus a very real one. In essence it is the
+problem that is ever before humanity--that of subjugating forces to its
+own welfare. Primitive man is not, however, concerned with the
+elaboration of theories; nor is he consumed with vague 'spiritual
+yearnings.' His difficulty is how to control or placate those invisible
+but very real powers upon which he believes everything depends. He would
+willingly ignore them if he could, and would cheerfully dispense with
+their presence altogether if he believed that things would proceed as
+well in their absence. But there they are, inescapable facts that have
+to be reckoned with.
+
+The general outlook of the primitive mind is well put by Miss Mary
+Kingsley in the following passage:--
+
+"To the African the Universe is made up of matter permeated by spirit.
+Everything happens by the direct action of spirit. The thing he does
+himself is done by the spirit within him acting on his body ...
+everything that is done by other things is done by their spirit
+associated with their particular mass of matter.... The native will
+point out to you a lightning-stricken tree and tell you that its spirit
+has been killed. He will tell you, when the earthen cooking pot is
+broken, it has lost its spirit. If his weapon fails him, it is because
+someone has stolen its spirit or made it weak by means of his influence
+on spirits of the same class.... In every action of his life he shows
+you how he lives with a great spirit world around him. You see him
+before he starts out to fight rubbing stuff into his weapon to
+strengthen the spirit that is in it; telling it the while what care he
+has taken of it.... You see him leaning over the face of the water
+talking to its spirit with proper incantations, asking it when it meets
+an enemy of his to upset his canoe and destroy him.... If a man is
+knocked on the head with a club, or shot by an arrow or a bullet, the
+cause of death is clearly the malignity of persons using these weapons;
+and so it is easy to think that a man killed by the falling of a tree,
+or by the upsetting of a canoe in the surf, or in a whirlpool in the
+river is also a victim of some being using these things as weapons. For
+a man holding this view, it seems both natural and easy to regard
+disease as a manifestation of the wrath of some invisible being, and to
+construct that intricate system which we find among the Africans, and
+agree to call Witchcraft, Fetish, or Juju."[15]
+
+Miss Kingsley is here dealing specifically with West Africa, but her
+description applies in a general way to uncivilised people all over the
+world. There is much closer resemblance between the beliefs of
+uncivilised peoples than between civilised ones, because the conditions
+are much more alike. And under substantially identical conditions the
+human mind has everywhere reached substantially identical conclusions.
+The philosophy of the savage is simple, comprehensive, and, given the
+data, logical. He does not divide the world into the natural and the
+supernatural; it is all one. At most, he has only the seen and the
+unseen. The supernatural, as a distinct category, only appears when a
+definite knowledge of the natural has arisen to which it can be opposed.
+He has no such distinction as that of the material and the immaterial;
+so far as he thinks of these things, the invisible is only a finer form
+of the visible. Of one thing, however, he is perfectly convinced, and
+this is that he is at all times surrounded by a host of invisible
+agencies to which all occurrences are due, and with whom he must come to
+terms. Even death wears a different aspect to the primitive mind from
+that which it presents to the modern. To us death puts a sharp and
+abrupt termination to life. To the primitive mind death involves no such
+ending.[16] Death is no more of a break than is sleep; and at all times
+the conception of an annihilation of personality requires a marked
+degree of mental power. So with the savage--the 'dead' man simply goes
+on living. He may be incarnated in some natural object, or he may simply
+go on living as one of the innumerable company of tribal ghosts. But he
+remains a force to be reckoned with, and the need for dealing with these
+ghostly personages is one of the ever-present problems of primitive
+sociology, and brings us very near the beginnings of all religious
+beliefs and ceremonies--if it does not form their real starting-point.
+
+On one point all modern schools of anthropologists are agreed. This is
+that man's first conception of the supernatural--or what afterwards
+ranks as such--is derived from a purely mistaken interpretation of
+natural phenomena. In this they have returned to the standpoint of
+Hobbes, that "fear of things invisible" forms the "natural seed of
+religion." One source of origin of this belief in a supernatural world
+is certainly found in the phenomena of dreaming. To the savage his
+dreams are as real as his waking experiences. He does not _dream_ he
+goes to distant places; he goes there during his sleep. He does not
+_dream_ that people visit him; they actually come. If a West African
+wakes up in the morning with a tired, bruised feeling, this arises, as
+Miss Kingsley says, from his 'soul' having been out fighting and got
+ill-treated. The only philosophy of dreaming amongst savage races is
+that of the excursions and incursions of a 'soul' or double.
+
+Another powerful factor in the development of belief in the supernatural
+is that of man's attempt to explain natural happenings. Why do things
+happen? Why does the sun rise and set, why does rain fall, thunder
+crash, rivers flow? Note the way in which a child answers similar
+questions, and one is on the track of the primitive intelligence. If
+man's own movements are caused by a 'soul' or double, then other things
+must also move because they possess a 'soul.' If an answer is to be
+found at all, it is only along these lines that the primitive mind is
+able to find it. And, once the answer is given, there are a thousand
+and one things occurring that lend it apparent support. Resemblances in
+nature, coincidences, echoes, shadows, etc., all give their support to
+this primitive hypothesis--the only one possible in the circumstances,
+and the one still endorsed by the majority of the world's population.
+
+Particularly strong endorsement of this belief is supplied by disease
+and abnormal nervous states. Instances to illustrate this are
+innumerable, but from the numerous cases cited by Spencer I select the
+following: Among the Amazulus convulsions are believed to be caused by
+ancestral spirits. With Asiatic races epileptics are regarded as
+possessed by demons. With the Kirghiz the involuntary muscular movements
+of a woman in childbirth are believed to be caused by a spirit taking
+possession of the body. The Samoans attribute all madness to possession.
+The Congo people have the same notion of epilepsy. The East Africans
+believe that falling sickness is due to spirits.[17] In Rajputana, says
+Mr. W. Crooke, disease is generally attributed to Khor or the agency of
+offended spirits. The Mahadeo Kolis of Ahmadnagar believe that every
+malady or disease that seizes man, woman, or child, or cattle, is caused
+either by evil spirits or by an angry god. The Bijapur Veddas have a
+yearly feast to their ancestors to prevent the dead bringing sickness
+into the house.[18] "A Catholic missionary," says Professor Frazer,
+"observes that in New Guinea the _nepir_, or sorcerer, is everywhere....
+Nothing happens without the sorcerer's intervention; wars, marriage,
+death, expeditions, fishing, hunting, always and everywhere the
+sorcerer."[19]
+
+In Ancient Egypt, Chaldea, and Assyria there is ample evidence that the
+same belief flourished. Everywhere we find the exorcist and the
+witch-doctor existing as natural consequents of the belief that disease
+has a supernatural origin. We see it in both the teaching and practice
+of the early Christian Church. That great father of the Church, Origen,
+says: "It is demons which produce famine, unfruitfulness, corruption of
+the air, and pestilence." St. Augustine said that "All diseases of
+Christians are to be ascribed to demons." The Church of England still
+retains in its Articles an authorisation for the expulsion of demons;
+and a number of charms yet in wide use amongst civilised nations show
+how persistent is this belief. For centuries there existed all over
+Europe sacred pools, wells, grottos, etc., all bearing eloquent witness
+to the deep-seated belief that disease was of supernatural origin, and
+was to be conquered by supernatural means.
+
+Enough has been said to indicate the kind of environment in which
+primitive man moves, and also to understand why ideas concerning the
+supernatural exert such an enormous influence in early society. In a
+world where everything was yet to be learned, man's first attempts at
+understanding himself and his fellows were necessarily blundering and
+tentative. His first attempts at explanation are expressed in terms of
+his own nature. He sees himself, his own passions, strengths, and
+weaknesses reflected in the nature around him. This is the outstanding,
+dominating fact in primitive life. Leave out this consideration and
+primitive sociology becomes a chaos. Admit it, and we see the reason why
+social institutions assumed the form they took, and also a key to much
+that happens in subsequent human history. In primitive life religious
+beliefs are not something separate from other forms of social life; so
+far as man seeks consciously to shape that life they are to him an
+essential part of it. And the mistake once made is perpetuated. The
+initial blunder once committed, daily experience seems to give it
+constant justification. In the absence of knowledge concerning natural
+forces every event,--particularly if unusual,--every case of disease,
+endorses and strengthens the mistake made. A psychological fatality
+drives the human race along the wrong path of investigation, and only
+very slowly is the mistake rectified. One cannot see how it could have
+been otherwise. The only corrective is knowledge, and knowledge is a
+plant of slow growth. This psychological first step was man's first
+attempt to frame a theory of things satisfactory to his intellect--an
+attempt that, beginning in the crude animism of the savage, ends in the
+verifiable laws of modern science.
+
+From the point of view of our present enquiry two things are to be
+noted. The first is that man's conviction of the nearness of a
+supernatural world began in his lack of knowledge concerning the nature
+of natural forces. Of this there can be little doubt. One can take all
+the facts upon which primitive mankind built, and still builds, its
+theories of supernaturalism, and show that they may be explained in a
+quite different manner. The movements of the planets, the rush of
+comets, the presence of disaster, the thousand and one operations of
+natural forces no longer suggest to educated minds the action of
+personal beings. The whole data of the primitive theory of things have
+been rejected. The premises were false, and the conclusions necessarily
+false also.
+
+The second point is that from the earliest times one of the strongest
+proofs of human contact with a supernatural world has been found in the
+existence of abnormal or pathological states of mind. These may have
+sometimes arisen quite naturally; at other times they have been
+deliberately induced. How much the perpetuation of religious beliefs as
+a whole owes to this factor has never yet been adequately realised. That
+it has had a very great influence seems beyond dispute. For it seems
+certain that had not "proofs" of a supernatural world been offered in
+the shape of visions, ecstatic states, etc., religious beliefs would
+hardly have exercised the power that has been theirs. The number of
+people who are able to maintain a strong consciousness of the truth of
+religion, merely looking at it as a philosophy of existence, is
+naturally very few. The great majority require more tangible evidence if
+their belief is to be kept alive and active. And curiously enough, the
+very growth of a naturalistic explanation has driven a great many to
+find the evidence they desired in those abnormal states of mind that
+seemed to defy scientific analysis. In succeeding chapters evidence will
+be given to show to what extent this kind of evidence for the
+supernatural has been offered and accepted. It will be seen, as
+Professor Tylor points out, that the line of religious development is
+continuous. The latest forms stretch back in an unbroken line to the
+earliest. And if this proves nothing else, it at least proves that
+consequences do not always die out with the conditions that gave them
+birth. It was the world of the savage that gave birth to the
+supernatural. But the supernatural is still with us, even though the
+world that gave it birth has disappeared. We retain conclusions based on
+admittedly false premises.
+
+
+FOOTNOTES:
+
+[14] _Lectures on the Early History of the Kingship_, pp. 36-7.
+
+[15] _West African Studies_, pp. 394-6.
+
+[16] See an interesting article on this point by W. H. R. Rivers on "The
+Primitive Conception of Death," in _The Hibbert Journal_ for Jan. 1912.
+
+[17] _Principles of Sociology_, vol. i.
+
+[18] _Popular Religion and Folklore of Northern India_, i. p. 124.
+
+[19] _Golden Bough_, 3rd ed., i. 337.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER THREE
+
+THE RELIGION OF MENTAL DISEASE
+
+
+"It is an interesting problem," says Professor J. H. Leuba, "to
+determine what influences have led theologians to anchor their beliefs
+upon the proposition that religious experience differs from other forms
+of consciousness in that it gives one an _immediate_ knowledge of the
+external existence of certain objects of belief, although they do not
+fall under the senses, and an immediate knowledge of the truth of
+certain historical facts."[20] This is, indeed, an interesting problem,
+and, we may add, one of growing importance, since there is a pronounced
+tendency on the part of present-day exponents of religion to rest their
+case almost entirely upon the immediacy of their religious
+consciousness. This conception of a certain order of experience,
+however, is not and cannot have always existed. A belief may be so
+widely and so generally diffused that it is accepted without resistance,
+and, as it would almost seem, in the absence of evidence. But its
+intuitive character is only superficial, and disappears on careful
+examination. The mere vogue of a belief constitutes in itself a kind of
+evidence, and for many people the most powerful kind of evidence. But
+the conviction itself has a history, and it is in the unravelling of
+that history, in the discovery of the class of facts upon which the
+conviction has been built, that the work lies. And when this is done it
+will be found that our intuitions are invariably based upon a
+continuous--even though partly unconscious--appeal to facts. Sometimes
+it will, of course, be found that a renewed and deliberate appeal to the
+facts in question will justify the conviction. At other times it will
+be found that the facts demand an altogether new interpretation. For
+centuries all the observed facts supported a conviction that the earth
+was flat. It was a fresh scrutiny of the facts in the light of a new
+conception that revolutionised human opinion on the subject.
+
+What, then, is the history, and what are the facts upon which the belief
+that religious experience brings man into contact with a kind of
+existence not given in ordinary experience, is based? The kind of answer
+that will be given to this question has already been indicated.
+Religious beliefs are in their origin of the nature of an induction from
+an observed order. The induction is not the result of that careful
+collection of facts, leading up to an equally careful generalisation and
+subsequent verification, which is a characteristic of modern science,
+but it is an induction none the less. The primitive mind is not so much
+engaged in seeking an explanation of certain experiences, as it has an
+explanation forced upon it. To picture the savage as inventing a theory
+in the sense in which Darwin propounded the theory of Natural Selection
+is to quite misconceive the nature of the savage intelligence. But to
+conceive the savage as having a certain explanation suggested by the
+pressure of repeated experiences, and that this explanation subsequently
+assumes the character of a fixed belief, is well within the scope of the
+facts known to us. In this stage of culture the existence of
+supernatural beings is as much a deduction from experience as any modern
+scientific generalisation. Certain things are seen, certain feelings are
+experienced, and the conclusion is that they are the products of
+supernatural agency. From this point of view religion is no more than a
+primitive science. It is the first stage of that long series of
+generalisations which, beginning with crude animism, ends with the
+discoveries of a Copernicus, a Newton, a Darwin, or a Spencer. It is a
+history that begins with vitalism and ends with mechanism. We commence
+with a world in which there exists a chaotic assemblage of independent
+personal forces, and end with a universe that is self-acting,
+self-adjusting, self-contained, and in which science makes no allowance
+for the operation of intelligence save such as meets us in animal
+organisation.
+
+Now amongst the facts that suggest to the primitive intelligence the
+operation of 'spiritual' forces are those connected with the human
+organism itself in both its normal and abnormal states. But it is
+important to note--particularly so for the understanding of the part
+played by ecstatic religious phenomena in comparatively recent
+times--that once the occurrence of a certain state of mind is conceived
+as the product of intercourse between man and spirits, there is every
+inducement to cultivate these frames of mind whenever renewed
+intercourse is desired. This does not imply, at least in the earlier
+stages, conscious imposture. Generally the operator imposes on himself
+as much as he imposes on others. Noting that privation of body, or
+torture of mind, or the use of certain herbs is followed by visions or
+ecstasy, it is believed, not that the vision is the product of the
+practice, but that the practice is the condition of illumination.
+
+This attitude of mind is fairly paralleled by what takes place at the
+ordinary spiritualistic _seance_. Those attending are advised that the
+chief condition of a communication with the inhabitants of the other
+world is a passive state of mind. This passivity cannot exclude
+expectancy, since it is only assumed in order that something may occur.
+If nothing occurs, if no communications are received, it is because the
+requisite conditions have not been fulfilled, and the sceptic is met
+with much semi-scientific jargon as to conditions being necessary to
+every scientific investigation. The fact that this passivity and
+expectancy, with other attendant circumstances, not the least of which
+is the contagious influence of a number of people with a similar mental
+disposition, opens the way to self-delusion is ignored. Then when the
+expected and desired result follows, the mental attitude cultivated is
+taken as the condition of communication with the spiritual world,
+instead of its being, in all probability, the true cause of what is
+experienced. In this way the story of supernatural intercourse runs
+clear and unbroken from primitive savagery to its survival in modern
+civilisation. When Professor Tylor says, "The conception of the human
+soul is, as to its most essential nature, continuous from the philosophy
+of the savage thinker to that of the modern professor of theology,"[21]
+he makes a statement that is true of the whole story of supernatural
+intercourse in all its varied manifestations.
+
+The chief distinction between primitive and modern man lies in the
+consideration that in the first case the blunder is inevitable, in the
+latter case the remedy lies to hand. How could primitive man be aware of
+the real connection between the use of certain drugs or herbs and an
+excitation or depression of the activities of the nervous system? He
+does observe consequences, but he is quite ignorant of causes. Even
+to-day their full consequences are unknown; and it is absurd to expect
+that savage humanity should have been better informed. And even when a
+more rational theory exists, the practice persists under various forms.
+This is a principle that receives vivid illustration from the history of
+religions. The modern believer in mystical states of consciousness no
+longer advocates the use of drugs, and even fasting is going out of
+fashion. But we still have a continuation of the primitive practice in
+the shape of insistence on the cultivation of abnormal frames of mind if
+we are to experience a consciousness of communion with an alleged
+supersensible reality. That is, we are to achieve by a mental discipline
+what the savage or the medieval monk achieved by coarser and more
+obvious methods. To withdraw the mind from the normal influence of
+everyday life is to expose it to the play of hallucination and delusion.
+There is really no vital difference between unhealthy, solitary brooding
+on a given subject and drugging the mind with hashish. This class of
+modern mystic is one with the savage in an inability to recognise that
+the illumination is the product of the discipline, not the mere
+condition of its possession. Between the drug of the savage, the fasting
+and self-torture of the medieval monk and the prayerful meditation of
+the modern mystic, the difference is only that of changed times and
+altered conditions. The method is the same throughout.
+
+The truth of this has been well put by Tylor:--
+
+"The religious beliefs of the lower races are in no small measure based
+on the evidence of visions and dreams, regarded as actual intercourse
+with spiritual being. From the earliest stages of culture we find
+religion in close alliance with ecstatic physical conditions. These are
+brought on by various means of interference with the healthy action of
+body and mind, and it is scarcely needful to remind the reader that,
+according to philosophic theories antecedent to those of modern
+medicine, such morbid disturbances are explained as symptoms of divine
+visitation, or at least of superhuman spirituality. Among the strongest
+means of disturbing the functions of the mind so as to produce ecstatic
+vision, is fasting, accompanied, as it usually is, with other
+privations, and with prolonged solitary contemplation in the desert or
+in the forest. Among the ordinary vicissitudes of savage life, the wild
+hunter has many a time to try involuntarily the effects of such a life
+for days together, and under these circumstances he soon comes to see
+and talk with phantoms which are to him invisible spirits. The secret of
+spiritual intercourse thus learnt, he has thence-forth but to reproduce
+the cause in order to renew the effects."[22]
+
+As a means, then, of strengthening and perpetuating a consciousness of
+intercourse with the spiritual world, we have to reckon with, not merely
+the accidental occurrence of abnormal nervous conditions, but with their
+deliberate cultivation. The practice is world-wide, and persists in some
+form or other in all ages. Thus we find the Australians and many tribes
+of North American Indians use tobacco for this purpose. In Western
+Siberia a species of fungi, the 'fly Agaric,' so called because it is
+often steeped and the solution used to destroy house flies, is used to
+produce religious ecstasy. Its action on the muscular system is
+stimulatory, and it greatly excites the nervous system.[23] An early
+Spanish observer says of the ancient Mexicans that they used a kind of
+mushroom, "which are eaten raw, and on account of being bitter, they
+drink after them, or eat with them a little honey of bees, and shortly
+after they see a thousand visions."[24] The mushroom was called the
+"bread of the gods." The Californian Indians give children tobacco, in
+order to receive instruction from the resulting visions. North American
+Indians held intoxication by tobacco to be supernatural ecstasy, and the
+dreams of men in this state to be inspired. The Darien Indians use the
+seeds of the Datura Sanguinea to induce visions. In Peru the priests
+prepared themselves for intercourse with the gods by partaking of a
+narcotic drink from the same plant. In Guiana the priest was prepared
+for his functions by fasting and flagellation, and was afterwards dosed
+with tobacco juice.[25] In India the Laws of Manu give explicit
+instructions as to the means of producing visions. Chief of these is the
+use of the 'Soma' drink. This is prepared from the flower of the lotus.
+The sap of this, says De Candolle, would be poisonous if taken in large
+quantities, but in small doses merely induces hallucination. Opium and
+hashish, a preparation of the hemp plant, have been in general use among
+Eastern peoples, as a means of producing ecstasy from remote antiquity.
+Opium, it is well known, produces an extraordinary state of exaltation,
+intensifying the sense of one's personality, and inducing a pleasurable
+consciousness of mental strength and clarity. Under its influence, as De
+Quincey said, time lengthens to infinity and space swells to
+immensity.[26] Belladonna, a drug much used by medieval witches and
+sorcerers, has also had its vogue for purely religious purposes. With
+the Greeks the laurel was sacred to Æsculapius. Those who wished to ask
+counsel of the god appeared before the altar crowned with laurel and
+chewing its leaves. Before prophesying, the Greek priestesses drank a
+preparation of laurel water. This contains, although it was, of course,
+unknown to them, two toxic substances--prussic acid and the volatile oil
+of laurel. The first would induce convulsions, the second, hallucinatory
+visions. The two combined were calculated to produce with both subject
+and observer a profound impression of spiritual illumination and
+possession.
+
+It is unnecessary to multiply examples of the action of various drugs or
+herbs on the nervous system, or to cite the people who use them. Enough
+has been said to indicate how widespread is the practice, and the
+consequences are not hard to foresee. A very moderate development of
+intelligence would enable men to associate certain consequences with the
+use of particular drugs, but a very considerable amount of knowledge
+would be required to explain why these consequences were produced. In a
+social environment saturated with superstition the explanation lies
+ready to hand, and is accepted without question. A people that sees
+spiritual agency in all the familiar phenomena of nature are certainly
+not less likely to trace its influence in the mysterious and
+unaccountable effects of narcotics and stimulants. And each repeated
+experiment provides additional proof. Man thus not only believes himself
+to be surrounded by a spiritual world; he is actually able to enter into
+communication with it by methods that are defined in the clearest
+possible manner. Every repetition strengthens the delusion and even
+when the delusion, as such, is exploded, the temper of mind induced by
+it persists.
+
+Various other methods are employed to induce a feeling of religious
+exaltation. Prominent among these are dancing and singing. Dancing in
+connection with religious ceremonies is now generally outgrown in the
+civilised world, but singing is still the vogue. That is, singing is
+not, it must be remembered, practised from any desire to cultivate a
+love of music, although it may appeal to music-lovers. Still, its avowed
+purpose is to induce a feeling of devoutness in the congregation. The
+hypnotic consequences of a body of people singing in unison, or the
+soothing, mystical effect of certain airs from a choir upon a
+congregation, are recognised in practice if not in theory. This is a
+phenomenon that is not, of course, exclusively associated with religion.
+In this as in other instances religion only utilises the ordinary
+qualities of human nature. But in all cases the purpose and the result
+are the same. That is, the subject is placed for the time being in a
+supernormal condition, and the mild state of passivity or enthusiasm
+created makes him more susceptible to the influence brought to bear upon
+him. This is true of religious singing and chanting, from the forest
+gatherings of the primitive savage down to the more sedate and elaborate
+assemblages in church or chapel.
+
+Primitive dancing had both a sexual and religious significance,
+although, as will be seen later, in the primitive mind the sexual
+functions themselves are very closely associated with supernatural
+agency. Tylor is of opinion that originally men and women dance in order
+to express their feelings and wishes,[27] but it is certain it very
+early and universally became associated with religious ceremonies, and
+that because of the ecstasy induced. In some cases drug-taking and
+dancing go together. In others, reliance is placed on dancing alone.
+This latter is the case with the 'devil dancers' of Ceylon. In Africa
+the witch doctor discovers who has been guilty of sorcery by the aid of
+inspiration furnished during a dance. The whirling dance of the Eastern
+dervish is well known. Dancing also figures in the Bible. The Jews
+danced around the golden calf (Ex. xxxii. 19) in a state of nudity.
+David, too, danced naked before the Lord. Dancing was also part of the
+religious ceremonies attendant on the worship of Dionysos or
+Bacchus.[28] Along with the drinking of certain vegetable decoctions,
+dancing formed an important part of the witches' saturnalia during the
+medieval period. When in a state of frenzy, partly drug induced and
+partly the product of exhilaration caused by wild dancing, visions of
+Satan followed. In the dancing mania of the fourteenth century, the
+sufferers saw visions of heaven opened, with Jesus and the Virgin
+enthroned. Dancing was one of the prominent characteristics of the
+French Convulsionnaires in the eighteenth century. In more recent times
+we have the dancing and singing connected with the Methodist revival. In
+modern instances the dancing seems to have been consequent on religious
+excitement rather than precedent to it, but in earlier times there is no
+doubt that it was deliberately practised as a means of producing a state
+of exaltation.
+
+Among the commonest methods of inducing a sense of religious exaltation
+is the practice of fasting. In various guises, this is the most
+persistent form of religious self-torture. Amongst more civilised people
+the reason given for fasting is that it is a form of repentance, the
+genuineness of which is attested by voluntary punishment. But originally
+there seems little reason to doubt that it was adopted for a different
+purpose. It was valued not because the fasting person felt that he had
+done anything for which it was necessary to repent, but because it was
+believed to bring people into closer touch with the spiritual world.
+There is, of course, a very obvious reason for this belief. A lowered
+vitality is favourable to hallucinations of every description. A
+shipwrecked sailor is placed, by no act of his own, in precisely the
+same condition as is the primitive medicine man or the medieval saint by
+his own volition. It has always been recognised, and by none more
+readily than by the great religious teachers of the world, that a
+well-nourished body is inimical to what they chose to term "spiritual
+development." The historic Christian outcry against fleshly indulgence
+has much more in it than a revolt against mere sensualism. A well-fed
+body has been deprecated because it closed the avenue to spiritual
+illumination. Hence it is that fasting has found such favour in all
+religious systems. The ascetic saw more because, by reducing the body to
+an abnormal state, he provided the conditions for seeing more. The Zulu
+maxim, "A stuffed body cannot see secret things," really expresses in a
+sentence the philosophy of the matter.
+
+Among the Blackfoot Indians of North America, when a boy reaches puberty
+he is sent away from his father's lodge in search of a spiritual
+protector or totem. Seeking a secluded spot, he abstains from food until
+he is favoured in a dream with a vision of some animal or bird, which is
+at once adopted by him.[29] This custom obtains with most of the North
+American tribes. Among these tribes, also, the soothsayer prepares
+himself by fasting for the ecstatic state in which the spirits give
+their messages through him. The ordinary member of the tribe who wants
+anything will fast until he is assured in a dream that it will be
+granted him. Similarly, the Malay, to procure supernatural intercourse,
+retires to the jungle and abstains from food. The Zulu doctor prepares
+for intercourse with the tribal spirits by spare diet or solitary fasts.
+Fasting is part of the ordinary regimen of the Hindu yogi. Of certain
+Indian tribes we are told that before proceeding on an expedition they
+"observe a rigorous fast, or rather abstain from every kind of food for
+four days. In this interval their imagination is exalted to delirium;
+whether it be through bodily weakness or the natural effect of delirium,
+they pretend to have strange visions. The elders and sages of the tribe,
+being called upon to interpret these dreams, draw from them omens more
+or less favourable to the success of the enterprise; and their
+explanations are received as oracles, by which the expedition will be
+faithfully regulated."[30] Amongst the Samoans, when rain was required,
+the priests blackened themselves all over, exhumed a dead body, took the
+skeleton to a cave and poured water over it. They had to fast and remain
+in the cave until it rained. Sometimes they died under the experiment,
+but they generally chose the showery months for their rain-making.[31]
+
+In both the Old and New Testaments fasting figures largely. The
+encounter of Jesus with Satan is preceded by a forty days' fast. St.
+Catherine of Sienna began regular fasts at a very early age. Santa
+Teresa kept lengthy fasts every year. The fasting of the monks and nuns
+during the epidemic period of monasticism is too well known to call for
+more than a mere reference. Perhaps the most curious religious reason
+given for fasting is that cited by a writer from a monkish chronicler:--
+
+"As a coach goes faster when it is empty, a man by fasting can be better
+united to God; for it is a principle with geometers that a round body
+can never touch a plane except in one point.... A belly too well filled
+becomes round, it cannot touch God except in one point; but fasting
+flattens the belly until it is united with the surface of God at all
+points."[32]
+
+George Fox, the founder of the Society of Friends, confesses that he
+"fasted much" and "walked abroad in solitary places," and "frequently in
+the night walked about mournfully by myself." After much brooding and
+fasting, he heard a voice which said, "There is one, even Jesus Christ,
+that can speak to thy condition." Such an experience is not at all
+surprising, seeing the method pursued to acquire it. Less fasting and
+brooding, with more genial intercourse with his fellows, might easily
+have prevented Fox, as it has prevented others, hearing heavenly voices
+proffering him counsel. Such an experience is well within the reach of
+anyone who cares to acquire it. Tylor has well said that "So long as
+fasting is continued as a religious rite, so long the consequences in
+morbid mental exaltation will continue the old savage doctrine that
+morbid phantasy is supernatural experience. Bread and meat would have
+robbed the ascetic of many an angel's visit; the opening of the
+refectory door must many a time have closed the gate of heaven to his
+gaze." No one will question the truth of this principle, so long as we
+are dealing with uncivilised mankind. Many, however, shrink from
+acknowledging that the practices current in more civilised times are
+disguised illustrations of the same principle of interpretation, which
+descends direct from savages, and but for them would never have existed.
+
+Commenting on the practices of certain savage medicine-men, a missionary
+remarks:--
+
+"It always appeared probable to me that these rogues, from long fasting,
+contract a weakness of brain, a giddiness, a kind of delirium, which
+makes them imagine that they are gifted with superior wisdom, and give
+themselves out for physicians. They impose upon themselves first, and
+afterwards upon others."[33]
+
+This is shrewdly said, and is a good example of the readiness with which
+obvious truths are recognised when they do not clash with religious
+prepossessions. The difficulty for others is to discern any real line of
+demarcation between the practices of civilised and uncivilised. So far
+as one can see, the only real distinction is that the method employed by
+savages is open. That followed by civilised people is more or less
+disguised. But derangement of function is derangement of function, no
+matter how produced. And if we decline to believe that a savage holds
+genuine intercourse with a spiritual world, as a consequence of this
+derangement, in what way are we justified in accepting the testimony of
+a Christian visionary to similar intercourse, when the derangement is in
+his case no less clear? It is a case of accepting both, or neither. The
+sane and scientific conclusion seems to lie in the following from Dr.
+Henry Maudsley:--
+
+"Now that the mental functions are known to be inseparably connected
+with nervous substrata, disposed and united in the brain in the most
+orderly fashion, superordinate, co-ordinate, and subordinate--the whole
+a complex organisation of confederate nerve centres, each capable of
+more or less independent action--a natural interpretation presents
+itself. The extraordinary states of mental disintegration evince the
+separate and irregular function of certain mental nerve tracts, or
+grouped nerve tracts with which goes necessarily a coincident
+suspension, partial or complete, of the functions of all the rest; the
+supernatural incubus, therefore, neither demoniac nor divine, only
+morbid. Thus the strange nervous seizures, with their mental
+concomitants, not being outside the range of positive research, but
+interesting events within it, become useful natural experiments to throw
+an instructive light upon the intricate functions of the most complex
+organ in the world--the human brain. Steadily are the researches of
+pathology driving the supernatural back into its last and most obscure
+retreat; for they prove that in the extremest ecstasies there is neither
+_theolepsy_ nor _diabolepsy_, nor any other _lepsy_ in the sense of
+possession of the individual by an external power; what there is truly
+is a _psycholepsy_."[34]
+
+States of exaltation produced by the aid of drugs, fasting, or other
+forms of self-torture come naturally under the category of deliberately
+induced states of mind, owing to the conviction that spiritual knowledge
+may be gained in this way. But there are other states that arise
+naturally and which foster the same conviction. It has already been
+pointed out that the generally accepted theory with uncivilised peoples
+is that all disease is due to the action of malevolent spirits. There is
+no need now to repeat proof of this, and in any case it lies to hand in
+any work that deals with uncivilised life. Nor need we go back to
+uncivilised times for evidence. One requires only to look but a very
+little way into the history of any country to find the supernaturalistic
+theory of disease in full swing, and even to-day one may discover
+indications of its once general rule. Its importance to the present
+enquiry lies in the part it has played in building up in the religious
+consciousness a general conviction of religious truth that does not
+disappear even when it is seen that the evidence upon which it rests is
+faulty. Just as the inhabitants of a Welsh village have their general
+belief in religion strengthened by the semi-hysterical speeches of an
+Evan Roberts, and the convulsive capers of a whole congregation, so in
+all ages people have found endorsement of their belief in a supernatural
+world in the existence of cases the pathological nature of which admits
+of no doubt. Belief in the supernatural character of specific nervous
+conditions or mental states may disappear, but the fact that this
+belief has been general for a time leaves behind a certain psychological
+residuum in favour of supernaturalism in general.
+
+The connection between the priest and the physician is naturally a very
+ancient one. The priest, indeed, is the primitive physician, the belief
+that diseases are supernaturally caused indicating him as the agent of
+their cure. And it is only to be expected that when the attempt is made
+to divert the treatment of disease from priestly hands the effort should
+be met with determined opposition. Quite naturally, too, the first
+gropings after a scientific theory of disease show a curious mixture of
+rationalism and superstition. Thus, in Greece, the temple hospitals
+devoted to the mythical Æsculapius, which were situated at Epidaurus,
+Pergamus, Cyrene, Corinth, and many other places, served as colleges,
+hospitals, and places of worship. Sufferers slept in the temples in the
+hopes of receiving messages from the gods, and the priests themselves
+professed to have ecstatic visions which enabled them to prescribe for
+those afflicted.[35] Great emphasis was placed on bathing, light, air,
+and food, and it is pretty clear that the priests had begun to mix both
+faith and physic in a most perplexing manner.
+
+The definite separation of medicine from magic and religion begins with
+Hippocrates. His theory of disease was simple. He did not deny that
+there might be a supernatural side to disease; he insisted that there
+was always a natural one, and that this was the side with which we
+should be concerned. Each disorder, he said, had its own physical
+conditions, and he laid down the rule that we "ought to study the nature
+of man, what he is with reference to that which he eats and drinks, and
+to all his other occupations and habits, and to the consequences
+resulting from each."[36] In Egypt, also, very considerable advance was
+made in the same direction. Probably a good deal of their knowledge
+resulted from the practice of embalming, in spite of the priestly
+interdict on dissection. At all events, there is no doubt that
+considerable advance had been made. Herophilus and Erasistratus wrote of
+the structure of the heart, and described its connection with the veins
+and arteries. The two kinds of nerves, motor and sensory, were
+described, and the influence of foods, etc., as influencing health,
+dwelt on. Insanity was also dealt with as due to natural and
+controllable causes, and the effects of colour and music in dealing with
+mania noted.[37] Had this advance been followed, the history of European
+civilisation might have been different from what it was. Plagues,
+epidemics, and diseases, with their far-reaching social and political
+consequences,--consequences that are too little noted, or even
+understood, by historians,--might have met with adequate resistance, and
+some would never have occurred.
+
+The Pagan schools of medicine came to an untimely, although in some
+cases a lingering, end. "The introduction of Christianity," says a
+medical writer, "had an undoubted influence on the course of medical
+science; for the Christian was taught to recognise, in every bodily
+infirmity, the dispensation of the Almighty, and in the calm, abstracted
+pursuits of those holy men who passed their time in prayer and
+meditation, a propitiation: hence medicine fell into the hands of monks
+and anchorites, who assumed to themselves, exclusively, the power of
+interpreting all natural phenomena as indications of the Divine Will,
+and pretended to possess some occult and supernatural means of curing
+disease."[38] Reversing the natural order of things, the physician was
+replaced by the priest. The supernaturalistic theory was revived, and
+held its own for well on a thousand years. For every complaint the
+Church provided a specific in the shape of a charm, an incantation, or a
+saint. St. Apollonia for toothache, St. Avertin for lunacy, St. Benedict
+for stone, St. Clara for sore eyes, St. Herbert for hydrophobia, St.
+John for epilepsy, St. Maur for gout, St. Pernel for agues, St.
+Genevieve for fevers, St. Sebastian for plague, etc.[39] The height of
+absurdity was reached when, in spite of the monopoly of the treatment of
+disease by the priesthood, the Council of Rheims (1119) actually forbade
+monks to study medicine. This was followed by the Council of Beziers
+(1246) prohibiting Christians applying for relief to Jewish physicians,
+at a time when practically the only doctors of ability in Christendom
+were Jews. In 1243 the Dominicans banished all books on medicine from
+their monasteries. Innocent III. forbade physicians practising except
+under the supervision of an ecclesiastic. Honorius (1222) forbade
+priests the study of medicine; and at the end of the thirteenth Century
+Boniface VIII. interdicted surgery as atheistical. The ill-treatment and
+opposition experienced by the great Vesalius at the hands of the Church,
+on account of his anatomical researches, is one of the saddest chapters
+in the history of science.[40]
+
+When the sight of bodily disease strengthened and confirmed belief in
+the supernatural, mental disease must have offered still more convincing
+evidence. Among uncivilised people we know that this is so. To quote
+again from the indispensable Tylor:--
+
+"The possessed man ... rationally finds a spiritual cause for his
+sufferings.... Especially when the mysterious unseen power throws him
+helpless on the ground, jerks and writhes him in convulsions, makes him
+leap upon the bystanders with a giant's strength and a wild beast's
+ferocity, impels him with distorted face and frantic gesture, and voice
+not his own nor seemingly even human, to pour forth wild incoherent
+raving, or with thought and eloquence beyond his sober faculties to
+command, to counsel, to foretell--such a one seems to those who watch
+him, and even to himself, to have become the mere instrument of a spirit
+which has seized him or entered into him, a possessing demon in whose
+personality the patient believes so implicitly that he often imagines a
+personal name for it, which it can declare when it speaks in its own
+voice and character through his organs of speech."[41]
+
+It was this conception of insanity, universally current in the
+uncivilised world, that was revived with fearful intensity in the early
+Christian Church, and which certainly served its purpose in intensifying
+the genuine belief in supernaturalism. Jesus had given His followers
+power to expel demons "In My name," and this power of exorcism was one
+upon which the early Christians specially prided themselves. It is with
+unconscious sarcasm that Dean Trench puts the question, If one of the
+disciples "were to enter a madhouse now, how many of the sufferers there
+he might recognise as 'possessed'?"[42] One may safely say that he would
+regard all as under the dominion of evil spirits. No other cause of
+insanity appears to have been recognised, and the Church devised the
+most elaborate formulæ for casting out demons. The assumed demoniac was
+prayed over, incensed, and evil-smelling drugs burned under his nose. A
+set form of objurgation then followed:--
+
+"Thou lustful and stupid one.... Thou lean sow, famine-stricken and most
+impure.... Thou wrinkled beast, of all beasts the most beastly.... Thou
+bestial and foolish drunkard.... Thou sooty spirit from Tartarus.... I
+cast thee down, O Tartarean boor, into the infernal kitchen....
+Loathsome cobbler ... filthy sow ... envious crocodile.... Malodorous
+drudge ... swollen toad ... lousy swineherd," etc. etc.[43]
+
+Then followed the exorcism proper:--
+
+"By the Apocalypse of Jesus Christ, which God hath given to make known
+unto His servants those things which are shortly to be ... I exorcise
+you, ye angels of untold perversity.... May all the devils that are thy
+foes rush forth upon thee and drag thee down to hell!... May the Holy
+One trample on thee and hang thee up in an infernal fork, as was done to
+the five kings of the Amorites!... May God set a nail to your skull, and
+pound it with a hammer as Jael did to Sisera!... May Sother break thy
+head and cut off thy hands, as was done to the cursed Dagon!... May God
+hang thee in a hellish yoke, as seven men were hanged by the sons of
+Saul!"[44]
+
+Marcus Aurelius mentions as one of his debts to the philosopher
+Diognetus that he had taught him "not to give credit to vulgar tales of
+prodigies and incantations, and evil spirits cast out by magicians or
+pretenders to sorcery, and such kind of impostors."[45] What would have
+been the thoughts of the great emperor, could he have revisited the
+earth two centuries after his death and seen the then civilised world
+enveloped in a mental atmosphere in which such ideas as those above
+described could live?
+
+All over Europe for centuries lunatics were whipped, and otherwise
+ill-treated, in the hopes of expelling the demons that were troubling
+them. The seventy-second Canon of the Church of England still provides
+that no unlicensed person shall "cast out any devil or devils" under
+pain of penalties prescribed. A Bishop of Beauvais, in the fifteenth
+century, not only caused five devils to come out of one person, but
+actually induced them to sign a document promising not to molest this
+particular sufferer again. Tremendous, again, were the labours of the
+Jesuit Fathers of Vienna, who boasted that they had cast out no less
+than 12,652 'living devils.' Such arithmetical exactitude silences all
+hostile comment. In some parts of Scotland, as late as 1783, lunatics
+were left all night in the churchyard, with a holy bell over their
+heads. In Cornwall, St. Nun's pool was famous for the cure of lunatics.
+The poor devils were tied hand and foot and doused in the water until
+they were cured--or killed. Even the embraces of prostitutes, for some
+peculiar reason, were recommended as a cure for insanity.[46] In 1788,
+in Bristol, a drunken epileptic, one George Larkins, was brought into
+church, and seven clergymen solemnly set themselves to the task of
+exorcising the possessing demon. Whereupon Satan swore 'by his infernal
+den'--an oath, says the chronicler, nowhere to be found but in Bunyan.
+Under date of October 25, 1739, John Wesley also relates how he was sent
+for and assisted at the expulsion of a demon from the body of a young
+girl.
+
+Of all nervous diseases that of epilepsy appears to have been most
+favourable to the encouragement of a belief in spiritual agency. One
+medical authority whose experience enables him to speak with a peculiar
+degree of authority has pointed out that with epilepsy there is often an
+exaltation of the religious sentiments.[47] A more recent writer, Dr.
+Bernard Hollander, asserts that epileptics are "highly religious."[48]
+Sir T. S. Clouston also points out that strong religious emotionalism
+often accompanies epilepsy.[49] Another eminent physician, while
+pointing out that "a high degree of intelligence, amounting even to
+genius, has in some cases been associated with epilepsy," observes that
+"the epileptic is apt to be influenced greatly by the mystical and
+awe-inspiring, and he is disposed to morbid piety."[50]
+
+Every medical man is acquainted with the close relation that exists
+between epilepsy and all kinds of hallucinations and delusions, and it
+would be more than surprising if in an environment where the religious
+interpretation of things is paramount, or with a patient of strong
+religious convictions, these delusions did not take a religious form.
+And of all nervous disorders epilepsy seems most favourable for
+producing this. Under its influence hallucination attacks every one of
+the senses with a varying degree of intensity. "The patient hears
+voices, and generally words expressing definite ideas, though he is
+often unable to properly refer them to any speaking person. Sometimes
+instead of external sounds or voices, the patient has a consciousness of
+an internal voice that may be as real to him as any external auditory
+perception. At first the voices may be indistinct, but upon constant
+repetition and evolution from sub-conscious thought they acquire
+intensity, eventually dominating the life of the individual."[51] Dr.
+Ball says: "One patient perceives at the beginning of the attack a
+toothed wheel, in the middle of which there appears a human face making
+strange contortions; another sees a series of smiling landscapes. In
+some cases it is the sense of hearing which is affected;--the patient
+hears voices or strange noises. Others are warned by the sense of smell
+that the fit is going to commence."[52]
+
+Sometimes these hallucinations of sight and hearing are in curious
+contrast with each other. "Not rarely," says Dr. Conolly Norman, "a
+patient has visual hallucinations of a cheering kind--as of God or
+angels; yet his auditory hallucinations are full of blasphemy, mockery,
+and insult."[53]
+
+Dr. Maudsley thus describes the general symptoms accompanying an
+epileptic attack:--
+
+"The patient's senses are possessed with hallucinations, his ganglionic
+central cells being in a state of what may be called convulsive action;
+before the eyes are blood-red flames of fire, amidst which whoever
+happens to present himself appears as a devil or otherwise horribly
+transformed; the ears are filled with a terribly roaring noise, or
+resound with a voice imperatively commanding him to save himself; the
+smell is one of sulphurous stifling, and the desperate and violent
+actions are the convulsive reaction to such fearful hallucinations."[54]
+
+If anyone will bear in mind the numerous descriptions of religious
+visions, written in all good faith, and the behaviour of many an assumed
+'inspired' character, he will have little difficulty in realising how
+easily, to a people unacquainted with the real character of such
+phenomena, epilepsy lends itself to a religious interpretation. It must
+also be borne in mind that the consequences of vivid hallucinations
+experienced during epilepsy do not always disappear with the attack to
+which they were originally due.
+
+It is certain that from the earliest times cases of what are undoubtedly
+epilepsy have been taken as positive indications of supernatural
+influence. "There is," says Emanuel Deutsch, "a peculiar something
+supposed to inhere in epilepsy. The Greeks called it a divine disease.
+Bacchantic and chorybantic furor were God-inspired stages. The Pythia
+uttered her oracles under the most distressing signs. Symptoms of
+convulsion were ever needed as a sign of the divine."[55] Much of the
+evidence for the supernatural in the New Testament rests upon cases that
+are obviously pathological in character. A man brings his son to Jesus
+and describes how "ofttimes he falleth into the fire, and oft into the
+water" (Matt. xvii. 15), and in another place (Mark ix. 18) the same
+patient is described as having a dumb spirit, "and wheresoever he taketh
+him, he teareth him; and he foameth, and gnasheth with his teeth, and
+pineth away." The response to the father's appeal for help is an
+exorcism of the possessing spirit such as one meets with in all savage
+culture. Between possession by a malignant spirit and domination by a
+god, the difference is clearly one of terminology alone. And at the
+side of the New Testament case just cited one may place this account
+from Polynesia, written by a very competent observer, and a
+missionary:--
+
+"As soon as the god was supposed to have entered the priest, the latter
+became violently agitated and worked himself up to the highest pitch of
+apparent frenzy; the muscles of the limbs seemed convulsed, the body
+swelled, the countenance became terrific, the features distorted, the
+eyes wild and strained. In this state he often rolled on the earth,
+foaming at the mouth, as if labouring under the influence of the
+divinity by whom he was possessed, and in shrill cries, and often
+violent and indistinct sounds, revealed the will of the god."[56]
+
+Advancing to a higher culture stage than that indicated in the last
+passage, there is much evidence that Mohammed was subject to
+hallucinations, and many authorities have indicated epilepsy as their
+source. There is a tradition that someone who saw Mohammed while he was
+receiving one of his revelations observed that he seemed unconscious and
+was red in the face. Mohammed himself said:--
+
+"Inspiration descendeth upon me in two ways. Sometimes Gabriel cometh
+and communicateth the revelation unto me, as one man unto another, and
+this is easy; at other times it affecteth me like the ringing of a bell,
+penetrating my very heart, and rending me as it were in pieces; and this
+it is which grievously afflicteth me."
+
+Emanuel Deutsch, although, in a passage already cited, recognising the
+religious significance attached to epilepsy, has the following curious
+comment:--
+
+"Mohammed was epileptic; and vast ingenuity and medical knowledge have
+been lavished upon this point as explanatory of Mohammed's mission and
+success. We, for our own part, do not think that epilepsy ever made a
+man appear a prophet to himself or even to the people of the East; or,
+for the matter of that, inspired him with the like heart-moving words
+and glorious pictures. Quite the contrary. It was taken as a sign of
+demons within--demons, 'Devs,' devils to whom all manner of diseases
+were ascribed throughout the antique world."
+
+This seems very largely to miss the point at issue. Of course, no one
+would claim that Mohammed's success was due to epilepsy, or even that
+the very severe forms of epilepsy were favourable to inducing a
+conviction of revelation. But the disease assumes various forms, and in
+some cases it is expressed in the form of a period of mental excitement
+and general irritability. All that is claimed is that, given the
+complaint in its less severe forms in one with whom religious beliefs
+are strong, there are present all the conditions for attributing the
+resulting hallucinations to personal revelation or ecstatic vision. And
+it is also true that while some patients after emerging from a fit of
+epilepsy are in a dazed or confused condition, others have a very clear
+recollection of all they have seen and heard. Mohammed simply took the
+current explanation of cases of nervous derangement, and being a man of
+strong religious feeling, naturally gave his visions a religious
+interpretation. All the rest has to be explained in terms of the innate
+genius of the man and of the circumstances of his time.
+
+A similar case to the above is that of Emanuel Swedenborg. His followers
+naturally resent the ascription of his visions and voices to a
+pathologic origin, and point to his pronounced mental ability. And
+certainly no one who is at all acquainted with the writings of
+Swedenborg will question his great mental power, amounting at times to
+positive genius. But here, again, we have strong religious conviction in
+alliance with pathological conditions. Swedenborg's communications with
+celestial beings were of a more frequent and more ordered character than
+Mohammed's, but there is the same general likeness between them. Of his
+first revelation he writes:--
+
+"At ten o'clock I lay down in bed and was somewhat better; half an hour
+after I heard a clamour under my head; I thought that then the tempter
+went away; immediately there came over me a rigor so strong from the
+head and the whole body, with some din, and this several times. I found
+that something holy was over me. I thereupon fell asleep, and at about
+twelve, one, or two o'clock in the night there came over me so strong a
+shivering from head to foot, as if many winds rushed together, which
+shook me, was indescribable, and prostrated me upon my face. Then, while
+I was prostrated, I was in a moment quite awake, and saw that I was cast
+down, and wondered what it meant. And I spoke as if I was awake, but
+found that the word was put into my mouth, and I said, 'Omnipotent Jesus
+Christ, as of Thy great grace Thou condescendest to come to so great a
+sinner, make me worthy of this grace!' I held my hands together and
+prayed, and then came a hand which squeezed my hands hard; immediately
+thereupon I continued in prayer."[57]
+
+Swedenborg confessed to repeated walks and talks with celestial
+visitants, and, of course, all thought of imposture must be put on one
+side. What one has to consider is whether we are to accept these
+experiences as hallucinations or not. On the one side no further
+evidence seems possible than the profound faith of the man himself, his
+recognised mental ability, and the belief of his followers. And against
+this it must be urged that the most complete honesty is no guarantee
+against self-deception, while ability and even genius are not at all
+incompatible with a pathologic strain. And in addition it must be borne
+in mind that these hallucinations are, after all, part of a very large
+class. Men of very little ability and influence experience substantially
+the same visions; they occur all over the world, under all conditions of
+culture, and always express the personal idiosyncrasies of the subject
+and reflect the character of his social environment. One may safely say
+that had Swedenborg lived a century later, while he might still have
+gone through the same mental and physical experiences, he himself would
+have given a very different interpretation of them.
+
+St. Paul, Professor James points out, "certainly had once an epileptoid,
+if not an epileptic seizure." One needs to add to this that the seizure
+occurred at the one critical moment of his life which eventuated in his
+conversion from Judaism to Christianity. Mary Magdalene, the first who
+brought tidings of the resurrection, had been delivered of seven
+devils. Luther's religious opinions were, of course, quite apart from
+his physical state, sound or unsound. Still, even with him the reality
+of supernatural intercourse became intensely vivid as a result of
+nervous affections. His latest biographer points out that as a youth
+while in the monastery he was seized with something that might well have
+been an epileptic fit, and that although there is no record of a return
+of this, he did suffer from ordinary fits of fainting.[58] He confesses
+to have been much troubled, at twenty-two years of age, with giddiness
+and noises in the ear, which he attributed to the devil. And right
+through his life he attributed similar experiences to the same source.
+Bunyan confesses that even during childhood the Lord "did scare and
+affright me with fearful dreams, and did terrify me with dreadful
+visions." George Fox, founder of the Society of Friends, describes how,
+in the middle of winter, when approaching Lichfield, "the Word of the
+Lord was like a fire in me," and as he went through the town, "there
+seemed to me to be a channel of blood running down the streets, and the
+market-place appeared like a pool of blood." Reflecting on the meaning
+of the vision, he remembered that, "In the Emperor Diocletian's time a
+thousand Christians were martyred at Lichfield. So I was to go without
+my shoes through the channel of their blood in the market-place, that I
+might raise up the blood of these martyrs which had been shed above a
+thousand years before."[59]
+
+In none of these cases could it be fairly claimed that the religious
+conviction, as such, was the consequence of the hallucinations
+experienced. But it can scarcely be questioned that these served to
+strengthen it to an enormous extent. These trances, ecstasies, visions,
+were accepted by the subjects as proofs of their 'divine mission,' and
+were so accepted by multitudes of their followers. In their absence
+religion would most probably have failed to be the fiercely irruptive
+force in life that it has been. The religious idea has, so to speak
+given hallucination a standing and an authority in life it would not
+have possessed in its absence. In the case of men of ordinary capacity
+these visions possess little authority. But in the case of men of
+extraordinary capacity, men like Luther, Mohammed, Fox, Swedenborg,--who
+must in any case have stood superior to their fellows,--these
+hallucinations are then under favouring social conditions invested with
+enormous authority. And there is no doubt about the fact that religious
+leaders have been peculiarly subject to these psychical variations. This
+is pointed out by Professor James in the following passage:--
+
+"Even more perhaps than other kinds of genius, religious leaders have
+been subject to abnormal psychical visitations. Invariably they have
+been creatures of exalted emotional sensibility. Often they have led a
+discordant inner life, and had melancholy during a part of their career.
+They have known no measure, been liable to obsessions and fixed ideas;
+and frequently they have fallen into trances, heard voices, seen
+visions, and presented all sorts of peculiarities which are ordinarily
+classed as pathological. Often, moreover, these pathological features in
+their career have helped to give them their religious authority and
+influence."[60]
+
+Well, in what way are we to discriminate between the visions of a
+religious person, admittedly of an abnormal disposition, subject to fits
+of melancholy, etc., and presenting "all sorts of peculiarities
+ordinarily classed as pathological," and the hallucinations of an
+admittedly pathologic subject? Why should the ordinary classification
+break down at this point? Dr. Granger, dealing with this aspect of the
+question, says: "The religious genius is not proved to be morbid by the
+extent to which he diverges from the average type."[61] Quite so, genius
+_must_ depart from the average type in order to be genius. But the
+statement is quite beside the point at issue. It is not a mere
+divergence from the average type that warrants one in assuming that much
+passing for divine illumination owes its origin to pathological
+conditions, but the fact that it is possible to affiliate certain cases
+of religious exaltation with these conditions. Hallucinations are common
+to all forms of ecstasy, and ecstasy is not confined to religion. Given
+a one-sided mental activity, intense concentration on one or a few
+analogous ideas, combined with a lowered nervous sensibility, and we
+have all the conditions present favourable to hallucination.[62] These
+hallucinations may occur in connection with any topic that engrosses the
+subject's mind. In every other direction their true nature is recognised
+and admitted. In connection with religious belief alone, it is held that
+they bring the subject into touch with a supersensual world of reality.
+What possible scientific warranty is there for any such distinction?
+
+Let us take, as an example, one of James's own cases, which he admits is
+'distinctly pathological,' but without allowing this admission to
+disturb his general conclusion. The case is that of Suso, a famous
+fourteenth-century mystic. As a young man he wore a hair shirt and an
+iron chain next the skin. Later he had made a leathern garment studded
+with one hundred and fifty nails, points inward. The garment was made
+very tight, and he used it to sleep in. To prevent himself throwing it
+off during sleep he procured a pair of leather gloves studded with
+tacks, so that if he attempted to get rid of the dress the tacks would
+penetrate his flesh. Next he had made a wooden cross, with thirty
+protruding nails, to emulate the sufferings of Jesus. He procured an old
+door to sleep on. In winter he suffered from the frost. His feet were
+full of sores, his legs became dropsical, his knees bloody and seared,
+his loins covered with scars, his hands tremulous. During twenty years
+he fed scantily upon the coarsest food, slept in the most uncomfortable
+places, and during the whole of the time never took a bath. No wonder
+that after his fortieth year he was favoured with a series of visions
+from God. Would not one be surprised if any other result than this had
+been achieved? And Suso's case is only one of thousands, many of not so
+extreme a character, others quite as bad.
+
+In the case of Catherine of Sienna the austerities began earlier than
+with Suso. As a child she flogged herself, and was favoured with visions
+before she reached her teens. Santa Teresa, as a young woman, prayed to
+God to send her an illness, and describes how she remained for days in a
+trance, during which time her tongue was bitten in many places. She
+describes how, during these trances, her body became to her light, and
+she remained rigid. "It was altogether impossible for me to hinder it;
+for my world would be carried absolutely away, and ordinarily even my
+head, as it were, after it."[63] These are typical examples from a very
+large number of cases. The annals of monasticism are filled with
+accounts of self-inflicted tortures, with the one end in view, and in
+serious belief that their experiences brought them into touch with a
+reality denied them under normal conditions. The practice not only
+quickened their own sense of the reality of religion, it served the same
+purpose for thousands of others pursuing the course of ordinary social
+existence. "Religious teachers," says Francis Galton, "by enforcing
+celibacy, fasting, and solitude, have done their best towards making men
+mad, and they have always largely succeeded in inducing morbid mental
+conditions among their followers."[64]
+
+The phenomenon is thus continuous and, in its essentials, unchanging.
+From the most primitive times there has been a close association between
+the belief in divine illumination and spiritual intercourse, and mental
+states that are unquestionably pathological. Following this there has
+been a more or less deliberate cultivation of these states in the desire
+to renew communion with a spiritual world hidden from man's normal
+senses. In this there need be no deliberate imposture. When imposture
+does occur, it would be at a later culture stage. At the beginning
+there is nothing but misunderstanding. First in order of time comes the
+crude animistic interpretation of almost every phase of human activity.
+So far as primitive life is concerned, the evidence of this is simply
+overwhelming. Next, as Tylor has pointed out, from believing that the
+occurrence of certain mental states provides the conditions of
+communication with an unseen world to the deliberate creation of those
+states is a natural and an easy step. There is thus set on foot a
+deliberate culture of the supernatural. This cultivation of abnormal
+states of mind once initiated persists, now in one form, now in another,
+but is substantially the same throughout. Whether we are dealing with
+the crude practices of the savage, the less crude, but still obvious
+methods of solitary living and bodily maceration of the medieval monk,
+or the morbid and unhealthy dwelling upon a single idea which remains
+one of the conditions of 'illumination' to-day, we are confronted with
+the same thing. In every case the object--unconscious, maybe--is the
+provision of conditions that render hallucination and illusion a
+practical certainty. In connection with non-religious matters the
+unhealthiness of mind, distortion of vision, and unreliability of
+judgment induced by methods akin to those named is now generally
+recognised. We have yet to see the same thing as generally recognised in
+connection with religious beliefs. We see in addition that a great many
+of those experiences, once accepted as clear evidence of supernatural
+communication, are more properly explainable in terms of nervous
+derangement. In such cases there is neither celestial illumination nor
+diabolic communion, neither--to use Maudsley's phrase--theolepsy nor
+diabolepsy, only psycholepsy. In the present chapter we have been
+striving to apply this principle to a little wider field than is usual.
+We have been studying the misinterpretation, in terms of religion, of
+abnormal or pathological states of mind, and observing how far these
+have contributed to building up and perpetuating a conviction of the
+possibility of supernatural intercourse. We have yet to trace the same
+principle of misinterpretation in the sexual and social life of mankind.
+
+
+FOOTNOTES:
+
+[20] _A Psychological Study of Religion_, p. 234.
+
+[21] _Primitive Culture_, i. p. 501.
+
+[22] _Primitive Culture_, ii. p. 410.
+
+[23] Some very curious information concerning the use of this and other
+fungi is given by Dr. J. G. Bourke in his _Scatologic Rites_, pp. 69-75.
+
+[24] Cited by Bourke, p. 90.
+
+[25] Tylor, ii. pp. 417-9.
+
+[26] For a clear account of the effects of hemp preparations, calculated
+to produce a feeling of religious ecstasy, the reader should consult Dr.
+Hale White's _Text-Book of Pharmacology_, 1901, pp. 318-22. The effects
+of opium are thus described by another writer: "Opium, in those who are
+capable of stimulation by it, gives rise to a pleasurable feeling,
+something like that which is produced by wine in not excessive doses;
+but the excitement derived from it, instead of tending to some highest
+point, remains stationary for hours, and in place of the slight
+incoherence of thought always present in those who are exhilarated with
+wine, the most perfect harmony is established among all the conceptions.
+There is an extraordinary stimulation of the pure intellect, and not
+merely of the power of expression. The opium-eater seems to have had the
+eyes of his spirit opened, to have acquired a gift of insight into
+things that to mere mortals are inexplicable. The most remote parts of
+consciousness come into clear light; the finer shades of personality,
+those that had been unknown even to the opium-eater himself, are brought
+into view and become distinct; the smallest details of the things around
+take new significance, and are seen to be profoundly important; their
+analogies with other phenomena of nature are revealed. It is the same
+with the moral as with the intellectual being; that also becomes
+indefinitely exalted. An absolute balance of the faculties seems to have
+been attained. The whole man _is_ what in his ordinary state he only
+tends to be; he has realised the highest perfection of which he is
+capable; only his 'best self' now remains; his lower self has been left
+behind without need of the purgatorial fire of contention with the
+environment to destroy it."--T. Whittaker, _Essays and Notices,
+Psychological and Philosophical_, p. 367.
+
+[27] _Anthropology_, p. 296.
+
+[28] For a general account of religious dances, see Major-General
+Forlong's _Faiths of Man_, art. "Dancing."
+
+[29] Catlin, _North American Indians_, i. p. 36.
+
+[30] Cited by Frazer, _Taboo and the Perils of the Soul_, p. 161.
+
+[31] Turner's _Samoa_, p. 345-6.
+
+[32] Brady, _Clavis Calendaria_, vol. i. p. 223.
+
+[33] Cited by Tylor, _Primitive Culture_, ii. pp. 412-3.
+
+[34] _Natural Causes and Supernatural Seemings_, p. 277.
+
+[35] A very good account of the methods followed in these places will be
+found in Miss Hamilton's _Incubation, or the Cure of Diseases in Pagan
+Temples and Christian Churches_, 1906.
+
+[36] Grote, _History of Greece_, vol. i. p. 359 and vol. v. p. 232.
+
+[37] "The ancient Egyptians and Greeks," says Dr. Maudsley, "used humane
+and rational methods of treatment; it was only after the Christian
+doctrine of possession by devils had taken hold of the minds of men that
+the worst sort of treatment, of which history gives account, came into
+force" (_Pathology of Mind_, p. 523). For a general account of Egyptian
+medicine see the chapter on Egypt in Dr. Berdoe's _Origin and Growth of
+the Healing Art_.
+
+[38] Meryon, _The History of Medicine_, vol. i. p. 67.
+
+[39] _Ibid._, vol. i. p. 104.
+
+[40] See Sir Michael Foster's _Lectures on the History of Physiology_,
+chap. i.
+
+[41] _Primitive Culture_, ii. 124.
+
+[42] _On the Miracles_, p. 168.
+
+[43] Cited by White, who gives original authorities, _Warfare of Science
+with Theology_, ii. 107.
+
+[44] White, ii. 108.
+
+[45] _Meditations_, bk. i.
+
+[46] Fort's _Medical Economy during the Middle Ages_, p. 345.
+
+[47] Dr. Howden, Medical Superintendent of the Montrose Lunatic Asylum,
+in _Journal of Mental Science_, 1873.
+
+[48] _First Signs of Insanity_, p. 293.
+
+[49] _Clinical Lectures on Mental Diseases_, p. 428. The whole of
+chapter xi. is very pertinent.
+
+[50] Dr. R. Jones, in Allbutt's _System of Medicine_, vol. viii. p. 335
+
+[51] Dr. Hollander, _First Signs of Insanity_, pp. 64-5.
+
+[52] Cited by Ireland, _The Blot on the Brain_, p. 39.
+
+[53] Allbutt's _System of Medicine_, viii. 395.
+
+[54] _Physiology of Mind_, p. 251. See also Dr. Mercier's _The Nervous
+System and the Mind_, p. 55.
+
+[55] _Literary Remains_, p. 83.
+
+[56] W. Ellis, _Polynesian Researches_, ii. 235-6.
+
+[57] Dr. H. Maudsley has gone fully into the case of Swedenborg in an
+article in the _Journal of Mental Science_ for July and October 1869,
+since reprinted in his _Body and Mind_.
+
+[58] See _Luther_, by H. Grisar, 1913, vol. i. pp. 16-7.
+
+[59] For other cases, and a general account of the relations between
+pathologic states and religious delusion, see Lombroso, _Man of Genius_,
+chap. iv. pt. iii.
+
+[60] _Varieties of Religious Experience_, pp. 6-7.
+
+[61] _The Soul of a Christian_, p. 13.
+
+[62] See Parish's _Hallucinations and Illusions_, pp. 38-9.
+
+[63] _Saint Teresa_, by H. Joly, pp. 25, 26, and 58.
+
+[64] _Inquiries into Human Faculty_, 1883, p. 68.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER FOUR
+
+SEX & RELIGION IN PRIMITIVE LIFE
+
+
+The connection between sexual feeling and religious belief is ancient,
+intimate, and sustained. It has impressed itself on many observers who
+have approached the subject from widely different points of view. Some
+have treated the connection as purely accidental, and as having no more
+than a mere historical interest. Others have used it as illustrating the
+way in which so sacred a subject as religion may suffer degradation in
+degenerate hands. Others of a more scientific temper have dealt with the
+relations between sexualism and religion as illustrations of a mere
+perversion. A deal may be said in favour of this last point of view. We
+know, as a matter of fact, that such cases of perversion do exist, in
+what form and to what extent will be discussed later. We are also aware
+that strong feeling which cannot find vent in one direction will secure
+expression in another. The annals of Roman Catholicism contain accounts
+of numerous persons who have sought refuge in a monastery or a nunnery
+as the result of disappointment in love, and it would be foolish to
+conclude that strong amorous feelings are annihilated because there is a
+change in the object to which they are directed. Paul was not a
+different man from the Saul of pre-conversion days, but the same person
+with his energies directed into a new channel. Protestantism is without
+the obvious outlets for unsatisfied sexual feeling such as is provided
+by Roman Catholicism, but it provides other outlets. Religious service
+as a whole remains, and intense religious devotion may very often owe
+its origin to sources undreamt of by the devotee.
+
+Between religious beliefs and sexual feelings the connection is,
+however, wider and deeper, than the relation expressed by mere
+perversion. Neither is the relation one of mere accident. An examination
+of the facts in the light of adequate scientific knowledge, combined
+with a due perception of primitive human psychology and sociology, have
+shown that the two things are united at their source. One eminent
+medical writer asserts that "in a certain sense, the history of religion
+can be regarded as a peculiar mode of manifestation of the human sexual
+instinct."[65] Another writer substantially endorses this by the remark
+that "in a certain sense the religious life is an irradiation of the
+reproductive instinct."[66] How easily one glides into the other very
+little observation of life or study of history will show. The language
+of devotion and of amatory passion is often identical, and seems to
+serve equally well for either purpose. The significance of this fact is
+often obscured by our having etherealised the conception of love, and so
+losing sight of its physiological basis. And, having hidden it from
+sight, we, not unnaturally, fail to give it due consideration. This is,
+in its way, a fatal blunder. The sex life of man and woman is too large
+a fact and too pervasive a force to be ignored with safety. Ignorance
+combined with prudery conspires to perpetuate what ignorance alone
+began; and the sex life, in both its normal and abnormal manifestations,
+has been perpetually exploited in the interests of supernaturalism.
+
+The evidence that may be adduced in favour of what has been said is
+vast, and covers a wide range. Historically it covers such facts as the
+relations between primitive religious beliefs and the sexual life, and
+the multiplication of sects of a markedly erotic character during
+periods of religious enthusiasm. "Even the most casual students of
+religion," says Professor G. B. Cutten, "must have observed an
+apparently intimate connection between religious and sexual emotions,
+and not a few have read with amazement the abnormal cults which have had
+the sexual element as a foundation for their denominational
+dissent."[67] A phenomenon so striking as to force itself on the notice
+of the most 'casual students' raises the presumption that the relation
+between the two sets of facts is rather more than that of 'apparent'
+intimacy. When in the course of history two things appear together over
+and over again, one is surely justified in assuming that there is some
+underlying principle responsible for the association. The search for
+this principle leads to the next class of evidence--the psychological.
+In this we are concerned with the relation between the sexual feelings
+and the religious idea, an association not always expressed through the
+comparatively harmless medium of language. And, finally, we have the
+evidence derived from pathology, where we are able to discern a
+perverted sexuality masquerading as religious fervour.
+
+In a previous chapter there has been pointed out the kind of mental
+environment in which primitive man moves. As one of the earliest forms
+of systematised thinking, religion dominates all other forms of mental
+activity. In savage culture there is hardly a single event into which
+religious considerations do not enter. The savage does not merely
+believe in a supernatural world, he lives in it; it is as real to him as
+anything around him, and far more potent in its action. Above all, it is
+important to bear in mind that although one is compelled to speak of the
+natural and the supernatural when dealing with early beliefs, no such
+separation is present to the primitive intelligence. The division
+between the natural and the supernatural in the external world is the
+reflection of a corresponding division in the world of thought, and this
+arises only at a subsequent stage. What is afterwards recognised as the
+supernatural pervades everything. In a sense it is everything, since
+most of what occurs is by the agency or connivance of animistic forces.
+
+In such a world, where even the ordinary events of life have a
+supernatural significance, the strange and sometimes terrifying
+phenomena of sexual life carry peculiarly strong evidences of
+supernatural activity. Events which are to the modern mind the most
+obvious consequences of sex life are to the primitive mind proofs of
+supernatural or ghostly agency. Nothing, for example, would appear less
+open to misconception than the connection between sexual relations and
+the birth of children. Yet, on this head, Mr. Sidney Hartland has
+produced a mass of evidence, gathered from all parts of the world, and
+leading to the conclusion that in the most primitive stages of human
+culture, conception and birth are ascribed to direct supernatural
+influence. Setting out from a study of the world-wide vogue of the
+belief in supernatural birth--contained in the author's earlier work,
+_The Legend of Perseus_--Mr. Hartland finds in this a survival of a
+culture stage in which all birth is believed to be supernatural.
+Survivals of this belief that birth is a phenomenon independent of the
+union of the sexes are found in the existence of numerous semi-magical
+devices to obtain children, still practised in many parts of Europe, and
+which were practised on a much more extensive scale during the medieval
+period; in the ignorance of man concerning physiological functions in
+general, the existence of Motherright which appears to have universally
+antedated Fatherright--the origin of which he traces to economic causes,
+and to the animistic nature of primitive beliefs in general.[68]
+
+Such a conclusion is not without verification from the beliefs of
+existing savages. The Bahau of Central Borneo have no notion of the real
+duration of pregnancy, and date its commencement only from the time of
+its becoming visible. The Niol-Niol of Dampier Land in North-Western
+Australia hold birth to be independent of sexual intercourse. It is
+engendered by a pre-existing spirit through the agency of a medicine
+man. The North Queenslanders have a similar belief. They believe a child
+to be sent in answer to the husband's prayer as a punishment to his wife
+when he is vexed with her. On the Proserpine River the Blacks believe
+that a child is the gift of a supernatural being called Kunya. In South
+Queensland the Euahlayi believe that spirits congregate at certain spots
+and pounce on passing women, and so are born. On the Slave Coast of West
+Africa the Awunas say that a child derives the lower jaw from the
+mother; all the rest comes from the spirits. Among these people and
+others that might be named paternity exists in name, but it implies
+something entirely different to what it afterwards connotes. Mr.
+Hartland gives numerous instances of this curious fact, and points out
+that "the attention of mankind would not be early or easily fastened
+upon the procreative process. It is lengthy, extending over months
+during which the observer's attention would be inevitably diverted by a
+variety of objects, most of them of far more pressing import.... The
+sexual passion would be gratified instinctively without any thought of
+the consequences, and in an overwhelming proportion of cases without the
+consequence of pregnancy at all. When that consequence occurred it would
+not be visible for weeks or months after the act which produced it. A
+hundred other events might have taken place in the interval which would
+be likely to be credited with the result by one wholly ignorant of
+natural laws."
+
+There seems, therefore, fair grounds for Mr. Hartland's conclusion
+that:--
+
+"for generations and æons the truth that a child is only born in
+consequence of an act of sexual union, that the birth of a child is the
+natural consequence of such an act performed in favouring circumstances,
+and that every child must be the result of such an act and of no other
+cause, was not realised by mankind, that down to the present day it is
+imperfectly realised by some peoples, and that there are still others
+among whom it is unknown."
+
+This, however, is but one of the ways in which supernatural beliefs
+become associated with sexual phenomena. In truth, there is not a stage
+of any importance in the sexual life of men and women where the same
+association does not transpire. There is, for example, the important
+phenomenon of puberty--important from both a physiological and
+sociological point of view. Pubic ceremonies of some kind are found all
+over the world, and in all forms, from those current amongst savages up
+to the contemporary practice of confirmation in the Christian Church. At
+all stages the period of puberty is the time of initiation. With
+uncivilised peoples a very general rule is the separation of the sexes,
+with fasting. Mr. Stanley Hall in his elaborate work on _Adolescence_
+has dealt very exhaustively with these customs, with which we shall be
+more closely concerned when we come to deal with the subject of
+conversion. At present it is only necessary to point out that the
+governing idea is that at puberty the boy and the girl are brought into
+special relationship with the tribal spirits, the proof of which
+relationship lies in the sexual functions originated.
+
+With boys, once puberty is attained, the sexual development is orderly
+and unobtrusive. In the case of girls certain recurring phenomena make
+the essential fact of sex much more impressive to the primitive mind,
+with far-reaching sociological consequences. "Ignorance of the nature of
+female periodicity," says A. E. Crawley, "leads man to consider it as
+the flow of blood from a wound, naturally, or more usually,
+supernaturally produced."[69] In Siam an evil spirit is believed to be
+the cause of the wound. Amongst the Chiriguanas the girl fasts, while
+women beat the floor with sticks in order to drive away "the snake that
+has wounded the girl." Similar beliefs are found very generally among
+people in a low stage of culture, and customs and beliefs still
+surviving among people more advanced point to the conclusion that
+convictions of the same kind were once fairly universal. It is this
+function, combined with the function of childbirth, that brings woman
+into close contact with the supernatural world, makes her an object of
+fear and wonder to primitive man, accounts for a number of the customs
+and beliefs associated with her, and finally helps to determine her
+social position. It is because her periodicity is taken as evidence of
+her communion with spiritual forces that special precautions have to be
+taken concerning her. She becomes spiritually contagious. Thus, the
+natives of New Britain, while engaged in making fish-traps, carefully
+avoid all women. They believe that if a woman were even to touch a
+fish-trap, it would catch nothing. Amongst the Maoris, if a man touched
+a menstruous woman, he would be taboo 'an inch thick.' An Australian
+black fellow, who discovered that his wife had lain on his blanket at
+her menstrual period, killed her, and died of terror himself within a
+fortnight. In Uganda the pots which a woman touches while the impurity
+of childbirth or menstruation is on her, are destroyed. With many North
+American Indians the use of weapons touched by women during these times
+would bring misfortune. A menstruating woman is with them the object
+they dread most. In Tahiti women are secluded. In some cases she is too
+dangerous to be even touched by others, and food is given her at the end
+of a stick. With the Pueblo Indians contact with a woman at these times
+exposes a man to attacks from an evil spirit, and he may pass on the
+infection to others.[70]
+
+It is needless to multiply instances; the same general reason governs
+all, and this has been clearly expressed by Dr. Frazer:--
+
+"The object of secluding women at menstruation is to neutralise the
+dangerous influence which is supposed to emanate from them at such
+times. The general effect of these rules is to keep the women suspended,
+so to say, between heaven and earth. Whether enveloped in her hammock
+and slung up to the roof, as in South America, or elevated above the
+ground in a dark and narrow cage, as in New Zealand, she may be
+considered to be out of the way of doing mischief, since being shut off
+both from the earth and from the sun, she can poison neither of these
+great sources of life by her deadly contagion. The precautions thus
+taken to isolate and insulate the girl are dictated by regard for her
+own safety as well as for the safety of others.... In short, the girl is
+viewed as charged with a powerful force which, if not kept within
+bounds, may prove the destruction both of the girl herself and all with
+whom she comes in contact. To repress this force within the limits
+necessary for the safety of all concerned is the object of the taboos in
+question."
+
+The savage is far too logical in his methods to allow such an idea to
+end here. If a woman is so highly charged with spiritual infection as to
+be dangerous at certain frequently recurring periods, she may be more or
+less dangerous between these periods. As Havelock Ellis says: "Instead
+of being regarded as a being who at periodic intervals becomes the
+victim of a spell of impurity, the conception of impurity becomes
+amalgamated with the conception of woman; she is, as Tertullian puts it,
+_Janua diaboli_; and this is the attitude which still persisted in
+medieval days."[71] This is to be expected from what one knows of the
+workings of the primitive intelligence, but it is surprising to find Mr.
+Ellis continue by saying, on apparently good grounds, that "the belief
+in the periodically recurring impurity of women has by no means died out
+to-day. Among a very large section of the women of the middle and lower
+classes of England and other countries it is firmly believed that the
+touch of a menstruating woman will contaminate; only a few years since,
+in the course of a correspondence on this subject in the _British
+Medical Journal_ (1878), even medical men were found to state from
+personal observation that they had no doubt whatever on this point.
+Thus, one doctor, who expressed surprise that any doubt could be thrown
+on the point, wrote, after quoting cases of spoiled hams, etc., presumed
+to be due to this cause, which had come under his own personal
+observation: 'For two thousand years the Italians have had this idea of
+menstruating women. We English hold to it, the Americans have it, also
+the Australians. Now, I should like to know the country where the
+evidence of any such observation is unknown.'" Evidently animism is a
+more persistent frame of mind than most people are inclined to believe.
+
+It is certain, however, that this conception of woman's nature is
+dominant in the lower stages of culture. She is spiritually dangerous,
+and the principle of 'taboo' is made to cover a great many of her
+relations to man. In Tahiti a woman was not allowed to touch the weapons
+or fishing implements of men. Amongst the Todas women are not permitted
+to touch the cattle. If a wife touches the food of her husband, among
+the Hindus, the food is unfit to be eaten. An Eskimo wife dare not eat
+with her husband. In New Zealand wives were not allowed to eat with the
+males lest their taboo should kill them. Many tribes are careful to
+refrain from contact with women before going to fight. They believe that
+this would rob them and their weapons of strength. Other practices
+followed by savages before going to war forbid one assuming that this
+abstention is due to any rational fear of dissipating their energies.
+Instead of conserving their strength they weaken themselves by the many
+privations they undergo before fighting, in order to ensure victory.
+Professor Frazer well says:--
+
+"When we observe what pains these misguided savages took to unfit
+themselves for the business of war by abstaining from food, denying
+themselves rest, and lacerating their bodies, we shall probably not be
+disposed to attribute their practice of continence in war to a rational
+fear of dissipating their bodily energies by indulgence in the lusts of
+the flesh."[72]
+
+The conception of woman as one heavily charged with supernatural
+potentialities, and, therefore, a source of danger to the community,
+seems to lie at the basis of the widespread belief in the religious
+'uncleanness' of women. The real significance of the word 'unclean' in
+religious ritual has been obscured by our modern use of it in a hygienic
+or ethical sense. In reality it is but an illustration of the principle
+of 'taboo,' and 'taboo' may extend to anything, good or bad, useful or
+useless, hygienically clean or unclean. The primary meaning of 'taboo,'
+a Polynesian word, is something that is set aside or forbidden. The
+field covered by this word among savage and semi-savage races is, as
+Robertson Smith points out, "very wide, for there is no part of life in
+which the savage does not feel himself surrounded by mysterious agencies
+and recognise the need of walking warily."[73] Anything may thus become
+the object of a 'taboo.' Weapons, food, animals, places, special
+relations of one person to another at certain times and under certain
+conditions. It is enough that some special or particular degree of
+supernatural influence is associated with the object in question. The
+ancient Jews, for example, in prohibiting the eating of swine's flesh,
+were as far as possible removed in their thought from any connection
+with dietetics. They were simply following the well-known savage custom
+that the totem of a tribe is sacred. The pig was a totem with many of
+the Semitic tribes, and must not, therefore, be eaten.[74] It was not an
+unclean animal, in the modern sense, it was a 'holy' animal. With the
+Syrians the dove was so holy that even to touch it made a man 'unclean'
+for a whole day. No North American Indian will eat of the flesh of an
+animal that is a tribal totem, except under grave necessity, and even
+then with elaborate religious ceremonies. So, "a prohibition to eat the
+flesh of an animal of a certain species, that has its ground not in
+natural loathing but in religious horror and reverence, implies that
+something divine is ascribed to every animal of the species. And what
+seems to us to be a natural loathing often turns out, in the case of
+primitive peoples, to be based on a religious _taboo_, and to have its
+origin not in feelings of contemptuous disgust, but of reverential
+dread."[75]
+
+The real significance of 'unclean' in connection with religious ritual
+is 'holy', something that partakes in a special manner of supernatural
+influence and therefore involves a certain danger in contact. As the
+writer just cited observes:--
+
+"The acts that cause uncleanness are exactly the same which among savage
+nations place a man under taboo.... These acts are often involuntary,
+and often innocent, or even necessary to society. The savage,
+accordingly, imposes a taboo on a woman in childbed, or during her
+courses ... simply because birth and everything connected with the
+propagation of the species on the one, and disease and death on the
+other hand, seem to involve the action of supernatural agencies of a
+dangerous kind. If he attempts to explain, he does so by supposing that
+on these occasions spirits of deadly power are present; at all events
+the persons involved seem to him to be sources of mysterious danger,
+which has all the characters of an infection, and may extend to other
+people unless due precautions are observed.... It has nothing to do with
+respect for the gods, but springs from mere terror of the supernatural
+influences associated with the woman's physical condition."[76]
+
+It is interesting to observe the manner in which this notion of the
+sacramentally 'unclean' nature of woman has affected her religious
+status, and by inference, her social status likewise. Among the
+Australians women are shut out from any part in the religious
+ceremonies. In the Sandwich Isles a woman's touch made a sacrifice
+unclean. If a Hindu woman touches a sacred image the divinity is
+destroyed. In Fiji women are excluded from the temples. The Papuans have
+the same custom. The Ainus of Japan allow a woman to prepare the
+sacrifice, but not to offer it. Women are excluded from many Mohammedan
+mosques. Among the Jews women have no part in the religious ceremonies.
+In the Christian Church women were excluded from the priestly office. A
+Council held at Auxerre at the end of the sixth century forbade women
+touching the Eucharist with their bare hands, and in various churches
+they were forbidden to approach the altar during Mass.[77] In the
+gospels Jesus forbids the woman to touch Him, after the resurrection,
+although Thomas was allowed to feel His wounds. "The Church of the
+Middle Ages did not hesitate to provide itself with eunuchs in order to
+supply cathedral choirs with the soprano tones inhering by nature in
+women alone."[78] The 'Churching' of women still in vogue has its origin
+in the same superstition that childbirth endows woman with a
+supernatural influence which must be removed in the interests of others.
+This ceremony was formerly called "The Order of the Purification of
+Women," and was read at the church door before the woman entered the
+building. Its connection with the ideas indicated above is obvious. The
+Tahitian practice of excluding women from intercourse with others for
+two or three weeks after childbirth, with similar practices amongst
+uncivilised peoples all over the world, led with various modifications
+up to the current practice of churching. They show that in the opinion
+of primitive peoples "a woman at and after childbirth is pervaded by a
+certain dangerous influence which can infect anything and anybody she
+touches; so that in the interests of the community it becomes necessary
+to seclude her from society for a while, until the virulence of the
+infection has passed away, when, after submitting to certain rites of
+purification, she is again free to mingle with her fellows."[79] The
+gradual change of this ceremony, from a getting rid of a dangerous
+supernatural infection to returning thanks for a natural danger passed,
+is on all fours with what takes place in other directions in relation to
+religious ideas and practices.
+
+The important part played by this conception of woman's nature may be
+traced in the fierce invective directed against her in the early
+Christian writings. Of course, by that time society had reached a stage
+when the primitive form of this belief had been outgrown, but ideas and
+attitudes of mind persist long after their originating conditions have
+disappeared. In this particular case we have the primitive idea
+expressed in a form suitable to altered circumstances, and the primitive
+feeling seeking new warranty in ethical or social considerations. But in
+the main the old notion is there. Woman is a creature threatening
+danger to man's spiritual welfare.[80] In this connection we may note
+an observation of Westermarck's during his residence among the country
+people of Morocco. He was struck, he says, with the superstitious fear
+the men had of women. They are supposed to be much better versed in
+magic, and therefore one ran greater danger in offending them. The
+curses of women are, generally, much more feared than those of men. To
+this we have a parallel in Christianity which so often revived and
+strengthened the lower religious beliefs. During the witch mania an
+overwhelming proportion of those charged with and executed for sorcery
+were women. As a matter of fact, women were more prone than men to
+credit themselves with possessing supernatural power. But the
+theological explanation was that the devil had more power over women
+than men. This was, obviously, a heritage from the primitive belief
+above described.[81]
+
+Another way in which religion becomes closely associated with sexualism
+is through the widely diffused phallic worship. The worship of the
+generative power in the form of stones, pillars, and carved
+representations of the male and female sexual organs plays an
+unquestionably important part in the history of religion, however hardly
+pressed it may have been by some enthusiastic theorisers. "The farther
+back we go," says Mr. Hargrave Jennings, "in the history of every
+country, the deeper we explore into all religions, ancient as well as
+modern, we stumble the more frequently upon the incessantly intensifying
+distinct traces of this supposedly indecent mystic worship."[82] On the
+lower Congo, says Sir H. H. Johnston:--
+
+"Phallic worship in various forms prevails. It is not associated with
+any rites that might be called particularly obscene; and on the coast,
+where manners and morals are particularly corrupt, the phallus cult is
+no longer met with. In the forests between Manyanga and Stanley Pool it
+is not rare to come upon a little rustic temple, made of palm fronds and
+poles, within which male and female figures, nearly or quite life size,
+may be seen, with disproportionate genital organs, the figures being
+intended to represent the male and female principle. Around these carved
+and painted statues are many offerings, plates, knives, and cloth, and
+frequently also the phallic symbol may be seen dangling from the
+rafters. There is not the slightest suspicion of obscenity in all this,
+and anyone qualifying this worship of the generative power as obscene
+does so hastily and ignorantly. It is a solemn mystery to the Congo
+native, a force but dimly understood, and, like all mysterious natural
+manifestations, it is a power that must be propitiated and persuaded to
+his good."[83]
+
+The Egyptian religion was permeated with phallicism. In India phallic
+worship is widely scattered. In Benares, the sacred city, "everywhere,
+in the temples, in the little shrines in the street, the emblem of the
+Creator is phallic." Symbols of the male and female sexual organs, the
+Lingam and the Yoni, have been objects of worship in India from the
+earliest times. With the Sakti ceremonies, Hindu religion dispenses with
+symbols, and devotion is paid to a naked woman selected for the
+occasion.[84] This worship of a nude female is a very familiar
+phenomenon in the history of religion. Some of the early Christian sects
+were said to have practised it, and it is a feature of some Russian
+religious sects to-day. The subject will be dealt with more fully
+hereafter.
+
+In ancient Rome, in the month of April, "when the fertilising powers of
+nature begin to operate, and its powers to be visibly developed, a
+festival in honour of Venus took place; in it the phallus was carried in
+a cart, and led in procession by the Roman ladies to the temple of Venus
+outside the Colline gate, and then presented by them to the sexual part
+of the goddess."[85] In the Greek Bacchic religious processions huge
+phalli were carried in a chariot drawn by bulls, and surrounded by women
+and girls singing songs of praise. Phallic worship was also associated
+with the cults of Dionysos and Eleusis. It is met with among the ancient
+Mexicans and Peruvians, and also among the North American tribes. The
+famous Black Stone of Mecca, to which religious honours are paid, is
+also said by authorities to be a phallic symbol. The stone set up by
+Jacob (Gen. xxviii. 18-9) falls into the same category. References to
+phallic worship may be found in many parts of the Bible, and
+authoritative writers like Mr. Hargrave Jennings and Major-General
+Forlong have not hesitated to assert that the god of the Jewish Ark was
+a sexual symbol. Seeing the extent to which phallic worship exists in
+other religions, it would be surprising did this not also exist in the
+early Jewish religion.
+
+In Christendom we have evidence of the perpetuation of the phallic cult
+in the decree of Mans, 1247, and of the Synod of Tours, 1396, against
+its practice. Quite unsuccessfully, however. Indeed, the architecture of
+medieval churches bear in their ornamentation numerous evidences of the
+failure at suppression. Of course, much of this ornamentation may have
+been due to mere imitation, but often enough it was deliberate. "The
+scholar," says Bonwick, "who gazed to-day at the roof of Temple Church,
+London, had the illustration before him. A symbol there, repeatedly
+displayed, is the popular Hindu one to express sex worship."[86] The
+belief found expression in other ways than ornamentation. When Sir
+William Hamilton visited Naples in 1781 he found in Isernia a Christian
+custom in vogue which he described in a letter to Sir William Banks, and
+which admitted of no doubt as to its Priapic character. Every September
+was celebrated a festival in the Church of SS. Cosmus and Damianus.
+During the progress of the festival vendors paraded the streets offering
+small waxen phalli, which were bought by the devout and placed in the
+church, much as candles are still purchased and given. At the same time,
+prayers are offered to St. Como by those who desire children. In
+Midlothian, in 1268, the clergy instructed their flock to sprinkle water
+with a dog's phallus in order to avert a murrain. The same practice
+existed in Inverkeithing, and in Easter week priest and people danced
+round a wooden phallus.[87] Mr. Westropp, quoting an eighteenth-century
+writer,[88] says: "When the Huguenots took Embrun, they found among the
+relics of the principal church a Priapus, of three pieces in the ancient
+fashion, the top of which was worn away from being constantly washed
+with wine." The temple of St. Eutropius, destroyed by the Huguenots, is
+said to have contained a similar figure. From Mr. Sidney Hartland's
+collection of practices for obtaining children I take the following:--
+
+"At Bourg-Dieu, in the diocese of Bourges, a similar saint" (similar to
+the priapean figure previously described) "was called Guerlichon or
+Greluchon. There after nine days' devotions women stretched themselves
+on the horizontal figure of the saint, and then scraped the phallus for
+mixture in water as a drink. Other saints were worshipped elsewhere in
+France with equivalent rites. Down to the Revolution there stood at
+Brest a chapel of Saint Guignolet containing a priapean statue of the
+holy man. Women who were, or feared to be, sterile used to go and scrape
+a little of the prominent member, which they put into a glass of water
+from the well and drank. The same practice was followed at the Chapel of
+Saint Pierre-à-Croquettes in Brabant until 1837, when the archæologist
+Schayes called attention to it, and thereupon the ecclesiastical
+authorities removed the cause of scandal. Women have, however, still
+continued to make votive offerings of pins down almost, if not quite, to
+the present day. At Antwerp stood at the gateway to the Church of Saint
+Walburga in the Rue des Pêcheurs a statue, the sexual organ of which
+had been entirely scraped away by women for the same purpose."[89]
+
+From what has been said, it will not be difficult to understand the
+existence of the custom of religious prostitution. Considering the
+sexual impulse as specially connected with a supernatural force, man
+pays it religious honour, and comes to identify its manifestations as an
+expression of the supernatural and also as an act of worship towards it.
+In India the practice existed, when most temples had their 'bayadères.'
+In ancient Chaldea every woman was compelled to prostitute herself once
+in her life in the temple of the goddess Mylitta--the Chaldean Venus.
+This custom existed elsewhere, and by it the woman was compelled to
+remain within the temple enclosures until some man chose her, from whom
+she received a piece of money. The money, of course, belonged to the
+temple.[90] In Greece, Carthage, Syria, etc., we find the same custom.
+Among the Jews, so orthodox a commentary as Smith's _Bible Dictionary_
+admits that the 'Kadechim' attached to the temple were prostitutes. The
+frequent references to the service of the 'groves' surrounding the
+temple irresistibly suggest their likeness to the groves around the
+temples of Mylitta, and their use for the same purpose.
+
+There is no necessity to prolong the subject,[91] nor is it necessary to
+my purpose to discuss the origin of phallic worship. It is enough to
+have shown the manner in which, from the very earliest times, religious
+belief and sexual phenomena have been connected in the closest possible
+manner. In this respect it is only on all fours with the relation of
+religion to phenomena in general, but here the attitude of mind is
+accentuated and prolonged by the startling facts of sexual development.
+The connection becomes consequently so close it is not surprising to
+find that the association has persisted down to the present time, and
+moods that have their origin in the sexual life are frequently
+attributed to religious influences. The primitive intelligence, frankly
+seeing in the phenomena of sex a manifestation of the supernatural, sees
+here a continuous endorsement of religious life. The more sophisticated
+mind raised above this point of view continues, with modifications, the
+primitive practices, and in ignorance of the physiological causes of its
+own states is only too ready to interpret ebullitions of sex feeling as
+evidence of the divine.
+
+
+NOTE TO PAGE 104.
+
+      It is strange that so little attention has been paid to
+      these primitive beliefs as important factors in determining
+      the social position of women. It is too generally assumed
+      that because woman is physically weaker than man it is her
+      weakness that has determined her subordination. Both the
+      advocates and the opponents of 'Woman's Rights' appear to
+      have reached a common agreement on this point. During some
+      of the debates in the House of Commons, for example, it was
+      openly stated by prominent politicians, as an axiom of
+      political philosophy, that all laws rest upon a basis of
+      force, and if men say they will not obey woman-made laws
+      there is no power that can compel them to do so. On the
+      other side, women, while appealing to what they properly
+      call higher considerations, themselves dwell upon the
+      physical weakness of woman as the reason for her
+      subordination in the past. Both parties are helped in their
+      arguments by the facile division of social history into two
+      periods, an earlier one in which club law plays the chief
+      part, and a later period when mental and moral qualities
+      assume a dominating position. The consequence is, runs the
+      argument, that each sex has to battle with the dead weight
+      of tradition and custom. The woman is oppressed by the
+      tradition of subordination to the male; the man is inspired
+      by that of dominance over the female.
+
+      It is when we ask for evidence of this that we see how
+      flimsy the case is. Social phenomena in either civilised or
+      uncivilised society furnishes no proof that institutions
+      and customs rest upon a basis of physical force. The
+      rulership of a tribe often rests with the old men of a
+      tribe; with some tribes the women are consulted, and
+      invariably custom and tradition plays a powerful part. The
+      notion that the primitive chief is the primitive strong man
+      of the tribe is as baseless as the belief in an original
+      social contract, and owes its existence to the same kind of
+      fanciful speculation. As Frazer says, "it is one of those
+      facile theories which the arm-chair philosopher concocts
+      with his feet on the fender without taking the trouble to
+      consult the facts." The primitive chief may be a strong
+      man. The tribal council or chief may use force or rely upon
+      physical force to enforce certain decrees, just as the
+      modern king or parliament may call on the help of policeman
+      or soldier, but this no more proves that their rule is
+      based upon force than Mr. Asquith's premiership proves his
+      physical superiority to the rest of the Cabinet.
+
+All political life, and to a smaller degree all social life, involves
+the direction of force, but neither appeal to force for an ultimate
+justification, nor do social institutions originate in an act of force.
+It is one of the commonplaces of historical study that when an
+institution is actually forced upon a people it very quickly becomes
+inoperative. Other things equal, one group of people may overcome
+another group because of physical superiority, but the conquest over,
+the question as to which group shall really rule, or which set of
+institutions shall survive, is settled on quite different grounds. The
+history of almost any country will give examples of the absorption of
+the conqueror by the conquered, and the bringing of imported
+institutions into line with native life and feeling. Fundamentally the
+relations binding people together into a society are not physical, but
+psychological. Society rests upon the foundations of a common mental
+life--upon sympathy, beliefs, the desire for companionship, etc. As
+Professor J. M. Baldwin puts it, the fundamental social facts are not
+_things_, but _thoughts_.[92] As a member of a social group man is born
+into an environment that is essentially psychological, and his attitude
+not only towards his fellow human beings, but towards nature in general,
+is determined by the psychological contents of the society to which he
+belongs.
+
+Now if the relation of one man to another is not determined by physical
+superiority and inferiority, if the relations of classes within a
+society are not determined in this manner, why should it be assumed that
+as a sex woman's position is fixed by this means? It seems more
+reasonable to assume that some other principle than that of club law, a
+principle set in operation very early in the history of civilisation,
+fixed the main lines upon which the relations of the sexes were to
+develop, however much other forces helped its operation. I believe this
+desired factor is to be found in the superstitious notions savages
+develop concerning the nature and function of woman, and which society
+only very slowly outgrows. For, as Frazer says: "The continuity of human
+development has been such that most, if not all, of the great
+institutions which still form the framework of a civilised society have
+their roots in savagery, and have been handed down to us in these later
+days through countless generations, assuming new outward forms in the
+process of transmission, but remaining in their inmost core
+substantially unchanged."
+
+In considering the play of primitive ideas as determining the lines of
+human evolution several things must be kept clearly in mind. One is that
+the course of biological development has made woman, as a sex, dependent
+upon man, as a sex, for protection and support. This is true quite apart
+from economic considerations or from those arising from the relative
+physical strength of the sexes. The prime function of woman,
+biologically, is that of motherhood. She is, so to speak, mother in a
+much more important and more pervasive sense than man is father. In the
+case of woman, her functions are of necessity subordinated to this one.
+With man this is not the case. It is with the woman that the nutrition
+of the child rests before birth, and a large portion of her strength is
+expended in the discharge of this function. The same is true for some
+period immediately after birth. Again to use a biological illustration,
+during the period of child-bearing and child-rearing the relation of the
+man to the woman may be likened to that which exists between the germ
+cells and the somatic cells. As the latter is the medium of protection
+and the conveyer of nutrition in relation to the former, so it falls to
+the male to protect and in some degree to provide for the woman as
+child-bearer. It would not, of course, be impossible for woman to
+provide for herself, but it would detract so considerably from social
+efficiency that any group in which it was done would soon disappear. It
+is the nature and supreme function of woman that makes her dependent
+upon man. And even though the dreams of some were realised, and society
+as a whole cared for woman in the discharge of this function, the issue
+would not be changed. It would mean that instead of a woman being
+dependent upon one man she would be dependent upon all men. Nor are the
+substantial facts of the situation changed by anyone pointing out that
+all women do not and cannot under ordinary circumstances become wives
+and mothers. Human nature will always develop on the lines of the normal
+functions of men and women, and there can be no question in this case as
+to what these are.
+
+I have used the word 'dependence,' but this does not, of necessity,
+involve either subordination or subjection. It may provide the condition
+of either or of both, but the dependence of the woman on the man is, as
+I have said, biologically inescapable. Her subjection is quite another
+question. Dependence may be mutual. One class of society may be
+dependent upon another class, but the two may move on a perfect level of
+equality. And with uncivilised peoples the evidence goes to prove that,
+while the spheres of the sexes are more clearly differentiated than with
+us, this difference is seldom if ever expressed in terms of superior and
+inferior. Savages would say, as civilised people still say, there are
+many things that it is wrong for a woman to do, and they would add there
+are also things that a man must not do. They would be as shocked at
+woman doing certain things as some people among ourselves were when
+women first began to speak at public meetings. Their disapproval would
+not rest on the ground that these things were 'unwomanly', nor upon any
+question of weakness or strength, of inferiority or superiority, but for
+another and, to the savage, very urgent reason.
+
+One can very easily exaggerate the extent of the subjection of women
+among uncivilised people. As a matter of fact, it usually is
+exaggerated. Not all travellers are capable of accurate observation, and
+very many are led astray by what are really superficial aspects of
+savage life. They are so impressed by the contemplation of a state of
+affairs different from our own that they mistake mere lines of
+demarcation for a moral valuation. Many travellers, for example,
+observing that women are strictly forbidden to do this or that, conclude
+that the woman has no rights as against the man. As in nearly all these
+cases the man is as strictly forbidden to encroach on the woman's
+sphere, one might as reasonably reverse the statement and dwell upon
+male subjection. As a matter of fact, both furnish examples of the
+all-powerful principle of 'taboo.' Some things are taboo to the man,
+others to the woman. And the key to the problem lies in the nature and
+origin of these taboos. But taboo does not extinguish rights; it
+confirms them. Under its operation, far from its being the truth that
+women are without status or rights or power, her position and rights are
+clearly marked, generally recognised, and quickly enforced. Some
+examples of this may be noted.
+
+A Kaffir woman when ill-treated possesses the right of asylum with her
+parents, and remains there until the husband makes atonement. The same
+thing holds of the West African Fulahs. In the Marquesas a woman is
+prohibited the use of canoes; on the other hand, men are prohibited
+frequenting certain places belonging to the women. In Nicaragua no man
+may enter the woman's market-place under penalty of a beating. With most
+of the North-American tribes a woman has supreme power inside the lodge.
+The husband possesses no power of interference. In most cases the
+husband cannot give away anything belonging to the lodge without first
+getting the consent of his wife. With the Nootkas, women are consulted
+on all matters of business. Livingstone relates his surprise on finding
+that a native would not accompany him on a journey because he could not
+get his wife's consent. He found this to be one of the customs of the
+tribe to which the man belonged. Among the Kandhs of India nothing
+public is done without consulting the women. In the Pellew Islands the
+head of the family can do nothing of importance without consulting the
+oldest female relative. Among the Hottentots women have supreme rule in
+the house. If a man oversteps the line, his female relatives inflict a
+fine, which is paid to the wife. With the Bechuanas the mother of the
+chief is present at all councils, and he can hardly decide anything
+without her consent. These are only a few of the cases that might be
+cited, but they are sufficient to show that the common view of women
+among savages as without recognised status, or power, needs very serious
+qualification. Of course, ill-treatment of women does occur with
+uncivilised as with civilised people, and she may suffer from the
+expression of brutal passion or superior strength, but an examination of
+the facts justifies Starcke's opinion that "we are not justified in
+assuming that the savage feels a contempt for women in virtue of her
+sex."
+
+In primitive life, in short, the dominant idea is not that of
+superiority in relation to woman, but that of difference. She is
+different from man, and this difference involves consequences of the
+gravest character, and against which due precautions must be taken.
+Superiority and inferiority are much later conceptions; they belong to a
+comparatively civilised period, and their development offers an
+admirable example of the way in which customs based on sheer
+superstitions become transformed into a social prejudice, with the
+consequent creation of numerous excuses for their perpetuation. What
+that initial prejudice is--a prejudice so powerful that it largely
+determines the future status of woman--has already been pointed out. Her
+place in society is marked out in uncivilised times by the powerful
+superstitions connected with sexual functions. Not that she is
+weaker--although that is, of course, plain--nor that she is inferior, a
+thought which scarcely exists with uncivilised peoples, but that she is
+dangerous, particularly so during her functional crises and in
+childbirth. And being dangerous, because charged with a supernatural
+influence inimical to others, she is excluded from certain occupations,
+and contact with her has to be carefully regulated. I agree with Mr.
+Andrew Lang that in the regulations concerning women amongst uncivilised
+people we have another illustration of the far-reaching principle of
+taboo (_Social Origins and Primal Law_, p. 239) she suffers because of
+her sex, and because of the superstitious dread to which her sex nature
+gives birth.
+
+Of course, at a later stage other considerations begin to operate.
+Where, for example, as amongst the Kaffirs, women are not permitted to
+touch cattle because of this assumed spiritual infection, and where a
+man's wealth is measured by the cattle he possesses, it is easy to see
+that this would constitute a force preventing the political and social
+equality of the sexes. The pursuits from which women were primarily
+excluded for purely religious reasons would in course of time come to be
+looked upon as man's inalienable possessions. And here her physical
+weakness would play its part; for she could not take, as man could
+withhold, by force. Even when the primitive point of view is discarded,
+the social prejudices engendered by it long remains. And social
+prejudices, as we all know, are the hardest of all things to destroy.
+
+A final consideration needs to be stated. This is that the customs
+determined by the views of woman (above outlined) fall into line, in a
+rough-and-ready fashion, with the biological tendency to consecrate the
+female to the function of motherhood and conserve her energies to that
+end, leaving other kinds of work to the male. It would be an obvious
+advantage to a tribe in which woman, relieved from the necessity of
+physical struggle for food and defence, was able to attend to children
+and the more peaceful side of family life. Children would not only
+benefit thereby, but the home with all its civilising, humanising
+influences would develop more rapidly. Assuming variations in tribal
+life in this direction, there is no question as to which tribe that
+would stand the better chance of survival. The development of life has
+proceeded here as elsewhere by differentiation and specialisation; and
+while the tasks demanding the more sustained physical exertions were
+left to man, and to the performance of which his sexual nature offered
+no impediment, woman became more and more specialised for maternity and
+domestic occupations. This, I hasten to add, is not at all intended as a
+plea for denying to women the right to participate in the wider social
+life of the species. I am trying to explain a social phase, and neither
+justifying nor condemning its perpetuation.
+
+
+FOOTNOTES:
+
+[65] Dr. Iwan Bloch, _The Sexual Life of Our Time_, p. 97.
+
+[66] E. D. Starbuck, _The Psychology of Religion_, p. 401.
+
+[67] _The Psychological Phenomena of Christianity_, p. 419.
+
+[68] _Primitive Paternity_, 2 vols., 1909-10.
+
+[69] _The Mystic Rose_, p. 191.
+
+[70] See Frazer's _Taboo and the Perils of the Soul_, pp. 145-63, and
+Crawley's _Mystic Rose_.
+
+[71] _Man and Woman_, p. 15.
+
+[72] _Taboo_, pp. 163-4.
+
+[73] _Religion of the Semites_, p. 142.
+
+[74] A long list of animals that were sacred to various Semitic tribes
+has been compiled by Robertson Smith, _Kinship and Marriage in Early
+Arabia_, pp. 194-201.
+
+[75] Robertson Smith, _Kinship and Marriage in Early Arabia_, pp. 306-7.
+
+[76] _Religion of the Semites_, pp. 427-9. For a fuller discussion of
+the subject, see _Studies in the Psychology of Sex_, by Havelock Ellis,
+1901.
+
+[77] Westermarck, _Origin and Development of the Moral Ideas_, p. 666.
+
+[78] Westermarck, p. 666.
+
+[79] Frazer, _Taboo_, p. 150.
+
+[80] See the Rev. Principal Donaldson's _Woman: her Position and
+Influence in Ancient Greece and Rome, and among the Early Christians_,
+bk. iii.
+
+[81] For the general influence of these beliefs about woman in
+determining her social position, see note at the end of this chapter.
+
+[82] _The Worship of Priapus_, Pref. p. 9.
+
+[83] _The River Congo_, p. 405.
+
+[84] A description of the Sakti ceremony is given by Major-General
+Forlong, _Faiths of Man_, iii. pp. 228-9.
+
+[85] Westropp, _Primitive Symbolism_, p. 30.
+
+[86] _Egyptian Belief and Modern Thought_, p. 256.
+
+[87] Forlong, _Faiths of Man_, iii. p. 66.
+
+[88] _Primitive Symbolism_, p. 36.
+
+[89] _Primitive Paternity_, i. pp. 63-4.
+
+[90] Major-General Forlong agrees with many other authorities in tracing
+our custom of kissing under the mistletoe to this ancient practice. "The
+mistletoe," he says, "marks in one sense Venus's temple, for any girl
+may be kissed if caught under its sprays--a practice, though modified,
+which recalls to us that horrid one mentioned by Herodotus, where all
+women were for once at least the property of the man who sought them in
+Mylitta's temple."--_Rivers of Life_, i. p. 91.
+
+[91] Those who desire further and more detailed information may consult
+Forlong's great work, _The Rivers of Life_, Payne Knight's _Worship of
+Priapus_, Westropp and Wake's _Phallicism in Ancient Religion_, Brown's
+_Dionysiak Myth_, Westropp's _Primitive Symbolism_, R. A. Campbell's
+_Phallic Worship_, Hargrave Jennings's _Worship of Priapus_, etc.
+
+[92] A good discussion of the topic will be found in this author's
+_Social and Ethical Interpretations in Mental Development_.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER FIVE
+
+THE INFLUENCE OF SEXUAL AND PATHOLOGIC STATES ON RELIGIOUS BELIEF
+
+
+In the preceding chapter we have been concerned with the various ways in
+which the phenomena attendant on the sexual life of man and woman become
+associated with religious beliefs. As a force that arises in the life of
+each individual, and intrudes, as it were, into consciousness, the
+phenomena of sex fill primitive man with an amazement that is not
+unmixed with terror. In strict accord with primitive psychology sexual
+phenomena are conceived as more or less connected with the supernatural
+world, and becoming thus entwined with religious convictions are made
+the nucleus of a number of superstitious ceremonies. The connection is
+close and obvious so long as we restrict our survey to uncivilised
+humanity. The only room for doubt or discussion is the exact meaning of
+certain ceremonies, or the order of certain phases of development. It is
+when we take man in a more advanced stage that obscurity gathers and
+difficulties arise. The sexual life is no longer lived, as it were,
+openly. Symbolism and mysticism develop; a more complex social life
+provides disguised outlets for primitive and indestructible feelings.
+Sexualism, instead of being something to be glorified, and, so to speak,
+annotated by religious ceremonies, becomes something to be hidden or
+decried. Ignored it may be. Decried it may be; but it will not be
+denied. That is a practical impossibility in the case of so powerful and
+so pervasive a fact as sex. We may disguise its expression, but only too
+often the disguise is the equivalent of undesirable and unhealthy
+manifestations.
+
+The modern history of religion offers a melancholy illustration of the
+truth of the last sentence, and it is quite clearly exhibited in the
+history of Christianity itself. From the beginning it strove to suppress
+the power of sexual feeling. It was an enemy against whom one had to be
+always on guard, one that had to be crushed, or at least kept in
+subjection in the interests of spiritual development. And yet the very
+intensity of the efforts at suppression defeated the object aimed at.
+With some of the leaders of early Christianity sex became an obsession.
+Long dwelling upon its power made them unduly and unhealthily conscious
+of its presence. Instead of sex taking its place as one of the facts of
+life, which like most other facts might be good or bad as circumstances
+determined, it was so much dwelt upon as to often dwarf everything else.
+Asceticism is, after all, mainly a reversed sensualism, or at least
+confesses the existence of a sensualism that must not be allowed
+expression lest its manifestation becomes overpowering. Mortification
+confesses the supremacy of sense as surely as gratification. Moreover,
+mortification of sense as preached by the great ascetics does not
+prevent that most dangerous of all forms of gratification, the
+sensualism of the imagination. That remains, and is apt to gain in
+strength since the fundamentally healthful energies are denied
+legitimate and natural modes of expression. Thus it is that we find
+developing social life not always providing a healthy outlet for the
+sexual life, and thus it is that the intense striving of religious
+leaders against the power of the sexual impulse has often forced it into
+strange and harmful forms of expression. So we find throughout the
+history of religion, not only that a deal of what has passed for
+supernatural illumination to have undoubtedly had its origin in
+perverted sexual feeling, but the constant emergence of curious
+religio-erotic sects whose strange mingling of eroticism and religion
+has scandalised many, and offered a lesson to all had they but possessed
+the wit to discern it.
+
+Although there is an understandable disinclination, amounting with some
+to positive revulsion, to recognise the sexual origin of much that
+passes for religious fervour, the fact is well known to competent
+medical observers, as the following citations will show. More than a
+generation since a well-known medical authority said:--
+
+"I know of no fact in pathology more striking and more terrifying than
+the way in which the phenomena of the ecstatic--which have often been
+seized upon by sentimental theorisers as proofs of spiritual
+exaltation--may be plainly seen to bridge the gulf between the innocent
+foolery of ordinary hypnotic patients and the degraded and repulsive
+phenomena of nymphomania and satyriasis."[93]
+
+Dr. C. Norman also observes:--
+
+"Ecstasy, as we see in cases of acute mental disease, is probably always
+connected with sexual excitement, if not with sexual depravity. The same
+association is seen in less extreme cases, and one of the commonest
+features in the conversation of acutely maniacal women is the
+intermingling of erotic and religious ideas."[94]
+
+This opinion is fully endorsed by Sir Francis Galton:--
+
+"It has been noticed that among the morbid organic conditions which
+accompany the show of excessive piety and religious rapture in the
+insane, none are so frequent as disorders of the sexual organisation.
+Conversely, the frenzies of religious revivals have not infrequently
+ended in gross profligacy. The encouragement of celibacy by the fervent
+leaders of most creeds, utilises in an unconscious way the morbid
+connection between an over-restraint of the sexual desires and impulses
+towards extreme devotion."[95]
+
+Dr. Auguste Forel, the eminent German specialist, points out that--
+
+"When we study the religious sentiment profoundly, especially in the
+Christian religion, and Catholicism in particular, we find at each step
+its astonishing connection with eroticism. We find it in the exalted
+adoration of holy women, such as Mary Magdalene, Marie de Bethany, for
+Jesus, in the holy legends, in the worship of the Virgin Mary in the
+Middle Ages, and especially in art. The ecstatic Madonnas in our art
+galleries cast their fervent regards on Jesus or on the heavens. The
+expression in Murillo's 'Immaculate Conception' may be interpreted by
+the highest voluptuous exaltation of love as well as by holy
+transfiguration. The 'saints' of Correggio regard the Virgin with an
+amorous ardour which may be celestial, but appears in reality extremely
+terrestrial and human."[96]
+
+Another German authority remarks:--
+
+"I venture to express my conviction that we should rarely err if, in a
+case of religious melancholy, we assumed the sexual apparatus to be
+implicated."[97]
+
+Dr. Bevan Lewis points out how frequently religious exaltation occurs
+with women at puberty, and religious melancholia at the period of sexual
+decline. And Dr. Charles Mercier puts the interchangeability of sexual
+and religious feelings in the following passage:--
+
+"Religious observances provide an alternative, into which the amatory
+instinct can be easily and naturally diverted. The emotions and
+instinctive desires, which finds expression in courtship, is a vast body
+of vague feeling, which is at first undirected.... It is a voluminous
+state of exaltation that demands enthusiastic action. This is the state
+antecedent to falling in love, and if an object presents himself or
+herself, the torrent of emotion is directed into amatory passion. But if
+no object appears, or if the selected object is denied, then religious
+observances yield a very passable substitute for the expression of the
+emotion. Religious observances provide the sensuous atmosphere, the call
+for self-renunciation, the means of expressing powerful and voluminous
+feeling, that the potential or disappointed lover needs. The madrigal is
+transformed into the hymn; the adornment of the person that should have
+gone to allure the beloved now takes the shape of ecclesiastical
+vestments; the reverence that should have been paid to the loved one is
+transformed to a higher object; the enthusiasm that would have expanded
+in courtship is expressed in worship; the gifts that would have been
+made, the services that would have been rendered to the loved one, are
+transferred to the Church."[98]
+
+Dr. Krafft-Ebing, after dwelling upon the substantial identity of sexual
+love and religious emotion, summarises his conclusions by saying:--
+
+"Religious and sexual hyperæsthesia at the acme of development show the
+same volume of intensity and the same quality of excitement, and may,
+therefore, under given circumstances interchange. Both will in certain
+pathologic states degenerate into cruelty."[99]
+
+Even so orthodox a writer as the Rev. S. Baring-Gould points out that--
+
+"The existence of that evil, which, knowing the constitution of man, we
+should expect to find prevalent in mysticism, the experience of all ages
+has shown following, dogging its steps inevitably. So slight is the film
+that separates religion from sensual passion, that uncontrolled
+spiritual fervour roars readily into a blaze of licentiousness."[100]
+
+No useful purpose would be served by lengthening this list of citations.
+Enough has been said to show that the point of view expressed is one
+endorsed by many sober, competent, and responsible observers. There
+exists among them a general, and one may add a growing, recognition of
+the important truth that the connection between religious and sexual
+feeling is of the closest character, and that one is very often mistaken
+for the other. Asceticism, usually taken as evidence to the reverse, is
+on the contrary, confirmative. The ascetic often presents us with a
+flagrant case of eroto-mania, expressing itself in terms of religion.
+It is highly significant that the biographies of Christian saints should
+furnish so many cases of men and women of strong sensual passions, and
+whose ascetic devotion was only the reaction from almost unbridled
+sensualism. No wonder that in the temptations experienced by the monks
+the figures of nude women so often appeared before their heated
+imaginations. Sexual feeling suppressed in one direction broke out in
+another. Feelings, in themselves perfectly normal, became, as a
+consequence of repression and misdirection, pathologic. And one
+consequence of this was that many of the early Christian writers brought
+to the consideration of the subject of sex a concentration of mind that
+resulted in disquisitions of such a nature that it is impossible to do
+more than refer to them. The sexual relation instead of being refined
+was coarsened. Marriage was viewed in its lowest form, more as a
+concession to the weakness of the flesh than as a desirable state for
+all men and women. Nor can it be said, after many centuries, that these
+ideas are quite eradicated from present-day life.
+
+A field of investigation that yields much illuminating information is
+the biographies of the saints and of other religious characters. In many
+of these cases the acceptance of sexual feeling for religious
+illumination is very clear. Thus of St. Gertrude, a Benedictine nun of
+the thirteenth century, we read:--
+
+"One day at chapel she heard supernaturally sung the words, '_Sanctus,
+Sanctus, Sanctus_.' The Son of God, leaning towards her like a sweet
+lover, and giving to her soul the softest kiss, said to her at the
+second _Sanctus_, 'In the _Sanctus_ addressed to My person, receive with
+this all the sanctity of My divinity and of My humanity.'... And the
+following Sunday, while she was thanking God for this favour, behold the
+Son of God, more beauteous than thousands of angels, takes her to His
+arms as if He were proud of her, and presents her to God the Father, and
+in that perfection of sanctity with which He had endowed her."[101]
+
+Of Juliana of Norwich, who was granted a revelation in 1373, we are told
+that she had for long 'ardently desired' a bodily sight of the Lord upon
+the cross; and that finally Jesus appeared to her and said, "I love thee
+and thou lovest Me, and our love shall never be disparted in two."[102]
+So, again, in the case of Sister Jeanne des Anges, Superior of the
+Convent of Ursulines of Loudun, and the principal character in the
+famous Grandier witchcraft case, we have a detailed account, in her own
+words, of the lascivious dreams, unclean suggestions, etc.--all
+attributed to Satan--and alternating with impressions of bodily union
+with Jesus.[103] Marie de L'Incarnation addresses Jesus as follows:--
+
+"Oh, my love, when shall I embrace you? Have you no pity on the torments
+that I suffer? Alas! alas! My love! My beauty! My life! Instead of
+healing my pain, you take pleasure in it. Come, let me embrace you, and
+die in your sacred arms."[104]
+
+Veronica Juliani, beatified by Pope Pius II., took a real lamb to bed
+with her, kissed it, and suckled it at her breasts. St. Catherine of
+Genoa threw herself on the ground to cool herself, crying out, "Love,
+love, I can bear it no longer." She also confessed to a peculiar
+longing towards her confessor.[105]
+
+The blessed Mary Alacoque, foundress of the Sacred Heart, was subject
+from early life to a number of complaints--rheumatism, palsy, pains in
+the side, ulceration of the legs--and experienced visions early in her
+career. As a child she had so vivid a sense of modesty that the mere
+sight of a man offended her. At seventeen she took to wearing a knotted
+cord drawn so tightly that she could neither eat nor breathe without
+pain. She compressed her arms so tightly with iron chains that she could
+not remove them without anguish. "I made," she says, "a bed of
+potsherds, on which I slept with extreme pleasure." She fasted and
+tortured herself in a variety of ways, and the more her physical
+disorders increased the more numerous became her visions. Before she was
+eighteen years of age, in 1671, she entered a nunnery. From the time she
+donned the habit of a novice she was 'blessed' with visions. "Our Lord
+showed me that that day was the day of our spiritual wedding; He
+forthwith gave me to understand that He wished to make me taste all the
+sweetness of the caresses of His love. In reality, those divine caresses
+were from that moment so excessive, that they often put me out of
+myself." "Once," says one of her biographers, "having retired into her
+chamber, she threw off the clothes with which she had bedecked herself
+during the day, when the Son of God showed Himself to her in the state
+in which He was after His cruel flagellation--that is, with His body all
+wounded, torn, gory--and He said to her that it was her vanities that
+had brought Him into that condition." In one of these visions Jesus
+took the head of Mary, pressed it to His bosom, spoke to her in
+passionate words, opened her side and took out her heart, plunged it
+into His own, and then replaced it. He then explained His design of
+founding the Order of the Sacred Heart. Ever after, Mary was conscious
+of a pain in her side and a burning sensation in her chest--two plain
+symptoms of hysteria.[106]
+
+Santa Teresa, who died at the early age of thirty-three, and in whose
+family more than one case of well-developed neurasthenia can be traced,
+was favoured with 'messages' at a very early age. She believed some of
+these were temptations from the devil suggesting an 'honourable
+alliance.' A nervous breakdown followed directly after entrance into a
+convent. She was then twenty years of age, was subject to fainting fits
+and longed for illness as a sign of divine favour. She was subject to
+convulsions, and soon after taking the veil fell into a cataleptic
+trance, which lasted three days. She was thought to be dead, but at the
+end of the time sat up and told those around that she had visited both
+heaven and hell, and seen the joys of the blessed and the torments of
+the damned. It is at least suggestive that, in spite of the longing for
+personal communion with Jesus, her first experience of the ecstasy of
+divine love was experienced after discovering a 'very realistic' picture
+of a martyred saint--St. Joseph. The significance of the intense
+contemplation of a tortured body--possibly made by one whose sexual
+nature was undergoing a process of suppression--is unmistakable.[107]
+
+On these and similar cases Professor William James makes the following
+comment:--
+
+"To the medical mind these ecstasies signify nothing but suggested
+hypnoid states, on an intellectual basis of superstition, and a
+corporeal one of degeneration and hysteria. Undoubtedly these
+pathological conditions have existed in many and possibly in all the
+cases, but that fact tells us nothing about the value for knowledge of
+the consciousness which they induce. To pass a spiritual judgment upon
+these states, we must not content ourselves with superficial medical
+talk, but enquire into their fruits for life."[108]
+
+Now the question is really not what these ecstasies suggest to the
+'medical mind,' as though that were a type of mind quite unfitted to
+pass judgment. It is a question of what the facts suggest to any mind
+judging the behaviour of a person under the influence of strong
+religious emotion exactly as it would judge anyone under any other
+strong emotional pressure. And if it be possible to explain these states
+in terms of known physiological and mental action, what warranty have we
+for rejecting this and preferring in its stead an explanation that is
+both unprovable and unnecessary? And one would be excused for thinking
+that cases which certainly involve some sort of abnormal nervous action
+are precisely those in which the medical mind should be called on to
+express an opinion. What is meant by passing 'a spiritual judgment'
+upon these states is not exactly clear, unless it means judging them in
+terms of the historic supernatural interpretation. But that is precisely
+the interpretation which is challenged by the 'medical mind.'
+
+I do not see how any enquiry "into their fruits for life" can affect a
+rational estimate of the nature of these mystical states. Mysticism adds
+nothing to the native disposition of a person. It merely gives their
+energies a new turn, a new direction. What they were before the
+experience they remain, substantially, afterwards. That is why we find
+religious mystics of every variety. Some energetically practical; others
+dreamily unpractical. Professor James admits this in saying that "the
+other-worldliness encouraged by the mystical consciousness makes this
+over-abstraction from practical life peculiarly liable to befall mystics
+in whom the character is naturally passive and the intellect feeble; but
+in natively strong minds and characters we find quite opposite
+results."[109] And when it is further admitted that "the mystical
+feeling of enlargement, union, and emancipation has no specific
+intellectual content whatever of its own," but "is capable of forming
+matrimonial alliances with material furnished by the most diverse
+philosophies and theologies, provided only they can find a place in
+their framework for its peculiar emotional mood," mysticism seems
+reduced to an emotional development on all fours with emotional
+development in other directions. It is not peculiar to religious minds
+because "it has no specific intellectual content." It is amorphous, so
+to speak. And it may form diverse 'matrimonial alliances' precisely
+because it does not point to a hidden world of reality, but is merely
+indicative of tense emotional moods. In the face of nature the
+non-theistic Richard Jeffries experiences all the feelings of mental
+enlargement and emotional transports that Mary Alacoque or Santa Teresa
+experienced in their visions of the 'Risen Christ.'
+
+It is idle, then, to sneer at 'medical materialism,' and stigmatise it
+as superficial. Many people are constitutionally afraid of words, and
+there is nothing that arouses prejudice so quickly as a name. But it is
+really not a question of materialism, medical or non-medical. It is a
+mere matter of applying knowledge and common sense to the cases before
+us. Are we to take the subject's explanation of his or her mental states
+as authoritative, so far as their nature is concerned; or are we to
+treat them as symptoms demanding the skilled analysis of the specialist?
+If the former, how can we differentiate between the mystic and the
+admittedly hysterical patient? If the latter, what ground is there for
+placing the mystic in a category of his own? Rational and scientific
+analysis will certainly take far more notice of the nature of the
+feelings excited than of the object towards which they are directed.
+Here is the case of a young lady, given by Dr. Moreau, in his _Morbid
+Psychology_:--
+
+"During my long hours of sleeplessness in the night my beloved Saviour
+began to make Himself manifest to me. Pondering over the meditations of
+St. François de Sales on the _Song of Songs_, I seemed to feel all my
+faculties suspended, and crossing my arms upon my chest, I awaited in a
+sort of dread what might be revealed to me.... I saw the Redeemer
+veritably in the flesh.... He extended Himself beside me, pressed me so
+closely that I could feel His crown of thorns, and the nails in His feet
+and hands, while He pressed His lips over mine, giving me the most
+ravishing kiss of a divine Spouse, and sending a delicious thrill
+through my entire body."[110]
+
+Get rid of the narcotising effect of theological associations by
+eliminating the name of Jesus and other religious terms from this case,
+and from the others already cited, and no one would have the least doubt
+as to their real nature. Given a condition of physical health in these
+cases, with conditions that favoured social activity, healthy
+intercourse with the opposite sex, culminating in marriage and
+parenthood, can there be any doubt that this species of religious
+ecstasy would have been non-existent? If, as Tylor says, the refectory
+door would many a time have closed the gates of heaven, happy family
+life would in a vast number of cases have prevented those religio-erotic
+trances which have played so powerful a part in the history of
+supernaturalism. Most people will agree with Dr. Maudsley:--
+
+"The ecstatic trances of such saintly women as Catherine Sienne and St.
+Theresa, in which they believed themselves to be visited by their
+Saviour and to be received as veritable spouses into His bosom, were,
+though they knew it not, little better than vicarious sexual orgasm; a
+condition of things which the intense contemplation of the naked male
+figure, carved or sculptured in all its proportions on a cross, is more
+fitted to produce in young women of susceptible nervous temperament than
+people are apt to consider. Every experienced physician must have met
+with instances of single and childless women who have devoted
+themselves with extraordinary zeal to habitual religious exercises, and
+who, having gone insane as a culmination of their emotional fervour,
+have straightway exhibited the saddest mixture of religious and erotic
+symptoms--a boiling over of lust in voice, face, gestures, under the
+pitiful degradation of disease.... The fanatical religious sects, such
+as the Shakers and the like, which spring up from time to time in
+communities and disgust them by the offensive way in which they mingle
+love and religion, are inspired in great measure by sexual feeling; on
+the one hand, there is probably the cunning of a hypocritical knave, or
+the self-deception of a half-insane one, using the weaknesses of weak
+women to minister to his vanity or his lust under a religious guise; on
+the other hand, there is an exaggerated self-feeling, often rooted in
+the sexual passion, which is unwittingly fostered under the cloak of
+religious emotion, and which is apt to conduct to madness or to sin. In
+such cases the holy kiss owes its warmth to the sexual impulse, which
+inspires it, consciously or unconsciously, and the mystical religious
+union of the sexes is fitted to issue in a less spiritual union."[111]
+
+Many manuals of devotion will be found to furnish the same kind of
+evidence as biographical narratives concerning the intimate relations
+that exists between sexuality and religious feeling. What has just been
+said may be repeated here, namely, that if the religious associations
+were dispelled, there would be no mistaking the nature of feelings that
+originated much of this class of writing, or the feelings to which they
+appeal. The serious fact is that the appeal is there whether we
+recognise it or not, and it is a question worthy of serious
+consideration whether the unwary imagination of the young may be not as
+surely debauched by certain books of devotion as by a frankly erotic
+production. It is not without reason that d'Israeli the elder, in an
+essay omitted from all editions of his book after the first, remarked
+that "poets are amorous, lovers are poetical, but saints are both."[112]
+Take, for example, the following from a collection of old English
+homilies, dating from the thirteenth and fourteenth centuries:--
+
+"Jesus, my holy love, my sure sweetness! Jesus, my heart, my joy, my
+soul-heal! Jesus, sweet Jesus, my darling, my life, my light, my balm,
+my honey-drop!... Kindle me with the blaze of Thy enlightening love. Let
+me be Thy leman, and teach me to love Thee.... Oh, that I might behold
+how Thou stretchedst Thyself for me on the cross. Oh, that I might cast
+myself between those same arms, so very wide outspread.... Oh, that I
+were in Thy arms, in Thy arms so stretchedst and outspread on the
+cross."
+
+Or this, from the same collection:--
+
+"Sweet Jesus, my love, my darling, my Lord, my Saviour, my balm, sweeter
+is the remembrance of Thee than honey in the mouth. Who is there that
+may not love Thy lovely face? Whose heart is so hard that may not melt
+at the remembrance of Thee? Oh! who may not love Thee, lovely Jesus?
+Jesus, my precious darling, my love, my life, my beloved, my most worthy
+of love, my heart's balm, Thou art lovesome in countenance, Thou art
+altogether bright. All angels' life is to look upon Thy face, for Thy
+cheer is so marvellously lovesome and pleasant to look upon.... Thou art
+so bright, and so white that the sun would be pale if compared to Thy
+blissful countenance. If I, then, love any man for beauty, I will love
+Thee, my dear life, my mother's fairest son."[113]
+
+The language of erotic piety figures much more prominently in Roman
+Catholic medieval writings than in Protestant literature. This is not
+because an appeal to the same feelings is absent from the religious
+literature of Protestantism, it is mainly due to the fact that more
+modern conditions leads to a less intense religious appeal, while the
+broadening of social life encourages a more natural outlet for all
+aspects of human nature. Still, the following expression of a young lady
+convert of Wesley's offers a fair parallel to the specimen given above.
+It is taken from Southey's _Life of Wesley_:--
+
+"Oh, mighty, powerful, happy change! The love of God was shed abroad in
+my heart, and a flame kindled there with pains so violent, and yet so
+very ravishing, that my body was almost torn asunder. I sweated, I
+trembled, I fainted, I sang. Oh, I thought my head was a fountain of
+water. I was dissolved in love. My beloved is mine, and I am His. He has
+all charms; He has ravished my heart; He is my comforter, my friend, my
+all. Oh, I am sick of love. He is altogether lovely, the chiefest among
+ten thousand. Oh, how Jesus fills, Jesus extends, Jesus overwhelms the
+soul in which He lives."
+
+The _Imitation of Christ_ has been described by more than one writer as
+a manual of eroticism, and certainly the chapters "The Wonderful Effects
+of Divine Love," and "Of the Proof of a True Lover," might well be cited
+in defence of this view. In the following canticle of St. Francis of
+Assisi it does not seem possible to distinguish a substantial difference
+between it and a frankly avowed love poem:--
+
+    "Into love's furnace I am cast,
+     Into love's furnace I am cast,
+     I burn, I languish, pine, and waste.
+     Oh, love divine, how sharp thy dart!
+     How deep the wound that galls my heart!
+     As wax in heat, so, from above,
+     My smitten soul dissolves in love.
+     I live, yet languishing I die,
+     While in thy furnace bound I lie."[114]
+
+It would certainly be possible to furnish exact parallels from volumes
+of secular verse that would be strictly 'taboo' among those who fail to
+see anything objectionable in verses like the above when written in
+connection with religion. Such people fail to recognise that their
+attractiveness lies in the hidden appeal to amatory feeling, and owe
+their origin to the suppressed or perverted sexual passion of their
+author. We must not allow ourselves to be blinded by the consideration
+as to whether the object of adoration be an earthly or a heavenly one.
+Men and women have not distinct feelings that are aroused as their
+objective differs, but the same feelings directed now in one direction,
+now in another. The direction of these feelings, their exciting cause,
+are sheer environmental accidents. How can one resist the implications
+of the following, from a devotional work widely circulated amongst the
+women of France:--
+
+    "Praise to Jesus, praise His power,
+     Praise His sweet allurements.
+     Praise to Jesus, when His goodness
+     Reduces me to nakedness;
+     Praise to Jesus when He says to me,
+     My sister, my dove, my beautiful one!
+     Praise to Jesus in all my steps,
+     Praise to His amorous charms.
+     Praise to Jesus when His loving mouth
+     Touches mine in a loving kiss.
+     Praise to Jesus when His gentle caresses
+     Overwhelm me with chaste joys.
+     Praise to Jesus when at His leisure
+     He allows me to kiss Him."[115]
+
+Against this we may place the following hymn, sung at an American camp
+meeting of some thousands of persons between the ages of fourteen and
+twenty-five:--
+
+    "Blessed Lily of the Valley, oh, how fair is He;
+            He is mine, I am His.
+     Sweeter than the angels' music is His voice to me;
+            He is mine, I am His.
+     Where the lilies fair are blooming by the waters calm
+     There He leads me and upholds me by His strong right arm.
+
+     All the air is love around me--I can feel no harm;
+            He is mine, I am His."[116]
+
+Special significance is given to this reference by the age of those who
+composed the gathering. This period embraces the years during which
+sexual maturity is attained, and the organism experiences important
+physiological and psychological changes. The consequence is that the
+atmosphere is, so to say, charged with unsuspected sex feeling, and it
+is not surprising that many complaints have been made of immorality
+following such gatherings. The organism is then peculiarly liable to
+suggestion in all forms. Along with the imitativeness of early years
+there is something of the decisive initiative of maturity. These
+qualities wisely guided might be turned to the great advantage of both
+the individual and of the community. Mere incitement by religious
+revivalism can result in little else than misdirection and injury. It
+should be the most obvious of truths that the attractiveness of hymns
+such as the one given, with the keen delight in the suggested pictures,
+lies in their yielding--all unknown, perhaps, to those participating--
+satisfaction to feelings that are very frequently imperious in their
+demands, and are at all times astonishingly pervasive in their
+influence.
+
+Much valuable light is thrown upon this aspect of the subject by a
+study of human behaviour under the influence of actual disease. Of late
+years much useful work has been done in this direction, and our
+knowledge of normal psychology greatly helped by a study of abnormal
+mental states.[117] This is mainly because in disease we are able to
+observe the operation of tendencies that are unobscured by the
+restraints and inhibitions created by education and social convention.
+And one of the most striking, and to many startling, things observed is
+the close relation existing between erotic mania and religious delusion.
+The person who at one time feels himself under direct religious
+inspiration, or who imagines himself to be the incarnation of a divine
+personage, will at another time exhibit the most shocking obscenity in
+action and language. Sir T. S. Clouston furnishes a very striking case
+of this character, which he cites in order to show "the common mixture
+of religious and sexual emotion."[118] I do not reproduce it here
+because of its grossly obscene character; but, save for coarseness of
+language, it does not differ materially from illustrations already
+given. Almost any of the text-books will supply cases illustrating the
+connection between sexualism and religion, a connection generally
+recognised as the opinions cited already clearly show.
+
+Dr. Mercier, in dealing with the connection between sexualism and
+religion, which he says "has long been recognised, but never accounted
+for," traces it to a feeling of, or desire for self-sacrifice common to
+both. Certainly sacrifice in some form--of food, weapons, land, money,
+or bodily inconvenience--is a feature present in every religion more or
+less. And it is quite certain that not merely the fact, but the desire
+for some amount of sacrifice, forms "an integral, fundamental, and
+preponderating element" in the sexual emotion. Dr. Mercier further
+believes that the benevolence founded on religious emotion has its
+origin in sexual emotion, which is, again, extremely likely. This
+community of origin would allow for the transformation of one into the
+other, and supplies a key to the language of lover-like devotion and
+self-abnegation which is so prominent in religious devotional
+literature. The importance attached to dress is also very suggestive;
+for here, again, the element of sacrifice expresses itself in the
+cultivation of a studied repulsiveness to the normal attractiveness of
+costume. "Thus," says Dr. Mercier, "we find that the self-sacrificial
+vagaries of the rejected lover and of the religious devotee own a common
+origin and nature. The hook and spiny kennel of the fakir, the pillar of
+St. Simeon Stylites, the flagellum of the monk, the sombre garments of
+the nun, the silence of the Trappists, the defiantly hideous costume of
+the hallelujah lass, and the mortified sobriety of the district visitor,
+have at bottom the same origin as the rags of Cardenio, the cage of Don
+Quixote de la Mancha, and the yellow stockings and crossed garters of
+Malvolio."[119]
+
+Professor Granger, who at times comes very near the truth, says:--
+
+"There is something profoundly philosophical in the use of _The Song of
+Songs_ to typify the communion of the soul with its ideal. The passion
+which is expressed by the Shulamite for her earthly lover in such
+glowing phrases becomes the type of the love of the soul towards
+God."[120]
+
+One fails to see the profoundly philosophic nature of the selection. The
+_Song of Songs_ is a frankly erotic love poem, written with no other aim
+than is common to such poetry, and its spiritualisation is due to the
+same process of reinterpretation that is applied to other parts of the
+Bible in order to make them agreeable to modern thought. Had it not been
+in the Bible, Christians would have found it neither profoundly
+philosophical nor spiritually illuminating; and, as a matter of fact,
+similar effusions are selected by Christians from non-Christian writings
+as proofs of their sensual character. The real significance of its use
+in religious worship is that it gives a marked expression to feelings
+that crave an outlet. And the lesson is that sexual feeling cannot be
+eliminated from life; it can only be diverted or disguised. Some
+expression it will find--here in open perversion resulting in positive
+vice, there in obsession that leads to a half-insane asceticism, and
+elsewhere the creation of the unconsciously salacious with an unhealthy
+fondness for dabbling in questions that refer to the illicit relations
+of the sexes.
+
+"One of the reasons why popular religion in England," says Professor
+Granger, "seems to be coming to the limits of its power, is that it has
+contented itself so largely with the commonplace motives which, after
+all, find sufficient exercise in the ordinary duties of life." Here,
+again, is a curious obtuseness to a plain but important truth. With
+what else should a healthy religion associate itself but the ordinary
+motives or feelings of human life? With what else has religion always
+associated itself? Far from that being the source of the weakness of
+modern religion, it is its only genuine source of strength. If religion
+can so associate itself with the ordinary facts and feelings of life
+that these are unintelligible or poorer without religion, then religious
+people have nothing to fear. But if it be true, as Professor Granger
+implies, that life in its normal moods can receive complete
+gratification apart from religion, then the outlook is very different.
+From a merely historic point of view it is true that as men have found
+explanations of phenomena, and gratifications of feelings apart from
+religion, the latter has lost a deal of its power. This is seen in the
+growth of the physical sciences, and also, although in a smaller
+measure, in sociology and morals.
+
+This, however, opens up the enquiry, previously indicated, as to how far
+the whole range of human life may be satisfactorily explained in the
+complete absence of religion or supernaturalism. And with this we are
+not now directly concerned. What we are concerned with is to show that
+from one direction at least supernaturalism has derived strength from a
+misinterpretation of the facts. These facts, once interpreted as clear
+evidence for supernaturalism, are now seen to be susceptible to a
+different explanation. But they have nevertheless played their part in
+creating as part of the social heritage a diffused sense of the reality
+of supernatural intercourse. It is not, then, a question of religion
+losing power because it has contented itself with commonplace motives,
+and because these have now found satisfaction in ordinary life. It is
+rather a question of the adequacy of science to deal with facts that
+have been taken to lie outside the scientific order. Has science the
+knowledge or the ability to deal with the extraordinary as well as with
+the ordinary facts of life? I believe it has. The facts we have passed
+in review _are_ amenable to scientific treatment, for the reason that
+they belong to a class with which the physician of to-day finds himself
+in constant contact. And it is too often overlooked that the belief in
+the existence and influence of a supersensible world is itself only a
+theory put forward in explanation of certain classes of facts, and like
+all theories it becomes superfluous once a simpler theory is made
+possible.
+
+
+FOOTNOTES:
+
+[93] Article in _The Lancet_, Jan. 11, 1873.
+
+[94] Article in Tuke's _Dictionary of Psychological Medicine_.
+
+[95] _Inquiries into Human Faculty_, pp. 66-7.
+
+[96] _The Sexual Question_, pp. 354-5.
+
+[97] Cited by Havelock Ellis, _Psychology of Sex_, pp. 233-4.
+
+[98] _Conduct and its Disorders_, pp. 368-9.
+
+[99] _Psychopathia-Sexualis_, pp. 9-11.
+
+[100] _Lost and Hostile Gospels_, Preface.
+
+[101] Cited by James, _Varieties_, pp. 345-6.
+
+[102] Inge, _Christian Mysticism_, pp. 201-9.
+
+[103] See Ellis, _Psychology of Sex_, pp. 240-2.
+
+[104] Parkman's _Jesuits in North America_, p. 175.
+
+[105] Krafft-Ebing, _Psychopathia-Sexualis_, p. 8.
+
+[106] See L. Asseline's _Mary Alacoque and the Worship of the Sacred
+Heart of Jesus_.
+
+[107] See _St. Teresa of Spain_, by H. H. Colvill, and _Saint Teresa_,
+by H. Joly.
+
+[108] _Varieties_, p. 413.
+
+[109] _Varieties_, p. 413.
+
+[110] Cited by J. F. Nisbet, _The Insanity of Genius_, p. 248.
+
+[111] _Pathology of Mind_, p. 144. Also Mercier, _Sanity and Insanity_,
+pp. 223, 281.
+
+[112] _Miscellanies_, 1796, p. 365. From the same essay I take the
+following: "Even the ceremonies of religion, both in ancient and in
+modern times, have exhibited the grossest indecencies. Priests in all
+ages have been the successful panders of the human heart, and have
+introduced in the solemn worship of the divinity, incitements,
+gratifications, and representations, which the pen of the historian must
+refuse to describe. Often has the sensible Catholic blushed amidst his
+devotions, and I have seen chapels surrounded by pictures of lascivious
+attitudes, and the obsolete amours of saints revived by the pencil of
+some Aretine.... Their homilies were manuals of love, and the more
+religious they became, the more depraved were their imaginations. In the
+nunnery the love of Jesus was the most abandoned of passions, and the
+ideal espousal was indulged at the cost of the feeble heart of many a
+solitary beauty" (pp. 369-70).
+
+[113] From a collection published by the Early English Text Society,
+1868, pp. 182-4, 268.
+
+[114] G. A. Coe, _The Spiritual Life_, p. 210.
+
+[115] _Les Perles de Saint François de Sales_, 1871. Cited by Bloch, p.
+111.
+
+[116] Davenport's _Primitive Traits in Religious Revivals_, p. 29.
+
+[117] See, for example, _Conduct and its Disorders_, by Dr. C. Mercier;
+_Psycho-Pathological Researches_, by Dr. Boris Sidis; and _Abnormal
+Psychology_, by I. H. Coriat.
+
+[118] _Clinical Lectures on Mental Diseases_, p. 584.
+
+[119] _Sanity and Insanity_, chap. viii.
+
+[120] _The Soul of a Christian_, p. 178.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER SIX
+
+THE STREAM OF TENDENCY
+
+
+It should hardly need pointing out that the facts presented in the last
+chapter are not offered as an attempt at the--to use Professor William
+James's expression--"reinterpretation of religion as perverted
+sexuality." Nor, so far as the present writer is aware, has anyone ever
+so presented them. The expression, indeed, seems almost a deliberate
+mis-statement of a position in order to make its rebuttal easier.
+Obviously the idea of religion must be already in existence before it
+could be utilised for the purpose of explaining any group of phenomena.
+But if the biographic and other facts described have any value whatever,
+they are at least strong presumptive evidence in favour of the position
+that in very many cases a perverted or unsatisfied sexuality has been at
+the root of a great deal of the world's emotional piety. Of course, the
+strong religious belief must be in existence before-hand. But given
+this, and add thereto a sexual nature imperious in its demands and yet
+denied legitimate outlet, and we have the conditions present for its
+promptings being interpreted as the fruits of supernatural influence. It
+is not a reinterpretation of _religion_ that is attempted, but a
+reinterpretation of phenomena that have been erroneously called
+religious. And on all sides the need for this reinterpretation is
+becoming clear. Over sixty years ago Renan wrote, "A rigorous
+psychological analysis would class the innate religious instinct of
+women in the same category with the sexual instinct,"[121] and since
+then a very much more detailed knowledge of both physiology and
+psychology has furnished a multitude of data for an exhaustive study of
+the whole question.
+
+In the present chapter our interest is mainly historical. And for
+various reasons, chief amongst which is that interested readers may the
+more easily follow up the study should they feel so inclined, the survey
+has been restricted to the history of that religion with which we are
+best acquainted--Christianity. Moreover, if we are to form a correct
+judgment of the part played in the history of religions by the
+misinterpretations already noted, it is necessary to trace the extent to
+which they have influenced men and women in a collective capacity. For
+the striking fact is that, in spite of the purification of the sexual
+relations being one of the avowed objects of Christianity, in spite,
+too, of the attempts of the official churches to suppress them, the
+history of Christianity has been dogged by outbreaks of sexual
+extravagance, by the continuous emergence of erotico-religious sects,
+claiming Christian teachings as the authority for their actions. We need
+not discuss the legitimacy of their inferences. We are concerned solely
+with a chronicle of historic facts so far as they can be ascertained;
+and these have a certain significance of their own, as events, quite
+apart from their reasonableness or desirability.
+
+A part cause of the movements we are about to describe may have been a
+violent reaction against an extravagant asceticism. Something may also
+be due to the fact that over-concentration of mind upon a particular
+evil is apt to defeat its end by the mere force of unconscious
+suggestion in the contrary direction. But in all probability much was
+due to the presence of certain elements inherited by Christianity from
+the older religions. At any rate, those whose minds are filled with the
+idea that sexual extravagance on a collective scale and under the cloak
+of religion is either a modern phenomenon, or was unknown to the early
+history of Christianity, would do well to revise their opinions in the
+light of ascertainable facts. No less a person than the Rev. S.
+Baring-Gould has reminded us that criticism discloses "on the shining
+face of primitive Christianity rents and craters undreamt of in our old
+simplicity," and also asserts "that there was in the breast of the
+newborn Church an element of antinomianism, not latent, but in virulent
+activity, is a fact as capable of demonstration as any conclusion in a
+science which is not exact."[122]
+
+There would be little value in a study of these erotico-religious
+movements if they involved only a detection of individual lust
+consciously using religion as a cloak for its gratification. Such a
+conclusion is a fatally easy one, but it does little justice to the
+chief people concerned, and it is quite lacking in historical
+perspective. In most cases the initiators of these strange sects have
+put forward a philosophy of religion as a justification of their
+teaching, and only a slight knowledge of this is enough to prove that we
+are face to face with a phenomenon of much greater significance than
+mere immorality. This may be recognised even in the pages of the New
+Testament itself. It is not a practice that is there denounced; it is a
+teaching that is repudiated. And one sees the same thing at later
+periods. The conviction on the one side that certain actions are
+unlawful, is met on the other side with the conviction that they are
+perfectly legitimate. Conviction is met with conviction. Each side
+expresses itself in terms of religion; the ethical aspect is incidental
+or subordinate. It is a contest of opposing religious beliefs and
+practices.
+
+The real nature of the conflict is often obscured by the fact of social
+opinion and the social forces generally being on the side of the more
+normal expression of sexual life. This, however, is no more than a
+necessity of the situation. The continuance of a healthful social life
+is dependent upon the maintenance of a certain balance in the relations
+of the sexes, and anything that strikes at this strikes at social life
+as a whole. In such cases we have, therefore, to allow for the operation
+of social selection, which is always on the side of the more normal
+type. From this it follows that although a small body of people may
+exemplify a variation that is in itself socially disastrous, the main
+forces of social life will prevent its ever assuming large dimensions.
+Moreover, a large body of people, such as is represented by a church
+holding a commanding position in society, will be forced to come to
+terms with the permanent tendencies of social life, and will either
+suppress undesirable variations or expel them. It thus happens that
+while the larger and more dominant churches have been on the side of
+normal, regularised expressions of the sexual life, abnormal variations
+have constantly arisen and have been denounced by them. But the
+significant feature is that they have arisen within the churches, and
+most commonly during periods of great religious stress or excitement.
+
+These tendencies, as the Rev. S. Baring-Gould has pointed out, existed
+in the very earliest days of Christianity. It is quite apparent from
+Paul's writings that as early as the date of the First Epistle to the
+Corinthians some of the more objectionable features of the older Pagan
+worship had shown themselves in the Church. The doctrine of 'spiritual
+wifehood' appeared at a very early date in the Church, and its teachers
+cited even St. Paul himself as their authority. Their claim was based
+upon Paul's declaration (1 Cor. ix. 5) that he had power to lead about
+"a sister, a wife, as well as other apostles, and as the brethren of the
+Lord and Cephas." Curiously enough, commentators have never agreed as to
+what Paul meant by this expression. The word translated may mean either
+wife, or sister, or woman. Had it been wife in the ordinary sense, it
+does not appear that at that date there would have been any room for
+scandal. The clear fact is, however, that others claimed a like
+privilege; the privilege was not always restricted to one woman, and the
+practice, if not general, became not uncommon, and furnished the ground
+for scandal for a long period. Two epistles, wrongly attributed to St.
+Clement of Rome, and dating from some time in the second century,
+condemn the practice of young people living together under the cloak of
+religion, and specially warns virgins against cohabiting with the clergy
+and so giving offence. That the practice was difficult to suppress is
+shown by its being condemned by several church councils--Antioch in 210,
+Nicea in 325, and Elvira in 350.[123] At a later date a much more
+elaborate theory has been built on Paul's claim. The Pauline Church has
+found several expressions both in England and America within recent
+times.[124] These sects have claimed that both St. Paul and the woman
+with whom he travelled were in a state of grace, and, therefore, above
+all law. We do not mean the maintenance of an ascetic relationship, but
+the normal relation of husband and wife. It is really the doctrine of
+'Free Love' with a spiritual warranty instead of a secular one.
+
+This doctrine of religious 'Free Love' rests upon a twofold basis.
+First, it was held that, apart from a wife after the flesh, one might
+also have a wife after the spirit, and this spiritual union might exist
+side by side with the fleshly one, and with different persons. A great
+impetus appears to have been given to this theory from Germany, many of
+the originators of the American sects of Free Lovers being Germans.
+Secondly, it was held that a Christian in a state of grace was absolved
+from laws that were binding upon other people. His actions were no
+longer subject to the categories of right and wrong; as it was said, to
+one in a state of grace all things were lawful, even though all things
+might not be expedient. Some went the length of teaching that not only
+were all things lawful, but all things were desirable. Separating by a
+sharp division things that influenced the soul from things that
+influenced the body, it was openly taught by some of the early sects
+that nothing done by the body could injure the soul, and so could not
+affect its salvation. Reversing the practice of asceticism, which sought
+to crush bodily passions by a course of deprivation, it was taught that
+all kinds of forbidden conduct might be practised in order to
+demonstrate the soul's superiority. There is no question whatever that
+this tendency was very prominent in the early Christian Church. It was
+not there as something hidden, something of which men ought to be
+ashamed; it was an avowed teaching, claiming full religious sanction.
+"The Church," says Baring-Gould, "trembled on the verge of becoming an
+immoral sect." The same writer also says:--
+
+"This _teaching_ of immorality in the Church is a startling feature, and
+it seems to have been pursued by some who called themselves apostles as
+well as by those who assumed to be prophets. In the Corinthian Church
+even the elders encouraged incest. Now, it is not possible to explain
+this phenomenon except on the ground that Paul's argument as to the Law
+being overridden had been laid hold of and elevated into a principle.
+These teachers did not wink at lapses into immorality, but defiantly
+urged on the converts to the Gospel to commit adultery, fornication, and
+all uncleanness ... as a protest against those who contended that the
+moral law as given on the tables was still binding upon the
+Church."[125]
+
+A certain detachment from modern conditions, and from modern frames of
+mind, is essential to an adequate appreciation of what has been said.
+Looking at these events through the distorting medium of an altogether
+different social atmosphere, one is apt to attribute them to the
+operation of lawless desire, and so have done with it. This, however, is
+to overlook the fact that we are dealing with a society in which sexual
+symbols were common in religious worship, and in which theories of the
+religious life were propounded and accepted which to-day would be
+regarded as little less than maniacal. Unquestionably even then, once
+the situation had established itself it would be utilised by those of a
+coarser nature for mere sensual gratification. But practices such as we
+know existed, on the scale we have every reason for believing they were,
+could never have been had they not taken the form of an intense
+conviction. To assume otherwise is equal to arguing that because men
+have entered the Church from mere love of power or lust for wealth, the
+Church owed its establishment to the play of these motives. It is true
+that those who opposed these religio-erotic sects accused them of
+immorality, but it is the form these teachings assumed to the members of
+the impeached sects, not how they appeared to their enemies, that is
+important. Eroticism taught and practised as a religious
+conviction--that is the essential and significant feature of the
+situation. Not to grasp this is to fail to realise the vital fact
+embodied in the phenomena under consideration. We are not dealing with
+mere sensualists, even though we may be dealing with what is largely an
+expression of sensualism. It is sensualism expressed as, and sanctioned
+by, religious conviction that is the vital fact of the situation.
+
+One of the earliest Christian institutions around which scandals
+gathered was that of the Agapæ, or love-feasts. From the outset the
+Pagan writers asserted that these love-feasts were new versions of
+various old orgiastic practices, some of which were still current,
+others of which had been suppressed by the Roman government. There is no
+doubt that they were the grounds of very serious accusations against the
+Christians. On the other hand, it must be remembered that, at the outset
+at least, these charges were indignantly rejected by the Christians. The
+Agapæ were called indiscriminately Feasts of Love and Feasts of
+Charity. Each member, male and female, greeted each other with a holy
+kiss, and the institution was described by Tertullian as "a support of
+love, a solace of purity, a check on riches, a discipline of weakness."
+These love-feasts were held on important occasions, such as a marriage,
+a death, or the anniversary of a martyrdom. Some churches celebrated
+them weekly. From the Acts of the Apostles we learn that the feasts
+began about nightfall, and continued till after midnight, or even till
+daybreak. It was only natural that mixed assemblies of men and women
+that gathered in this manner, and where there was eating and drinking,
+should create scandal. It is absolutely certain that some of this
+scandal had a basis in fact. The Rev. S. Baring-Gould confesses that "at
+Corinth, and certainly elsewhere, among excitable people, the wine, the
+heat, the exaltation of emotion, led to orgiastic ravings, the jabbering
+of disconnected, unintelligible words, to fits, convulsions, pious
+exclamations, and incoherent ravings." And unless St. Paul was
+deliberately slandering his fellow-believers worse things than these
+occurred.
+
+Generally, even by non-Christian writers, it has been assumed that the
+Agapæ commenced as a perfectly harmless, even admirable institution, and
+afterwards degenerated, and so gave genuine cause for scandal. It is not
+easy to see that this opinion rests on anything better than a mere
+prejudice. It is true that there is no unmistakable evidence to the
+contrary, but no clear evidence is to be found in its behalf. The Agapæ
+was not, after all, an essentially Christian institution. Similar
+gatherings existed among the Pagans, more or less orgiastic in
+character. And even though at first some of the more extreme forms were
+avoided amongst the Christians, it is not improbable, on the face of it,
+that some kind of sexual extravagance or symbolism was present from the
+outset. At any rate, as I have said, the charges were made, first by
+Pagans, afterwards by Christians against other Christians. The charges
+were persistent, and were made in districts far removed from each other.
+Says Lecky: "When the Pagans accused the Christians of indulging in
+orgies of gross licentiousness, the first apologist, while repudiating
+the charge, was careful to add, of the heretics, 'Whether or not these
+people commit those shameful acts ... I know not.' In a few years the
+language of doubt and insinuation was exchanged for that of direct
+assertion; and if we may believe St. Irenæus and St. Clement of
+Alexandria, the followers of Carpocrates, the Marcionites, and some
+other gnostic sects habitually indulged, in their secret meetings, in
+acts of impurity and licentiousness as hideous and as monstrous as can
+be conceived, and their conduct was one of the causes of the persecution
+of the orthodox."[126] Tertullian accused some of the sects of
+practising incestuous intercourse at the Agapæ. Ambrose compared the
+institution to the Pagan Parentalia. Clement says, probably referring to
+the Agapæ, "the shameless use of the rite occasions foul suspicion and
+evil reports." The first epistle on Virginity by the Pseudo-Clement
+(probably written in the second century) admits the existence of
+immorality by saying, "Others eat and drink with them (_i.e._ the
+virgins) at feasts, and indulge in loose behaviour and much uncleanness,
+such as ought not to be among those who have elected holiness for
+themselves." Justin Martyr, referring to certain sects, says more
+cautiously: "Whether or not these people commit these shameful acts (the
+putting out of lights, and indulging in promiscuous intercourse) I know
+not." Others are more precise in their charges. That the Agapæ became
+the legitimate cause of complaint is admitted by all. The only question
+is whether it was the institution itself or the public mind in relation
+to it that underwent a change. Eventually, on the avowed ground of evil
+conduct, the Agapæ were forbidden by the Council of Carthage, 391, of
+Orleans, 541, and of Constantinople, 680.
+
+The whole subject is obscure, but the one certain and significant thing
+is that charges of licentiousness were connected with the Agapæ from the
+outset. These may at first have been unfounded or exaggerated. On the
+other hand, it is quite probable that just as Christianity continued
+Pagan ceremonies in other directions, so there was also a carrying over
+into the Church of some of the sexual rites and ceremonies connected
+with earlier forms of worship. And we know that the principle of
+Antinomianism, a prolific cause of evil at all times, was active amongst
+the Christians from the outset.
+
+It is almost impossible to say at this distance how many sects
+exhibiting marked erotic tendencies appeared in the early Christian
+centuries. Many must have disappeared and left no trace of their
+existence. But there can be no question that they were fairly numerous.
+The extensive sect, or sects, of the gnostics contained in its teachings
+elements that at least paved the way for the conduct with which other
+Christians charged them, although the charges made may not have been
+true of all. To some of the gnostic sects belongs the teaching--quite in
+accord with the doctrine of the evil nature of the world, that
+liberation from the 'Law' was one of the first conditions of spiritual
+freedom. From this came the teaching, subsequently held by numerous
+other sects, that those born of the Spirit could not be defiled by any
+acts of the flesh, and that so-called vicious actions were rather to be
+encouraged as providing experience useful to spiritual welfare. Some
+branches of the gnostics had 'spiritual marriages,' similar to what
+existed in India in the Sakti rites already described. Thus the
+Adamites, a rather obscure gnostic sect of the second century, attempted
+to imitate the Edenic state by condemning marriage and abandoning
+clothing. Their assemblies were held underground, and on entering the
+place of worship both sexes stripped themselves naked, and in that state
+performed their ceremonies. They called their church Paradise, from
+which all dissentients were promptly expelled. The Adamites themselves
+claimed that their object was to extirpate desire by familiarising the
+senses to strict control. Their religious opponents gave a very
+different account of the practice, and it is not difficult to realise,
+whatever may have been the motive of the founders, the consequences of
+such a practice. It is curious, by the way, to observe how strong
+religious excitement seems to lead people to discard clothing. Thus,
+during the Crusade of 1203-42 the women crusaders rushed about the
+streets in a state of nudity.[127] During the wars of the League in
+France, men and women walked naked in procession headed by the
+clergy.[128] Other examples of this curious practice might be given.
+
+The Nicolaitanes, a second-century sect referred to in the New Testament
+(Rev. ii. 14), were accused of practising religious prostitution. So
+also were the Manichæans, a very numerous sect, against whom the charges
+were of a much more detailed character. With them the ceremonial
+violation of a virgin is said to have formed a part of their regular
+ritual, and that their meetings frequently ended in an orgy of
+promiscuous intercourse.[129] As both these acts are found in connection
+with other religious ceremonies, and, as will be seen later, have
+persisted until recent times, the story does not sound so incredible as
+otherwise it might. The difficulty of deciding definitely is intensified
+by the fact of the Manichæans being split into a number of sects, and
+statements true of some might be untrue of others. So we find St.
+Augustine, who had been a Manichæan, declaring that if all did not
+practise licentious rites, one sect (the Catharists) did, believing that
+they could only mortify the flesh by the exercise of bad instincts,
+since the flesh proceeded from demons. St. Augustine himself confesses
+to have taken part in various phallic ceremonies before his conversion.
+"I myself," he says, "when a young man used to go sometimes to the
+sacrilegious entertainments and spectacles; I saw the priests raving in
+religious excitement, and heard the choristers; I took pleasure in the
+shameful games which were celebrated in honour of gods and goddesses, of
+the Virgin Coelestia, and of Berecynthia, the mother of all gods. And
+on the day consecrated to her purification, there were sung before her
+couch productions so obscene and filthy to the ear--I do not say of the
+mother of the gods, but of the mother of any senator or honest man--nay,
+so impure that not even the mother of the foul-mouthed players
+themselves could have formed one of the audience."[130]
+
+The Carpocratians, who claimed to be a branch of the Gnostics, taught
+that faith and charity were alone necessary virtues: all others were
+useless. There is nothing evil in itself, and life only becomes complete
+when all so-called blemishes are fully displayed in conduct. Their
+leader "not only allowed his disciples a full liberty to sin, but
+recommended a vicious course of life as a matter of obligation and
+necessity; asserting that eternal salvation was only attainable by those
+who had committed all sorts of crimes.... It was the will of God that
+all things should be possessed in common, the female sex not
+excepted."[131]
+
+A little later we have the sect of the Agapetæ. They rejected marriage
+as an institution, and permitted unrestrained intercourse between the
+sexes. St. Jerome, alluding to this sect, says: "It is a shame even to
+allude to the true facts. Whence did the pest of the Agapetæ creep into
+the Church? Whence is this new title of wives without marriage rites?
+Whence this new class of concubines? I will infer more. Whence these
+harlots cleaving to one man? They occupy the same house, a single
+chamber, often a single bed, and call us suspicious if we think anything
+of it. The brother deserts his virgin sister, the virgin despises her
+unmarried brother, and seeks a stranger, and since they pretend to be
+aiming at the same object, they ask for the spiritual consolation of
+each other that they may enjoy the pleasures of the flesh."[132]
+
+This form of extravagance does not appear to have been limited to a
+single sect. It was more or less general during the ascendancy of
+asceticism. Tertullian says that the desire to enjoy the reputation of
+virginity led to much immorality, the effects of which were concealed by
+infanticide. The Council of Antioch lamented the practice of unmarried
+men and women sharing the same room. In 450, the Anchorites of Palestine
+are described as herding together without distinction of sex, and with
+no garments but a breech-clout.[133] The practice of priests travelling
+about with women, mothers and wives, and the scandals created thereby,
+is referred to in regulation after regulation. Although legislated
+against, it never entirely disappeared, and eventually led to a
+recognised priestly concubinage--recognised, that is, by public opinion,
+although condemned by the Church.
+
+There is no need to go over even the names of all the numerous sects
+that appeared during the early centuries manifesting curious features
+concerning sexual relations. When suppressed in one form they reappeared
+in another, and were unusually prominent during seasons of religious
+unrest. Many of the teachings already noted made their appearance again
+with the "Brethren of the Free Spirit" in the thirteenth, fourteenth,
+and fifteenth centuries. Some of these sects took their stand on the
+Pauline teaching, "The law of the spirit of life in Jesus Christ hath
+made me free from the law of sin and death," and claimed freedom from
+sin, no matter what their actions. The "Brethren of the Free Spirit"
+carried women about with them, held midnight assemblies, and, according
+to Mosheim, attended these meetings in a state of nudity. The Ranters,
+the Spirituels of Geneva, the Berghards, the Flagellants, the Molinists,
+were all accused of sexual misconduct in their assemblies. One of the
+specific teachings of the last-named body, as condemned by the
+Inquisition, ran as follows: "God, to humble us, permits in certain
+perfect souls that the devil should make them commit certain acts. In
+this case, and in others, which without the permission of God, would be
+guilty, there is no sin because there is no consent. It may happen, that
+this violent movement, which excites to carnal acts, may take place in
+two persons, a man and a woman, at the same instant."[134]
+
+It has been pointed out that the dominant Church made continuous efforts
+to suppress these sects, but the remarkable thing is that they should so
+often reappear, and always with strong claims to existence on the basis
+of religious conviction. That a number of men and women should seek
+gratification of their sensual feelings in ways not countenanced by the
+laws of normal life need not excite surprise. There always have been and
+always will be such. But to do this in the name of religion, and with a
+persistency as great as that of the religious idea itself, is a
+phenomenon that surely deserves more attention than it ordinarily
+receives. Nor can it be said with justice that these sects began in mere
+conscious lust. They ended there, true; more or less disguised, it may
+always have been present, but those who initiated them believed that
+they were justified in doing so by religious principles, and appealed to
+those principles to justify their conduct. Why should this have been the
+case? Why should conduct of which men and women are ashamed in the
+social sphere, and which their social sense promptly condemns, in the
+religious sphere be crowned with the dignity of lofty principles and
+fought for with the fervour of intense conviction? So long as
+theologians leave that question unanswered, their arguments are simply
+wide of the real issue.
+
+Naturally, the closer we get to our own day, and to times when religious
+feeling is more vigorously controlled by purely social forces, these
+manifestations of sexuality become less frequent, less widely spread,
+and more transient in character. Still they do occur. For reasons that
+do not concern us here, America has in recent years been a favourable
+ground for these religio-sexual developments. A sympathetic account of
+many of these American sects will be found in Hepworth Dixon's
+_Spiritual Wives_, with accounts of similar sects in Germany and
+England. In some cases many of the features of the early Christian sects
+were reproduced, even to the length of young women sharing the bedrooms
+of their spiritual guides. All took Paul as their principal authority.
+J. H. Noyes, one of the best known and most representative of these
+teachers, laid down the main principles of his teachings thus:--
+
+"When the will of God is done on earth as it is in heaven, there will be
+no marriage. The marriage supper of the Lamb is a feast at which every
+dish is free to every guest. Exclusiveness, jealousy, quarrelling, have
+no place there, for the same reason as that which forbids the guests at
+a thanksgiving dinner to claim each his separate dish, and quarrel with
+the rest for his rights. In a holy community there is no more reason why
+sexual intercourse should be restrained by law, than why eating and
+drinking should be; and there is as little occasion for shame in the one
+case as in the other.... The guests of the marriage supper may have each
+his favourite dish, each a dish of his own procuring, and that without
+the jealousy of exclusiveness. I call a certain woman my wife; she is
+yours; she is Christ's; and in Him she is the bride of all saints. She
+is dear in the hands of a stranger, and according to my promise to her I
+rejoice."[135]
+
+In a letter to Mr. Hepworth Dixon, J. H. Noyes claims the "right of
+religious inspiration to shape society and dictate the form of family
+life," and with probable accuracy says that the origin of these American
+sects is to be found in revivals:--
+
+"The philosophy of the matter seems to be this: Revivals are theocratic
+in their very nature; they introduce God into human affairs.... In the
+conservative theory of revivals, this power is restricted to the
+conversion of souls; but in actual experience it goes, or tends to go,
+into all the affairs of life.... Religious love is very near neighbour
+to sexual love, and they always get mixed in the intimacies and social
+excitements of revivals. The next thing a man wants, after he has found
+the salvation of his soul, is to find his Eve and his Paradise.... The
+course of things may be restated thus: Revivals lead to religious love;
+religious love excites the passions; the converts, finding themselves
+in theocratic liberty, begin to look about for their mates and their
+liberty."[136]
+
+With regard to the beginnings of these modern movements of "Spiritual
+Wifehood," all involving the abrogation of the normal relations of the
+sexes, Hepworth Dixon writes:--
+
+"It has not, I think, been noticed by any writer that three of the most
+singular movements in the churches of our generation seem to have been
+connected, more or less closely, with the state of mind produced by
+revivals; one in Germany, one in England, and one in the United States;
+movements which resulted, among other things, in the establishment of
+three singular societies--the congregation of Pietists, vulgarly called
+the Mucker, at Königsberg; the brotherhood of Princeites at Spaxton; and
+the Bible Communists at Oneida Creek.... They had these chief things in
+common: they began in colleges, they affected the form of family life,
+and they were carried on by clergymen; each movement in a place of
+learning and of theological study: that in Germany at the Luther-Kirch
+of Königsberg, that in England at St. David's College, that in the
+United States at Yale College.... These three divines, one Lutheran, one
+Anglican, one Congregational, began their work in perfect ignorance of
+each other.... Each movement was regarded by its votaries as the most
+perfect fruit of the revival spirit. In truth, the change which came
+upon the saints from their close experience of revival passion, was
+regarded by themselves as in some degree miraculous, equal in divine
+significance to a new creation of the world."[137]
+
+For an almost exact replica of the erotic extravagances of some of the
+early Christian sects, one may turn to Russia. The difficulties and
+dangers of political life in Russia are doubtless responsible for having
+made religion such a power among the mass of the people, and this will
+also explain the diversion into religious channels of energy that under
+more favourable conditions is expended in social agitation and activity.
+Many of these sects are, of course, of a harmless character, mostly
+originating in an even greater love for the past and a more slavish
+adherence to ancient formulas than is displayed by the orthodox Church.
+Some, however, present the wildest excesses of sexual theory and
+practice. Nothing seems too wild or too extravagant to become the
+originating point of a new sect. Theories of marriage and sexual
+relations generally are developed with a logical fearlessness peculiarly
+Russian. Among the Bezpopovtsi, a numerous sect split up into several
+branches, opinions on marriage vary between regarding it as a mere
+conventional affair, and denouncing it as a hindrance to spiritual
+development. "Between these two extremes," says Mr. Heard, "there is
+room for the wildest and most repulsive theories. Carnal sensuality is
+allied in monstrous union with religious mysticism. Free love,
+independence of the sexes, possession of women in common, have been
+preached and practised. Debauchery, as an incidental weakness of human
+nature, has been advocated as the lesser evil; libertinism as preferable
+to concubinage, and the latter as better than marriage. One of their
+most austere teachers cynically declares that 'it is wiser to live with
+beasts than to be joined to a wife; to frequent many women in secret,
+rather than to live with one openly.'"[138]
+
+Another sect called 'Eunuchs' take their stand on Matt. xix. 12: "There
+are some eunuchs, which were so born from their mother's womb: and there
+are some eunuchs, which were made eunuchs of men: and there be eunuchs,
+which have made themselves eunuchs for the kingdom of heaven's sake. He
+that is able to receive it, let him receive it." This sect believes in
+and practises emasculation as the surest way of attaining perfection.
+Man, they say, should be like the angels, without sex and without
+desire. This practice reminds one of an early Christian sect, the
+Valesians, which not only emasculated members of their own sect, but
+performed the same operation forcibly on those who fell into their
+hands.[139] The Khlysti, a sect which derives its name from the practice
+of flagellation, denounce marriage as unclean, and part of their
+religious ritual is, according to some writers, the worship of a naked
+woman. Baron Von Haxthausen, writing in 1856, gives the following
+description of their ceremonies on Easter night:--
+
+"On this night the Khlysti all assemble for a great solemnity, the
+worship of the mother of God. A virgin, fifteen years of age, whom they
+have induced to act the part by tempting promises, is bound and placed
+in a tub of warm water; some old women come, and first make a large
+incision in the left breast, then cut it off, and staunch the blood in a
+wonderfully short time. During the operation a mystical picture of the
+Holy Spirit is put into the victim's hand, in order that she may be
+absorbed in regarding it. The breast which has been removed is laid upon
+a plate and cut into small pieces, which are eaten by all the members of
+the sect present; the girl in the tub is then raised upon an altar which
+stands near, and the whole congregation dance wildly round it, singing
+at the same time. The jumping then grows madder and wilder, till the
+lights are suddenly extinguished and horrible orgies commence."[140]
+
+The 'Jumpers,' an offshoot of the Khlysti, are much more pronounced in
+their sexual extravagances. They openly profess debauchery, for the
+usual reason, that of conquering the flesh by exhaustion and satiety.
+They meet usually by night, and after prayers are chanted and hymns
+sung, the leader commences a slow jumping movement, keeping time with a
+song. Then:--
+
+"The audience, arranged in couples, engaged to each other in advance,
+imitate his example and join the strain; the bounds and the singing grow
+faster and louder as it spreads, until, at its height, the elder shouts
+that he hears the voices of angels; the lights are extinguished, the
+jumping ceases, and the scene that follows in the darkness defies
+description. Each one yields to his desires, born of inspiration, and
+therefore righteous, and to be gratified; all are brethren in Christ,
+all promptings of the inner spirit are holy; incest, even, is no sin.
+They repudiate marriage, and justify their abominations by the Biblical
+legends of Lot's daughters, Solomon's harem, and the like."[141]
+
+There are many other curious sects in Russia, many of which bring us
+back to the religious atmosphere of the European dark ages. But without
+pursuing a description of these to any greater extent, enough has been
+said to show the persistence of the stream of sexualism in the history
+of Christianity. Of course, this feature did not enter religion with
+Christianity. On the contrary, I have shown that it was present from the
+earliest times. The association of religion with sexual phenomena does
+not commence as a sexual aberration; it only assumes that form at a
+comparatively late stage in religious history. The origin of the
+connection has to be found in that atmosphere of the supernatural which
+envelops primitive life, moulds primitive conceptions, and more or less
+fashions all primitive institutions. The sexual side of religious belief
+and religious symbolism only becomes abnormal, and even morbid, when the
+development of social life makes possible a truer view of sexuality. In
+this the great churches have, perhaps, unconsciously assisted. Their
+position of social control has compelled them to set their faces against
+the sexual symbolism which is so closely associated with early religious
+history, while at the same time countenancing religious fervour in
+general. The consequence has been that small bodies of men and women,
+freed from the restraining influence of social responsibility, have
+developed to extravagant length certain phases of religious belief that
+have been generally discountenanced elsewhere. Their so doing certainly
+helps the present-day student to make a more complete survey of all the
+factors that have played their part in religious history than would
+otherwise have been possible. Repulsive as some of these features now
+are, they have helped in their time to nourish the general belief in a
+supernatural order, and so to strengthen the general idea to which they
+were affiliated.
+
+
+FOOTNOTES:
+
+[121] _The Future of Science_, p. 465.
+
+[122] _Lost and Hostile Gospels_, Preface, p. 7.
+
+[123] See Baring-Gould's _Study of St. Paul_, pp. 450-1.
+
+[124] See Hepworth Dixon's curious work, _Spiritual Wives_, 1888, 2
+vols.
+
+[125] _Study of St. Paul_, p. 458.
+
+[126] _History of European Morals_, i. p. 417.
+
+[127] Cutten, _Psychological Christianity_, p. 157.
+
+[128] Sanger, _History of Prostitution_, p. 116.
+
+[129] See Blunt's _Dictionary of Sects_, art. "Manichæans."
+
+[130] _De Civitate Dei_, ii. 4.
+
+[131] Mosheim, _Cent. 2_, chap. v. sec. 4.
+
+[132] _Dictionary of Sects_, p. 13.
+
+[133] Lea, _Hist. of Sacerdotal Celibacy_, 1884, p. 42.
+
+[134] Cited by Michelet, _Priests, Women, and Families_, p. 130.
+
+[135] _Spiritual Wives_, ii. pp. 55-6.
+
+[136] _Spiritual Wives_, pp. 176-7, 181.
+
+[137] _Ibid._, pp. 84-6.
+
+[138] _The Russian Church and Russian Dissent_, p. 201.
+
+[139] Lea, _Hist. of Sacerdotal Celibacy_, p. 40.
+
+[140] _Visit to the Russian Empire_, i. p. 254. Merejkowski, in his
+historical novel, _Peter and Alexis_, gives a more detailed account of
+the sexual ceremonies of this sect. See also Heard's description,
+_Russian Church_, p. 258.
+
+[141] _Russian Church and Russian Dissent_, p. 262.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER SEVEN
+
+CONVERSION
+
+
+From what has been already said, it should be clear that a complete
+understanding of religious phenomena--whether legitimately or wrongly so
+called--involves acquaintance with a number of factors that are not
+usually called religious. Man's religious beliefs are usually a very
+composite product; they are built up from a number of states of feeling
+and mental convictions, some of which have only an accidental connection
+with the religious idea itself. Unfortunately, the training given to
+professional religious teachers rarely equips them for dealing with
+religion from the scientific point of view. Their training gives them a
+knowledge of several ancient languages, makes them acquainted with the
+rise and fall of certain doctrines, the nature of Church ritual and the
+like, all of which, while interesting enough in themselves, give little
+more genuine enlightenment than a knowledge of the dates of English
+monarchs provides of the character of genuine historic processes. One
+writer pertinently asks:--
+
+"What does the ordinary seminary graduate know of the histology,
+anatomy, and physiology of the soul? Absolutely nothing. He must stumble
+along through years of trying experience and look back over countless
+mistakes before he understands these things even in a general way. What
+does the ordinary graduate understand about doubt? It is all classed
+together, whether in adolescents or in hardened sinners, and one dose is
+applied. What does the graduate know about sexuality, so closely allied
+with certain forms of religious manifestations? What about ecstasy, in
+its various forms, the numerous methods of faith cure thrust upon an
+illiterate but credulous people, or the significance or insignificance
+of visions and dreams?"[142]
+
+It is, indeed, not too much to say that a theological training tends to
+prevent a rational comprehension of religion in both its normal and
+abnormal manifestations. Religious phenomena are not affiliated to
+phenomena as a whole; they are treated as quite distinct from the rest
+of life, possessing both an independent origin and justification. The
+consequence is that what are usually called studies of religion move
+round and round the same circle of ideas, and a revolution is mistaken
+for progress. Genuine enlightenment has come to us from men who have
+attacked the subject from a quite different point of view. They
+recognised that whether the religious idea was accepted as true or
+rejected as false, it could not be separated from that host of ideas and
+beliefs which make up the psychological side of the social structure. It
+was to be studied as a piece of natural history first of all. Whether it
+involved more than this they left to be settled later. It cannot be said
+that they belittled the _power_ of religion; on the contrary, the
+investigations showed it to be one of the most potent of the forces that
+shape social institutions. But they demonstrated the absurdity of
+placing religion in a category of its own. As an objective fact, they
+showed that religion was subject to the same forces that determine the
+form of other objective facts. As a culture fact, they traced its
+connection with corresponding phases of social development; and as a
+psychological fact, they demonstrated its workings to be in harmony with
+workings of normal psychological laws. Five thousand years of
+theological study had left the world as ignorant of the nature of
+religious phenomena as it was in the days of ancient Chaldea. Fifty
+years of scientific study has served to make at least a broad path
+through what was hitherto an impenetrable jungle.
+
+What has been said holds with peculiar force of the subject of
+conversion. This is not a phenomenon peculiar to Christianity, for
+initiation and conversion accompanies religion in all its phases. I do
+not think that it is peculiar to religion even as a whole. A sudden
+discharge of feeling in a special direction leading to a changed
+attitude, more or less permanent towards life, may be seen in connection
+with the non-religious life, although it fails to receive the attention
+bestowed on changes that are connected with religion. But if conversion
+is not a peculiarly Christian phenomenon, one school of theologians, at
+least, has raised it to a position of peculiar eminence in connection
+with Christianity. They have taken it to be the mark of a person who has
+attained spiritual manhood, and have laid down elaborate rules for its
+achievement. Many theologians will agree that this has been almost
+wholly disastrous. On the one side, conversion has been dwelt upon as a
+cataclysmal epoch in a person's life, produced, negatively, by an act of
+self-surrender, and, positively, by a supernatural act of grace. This
+has had the effect of blinding people to the real nature of the process,
+and has led to certain evil consequences that must always accompany
+attempts at wholesale conversion. On the other hand, it has given rise
+to a class of professional evangelists who count their trophies in
+'souls' as a Red Indian might count scalps, and who are ignorant of
+nearly everything except the art of working upon the emotions of a crowd
+of more or less uncultured people. Here, for instance, is an account of
+an American evangelist and ex-prize fighter, and evidently a great
+favourite with certain sections of the religious public in America. The
+account is cited by Dr. Cutten from a local paper, Illinois:--
+
+"5843 converts, 683 in a day. Total gift to Mr. Sunday, $10,431.
+Greatest revival in history. Will attract the attention of the religious
+world. Sermon on 'Booze,' the great effort of the revival! These are all
+headlines to the report of the meeting, which covers six
+columns--evidently a response to the interest shown in 'Billy' Sunday's
+meetings. The sermon on 'Booze' is given in full, and the physical
+exertions of the preacher described in detail. He began with his coat,
+vest, tie, and collar off. In a few moments his shirt and undershirt
+were gaping open to the waist, and the muscles of his neck and chest
+were seen working like those in the arm of a blacksmith, while
+perspiration poured from every pore. His clothing was soaked, as if a
+hose had been turned on him. He strained, and twisted, and reached up
+and down. Once he was on the floor for just a second, in the attitude of
+crawling, to show that all crime crawled out of the saloon; then he was
+on his feet as quickly as a cat could jump. At the end of forty-five
+minutes he mounted a chair, reached high, as he shouted, then again was
+on the floor, and dropped prostrate to illustrate a story of a drunken
+man, bounded to his feet again as if steel springs filled that lithe,
+slender, lightning-like body. He generally breaks a common kitchen chair
+in this sermon, and this came after a terrible effort, with eyes
+flashing, face scowling, the picture of hate. He whirled the chair over
+his head, smashed the chair to the platform floor, whirled the shattered
+wreck in the air again, and threw it to the ground in front of the
+pulpit. In two minutes men from the front row were tearing the wreck to
+pieces and dividing it up--a round here, a leg there, a piece of the
+back to another, and so on. Later, men carried away in cheering could be
+seen in the audience waving those chair fragments in the air."
+
+This is, of course, an extreme case, although it is but an exaggeration
+of methods in common use among these professional revivalists. The whole
+aim and purpose of these men is to arouse in the audience a high
+emotional tension, and any means is acceptable that succeeds in doing
+this. On the part of the congregation a large portion go for the express
+purpose of indulging in an emotional debauch. Many attend revival after
+revival, living over again the debauch of the last, and treasuring
+lively expectations of the next. Between these and the victim of alcohol
+tasting again his last 'burst,' and seeking opportunities for another,
+there is really little moral or psychological distinction. The social
+consequences of these engineered revivals have never been fully worked
+out, but when it is done by some competent person, the conclusions will
+be a revelation to many. One thing is certain: to expect really useful
+social results from such methods is verily to look to gather grapes from
+thistles.
+
+During recent years the phenomena of religious conversion have been
+studied in a more scientific spirit.[143] Statistics have been compiled
+and analysed, the frames of mind attendant on conversion arranged and
+studied, with the result that the salient features are to be discerned
+by all who approach the study of the subject with a little detachment of
+mind. One outstanding feature of this more scientific enquiry into the
+nature of conversion has been to demonstrate that it is almost
+exclusively a phenomenon of puberty and adolescence. Mr. Hall has
+compiled a lengthy list of the ages at which noted religious characters
+experienced what is known as conversion.[144] From this I take the
+following examples. Religious conviction came to St. Thekla at the age
+of 18, to St. Agnes at 13, St. Antony at 18, Martin of Tours at 18,
+Euphrasia at 12, Benedict at 14, Cuthbert at 15, St. Bernard at 12, St.
+Dominic at 15, St. Collette at 20, St. Catherine at 7, St. Teresa at 12,
+St. Francis of Sales at 11. In his _Life of Jesus_, Keim also remarks
+that although some of the disciples may have been married, most of them
+were probably about twenty years of age.[145]
+
+Professor Starbuck, placing on one side both historical and
+anthropological aspects, set himself the task of examining cases of the
+present day. A paper was sent out asking various questions as to age,
+state of health, frame of mind, before, during, and following
+conversion. The questions were sent to male and female members of
+different religious denominations. In reply, 1265 papers were filled up
+and returned. One result of a scrutiny of these returns was to show that
+the age at which religious conversion was experienced began as early as
+7 or 8 years, it increased gradually till 10 or 11, then a more rapid
+increase till 18 or 20, a decline increasing in rapidity to the age of
+25, and its practical disappearance beyond the age of 30. In girls, the
+period of conversion antedates that of boys by about two years.[146]
+Starbuck's conclusion is the perfectly valid one that conversion
+"belongs almost exclusively to the years between 10 and 25," and is
+distinctly a phenomenon of adolescence.
+
+This conclusion would be borne out by a study of almost any revival
+crusade. Thus a few years ago--1904--England received a visit from the
+American evangelist, Dr. Torrey. At the conclusion of his visit, Sir
+Robertson Nicol invited opinions from ministers in the towns visited by
+Torrey, and published the replies in his paper, _The British Weekly_, on
+October 27. There was no attempt whatever to elicit the ages of the
+reported converts; the enquiry was directed to the point of ascertaining
+whether these engineered missions had a beneficial effect on church
+life, or the reverse. But incidentally the ages of the converts were
+given in some cases, and one may safely assume that in the reports where
+no age was mentioned the facts, if disclosed, would not run counter to
+the generalisation above given. The Rev. T. Towers, Birmingham, noted
+that 16 out of 25 reported converts were children. Rev. A. Le Gros,
+Rugby, reported: "A number of our youngest members, especially amongst
+the young girls, were amongst those who professed conversion." Rev. H.
+Singleton, Smethwick, says: "The bulk of the names sent to me were those
+of children under thirteen years of age." Rev. W. G. Percival, Lozells
+Congregational Church, says of the 'inquiry' meeting held after the
+preaching: "The dear little things followed one another for inquiry
+until the place was a scene of utter confusion." Reports of a similar
+nature came from other places. The ages were pointed out quite
+incidentally; conversions of youths of 17 or 18 would not excite comment
+with these. Were the ages of all given, we should, without doubt, find
+them fall into line with Starbuck's and Hall's figures.
+
+Professor James quite accepts this view of conversion. The conclusion,
+he says, "would seem to be the only sound one: conversion is in its
+essence a normal adolescent phenomenon, incidental to the passage from
+the child's small universe to the wider intellectual and spiritual life
+of maturity."[147] Conversion, in the sense of a change from "the
+child's small universe" to the large world of human society, may be a
+normal fact in life, but the really essential fact in the enquiry is not
+the fact of growth, but growth in a specific direction. Why should this
+normal change from childhood to maturity be the period during which
+_religious_ conversion is experienced? This question is not only ignored
+by Professor James, it is made more confused by his method of stating
+it. Of course, if all people experienced this religious conviction, as
+all people undergo other changes at adolescence, the question would be
+simplified. But this is obviously not the case. A large number of people
+never experience it so long as they are only brought into contact with
+ordinary social forces. Special circumstances seem usually to be
+required to rouse this sense of religious conviction. Nearly every story
+of conversion turns upon something unusual, unexpected, or dramatic
+occurring as the exciting cause. The question is, therefore, why should
+the line of growth, general with all at adolescence, be, in the case of
+some, diverted into religious channels? A study of the subject from this
+point of view will, I think, show that conversion is only normal in the
+sense that in an environment where religious influences are powerful
+each person is normally exposed to it. Those on whom the religious
+influence fails to operate experience the change from childhood to
+adolescence, on to complete maturity, without their nature evincing any
+lack of completeness. This is the vital truth of which Professor James
+loses sight, and it is ignored by the vast majority of writers who treat
+of the subject.
+
+Leaving, for a while, the statistical view of conversion, we may turn to
+its other aspects. By the more advanced of religious teachers to-day the
+developments attendant on adolescence are taken as supplying no more
+than a favourable occasion for directing mind and emotion to definite
+religious conviction. Here the connection is admittedly more or less
+accidental. But by the great majority of theologians there is assumed a
+direct supernatural influence in the states of mind developed during
+adolescence. In more primitive times the connection is of a yet closer
+character. Puberty does not at this stage represent what a modern would
+call an awakening of the religious consciousness, but a direct
+impingement of supernatural influence. From one point of view this
+conception still remains part of all religious systems, however overlaid
+it may be with modern ideas concerning sexual maturity. And we have, as
+a mere matter of historic fact, a whole series of customs commencing
+with the initiatory customs of savages and running right on to the
+modern practice of confirmation.
+
+In a previous chapter it was pointed out what is the savage state of
+mind in relation to the beginnings of sex life as it is manifested in
+both boys and girls. Adolescence does not, to the primitive mind, serve
+as an occasion for the creation of an interest in the religious life, it
+is the sign of direct supernatural influence. One consequence of this is
+the rise of more or less elaborate ceremonials marking the initiation of
+youth into direct communion with the spiritual forces that govern tribal
+life.[148] Among the Polynesians tattooing forms part of the religious
+ceremony, and during the time the marks are healing the boy is taboo to
+the rest of the tribe, owing to his having been touched by the gods.
+With the North American Indians the following ceremony seems
+characteristic:--
+
+"When a boy has attained the age of fourteen or fifteen years he absents
+himself from his father's lodge, lying on the ground in some remote or
+secluded spot, crying to the Great Spirit, and fasting the whole time.
+During this period of peril and abstinence, when he falls asleep, the
+first animal, bird, or reptile, of which he dreams, he considers the
+Great Spirit has designated for his mysterious protector through
+life."[149] Similar ceremonies are described by Livingstone as existing
+among the South African tribes. These customs are too widespread, and
+bear too great a similarity to be described with reference to many
+races. The variations are unimportant, and such as they are they may be
+studied in the pages of Hall, Frazer, and numerous other writers. With
+girls the measures adopted are of a more elaborate character than is the
+case with boys, because, for reasons already stated, the occurrence of
+puberty in girls gives the supernatural act a more startling and
+significant character. Hence the strict seclusion of girls almost
+universally practised among uncivilised peoples. The precautions taken
+indicate, as Hartland points out, that they are at this period not
+merely charged with a malign influence, but are peculiarly susceptible
+to the onset of powers other than human. And with a modification of
+language the same idea has persisted down to our time, even amongst
+those who would reject with indignation the statement that savage ideas
+concerning the nature of puberty form the real basis of their own mental
+attitude.
+
+This truth cannot be too strongly emphasised. To ignore it is to miss
+the whole significance of continuity in human institutions and ideas.
+The ceremonies described do, of course, gather round the fact of sexual
+development, but they are not concerned with the sexual life, as such.
+It is sex as a supernatural manifestation that is the vital feature of
+the situation. The governing idea is that puberty marks the direct
+association of the individual with a spiritual world to the influence of
+which the functional changes are due. As more accurate conceptions are
+formed, the older and inaccurate one is not altogether discarded. It has
+become incarnate in ceremonies, it is part of the traditional psychic
+life of the people, and the change is one of transformation rather than
+of eradication. In later cultural stages the physiological nature of the
+changes are seen, but they are expressed in terms of religion. Such
+expressions as "the soul's awareness of God," "the dawning consciousness
+of religion," etc., take the place of the earlier and more direct
+animistic interpretation. But the essential misinterpretation is
+retained, disguised from careless or uninformed people by the use of a
+modified terminology. But in substance the use made of puberty by
+organised religious forces remains the same throughout. We have the same
+absence of a rational explanation in both instances. In the one because
+the state of knowledge makes any other impossible; in the other because
+tradition, self-interest, and prejudice prevent its use. It is not only
+in his physical structure that man carries reminiscences of a lower form
+of life; such reminders are quite as plentiful in his mental life, and
+in social institutions.
+
+Even with many who perceive the mechanism of conversion its real
+significance is often missed. For the important thing is, not that some
+people express the changes incident to adolescence in terms of religion,
+but that many do not, and also that these find complete satisfaction
+along lines of æsthetic, intellectual, or social interest. Yet one often
+finds it assumed that the difference between the two classes is
+explained by assuming a certain lack of 'spiritual' development in the
+non-religious class. As stated, this is often perilously near to
+impertinence, and in any case is little better than the language of a
+charlatan. In the same way, the use of amatory phraseology is often
+treated as the intrusion of the sex element in a sphere in which it has
+no proper place. Enough has already been said to furnish good grounds
+for believing that there is much more than this in the phenomenon, and
+that one is justified in treating it as symptomatic of the operation of
+forces of the nature of which the subject is quite unaware. The only
+explanation of the facts already cited is that a misinterpretation of
+sexual states lies at the heart of the question. No other hypothesis
+covers the facts; no other hypothesis will explain why the larger number
+of people should find complete development in activities that lie
+outside the field of religion.
+
+How easy it is to see the truth and distort it in the stating may be
+seen in the following passage:--
+
+"Passing over the fact that the period of adolescence is noticeably a
+period of 'susceptibility,' we may take as an example of the intrusion
+or the persistence of the sexual elements in conditions of a non-sexual
+kind the frequent association of sexual with religious excitement. The
+appeal made during a religious revival to an unconverted person has
+psychologically some resemblance to the attempt of the male to overcome
+the hesitancy of the female. In each case the will has to be set aside,
+and strong suggestive means are used; and in both cases the appeal is
+not of the conflict type, but of an intimate, sympathetic, and pleading
+kind. In the effort to make a moral adjustment, it consequently turns
+out that a technique is used which was derived originally from sexual
+life, and the use, so to speak, of the sexual machinery for a moral
+adjustment involves, in some cases, the carrying over into the general
+process of some sexual manifestations."[150]
+
+The important questions, why religion should so powerfully appeal to
+people at adolescence, why its strength should reside so largely in the
+appeal to feelings associated with sexual development, and why
+conversion should be so rarely experienced when the period of sexual
+crisis is past, are quite ignored by Mr. Thomas. Yet it is precisely
+these questions that call most loudly for answers, and which, I believe,
+contain the key of the situation.
+
+From many points of view adolescence is perhaps the most important epoch
+in the life of every individual. It is a time of great and significant
+organic growth, with the development of new organs and functions, and a
+corresponding transformation of both the emotional and intellectual
+output. So far as the brain, the most important organ of all, is
+concerned, one may safely say that before puberty its main function has
+been acquisition. After puberty vast tracts of brain tissue become
+active, and an era of rapid development sets in. There is a rapid growth
+of new nerve connections which occasions both physiological and
+psychological unrest.[151] An important point to bear in mind, also, is
+that all periods of rapid development involve conditions of relative
+instability--one is, in fact, only the obverse side of the other. Dr.
+Mercier says that with girls "more or less decided manifestations of
+hysteria are the rule," and with both sexes this instability involves a
+peculiar susceptibility to suggestions and impressions. Accompanying the
+purely physical changes the mental and emotional nature undergoes what
+is little less than a transformation. There is less direct concern with
+self, and a more conscious concern with others. There is a craving for
+sympathy, for fellowship, a tendency to look at oneself from the
+outside, so to speak, a susceptibility to sights and sounds and
+impressions that formerly had little influence. Each one is conscious of
+new desires, new attractions, expressed often only in a vague feeling of
+unrest, with a desire, half shy because half conscious, for the company
+of the opposite sex. The childish desire for protection weakens; the
+more mature desire to protect others begins to express itself.
+
+Now, the whole significance of these changes, physical and mental, is
+fundamentally sexual and social. Human life, it may be said, has a
+twofold aspect. As a mere animal organism, there is the perpetuation of
+the species, which nature secures by the mere force of the sex impulse.
+As a human being, he is part of a social structure, cell in the social
+tissue, to use Leslie Stephen's expressive phrase. And in this direction
+nature secures what is necessary by the presence of impulses and
+cravings as imperious as, and even more permanent than, those of mere
+sex. Of course, in practice these two things operate together. By a
+process of selection, the anti-social character is weeded out, and the
+two sets of feelings work together in harmony for the furtherance and
+the development of the life of the species. The species is perpetuated
+in the interests of society; society is perpetuated in the interests of
+the species. Further, it is part of the natural 'plan' that there shall
+be developed impulses and capacities suitable to each phase of life as
+it emerges. Thus it has been shown that the lengthening of infancy--that
+is, the prolongation of the time during which the young human being is
+dependent upon its parents for support and protection--is nature's
+method of developing to a greater degree the capacity of the human
+animal for more complex adjustment. Instead of being launched on the
+world with a number of instincts practically fully developed, and so
+capable of attending to its own needs almost as soon as born, man is
+born with few instincts, and a great capacity for education enabling him
+to adjust his conduct to the demands of an environment constantly
+increasing in complexity. In the same way it has been shown that the
+instinct for play, practically universal throughout the whole of the
+animal world, is nature's method of preparing the young for the more
+serious business of nature.[152] It is, therefore, only in line with
+what is found to be true elsewhere that the changes incident to puberty
+should receive their rational interpretation in the necessities of
+social life. That these necessities should be met largely by the play of
+unreasoning impulse is, again, quite in line with what occurs in other
+directions. The insistent pressure of social life for thousands of
+generations secures the emergence of needs of the true nature of which
+the individual may be ignorant. In no other way, in fact, could the
+persistence of the species and of human society be secured.
+
+The whole significance, then, of puberty and adolescence is the entry of
+the individual into the larger life of the race. It is, too, a statement
+beyond reasonable dispute that if we eliminate religion altogether from
+the environment there is not a single feeling experienced at
+adolescence, not a single intellectual craving, that would not undergo
+full development and receive complete satisfaction. The proof of the
+truth of this is that it occurs in a large number of cases. Sacrifice,
+the craving for the ideal, with every other feeling associated by many
+with religion, exist in connection with non-religious phases of life. It
+is idle to argue that some people have a craving for religion, and
+nothing but religion will satisfy them. Where an individual is in
+complete ignorance of the nature and significance of his own
+development, and those around him no better informed; where, moreover,
+there are others in a position of authority ready with a special
+interpretation, it is not surprising if the religious explanation is
+accepted as the genuine and only one. But in reality a sound judgment is
+formed, not on the basis of what some declare they cannot do without,
+but on the basis of what others actually do without, and suffer no
+observable loss in consequence. We do not estimate the value of alcohol
+on the basis of those who declare they cannot do without it. The true
+test is found in those who abstain from its use. So, also, in the case
+of religion. That some, even the majority, declare that religious belief
+is essential to their welfare, proves little or nothing. Human nature
+being what it is, and the history of society being what it is, it would
+be surprising were it otherwise. There is much greater significance in
+so large a number of people finding complete satisfaction in purely
+secular activities.
+
+After what has been said of the misinterpretation of mental and
+emotional states in terms of religious belief, it is not surprising to
+find a writer, a clergyman, and one with experience of growing boys,
+express himself as follows:--
+
+"My experience confirms the opinion of the psychologists that most boys
+of the public school age have a strongly mystical tendency. This is to
+be expected, on account of the great emotional development of that
+period of life. But it is obscured by the fact that the boy is both
+unwilling and unable to give any verbal expression to this tendency. He
+is unwilling because it is something very new and curious in his
+experience; he is often a little frightened of it, and he is exceedingly
+frightened of other people's contempt for it. And he is unable, because
+the words he is accustomed to use are valueless in this connection, and
+he feels priggish if he tries to use others.... But, though unexplained,
+the mystical tendency is there, and should be appealed to and
+developed."[153]
+
+Now, clearly, all that can be reasonably meant by saying that a boy of,
+apparently, from 12 to 16 has a mystical tendency, is that the
+physiological changes incident to puberty are accompanied by a mass of
+feeling of a vague and formless character. Naturally, his boyish
+experience is unable to furnish him with the means of giving adequate
+expression to his feelings. That can only come with the experience of
+maturity. And with equal inevitability he is at the mercy of the
+explanation furnished him by those whom he regards as his teachers and
+guides. When he is told that this element of 'mysticism' is the
+awakening of religion in his soul, he accepts the explanation precisely
+as he accepts explanations of other things. That this 'mystical
+tendency' should be appealed to and developed is a statement open to
+very great doubt. It should rather be explained, not perhaps in a
+brutally frank manner, but in a way that would lead the boy to see
+himself as an organic part of society, with definite duties and
+obligations. If this were done, adolescence might provide us with the
+raw material for a much greater number of useful and intelligent
+citizens than it does at present. The true nature of the process, so
+elaborately misunderstood by Dr. Temple, is clearly outlined by Dr.
+Mercier:--
+
+"In connection with normal development, a large body of vague and
+formless feeling arises, and, until experience gives it shape, the
+possessor remains ignorant of the source and nature of the feeling. If
+the circumstances are appropriate for the natural outlet and expression
+of the activities, they are expressed in affection, and are a source of
+health and strength to the possessor. But if no such outlet exists, the
+vague, voluminous, formless feelings are referred to an occasion that is
+vague, voluminous, and wanting in definite form, they are ascribed to
+the direct influence of the Deity, and assume a place in religious
+emotion."[154]
+
+Leaving this aspect of the subject for a time, let us look more closely
+at the process of conversion. It has already been pointed out that one
+great feature of adolescence is susceptibility to impressions and
+suggestions. One is not surprised to find, therefore, that in
+Starbuck's collection of cases 34 per cent. of the females and 29 per
+cent. of the males described their conversion as being directly due to
+imitation, social pressure, and example. If we were to add to these the
+cases where unconscious imitation and suggestion is at work, the
+proportion would be much greater. Religion, like dress, has its modes,
+and imitation will occur in the one direction as readily as in the
+other. Nothing is more striking in the records of conversion than the
+monotony of the language used to describe the feelings experienced. It
+is exactly as though the converts had been learning a regular catechism,
+as in a way they have been. Young boys and girls will confess their
+sinful state in language identical with that used by one who has
+actually lived a career of vice and crime. Others of an aggressively
+commonplace character will use the language of exalted mysticism
+suitable to an Augustine or a Jacob Boehme. In these cases we have not
+identity of feeling finding expression in identity of language; it is
+pure imitation and suggestion without the least regard to the fitness of
+the language employed.
+
+The full power of suggestion would be more fitly considered in
+connection with waves of religious feeling that have assumed an epidemic
+form; but it will not be out of place here to call attention to this
+factor in such a recent case as the outbreaks in Wales under the
+leadership of persons such as Evan Roberts. Quite apart from the
+suggestion and imitation operating in the gatherings themselves, it is
+plain that many went to the meetings quite prepared to act in accordance
+with what had gone before. Newspapers had published elaborate reports
+of the 'scenes,' certain manifestations were recognised as signs of the
+"workings of the Spirit," with the result that all these operated as
+powerful suggestions, particularly with those of a hysterical
+disposition. And behind this particular revival there were the
+traditions of other revivals, all of which had created a heritage as
+coercive as any purely social tradition. A crowd of people in a state of
+eager expectancy, exposed to the assaults of a preacher skilled in
+rousing their emotion to fever pitch, is naturally ready to see and hear
+things that none would see and hear in their normal moments. No better
+field for the study of crowd psychology, particularly at the point at
+which it merges into the abnormal, could be imagined than the ordinary
+revival.
+
+In America these revival out breaks seem to assume a much more
+extravagant form than with us. Mr. Stanley Hall, for example, thus
+describes a Kentucky camp meeting in which the prevailing term of
+spiritual manifestation was that of 'jerking.' Quoting from an
+eye-witness, he says:--
+
+"The crowd swarmed all night round the preacher, singing, shouting,
+laughing, some plunging wildly over stumps and benches into the forest,
+shouting 'Lost, lost!' others leaping and bounding about like live fish
+out of water; others rolling over and over on the ground for hours;
+others lying on the ground and talking when they could not move; and yet
+others beating the ground with their heels. As the excitement increased,
+it grew more morbid and took the form of 'jerkings,' or in others the
+holy laugh. The jerks began with the head, which was thrown violently
+from side to side so rapidly that the features were blurred and the
+hair almost seemed to snap, and when the sufferer struck an obstacle and
+fell he would bounce about like a ball. Saplings were sometimes cut
+breast high for the people to jerk by. In one place the earth about the
+roots of one of them was kicked about as though by the feet of a horse
+stamping flies. One sufferer mounted his horse to ride away when the
+jerks threw him to the earth, whence he rose a Christian. A lad, who
+feigned illness to stay away, was dragged there by the spirit and his
+head dashed against the wall till he had to pray. A sceptic who cursed
+and swore was crushed by a falling tree. Men fancied themselves dogs,
+and gathered round a tree barking and 'treeing the devil.' They saw
+visions and dreamed dreams, and as the revival waned, it left a crop of
+nervous and hysterical disorders in its wake."[155]
+
+We have nothing quite so extreme as this in British revivals, but the
+home phenomena are not substantially different in nature. A medical
+observer of some of the earliest Methodist revivals thus describes the
+symptoms of those who were subject to 'divine' seizures under the
+influence of Wesley and his immediate followers:--
+
+"There came on first a feeling of faintness, with rigor and a sense of
+weight at the pit of the stomach; soon after which the patient cried out
+as though in the agonies of labour. The convulsions then began, first
+showing themselves in the muscles of the eyelids, though the eyes
+themselves were fixed and staring. The most frightful contortions of the
+countenance followed, and the convulsions now took their course
+downwards, so that the muscles of the trunk and neck were affected,
+causing a sobbing respiration, which was performed with great effort.
+Tremors and agitations ensued, and the patients screamed out violently,
+and tossed their heads from side to side. As the complaint increased, it
+seized the arms, and its victims beat their breasts, clasped their
+hands, and made all sorts of strange noises."
+
+To the non-medical religious observer the scenes produced a different
+impression, thus:--
+
+"When the power of religion began to be spoken of, the presence of God
+really filled the place.... The greatest number of them who cried or
+fell were men; but some women and several children felt the power of the
+same Almighty Spirit, and seemed just sinking into hell. This occasioned
+a mixture of sounds, some shrieking, some roaring aloud. The most
+general was a loud breathing, like that of people half strangled and
+gasping for life; and, indeed, almost all the cries were like those of
+human creatures dying in bitter anguish.... I stood on a pew seat, as
+did a young man in the opposite pew, an able-bodied, fresh, healthy
+countryman; but in a moment, while he seemed to think of nothing less,
+down he dropt with a violence inconceivable. The adjoining pews seemed
+shook with his fall. I heard afterwards the stamping of his feet ready
+to break the boards as he lay in strong convulsions at the bottom of the
+pew.... Among the children who felt the arrows of the Almighty, I saw a
+sturdy boy, about eight years old, who roared above his fellows, and
+seemed, in his agony, to struggle with the strength of a grown man. His
+face was red as scarlet; and almost all on whom God laid His hand turned
+either very red or almost black."[156]
+
+In other instances connected with the same movement, a girl is described
+as "lying on the floor as one dead." One woman "tore up the ground with
+her hands, filling them with dust and with the hard-trodden grass";
+another "roared and screamed in dreadful agony." A child, seven years
+old, "saw visions, and astonished the neighbours with her awful manner
+of relating them." John Wesley personally interviewed a number of the
+people seized in this manner, and was quite convinced of the
+supernatural nature of the attacks. He said that he had "generally
+observed more or less of these outward symptoms to attend the beginning
+of a general work of God," although he admitted that in some cases
+"Satan mimicked God's work in order to discredit the whole work." But
+whether of God or Satan there was no question of their supernatural
+character. Moreover, whatever may be one's opinion of these outbreaks,
+there is one fact that stands out clear and indisputable. This is that
+the Methodist revival owed a great deal of its vitality--as is also the
+case with other religious movements--to phenomena of a distinctly
+pathologic nature. Subtract from these movements all phenomena of the
+class indicated, and such phrases as 'the revival fire' become
+meaningless. Right through history religious conviction has been gained
+in innumerable cases by the operation of factors that a more accurate
+knowledge finds can be explained without any reference whatever to
+supernatural forces.
+
+Lest the above examples be dismissed as belonging to an old order of
+things, I subjoin the following account--from a missionary--of a recent
+revival scene in India:--
+
+"There were people ... on the floor fairly writhing over the realisation
+of sin as it came over them.... Saturday we were favoured with a
+wonderful manifestation of the Spirit. One of the older girls who had
+had a remarkable experience, went into a trance, with her head thrown
+back, her arms folded, and motionless, except for a slight movement of
+her foot. She seemed to be seeing something wonderful, for she would
+marvel at it, and then laugh excitedly.... One girl rushed to the back
+of the vestibule and, lying across a bench, with her head and hands
+against the wall, she fairly writhed in agony for two hours before peace
+came to her."[157]
+
+I do not know on what grounds we are justified in calling civilised
+people who chronicle these outbreaks as "a wonderful manifestation of
+the Spirit." Civilised in other respects, in relation to other matters,
+they may be. Civilised in relation to this particular matter they
+certainly are not. Their viewpoint is precisely that of the lowest tribe
+of savages. Savages, indeed, could not do more; our 'civilised'
+missionaries do no less. Tylor well says that "such descriptions carry
+us far back in the history of the human mind, showing modern men still
+in ignorant sincerity producing the very fits and swoons to which for
+untold ages savage tribes have given religious import. These
+manifestations in modern Europe indeed form part of a revival of
+religion, the religion of mental disease."[158]
+
+The truth is that the appeals usually made to induce conversion, and the
+methods adopted, tend to develop a morbid state of mind, which very
+easily passes into the pathological. A too insistent habit of
+introspection is always dangerous, and the danger is heightened when it
+takes the form of religious brooding. In Dr. Starbuck's collection of
+cases, seventy-five per cent. of the males and sixty per cent. of the
+females confessed to feelings of depression, anxiety, and sadness before
+conversion. This may be attributed partly to the harping upon a
+conviction of sinfulness, which in itself is wholly of an unhealthy
+character. It does not indicate moral health, and it is very far from
+indicating physiological health. The following confessions are
+pertinent, and will illustrate both points. I give in brackets the ages
+of the subjects where stated:--
+
+"I felt the wrath of God resting on me. I called on Him for aid, and
+felt my sins forgiven" (13).
+
+"I couldn't eat, and would lie awake all night."
+
+"Often, very often, I cried myself to sleep" (19).
+
+"Hymns would sound in my ears as if sung" (10).
+
+"I had visions of Christ saying to me, Come to Me, My child" (15).
+
+"Just before conversion I was walking along a pathway, thinking of
+religious matters, when suddenly the word H-e-l-l was spelled out five
+yards ahead of me" (17).
+
+"I felt a touch of the Divine One, and a voice said 'Thy sins are
+forgiven thee; arise and go in peace'" (12).
+
+"The thoughts of my condition were terrible" (13).
+
+"For three months it seemed as if God's Spirit had withdrawn from me.
+Fear took hold of me. For a week I was on the border of despair" (16).
+
+"A sense of sinfulness and estrangement from God grew daily" (15).
+
+"Everything went wrong with me; it felt like Sunday all the time" (12).
+
+"I felt that something terrible was going to happen" (14).
+
+"I fell on my face by a bench and tried to pray. Every time I would call
+on God something like a man's hand would strangle me by choking. I
+thought I would surely die if I could not get help. I made one final
+effort to call on God for mercy if I did strangle and die, and the last
+I remember at that time was falling back on the ground with that unseen
+hand on my throat. When I came to myself there was a crowd around
+praising God."
+
+A crowd around praising God! For all substantial purposes this last
+might be the description of a state of affairs in Central Africa instead
+of an occurrence in a country that claims to be civilised. It is not
+surprising that so great an authority as Sir T. S. Clouston gives an
+emphatic warning against revival services and unusual religious
+meetings, which should "on no account be attended by persons with weak
+heads, excitable dispositions, and neurotic constitutions."[159]
+Unfortunately it is precisely these classes for whom they possess the
+greatest attractions, and from whom the larger number of chronicled
+cases are drawn. The excitement of the revival meeting is as fatal an
+attraction to them as the dram is to the confirmed alcoholist; and if
+the ill-consequences are neither so immediately discernible nor as
+repulsive in character, they are none the less present in a large number
+of cases. The emotional strain to which the organism is subjected
+occurs, as the ages of the converts show, precisely at the time when it
+is least able to bear it safely. The main characteristic of adolescence
+is instability, physical, emotional, and intellectual. It is a time of
+stress and strain, of the formation of new feelings and associations and
+desires that crave for expression and gratification. The instability of
+the organic conditions is evidenced by the large proportion of nervous
+disorders that occur during adolescence. Adolescent insanity is a
+well-known form of mania, although it is usually of brief duration. Sir
+T. S. Clouston, in his _Neuroses of Development_, gives a long list of
+complaints attendant on adolescence, and Sir W. R. Gowers, dealing with
+1450 cases of epilepsy, points out that "three-quarters of the cases of
+epilepsy begin under twenty years, and nearly half (46 per cent.)
+between ten and twenty, the maximum being at fourteen, fifteen, and
+sixteen." Of hysteria, the same writer points out that of the total
+cases 50 per cent. occurs from ten to twenty years of age, 20 per cent.
+from twenty to thirty, and only 10 per cent. from thirty to forty.[160]
+
+The peculiar danger, then, of the modern appeal for conversion is that
+it is couched in a form likely to do the minimum of good and the maximum
+of harm. Where religion exists as a normally operative factor of the
+environment--as in lower stages of culture--the danger is avoided,
+because no special machinery is required to bring about religious
+conviction. The general social life secures this. But at a later stage,
+when the religious and secular aspects of life become separated, with a
+growing preponderance of the latter, religion must be, as it were,
+specially and forcibly introduced. Whether for good or ill, it is a
+disturbing force. It strives to divert the developing organic energies
+into a new channel. To effect this, it plays upon the emotions to an
+altogether dangerous extent, in complete ignorance of the nature of the
+passions excited. In the older form of the religious appeal, that in
+which fear was the chief emotion aroused, it is now generally conceded
+that the consequences were wholly bad. But under any form the emotional
+appeal is fraught with danger, since the tendency is for it to bring out
+unsuspected weaknesses in other directions. Sir W. R. Gowers wisely
+points out that "mental emotion--fright, excitement, anxiety--is the
+most potent cause of epilepsy," which is accounted for by bearing in
+mind "the profoundly disturbing effect of alarm on the nervous system,
+deranging as it does almost every function of the nervous system."
+Persons with predispositions to nervous disorders may pass with safety
+through the period of adolescence so long as their circumstances provide
+opportunities for healthy occupation with no undue emotional strain. But
+let the former be lacking, and the latter danger is always present. The
+hidden weakness develops, and injury more or less permanent follows.
+There is hardly a qualified medical authority in the country who would
+deny the truth of what has been said, although many do not care to speak
+out in relation to religious matters. But all would doubtless agree with
+Dr. Mercier that "every revival is attended by its crop of cases of
+insanity, which are the more numerous as the revival is more fervent and
+long continued."[161]
+
+Something must be said on the moral character of conversions in
+general. This is, naturally, greatly exaggerated, often deliberately so.
+In the first place, confessions of 'sinfulness' in a pre-conversion
+state, when made by youths of both sexes, may be dismissed as quite
+worthless. They are merely using the language placed in their mouths by
+professional evangelists, and the similarity of the confessions carry
+their own condemnation. Leading a sinful, or even a vicious life,
+usually means no more than visiting a theatre, or a music hall, or
+playing cards, or non-attendance at church, or not troubling about
+religious doctrines. Very often the vague feeling of restlessness
+incident to adolescence is interpreted as due to sin or estrangement
+from God, and after conversion the convert is, for purposes of
+self-glorification, given to magnify the benefits and comforts derived
+from his religious convictions. The magnitude of the change increases
+the value of the convert, and with well-known characters there has been
+as great an exaggeration of vices before conversion as of virtues
+subsequently. The way in which evangelical Christianity has created a
+life of the wildest dissipation for the earlier years of John Bunyan is
+an instructive instance of this procedure.
+
+So far as older converts are concerned, everyone of balanced judgment
+will regard stories of conversion from extreme vice to extreme virtue
+with the greatest suspicion. Character does not change suddenly,
+although there may be cases of 'sports' in the moral world as elsewhere.
+Where some modification of conduct, but hardly of character, results,
+the machinery is very obvious, and does not in the least necessitate an
+appeal to the intrusion of a supernatural influence for an explanation.
+The religious gathering opens--as any non-religious meeting may open--a
+new circle of associates with different ideals and standards of value.
+So long as the newcomer is desirous of retaining the respect of his
+fresh associates, so long he will try to act as they act and think as
+they think. There will be a change of conduct, but not, as I have said,
+of character. Those who look closely will find the same character still
+active. The mean character remains mean, the untruthful one remains
+untruthful. The only difference is that these qualities will be
+expressed in a different form. Moreover, the same thing may be seen
+occurring quite apart from religion. Every association of men and women
+exerts precisely the same influence. In the army, a regiment that has a
+reputation for steadiness and sobriety develops these qualities in all
+who enter it. Regiments with a reputation for opposite qualities do not
+fail to convert newcomers. A workshop, a club, a profession, exerts a
+precisely similar influence. One man finds inspiration in the Bible and
+another in the Newgate Calendar. A man will usually be guided by the
+ideals of his associates, whether these ideals be those of a thieves'
+kitchen or of a philanthropic institution. This only means that each
+individual is subject to the influence of the group spirit. For good and
+evil this is one of the deepest and most pregnant facts of human nature.
+The utilisation and distortion of this fact in the interests of
+religious organisations has served to prevent its general recognition
+and the wise use of it by the community at large.
+
+Finally, it has to be borne in mind, in view of the data given above,
+that conversion is experienced by the individual at that period of life
+when the more social side of human nature is beginning to find
+expression. In this way the natural growth from the small world of
+childhood to the larger world of adult humanity is taken advantage of by
+religion, and the process of inevitable growth is attributed to the
+influence of religious belief. In itself the phenomenon is in no degree
+religious, but wholly social. The process is well enough described by
+Starbuck in the following passage--although there are certain quite
+unnecessary theological implications:--
+
+"Conversion is the surrender of the personal will to be guided by the
+larger forces of which it is a part. These two aspects are often
+mingled. In both there is much in common. There is a sudden revelation
+and recognition of a higher order than that of the personal will. The
+sympathies follow the direction of the new insight, and the convert
+transfers the centre of life and activity from the part to the whole.
+With new insight comes new beauty. Beauty and worth awaken love--love
+for parents, kindred, kind, society, cosmic order, truth, and spiritual
+life. The individual learns to transfer himself from a centre of
+self-activity into an organ of revelation of universal being, and to
+live a life of affection for and oneness with the larger life outside.
+As a necessary condition of the spiritual awakening is the birth of
+fresh activity and of a larger self-consciousness, which often assert
+themselves as the dominant element in consciousness."[162]
+
+Adolescence is the golden period of life, because it is the age in which
+the formative influences effect their strongest and most permanent
+impressions. But this susceptibility, while pregnant with promise, is
+because of this susceptibility likewise fraught with the possibilities
+of danger. The developing qualities of mind need to be wisely and
+carefully guided; and it is little short of criminal that at this
+critical juncture so many young people should be handed over to the
+ignorant ministrations of professional evangelism. The true sociological
+significance of the development is ignored, and it is small wonder that,
+having wasted this impressionable period, so many people should go
+through life with a quite rudimentary sense of social responsibility and
+duty. An American author, speaking of the connection between certain
+brutal manifestations in social life in the United States and religious
+teaching, says:--
+
+"It is well known that lynching in the South is carried on largely by
+the ignorant and baser elements of the white population. It is also well
+known that the chief method of religious influence and training of the
+black man and the ignorant white man is impulsive and emotional
+revivalism. It is a highly dangerous situation, and deserves the earnest
+consideration of the ecclesiastical statesmen of all denominations which
+work in the South. It will be impossible to protect that part of the
+nation, or any other, from the epidemic madness of the lynching mob if
+the seeds of it are sown in the sacred soil of religion.... Their
+preachers are great 'soul-savers,' but they lack the practical sense to
+build up their emotionalised converts into anything that approaches a
+higher life."[163]
+
+The truth of this passage has a very wide implication. It is not alone
+true that so long as the lower kind of revivalism is encouraged, we are
+unconsciously perpetuating certain very ugly manifestations of social
+life; it is also true that while we give a supernaturalistic
+interpretation of phenomena that are wholly physiological and
+sociological in character, we can never make the most of the human
+material we possess. On the one side we have a deplorable encouragement
+of unhealthy emotionalism, and on the other a sheer misdirection and
+misuse of human faculty. The increase of self-consciousness, the craving
+for sympathy and communion with one's fellows, the impulse to service in
+the common life of the State, have no genuine connection with religion,
+although all these qualities are classified as religious, and are
+utilised by religious organisations. Actually and fundamentally they
+belong to the social side of human nature. As our hands are developed
+for grasping, and the various organs of the body for their respective
+functions, so mental and emotional qualities are developed in their due
+course for a rational social life. Biologically and psychologically,
+male and female are at adolescence entering into a deeper and more
+enduring relationship with the life of the race. There is no other
+meaning to the process.
+
+Naturally enough, the vast majority of people express their developing
+nature in accordance with the fashion of their environment. If this
+environmental influence were rationally non-religious, the language
+would be that of a non-religious philosophy. As, however,
+supernaturalism, in some form or other, is still a potent force we have
+a contrary result. It is only here and there that one is found with the
+inclination or the wit to analyse his or her impulses, and few possess
+enough knowledge to make the analysis profitable. There is no wonder
+that concerning many of the most important phenomena of human life we
+are still little above the level of the fetish worshipper. We may have a
+more elaborate phraseology, but the old ideas are still operative. The
+consequence is that each newcomer finds certain ideas and forms of
+speech ready for his acceptance, and is handed over, bound hand and
+foot, to influences that are the least capable of sane direction. We do
+not merely sacrifice our first-born; we immolate the whole of our
+progeny. The ignorant past plays into the hands of the designing
+present; the present conspires with the past to rob the future of the
+good that might result from the growth of a wiser and a better race.
+
+Were society really enlightened and genuinely civilised, the truth of
+what has been said would be recognised as soon as stated. It would,
+indeed, be unnecessary to labour what would then be a generally
+recognised truth. But the mass of the people are not genuinely
+enlightened, our civilisation is largely a veneer, and numerous agencies
+prevent our reaping the full benefit of our available knowledge. Thus it
+happens that in place of an explanation of human qualities in terms of
+biologic and social evolution, we find current an explanation that is
+based upon pre-scientific ideas. Because our less instructed ancestors
+accounted for various manifestations of human qualities as due to a
+supernatural influence, we continue to perpetuate the delusion. We teach
+youth to express itself in terms of supernaturalism, and then treat the
+language and the fact as inseparable. In this respect, sociology is
+passing through a phase from which some of the sciences have finally
+emerged. In physics and astronomy, for instance, the fact has been
+separated from the supernatural explanation, and shown to be
+independent of it. An exploitation of social life in the interests of
+supernaturalism is still in active operation. It is this that is really
+the central truth of the situation. And in ignoring this truth we expose
+a growing generation to the worst possible of educative influences, at a
+time when a wiser control would be preparing it for an intelligent
+participation in the serious and enduring work of social organisation.
+
+
+FOOTNOTES:
+
+[142] Dr. G. B. Cutten, _The Psychological Phenomena of Christianity_,
+pp. 7-8.
+
+[143] The most elaborate study of this character known to the present
+writer is Mr. G. Stanley Hall's _Adolescence_, in two volumes. The bulk
+of the work is, however, terrifying to some, and the cost prohibitive to
+many. For the general reader of limited leisure and means, Professor
+Starbuck's smaller volume, _The Psychology of Religion_, presents the
+salient facts in a brief and satisfactory manner. It is lacking,
+however, on the anthropological side, a view that is well presented by
+Dr. Stanley Hall.
+
+[144] See _Adolescence_, i. p. 528.
+
+[145] Vol. iii. p. 279.
+
+[146] _Psychology of Religion_, chap. iii. Hall's figures are given in
+the second volume of his work, pp. 288-92.
+
+[147] _Varieties_, p. 199.
+
+[148] An elaborate list of these ceremonies in both the savage and
+civilised worlds has been compiled by Mr. Hall, ii. chap. xiii.
+
+[149] Catlin, _North American Indians_, i. p. 36; see also ii. p. 347.
+
+[150] W. I. Thomas, _Sex and Society_, pp. 115-6.
+
+[151] For a good summary, see Donaldson's _Growth of the Brain_, pp.
+241-48.
+
+[152] See on this subject the two fine works by Karl Groos, _The Play of
+Animals_, _The Play of Man_.
+
+[153] W. Temple, _Repton School Sermons_.
+
+[154] _Sanity and Insanity_, p. 281.
+
+[155] _Adolescence_, ii. pp. 286-7.
+
+[156] Southey's _Life of Wesley_, chap. xxiv.
+
+[157] From _The Examiner_ of September 6, 1906, cited by Cutten, p. 185.
+
+[158] _Primitive Culture_, ii. p. 422.
+
+[159] _Clinical Lectures_, p. 39.
+
+[160] _Manual of Diseases of the Nervous System_, 1893, pp. 732 and 785.
+
+[161] _Sanity and Insanity_, p. 282.
+
+[162] _Psychology of Religion_, pp. 146-7.
+
+[163] _Primitive Traits in Religious Revivals._
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER EIGHT
+
+RELIGIOUS EPIDEMICS
+
+
+Under pressure of scientific analysis the old distinction between the
+individual and society bids fair to break down, or to maintain itself as
+no more than a convenience of classification. It is now being recognised
+that a society is something more than a mere aggregate of self-contained
+units, and that the individual is quite inexplicable apart from the
+social group. It is the latter which gives the former his individuality.
+His earliest impressions are derived from the life of the group, and as
+he grows so he comes more and more under the influence of social forces.
+The consequence is that the key to a very large part of the phenomena of
+human nature is to be found in a study of group life. We may abstract
+the individual for purposes of examination, much as a physiologist may
+study the heart or the liver apart from the body from which it has been
+taken. But ultimately it is in relation to the whole that the true
+significance and value of the part is to be discerned.
+
+In this corporate life imitation and suggestion play a powerful part.
+With children, by far the larger part of their education consists of
+sheer imitation, nor do adults ever develop beyond its influence.
+Suggestion is a factor that is more operative in youth and maturity than
+in early childhood, and is exhibited in a thousand and one subtle and
+unexpected ways. Both these forces are essential to an orderly, and to a
+progressive, social life; but they may just as easily become the cause
+of movements that are retrogressive, and even anti-social in character.
+An epidemic of suicide or of murder is as easily initiated as an
+epidemic of philanthropy. Let a person commit suicide in a striking and
+unusual manner, and there will soon be others following his example.
+Given a favourable environment, there is no idea, however unreal, that
+will not find advocates; no example, however strange or disgusting, that
+will not find imitators. The more uniform the society, the more powerful
+the suggestion, the easier the imitation. That is why a crowd, acting as
+a crowd, is nearly always made up of people drawn from the same social
+stratum, each unit already familiar with certain ideals and belief.
+Under such conditions a crowd will assume all the characteristics of a
+psychological entity. As Gustave Le Bon has pointed out, a crowd will do
+collectively what none of its constituent units would ever dream of
+doing singly.[164] It becomes capable of deeds of heroism or of savage
+cruelty. It will sacrifice itself or others with indifference. Above
+all, the mere fact of moving in a mass gives the individual a sense of
+power, a certainty of being in the right that he can--save under
+exceptional circumstances--never acquire while alone. The intellect is
+subdued, inhibition is inoperative, the instincts are given free play,
+and their movement is determined in turn by suggestions not unlike those
+with which a trained hypnotist influences his subject.
+
+In the phenomena of contagion words and symbols play a powerful part.
+They are both a rallying-point and an outlet for the emotions of a
+crowd. These words or symbols may be wholly incongruous with the real
+needs of a people, but provided they are sufficiently familiar they will
+serve their purpose. And the more primitive the type of mind represented
+by the mass of the people the more powerfully these symbols operate.
+Shakespeare's portrayal of the crowd in _Julius Cæsar_ remains eternally
+true. The skilled orator, playing on old feelings, using familiar terms,
+and invoking familiar ideas, finds a crowd quite plastic to his hands.
+It is for these reasons that there is so keen a struggle with political
+and social parties for a monopoly of good rallying cries, and a
+readiness to fix objectionable titles on their opponents. Patriotism,
+Little Englander, Jingo, The Church in Danger, Godless Education, etc.
+etc. Causes are materially helped or injured by these means. There is
+little or no consideration given to their justice or reasonableness; it
+is the image aroused that does the work.
+
+Psychological epidemics may in some cases be justly called normal in
+character. That is, they depend upon factors that are always in
+operation and which form a part of every social structure. A war fever
+or a commercial panic falls under this head. In other instances they
+depend upon abnormal conditions, upon the workings, perhaps, of some
+obscure nervous disease, and are of a pathological description. In yet
+other cases they represent a mixture of both. In such cases, for
+example, as that of the Medieval Flagellants or of the Dancing Mania,
+the presence of pathological elements is unmistakable. But neither of
+these epidemics could have occurred without a certain social
+preparation, and unless they had called into operation those principles
+of crowd psychology to which science has within recent years turned its
+attention, and which are normal factors in every society. These three
+classes of epidemics may be found in connection with subjects other than
+religious, but I am at present concerned with them only in that
+relation, and to point out that, in spite of their undesirable or
+admittedly pathologic character, they have yet served to keep
+supernaturalism alive and active.
+
+During the Christian period of European history by far the most
+important of all epidemics, as it was indeed the earliest, was
+monasticism. This takes front rank because of its extent, the degree to
+which it prepared the ground for subsequent outbreaks, and because of
+its indirect, and, I think, too little noticed, social consequences. It
+may safely be said that no other movement has so powerfully affected
+European society as has the monasticism of the early Christian
+centuries. It cannot, of course, be urged that Christianity originated
+monasticism. India and Egypt had its ascetic practices and celibate
+priesthood long before the birth of Christianity, and indeed gave
+Christianity the pattern from which to work. But the main stream of
+social life remained unaffected to any considerable extent by this
+asceticism. The social and domestic virtues received full recognition
+from the upholders of the monastic life, and there is no evidence that
+asceticism ever assumed an epidemic form. It has often been the lot of
+the Christian Church to give a more intense expression to religious
+tendencies already existing, and this was so in the case before us. At
+any rate, it was left for the Christian Church to give to monasticism
+the character of an epidemic, to treat the purely social and domestic
+virtues as a positive hindrance to the religious life, seriously to
+disturb national well-being, and to come perilously near destroying
+civilisation.
+
+The origin of ascetic practices has already been indicated in a previous
+chapter. It has there been pointed out that the deliberate torture of
+mind and body arose from the belief that the induced states brought man
+into direct communion with supernatural powers, and that this element
+has continued in almost every religion in the world. Says
+Baring-Gould:--
+
+"The ascetic instinct is intimately united with the religious instinct.
+There is scarcely a religion of ancient and modern times, certain forms
+of Protestantism excepted, that does not recognise asceticism as an
+element in its system.... Brahmanism has its order of ascetics....
+Mohammedanism has its fakirs, subduing the flesh by their austerities,
+and developing the spirit by their contemplation and prayers. Fasting
+and self-denial were observances required of the Greeks, who desired
+initiation into the mysteries.... The scourge was used before the altars
+of Artemis and over the tomb of Pelops. The Egyptian priests passed
+their novitiate in the deserts, and when not engaged in their religious
+functions were supposed to spend their time in caves. They renounced all
+commerce with the world, and lived in contemplation, temperance, and
+frugality, and in absolute poverty.... The Peruvians were required to
+fast before sacrificing to the gods, and to bind themselves by vows of
+chastity and abstinence from nourishing food.... There were ascetic
+orders for old men and nunneries for widows among the Totomacs, monastic
+orders among Toltecs dedicated to the service of Quetzalcoatl, and
+others among the Aztecs consecrated to Tezcatlipoca."[165]
+
+It was argued by Bingham, a learned eighteenth-century ecclesiastical
+historian, that although asceticism was known and practised in
+individual cases from the earliest period of Christian history, it did
+not establish itself within the Church until the fourth century. It is
+not a matter of great consequence to the subject under discussion
+whether this be so or not. It is at least certain that Christian
+teaching contained within itself all the elements for such a
+development, which was bound, sooner or later, to transpire. The
+antithesis between the flesh and the spirit, the conception of the world
+as given over to Satan, the ascetic teaching of Paul, with the value
+placed upon suffering and privation as spiritually disciplinary forces,
+could not but create in a society permeated with a special type of
+supernaturalism, that asceticism which became so marked a feature of
+medieval Christianity. And it is certain also that in no other instance
+has asceticism proved itself so grave a danger to social order and
+security. Allowing for what Lecky calls the 'glaring mendacity' of the
+lives of the saints, a description that applies more or less to all the
+ecclesiastical writings of the early centuries, it is evident that the
+number of monks, their ferocity, and general practices, were enough to
+constitute a grave social danger. It is said that St. Pachomius had 7000
+monks under his direct rule; that in the time of Jerome 50,000 monks
+gathered together at the Easter festival; that one Egyptian city
+mustered 20,000 nuns and 10,000 monks, and that the monastic population
+of Egypt at one time equalled in number the rest of the inhabitants. At
+a later date, within fifty years of its institution, the Franciscan
+Order possessed 8000 houses, with 200,000 members. In the twelfth
+century the Cluniacs had 2000 monasteries in France. In England, as late
+as 1546, Hooper, afterwards Bishop of Gloucester, declared that there
+were no less than 10,000 nuns in England. Every country in Europe
+possessed a larger or smaller army of men and women whose ideals were in
+direct conflict with nearly all that makes for a sane and progressive
+civilisation.
+
+The general character of the monk during the full swing of the ascetic
+epidemic has been well sketched by Lecky. His summary here will save a
+more extended exposition:--
+
+"There is perhaps no phase in the moral history of mankind of a deeper
+and more painful interest than this ascetic epidemic. A hideous, sordid,
+and emaciated maniac, without knowledge, without patriotism, without
+natural affection, passing his life in a long routine of useless and
+atrocious self-torture, and quailing before the ghastly phantoms of his
+delirious brain, had become the ideal of the nations which had known the
+writings of Plato and Cicero, and the lives of Socrates and Cato. For
+about two centuries, the hideous maceration of the body was regarded as
+the highest proof of excellence. St. Jerome declares, with a thrill of
+admiration, how he had seen a monk, who for thirty years had lived
+exclusively on a small portion of barley bread and of mouldy water;
+another who lived in a hole and never ate more than five figs for his
+daily repast; a third who cut his hair only on Easter Sunday, who never
+washed his clothes, who never changed his tunic till it fell to pieces,
+who starved himself till his eyes grew dim, and his skin like a pumice
+stone.... For six months, it is said, St. Macarius of Alexandria slept
+in a marsh, and exposed his naked body to the stings of venomous
+flies.... His disciple, St. Eusebius, carried one hundred and fifty
+pounds of iron, and lived for three years in a dried-up well.... St.
+Besarion spent forty days and nights in the middle of thorn bushes, and
+for forty days and nights never lay down when he slept.... Some saints,
+like St. Marcian, restricted themselves to one meal a day, so small that
+they continually suffered the pangs of hunger.... Some of the hermits
+lived in deserted dens of wild beasts, others in dried-up wells, while
+others found a congenial resting-place among the tombs. Some disdained
+all clothes, and crawled abroad like the wild beasts, covered only by
+their matted hair. The cleanliness of the body was regarded as a
+pollution of the soul, and the saints who were most admired had become
+one hideous mass of clotted filth. St. Athanasius relates with
+enthusiasm how St. Antony, the patriarch of monachism, had never, to
+extreme old age, been guilty of washing his feet.... St. Abraham, the
+hermit, however, who lived for fifty years after his conversion, rigidly
+refused from that date to wash either his face or his feet.... St. Ammon
+had never seen himself naked. A famous virgin, named Sylvia, though she
+was sixty years old, and though bodily sickness was a consequence of her
+habits, resolutely refused, on religious principles, to wash any part of
+her body except her fingers. St. Euphraxia joined a convent of one
+hundred and thirty nuns, who never washed their feet, and who shuddered
+at the mention of a bath."[166]
+
+It is difficult to realise what it is exactly that some writers have in
+their minds when they praise the purity of the ascetic ideal, and lament
+its degradation as though society lost something of great value thereby.
+The examples cited realised that ideal as well as it could be realised,
+and its anti-social character is unmistakable. If it is intended to
+imply that an element of self-denial or self-discipline is essential to
+healthy development, that is admitted, but this is not the ascetic
+ideal; it is that of temperance as taught by the best of the ancient
+philosophers. What the ascetic aimed at was not self-development, but
+self-suppression. The discipline of the monk was only another name for
+the cultivation of a frame of mind unhealthy and anti-social.
+Eventually, the rapidity with which this mania spread, the fact that for
+several centuries it raged as a veritable epidemic, carried with it the
+germs of a corrective. The more numerous monks and nuns became, the more
+certain it became that many of them would develop passions and
+propensities they professed to despise. The love of ease and wealth, the
+lust of power and pride of place, was sure to find expression, and if by
+the degradation of the ascetic ideal is meant the fact that the
+preachers of poverty, and humility, and meekness, became the wealthiest,
+the most powerful, the most corrupt, and the most tyrannical order in
+Christendom, the reason is that not even monasticism could prevent
+ordinary human passions from finding expression. They might be
+suppressed in the case of a few; it became impossible with a multitude.
+That they found expression in so disastrous a form was due to the fact
+that the disciplinary agent of these passions, a developed social
+consciousness, played so small a part in the life of the monk.
+
+It is no part of my present purpose to trace the full consequences of
+the ascetic epidemic. Some of these consequences, however, have a more
+or less direct bearing upon this enquiry, and it is necessary to say
+something upon them. One enduring and inevitable consequence of
+monasticism has not, I think, been adequately noted by many writers.
+This is its influence on the ideal of marriage, on the family, and on
+the domestic virtues. In India and Egypt celibacy had been closely
+associated with the religious life, but the ascetic was regarded as a
+man peculiarly apart from his fellows, and the family continued to be
+held in great honour, even by religious writers. Christianity provided
+for the first time a body of writers who made a direct attack upon
+marriage as obstructing the supreme duty of spiritual development. The
+Rev. Principal Donaldson, in his generally excellent book on _Woman_,
+professes to find some difficulty in accounting for the growth among the
+early Christians of the feeling in favour of celibacy. He remarks that
+"no one with the New Testament as his guide could venture to assert that
+marriage was wrong." Not wrong, certainly; but anyone with the New
+Testament before him would be justified in asserting marriage to be
+inferior to celibacy. It is at most taken for granted; it is neither
+commended nor recommended, and of its social value there is never a
+glimpse. And there is much on the other side. Paul's teaching is
+strongly in favour of celibacy, and marriage is only advised to avoid a
+greater evil. In the Book of _Revelation_ there is a reference to the
+144,000 saints who wait on "the Lamb," and who "were not defiled with
+women, but were virgins." Certainly the New Testament does not condemn
+marriage, but it is idle to pretend that those who preached the celibate
+ideal failed to find therein a warranty for their teaching.
+
+The historic fact is, however, that the early Christian leaders were, in
+the main, ardent advocates of celibacy. The social importance of
+marriage being ignored, its functions became those of ministering to
+sexual passion and the perpetuation of the race. In view of the supposed
+approaching end of the world, the desirability of this last was
+questioned, and in the name of purity the former was strongly denounced.
+It is from these points of view that Tertullian describes children as
+"burdens which are to most of us perilous as being unsuitable to faith,"
+and wives as women of the second degree of modesty who had fallen into
+wedlock. Jerome said that marriage was at best a sin, and all that could
+be done was to excuse and purify it. Epiphanius said that the Church was
+based upon virginity as upon a corner-stone. Augustine was of opinion
+that celibates would shine in heaven like dazzling stars. Married people
+were declared, by another authority, to be incapable of salvation. The
+most powerful and most influential of writers concurred that the sexual
+relation was an almost fatal obstacle to religious salvation.
+
+Hardly any movement ever struck so hard against social well-being as
+did this teaching of celibacy. Wives were encouraged to desert their
+husbands, husbands to forsake their wives, children their parents.
+Parents, in turn, were exhorted to devote their children to the monastic
+life; and although at first children who had been so condemned were
+allowed to return to the world, should they desire it, on reaching
+maturity, this liberty was taken from them by the fourth Council of
+Toledo in 633.[167] Some few of the Christian writers protested against
+children being taught to forsake their parents in this manner, but the
+general spirit of the time was in its favour.
+
+"Children were nursed and trained to expect at every instant more than
+human interferences; their young energies had ever before them examples
+of asceticism, to which it was the glory, the true felicity of life, to
+aspire. The thoughtful child had all his mind thus preoccupied ...
+wherever there was gentleness, modesty, the timidity of young passion,
+repugnance to vice, an imaginative temperament, a consciousness of
+unfitness to wrestle with the rough realities of life, the way lay
+invitingly open.... It lay through perils, but was made attractive by
+perpetual wonders. It was awful, but in its awfulness lay its power over
+the young mind. It learned to trample down that last bond which united
+the child to common humanity, filial reverence; the fond and mysterious
+attachment of the child and the mother, the inborn reverence of the son
+to the father. It is the highest praise of St. Fulgentius that he
+overcame his mother's tenderness by religious cruelty."[168]
+
+The full warranty for Dean Milman's stricture is seen in the following
+passage from St. Jerome:--
+
+"Though your little nephew twine his arms around your neck; though your
+mother, with dishevelled hair, and tearing her robe asunder, point to
+the breast with which she suckled you; though your father fall down on
+the threshold before you, pass on over your father's body. Fly with
+tearless eyes to the banner of the cross. In this matter cruelty is the
+only piety.... Your widowed sister may throw her gentle arms around
+you.... Your father may implore you to wait but a short time to bury
+those near to you, who will soon be no more; your weeping mother may
+recall your childish days, and may point to her shrunken breast and to
+her wrinkled brow. Those around you may tell you that all the household
+rests upon you. Such chains as these the love of God and the fear of
+hell can easily break. You say that Scripture orders you to obey your
+parents, but he who loves them more than Christ loses his soul. The
+enemy brandishes a sword to slay me. Shall I think of a mother's
+tears?"[169]
+
+Gibbon said of the ascetic movement that the Pagan world regarded with
+astonishment a society that perpetuated itself without marriage.
+Unfortunately this perpetuation was secured by the sacrifice of some of
+the dearest interests of the race. For, in general, one may say that
+idealistic teaching of any kind appeals most powerfully to those who are
+least in need of it. The world would at any time lose little, and might
+possibly gain much, were it possible to restrain a certain class from
+parentage. But there is no evidence that monasticism ever had its effect
+on that kind of people; the presumption is indeed in the contrary
+direction. The careless and brutal hear and are unaffected. The more
+thoughtful and desirable alone are influenced. And there can be little
+doubt that the Church in appealing to certain aspects of human nature
+dissuaded from parentage those who were most fitted for the task. There
+was a practical survival of the unfittest. Nothing is more striking, in
+fact, in the early history of Christianity than the comparative absence
+of home life and of the domestic ideals. Dean Milman remarked that in
+all the discussion concerning celibacy he could not recall a single
+instance where the social aspects appear to have occurred to the
+disputants. The Dean's remark applies to some extent to a much later
+period of Christian history than the one to which he refers. That
+much-admired evangelical classic, Bunyan's _Pilgrim's Progress_, for
+example, shows a curious obliviousness to the value of family and social
+life. But neglect of the socialising and refining influence of family
+life leads inevitably to a hardening of character and a brutalising of
+life in general. The ferocious nature of the theological disputes of the
+early Christian period never fail to arouse the comments of historians.
+But there was really nothing to soften or restrain them. Everything was
+dominated by the theological interest. And we owe it in no small measure
+to the vogue of the monk that the tolerance of Pagan times, with its
+widespread respect for truth-seeking, was replaced by the narrow
+intolerance of the medieval period, an intolerance which has never
+really been eradicated from any part of Christian Europe.
+
+In counting this as one of the consequences of the Christian preaching
+of celibacy, I am supported by no less an authority than the late Sir
+Francis Galton. In his epoch-marking work, _Hereditary Genius_, this
+writer says:--
+
+"The long period of the Dark Ages under which Europe has lain is due, I
+believe, in a very considerable degree, to the celibacy enjoined by the
+religious orders on their votaries. Whenever a man or woman was
+possessed of a gentle nature that fitted him or her to deeds of charity,
+to meditation, to literature, or to art, the social condition of the
+time was such that they had no refuge elsewhere than in the bosom of the
+Church. But she chose to preach and exact celibacy. The consequence was
+that these gentle natures had no continuance, and thus by a policy so
+singularly unwise and suicidal that I am hardly able to speak of it
+without impatience, the Church brutalised the breed of our forefathers.
+She acted precisely as if she had aimed at selecting the rudest portion
+of the community to be alone the parents of future generations. She
+practised the arts that breeders would use, who aimed at creating
+ferocious, currish, and stupid nature. No wonder that club law prevailed
+for centuries over Europe; the wonder rather is that enough good
+remained in the veins of Europeans to enable their race to rise to its
+very moderate level of natural morality."[170]
+
+The consequences of asceticism on morals were almost wholly disastrous.
+There is no intention of endorsing the vulgar Protestant prejudice of
+every convent being a brothel, and all monks and nuns as given over to a
+vicious life, but there is no question that a very widespread
+demoralisation existed amongst the religious orders, that this existed
+from the very earliest times, and that it was an inevitable consequence
+of so large a number of people professing the ascetic life. This is not
+a history of morals, and it is needless to enter into a detailed account
+of the state of morality during the prevalence of asceticism. But the
+absence of any favourable influence exerted by asceticism on conduct is
+well illustrated in the description of Salvianus, Bishop of Marseilles
+at the close of the fifth century, of the condition of society in his
+day. Gaul, Spain, Italy, and Africa are depicted as sunk in an
+overmastering sensuality. Rome is represented as the sewer of the
+nations, and in the African Church, he says, the most diligent search
+can scarce discover one chaste among thousands. And this, it must be
+borne in mind, was the African Church, which under the care of Augustine
+had been specially nurtured in the most rigid asceticism. Four hundred
+years later the state of monastic morals is sufficiently indicated by a
+regulation of St. Theodore Studita prohibiting the entrance of female
+animals into monasteries.[171] A regulation passed in Paris at a Council
+held in 1212 enforces the same lesson by forbidding monks or nuns
+sleeping two in a bed. The avowed object of this was to repress offences
+of the most disgusting description.[172] In 1208 an order was issued
+prohibiting mothers or other female relatives residing with priests, on
+account of the frequent scandals arising. Offences became so numerous
+and so open that it was with relief that laymen saw priests openly
+select concubines. That at least gave a promise of some protection to
+domestic life. In some of the Swiss cantons it actually became the
+practice to compel a new pastor, on taking up his charge, to select a
+concubine as a necessary protection to the females under his care. The
+same practice existed in Spain.[173]
+
+There is, as Lea rightly says, no injustice in holding the Church mainly
+responsible for the laxity of morals which is characteristic of medieval
+society. It had unbounded and unquestioned power, and this with its
+wealth and privileges might have made medieval society the purest in the
+world. As it was, "the period of its unquestioned domination over the
+conscience of Europe was the very period in which licence among the
+Teutonic races was most unchecked. A church which, though founded on the
+Gospel, and wielding the illimitable power of the Roman hierarchy, could
+yet allow the feudal principle to extend to the _jus primæ noctis_ or
+_droit de marquette_, and whose ministers in their character of temporal
+seigneurs could even occasionally claim the disgusting right, was
+evidently exercising its influence, not for good, but for evil."
+
+On civic life and the civic virtues the influence of asceticism was
+equally disastrous. "A candid examination," says Lecky, "will show that
+the Christian civilisation has been as inferior to the Pagan ones in
+civic and intellectual virtues as it has been superior to them in the
+virtues of humanity and chastity." One may reasonably question the
+latter part of this statement, bearing in mind the facts just pointed
+out, but the first part admits of overwhelming proof. Celibacy is not
+chastity, and it is difficult to see how the coarsening of character
+described by Lecky himself can be consistent with a heightened
+humanity. But there can be small doubt that the growth of the Christian
+Church spelt disaster to the civic life and institutions of the Empire.
+Nothing the Romans did was more admirable than their organisation of
+municipal life. They avoided the common blunder of imposing on all a
+uniform organisation, and so gave free play to local feeling and custom
+so far as was consistent with imperial order and peace. Civic life
+became, as a consequence, well ordered and persistent. It was far less
+corrupt than administration in the capital, and freedom persisted in the
+provincial towns for long after its practical disappearance in Rome
+itself. Indeed, but for the antagonism of Christianity, it is probable
+that the urban municipalities might have provided the impetus for the
+rejuvenation of the Empire.[174]
+
+From the outset, the early Christian movement stood as a whole apart
+from the civic life of the Empire, while the ascetic waged a constant
+warfare against it. "According to monastic view of Christianity," says
+Milman, "the total abandonment of the world, with all its ties and
+duties, as well as its treasures, its enjoyments, and objects of
+ambition, advanced rather than diminished the hopes of salvation." The
+object was individual salvation, not social regeneration. When people
+were praised for breaking the closest of family ties in their desire for
+salvation, it would be absurd to suppose that social duties and
+obligations would remain exempt. The Christian ascetic was ready enough
+to risk his own life, or to take the life of others, on account of
+minute points of doctrinal difference, but he was deaf to the call of
+patriotism or the demands of civic life. Theology became the one
+absorbing topic; and as monasticism assumed more menacing proportions,
+the monk became the dominating figure, paralysing by his presence the
+healthful activities of masses of the people. Speaking of the Eastern
+Empire, although his words apply with almost equal truth wherever the
+Church was supreme, Milman says:--
+
+"That which is the characteristic sign of the times as a social and
+political, as well as a religious, phenomenon, is the complete dominion
+assumed by the monks in the East over the public mind.... The monks, in
+fact, exercise the most complete tyranny, not merely over the laity, but
+over bishops and patriarchs, whose rule, though nominally subject to it,
+they throw off whenever it suits their purposes.... Monks in Alexandria,
+monks in Antioch, monks in Constantinople, decide peremptorily on
+orthodoxy and heterodoxy.... Persecution is universal; persecution by
+every means of violence and cruelty; the only question is in whose hands
+is the power to persecute.... Bloodshed, murder, treachery,
+assassination, even during the public worship of God--these are the
+frightful means by which each party strives to maintain its opinions and
+to defeat its adversary. Ecclesiastical and civil authority are alike
+paralysed by combinations of fanatics ready to suffer or to inflict
+death, utterly unapproachable by reason."[175]
+
+Against such combinations of ignorance, fanaticism, and ferocity, the
+few remaining lovers of secular progress were powerless. Patriotism
+became a mere name, and organised civic life an almost forgotten
+aspiration. What the Pagan world had understood by a 'good man' was one
+who spent himself in the service of his country. The Christian
+understood by it one who succeeded in saving his own soul, even at the
+sacrifice of family and friends. Vampire-like, monasticism fed upon the
+life-blood of the Empire. The civic life and patriotism of old Rome
+became a mere tradition, to inspire long after the men of the
+Renaissance and of the French Revolution.
+
+Finally, asceticism exerted a powerful influence on religion itself.
+That it served to strengthen and perpetuate the life of religion there
+can be little doubt. However strongly some people may have resented the
+monastic ideal, it nevertheless gave increased strength and vitality to
+the religious idea. To begin with, it offered for centuries a very
+powerful obstacle to the development of those progressive and scientific
+ideas that have made such advances in all centres of civilisation during
+the past two or three centuries. To the common mind it brought home the
+supremacy of religion in a way that nothing else could. The mere sight
+of monarch and noble yielding homage to the monk, acknowledging his
+supremacy in what was declared to be the chief interest in life, the
+interference of the monk in every department of life, saturated society
+with supernaturalism. And although at a later period the rapacity,
+dissoluteness, and tyranny of the monkish orders led to revolt, by that
+time the imagination of all had been thoroughly impressed with the value
+of religion. Even to-day current theology is permeated with the monkish
+notions of self-denial, self-sacrifice, and contempt of the world's
+comfort and beauty as belonging to the essence of pure religion. The
+lives of the saints still remain the storehouse of ideals for the
+religious preacher. In spite of their absurd practices and disgusting
+penances, later generations have not failed to hold them up as examples.
+They have been used to impress the imagination of their successors, as
+they were used to impress the minds of their contemporaries. The fact of
+Thomas à Beckett wearing a hair shirt running with vermin has not
+prevented his being held up as an example of the power of religion.
+People fear ghosts long after they cease to believe in them; they pay
+unreasoning homage to a crown long after intellectual development has
+robbed the kingly office of its primitive significance; all the recent
+developments of democracy have not abolished the Englishman's
+constitutional crick in the neck at the sight of a nobleman. Nor is
+supernaturalism expunged from a society because the conditions that gave
+it birth have passed away. A religious epidemic is not analogous to
+those physical disorders which deposit an antitoxin and so protect
+against future attacks. It resembles rather those disorders that
+permanently weaken, and so invite repeated assaults. The ascetic
+epidemic passed away; but, before doing so, it thoroughly saturated with
+supernaturalism the social atmosphere and impressed its power upon the
+public mind. It gave supernaturalism a new and longer lease of life, and
+paved the way for other outbreaks, of a less general, but still of a
+thoroughly epidemic character.
+
+
+FOOTNOTES:
+
+[164] See _The Psychology of Peoples_ and _The Crowd_.
+
+[165] _Origin and Development of Religious Belief_, i. pp. 343-8.
+
+[166] _History of European Morals_, ii. pp. 107-10. For a careful
+description of the monastic discipline in its more normal aspects, see
+Bingham's Works, vol. ii. bk. vi. Gibbon gives his usual brilliant
+summary of the movement in chapter xxxvii. of the _Decline and Fall_. A
+host of facts similar to those cited by Lecky will be found in _The Book
+of Paradise_, 2 vols., trans. by Wallis Budge. Lea's _History of
+Sacerdotal Celibacy_ gives the classical and authoritative account of
+the moral consequences of the practice of celibacy. For a vivid picture
+of the psychology of the ascetic, see Flaubert's great romance, _St.
+Antony_.
+
+[167] Cited by Lecky, ii. p. 131.
+
+[168] Dean Milman, _Hist. of Latin Christianity_, ii. pp. 81-2.
+
+[169] Lecky, ii. pp. 134-5.
+
+[170] _Hereditary Genius_, 1869, p. 357.
+
+[171] Lea, p. 109.
+
+[172] Lea, p. 332.
+
+[173] See Lea, pp. 353-4.
+
+[174] For a fine sketch of Roman municipal life, see Dill's _Roman
+Society from Nero to Marcus Aurelius_, chap. ii.
+
+[175] _Hist. of Latin Christianity_, i. pp. 317-8.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER NINE
+
+RELIGIOUS EPIDEMICS--(_CONCLUDED_)
+
+
+It is not easy to overestimate the influence of monasticism on
+subsequent religious history. The lives of its votaries provided
+examples of almost every conceivable kind of self-torture or
+semi-maniacal behaviour. It had made the world thoroughly familiar with
+extravagance of action as the symptom of intense religious conviction.
+And its influence on social development had been such that the
+susceptibility of the public mind to suggestions was as a raw wound in
+the presence of a powerful irritant. Such an institution as the
+Inquisition could only have maintained itself among a people thoroughly
+familiar with supernaturalism, and to whom its preservation was the
+first and most sacred of duties.
+
+A society habituated to the commanding presence of the monk, fed upon
+stories of their miraculous encounters with celestial and diabolic
+visitants, and so accustomed to regard the priesthood as in a very
+peculiar sense the mouthpiece of divinity, was well prepared for such a
+series of events as the crusades for the recovery of the Holy Land.
+Pilgrimages to the burial-places of saints, and to spots connected, by
+legend or otherwise, with Christian history, had long been in vogue, and
+formed a source of both revenue to the Church and of inspiration to the
+faithful. As early as 833 a guide-book had been prepared called the
+_Itinerary from Bordeaux to Jerusalem_, and along the route marked
+convents and shelters for the pilgrims were established. A lucrative
+traffic in relics of every description had also been established, and
+any interference with this touched the Church in its tenderest point.
+Added to which the expected end of the world in the year 1000 had the
+effect of still further increasing the crowd of pilgrims to the Holy
+Land, where it was firmly believed the second advent would take place.
+
+In the eleventh century a tax was imposed on all Christians visiting
+Jerusalem. There were also reports of Christian pilgrims being
+ill-treated. Recent events in Europe have shown with what ease Christian
+feeling may be roused against a Mohammedan power, and it was
+considerably easier to do this in the eleventh century. Between them,
+Pope Urban II. and Peter the Hermit--the former acting mainly from
+political motives; the latter from a spirit of sheer fanaticism--
+succeeded in rousing Europe to a maniacal desire for the recovery
+of the Holy Land. And for nearly two hundred years the world saw
+a series of crusades on as absurd an errand as ever engaged the
+energies of mankind. Every class of society participated, and it is
+calculated that no less than two millions of lives were sacrificed.
+
+Ordinary histories lean to representing the crusades as a series of
+armed expeditions, led by princes, nobles, and kings. But this gives a
+quite inaccurate conception of the movement, during its early stages, at
+all events. In reality it was a true psychological epidemic. No custom,
+however ancient, no duty, no law, was allowed to stand before the
+crusading mania. In every village the clergy fed the mania, promising
+eternal rewards to all who took up the burden of the cross. Old and
+young, the strong and the sick, the rich and the poor were enrolled.
+Urban had told them that "under their General, Jesus Christ," they would
+march to certain victory. Absolution for all sins was promised to all
+who joined; and, as Gibbon says, "at the voice of their pastor, the
+robber, the incendiary, the homicide, arose by thousands to redeem their
+souls by repeating on the infidels the same deeds which they had
+exercised against their Christian brethren." Until experience had taught
+them better, little precautions were taken to provide food or arms. Huge
+concourses of people,[176] some led by a goose and a goat, into which it
+was believed the Holy Ghost had entered, set out for the Holy Land, so
+ignorant that at every large town or city they enquired, "Is this Zion?"
+Although a religious expedition, small regard was paid to decency or
+humanity. Defenceless cities _en route_ were sacked. Women were
+outraged, men and children killed. The Jews were murdered wholesale.
+Almost universally the slaughter of Jews at home were preparatory to
+crusading abroad. Germany, Hungary, and Bulgaria, although providing
+contingents for the crusading army, suffered heavily by the passage of
+these undisciplined, lawless crowds. As one writer says:--
+
+"If they had devoted themselves to the service of God, they convinced
+the inhabitants on their line of march that they had ceased to regard
+the laws of man. They considered themselves privileged to gratify every
+wish and every lust as it arose. They recognised no rights of property,
+they felt no gratitude for hospitality, and they possessed no sense of
+honour. They violated the wives and daughters of their hosts when they
+were kindly treated, they devastated the lands of friends whom they had
+converted into enemies, they resorted to wanton robbery and destruction
+in revenge for calamities which they had brought upon themselves. They
+believed that they proved their superiority to the Mohammedans by
+torturing the defenceless Jews; and this was the only exploit in which
+the first divisions of the crusaders could boast of success.... To the
+leaders, who could not write their own names, deception and treachery
+were as familiar as force; to their followers rapine and murder were so
+congenial that, in the absence of Saracens, Jews, or townsfolk, it
+seemed but a professional pastime to kill or to rob a companion in
+arms."[177]
+
+And of the behaviour of the crusaders on the first capture of Jerusalem,
+1099, Dean Milman writes:--
+
+"No barbarian, no infidel, no Saracen, ever perpetrated such wanton and
+cold-blooded atrocities of cruelty as the wearers of the Cross of Christ
+(who, it is said, had fallen on their knees and burst into a pious hymn
+at the first view of the Holy City) on the capture of that city. Murder
+was mercy, rape tenderness, simple plunder the mere assertion of the
+conqueror's right. Children were seized by their legs, some of them
+plucked from their mother's breasts, and dashed against the walls, or
+whirled from the battlements. Others were obliged to leap from the
+walls; some tortured, roasted by slow fires. They ripped up prisoners to
+see if they had swallowed gold. Of 70,000 Saracens there were not left
+enough to bury the dead; poor Christians were hired to perform the
+office. Everyone surprised in the Temple was slaughtered, till the reek
+from the dead drove away the slayers. The Jews were burned alive in
+their synagogue."[178]
+
+The most remarkable of all the crusades, and the one that best shows
+the character of the epidemic, was the children's crusade of 1212. It
+was said that the sins of the crusaders had caused their failure, and
+priests went about France and Germany calling upon the children to do
+what the sins of their fathers had prevented them accomplishing. The
+children were told that the sea would dry up to give them passage, and
+the infidels be stricken by the Lord on their approach. A peasant lad,
+Stephen of Cloyes, received the usual vision, and was ordered to lead
+the crusade. Commencing with the children around Paris, he collected
+some 30,000 followers, and without money or food commenced the march. At
+the same time an army of children, 40,000 strong, was gathered together
+at Cologne. The result of the crusade may be told in a few words. About
+6000 of the French contingent, having reached Marseilles, were offered a
+passage by some shipowners. Several of the ships foundered, others
+reached shore, and the boys were sold into slavery. The girls were
+reserved for a more sinister fate. Thousands of the children died in
+attempting a march over the Alps. A mere remnant succeeded in reaching
+home, ruined in both mind and body. Well might Fuller say: "This crusade
+was done by the instinct of the devil, who, as it were, desired a
+cordial of children's blood, to comfort his weak stomach, long cloyed
+with murdering of men."[179]
+
+On both the social and the religious side the consequences were
+important. For the first time large bodies of men, taught to regard all
+those who were outside Christendom as beneath consideration, came into
+contact with a people possessing an art, an industry, a culture far
+superior to their own. As Draper says: "Even down to the meanest camp
+follower, everyone must have recognised the difference between what they
+had anticipated and what they had found. They had seen undaunted
+courage, chivalrous bearing, intellectual culture far higher than their
+own. They had been in lands filled with prodigies of human skill. They
+did not melt down into the populations to whom they returned without
+imparting to them a profound impression destined to make itself felt in
+the course of time."[180] Hitherto Mohammedan culture had only
+influenced Christendom through the medium of the Spanish schools and
+universities. Now the influence became more general. A taste for greater
+comfort developed. Commerce grew; literature improved. We approach the
+period of the Renaissance, and to that new birth the crusades, despite
+their intolerance and brutality, offered a contribution of no small
+value.
+
+On the other hand, and for a time, the power of the Church grew greater.
+The impetus given to superstitious hopes and fears made on all hands for
+the wealth of the Church. Much was made over to the Church as a free
+gift. Much was pawned to it. Much also was entrusted by those who went
+to the Holy Land, never to return, in which case the Church became the
+designated or undesignated heir. "In every way the all-absorbing Church
+was still gathering in wealth, encircling new land within her hallowed
+pale, the one steady merchant who in this vast traffic and sale of
+personal and of landed property never made a losing venture, but went on
+accumulating and still accumulating, and for the most part withdrawing
+the largest portion of the land in every kingdom into a separate
+estate, which claimed exemption from all burthens of the realm, until
+the realm was compelled into measures, violent often and iniquitous in
+their mode, but still inevitable."[181]
+
+Next, the crusades set their seal upon the justice of religious wars,
+and established an enduring alliance between militarism and religion.
+The military profession became surrounded with all the ceremonies and
+paraphernalia of religion, without being in the least humanised by the
+alliance. The knight received his arms blessed by the Church, he was
+sworn to defend the Church, and he was as ready to turn his weapons
+against heretics in Europe as against infidels in Syria. Military
+persecutions of heretics assumed the form of a mania. There were
+crusades against the Moors in Spain, against the Albigenses, and against
+other heretics. As Bryce remarks: "The religious feeling which the
+crusades evoked--a feeling which became the origin of the great orders
+of chivalry, and somewhat later of the two great orders of mendicant
+friars--turned wholly against the opponents of ecclesiastical claims,
+and was made to work the will of the Holy See, which had blessed and
+organised the project."[182] The expedition against King John by Philip
+of France was undertaken at the behest of the Pope, and was called a
+crusade. The attempt of Spain to crush the Netherlands was called a
+crusade. So was the Armada that was fitted out against England.
+
+More than all, a stamp of permanency was given to popular superstition.
+For two centuries people had seen expedition after expedition fitted out
+to accomplish an avowedly religious purpose. They had been taught that
+to die in defence of religion, or in the attempt to achieve a religious
+object, was the noblest of deaths. They had seen the greatest in Europe
+setting forth at the command of the Church. Signs and wonders had
+abounded to prove the heaven-blessed character of the crusades. They had
+seen the Church growing steadily in power, and every possible means had
+been utilised to increase the flame of religious fanaticism. Expeditions
+might fail, but failure did not cure fanaticism. It fed it; the
+crusaders returned, chastened in some respects, but still sufficiently
+full of religious zeal to be ready to battle against the unbeliever and
+the heretic at the behest of the Church. And it was not the policy of
+the Church to allow this fanaticism to remain unemployed. Even though it
+might ultimately lose, the Church and superstition profited enormously
+by the crusading spirit. It strengthened the general sense of the
+supernatural, even while creating tendencies that were destined to limit
+its sway. Above all, it prepared the way for other religious epidemics.
+These were more circumscribed in area, and less lengthy in their
+duration; but their existence was made possible and easy by the
+centuries during which, first monasticism, and later the crusading
+mania, had dominated the public mind.
+
+The crusades had hardly been brought to a close before continental
+Europe witnessed an outbreak, in epidemic form, of a practice that had
+been long associated with monastic discipline. The use of the whip as a
+form of religious discipline had always played a part in conventual and
+monastic life. On the one hand, it formed part of that insensate desire
+to torture the body which went to make up the ascetic ideal; on the
+other hand, the fondness for whipping bare flesh and for being whipped
+has a distinctly pathologic character. The subject is rather too
+unsavoury to dwell upon, but it has long been established that there is
+a close connection between the whipping of certain parts of the body and
+the production of intense sexual pleasure.[183] And it is also clear
+that the life led by monks and nuns was such as to encourage sexual
+aberrations of various forms. Moreover, when once the practice of
+whipping became a public spectacle, and assumed an epidemic form,
+imitation, combined with intense religious faith, would operate very
+powerfully.
+
+In the fourteenth century Europe was visited by the Black Plague. In
+countries utterly devoid of sanitation, where baths were practically
+unknown and personal habits of the filthiest, the plague found a
+fruitful soil. Nearly a quarter of the population died, and corpses were
+so numerous that huge pits were dug and hundreds buried together. It was
+amid the general terror and demoralisation caused by this visitation
+that the sect of the Flagellants arose. Calling themselves the
+Brotherhood of the Flagellants, or the Brethren of the Cross, wearing
+dark garments with red crosses front and back, they traversed the cities
+of the Continent carrying whips to which small pieces of iron were
+fixed. England appears to have been the only country in which they
+failed to establish themselves. Elsewhere their numbers grew with
+formidable rapidity. At Spires two hundred boys, under twelve years of
+age, influenced probably by the example of the children's crusade,
+formed themselves into a brotherhood and marched through some of the
+German cities. In Italy over 20,000 people marched from Florence in one
+of these processions; from Modena, over 25,000. Some of them professed
+to work miracles. Everywhere, while the mania lasted, they were warmly
+welcomed, the inhabitants of towns and cities ringing the bells and
+flocking in crowds to hear the preaching and witness the whippings.
+
+The proceedings of the Flagellants in all countries were very similar.
+They marched from town to town, men and women and children stripped to
+the waist--sometimes entirely naked--praying incessantly and whipping
+each other. "Not only during the day, but even by night, and in the
+severest winter, they traversed the cities with torches and banners, in
+thousands and tens of thousands, headed by their priests, and prostrated
+themselves before the altars." At other times they proceeded to the
+market-place, arranged themselves on the ground in circles, assuming
+attitudes in accordance with their real or supposed crimes. After each
+had been whipped, "one of them, in conclusion, stood up to read a
+letter, which it was pretended an angel had brought from heaven to St.
+Peter's Church, at Jerusalem, stating that Christ, who was sore
+displeased at the sins of man, had granted, at the intercession of the
+Holy Virgin and of the angels, that all who should wander about for
+thirty-four days and scourge themselves should be partakers of the
+Divine grace." In the end the movement became so obnoxious to the
+Church, and so troublesome to the civil authorities, that both combined
+to secure its suppression.
+
+Equally significant in the history of religion is the dancing mania,
+which broke out as the mania for flagellation was subsiding. The
+function of dancing in primitive religious ceremonial has been pointed
+out in a previous chapter. It is there a common and obvious method of
+both creating and expressing a high state of nervous excitability. In
+later times religious dancing becomes more purely hypnotic in character,
+and suggestion plays a powerful part. During the medieval period the
+conditions were peculiarly favourable to the prevalence of psychological
+epidemics. Plagues, more or less severe, were of frequent occurrence.
+Between 1119 and 1340, Italy alone had no less than sixteen such
+visitations. Smallpox and leprosy were also common. The public mind was
+morbidly sensitive to signs and portents and saturated to an almost
+incredible degree with superstition. The public processions of the
+Church, its penances, and practices were all calculated to fire the
+imagination, and produce a mixed and dangerous condition of fear and
+expectancy. Moreover, dancing mania, on a small scale, had made its
+appearance on several previous occasions, and the public mind was thus
+in a way prepared for a more serious outbreak.
+
+The great dancing mania of 1374 occurred immediately after the revels
+connected with the semi-Pagan festival of St. John. Bacchanalian dances
+formed one of the accompaniments of the festival of St. John, and made,
+so to speak, a natural starting-point for the epidemic. Hecker, who
+gives a very elaborate account of the dancing mania as it appeared in
+various countries, thus describes the behaviour of those afflicted:--
+
+"They formed circles, hand in hand, and, appearing to have lost control
+over their senses, continued dancing, regardless of all bystanders, for
+hours together, in wild delirium, until at length they fell to the
+ground in a state of exhaustion.... While dancing, they neither saw nor
+heard, being insensible to external impressions, but were haunted by
+visions, their fancies conjuring up spirits whose names they shrieked
+out; and some of them afterwards asserted that they felt as if they had
+been immersed in a stream of blood, which obliged them to leap so high.
+Others, during the paroxysm, saw the heavens open and the Saviour
+enthroned with the Virgin Mary."[184]
+
+At Aix-la-Chapelle, Cologne, and Metz, says the same writer:--
+
+"Peasants left their ploughs, mechanics their workshops, housewives
+their domestic duties, to join the wild revels. Secret desires were
+excited, and but too often found opportunities for wild enjoyment; and
+numerous beggars, stimulated by vice and misery, availed themselves of
+this new complaint to gain a temporary livelihood. Girls and boys
+quitted their parents, and servants their masters, to amuse themselves
+at the dances of those possessed, and greedily imbibed the poison of
+mental infection. Above a hundred unmarried women were seen raving about
+in consecrated and unconsecrated places, and the consequences were soon
+perceived."[185]
+
+Once attacked, the hypnotic character of the complaint was shown by its
+annual recurrence. Again to quote Hecker:--
+
+"Most of those affected were only annually visited by attacks; and the
+occasion of them was so manifestly referable to the prevailing notions
+of that period that, if the unqualified belief in the agency of saints
+could have been abolished, they would not have had any return of the
+complaint. Throughout the whole of June, prior to the festival of St.
+John, patients felt a disquietude and restlessness which they were
+unable to overcome. They were dejected, timid, and anxious; wandered
+about in an unsettled state, being tormented with twitching pains, which
+seized them suddenly in different parts, and eagerly expected the eve of
+St. John's Day, in the confident hope that by dancing at the altars of
+this saint they would be freed from all their sufferings. This hope was
+not disappointed; and they remained, for the rest of the year, exempt
+from any further attack."[186]
+
+In addition to John the Baptist, the dancing disease was also connected
+with another saint--St. Vitus. He is said to have been martyred about
+303, and a body, reputed to be his, was transported to France in the
+ninth century. It is said that just before he was killed he prayed that
+all who would commemorate the day of his death should be protected from
+the dancing mania. Whereupon a voice from heaven was heard to say,
+"Vitus, thy prayer is accepted." The fact that the prayer was offered a
+thousand years before the dancing mania appeared is a circumstance that
+to the eye of faith merely heightened its value.
+
+Within recent times epidemics of dancing have been more local, less
+persistent, and of necessity not so public in their display, but nearly
+always their appearance has been in connection with displays of
+religious fervour. In most cases the dancing has tended more to a
+species of 'jumping,' and--although this may be due to more careful
+observation--has been accompanied by actions of a clearly epileptoid
+nature. One of the most famous of these outbreaks was that of the French
+Convulsionnaires, which lasted from 1727 to the Revolution. In 1727, a
+popular, but half-crazy priest, François de Paris, died. During his life
+Paris had fasted and scourged himself, lived in a hut that was seldom or
+never cleansed, showed the same lack of cleanliness in his person, and
+often went about half naked. Very shortly after his death, it was said
+that miracles began to take place at his grave in the cemetery of St.
+Médard. People gathered round the tomb day after day, and one young girl
+was seized with convulsions. (She is called a girl in the narrative, but
+she was a mature virgin of forty-two years of age.) Afterwards other
+miracles followed in rapid succession. Some fell in fits, others
+swallowed pieces of coal or flint, some were cured of diseases. From the
+description of the behaviour of some of these devotees there seems to
+have been a considerable amount of sexual feeling mixed up with the
+display. Sometimes, we are told, those seized "bounded from the ground
+like fish out of water; this was so frequently imitated at a later
+period that the women and girls, when they expected such violent
+contortions, not wishing to appear indecent, put on gowns made like
+sacks, closed at the feet. If they received any bruises by falling down,
+they were healed with earth taken from the grave of the uncanonised
+saint. They usually, however, showed great agility in this respect; and
+it is scarcely necessary to remark that the female sex especially was
+distinguished by all kinds of leaping, and almost inconceivable
+contortions of body. Some spun round on their feet with incredible
+rapidity, as is related of the dervishes. Others ran with their heads
+against walls, or curved their bodies like rope dancers, so that their
+heels touched their shoulders."
+
+Women figured very prominently among the Convulsionnaires, particularly
+when the epidemic passed from convulsive dancing to prophecy, and thence
+to various forms of self-torture. Women stretched themselves on the
+floor, while other women, and even men, jumped upon their bodies. Others
+were beaten with clubs and bars of iron. Some actually underwent
+crucifixion on repeated occasions. They were stretched on wooden
+crosses, and nails three inches long driven through hands and feet. Some
+of the occurrences remind one of what is now seen to take place under
+hypnotic influence. People labouring under strong excitement, it is
+known, become insensible to pain.
+
+Outbreaks of jumping and dancing followed the introduction of Methodist
+preachers into country districts in the eighteenth century. In Wales, a
+sect of 'Jumpers' originated from this cause, and many of the American
+'Jumpers' and 'Dancers' seem to have had their origin from this Welsh
+outbreak. In all such cases the spread of the mania was helped, if not
+made possible, by the preachers. They themselves looked upon these
+exhibitions as manifestations of the power of God, and so encouraged
+their hearers in their behaviour. Not every minister has the common
+sense of the Shetland preacher cited by Hecker. An epileptic woman had a
+fit in church, which a number of others hailed as a manifestation of
+the power of God. Sunday after Sunday the same thing occurred with other
+women, the number of the sufferers steadily increasing. The thing
+threatened to assume such proportions, and to become so great a
+nuisance, he announced that attendants would be at hand who would dip
+women in the lake who happened to be seized. This threat proved a most
+powerful form of exorcism. Not one woman was affected. Similar conduct
+might have been quite as efficacious in preventing many religious
+manifestations that have assumed epidemic proportions.
+
+Unfortunately, the influence of preachers and religious teachers was
+most usually cast in the other direction. Very often, of course, they
+were no better informed than their congregations; at other times they
+undoubtedly encouraged the delusion for interested reasons. The most
+striking recent illustration of this latter behaviour was seen in the
+Welsh revival led by Evan Roberts. Of this man's mental condition there
+could be little doubt. Just as little doubt could there be that the
+behaviour of the congregations was wholly due to the power of
+suggestions upon weak and excitable natures. Yet scarcely a preacher in
+Britain said a word in disapproval. Hundreds of them used the outbreak
+to illustrate the power of religion. Many prominent preachers travelled
+down to Wales and returned telling of the great manifestations of
+'spiritual power' they had witnessed. How little removed such behaviour
+is from that of the savage watching with awe the actions of one
+suffering from epilepsy or insanity, readers of the foregoing pages will
+be in a position to judge.
+
+From the middle of the third century onward, Europe had been subject to
+wave after wave of religious fanaticism. All along, religious belief had
+been verified and strengthened by the occurrence of phenomena that now
+admittedly fall within the purview of the pathologist. And from one
+point of view the secularisation of life served but to emphasise the
+dependence of religion upon the occurrence of these abnormal conditions.
+For the more surely the phenomena of nature and of social life were
+brought within the scope of a scientific generalisation, the more people
+began to look for the life of religion in conditions that were removed
+from the normal. But, above all, this long succession of waves of
+fanaticism served to permeate the general mind with supernaturalism.
+Each one cleared the way for a successor. And in the next chapter we
+have to deal with one that, in some respects, is the most remarkable of
+all, viz., that of the belief in witchcraft.
+
+
+FOOTNOTES:
+
+[176] It is estimated that 275,000 people formed the van of the first
+crusade.
+
+[177] L. O. Pike, _History of Crime in England_, i. pp. 164-9.
+
+[178] _History of Latin Christianity_, iv. p. 188.
+
+[179] _History of the Holy War_, bk. iii.
+
+[180] _Intellectual Development of Europe_, 1872, p. 425.
+
+[181] Milman, iv. p. 199.
+
+[182] _Holy Roman Empire_, p. 164.
+
+[183] See Bloch, _Sexual Life of our Time_, pp. 568-74.
+
+[184] _Epidemics of the Middle Ages_, pp. 87-8.
+
+[185] Hecker, p. 91.
+
+[186] _Epidemics_, p. 105.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER TEN
+
+THE WITCH MANIA
+
+
+In all stages of religious history the witch and the wizard are familiar
+figures. It is of no importance to our present enquiry whether magic
+precedes religion or not. It is at all events certain that they are very
+closely connected, and that conditions which foster the belief in magic
+likewise serve to strengthen religious belief. Witchcraft, as Tylor
+says, is part and parcel of savage life. Death is very frequently
+attributed to the magical action of wizards, and the savage lives in
+perpetual fear lest some of his belongings, or some part of his person,
+should be bewitched by malevolent sorcerers. Sir Richard Burton says
+that in East Africa his experience taught him that among the negroes,
+what with slavery and what with black magic, no one, especially in old
+age, is safe from being burnt at a day's notice. When from savage life
+we mount to societies enjoying a higher culture, we still find the witch
+and the wizard in evidence. Both in Greece and Rome the belief in
+witchcraft existed. There were made direct laws against its practice,
+although neither the Greeks nor the Romans stained their civilisation
+with the judicial murder of thousands of victims such as occurred later
+in Christian Europe.
+
+But the belief in witchcraft is continuous. So also are the methods
+practised, and the modes of detection. The proofs offered in support of
+sorcery in the seventeenth century are precisely similar to those
+credited by savages in the lowest stage of human culture. The power of
+transformation possessed by the accused, the ability to bewitch through
+the possession of hairs belonging to the afflicted person, the making of
+little effigies and driving sharp instruments into them, and so
+affecting the corresponding parts of people, transportation through the
+air, etc., all belong to the belief in and practice of witchcraft
+wherever found. Had a Fijian been transported to a seat on the judicial
+bench by the side of Sir Matthew Hale, when that judge condemned two old
+women to death for witchcraft, he would have found himself in a quite
+congenial atmosphere. Allowing for difference in language, he would have
+found the evidence similar to that with which he was familiar, and he
+would have been able to endorse the judge's remarks with tales of his
+own experience. On this point, the level of culture attained by savages,
+and that of the inhabitants of the overwhelming majority of European
+countries little more than two hundred years ago, were substantially the
+same. Even to-day cases are continually occurring which prove that
+advances in knowledge and civilisation have not left this ancient
+superstition without supporters.
+
+In subscribing to the belief in witchcraft, the Christian Church thus
+fell into line with earlier forms of religious belief. The peculiar
+feature it represents is that it came into existence when the belief in
+witchcraft was losing its hold on the more cultured classes. Had it not
+allied itself with this tendency, no such thing as the witch mania of
+the medieval period could have existed. In sober truth, it brought about
+a veritable renaissance of the cruder theories of demonism, while its
+intolerance of opposition succeeded in stifling the voice of criticism
+for centuries. The primitive theory which holds that man is surrounded
+by hosts of spiritual agencies, mostly of a malevolent nature, was
+revived and fully endorsed by all Christian teachers. In the commonest,
+as well as in the rarest events of life, this supernatural activity was
+manifest. In both the Old and New Testament the belief in demoniacal
+agency was endorsed. Moreover, the fact that Christianity was not a
+creed seeking to live as one of many others, but a religion struggling
+for complete mastery, gave further impetus to the belief. An easy
+explanation for the miracles and marvels that occurred in connection
+with non-Christian beliefs was that they were the work of demons. The
+Christian felt himself to be fighting not so much human antagonists as
+so many embodiments of satanic power. And after the establishment of
+Christianity it is probable that much that went on under cover of witch
+assemblies, a more detailed knowledge than we possess would prove to be
+really the clandestine exercise of prescribed forms of faith. The old
+saying, "The sin of witchcraft is as the sin of rebellion," has more in
+it than meets the eye. There is little real difference between the magic
+that appears as piety and the magic that is denounced as sorcery, except
+that one is permitted and the other is not. And it is almost a law of
+religious development that the gods of one religion become the demons of
+its successor.
+
+But while witchcraft has existed in all ages, it existed in a much
+milder form than that which we find in the sixteenth and seventeenth
+centuries. First of all, there is the fact to which attention has
+already been directed, namely, the concentration of the public mind upon
+various forms of supernaturalism. Every aspect of life was more or less
+under the direct influence of the Church, and no teaching was tolerated
+that conflicted with her doctrines. And it was to the interest of the
+Church perpetually to emphasise the reality of either angelic or
+diabolic activity. Even in the case of those who showed a tendency to
+revolt against Church rule there was no exception to this. If anything,
+the belief was more pronounced. Next, the fifteenth and sixteenth
+centuries saw a rising tide of heresy against which the Church was
+compelled to battle; and to ascribe this alleged perversion of Christian
+doctrines to the malevolence of Satan offered the line of least
+resistance--just as the heretics attributed the power of the Church
+itself to the same source. Whatever diminution ensued in the general
+flood of superstition, as a consequence of the quarrel between
+Protestant and Catholic, was, so far as the disputants were concerned,
+incidental and even undesired. On the one point of demonism there
+existed complete unanimity, and the sceptic fared equally hard with both
+parties. In such an environment the wildest tales of sorcery became
+credible; and nothing illustrates this more forcibly than the fact that
+many of those tortured and condemned for sorcery actually believed
+themselves capable of performing the marvels laid to their charge. Added
+to these factors, we have to note that social conditions were also
+extremely favourable. Moral ties were as loose as they could reasonably
+be; and the attitude of the Church towards the sexual relation had
+forced both the religious and the non-religious mind into wholly
+unhealthy channels. This last aspect of the subject has been little
+dealt with, but it is unquestionably a very real one. A German writer
+says:--
+
+"Whilst in the fifteenth and the beginning of the sixteenth centuries,
+as those well acquainted with the state of morals during this period can
+all confirm, a most unbounded freedom was dominant in sexual relations,
+the State and the Church were desirous of compelling the people to keep
+better order by the use of actual force, and by religious compulsion. So
+forced a transformation in so vital a matter necessarily resulted in a
+reaction of the worst kind, and forced into secret channels the impulse
+which it had attempted to suppress. This reaction occurred, moreover,
+with an elemental force. There resulted widespread sexual violence and
+seduction, hesitating at nothing, often insanely daring, in which
+everywhere the devil was supposed to help; everyone's head was turned in
+this way; the uncontrolled lust of debauchees found vent in secret
+bacchanalian associations and orgies, wherein many, with or without
+masquerade, played the part of Satan; shameful deeds were perpetrated by
+excited women and by procuresses and prostitutes ready for any kind of
+immoral abomination; add to these sexual orgies the most widely diffused
+web of a completely developed theory of witchcraft, and the systematic
+strengthening of the widely prevalent belief in the devil--all these
+things, woven in a labyrinthine connection, made it possible for
+thousands upon thousands to be murdered by a disordered justice and to
+be sacrificed to delusion."[187]
+
+To those who look closely into the subject of medieval witchcraft the
+presence of a strong sexual element is undeniable. When we examine
+contemporary accounts of the 'Sabbath,' some of which are so gross as to
+be unprintable, we find a portion of the proceedings to be of a marked
+erotic character. The figure of Satan often enough reminds one of the
+pagan Priapus, and the ceremonies bear a strong resemblance to the
+ancient ones, with the mixture of Christian language and symbolism
+inevitable under such circumstances. Promiscuous intercourse between the
+sexes was said to occur at the witches' gatherings; and, indeed, unless
+some sort of sexual extravagance occurred, it is hard to account for
+both the persistency of the gatherings and of the reports concerning
+them. The most probable theory is, as I have just said, that these
+gatherings were covers for a continuance of the older sex worship. Many
+customs connected therewith lingered on in the Church itself, and it is
+not a wild assumption that they existed in a less adulterated and more
+extravagant form outside.
+
+Universal as the belief in witchcraft has been, it was not until the
+close of the fifteenth century that it assumed what may be justly called
+an epidemic form. The famous Bull of Pope Innocent VIII. was not
+unconnected in its origin with the growth of heresy. This precious
+document, issued in 1484, declares:--
+
+"It has come to our ears that very many persons of both sexes, deviating
+from the Catholic Faith, abuse themselves with demons, Incubus and
+Succubus; and by incantations, charms, and conjurations, and other
+wicked superstitions, by criminal acts and offences, have caused the
+offspring of women and of the lower animals, the fruits of the earth,
+the grape, and the products of various plants, men, women, and other
+animals of different kinds, vineyards, meadows, pasture land, corn and
+other vegetables of the earth, to perish, be oppressed, and utterly
+destroyed; that they torture men and women with cruel pains and
+torments, internal as well as external; that they hinder the proper
+intercourse of the sexes, and the propagation of the human species.
+Moreover, they are in the habit of denying the very faith itself. We,
+therefore, willing to provide by opportune remedies, according as it
+falls to our office, by our apostolical authority, by the tenor of these
+presents, do appoint and decree that they be convicted, imprisoned,
+punished, and mulcted according to their offences."
+
+It was this Pope who commissioned the inquisitor, Sprenger, to root out
+witches. Sprenger, with two others, acting on the authority of the
+Popes, drew up the famous work, _The Witch Hammer_, which provided the
+basis for all subsequent works on the detection and punishment of
+witches.[188] The folly and iniquity of the book is almost unbelievable,
+although it is quite matched by subsequent productions. It even provides
+for the silence of people under torture. If they confess when tortured,
+the case is complete. But if they do not confess, this diabolic
+production lays it down that this is because witches who have given
+themselves up to the devil are insensible to pain. Even the evidence of
+children was admitted. And although in ordinary trials the evidence of
+criminals was barred, it was to be freely allowed in trials for sorcery.
+Everything that ingenuity could suggest or brutality execute was
+provided for.
+
+From the issue of _The Witch Hammer_ until the middle of the seventeenth
+century, a period of about one hundred and fifty years, an epidemic of
+witchcraft raged. People of all ages and of all classes of society
+became implicated, and for some time, at least, accusation meant
+conviction. An almost unbelievably large number were executed. Says
+Lecky:--
+
+"In almost every province of Germany, but especially in those where
+clerical influence predominated, the persecution raged with a fearful
+intensity. Seven thousand witches are said to have been burned at
+Trèves, six hundred by a single bishop in Bamberg, and nine hundred in a
+single year in the bishopric of Würzburg.... At Toulouse, the seat of
+the Inquisition, four hundred persons perished for sorcery at a single
+execution, and fifty at Douay in a single year. Remy, a judge of Nancy,
+boasted that he put to death eight hundred witches in sixteen years....
+In Italy, a thousand persons were executed in a single year in the
+province of Como; and in other parts of the country the severity of the
+inquisitors at last created an absolute rebellion.... In Geneva, which
+was then ruled by a bishop, five hundred alleged witches were executed
+in three months; forty-eight were burned at Constance or Ravensburg, and
+eighty in the little town of Valery in Saxony. In 1670, seventy persons
+were condemned in Sweden, and a large proportion of them burnt."[189]
+
+In England, from 1603 to 1680, it is estimated that seventy thousand
+persons were put to death for sorcery.[190] Grey, the editor of
+_Hudibras_, says that he had himself seen a list of three thousand who
+were put to death during the Long Parliament. The celebrated
+witch-finder, Mathew Hopkins, hung sixty in one year in the county of
+Suffolk. In Scotland, for thirty-nine years, the number killed annually
+averaged about two hundred. This, of course, does not take into account
+the number who were hounded to death by persecution of a popular kind,
+or whose lives were made so wearisome that death must have come as a
+release. But the most remarkable, and the most horrible, of witchcraft
+executions occurred in Würzburg in February 1629. No less than one
+hundred and sixty-two witches were burned in a succession of
+_autos-da-fé_. Among these, the reports disclose that there were
+actually thirty-four children. The following details give the actual
+ages of some of them:--
+
+  +----------+---------+---------------------------------+
+  | Burning. | Number. |      Children.                  |
+  +----------+---------+---------------------------------+
+  |   7th    |   7     |  1 Girl, aged 12.               |
+  |  13th    |   4     |  1 Girl of 10 and another.      |
+  |  15th    |   2     |  1 Boy of 12.                   |
+  |  18th    |   6     |  2 Boys of 10, girl of 14.      |
+  |  19th    |   6     |  2 Boys, 10 and 12.             |
+  |  20th    |   6     |  2 Boys.                        |
+  |  23rd    |   9     |  3 Boys, 9, 10, and 14.         |
+  |  24th    |   7     |  2 Boys, brought from hospital. |
+  |  26th    |   8     |  Little boy and girl.           |
+  |  27th    |   7     |  2 Boys, 8 and 9.               |
+  |  28th    |   6     |  Blind girl and infant.[191]    |
+  +----------+---------+---------------------------------+
+
+The vast majority of those executed for sorcery were women. At all times
+witches have been more numerous than wizards, owing to their assumed
+closer connection with the world of supernatural beings. It was said,
+"For one sorcerer, ten thousand sorceresses," and Christian writers were
+ready to explain why. Woman had a greater affinity with the devil from
+the outset. It was through woman that Satan had seduced Adam, and it
+was only to be expected that he would employ the same instrument on
+subsequent occasions. _The Witch Hammer_ has a special chapter devoted
+to the consideration of why women are more given to sorcery than men,
+and quotes freely from the Fathers to prove that this follows from her
+nature. James I. in his _Demonologia_ follows Sprenger in accounting for
+the number of witches. "The reason is easy. For as that sex is frailer
+than man is, so it is easier to be entrapped in the gross snares of the
+devil, as was over-well proved to be true by the serpent's deceiving of
+Eve at the beginning, which makes him the homelier with the sex
+sensine." To be old, or ugly, or unpopular, to have any peculiar
+deformity or mark, was to invite persecution, and, in an overwhelming
+majority of instances, conviction followed accusation.
+
+It is a significant comment upon the popular belief that Protestantism,
+as a form of religious belief, was the product of an enlightened
+rational life, that it was only with the advance of Protestantism that
+the belief in witchcraft assumed an epidemic form. This may be partly
+due to the greater direct dependence upon the Bible, in which satanic
+influence--particularly in the New Testament--plays so large a part. In
+the Roman Church, exorcism remained a regular part of the functions of
+the priest; the Church was filled with accounts of satanic conflicts,
+but diabolic intercourse seems to have been mainly limited to saintly
+characters and priests. Protestantism which, theoretically, made every
+man his own priest, raised the belief in satanic agency to an obsession.
+And wherever Protestantism established itself there was an immediate
+and marked increase in the number of cases of witchcraft. In England, if
+we omit a doubtful law of the tenth century, there existed no regular
+law against witchcraft until 1541. It remained a purely ecclesiastical
+offence. Seventeen years later, the year of Elizabeth's accession,
+Bishop Jewell, preaching before the Queen, drew attention to the
+increase of sorcery. "It may please Your Grace," he said, "to understand
+that witches and sorcerers, within these last few years, are
+marvellously increased within Your Grace's realm. Your Grace's subjects
+pine away even to the death, their colour fadeth, their flesh rotteth,
+their senses are bereft. I pray God they never practise further than
+upon the subject." And he added, "These eyes have seen most evident and
+manifest marks of their wickedness." A measure was passed through
+Parliament the same year, making enchantments and witchcraft felony. The
+first year of James I. saw the passing of the 'Witch Act,' under which
+subsequent executions took place, and which remained in force until
+nearly the middle of the eighteenth century.
+
+With scarce an exception, the leaders of Protestantism encouraged the
+belief in witches and urged their extermination as a religious and civil
+duty. With Luther, in spite of the sturdy common sense he manifested in
+some directions, belief in the activity of Satan amounted to an
+obsession. He saw Satan everywhere in everything. The devil appeared to
+him while writing, disturbed his rest by the rattling of pans, and
+prevented his pursuing his studies by hammering on his skull. When a
+storm arose, Luther declared, "'Tis the devil who has done this; the
+winds are nothing else but good or bad spirits." Suicides, he said, were
+often those strangled by the devil. Moreover, "The devil can so
+completely assume the human form when he wants to deceive us, that we
+may very well lie with what seems to be a woman of real flesh and blood,
+and yet all the while 'tis only the devil in the shape of a woman." The
+devil could also become the father of children. Luther says that he knew
+of one such case, and added, "I would have that child thrown into the
+Moldau at the risk of being held its murderer."[192]
+
+In America, Protestantism manifested the same influence. Of course, the
+settlers took the superstition of witchcraft with them, but it underwent
+no diminution in a new land. Increase Mather and his celebrated son,
+Cotton Mather, were the principal agents in stirring up the belief to
+frenzy point, and a commission was appointed to rout out witches and
+suppress their practices. There was soon a plentiful supply of victims.
+One woman was charged with "giving a look towards the great
+meeting-house of Salem, and immediately a demon entered the house and
+tore down part of it." It seems that a bit of the wooden wainscotting
+had fallen down. In the case of Giles Corey, who refused to plead
+guilty, torture was used. He was pressed to death, and when his tongue
+protruded from his mouth the sheriff thrust it back with his
+walking-stick. Many people were executed, and the ministers of Boston
+and Charlestown drew up an address warmly thanking the commission for
+its zeal, and expressing the hope that it would never be relaxed.
+
+Certainly the commission did what it could to earn the thanks given. A
+shipmaster making for Maryland with emigrants encountered unusually
+rough weather. An old woman, one Mary Lee, was accused of raising the
+storm, and drowned as a witch. A woman walked a long distance over muddy
+roads without soiling her dress. "I scorn to be drabbled," she said, and
+was hanged as a reward. George Burroughs could lift a barrel by
+inserting his finger in the bunghole. He was hanged for a wizard.
+Bridget Bishop was charged with appearing before John Louder at midnight
+and grievously oppressing him. Louder's evidence against the woman also
+included the fact that he saw a black pig approach his door, and when he
+went to kick it the pig vanished. He was also tempted by a black thing
+with the body of a monkey, the feet of a cock, and the face of a man. On
+going out of his back door he saw the said Bridget Bishop going towards
+her house. The evidence was deemed quite conclusive. Another witness
+said that being in bed on the Lord's Day, he saw a woman, Susanna
+Martin, come in at the window and jump down on the floor. She took hold
+of the witness's foot, and drawing his body into a heap, lay upon him
+for nearly two hours, so that he could neither move nor hear. In most of
+these cases torture was applied, and confessions were obtained. These
+confessions often implicated others, but when the witches took to
+accusing those in high places, and even ministers of religion, the need
+for discrimination was realised. Once a critical judgment was aroused,
+the mania began to subside--Cotton Mather fighting manfully for the
+belief to the end.
+
+The impetus given by Protestantism to witch-hunting in Scotland was most
+marked. Scotch witchcraft, says Lecky, was the offspring of Scotch
+Puritanism, and faithfully reflected the character of its parent. The
+clergy nowhere possessed greater power, and nowhere used it more
+assiduously to fan the flame against witchcraft. Buckle says:--
+
+"Of all the means of intimidation employed by the Scotch clergy, none
+was more efficacious than the doctrines they propounded respecting evil
+spirits and future punishments. On these subjects they constantly
+uttered the most appalling threats. The language which they used was
+calculated to madden men with fear, and to drive them to the depths of
+despair.... It was generally believed that the world was overrun by evil
+spirits, who not only went up and down the earth, but also lived in the
+air, and whose business it was to tempt mankind. Their number was
+infinite, and they were to be found in all places, and in all seasons.
+At their head was Satan himself, whose delight it was to appear in
+person, ensnaring or terrifying everyone he met. With this object he
+assumed various forms. One day he would visit the earth as a black dog;
+another day, as a raven; on another, he would be heard in the distance
+roaring like a bull. He appeared sometimes as a white man in black
+clothes, and sometimes he appeared as a black man in black clothes, when
+it was remarked that his voice was ghostly, and that one of his feet was
+cloven. His stratagems were endless. For, in the opinion of divines, his
+cunning increased with his age, and, having been studying for more than
+5000 years, he had now attained to unexampled dexterity."[193]
+
+Witchcraft was declared by the Scotch Parliament in 1563 to be
+punishable by death. And, naturally, the more zealous and active the
+search for witches, the more numerous they became. In the search the
+clergy and the kirk-sessions led the way. In 1587 the General Assembly,
+having before them a case of witchcraft in which the evidence was
+insufficient, deputed James Melville to travel on the coast side and
+collect evidence in favour of the prosecution. It also ordered that the
+presbyteries should proceed in all severity against such magistrates as
+liberated convicted witches. As in England so here, a body of men came
+into existence whose business it was to travel the country and detect
+witches. Anonymous accusations were invited, the clergy "placing an
+empty box in church, to receive a billet with the sorcerer's name, and
+the date and description of his deeds."[194] In 1603 "at the College of
+Auld Abirdene" every minister was ordered to make "subtill and privie
+inquisition," concerning the number of witches in his parish, and report
+the same forthwith. Nothing that could whet the appetite for the hunt
+was neglected. William Johnston, baron, bailie "of the regalitie and
+barronie of Broughton," was awarded the goods of all who should be
+"lawfullie convict be assyses of notorious and common witches, haunting
+and resorting devilles and witches."[195] The lives of thousands of
+people were rendered unbearable, and the complaint of one, Margaret
+Miall, that "she desyres not to live, because nobody will converse with
+her, seeing she is under the reputation of a witch," must have
+represented the feelings of many.
+
+It was not only for working ill that people were accused of witchcraft
+and executed; ill or well made little difference. In Edinburgh in 1623
+it was charged against Thomas Grieve that he had relieved many
+sicknesses and grievous diseases by sorcery and witchcraft. "He took
+sickness off a woman in Fife, and put it upon a cow, which thereafter
+ran mad and died." He also cured a child of a disease "by straiking back
+the hair of his head, and wrapping him in an anointed cloth, and by that
+means putting him asleep," and thus through his devilry and witchcraft,
+cured the child. Other charges of a similar kind were brought against
+Grieve, who was found guilty and hanged on the Castle Hill.[196] At the
+same place, a year previous, Margaret Wallace was also sentenced to be
+hanged and burned, on the same kind of charge, and for "practising
+devilry, incantation, and witchcraft, especially forbidden by the laws
+of Almighty God, and the municipal laws of this realm."
+
+The following bill of costs for burning two women, Jane Wischert and
+Isabel Cocker, in Aberdeen, has a certain melancholy interest:--
+
+                                              £  _s._ _d._
+
+  Item for 20 loads of Peatts to burn them    2    0   0
+    "  for ane boll of colles                 1    4   0
+    "  for four tar barrells                  0    6   8
+    "  for fir and win barrells               0   16   8
+    "  for a staick and the dressing of it    0   16   0
+    "  for four fathoms of towis              4    0   0
+    "  to Jon Justice for their execution     0   13   4
+
+In England, no less than in Scotland, America, and on the Continent,
+much learned testimony might be cited in defence of witchcraft. The
+great Sir Thomas Browne said in the most famous of his writings: "For my
+part I have ever believed, and do now know, that there are witches. They
+that doubt of these do not only deny them, but spirits; and are
+obliquely and upon consequence, a sort, not of infidels, but
+atheists."[197] Henry More, the great Platonist, asserted that they who
+deny the agency of witches are "puffed up with nothing but ignorance,
+vanity, and stupid infidelity." Ralph Cudworth, one of the greatest
+scholars of the latter part of the seventeenth century, said that they
+who denied the possibility of satanic intercourse "can hardly escape the
+suspicion of some hankering towards atheism."[198] Writing nearly a
+century later, when the English law merely prosecuted as rogues and
+vagabonds those who pretended to witchcraft, Blackstone thought it
+necessary to point out that this alteration did not deny the possibility
+of the offence, and added:--
+
+"To deny this would be to contradict the revealed word of God in various
+passages both of the Old and New Testaments; and the thing itself is a
+truth in which every nation in the world hath in its turn borne
+testimony; either by examples seemingly well attested, or by prohibitory
+laws which at least suppose the possibility of a commerce with evil
+spirits."[199]
+
+About the same time Wesley gave the world his famous declaration on the
+subject:--
+
+"It is true likewise that the English in general, and indeed most of the
+men of learning in Europe, have given up all accounts of witches and
+apparitions as mere old wives' fables. I am sorry for it, and I
+willingly take this opportunity of entering my solemn protest against
+this violent compliment which so many who believe the Bible pay to those
+who do not believe it. I owe them no such service. I take knowledge
+that these are at the bottom of the outcry which has been raised and
+with such insolence spread through the land in direct opposition, not
+only to the Bible, but to the suffrage of the wisest and best of men in
+all ages and nations. They well know (whether Christians know it or not)
+that the giving up of witchcraft is in effect giving up the Bible."[200]
+
+The evidence upon which the convictions for witchcraft rested were
+almost incredibly stupid, as the punishments were almost unbelievably
+brutal. If the crops failed, or the milk turned sour; if the head of a
+local magnate ached, or a minister of the gospel fell sick; if a woman
+was childless, or a child taken with a fit; if a cow sickened, or sheep
+died suddenly, some poor woman was pretty certain to be seized, and
+tortured until she confessed her alleged crime. A mole or wart on any
+part of the body was a sure sign of commerce with the devil. It was
+believed that on the body of every witch was a spot insensible to pain.
+To discover this she was stripped, pins were run into the body, and when
+excess of pain had produced numbness, some such spot was pretty certain
+to be found. Men regularly took up with this work in both England and
+Scotland, and their fame as 'prickers' depended upon the number of
+witches they unearthed. If a suspected witch kept a black cat, did not
+shed tears, or could not repeat the Lord's Prayer correctly, these were
+pretty sure signs of guilt. A more serious test was the ordeal by water.
+This was a favourite and general test, and was highly recommended by
+that learned fool, James the First. In this the right hand was tied to
+the left foot, the left hand to the right foot. She was then thrown
+into a pond. If she floated she was a witch, and was either hanged or
+burned. If she sank, she was innocent--and was drowned. Another test was
+to tie a woman's legs across, and she was so seated on them that they
+bore the entire weight of her body. In this position she was kept for
+hours, and on the first sign of pain condemned as a witch.
+
+If none of these tests were adopted, torture was used. There was the
+boot--a frame of iron or wood in which the leg was placed and wedges
+driven in until the limb was smashed. A variation of this was to place
+the leg in an iron boot and slowly heat it over a fire. There was the
+thumbscrew, an instrument which smashed the thumb to pulp by the turning
+of a screw. More barbarous still was the bridle. This was an iron hoop
+passing over the head, with four prongs, two pointing to the tongue and
+palate, and one to either cheek. The suspected witch was then chained to
+the wall, and watchers appointed to prevent her sleeping. The slightest
+movement caused the greatest torture, and in the vast majority of cases
+a confession was secured. In obstinate cases pressing between heavy
+stones was adopted.
+
+One of the most famous of these witch-finders was the celebrated Mathew
+Hopkins before referred to. He was appointed to the work by Parliament
+during the time of the Commonwealth, and styled himself 'witch-finder
+general.' Hopkins travelled round the country, much like an assize
+judge, putting up at the principal inns, and at the expense of the local
+authorities. His charge was twenty shillings a visit, whether he found
+witches or not. If he discovered any, there was a further charge of
+twenty shillings for every witch brought to execution. His favourite
+method of detection was that of floating. But another of Hopkins's tests
+was the following: The suspected witch was placed cross-legged on a
+stool in the centre of the room. She was closely watched and kept
+without food for four-and-twenty hours. Doors and windows remained open
+to watch for the entrance of some of the devil's imps. These might come
+in the form of a fly, a wasp, a moth, or some other insect. The work of
+the watchers was to kill every insect that came into the room. But if
+one escaped, it was clear proof that this was one of the witch's
+familiars.
+
+Wherever Hopkins travelled numerous convictions followed. These were so
+numerous that suspicion was aroused, not of the genuineness of the
+convictions, but of Hopkins's knowledge concerning the locality of the
+witches. In defence he published in 1647 a tract entitled "The Discovery
+of Witches; in answer to several Queries lately delivered to the Judge
+of Assize for the County of Norfolk; and now published by Mathew
+Hopkins, Witchfinder, for the benefit of the whole Kingdom." The charge
+against Hopkins was that he had been supplied by the devil with a
+memorandum of all the witches, and so was able to find them where others
+failed. Absurd as the charge was, it found credence, and although his
+end is wrapped in obscurity, it is said that he was finally seized
+himself on a charge of sorcery, tried by his own favourite water
+test--and floated. One cannot but hope that tradition is in this case
+trustworthy.
+
+It is difficult, nowadays, to realise the gravity with which these
+trials were undertaken. An outline of a very famous witch trial, before
+an eminent judge in the latter part of the seventeenth century, will
+best serve as an illustration. Before me there lies a little tract of
+some sixty pages, printed "for William Shrewsbury at the Bible in Duck
+Lane," and bearing on the title page the following description:--
+
+"At the Assizes and general gaol delivery, held at Bury St. Edmunds for
+the County of Suffolk, the Tenth day of March, in the Sixteenth Year of
+the Reign of our Sovereign, Lord King Charles II., before Mathew Hale,
+Knight, Lord Chief Baron of His Majesties Court of Exchequer; Rose
+Callender and Amy Duny, Widows, both of Leystoff, in the county
+aforesaid, were severally indicted for bewitching Elizabeth and Anne
+Durent, Jane Bocking, Susan Chandler, William Durent, Elizabeth and
+Deborah Pacy and the said Callender and Duny, being arrainged upon the
+same indictments, pleaded not guilty; and afterwards upon a long
+evidence, were found guilty, and thereupon had judgment to dye for the
+same."
+
+Both the women charged were old. The charges were as follows: The mother
+of the infant, William Durent, sworn and examined in open court, deposed
+that about the 10th of March, having special occasion to go from home,
+left her child in the care of Amy Duny, giving her special occasion not
+to give her child the breast. Nevertheless, Amy Duny did acquaint her
+mother on her return that she had given the child the breast, and on
+being reprimanded "used many high expressions and threatening speeches
+towards her; telling her that she had as good have done otherwise than
+to have found fault with her ... and that very night her son fell into
+strange fits of swounding ... and so continued for several weeks." Much
+troubled, the mother consulted a Dr. Jacob, of Yarmouth, who advised
+her to hang up the child's blanket, at night to wrap the child in it,
+and if she found anything therein to throw it in the fire. A very large
+toad was found, which on being put in the fire "made a great and
+horrible noise, and after a space there was a flashing in the fire like
+gunpowder ... and thereupon the toad was no more seen or heard." More
+wonderful still, "the next day there came a young woman and told this
+deponnent that her aunt (meaning the said Amy) was in a most lamentable
+condition, having her face all scorched with fire." And on the mother
+enquiring of Amy Duny how this had happened, Amy replied, "she might
+thank her for it, for that she was the cause thereof, but that she
+should live to see some of her children dead, or else upon crutches." It
+was further alleged "that not long after this deponnent was taken with
+lameness in both her legges, from the knees downwards, and that she was
+fain to go upon crutches ... and so continued till the time of the
+Assizes, that the witch came to be tried."
+
+Concerning the bewitching of Elizabeth and Deborah Pacy, aged eleven and
+nine, their father declared that Deborah was suddenly taken with
+lameness. One day while the girl was resting outside the house, "Amy
+Duny came to the deponnent's house to buy some herrings; but, being
+denied, she went away discontented.... But at the very same instant of
+time, the said child was taken with most violent fits, feeling extreme
+pain in her stomach, like the pricking of pins, and shrieking out in a
+dreadful manner like unto a whelp." As the result of this and other
+ailments from which the child suffered, the father accused Amy Duny of
+being a witch, and she was placed in the stocks. Being placed in the
+stocks, further threats were uttered, and both children were afflicted
+with fits. Upon recovery they "would cough extremely, and bring up much
+phlegm and crooked pins, and one time a twopenny nail with a very broad
+head; which pins (amounting to forty or more), together with the
+twopenny nail, were produced in court, with the affirmation of the said
+deponnent that he was present when the said nail was vomited up, and
+also most of the pins.... In this manner the said children continued for
+the space of two months, during which time, in their intervals, this
+deponnent would cause them to read some chapters from the New Testament.
+Whereupon he observed that they would read till they came to the name of
+Lord or Jesus or Christ, and then, before they could pronounce either of
+the said words, they would suddenly fall into their fits. But when they
+came to the name of Satan or Devil, they would clap their fingers upon
+the book, crying out, 'This bites, but makes me speak right well!'"
+
+Much more evidence of a similar kind was offered during the course of
+the trial, with details of a too indelicate character for reproduction
+concerning the search made on the women's bodies for devil's marks.
+During the whole of the trial there were present in court a number of
+distinguished people, amongst them Sir Thomas Browne. The latter, being
+"desired to give his opinion, what he did conceive of him; was clearly
+of opinion that the persons were bewitched, and said that in Denmark
+there had lately been a great discovery of witches, who used the very
+same way of afflicting persons, by conveying pins into them, and crooked
+as these pins were, with needles and nails. And his opinion was that
+the devil in such cases did work upon the bodies of men and women as on
+a natural foundation, to stir up and excite such humours superabounding
+in their bodies to a great excess, whereby he did in an extraordinary
+manner afflict them with such distempers as their bodies were most
+subject to, as particularly appeared in these children."
+
+Sir Mathew Hale, one of the greatest lawyers of his day, in directing
+the jury, told them "he would not repeat the evidence unto them, lest by
+so doing he should wrong the evidence one way or the other. Only this
+acquainted them. First, whether or no these children were bewitched?
+Secondly, whether the prisoners at the bar were guilty of it? That there
+were such creatures he made no doubt at all. For, first, the Scriptures
+had affirmed as much. Secondly, the wisdom of all nations had provided
+laws against such persons, which is an argument of their confidence of
+such a crime. And such had been the judgment of this kingdom, as appears
+by that Act of Parliament which had provided punishments proportionable
+to the quality of the offence. And desired them strictly to observe
+their evidence, and desired the great God of Heaven to direct their
+hearts in this weighty thing they had in hand; for to condemn the
+innocent and let the guilty go free were both an abomination before the
+Lord." The jury took no more than half an hour to consider their
+verdict, and brought in both women guilty upon all counts. The judge
+expressed his complete satisfaction with the verdict, and sentenced them
+to be hanged--a sentence duly carried out a fortnight later.
+
+This is the last notable trial in English history. A witch was burned
+later than the date of this trial, and the last one actually condemned
+was in 1712. But in this case, on the representation of the judge who
+tried the issue, the verdict was formally set aside. By that time people
+were beginning to realise the wisdom of Montaigne's counsel, written at
+the commencement of the witch epidemic:--
+
+"How much more natural and more likely do I find it that two men should
+lie than one in twelve hours should pass with the winds from east to
+west? How much more natural that our understanding may, by the
+volubility of our loose, capering mind, be transported from its place
+than one of us should, flesh and bones as we are, by a strange spirit be
+carried upon a broom through a tunnel or a chimney."
+
+In England the Witch Act of 1604 was not formally repealed until 1736.
+In Scotland the last witch legally executed was in 1722. Captain Ross,
+Sheriff of Sutherland, has the doubtful honour of having condemned her
+to the stake. But fifty years later than this--1773--the Associated
+Presbytery passed a resolution deploring the fact that witchcraft was
+falling into disrepute. In Germany the last witch was executed in 1749,
+by decapitation. The last trial for witchcraft in Massachusetts was as
+late as 1793. These dates refer, of course, to legal proceedings.
+Examples of the existence of this belief are continually being recorded
+in newspapers, although they now only rank as solitary reminiscences of
+one of the most degrading and brutalising beliefs that European history
+records.
+
+I have not aimed at giving a history of the witch mania--indeed, a
+scientific history of witchcraft, one that will make plain the nature of
+the various factors involved, has yet to be written. I have only dwelt
+upon it for the purpose of enforcing the lesson of how materially such
+an epidemic must have contributed to give permanence to religious belief
+in general. It is certain that such an epidemic could not occur save in
+a society saturated with supernaturalism. It is equally certain that
+once such an epidemic occurs it must in turn strengthen the tendency
+towards supernaturalistic beliefs. Thanks to the long reign of the
+religious idea, and to the overwhelming influence of the Church, the
+people of Europe were prepared for such an outbreak. And it should be
+clear that the prevalence of such beliefs, even though they may be
+afterwards discarded, favours the perpetuation of religious belief as a
+whole. The particular form of a belief that is prevalent for a time may
+disappear, but the temper of mind induced by its reign remains. And
+absurd as the belief in witches capering through the air on broomsticks,
+changing themselves into black cats, raising storms, and causing
+sickness--absurd though all this may be, it yet serves to keep alive the
+temper of mind on which supernaturalism lives.
+
+
+FOOTNOTES:
+
+[187] Cited by Bloch, _Sexual Life of our Time_, p. 120. Michelet has
+also dealt with this matter in his vivid and picturesque work, _The
+Sorceress_.
+
+[188] A lengthy account of this work is given by Ennemoser in his
+_History of Magic_, vol. ii.
+
+[189] _Rise and Influence of Rationalism_, i. pp. 3-6.
+
+[190] H. Williams, _The Superstitions of Witchcraft_, p. 214.
+
+[191] T. Wright, _Narratives of Sorcery and Magic_.
+
+[192] Michelet, _Life of Luther_, chap. vi.
+
+[193] _History of Civilisation_, chap. xix.
+
+[194] Dalyell, _Darker Superstitions of Scotland_, p. 623.
+
+[195] Dalyell, p. 628.
+
+[196] Pitcairn's _Criminal Trials_, vol. iii.
+
+[197] _Religio Medici_, pt. i. sec. 30.
+
+[198] _True Intellectual System_, ii. p. 650.
+
+[199] _Commentaries_, Stephen's Edition, i. p. 238.
+
+[200] _Journal_, 1768.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER ELEVEN
+
+SUMMARY & CONCLUSION
+
+
+The study of religion falls naturally and easily into two parts. The
+first is a question of origin. Under what conditions did the hypothesis
+that supernatural beings control the life of man come into existence? We
+know that in civilised times religious beliefs are in the nature of an
+inheritance. A member of any civilised society finds them here when he
+is born, he grows up with them, generally accepting them without
+question, or effecting certain modifications in the form in which he
+continues to hold them. If we treat religion as a hypothesis, advanced
+as other hypotheses are advanced, to account for a certain class of
+facts, then we can safely say that religion is one of the earliest in
+the history of human thought. And its antiquity and universality
+preclude us from seeking an explanation of its origin in the mental life
+of civilised humanity. Whether the religious hypothesis can or cannot be
+justified by an appeal to civilised intelligence, it is plain it did not
+begin there. Its beginnings are earlier than any existing civilisation;
+and in its most general form may be said to be as old as mankind itself.
+Consequently, if any satisfactory explanation of the origin of the
+religious idea is to be found, it must be sought amid the very earliest
+conditions of human society.
+
+Now whatever the differences of opinion concerning matters of detail,
+there is substantial agreement amongst European anthropologists upon one
+important point. They all agree that the conception of supernatural, or
+'spiritual,' beings owes its beginning to the ignorance of primitive man
+concerning both his own nature and the nature of the world around him.
+The beginnings of human experience suggest questions that can only be
+satisfactorily answered by the accumulated experience of many
+generations. These questions do not materially differ from those that
+face men to-day. The why and wherefore of things are always with us;
+life propounds the same problem to all; it is the replies alone that
+vary, and the nature of these replies is determined by the knowledge at
+our disposal. The difference is not in nature but in man. The answers
+given by primitive man to these eternal questions are a complete
+inversion of those of his better informed descendants. The conception of
+natural force, of mechanical necessity, is as yet unborn, and the
+primitive thinker everywhere assumes the operation of personal beings as
+responsible for all that occurs. This is not so much the product of
+careful and elaborate philosophising, it is closer akin to the _naive_
+thinking of a child concerning a thunderstorm. Primitive thought accepts
+the universal operation of living and intelligent forces as an
+unquestionable fact. Modern thought tends more and more surely in the
+direction of regarding the universe as a complex of self-adjusting,
+non-conscious forces. Primitive thought assumes a supernatural agency as
+the cause of disease, and seeks, logically, to placate it by prayer or
+coerce it by magic. Modern thought turns to test-tube and microscope,
+searches for the malignant germ, and manufactures an antitoxin. The
+history of human thought is, as Huxley said, a record of the
+substitution of mechanical for vitalistic processes. The beginning of
+religion is found in connection with the latter. A genuine science
+commences with the emergence of the former.
+
+With this aspect of the matter I have not, however, been specially
+concerned. It has been left on one side in order to concentrate
+attention upon another and a more neglected aspect of the subject--that
+of the conditions that have served to perpetuate the religious idea.
+Grant, what cannot be well denied in the face of modern investigation,
+that ideas of the supernatural began in primitive delusion. How comes it
+that this idea has not by now disappeared from civilised society? What
+are the causes that have given it such a lengthy lease of life?
+Experience has shown that all really verifiable knowledge counts as an
+asset of naturalism, and is so far opposed to supernaturalism. Moreover,
+the history of science has been such that one feels justified in the
+assumption that, given time and industry, there are no phenomena that
+are not susceptible to a naturalistic explanation. Why, then, has not
+supernaturalism died out? Even the religious idea cannot persist without
+evidence of some kind being offered in its behalf. This evidence may be
+to a better instructed mind inconclusive or irrelevant, but evidence of
+some sort there must have been all along, and must still be. Granted
+that the religious idea began with primitive mankind, granted also that
+it was based on a mistaken interpretation of natural phenomena, these
+reasons are quite insufficient to explain why thousands of generations
+later that idea is still with us. "Our fathers have told us" offers to
+the average mind a strong appeal, but surely the children will require
+some further proof than this. What kind of evidence is it that
+throughout the ages religious people have accepted as conclusive? A
+study of primitive psychology shows clearly enough how the religious
+idea vitalised the facts. What we next have to discern is the class of
+facts that have kept the religious idea alive.
+
+The foregoing pages constitute an attempt to answer this question. The
+need for some such investigation was clearly shown by the publication of
+the late Professor William James's _Varieties of Religious Experience_
+and its reception by the religious press of the country as an
+epoch-marking work. As a mere collection of documents, the work is
+interesting enough. But its critical value is extremely small. How
+religious visionaries have felt, or what has been their experiences, can
+only furnish the mere data of an enquiry, and _their explanation of the
+cause of their experiences is a part of the data_. This, apparently,
+Professor James overlooked; and it will be noted by critical readers of
+his book that it proceeds on the assumption that the statements of
+religious visionaries are to be taken, not only as true concerning their
+subjective experiences at a given time, but also as approximately true
+as to the causes of their mental states. This, of course, by no means
+follows. A scientific enquiry cannot separate mental conditions from the
+subject's interpretation of their causation. Whether this interpretation
+is genuine or not must be decided finally by an appeal to what is known
+of the laws of mental life, under both normal and abnormal conditions.
+If these are adequate to explain the "Varieties of Religious
+Experience," there is no need whatever to assume the operation of a
+supernatural agency. Nor does calling this agency 'transcendent' or
+'supermundane' make any substantial difference. For, in this connection,
+these are only names that serve to disguise a visitant of a highly
+undesirable character.
+
+The evidence on behalf of a naturalistic explanation of religious
+phenomena has been purposely stated in a suggestive rather than in an
+exhaustive manner. The main lines of evidence are threefold. First,
+there is the indisputable fact that in the lower stages of culture all
+mental and bodily diseases are universally attributed to spiritual
+agency. This explanation holds the field; it is the only one possible at
+the time, and it is not replaced until a comparatively late stage of
+human history. But of special importance is the fact that a belief does
+not die out suddenly. It is only destroyed very slowly, and even after
+the facts upon which the belief was originally based have been otherwise
+interpreted, the attitude of mind engendered by the long reign of a
+belief remains. It has by that time become part of the intellectual
+environment. Theories of a quasi-philosophic or quasi-scientific
+character are elaborated, and give to the original belief something of a
+rational air. Even to-day the extent to which superstitious practices
+still gather round the subject of disease is known only to the curious
+in such matters. Not that the original reason is given for the practice.
+In nearly every case a different one is invented. To take only a single
+example. We still find saffron tea largely used in cases of measles. All
+medical men are aware that it possesses not the slightest curative
+value. Students of folklore are aware that it has its origin in the
+theory of sympathetic cures. Its redeeming feature is that it is
+harmless; so we find it still in common use, and the recovery of a child
+from measles is often enough attributed to the potency of the
+concoction. So with the relation of disease to the persistence of the
+belief in the supernatural. The conclusion that disease--whether bodily
+or mental--is due to the agency of spirits is one that follows from the
+existence of the religious idea; but in turn the observed facts react
+and strengthen the religious belief. Every case of disease becomes to
+the primitive mind an unanswerable proof in favour of the original
+hypothesis. The disease is there, and the only explanation possible is
+in terms of the animistic idea. And all the time the religious idea is
+becoming more deeply embedded in the social consciousness, more firmly
+established as a social fact.
+
+The next line of evidence is that furnished by what I have called the
+culture of the supernatural. By some means or other--probably by
+accident in the first instance--it is discovered that certain herbs and
+vegetable drugs have a peculiar effect on one's mental state. Those who
+use them see or hear things other people do not normally hear or see.
+Abstention from food and other bodily privations produce similar
+results. What is the inevitable conclusion? The only one possible under
+the existing conditions is that communication has been set up with an
+invisible world from which one is shut off under normal conditions. From
+this to the next step is obvious and easy. If a drug, or a fast, brings
+one into communication with the supernatural world, one has only to
+repeat the conditions in order to repeat the experience. And repeated
+they are in all religions, with, at most, those modifications induced by
+changed times and circumstances. This is why fasting and other forms of
+'fleshly mortification' play so large a part in the history of religion.
+The savage medicine man, the Hindu fakir, the medieval saint, all create
+their ecstasies by the simple plan of disturbing the normal operations
+of the nervous system. It is not, of course, implied that this is done
+with a full consciousness of all that is involved in the practice. The
+derangement is to them the condition of the supernatural manifestation,
+not the physiological and psychological cause of the experience.
+
+The third main line of evidence is connected with the phenomena of
+sexuality. It has been shown that in early stages of culture man
+everywhere connects the phenomena of the sexual life with the activity
+of supernatural forces. Following the lines of investigation indicated
+by Mr. Sidney Hartland, we saw reason to believe that the primitive
+conception of procreation is not that afterwards prevalent, but that of
+assuming the birth of a child to be due to the direct action of
+spiritual beings on the mother. Proofs of this are found in existing
+beliefs among primitive peoples, in the magical practices so widely
+current to obtain children, and in numerous other customs connected with
+childbirth. The phenomenon of puberty in the male and of menstruation in
+the female gives a terrifying reality to this belief. But still more
+important is the fact that a great deal of assumed religious feeling is
+found on analysis to be little more than masked sexuality. The
+connection between eroticism and piety has been noted over and over
+again by medical observers in the cases that have been brought
+professionally under their notice. And it is hardly less marked in a
+large number of instances that are usually classed as normal. Thus great
+religious teachers have often emphasised the value of a celibate life as
+a means of furthering religious devotion, and nearly all have treated it
+with marked respect. The reason given for this is that marriage involves
+a greater absorption in material or worldly cares, while celibacy
+leaves one free to full devotion to the spiritual. But the bottom reason
+for it is that sexual and domestic feelings, lacking their proper outlet
+in marriage and family life, run with greater force in the outlet
+provided by religion. So it happens that we find unmarried men and
+women, devoted to the religious life, expressing themselves towards
+Jesus or the Virgin in language which, separated from its religious
+associations, leaves no doubt as to its origin in unsatisfied sexual
+feeling. In these cases we are dealing with a perversion of one of the
+deepest of human instincts. And it is one of the commonest of
+observations in psychology that when a feeling is denied outlet through
+its proper channel it finds vent in some other direction, and is to that
+extent masked or disguised.
+
+Allied to the fact of perversion is that of misinterpretation. In the
+chapter on _Conversion_ we have seen how largely this occurs at the
+period of adolescence. The significant features of adolescence are a
+development of the sexual nature and an awakening of a consciousness of
+race kinship. Connected with these, and flowing from them, is a more or
+less rapid development of what are called the altruistic feelings, the
+individual becoming less self-centred and more concerned for the
+well-being of others. From an evolutionary point it is easy to read the
+fundamental meaning of these transformations, although in the course of
+social development they have become overlaid with a number of secondary
+characteristics. Still, in a completely rationalised social life, with
+adequate knowledge concerning the nature of adolescence, every care
+would be taken to direct these developing energies into purely social
+channels. Adolescence is the great formative period; it is then that
+imitation and suggestion play their most important parts, and it is then
+that the foundations may be laid of a really good and useful
+citizenship. If we fail then, we fail completely.
+
+In a society where supernaturalism still exerts considerable power
+another, and a more disastrous, policy is pursued. Every endeavour is
+made by religious organisations to exploit adolescence in their own
+interest. Thousands of priests, often, no doubt, with the best of
+motives, are engaged in impressing upon the youthful mind an entirely
+erroneous notion of the character and the direction of the feelings
+experienced. The sense of restlessness, consequent upon a period of
+great physiological disturbance, is utilised to create an unhealthy
+'conviction of sin,' or the need of 'getting right with God.' Social
+duties and obligations are made incidental rather than fundamental.
+Activities that should be consciously directed to a social end are
+diverted into religious channels, and one consequence of this, as we
+have seen, is a large crop of nervous disorders that might be avoided
+were a healthier outlet provided. In this the modern priest is acting
+precisely as his savage forerunner acted. As the savage medicine man
+associates sexual phenomena with the activity of the tribal ghosts, so
+the modern priest often associates the psychological conditions that
+accompany adolescence with a supernatural influence. The distinction
+between the two is a purely verbal one. In neither case is there a
+recognition of the nature of the processes actually at work; in both
+cases the phenomena are used to emphasise the reality and activity of
+the supernatural. In both cases the social feelings are disguised by
+the religious interpretation given, with the result that instead of
+adolescence being, as it should be, the period of a conscious entry into
+the larger social life, it only too often marks the beginning of a
+lifelong servitude to retrogressive forces.
+
+These are the main lines along which, I conceive, the study of the
+pathologic elements that enter into the history of religion must be
+studied. And so long as we restrict our study to the lower culture
+stages the evidence is clear and unmistakable. It is when we reach the
+higher stages of civilisation that the problem becomes more difficult.
+For although it is possible to detect the same factors at work they are
+expressed in a different way, and affiliated to current philosophic and
+even scientific ideas. Thus, it would be readily admitted by most people
+nowadays that visions seen by a fasting man, or by a taker of drugs, or
+by one suffering from some nervous disorder, were wholly inadmissible as
+evidence. So far we have advanced beyond the point of view of primitive
+races. But the testimony of one who by constantly dwelling upon a single
+idea, and by excluding rational and corrective influences, has brought
+about a quite abnormal state of mind, is still counted of value by
+theologians. Much of the current cant concerning 'mysticism' may be
+cited in illustration of this. Exactly what mysticism is no one appears
+to know. Definitions are numerous and varied. So far as most mystics are
+concerned the definition of Harnack--"Mysticism is rationalism applied
+to a sphere beyond reason"--appears to hit the mark, although how reason
+can be used in a sphere to which it does not apply is precisely one of
+those unintelligible statements that so delights those with yearnings
+after the ineffable. The normal mind will probably find more
+satisfaction in John Stuart Mill's description of mysticism as being
+"neither more nor less than ascribing objective existence to the
+subjective creations of the mind, and believing that by watching and
+contemplating these ideas of its own making, it can read what takes
+place in the world without."
+
+But the general claim of 'mystics,' and, indeed, of supernaturalists
+generally, is that they are, in virtue of the exercise of certain
+qualities or 'faculties,' either inoperative at certain times, or absent
+in the case of normal folk, able to perceive a truth not perceptible to
+people less fortunately endowed. And these claims, I have no hesitation
+in saying, are wholly false. There are all degrees of development of
+human faculty, but it is substantially the same with all. There is no
+royal road to truth in this direction more than in others. Truth is
+reached in the same way by all, and although an induction may in the
+case of certain well-dowered individuals be so rapid as to rank as an
+'intuition,' a careful analysis destroys the illusion.
+
+When we clear away from the claims of the 'mystic' all the superfluities
+of language that are there, and so reduce these claims to their lowest
+and plainest terms, we find ourselves face to face with the claim of the
+supernaturalist as it has existed from savage times onward. The method
+remains true to itself. In the first instance, we have the claim to
+illumination based upon direct interference with the normal workings of
+the mind. In the next stage, we find this interference still marked, but
+less direct. Finally, we have the unhealthy operation of fixed ideas,
+and the exclusion of all conditions that would prevent the operation of
+hallucination or illusion. But the method remains the same throughout,
+and it is equally sterile throughout. In all history these mystical
+states of illumination have discovered no verifiable truth; they have
+never at any time advanced human knowledge in the smallest degree. And
+the reason for this is plain: The brain of the mystic, like that of the
+non-mystic, can only work on the basis of its acquired knowledge or
+experience. It can create nothing new; it can declare no truth that is
+not in the nature of an induction from existing knowledge. All that the
+religious mystic can accomplish after brooding upon inherited religious
+beliefs is to create new combinations, or effect certain modifications
+or developments of them, and by continued contemplation endow his
+subjective creations with an objective existence. That is why the
+Christian mystic remains a Christian. The Mohammedan mystic remains a
+Mohammedan. The 'supersensible reality' is always of the kind consonant
+with their inherited beliefs and their social environment. That is also
+why mysticism has its fashions like all other forms of religious
+extravagance. And as he is "applying rationalism to a sphere above
+reason," the mystic may give full vent to his imaginative powers. That
+which is above reason may defy reasonable disproof. To some, however, it
+has the disadvantage of not admitting of reasonable verification. There
+is nothing here but the primitive delusion operating under changed
+conditions.
+
+In addition, to the lines of investigation followed in the foregoing
+pages, a great deal might be said as to how far the religious idea has
+been perpetuated by an exploitation of purely social qualities. It must
+be obvious to even the cursory student that a great deal of what is now
+being put forward as religious is really no more than a sociology with a
+religious label. The feeling for truth, beauty, justice, the desire for
+social intercourse, are all treated as expressions of religious
+conviction. All sorts of social reforms are urged in the name of
+religion, and the degree of success achieved dwelt upon as fruits of the
+religious spirit. But in no legitimate sense of the word can these
+things be called religious. They may or may not be consonant with the
+existing religion, but in themselves they are very clearly the outcome
+of man's social nature, and would exist even though religion disappeared
+entirely. The appeals made to man's moral sense, to his sense of
+justice, to his sympathies, are thus fundamentally appeals made to his
+social nature, and so far as the religious appeal is placed upon this
+basis it becomes an exploitation of the social consciousness.
+Unfortunately, the long association of religious forms with social life
+and institutions, due ultimately to the immense power of supernaturalism
+in early society, this, combined with early education, makes it a matter
+of no small difficulty for the average man or woman to separate the two
+things.
+
+Finally, let us imagine for a moment that the course of human history
+had been different to what it actually has been. Suppose that by some
+miracle humanity had started its career in full possession of that
+knowledge of nature which has been so laboriously accumulated. In that
+case, would the belief in the supernatural have ever existed? Would the
+thousand and one 'spiritual beings' of primitive society have ever had
+being? And if not called into being then, from what other source could
+they have been derived? Is there anything in later scientific knowledge
+that would ever have suggested the supernatural? We know there is not;
+we know that the whole of modern science is an emphatic protest against
+its existence. Unfortunately the scientist does not come first, but
+last; and by the time he appears, the supernatural has made good its
+foothold; it has permeated human institutions, and has bitten so deeply
+into habits of thought as to make its eradication the most difficult of
+all tasks.
+
+Let us carry our imagining yet a step further. Imagine that even after
+primitive ignorance had created the supernatural, it had come to an
+abrupt stop when man had emerged from the purely savage stage. Suppose a
+generation born, not without knowledge of what their progenitors
+believed, but with a sufficient knowledge of their own to correct their
+ancestor's errors. Suppose that generation in a position to recognise
+disease, insanity, delusion, hysteria, hallucination for what they are.
+Assume them to be under no delusion concerning the nature of man,
+physically or mentally. Would the religious idea have persisted in the
+way that it has done? Granted religion would still have continued to
+exist as an ultimate philosophy of nature that appealed to some minds,
+as other systems of philosophy number their disciples, would it have
+been the dominating power it has been? What under such conditions would
+have become of that evidence for the supernatural, accepted generation
+after generation, but which is now rejected by all educated minds? Where
+would have been that long array of seers, prophets, illuminants, whose
+credentials have been found in states of mind that are now seen to have
+been pathological in character? For remember it was not always--very
+seldom, in fact--the justice, or the reasonableness of the teachings set
+forth, that won support, but generally the 'signs and wonders' that were
+pointed to as evidence of the divine commission of the teachers. Assume,
+then, that these 'signs and wonders' had been wanting, and that for
+thousands of years people had looked at natural phenomena from the point
+of view of the educated mind of to-day, what would have been the present
+position of the religious idea? Would it not have been like a tree
+divorced from the soil?
+
+Well, we know that the course of history has been far different from
+what I have assumed to be the case. We know that the savage dies out
+very slowly, and that even in civilised States to-day he is honoured in
+the existence of a whole army of representatives. Each generation moves
+along the road marked out by its predecessors, and broadens or lengthens
+it to but a small extent. For many, many generations people went on
+adopting the conclusions of the savage concerning man and the universe,
+and finding proofs of the soundness of those conclusions in exactly the
+same kind of experiences. The beliefs thus engendered were wild and
+absurd--admittedly so, and many of such a nature that educated people
+are now ashamed of them. But such as they were, they served the purpose
+of perpetuating the belief in the supernatural, and so served to
+strengthen the general religious idea. Of that there can be no
+reasonable doubt. For the influence of beliefs that have been long held
+does not end with the intellectual perception of their falsity. A belief
+such as witchcraft dies out, but by that time it has done its work in
+familiarising the general mind with the reality of the supernatural, and
+so prepares the ground for other harvests. These long centuries of
+superstitious beliefs have left behind in society a psychological
+residuum that is at all times an obstacle and is sometimes fatal to
+scientific thinking. We are like men who have obtained freedom after
+almost a lifetime of slavery. We may be no longer in any real danger of
+the lash, but fear of the whip has become part of our nature, and we
+shrink without cause. So with all those now admitted delusions that have
+been described in the foregoing pages, and which for generations were
+asserted without question. They bit deeply in to social institutions;
+the temper of mind they induced became part of our social heritage. They
+perpetuated the long reign of supernaturalism, and still interpose a
+serious obstacle to sane and helpful conceptions of man and the
+universe.
+
+
+
+
+INDEX
+
+
+Adolescence and Religion, 177-8, 181, 276-7.
+
+Adolescence and Primitive Customs, 178.
+
+Adolescence and Nervous Disorders, 196-7.
+
+Adolescence, Social Significance of, 183-5.
+
+Agapæ, 152.
+
+Asceticism, 121, 125, 146, 208-13.
+
+Asceticism and Purity, 213.
+
+Asceticism, Influence on Religion, 224-5.
+
+Augustine, 157.
+
+Authority, Conflict with Science, viii.
+
+
+Baring-Gould, S., 147, 153, 209.
+
+Baring-Gould, S., on Mysticism and Sexualism, 125, 151.
+
+Brinton, D. G., on Origin of Religion, 14.
+
+Bryce, J., 232.
+
+Buckle, T. H., 256.
+
+
+Catherine of Sienna, 85, 129.
+
+Celibacy, 214-5.
+
+Celibacy, Results on Morals, 220-3.
+
+Celibacy, Social Consequences of, 216-9, 220-3.
+
+Clouston, Sir T. S., on Revivals, 195.
+
+Clouston, Sir T. S., on the Connection between Sexualism and Religion,
+140.
+
+Conversion, Pathological Nature of, 194.
+
+Conversion and Adolescence, 32, 176-7, 276.
+
+Conversion, Theological Notions of, 169-71.
+
+Conversion, Ages of Converts, 174-5, 194-5.
+
+Conversion, Statistics of, 173-5.
+
+Conversion and Imitation, 188.
+
+Conversion, Social Aspects of, 200.
+
+Convulsionnaires (The), 239.
+
+Crowd Psychology, 206.
+
+Crusades, Character of, 227-9.
+
+Crusades, Children's, 230.
+
+Crusades, Consequences of, 232-3.
+
+Cudworth, R., 259.
+
+
+Dalyell, J. G., 257.
+
+Dancing and Religious Ecstasy, 60-1.
+
+Dancing Epidemics, 236-40.
+
+Death, Savage Ideas of, 44.
+
+Demoniacs, 77.
+
+Disease, Theory of, amongst Primitive Peoples, 46.
+
+Disease, Theory of, amongst the Early Christians, 47.
+
+D'Israeli, I., on Sexualism and Religion, 17, 135.
+
+Draper, J. W., 231.
+
+Drugs, their use in the history of Religion, 57.
+
+
+Environment, 36, 38.
+
+Environment, Nature of Primitive, 39.
+
+Epilepsy, Influence of, in fostering Supernaturalism, 74-9.
+
+Epilepsy, Opinion of Dr. Hollander, 75.
+
+Epilepsy, Opinion of Sir T. S. Clouston, 75.
+
+Epilepsy, Opinion of Dr. C. Norman, 76.
+
+Epilepsy, Opinion of Emanuel Deutsch, 77, 79.
+
+Epilepsy in New Testament, 77.
+
+Erotic Sects, 155-60, 165.
+
+Eroticism and Supernaturalism, 126-8, 132, 136-9.
+
+Evidence for the Supernatural, 2, 271.
+
+
+Fasting, 61-5.
+
+Flagellation, 234-5.
+
+Forlong, Maj.-Gen., 109 _n._
+
+Fox, George, Account of Visions, 82.
+
+Frazer, J. G., 39, 46, 97, 99, 111.
+
+Free Love--Religious, 150, 161-4.
+
+
+Galton, Francis, on Religious and Morbid States, 86.
+
+Galton, Francis, 219.
+
+Gibbon, E., 227.
+
+Gowers, Sir W. R., 197.
+
+Granger, Prof., 84, 141-3.
+
+
+Hallucinations, 23-4-5, 62, 84.
+
+Hecker, J. F. C., 236-7.
+
+Hopkins, Mathew, 261-2.
+
+Human Qualities, Identity of, 6.
+
+
+Interpretation, Growth of Scientific, xiii.
+
+Ireland, Dr. W. W., on Hallucinations, 23-4.
+
+
+James, W., 10, 11, 14, 15, 16, 17, 21, 81, 83, 130, 131, 145, 175-6,
+272.
+
+
+Kingsley, Mary, on Primitive Thought, 42.
+
+
+Lea, H. C., 220-1.
+
+Le Bon, Gustave, on Crowd Psychology, 206.
+
+Lecky, W. E. H., 154, 212, 221.
+
+Luther and Demonism, 25, 58, 82, 253.
+
+
+Maudsley, H., on the Relation between Nervous States and Ecstasy, 66,
+76, 133.
+
+Medicine and the Church, 70-1.
+
+Menstruation, 95-6-7-8.
+
+Mental States, Reality of, xi, 7, 22.
+
+Mercier, C., Connection between Sexualism and Religion, 124, 140-1, 187,
+197.
+
+Milman, H. H., 219, 222-3, 225-6, 229, 232.
+
+Mind, Theories of, x.
+
+Mistletoe, Origin of Kissing under, 109 _n._
+
+Mohammed, his Account of Inspiration, 78, 81.
+
+Monasticism, 225.
+
+Monasticism and the Family, 216-7, 219, 222-3.
+
+Monasticism and Morals, 220.
+
+Mysticism, 131, 279-80.
+
+Mysticism and the Abnormal, 55.
+
+Mysticism and Puberty, 186.
+
+Mysticism, Definitions of, 278-9.
+
+Mystics, Claims of, xi.
+
+
+Opium, Effects of, 58.
+
+
+Pathological States and Religious Belief, 5, 49.
+
+Pathological Aspects of Revivals, 190-1-2-3, 201.
+
+Pathology of Religion, Need of, 3.
+
+Phallicism, 104-5-6-7-8-9.
+
+Pike, L. O., on Character of Crusaders, 229.
+
+Procreation, Primitive Beliefs concerning, 93-4.
+
+Psychological Epidemics, 207.
+
+Psychology, Normal and Abnormal, 3.
+
+Psychology as a Social Force, 37-8.
+
+Puberty, 180-6.
+
+Puberty Customs, 62, 95, 96.
+
+
+Religion, Definition of, 1.
+  Association of, with Non-religious Forces, 4.
+  and Intuition, 51.
+  and Puberty, 180.
+  and Dancing, 60-1-2.
+  and Fasting, 63-4-5.
+  and Environment, 199, 202.
+  in Primitive Life, 40, 44-5-6, 53.
+  its Connection with Pathological Conditions, 8, 14, 68-9, 70-1-2-3-4.
+
+Religious Faculty, Fallacy of, 7, 19, 20.
+
+Religious Idea and Modern Thought, vii.
+
+Renan, E., 145.
+
+Revivalistic Religion, 163, 172, 189, 190, 193, 201.
+
+Russian Sects, 164-7.
+
+
+Saints, Medical Uses of, 70.
+
+Santa Teresa, 85.
+
+Science, Function of, xi-xii.
+
+Sexualism and Religious Belief, 9, 11-2, 89-90, 120, 121, 125-9, 145,
+275.
+
+Sexualism and Religious Belief, Opinion of Dr. Norman, 122;
+  of Dr. Forel, 123;
+  of Dr. Mercier, 124;
+  of Dr. Krafft-Ebing, 125;
+  of Dr. Maudsley, 133-4.
+
+Smith, W. R., on the Meaning of 'Unclean,' 101.
+
+Sociability, Significance of, 35.
+
+Social Life and Religious Theories, 13, 281.
+
+Spencer, H., 37, 46.
+
+Spiritual Wifehood, 148-9.
+
+Spiritualism, 53-4.
+
+Starbuck, E. D., on Conversion, 174, 200.
+
+Sully, J., 20.
+
+Supernaturalism, Causes of Persistence of, 271, 273, 277, 282.
+
+Supernaturalism, Consequences of, 283-4.
+
+Supernaturalism, Persistence of, 2.
+
+Suso, Austerities of, 85.
+
+Swedenborg, E., 80.
+
+Symonds, J. A., Experience under Chloroform, 29.
+
+
+Theologians, Attitude towards Science, ix.
+
+Thomas, W. I., 182.
+
+Tylor, E. B., 1, 49, 54, 55, 71, 182, 193.
+
+
+Unclean, Religious Significance of, 100-1.
+
+
+Whittaker, T., on the Effects of Opium, 58.
+
+Williams, A., 250.
+
+Witchcraft, 27, 243.
+  Pathology of, 246-7.
+  and Christian Church, 244.
+  Bull of Innocent VIII., 248.
+  Extent of Epidemic, 250.
+  and Sir Thomas Browne, 265.
+  and Montaigne, 267.
+  and Sir M. Hale, 266.
+  and John Wesley, 259.
+  and Luther, 253.
+  and Protestantism, 252-3.
+  Scottish, 255-6-7-8, 267.
+  American, 254-5.
+  Children burned for, 251.
+  Description of Trial, 263-6.
+  Legislation in England, 253, 267.
+
+Witches, Methods of Detection, 260-1.
+
+Witches, Number killed, 250-1.
+
+Woman, Christian Church and, 102.
+
+Woman, why considered religiously unclean, 103.
+
+Woman, a Source of Spiritual Infection, 99.
+
+Woman, Influence of Religious Beliefs in determining her Social
+Position, 102-3, 110-9.
+
+Woman, Position among Primitive Peoples, 115.
+
+Wright, T., 251.
+
+
+[Transcriber's Note:
+
+The following corrections were made:
+
+p. 21: extra open quote removed (In what sense)
+
+p. 24: Dr. W. H. Ireland to Dr. W. W. Ireland (as given by Dr. W. W.
+Ireland)
+
+p. 25: Nuremburg to Nuremberg (came from Nuremberg), to match cited text
+
+p. 46: Crook to Crooke (says Mr. W. Crooke)
+
+p. 46: Ahmadnager to Ahmadnagar (Mahadeo Kolis of Ahmadnagar)
+
+p. 57: DeCandolle to De Candolle (says De Candolle)
+
+p. 58 (Footnote 26): Pharmæcology to Pharmacology (Text-Book of
+Pharmacology)
+
+p. 70: Persel to Pernel (St. Pernel for agues), to match cited text
+
+p. 75: everyone to every one (every one of the senses)
+
+p. 76: Connolly to Conolly (Dr. Conolly Norman)
+
+pp. 86 (Footnote 63), and 130 (Footnote 107): Joli to Joly (H. Joly)
+
+p. 101 (Footnote 76): on to in (Studies in the Psychology of Sex)
+
+p. 114: is to are (Nor are the substantial facts)
+
+p. 123 (Footnote 96): Problem to Question (The Sexual Question)
+
+pp. 125, 128 (Footnote 105), and 287 (Index): Kraft-Ebing to
+Krafft-Ebing
+
+p. 127: Loudon to Loudun (Convent of Ursulines of Loudun)
+
+p. 127 (Footnote 104): of America to in North America (Jesuits in North
+America)
+
+p. 128: Alacocque to Alacoque (The blessed Mary Alacoque)
+
+p. 149 (Footnote 123): Life of St. Paul to Study of St. Paul
+
+p. 166 (Footnote 140): Churches to Church (Heard's description, Russian
+Church)
+
+p. 178: tatooing to tattooing (tattooing forms part of the religious
+ceremony)
+
+p. 182 (Footnote 151): missing 4 added in 241 (pp. 241-48)
+
+p. 209: Brahminism to Brahmanism (Brahmanism has its order of ascetics),
+to match cited text
+
+p. 209: missing close quote added (consecrated to Tezcatlipoca.")
+
+p. 249 (Footnote 188): Enenmoser to Ennemoser (is given by Ennemoser)
+
+p. 250 (Footnote 190): A. Williams, The Superstition of Witchcraft to H.
+Williams, The Superstitions of Witchcraft
+
+p. 251 (Footnote 191): History to Narratives (Narratives of Sorcery and
+Magic)
+
+p. 255: Burroughes to Burroughs (George Burroughs)
+
+pp. 263, 264: Tacy to Pacy (Elizabeth and Deborah Pacy)
+
+p. 286 (Index): Ireland, Dr. W. H. to Ireland, Dr. W. W.
+
+p. 286 (Index): Millman, H. H. to Milman, H. H.
+
+Irregularities in hyphenation (e.g. supernormal vs. super-normal) and
+misquotations have not been corrected. Unless it was found that the
+error also occurred in the cited text, misspellings have been corrected.
+
+Although Footnote 81 (originally on p. 104) refers to a "note at the end
+of this chapter," the "NOTE TO PAGE 104" begins on p. 110, several pages
+before the chapter ends. This has not been changed.
+
+Footnotes markers have been changed from symbols (in the original) to
+numerals.
+
+For the plain text versions, an oe-ligature has been changed to oe
+(Coelestia).]
+
+
+
+
+
+End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of Religion & Sex, by Chapman Cohen
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+<pre>
+
+The Project Gutenberg EBook of Religion & Sex, by Chapman Cohen
+
+This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with
+almost no restrictions whatsoever.  You may copy it, give it away or
+re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included
+with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org
+
+
+Title: Religion & Sex
+       Studies in the Pathology of Religious Development
+
+Author: Chapman Cohen
+
+Release Date: October 21, 2009 [EBook #30306]
+
+Language: English
+
+Character set encoding: ISO-8859-1
+
+*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK RELIGION & SEX ***
+
+
+
+
+Produced by Marilynda Fraser-Cunliffe, S.D., and the Online
+Distributed Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net
+
+
+
+
+
+
+</pre>
+
+
+<p class="u center med">THE OPEN MIND LIBRARY</p>
+
+<p class="center sm">BEING A SERIES OF WORKS DEALING WITH<br />
+  QUESTIONS AS HANDLED BY DIFFERENT<br />
+  SCHOOLS OF THOUGHT, IN RELIGION,<br />
+  ETHICS, PHILOSOPHY &amp; PSYCHOLOGY</p>
+
+<div class="tp">
+<h1><span class="wide">RELIGION<br />
+ &amp; SEX</span><br />
+
+<span class="tpsub">STUDIES IN THE PATHOLOGY<br />
+OF RELIGIOUS DEVELOPMENT</span></h1>
+<p class="auth">BY CHAPMAN COHEN</p>
+
+<p class="center pub"><span class="med">T. N. FOULIS, PUBLISHER</span><br />
+<span class="sm">LONDON, EDINBURGH, &amp; BOSTON</span></p>
+</div>
+
+<p class="center"><i>Published October 1919</i></p>
+
+<p class="center"><i>Printed by</i> <span class="smcap">Morrison &amp; Gibb Limited</span>, <i>Edinburgh</i></p>
+
+<h2>THE LIST OF CHAPTERS</h2>
+
+<table class="toc" summary="Table of Contents">
+<tr><td class="top">I.</td> <td align="left" class="smcap">Science &amp; the Supernatural</td>              <td><i>page</i>&nbsp;<a href="#Page_1">1</a></td></tr>
+
+<tr><td class="top">II.</td> <td align="left" class="smcap">The Primitive Mind &amp; its Environment</td>              <td><a href="#Page_35">35</a></td></tr>
+
+<tr><td class="top">III.</td> <td align="left" class="smcap">The Religion of Mental Disease</td>                   <td><a href="#Page_51">51</a></td></tr>
+
+<tr><td class="top">IV.</td> <td align="left" class="smcap">Sex &amp; Religion in Primitive Life</td>                  <td><a href="#Page_89">89</a></td></tr>
+
+<tr><td class="top">V.</td> <td align="left" class="smcap">The Influence of Sexual &amp; Pathologic
+   States on Religious Belief</td>                            <td><a href="#Page_120">120</a></td></tr>
+
+<tr><td class="top">VI.</td> <td align="left" class="smcap">The Stream of Tendency</td>                           <td><a href="#Page_145">145</a></td></tr>
+
+<tr><td class="top">VII.</td> <td align="left" class="smcap">Conversion</td>                                      <td><a href="#Page_169">169</a></td></tr>
+
+<tr><td class="top">VIII.</td> <td align="left" class="smcap">Religious Epidemics</td>                            <td><a href="#Page_205">205</a></td></tr>
+
+<tr><td class="top">IX.</td> <td align="left"><span class="smcap">Religious Epidemics</span>&mdash;(<i>concluded</i>)</td>     <td><a href="#Page_226">226</a></td></tr>
+
+<tr><td class="top">X.</td> <td align="left" class="smcap">The Witch Mania</td>                                   <td><a href="#Page_243">243</a></td></tr>
+
+<tr><td class="top">XI.</td> <td align="left" class="smcap">Summary &amp; Conclusion</td>                         <td><a href="#Page_269">269</a></td></tr>
+</table>
+
+<p><!-- Page vii --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_vii" id="Page_vii">[vii]</a></span></p>
+
+<h2>PREFACE</h2>
+
+<p>In spite of all that has been done
+in the way of applying scientific principles to religious
+ideas, there is much that yet remains to be accomplished.
+Generally speaking science has only dealt
+with the subject of religion in its more normal
+and more regularised forms. The last half-century
+has produced many elaborate and fruitful studies of
+the origin of religious ideas, while comparative mythology
+has shown a close and suggestive relationship
+between creeds and symbols that were once believed
+to have nothing in common. But beyond these fields
+of research there is at least one other that has hitherto
+been denied the attention it richly deserves. When
+the anthropologist has described those conditions of
+primitive culture amid which he believes religious
+ideas took their origin, and the comparative mythologist
+has shown us the similarities and inter-relations
+of widely separated creeds, religious beliefs have yet
+to submit to the test of a scientific psychology, the
+function of which is to determine how far the same principles
+apply to all phases of mental life whether religious
+or non-religious. Moreover, in addition to the
+normal psychical life of man, there is that vast borderland
+in which the normal merges into the abnormal,
+and the healthy state into a pathologic one. That
+there is a physiology of religion is now generally admitted;
+but that there is also a pathology of religion
+is not so generally recognised. The present work seeks
+to emphasise this last aspect. It does not claim to be
+more than an outline of the subject&mdash;a sketch map of
+a territory that others may fill in more completely.</p>
+
+<p><!-- Page viii --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_viii" id="Page_viii">[viii]</a></span>
+From another point of view the following pages
+may be regarded as an attempt more completely to
+apply scientific principles to religious beliefs. And it
+would be idle to hope that such an attempt could be
+made without incurring much hostile criticism. In
+connection with most other subjects the help of science
+is welcomed; in connection with religion science is
+still regarded as more or less of an intruder, profaning
+a sacred subject with vulgar tests and impertinent enquiries.
+This must almost inevitably follow when one
+has to face the opposition of thousands of men who
+have been trained to regard themselves as the authorised
+exponents of all that pertains to religion, but
+whose training fails to supply them with a genuine
+scientific equipment. It should, however, be clear that
+an attitude of hostility to science, veiled or open, cannot
+be maintained. Mere authority has fallen on evil
+days, and in all directions is being freely challenged.
+There is increasing dislike to systems of thought that
+shrink from examination, and to conclusions that cannot
+withstand the most rigorous investigation. And
+if science really has anything of value to say on this
+question it cannot be held to silence for ever. Sooner
+or later the need for its assistance will be felt, and the
+self-elected authority of an order must give way. It is,
+moreover, impossible for science with its claim, sometimes
+avowed, but always implied, to cover the whole
+of life, to forego so large a territory as that of religion.
+For there can be no reasonable question that religion
+has played, and still plays a large part in the life of the
+race. Whatever be the nature of religion, science is
+bound either to deal with it or confess its main task to
+be hopeless.</p>
+
+<p>Whether or not it is possible to apply known scientific<!-- Page ix --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_ix" id="Page_ix">[ix]</a></span>
+principles to the whole of religion will be a matter
+of opinion; but the attempt is at least worth making.
+So much that appeared to be beyond the reach of
+science has been ultimately brought within its ken, so
+many things that seemed to stand in a class by themselves
+have been finally brought under some more
+comprehensive generalisation, and so become part of
+the 'cosmic machine,' that one is impelled to believe
+that given time and industry the same will result here.
+And it should never be forgotten that one aspect of
+scientific progress has been the taking over of large
+tracts of territory that religion once regarded as peculiarly
+its own; and just as psychology and pathology
+were found to hold the key to an understanding of
+such a phenomenon as witchcraft, so we may yet realise
+that a true explanation of religious phenomena is
+to be found, not in some supernatural world, but in the
+workings of natural forces imperfectly understood.</p>
+
+<p>The defences set up by theologians against the
+scientific advance may be summarised under two
+heads. It is claimed that the 'facts' of the religious life
+belong to a world of inner experience, to a state of spiritual
+development which brings the subject into touch
+with a super-sensuous world not open to the normal
+human being, and with which science, as ordinarily
+understood, is incompetent to deal. In essence this is
+a very old position, and contains the kernel of 'mysticism'
+in all ages, from the savage state onward. This
+position involves a very obvious begging of the question
+at issue. It assumes that all attempts to correlate
+religious phenomena with phenomena in general
+have failed, and that all future attempts are similarly
+doomed to failure. Of course nothing of the kind has<!-- Page x --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_x" id="Page_x">[x]</a></span>
+been shown. On the contrary, the aim of the present
+work is to show that no dividing line can be drawn between
+those states of mind that have been and are
+classed as religious, and those that are admittedly
+non-religious. For various reasons I have dealt almost
+entirely with those conditions that are admittedly
+pathological, but I believe it would be possible
+to prove the same of all normal frames of mind and
+emotional states. Any human quality may be enlisted
+in the service of religion, but there are none that are
+specifically religious. It is a pure assumption that the
+religious visionary possesses qualities that are either
+absent or rudimentary in other persons. Human faculty
+is everywhere identical although the form in which
+it is expressed differs according to education, the presence
+of certain dominating ideas, and the general influence
+of one's environment. To admit the claim of
+the mystic is to surrender all hope of a scientific co-ordination
+of life. It is quite fatal to the scientific ideal
+and involves the re-introduction into nature of a dualism
+the removal of which has been one of the most
+marked advantages of scientific thinking.</p>
+
+<p>Moreover, whatever views we may hold as to the ultimate
+nature of 'mind' the dependence of all frames
+of mind upon the brain and nervous system is now
+generally accepted. We may hold various theories
+as to the nature of mind, we may, with the late William
+James, treat the brain as merely a 'transmissive' organ,
+but even on that assumption&mdash;on behalf of which
+not a shred of positive evidence has been offered&mdash;the
+frames of mind expressed are determined by the nervous
+mechanism, and thus the laws of mental phenomena
+become ultimately the laws of the operation<!-- Page xi --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_xi" id="Page_xi">[xi]</a></span>
+of the nervous system. The 'facts' of the religious
+life thus become part of the facts of psychology as a
+whole. Its 'laws' will form part of psychological
+laws as a whole, and religious experiences must be
+handed over for examination and classification to the
+psychologist who in turn relies for help and understanding
+on various associated branches of science.</p>
+
+<p>Closely allied to the claim of the 'mystic' that his
+experiences bring him into touch with a world of
+super-sensuous reality, is the attempt to prove that
+science is incapable of dealing with anything but "in
+the first place, the endless ascertainment of facts and
+the physical conditions under which they occur, and
+in the second place to the criticism of error." Well,
+no one denies that it is part of the work of science to
+ascertain facts, or even that its work consists in ascertaining
+facts and framing 'laws' that will explain
+them. But why are we to limit science to <em>physical</em> facts
+only? All facts are not physical. If I have a head-ache,
+the unpleasant feeling is a fact. If I feel hot or
+cold, angry or pleased, think one thing ugly or another
+beautiful, my feelings are as much 'facts' as anything
+else that exists. Nay, if I fancy I see a ghost,
+or a vision, these also are 'facts' so far as my mental
+state at the time is concerned. So also are my beliefs
+about all manner of things, and often the most important
+facts with which I am connected. Facts may be
+objective or subjective. They may exist in relation
+to all minds normally constituted, or they may exist
+in relation to my own mind only; or, yet again, they
+may exist only in relation to certain states of mind,
+but they do not, nevertheless, cease to be facts.</p>
+
+<p>Now the business of science is to collect facts&mdash;all<!-- Page xii --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_xii" id="Page_xii">[xii]</a></span>
+facts&mdash;classify them, and frame generalisations that
+will explain their groupings and modes of operation.
+It talks of the facts of the physical world, the facts of
+the biological world, the facts of the psychological
+world, and so forth. This last group comprises all
+sorts of feelings and ideas, beliefs and experiences.
+Some of these facts it calls false, others it calls true&mdash;that
+is, they are true when they hold good of all men
+and women normally constituted, they are not true
+when they hold good of isolated individuals only, and
+can be seen to be the product of misinterpreted experience,
+or arise from a derangement&mdash;permanent
+or temporary&mdash;of the nervous system. But true or
+false they remain facts of the mental life. They must
+be collected, grouped, and explained exactly as other
+facts are collected, grouped, and explained. They
+fall within the scope of science, to be dealt with by
+scientific methods.</p>
+
+<p>There is really no escape from the position that so
+far as religious 'facts' are parts of mental life, religion
+becomes logically a department of psychology. The
+substantial identity of all mental facts is quite unaffected
+by their being directed to this or that special object.
+As mental facts they are part of the material that it is
+the work of science to reduce to order. And as mental
+facts religious phenomena are seen to follow the same
+'laws' that govern mental phenomena in general. It
+is perfectly true that we cannot test and measure the
+material of psychology with the same definiteness and
+accuracy that the chemist applies to the subject-matter
+of his department; but that may be due to want of
+knowledge, or to the extreme complexity and variability
+of the matter with which we are dealing. And<!-- Page xiii --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_xiii" id="Page_xiii">[xiii]</a></span>
+if it were true that the same tests could not be applied
+in psychology that are applied elsewhere, this would
+be no cause for scientific despair. It would only mean
+that fresh tests would have to be devised for a new
+group of facts, as every other science has already, as a
+matter of fact, created its own special standard of value.</p>
+
+<p>The second of the two lines of defence consists in
+the bold assertion that the religious interpretation of
+subjective phenomena is itself in the nature of a true
+scientific induction. The methods of science are not repudiated,
+but welcomed. But it is argued that the non-religious
+explanation of religious phenomena breaks
+down hopelessly, while the religious explanation fully
+covers and explains the facts. If this were true, nothing
+more remains to be said, and we must accept this
+dualistic scheme, however repugnant it may be to orthodox
+scientific ideas. But is it true? Is it a fact that
+the non-religious explanation breaks down so completely?
+Hitherto the course of events has been in the
+contrary direction. It is the religious explanation that
+has, over and over again, been shown to be unreliable,
+the non-religious explanation that has been finally
+established. Insanity and epilepsy, once universally
+ascribed to a supernatural order of being, have been
+reduced to the level of nervous disorders. All the phenomena
+of 'possession' are still with us, it is only our
+understanding of them that has altered. And before
+it is admitted that the phenomena described as religious
+can never be affiliated to the phenomena described
+as non-religious, it must be shown&mdash;beyond all possibility
+of doubt&mdash;that their explanation in terms of
+known forces is impossible. As I have said in the body
+of this work, the question at issue is essentially one of<!-- Page xiv --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_xiv" id="Page_xiv">[xiv]</a></span>
+interpretation. The 'facts' of the religious life are admitted.
+Science no more questions the reality of the
+visions of the medieval mystic than it questions the
+visions of the non-mystic admittedly suffering from
+neural derangement. The crucial question is whether
+we have any good reason for separating the two, and
+while we dismiss the one as hallucination accept the
+other as introducing us to another order of being? I
+do not think there is the slightest ground for any such
+differentiation, and I have given in the following pages
+what I conceive to be good reasons for so thinking.
+And I hope that the fact of the explanations there
+offered running counter to the traditional one will not
+prevent readers weighing with the utmost care the
+proofs that are offered.</p>
+
+<p><!-- Page 1 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_1" id="Page_1">[1]</a></span></p>
+
+<h2><span class="lg wide2">RELIGION AND SEX</span><br />
+CHAPTER <span class="cgap">ONE</span><br />
+SCIENCE AND THE SUPERNATURAL</h2>
+
+<p>Accepting Professor Tylor's famous
+minimum definition of religion as "the belief in
+Spiritual Beings," it is safe to say that religious belief
+constitutes one of the largest facts in human history.
+No other single subject has occupied so large a share
+of man's conscious life, no other subject has absorbed
+so much of his energy. In very early stages of culture
+religious belief is universal in the fullest sense of the
+word. It shapes all primitive institutions; it dominates
+life from the cradle to the grave, and creates a
+shadow-land beyond the grave from which the dead
+continue to influence the actions of the living. At a
+later stage of culture we see a distinction being drawn
+between the natural and the supernatural, the secular
+and the spiritual, and the beginning of an antagonism
+that is still with us. Of all antagonisms conceived by
+the brain of man this is the deepest and the most irreconcilable.
+Each feels that the growth of the other
+threatens its own supremacy, with the result that advance
+from either side has been contested with the
+greatest obstinacy and determination. And although
+it is true that at present the supernatural is very
+largely "suspect," it is still powerful. Nor is its influence
+confined to the lower strata of European society.
+It has very many representatives among the higher
+culture, disguised it may be under various pseudo-philosophic
+forms. Altogether we may say that the
+supernatural has never been without its "cloud of
+witnesses." At all times there have been individuals,<!-- Page 2 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_2" id="Page_2">[2]</a></span>
+or groups of individuals, who have believed themselves,
+and have been believed by others, to be in
+touch with another order of existence than that with
+which people are normally in contact. And apart from
+these specially favoured persons, the wide vogue of
+the belief in good and evil portents, in lucky and unlucky
+days, the attraction of the "occult" in fiction and
+in fact, all serve as evidence that belief in the supernatural
+is still a force with which one has to reckon.</p>
+
+<p>To what causes are we to attribute the persistence
+of this belief in the supernatural? It is useless replying
+that its persistence is evidence of its truth. That
+clearly begs the whole question at issue. Mere social
+heredity will doubtless count for much in this direction.
+Men do not start their thinking afresh with each
+generation. It is based upon that of preceding generations;
+it follows set forms, and is generally influenced
+by that network of ideas and beliefs into which we
+are born and from which none of us ever completely
+escapes. Still that is hardly enough in itself to account
+for the persistence of supernaturalism. Assuming
+that originally there existed what was accepted as
+good evidence for the existence of a supernatural, it
+is hardly credible that every subsequent generation
+went on accepting it merely because one generation
+received evidence of its existence. As organs atrophy
+for want of exercise, so do beliefs die out in time for
+want of proof. Some kind of evidence must have been
+continually forthcoming in order to keep the belief
+alive and active. It is not a question of whether the
+evidence was good or bad. All evidence, it is important
+to bear in mind, is good to some one. The "facts"
+upon which thousands of people were put to death<!-- Page 3 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_3" id="Page_3">[3]</a></span>
+for witchcraft would not be considered evidence to
+anyone nowadays, but they were once accepted as
+good ground for conviction.</p>
+
+<p>What kind of evidence is it, then, that has been accepted
+as proof of the supernatural? Or, to return to
+Tylor's definition of religion, seeing that the belief in
+spiritual beings has persisted in every generation, upon
+what kind of evidence has this belief been nourished?
+Various replies might be given to this question,
+all of which may contain some degree of truth, or
+an aspect of a general truth. In the present enquiry
+I am concerned with one line of investigation only,
+one that has been strangely neglected, but which yet,
+I am convinced, promises fruitful results. In other
+directions it has been established that a great aid to
+an understanding of the human organism in times of
+health is to study its activities under conditions of
+disease. Abnormal psychology is now a recognised
+branch of psychology in general, and a glance through
+almost any recent text-book will show that the two
+form parts of a natural whole. The normal and the
+abnormal are in turn used to throw light on each other.
+And it appears to the present writer that in the matter
+of religious beliefs a much clearer understanding of
+their nature, and also of some of the conditions of their
+perpetuation, may be gained by a study of what has
+happened, and is happening, in the light of mental
+pathology.</p>
+
+<p>To some, of course, the bare idea of there being a
+pathology of religion will appear an entirely unwarrantable
+assumption. On the other hand, the scientific
+study of all phases of religions having made so great
+headway it is hoped that a larger number will be prepared<!-- Page 4 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_4" id="Page_4">[4]</a></span>
+for a discussion of the subject from a point of
+view which, if not quite new, is certainly not common.
+Of course, such a discussion, even if the author quite
+succeeds in demonstrating the truth of his thesis, will
+still leave the origin of the religious idea an open question.
+For the present we are not concerned directly
+with the origin of the religious idea, but with an examination
+of some of the causes that have served to perpetuate
+it, and to trace the influence in the history of
+religion of states of mind, both personal and collective,
+that are now admittedly abnormal or pathological in
+character. The legitimacy of the enquiry cannot be
+questioned. As to its value and significance, that every
+reader must determine for himself.</p>
+
+<p>One may put the essential idea of the following
+pages in a sentence:&mdash;Given the religious idea as already
+existing, in what way, and to what extent has its
+development been affected by forces that are not in
+themselves religious, and which modern thought definitely
+separates from religion?</p>
+
+<p>Under civilised and uncivilised conditions we find
+religious beliefs constantly associated with various
+forces&mdash;social, ethical, and psychological. Very seldom
+is there any serious attempt to separate them and
+assign to each their respective value; nor, indeed, is
+the task at any time an easy one. The difficulty is
+made the greater by the way in which writers so enlarge
+the meaning of "religion" that it is made to include
+almost everything for which one feels admiration
+or respect. This practice is neither helpful nor accurate.
+Human nature under all aspects of intellectual
+conviction presents the same fundamental characteristics,
+and a definition to be of value, while of necessity<!-- Page 5 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_5" id="Page_5">[5]</a></span>
+inclusive, must also be decisively exclusive. It must
+unite, but it must also separate. And many current
+definitions of religion, while they may bear testimony
+to the amiability of those who frame them, are quite
+destitute of scientific value. In any case, the association
+of the religious idea with non-religious forces is a
+fact too patent to admit of denial; and the important
+task is to determine their reciprocal influence. In actual
+life this separation has been secured by the development
+of the various branches of positive thought&mdash;ethics,
+psychology, etc., all of which were once directly
+under the control of religion. What remains to be
+done is to separate in theory what has already been
+separated in fact, with such additions as a more critical
+knowledge may suggest as advisable.</p>
+
+<p>Far more suggestive, however, than the association
+of religion with what we may call the normal social
+forces, is its connection with conditions that are now
+clearly recognised as abnormal. From the earliest
+times we find the use of drugs and stimulants, the practice
+of fasting and self-torture, with other methods of
+depressing or stimulating the action of the nervous
+system, accepted as well-recognised methods of inducing
+a sense of religious illumination, or the feeling
+that one is in direct communion with a supernatural
+order of existence. Equally significant is the world-wide
+acceptance&mdash;right up to recent times&mdash;of purely
+pathological states as evidence of supernatural intercourse.
+About these two sets of facts there can be no
+reasonable doubt. Over and over again we can observe
+how the promptings of disease are taken for the voice
+of divinity, and men and women who to-day would be
+handed over to the care of the physician hailed as an<!-- Page 6 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_6" id="Page_6">[6]</a></span>
+incarnation of deity. In modern asylums we find one
+of the commonest of delusions to be that of the insane
+person who imagines himself to be a specially selected
+instrument of deity. In such instances the causal influence
+of pathological conditions is admitted. On
+the other hand, we have belonging to the more normal
+type the person who claims a supernatural origin for
+many of his actions and states of mind. And between
+these two extremes lie a whole series of gradations.
+They exist in all stages of culture, and it is difficult to
+see by what rule of logic or of experience one can say
+where the normal ends and the abnormal begins. If
+we assume the inference of the normal person concerning
+the origin of his mental states to be correct, it
+seems difficult to deny the possibility of those of the
+insane person having a similar origin, although distorted
+by the influence of disease. If, on the other
+hand, we say the insane person is wholly wrong as to
+the origin of his mental states, may we not also assume
+that the normal person has likewise erred as to the
+cause of his emotions or ideas?</p>
+
+<p>Two considerations may be urged in support of this
+conclusion. In the first place, there is the fact of the
+fundamental identity of human qualities under all
+conditions of their manifestation. It is too often assumed&mdash;sometimes
+it is explicitly claimed&mdash;that one
+with what is called "a strong religious nature" possesses
+some quality of mind absent or undeveloped in
+those of an opposite type. This assumption is quite
+unwarrantable. The religious man is marked off from
+the non-religious man, not by the possession of distinct
+mental qualities, but solely by holding different
+ideas concerning the cause and significance of his mental<!-- Page 7 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_7" id="Page_7">[7]</a></span>
+states. There is no such thing as a religious "faculty,"
+but only qualities of mind expressed in terms of
+the religious idea. If I am conscious of a strong desire
+to work on behalf of the social betterment of my
+fellows, I may account for this either by attributing
+it to having inherited a nature modified by generations
+of social intercourse, or on the hypothesis that I
+am an instrument in the hands of a superhuman personality.
+But in either case the qualities manifested
+remain the same. Love and hatred, fear and courage,
+honesty and roguery, with all other human qualities,
+may be expressed in terms of religion, or they may be
+expressed in non-religious terms. It is the cause to
+which they are attributed, or the object to which they
+are directed, that marks off the religious from the non-religious
+person.</p>
+
+<p>The second point is that the whole issue arises on a
+conflict of interpretations. If I question the reality of
+the visions or states of illumination experienced by
+Santa Teresa, I am not questioning that, so far as the
+saint herself was concerned, these states of exaltation
+were real. All mental states&mdash;whether arising under
+normal or abnormal conditions&mdash;are quite real to those
+who experience them. The visions of the hashish-eater
+are real, while they last; so are those of the victim
+of delirium tremens. All I question is their genuineness
+as corresponding to an objective reality. Over
+the mind of the subject these visions may exercise
+an absolute sway. As to their occurrence, he or she
+is the final and absolute authority. There can be no
+question here. But when we proceed from the occurrence
+of these visions to the question of their causation,
+then we are on entirely different ground. Here<!-- Page 8 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_8" id="Page_8">[8]</a></span>
+it is not a question of their genuineness, or of their
+power, but a question of how we are to interpret
+them. The honesty and singlemindedness of these
+"inspired" characters may be admitted, but honesty
+or singlemindedness is no guarantee of accuracy. We
+do not need to ask whether the peasant girl of Lourdes
+experienced a vision of the Madonna, but we do need
+to ask whether there was anything in her mental history,
+social surroundings, or nervous state that would
+account for the vision. All the "facts" of the religious
+life may be admitted; the sole question at issue is
+whether an adequate interpretation of at least some
+of them may not be found in terms of a purely scientific
+psychology.</p>
+
+<p>Taking, then, the religious idea as already existing,
+the following pages will be devoted to an examination
+of the extent to which this idea has been associated
+with forces and conditions that were plainly pathological.
+In very many individual cases it will not be
+difficult to trace a vivid sense of the supernatural to
+the presence of abnormal nervous states, sometimes
+deliberately induced, at other times arising of themselves.
+And it is a matter of mere historical observation
+that such individual cases have operated most
+powerfully to strengthen the belief in the supernatural
+with others. The example of Lourdes is a case in
+point. All Protestants will agree that the peasant
+girl's vision was a sheer hallucination. And yet there
+can be no question that this vision has served to strengthen
+the faith of many thousands of others in the nearness
+of the supernatural. And it needs but little effort
+of the imagination to realise how powerful such examples
+must have been in ages when medical science was<!-- Page 9 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_9" id="Page_9">[9]</a></span>
+in its infancy, and the more subtle operations of the
+nervous system completely unknown.</p>
+
+<p>This question, I repeat, is distinct from the much
+larger and wider enquiry of the origin of religion. A
+fairly lengthy experience of the capacity of the general
+mind for missing the real point at issue prevents my
+being too sanguine as to the efficiency of the most explicit
+avowal of one's purpose, but the duty of taking
+precautions nevertheless remains. And in elaborating
+an unfamiliar view of the nature of much of the
+world's so-called religious phenomena, the possibility
+of misconception is multiplied enormously. Still, a
+writer must do what he can to guard against misunderstanding,
+and in the most emphatic manner it must
+be said that it is not my purpose to prove, nor is it my
+belief, that religion springs from perverted sexuality,
+nor that the study of religion is no more than an
+exercise in pathology. Nothing is further from the
+writer's mind than so essentially preposterous a claim.
+Neither sexuality, no matter how powerful, nor disease,
+no matter how pronounced, can account for the
+religious idea. That has an entirely separate and independent
+origin. This should be plain to anyone
+who has but a merely casual acquaintance with the
+history of religion. It is, however, a very different
+thing to enquire as to the part played in the history
+of religion by morbid nervous states or perverted sexual
+feeling. That is an enquiry both legitimate and
+desirable; and it is one that promises to shed light on
+aspects of the subject otherwise very obscure. And
+certainly, if so-called religious feelings do not admit of
+explanation in terms of a scientific psychology, nothing
+remains but to recognise religion as something<!-- Page 10 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_10" id="Page_10">[10]</a></span>
+quite apart from normal life, to hand it over to the
+custody of word-spinning "Mystics," and so surrender
+all possibility of a rational understanding of either
+its nature or its history.</p>
+
+<p>In saying what I have concerning the probability
+of misconception, I have had specially in mind the
+attack made by the late Professor William James on
+what he called the "medical materialists." In that
+remarkable piece of religious yellow-journalism, <cite>The
+Varieties of Religious Experience</cite>, Professor James
+says of those who take up the position that a great
+deal of what has been accepted by the world as religious
+inspiration or exaltation can be accounted for
+as the products of disordered nervous states or perverted
+sexual feeling, "We are surely all familiar in a
+general way with this method of discrediting states
+of mind for which we have an antipathy. We all use
+it in some degree in criticising persons whose states
+of mind we regard as overstrained. But when other
+people criticise our own exalted soul-flights by calling
+them 'nothing but' expressions of our organic
+disposition, we feel outraged and hurt, for we know
+that, whatever be our organism's peculiarities, our mental
+states have their substantive value as revelations
+of the living truth; and we wish that all this medical
+materialism could be made to hold its tongue."
+Again, "Few conceptions are less instructive than this
+re-interpretation of religion as perverted sexuality....
+It is true that in the vast collection of religious phenomena,
+some are undisguisedly amatory&mdash;<i>e.g.</i> sex
+deities and obscene rites in polytheism, and ecstatic
+feelings of union with the Saviour in a few Christian
+Mystics. But then why not equally call religion an<!-- Page 11 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_11" id="Page_11">[11]</a></span>
+aberration of the digestive functions, and prove one's
+point by the worship of Bacchus and Ceres, or by the
+ecstatic feelings of some other saints about the Eucharist?"
+Or, seeing that the Bible is full of the language
+of respiratory oppression, "one might almost
+as well interpret religion as a perversion of the respiratory
+function." And if it is pointed out that
+active interest in religion synchronises with adolescence,
+"the retort again is easy.... The interest in
+mechanics, physics, chemistry, logic, philosophy, and
+sociology, which springs up during adolescent years
+along with that in poetry and religion, is also a perversion
+of the sexual instinct."<a name="FNanchor_1_1" id="FNanchor_1_1"></a><a href="#Footnote_1_1" class="fnanchor">[1]</a></p>
+
+<p>Excellent fooling, this, but little else. I do not
+know that anyone has ever claimed that religion took
+its origin in sexual feeling, or that this would alone
+provide an explanation of historical religion. All
+that anyone has ever urged is that a deal of so-called
+religious feeling, past and present, can be shown to
+be due to unsatisfied or perverted sexual feeling&mdash;which
+is a very different statement, and one of
+which the truth may be demonstrated from Professor
+James's own pages. But between saying that certain
+feelings are wrongly interpreted in terms of an already
+existing idea, and saying that the idea itself is
+nothing but these same feelings transformed, there is
+an obvious and important difference. In every case
+the religious idea is taken for granted. Its origin is
+a quite different subject of enquiry. But once the idea
+is in existence there is always the probability of evidence
+for its truth being found in the wrong direction.
+The analogy of the digestive and respiratory organs<!-- Page 12 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_12" id="Page_12">[12]</a></span>
+is clever, but futile. The belief that much which has
+passed for religious feeling is perverted sexuality is
+not based merely upon the language employed. The
+language is only symptomatic. The terminology of
+respiration and digestion when used in connection
+with religion is frankly and palpably symbolic. That
+of sexual love is as often frankly literal, and can be
+correlated with the actual state of the person using it.
+Digestion and respiration must go on in any case;
+but it is precisely the point at issue whether with a
+different sexual life these so-called religious ecstatic
+states would have been experienced. When we find
+religious characters of strongly marked amorous dispositions,
+but leading an ascetic life, using toward
+the object of their adoration terms usually associated
+with strong sexual feeling, it does not seem extravagant
+to find here a little more than what may be covered
+by mere symbolism. Would the medieval monk
+have been tempted by Satan in the form of beautiful
+women had he been happily married? Would
+Santa Teresa or Catherine of Sienna have used the
+language they did use to express their relations to
+Jesus had they been wives and mothers? Such questions
+admit of one answer, which is, in its way, decisive.
+Professor James admits that modern psychology
+holds as a general postulate "there is not a single one
+of our states of mind, high or low, healthy or morbid,
+that has not some organic process as its condition."<a name="FNanchor_2_2" id="FNanchor_2_2"></a><a href="#Footnote_2_2" class="fnanchor">[2]</a>
+The 'medical materialist' can ask for no more
+than this. But this being granted, on what ground
+are we to be forbidden finding in these same organic
+processes the condition of the visions and ecstatic<!-- Page 13 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_13" id="Page_13">[13]</a></span>
+states with which <cite>The Varieties of Religious Experience</cite>
+is so largely concerned?</p>
+
+<p>Again, it may be granted that adolescence brings
+with it an awakening of the whole mental life, not of
+religion alone. But the analogy goes no further, and,
+in any case, it begs the question. The full significance
+of the connection will be seen when we come to deal
+with initiation in primitive times and conversion in
+the modern period. At present it suffices to point out
+that the interest in art, in science, in literature, in
+sociology, are ends in themselves, and one need go no
+further than the developing mental life for an explanation.
+But the essential question here is whether this
+growing life can or cannot find complete satisfaction
+quite apart from religion. A developing interest in
+the larger social life is common to all, and to some
+extent this is secured by the pressure of forces that are
+simply inescapable. On the other hand, an interest
+in religion only exists with some, and then it may
+usually be traced to a conscious direction of their energies.
+Moreover, those who show no special interest
+in religion evince no lack of anything&mdash;save in religious
+terms. In every respect they exhibit the same
+mental and emotional qualities as their fellows. The
+only discernible difference is that while in the one case
+adolescent nature is expressed in terms of religion, in
+the other case it is expressed in terms of a larger social
+life.</p>
+
+<p>The question here might be put thus: Given a
+generation not taught to express its growing life in
+terms of religion, could adequate and satisfactory
+expression be found in the social life to which adolescence
+is unquestionably an introduction? Many<!-- Page 14 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_14" id="Page_14">[14]</a></span>
+would answer unhesitatingly, yes. They would argue
+that what are called the religious feelings, are normal
+social feelings exploited in the interests of the religious
+idea. They would deny that there is any such thing
+as a religious quality of mind. Any mental quality
+may be directed to a religious end, but all may find
+complete expression and satisfaction in a non-religious
+social life. This is the real question at issue, and
+yet Professor James never once, in the whole of his
+500 pages, addresses himself to it.</p>
+
+<p>Apart from sex, there is the important question of
+the relation between abnormal and morbid nervous
+states and religious illumination. How far has the one
+been mistaken for the other? To what extent have
+people accepted the outcome of pathological conditions
+as proofs of intercourse with an unseen spiritual
+world? There is no doubt that among uncivilised
+people this is usually, if not invariably, the case. And
+our knowledge of the relations between the nervous
+system and mental states&mdash;imperfect as it still is&mdash;is
+so recent, that it is not surprising that fasting, self-torture,
+solitary meditation, etc., because of the states
+of mind to which they give rise, have been universally
+valued as aids to the religious life. Dr. D. G. Brinton
+says:&mdash;</p>
+
+<p>"When I say that all religions depend for their origin
+and continuation directly upon inspiration, I state
+an historic fact. It may be known under other names,
+of credit or discredit, as mysticism, ecstasy, rhapsody,
+demoniac possession, the divine afflatus, the gnosis,
+or, in its latest christening, 'cosmic consciousness.'
+All are but expressions of a belief that knowledge
+arises, words are uttered or actions performed not<!-- Page 15 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_15" id="Page_15">[15]</a></span>
+through conscious ideation or reflective purpose, but
+through the promptings of a power above or beyond
+the individual mind."<a name="FNanchor_3_3" id="FNanchor_3_3"></a><a href="#Footnote_3_3" class="fnanchor">[3]</a></p>
+
+<p>The connection between very many, at least, of
+these inspirational moods and pathological states is
+too obvious to be ignored. Professor James admits
+that "we cannot possibly ignore these pathological
+aspects of the subject." His notice of them, however,
+reminds one of the preacher who advised his hearers
+to look a certain difficulty boldly in the face&mdash;and pass
+on. No serious attempt is made to deal with them.
+A huge mass of "religious experiences" is thrown at
+the reader's head without any adequate explanation.
+It is a glorified revival meeting in an expensive volume.
+The testimony of a crowd of religious enthusiasts of
+all ages is accepted at practically face value. Thus, a
+religious writer who experiences the fairly common
+feeling of exaltation during a storm at sea, and explains
+his carelessness of danger as resulting from his
+"certainty of eternal life,"<a name="FNanchor_4_4" id="FNanchor_4_4"></a><a href="#Footnote_4_4" class="fnanchor">[4]</a> is gravely cited as evidence
+of the working of the religious consciousness. What,
+then, are we to make of those who experience a similar
+feeling, but who are without the certainty of eternal
+life? The declaration of St. Ignatius that a single
+hour of meditation taught him more of the truth of
+"heavenly things than all the teachings of the doctors"
+is given as evidence of mystic illumination.<a name="FNanchor_5_5" id="FNanchor_5_5"></a><a href="#Footnote_5_5" class="fnanchor">[5]</a> So with
+numerous other cases. We are even informed that
+"nitrous oxide and ether, especially nitrous oxide,
+when sufficiently diluted with air, stimulate the mystical
+consciousness in an extraordinary degree."<a name="FNanchor_6_6" id="FNanchor_6_6"></a><a href="#Footnote_6_6" class="fnanchor">[6]</a>
+<!-- Page 16 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_16" id="Page_16">[16]</a></span>
+There seems no reason why the same claim should
+not be made on behalf of whisky. If one were not
+assured to the contrary, one might conclude that Professor
+James wrote this volume to poke fun at the
+whole tribe of mystics and their followers.</p>
+
+<p>The use made by Professor James of his long list of
+cases is the more remarkable, since he quite correctly
+points out that there are no religious feelings, only
+feelings directed towards a religious end. But if this
+be so, how are we justified in taking the accounts of
+religious visionaries as correct descriptions of the nature
+of their own mental states? Clearly, we need a
+study of these cases quite apart from the mystical interpretation
+of them. Instead of a study Professor
+James presents us with a catalogue&mdash;useful from a
+documentary point of view, but useless to any other
+end. And he is so averse to subjecting his examples to
+analysis that, when the extravagance of certain cases
+are glaring, he warns us that it is unfair to impute narrowness
+of mind as a vice of the individual, because
+in "religious and theological matters he probably absorbs
+his narrowness from his generation."<a name="FNanchor_7_7" id="FNanchor_7_7"></a><a href="#Footnote_7_7" class="fnanchor">[7]</a> Granted;
+only one would like to know what reason there is for
+not deriving virtues as well as vices from the same
+source? And, deeper enquiry still, may not the religious
+interpretation itself be a product of the special
+environment of the period?</p>
+
+<p>The study of religious phenomena from the point
+of view above indicated is of first-rate importance.
+But although much has been said, parenthetically and
+inferentially, on the subject by various writers, the
+enquiry has never been exhaustively or systematically<!-- Page 17 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_17" id="Page_17">[17]</a></span>
+pursued. This is not due to any lack of material;
+that is abundant among both savage and civilised
+peoples. Perhaps it is because, while it has been considered
+permissible to point out that certain individuals
+have mistaken their own morbid states for
+evidence of divine illumination, too much ill-will would
+have been aroused had the powerful part played by
+this factor in religious development as a whole been
+pointed out. Still less admissible would it have been
+to point out, as will be done in succeeding chapters,
+that the deliberate culture of abnormal states of mind
+has been a part of the ritual of religions from the most
+primitive to the most recent times. In this connection
+it is worth noting that a very clear and shrewd essay on
+the connection between love and religious devotion
+by Isaac d'Israeli, which appeared in the first issue
+of the <cite>Miscellanies of Literature</cite>, was quietly eliminated
+from subsequent editions.</p>
+
+<p>My purpose, therefore, is to give Professor James's
+query&mdash;"Under just what biographic conditions did
+the sacred writers bring forth their contributions to
+the holy volume? and what had they exactly in their
+several individual minds, when they delivered their utterances?"<a name="FNanchor_8_8" id="FNanchor_8_8"></a><a href="#Footnote_8_8" class="fnanchor">[8]</a>&mdash;a
+wider scope. What are the conditions,
+biographic and social, under which certain persons
+have imagined themselves, and have been believed by
+others, to be specially favoured with divine illumination?
+The majority of people, it may safely be said, are
+conscious of no such experience. In what respect, then,
+do the favoured few differ from their fellows? Must
+we assume that by some rare quality of natural endowment,
+or by some unusual development of faculty,<!-- Page 18 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_18" id="Page_18">[18]</a></span>
+they are brought into touch with a wider and deeper
+reality? Or are we to seek a less romantic explanation
+with the aid of known tendencies and forces in human
+nature? And, further, as this minority are not conscious
+of divine illumination all the time, what is it
+that differentiates their normal state from their abnormal
+condition?</p>
+
+<p>These are pertinent questions, and demand answer.
+But no answer of real value will be found in ordinary
+religious writings. Rhapsodical eulogies of religion
+tell us nothing; less than nothing that is useful, since
+theories that obtain in such quarters are based upon
+the absolute veracity of the phenomena under consideration.
+We may gather from this direction what
+religious people say or do, but not why they say or do
+these things. A description of the states of mind of
+religious people, such as is given by Professor James,
+is interesting enough, but it is their causation that is
+of fundamental importance. And their causation is
+only to be understood by associating them with other
+and more fundamental processes. Within recent years
+psychology owes much of the advance made to a
+closer study of the physiology of the nervous system,
+and if genuine advance is to be made in our understanding
+of religious phenomena we must adopt the
+same plan of investigation. We do not, for example,
+understand the nature of demoniacal possession by a
+mere collation of cases. It is only when we put them
+side by side with similar cases that now come under
+the control of the physician, and associate them with
+certain peculiar nervous conditions, and a particular
+social environment, that we find ourselves within sight
+of a rational explanation. Without adopting this plan<!-- Page 19 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_19" id="Page_19">[19]</a></span>
+we are in the position of one trying to determine the
+nature of a locomotive in complete ignorance of its
+internal mechanism. Yet this is precisely the position
+of the professional exponent of religion. As a student
+the budding divine has his head filled with historic
+creeds, and texts, and dogmas, and doctrines, none
+of which can possibly tell him anything of the real
+nature of religion. On the contrary, they act as so
+many obstacles to his acquiring real knowledge in
+later life. And it is a striking fact that while the professional
+astronomer, biologist, or physicist each adds
+to our knowledge of the subject that falls within his
+respective department, we owe little or nothing of
+our knowledge of the nature of religion to the professional
+theologian.</p>
+
+<p>To put the whole matter in a sentence, the study of
+religion must be affiliated to the study of life as a
+whole. If possible, we must get at the determining
+factors that lead one person to expend his energy on
+religion and see supernatural influence in a thousand
+and one details of his life, while another person, with
+apparently the same mental qualities, finds complete
+satisfaction in another direction, and is conscious of
+no such supernatural influence. It is scientifically inadmissible
+to posit a "religious faculty" organically
+ear-marked for religious use. Something of this kind
+is evidently in the minds of those who explain Darwin's
+agnosticism as due to atrophy of his religious
+sense, consequent on over-absorption in scientific pursuits,
+and who also argue that the "religious faculty,"
+like a physiological structure, increases in efficiency
+with use and atrophies with disuse. There is no reason
+for believing that, had Darwin been profoundly religious,<!-- Page 20 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_20" id="Page_20">[20]</a></span>
+his mental qualities would have been different
+to what they were. They would have been expressed
+in a different form, that is all. As I have already said,
+there are no such things as specifically religious qualities
+of the mind. There may be hope or fear or love
+or hatred or terror or devotion or wonder in relation
+to religion, but they are precisely the same mental
+qualities that meet us in relation to other things. The
+old "faculty" psychology is dead, and the religious
+faculty must go with it.<a name="FNanchor_9_9" id="FNanchor_9_9"></a><a href="#Footnote_9_9" class="fnanchor">[9]</a> Mental qualities may be
+roused to activity in connection with a belief in the
+supernatural, or they may be expressed in connection
+with mundane associations. Even the belief in the
+supernatural is only an expression of the same qualities
+of mind that with fuller knowledge result in a
+scientific generalisation. Whatever be the exciting
+cause, mental qualities themselves remain unchanged.</p>
+
+<p>In the present enquiry we are not concerned with a
+disproval of the religious idea, but with an examination
+of the conditions of its expression; less with the
+varieties of religious experience than with the nature
+of its manifestations. How far may religious experience
+be explained as a misinterpretation of normal
+non-religious life? To what extent have pathological<!-- Page 21 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_21" id="Page_21">[21]</a></span>
+nervous states influenced the building up of the religious
+consciousness? There can be no question that the
+last-named factor is an important one. This is admitted
+by Professor James in the following passage:&mdash;</p>
+
+<p>"You will in point of fact hardly find a religious
+leader of any kind in whose life there is no record of
+automatisms. I speak not merely of savage priests
+and prophets, whose followers regard automatic utterance
+and action as by itself tantamount to inspiration,
+I speak of leaders of thought and subjects of intellectualised
+experience. St. Paul had his visions, his
+ecstasies, his gifts of tongues, small as was the importance
+he attached to the latter. The whole array
+of Christian saints and heresiarchs, including the
+greatest, the Bernards, the Loyolas, the Luthers, the
+Foxes, the Wesleys, had their visions, voices, rapt
+conditions, guiding impressions, and 'openings.' They
+had these things because they had exalted sensibility,
+and to such things persons of exalted sensibility are
+liable."<a name="FNanchor_10_10" id="FNanchor_10_10"></a><a href="#Footnote_10_10" class="fnanchor">[10]</a></p>
+
+<p>The fact is unquestionable, but the question remains,
+In what sense were these people exalted? Did
+their exalted sensibility really bring them into touch
+with a form of existence hidden from persons of a
+coarser fibre? Or did it belong to a class of cases which
+in a more violent form comes within the province of
+the physician? The subjects, says Professor James,
+"actually feel themselves played upon by powers beyond
+their will. The evidence is dynamic; the god or
+spirit moves the very organs of their body.... We
+have distinct professions of being under the direction
+of a foreign power, and serving as its mouthpiece."<!-- Page 22 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_22" id="Page_22">[22]</a></span>
+Of course we have, but for diagnostic purposes such
+professions are quite valueless. What these people
+are conscious of, and all they are conscious of, is a
+series of feelings of a more or less unusual kind.
+Equally convinced was the medieval demoniac that
+a spirit moved the very organs of his body. Equally
+convinced is the modern spiritualist medium that his
+body is controlled by a disembodied spirit. It is not
+a question of the actuality of certain states, but of
+their origin. The intense conviction of the subject of
+the seizure is, as evidence, quite irrelevant. The subjective
+state is always real, whether it belongs to a
+saint in ecstasy or a drunkard in delirium tremens.
+There are no states of mind more "real" while they
+last than those due to opium or hashish. But it is
+never suggested that this is evidence of their veracity.
+In such cases the testimony of a skilled outsider is of
+far greater value than the conviction of the visionary.
+We are bound to appeal to Paul, and Loyola, and
+Fox, and Wesley to know what their feelings were,
+because here they are the supreme authorities. But
+we must consult others to discover why they experienced
+these feelings. An illusion is no more than a
+false interpretation of a real subjective experience;
+although many are inclined to treat the rejection of
+the interpretation as equivalent to a charge of imposture
+or deliberate lying.</p>
+
+<p>It is also a matter of demonstration that these religious
+experiences are strictly determined by environmental
+conditions. Thousands of Christians have
+been favoured with visions of Jesus or of the Christian
+heaven in their dying moments. Millions of Jews and
+Mohammedans have lived and died without any such<!-- Page 23 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_23" id="Page_23">[23]</a></span>
+experience&mdash;the very persons to whom, from an evidential
+point of view&mdash;such visions would be most useful.
+The spiritual experience is determined by the pre-existing
+religious belief. When belief in a personal devil
+was general, visions of Satan were common. The evidence
+for personal conflicts with Satan is of precisely the
+same nature and strength as is the evidence for intercourse
+with deity. When the belief in Satan died out,
+visions and conflicts with him ceased. How can we
+discriminate between the two classes of cases? Why
+should the testimony of a great Christian character
+that he is conscious of intercourse with deity be more
+authoritative than the testimony of, perhaps, the same
+person on other occasions, of conflict with a personal
+devil? Moreover, visions and a sense of contact with
+a super-normal world are not peculiar to the religious
+character. It is a common feature of a general psychopathic
+condition. Medical works are filled with
+such instances. And it is only to be expected that
+when the psychopath is of a deeply religious nature
+the affection will find a religious expression. What is
+clearly needed is an explanation that will cover the
+phenomenon as it appears in both a religious and a
+non-religious form.</p>
+
+<p>We may take as illustrative of what has been said
+the following case as given by Dr. W. W. Ireland. It
+is that of a Berlin bookseller who placed on record a
+clear description of his impressions while in ill-health,
+and which entirely ceased on recovery. His delusions
+mostly took the form of human figures; of these he
+says:&mdash;</p>
+
+<p>"I saw, in the full use of my senses, and (after I had
+got the better of the fright which at first seized me,<!-- Page 24 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_24" id="Page_24">[24]</a></span>
+and the disagreeable effects which it caused) even
+in the greatest composure of mind, for almost two
+months, constantly and involuntarily, a number of
+human and other apparitions&mdash;nay, I even heard
+their voices. For the most part I saw human figures
+of both sexes; they commonly passed to and fro, as
+if they had no connection with each other, like people
+at a fair where all is bustle. Sometimes they appeared
+to have business with one another. Once or twice I
+saw amongst them persons on horseback, and dogs
+and birds; these figures all appeared to me in their
+natural size, as distinctly as if they had existed in real
+life, with the several tints on the uncovered parts of
+the body, and with all the different kinds and colours
+of clothes."<a name="FNanchor_11_11" id="FNanchor_11_11"></a><a href="#Footnote_11_11" class="fnanchor">[11]</a></p>
+
+<p>Here we have the case of a man who was under no
+misconception as to the nature of his visions. But it is
+safe to say that had he been of a less practical and analytic
+turn of mind, had he been, moreover, deeply
+interested in religious matters, we might have had an
+altogether different presentation of the facts.</p>
+
+<p>In the next instance, also given by Dr. Ireland, we
+have a religious explanation given of somewhat similar
+experiences:&mdash;</p>
+
+<p>"A poor woman complained to me that she was continually
+persecuted by the devils who let loose at her
+all sorts of blasphemies, and, indeed, all the worse the
+more she exerted herself not to attend to them; but
+often, also, when she was talking and active. She had
+already been to a clergyman who should exorcise the
+devil, and who had judiciously directed her to me. I
+asked in which ear the devil always talked to her. She<!-- Page 25 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_25" id="Page_25">[25]</a></span>
+was surprised at the question, which she had never
+started for herself, but now recognised that it always
+occurred in the left ear. I explained to her that it was
+an affection of the ear which now and then occurs, but
+she was doubtful."<a name="FNanchor_12_12" id="FNanchor_12_12"></a><a href="#Footnote_12_12" class="fnanchor">[12]</a></p>
+
+<p>Here we have a distinctly physical affection ascribed
+to supernatural agency. In this case the inference
+is promptly corrected by the physician. But given
+a different environment, an atmosphere permeated
+with a belief in the supernatural, an absence of adequate
+scientific advice, and the more primitive explanation
+is certain to prevail. In the next instance&mdash;that
+of Martin Luther&mdash;we have just this conjuncture
+of circumstances, with the inevitable result. Writing
+of his experience in 1530, Luther says:&mdash;</p>
+
+<p>"When I was in Coburg in 1530, I was tormented
+with a noise in my ear, just as though there was some
+wind tearing through my head. The devil had something
+to do with it.... When I try to work, my head
+becomes filled with all sorts of whizzing, buzzing,
+thundering noises, and if I did not leave off on the instant
+I should faint away. For the last two or three
+days I have not been able to even look at a letter.
+My head has lessened down to a very short chapter;
+soon it will be only a paragraph, then only a syllable,
+then nothing at all. The day your letter came from
+Nuremberg I had another visit from the devil....
+This time the evil one got the better of me, drove me
+out of my bed, and compelled me to seek the face of
+man."<a name="FNanchor_13_13" id="FNanchor_13_13"></a><a href="#Footnote_13_13" class="fnanchor">[13]</a></p>
+
+<p>There is no need to quote more of this class of cases,<!-- Page 26 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_26" id="Page_26">[26]</a></span>
+at least for the present. Their name is legion. One
+could, in fact, construct an ascending series of cases,
+all agreeing in their symptom, and differing only in
+the explanation offered. The series would commence
+with the explanation of a possessing spirit, and end
+with that of a deranged nervous system. Ignorant of
+the nature, or even of the existence, of a nervous system,
+primitive man explains abnormal mental states
+as due to a malignant spirit. Martin Luther, George
+Fox, or John Bunyan, living at a time when the activity
+of evil spirits was a firmly held doctrine, attribute
+their infirmities to satanic influence. We are in
+the true line of descent. To-day we have with us every
+one of the phenomena on which the satanic theory
+rested, but they are described, and prescribed for, in
+medical works instead of manuals of exorcism. The
+supernaturalist theory gives way to that of the expert
+neurologist. The exorcist is replaced by the physician.
+Instead of expelling an intruding demon, we have to
+repair a deranged system. We cannot argue that
+while these affections remain constant in character
+their causes may have been different in other ages
+from what they are now. That is pure absurdity. To
+claim that the religious mystic is in moments of exaltation
+brought into contact with a "deeper reality"
+is to invite the retort that one might make a similar
+claim on behalf of the inmates of a lunatic asylum.
+We cannot, with any pretence to rationality, accept
+the verdicts of both the neurologist and the exorcist. If
+we agree that certain states of mind to-day have their
+origin in neural disorder, on what ground can we believe
+that similar mental states occurring a thousand
+or two thousand years ago were due to supernatural<!-- Page 27 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_27" id="Page_27">[27]</a></span>
+stimulation? We may be told that there are more
+things in heaven and earth than are dreamed of in our
+philosophy. This may be true, and while it is an observation
+that would not occur to a fool, it needs no
+supreme wisdom for its excogitation, and as generally
+used it is an excuse for idle speculation and grotesque
+theory. Far more useful is the lesson, sadly needed,
+that there are few things in heaven or earth that will
+not yield their secret to a method of investigation that
+is sanely conceived and diligently employed.</p>
+
+<p>The utter uselessness of accepting at its face value
+anyone's explanation of the nature of his subjective
+experience, is well shown by the once universal belief
+in witchcraft. If there is a single belief on behalf of
+which a mass of apparently unimpeachable evidence
+could be produced, it is this one. It has run its course
+throughout the whole world. It is still accepted by
+probably half the human race. In our own country
+eminent men, not alone theologians, but doctors, lawyers,
+statesmen, and men of letters, have given their
+solemn testimony in its favour. Thousands of people
+have been bewitched, and their symptoms described
+by thousands of others. More remarkable still, those
+accused have often enough confessed their guilt. Every
+possible corroboration has been given to this belief,
+and yet it is now scouted by educated persons all
+over the civilised world. Even religious teachers accept
+the explanation that these witchcraft cases were
+due to distinctly pathological conditions, and to the
+power of suggestion operating upon uninformed minds
+during an unenlightened age. But communications
+with spiritual beings rest on no better foundation
+than communication with Satan. Whether the alleged<!-- Page 28 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_28" id="Page_28">[28]</a></span>
+illumination be diabolic or angelic, the evidence
+for either, or both, is the same. The testimony of a man
+like the Rev. R. J. Campbell that he is conscious of a
+divine influence in his life is of no greater value than
+that of the medieval peasant who felt himself tormented
+by Satan. The one person is no better authority
+than is the other on such a topic. Both are the
+heirs of the ages, inheritors of a superstition that goes
+back to the most primitive ages of mankind, only
+modified in its expression by the culture of contemporary
+life.</p>
+
+<p>There is nothing new under the sun, and human
+nature remains substantially unchanged generation
+after generation. All the phenomena on which the
+belief in witchcraft was based, remain. Cases of delusion
+are common, and the power of suggestion is an
+established fact in psychology. All that has happened
+is this: taking the facts on which the belief was
+based, modern science has shown them to be explainable
+without the slightest reference to the supernatural.
+And this is the principle that must be applied
+in other directions. Old occurrences must be explained
+in the light of new knowledge. This is the accepted
+rule in other directions, and it is of peculiar value in
+relation to religious beliefs. To know what religious
+people have thought and felt and said gives us no
+more than the data for a scientific study of the subject.
+To know <em>why</em> they thought and felt and spoke thus
+is what we really need to understand. But if we are to
+do this we must relate phases of mind that are called
+religious to other phases of a non-religious character.
+I believe it is quite possible to do this. From medical
+records and from numerous biographies it is possible<!-- Page 29 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_29" id="Page_29">[29]</a></span>
+to parallel all the experiences of the religious mystic.
+We can see the same sense of exaltation, the same
+conviction of illumination, the same belief that one is
+the tool of a superior power. Take, as merely illustrative
+of this, the case of J. Addington Symonds, as
+narrated by Professor James, who cites it as an example
+of a "mystical experience with chloroform."
+Symonds tells us that until he was twenty-eight years
+of age he was liable to extreme states of exaltation
+concerning the nature of self. (It is worth while pointing
+out that Sir James Crichton-Browne expresses
+the opinion that Symonds's higher nerve centres were
+in some degree enfeebled by these abnormal states.)
+In addition to this confession he placed on record an
+interesting experience while under the influence of
+chloroform. He says:&mdash;</p>
+
+<p>"After the choking and stifling had passed away, I
+seemed at first in a state of utter blankness; then came
+flashes of intense light, alternating with blankness,
+and with a keen sense of vision of what was going on
+in the room around me, but no sensation of touch. I
+thought that I was near death; when suddenly my
+soul became aware of God who was manifestly dealing
+with me, handling me, so to speak, in an intense
+personal reality. I felt him streaming in like light
+upon me.... I cannot describe the ecstasy I felt. Then,
+as I gradually awoke from the influence of the anæsthetic,
+the old sense of my relation with the world
+began to return, the new sense of my relation to God
+began to fade.... Only think of it. To have felt for
+that long dateless ecstasy of vision the very God, in
+all purity, tenderness, and truth, and absolute love,
+and then to find that I had after all had no revelation,<!-- Page 30 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_30" id="Page_30">[30]</a></span>
+but that I had been tricked by the abnormal excitement
+of my brain."</p>
+
+<p>With a slight variation of expression this confession
+might have come direct from the lips of the most
+pronounced mystic. There is no question of the intense
+reality of the experience. That was as vivid as
+anything that ever occurred to any saint in the calendar.
+Still, no one will dream of claiming that the
+way to get <i>en rapport</i> with the higher mysteries is by
+way of a dose of chloroform. The distinction here is
+that Symonds knew and described the cause of his
+experience. And no one will question that the phrase
+"tricked by the abnormal excitement of my brain"
+covers the ground. Of course, there is always the easy
+retort that saints and mystics did not use chloroform
+to produce their visions. True, but chloroform is not
+the only agent by means of which a person may be
+thrown into an abnormal state. Other means may be
+used; and as a matter of fact, the use of herbs and
+drugs, as methods of producing ecstatic states, have
+obtained in religious ceremonies from the most primitive
+times. As we shall see later, tobacco, hashish,
+coca, laurel water, and similar agents have been
+largely utilised for this purpose. And when this plan
+is not adopted&mdash;although very often the two things
+run side by side&mdash;we find fasting and other forms of
+self-torture practised because of the abnormal conditions
+produced.</p>
+
+<p>It is not argued or implied that in all this there was
+of necessity deliberate imposture. That would imply
+the possession of greater knowledge than actually
+existed. But it was known that ecstatic states followed
+the use of certain drugs, or were consequent on<!-- Page 31 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_31" id="Page_31">[31]</a></span>
+certain austerities, and they were valued because they
+were believed to bring people into communion with a
+hidden spiritual world. In this way there has always
+been going on a more or less deliberate culture of the
+supernatural, in more primitive times by crude and
+easily recognisable means, later by methods that are
+more subtle in character and more difficult of detection.
+But the method of inducing a sense of "spiritual"
+illumination by means of practices alien to the
+normal life of man remains unchanged throughout.
+The collation of the conditions under which mystical
+states of mind are experienced among savages with
+similar experiences among the higher races, proves
+at once that this statement contains no exaggeration
+of the facts.</p>
+
+<p>The continuity of the phenomena is, indeed, of profound
+significance, and is too often ignored. It is often
+asserted that we have to explain the lower by the
+higher, and we can only understand the significance of
+religion in its lower forms by bearing in mind the higher
+manifestations. This is sheer fallacy. In nature the
+higher develops out of the lower, of which it is compounded.
+In biology, for example, it is now generally
+conceded that the secret of animal life lies in the cell.
+This may be modified in all kinds of directions, the resulting
+organic structure may be of the utmost complexity,
+but the basis remains unchanged. So, too, with
+a great deal of so-called religious phenomena. The
+story is not only continuous, but the same elements
+remain unchanged with only those modifications initiated
+by a changed environment. And just as we
+are driven back to the cell to explain organic structure,
+so for an understanding of the phenomena under consideration<!-- Page 32 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_32" id="Page_32">[32]</a></span>
+we must study their primitive elements.
+Analysis must precede synthesis here as elsewhere.</p>
+
+<p>A survey of the subject is not at all exhausted by
+a study of abnormal conditions, so far as these have entered
+into the life of religion. There still remains the
+study of perfectly normal frames of mind that are misinterpreted
+and diverted into religious channels. The
+importance of this will be seen more clearly when we
+come to deal with the subject of conversion. That
+"conversion" is a phenomenon of adolescence is now
+settled beyond all reasonable doubt. Statistics are
+conclusive on this point. But the advocate of revivalism
+quite misses the true significance of the fact. Current
+religious literature is full of quite meaningless
+chatter concerning the change of view, the larger and
+more unselfish activities, that arise as a consequence
+of conversion. There is really no evidence that the
+changes indicated have any connection with conversion.
+All that does happen can be more simply and
+more adequately explained as resulting from physiological
+and psychological changes in terms of racial and
+social evolution. The whole significance of adolescence
+lies in the bursting into activity of feelings hitherto
+dormant, and the quickening of a desire for communion
+with a larger social life. The individual becomes less
+self-centred, more alive to, and more responsive to
+the claims of others; he displays tendencies towards
+what the world calls self-sacrifice, but which mean, in
+the truest sense, self-realisation. That these changes
+are often expressed in terms of religion is undeniable.
+This, however, may be no more than an environmental
+accident, quite as much so as was the case when epilepsy
+was explained in terms of possession.</p>
+
+<p><!-- Page 33 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_33" id="Page_33">[33]</a></span>
+So far as one can see, there are no feelings or impulses
+characteristic of adolescence that could not receive
+complete satisfaction in a rationally ordered social
+life. To-day it usually happens that the strongest
+expressed influences brought to bear upon the individual
+are of a religious kind, with the result that adolescent
+human nature is most apt to express itself in
+religious language. It must always be borne in mind
+that we are all as dependent upon our environment
+for the form in which our explanation of things is
+cast, as we are for the language in which we express
+those ideas. The whole enquiry opened is a very wide
+one, with which I can only deal parenthetically. It is
+really an enquiry as to how far the religious theory of
+human nature rests upon a wrong interpretation of
+perfectly normal feelings, or to what extent supernaturalistic
+ideas are perpetuated by the exploitation&mdash;innocent
+exploitation, maybe&mdash;of man's social nature.
+It is extremely probable that a deeper knowledge,
+a more accurate analysis of human qualities,
+will disclose the truth that man is a social animal in a
+much more profound sense than has usually attached
+to that phrase, and the expression of these qualities
+in terms of religious beliefs, or in terms of non-religious
+beliefs, is wholly determined by the knowledge
+current in the society in which he moves.</p>
+
+<p>I conclude this chapter with one more attempt to
+avoid misunderstanding. For purposes of clarity it
+will be necessary to consider various factors out of
+relation to other factors. But it should hardly need
+pointing out that in actual life such a separation does
+not obtain. The organism functions as a whole; each
+part acts upon and is acted upon by every other part.<!-- Page 34 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_34" id="Page_34">[34]</a></span>
+Life in action is a synthesis, and one resorts to analysis
+only for the purpose of more adequate comprehension.
+It is not, moreover, pretended that any
+one of the factors described in the following pages
+will explain religion, nor even that all of them combined
+will do so. The origin of the religious idea is a
+quite different enquiry, and is adequately dealt with
+in the writings of men like Tylor, Frazer, Spencer,
+and other representatives of the various schools of
+anthropologists. My present purpose is of a more
+restricted kind. It is that of tracing the operation of
+various processes, some normal, but most of them
+abnormal, that have in all ages been accepted as evidence
+for the supernatural. That the religious idea
+has been associated with these processes, and that for
+multitudes they have served as strong evidence of its
+truth, cannot be denied. And an examination of this
+aspect of the history of religion ought not to be ignored,
+however unpalatable such a study may be to
+certain supersensitive minds.</p>
+
+<div class="footnotes">
+<h3>Footnotes:<br />
+<span class="skip">[<a href="#Page_35">Skip</a>]</span>
+</h3>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_1_1" id="Footnote_1_1"></a><a href="#FNanchor_1_1"><span class="label">[1]</span></a> <cite>Varieties of Religious Experience</cite>, pp. 11-3.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_2_2" id="Footnote_2_2"></a><a href="#FNanchor_2_2"><span class="label">[2]</span></a> <cite>Varieties</cite>, p. 14.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_3_3" id="Footnote_3_3"></a><a href="#FNanchor_3_3"><span class="label">[3]</span></a> <cite>Religions of Primitive Peoples</cite>, p. 50.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_4_4" id="Footnote_4_4"></a><a href="#FNanchor_4_4"><span class="label">[4]</span></a> Page 288.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_5_5" id="Footnote_5_5"></a><a href="#FNanchor_5_5"><span class="label">[5]</span></a> Page 410.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_6_6" id="Footnote_6_6"></a><a href="#FNanchor_6_6"><span class="label">[6]</span></a> Page 387.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_7_7" id="Footnote_7_7"></a><a href="#FNanchor_7_7"><span class="label">[7]</span></a> Page 370.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_8_8" id="Footnote_8_8"></a><a href="#FNanchor_8_8"><span class="label">[8]</span></a> <cite>Varieties</cite>, p. 4.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_9_9" id="Footnote_9_9"></a><a href="#FNanchor_9_9"><span class="label">[9]</span></a> "The hypothesis of faculties ... must be regarded as productive
+of much error in psychology. It has led to the false
+supposition that mental activity, instead of being one and the
+same throughout its manifold phases, is a juxtaposition of totally
+distinct activities, answering to a bundle of detached powers,
+somehow standing side by side, and exerting no influence on one
+another. Sometimes this absolute separation of the parts of
+mind has gone so far as to personify the several faculties as
+though they were distinct entities."&mdash;Sully, <cite>Outlines of Psychology</cite>,
+p. 26.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_10_10" id="Footnote_10_10"></a><a href="#FNanchor_10_10"><span class="label">[10]</span></a> <cite>Varieties</cite>, p. 478.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_11_11" id="Footnote_11_11"></a><a href="#FNanchor_11_11"><span class="label">[11]</span></a> <cite>The Blot upon the Brain</cite>, p. 4.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_12_12" id="Footnote_12_12"></a><a href="#FNanchor_12_12"><span class="label">[12]</span></a> <cite>The Blot upon the Brain</cite>, p. 16.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_13_13" id="Footnote_13_13"></a><a href="#FNanchor_13_13"><span class="label">[13]</span></a> Cited by Dr. Ireland, p. 49.</p></div>
+</div>
+
+<p><!-- Page 35 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_35" id="Page_35">[35]</a></span></p>
+
+<h2>CHAPTER <span class="cgap">TWO</span><br />
+THE PRIMITIVE MIND &amp; ITS ENVIRONMENT</h2>
+
+<p>Ever since the time of Aristotle
+it has been an accepted truth that man is a social
+animal. Not only is individual human nature such
+that it craves for intercourse with its kind, but it can
+only be effectively understood in the light of those
+thousands of generations of associated life that lie behind
+us all. As an isolated object, considered, that is,
+apart from his fellows, man is more or less of a myth.
+At any rate, he would not be the man we know and so
+may well be left out of account. Man as we know him
+is essentially a member of a group; he is a part of a
+really organic structure inasmuch as the characteristics
+of each part are determined by its relations to
+the whole, and the characteristics of the whole determined
+by a synthesis of the qualities of the parts.</p>
+
+<p>But while there is agreement in the fact, there is
+a considerable divergence of opinion as to its nature.
+What is the nature of this fact of sociability? What is
+the character of the force that binds the members of a
+group so closely together? By some, the cause of
+sociability is found in the pressure exerted upon all
+by purely external forces. The need for protection, it
+is said, drives human beings together, and thus in
+course of time the feeling of sociability is developed.
+This seems much like mistaking a consequence for
+a cause. It certainly leaves unanswered the question
+<em>Why</em> should people have drawn together in the face of
+danger? Most certainly collective action strengthens
+the capacity for defence; and it also increases the certainty
+of obtaining the means of subsistence. Such
+consequences furnish a justification, so to speak, of
+group life, but they disclose neither its nature nor its<!-- Page 36 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_36" id="Page_36">[36]</a></span>
+cause. And most certainly they do not bring us into
+touch with the fundamental qualities of <em>human</em> society.
+The need for food, shelter, or protection will not differentiate
+the gregarious from the non-gregarious forms
+of life, nor the social from the merely gregarious. All
+forms of life require food, protection, and shelter; they
+are part of animal economics. There is nothing specifically
+human about them.</p>
+
+<p>We may reach what I conceive to be the truth in
+another way. Environment is to-day almost a cant
+word. It is very largely used, and, as one might expect,
+largely misunderstood. Without actually saying it in
+so many words, a vast number of people seem to conceive
+the environment as consisting of the purely
+material surroundings of man. This is to overlook a
+most important fact. Even in the lowest stages of
+human society, where man's power over natural forces
+is of the poorest kind, it is not an exact statement of
+the case, and it is profoundly untrue when we take
+society in its higher developments. If we take the
+lowest existing savage race we find that its attitude
+towards life, what it does, and what it refrains from doing,
+is the product of a certain mental attitude, which
+is itself the outcome of a number of inherited ideas and
+customs. A number of white people, placed in exactly
+the same material environment and faced with exactly
+the same external circumstances, bring a different
+psychological inheritance into play, and act in an entirely
+different manner. If we transport a Chinaman
+into England, or an Englishman into China, we find
+that both of them possess the same biological and
+material needs whether in their native country or elsewhere.
+Yet this community of needs does not make<!-- Page 37 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_37" id="Page_37">[37]</a></span>
+the Chinaman a member of English society, nor an
+Englishman a member of Chinese society. They are
+one in virtue of certain broad human characteristics;
+they are divided by certain qualities characteristic of
+their special groups. Each society is marked by the
+possession of certain psychological characteristics&mdash;a
+number of specific beliefs and emotional developments&mdash;without
+which its distinctive group character
+disappears. This is true of groups within the State; it
+is true of the State as a whole; it is true, on the most
+general scale of all, of the race.</p>
+
+<p>In other words, the distinguishing feature of human
+society is the possession of a psychological medium.
+The adaptations that the human being must make are
+mainly of a psychological character. Their <em>form</em> may
+be partly determined by external conditions, but this
+does not affect the general truth. Whether we take
+man in a civilised or in an uncivilised state we find the
+important thing about him to be his relations to his
+fellows. He is not merely a member of a tribe or a
+society, but he thinks that society's thoughts, he feels
+their emotions, his individual life is an expression of
+the psychical life of the group to which he belongs.
+And his transactions with nature are an expression of
+the ideas and beliefs current in the society of which he
+is a part.</p>
+
+<p>The recognition of this truth was one of the outstanding
+contributions of Herbert Spencer to the science of
+sociology. Whereas other writers had stressed the
+power of the environment, as a purely material thing,
+in shaping human institutions, Spencer placed chief
+stress upon the emotional and intellectual life of primitive
+man as determining their beginnings. He showed<!-- Page 38 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_38" id="Page_38">[38]</a></span>
+how man's feelings and beliefs about himself, and
+about his fellows, and about the world of living forces
+with which he believed himself to be surrounded, were
+the all-important factors of social evolution. And the
+subsequent history of society has been such that scientific
+sociology is very largely the study of the growth
+and elaboration of an essentially psychical environment.
+The lower animal world&mdash;except so far as we
+allow for the operation of instincts&mdash;has, broadly, only
+the existence of other animals and the physical surroundings
+for its environment. With man it is vastly
+different. Owing primarily to language, the environment
+of the man of to-day is made up in part of the
+ideas of men who lived and died thousands of years
+ago. The use of clothing and the invention of tools
+would alone make mind a dominant fact in human
+life. But apart from these things, the great fact of social
+heredity, in virtue of which one generation enjoys the
+acquired culture of preceding generations, and without
+which civilisation would have no existence, is a
+great and dominant <em>mental</em> fact. Our institutions, our
+customs, are transmitted to us as so many psychic facts.
+Every new invention, every fresh culture acquisition,
+is helping to strengthen and broaden the psychical
+environment of man. Each newcomer is born into it;
+it moulds his nature and determines his life, as his own
+career and his own acquisition help to mould the life
+of his successors. Whether the phenomena be simple
+or complex, whether we are dealing with man in a civilised
+or in an uncivilised state, there is no escape from
+the general truth that man is everywhere under the
+domination of his mental life.</p>
+
+<p>So far as this enquiry is concerned, we need only<!-- Page 39 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_39" id="Page_39">[39]</a></span>
+deal with one aspect of the psychological medium in
+which primitive human life moves. And so far as
+primitive mankind seeks to control the movements
+of social life, there can be no question that this is done
+under the impulsion of that class of beliefs which we
+call religious. The operation of religious belief in
+savage society is neither spasmodic nor local. It is,
+on the contrary, universal and persistent. It influences
+every event of daily life with a force that the
+modern mind finds very difficult to appreciate. In almost
+every action the savage feels himself to be in
+touch with a supersensual world of living beings that
+exert a direct and inescapable influence. And any
+study of human evolution that is to be of real value
+must take this circumstance into consideration to a far
+greater extent than is usually done. Professor Frazer,
+dealing with the origin of various social institutions,
+rightly observes that "we are only beginning to understand
+the mind of the savage, and therefore the mind
+of our savage forefathers who created these institutions
+and handed them down to us," and warns us that
+"a knowledge of the truth may involve a reconstruction
+of society such as we can hardly dream of." He also
+warns us that we have at all times, in dealing with
+social origins, to "reckon with the influence of superstition,
+which pervades the life of the savage and has
+contributed to build up the social organism to an incalculable
+extent."<a name="FNanchor_14_14" id="FNanchor_14_14"></a><a href="#Footnote_14_14" class="fnanchor">[14]</a></p>
+
+<p>In emphasising this it must not be taken to imply
+that because social institutions and human actions are
+in primitive times moulded by religious beliefs, they
+stand to them in a relation of complete dependence.
+<!-- Page 40 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_40" id="Page_40">[40]</a></span>
+It only means that the psychological medium is of such
+a character that supernaturalistic reasons are found
+for doings things that are susceptible to a totally different
+explanation. The facts of life are expressed in
+terms of supernaturalism. Birth, marriage, death, social
+cohesion, leadership, health and disease, are all
+natural facts, and the mere play of social selection determines
+the weeding out of practices that are sufficiently
+adverse to tribal well-being to threaten its security.
+But in primitive times all these facts are allied
+with religious beliefs, and to the primitive mind the
+religious belief becomes the chief feature connected
+with them. As a matter of fact, this is far from an uncommon
+feature of social life to-day. The amount of
+supernaturalism current is still very large; and one still
+finds people explaining some of the plainest facts of
+social life in terms of supernaturalistic beliefs. It is all
+part of the truth that man is always under the domination
+of the psychological forces.</p>
+
+<p>This being granted, the enquiry immediately presents
+itself, How comes it that the facts of social life
+should be expressed in terms of supernaturalism? Why
+do these facts not immediately present themselves in
+their true nature? To answer this question one must
+bear in mind a yet further truth. This is that the explanation
+which man offers to himself or to others of
+phenomena must always be in terms of current knowledge.
+A modern called upon to explain a storm, an
+eclipse, or a disease, does so in terms of current physical
+or biological science. This is done in virtue of a
+mass of prepared knowledge, slowly accumulated by
+preceding generations, and which forms part of his social
+heritage. Primitive man likewise explains things<!-- Page 41 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_41" id="Page_41">[41]</a></span>
+in terms of current knowledge, but in his case the amount
+of reliable information is of a very scanty and
+generally erroneous description. The inherited knowledge
+which enables a modern schoolboy to start life
+with what would have been an outfit to an ancient philosopher,
+had yet to be created. Instead of finding, as
+we find, tools ready to hand, replies prepared to questions
+that may arise, primitive mankind must create
+its own tools and prepare its own answers. And in consequence
+of this the social environment, which at all
+times determines the form of man's mental output, is
+with primitive man radically different from our own.
+But however the form varies there is agreement on
+this one point&mdash;in both cases phenomena are explained
+in terms of known forces; the reasoning of each is
+determined by the knowledge of each. The laws of
+mental life remain the same in all stages of culture.
+The brain functions identically whether we take the
+savage or the scientist. In a general way the savage
+intelligence is as rational as that of a modern thinker.
+The difference is dependent upon the accuracy and extent
+of the information possessed by each. Hence the
+vital difference in the conclusions reached. Hence, too,
+the dominance of supernaturalism in primitive times.</p>
+
+<p>The great distinction between primitive and scientific
+thinking may be expressed in a sentence&mdash;the
+modern mind explains man by the world, primitive
+thought explained the world by man. In the one case
+we move from within outward, in the other from without
+inward. We are not now concerned with semi-metaphysical
+idealistic theories that would reduce the
+"whole choir of heaven and furniture of earth" to the
+creation of mental activity, but with the plain, understandable<!-- Page 42 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_42" id="Page_42">[42]</a></span>
+truth that the human organism is fashioned
+by the environment in which it dwells. And there is
+amongst those capable of expressing an authoritative
+opinion&mdash;an agreement supported by evidence that
+has simply nothing against it&mdash;that the world of primitive
+man is overpoweringly animistic. In the absence
+of that mass of scientifically verified knowledge which
+forms part of our social heritage, humanity commences
+its intellectual career by endowing natural forces with
+the qualities possessed by itself. The forces conceived
+are living ones. They are to be dreaded exactly as
+human beings are to be dreaded; to be appeased or
+circumvented by the same methods that man applies
+to his fellows. The problem before the savage is thus
+a very real one. In essence it is the problem that is
+ever before humanity&mdash;that of subjugating forces to
+its own welfare. Primitive man is not, however, concerned
+with the elaboration of theories; nor is he consumed
+with vague 'spiritual yearnings.' His difficulty
+is how to control or placate those invisible but very
+real powers upon which he believes everything depends.
+He would willingly ignore them if he could,
+and would cheerfully dispense with their presence altogether
+if he believed that things would proceed as
+well in their absence. But there they are, inescapable
+facts that have to be reckoned with.</p>
+
+<p>The general outlook of the primitive mind is well
+put by Miss Mary Kingsley in the following passage:&mdash;</p>
+
+<p>"To the African the Universe is made up of matter
+permeated by spirit. Everything happens by the direct
+action of spirit. The thing he does himself is done by
+<!-- Page 43 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_43" id="Page_43">[43]</a></span>
+the spirit within him acting on his body ... everything
+that is done by other things is done by their spirit associated
+with their particular mass of matter.... The native
+will point out to you a lightning-stricken tree and
+tell you that its spirit has been killed. He will tell you,
+when the earthen cooking pot is broken, it has lost its
+spirit. If his weapon fails him, it is because someone
+has stolen its spirit or made it weak by means of his
+influence on spirits of the same class.... In every action
+of his life he shows you how he lives with a great spirit
+world around him. You see him before he starts out
+to fight rubbing stuff into his weapon to strengthen the
+spirit that is in it; telling it the while what care he has
+taken of it.... You see him leaning over the face of the
+water talking to its spirit with proper incantations,
+asking it when it meets an enemy of his to upset his
+canoe and destroy him.... If a man is knocked on the
+head with a club, or shot by an arrow or a bullet, the
+cause of death is clearly the malignity of persons using
+these weapons; and so it is easy to think that a man
+killed by the falling of a tree, or by the upsetting of a
+canoe in the surf, or in a whirlpool in the river is also a
+victim of some being using these things as weapons.
+For a man holding this view, it seems both natural and
+easy to regard disease as a manifestation of the wrath
+of some invisible being, and to construct that intricate
+system which we find among the Africans, and agree
+to call Witchcraft, Fetish, or Juju."<a name="FNanchor_15_15" id="FNanchor_15_15"></a><a href="#Footnote_15_15" class="fnanchor">[15]</a></p>
+
+<p>Miss Kingsley is here dealing specifically with
+West Africa, but her description applies in a general
+way to uncivilised people all over the world. There
+is much closer resemblance between the beliefs of uncivilised
+peoples than between civilised ones, because<!-- Page 44 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_44" id="Page_44">[44]</a></span>
+the conditions are much more alike. And under substantially
+identical conditions the human mind has
+everywhere reached substantially identical conclusions.
+The philosophy of the savage is simple, comprehensive,
+and, given the data, logical. He does not
+divide the world into the natural and the supernatural;
+it is all one. At most, he has only the seen and the
+unseen. The supernatural, as a distinct category,
+only appears when a definite knowledge of the natural
+has arisen to which it can be opposed. He has no such
+distinction as that of the material and the immaterial;
+so far as he thinks of these things, the invisible is only
+a finer form of the visible. Of one thing, however, he
+is perfectly convinced, and this is that he is at all times
+surrounded by a host of invisible agencies to which all
+occurrences are due, and with whom he must come to
+terms. Even death wears a different aspect to the
+primitive mind from that which it presents to the
+modern. To us death puts a sharp and abrupt termination
+to life. To the primitive mind death involves
+no such ending.<a name="FNanchor_16_16" id="FNanchor_16_16"></a><a href="#Footnote_16_16" class="fnanchor">[16]</a> Death is no more of a break than is
+sleep; and at all times the conception of an annihilation
+of personality requires a marked degree of
+mental power. So with the savage&mdash;the 'dead' man
+simply goes on living. He may be incarnated in some
+natural object, or he may simply go on living as one
+of the innumerable company of tribal ghosts. But he
+remains a force to be reckoned with, and the need for
+dealing with these ghostly personages is one of the
+ever-present problems of primitive sociology, and<!-- Page 45 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_45" id="Page_45">[45]</a></span>
+brings us very near the beginnings of all religious
+beliefs and ceremonies&mdash;if it does not form their real
+starting-point.</p>
+
+<p>On one point all modern schools of anthropologists
+are agreed. This is that man's first conception of the
+supernatural&mdash;or what afterwards ranks as such&mdash;is
+derived from a purely mistaken interpretation of
+natural phenomena. In this they have returned to
+the standpoint of Hobbes, that "fear of things invisible"
+forms the "natural seed of religion." One source
+of origin of this belief in a supernatural world is certainly
+found in the phenomena of dreaming. To the
+savage his dreams are as real as his waking experiences.
+He does not <em>dream</em> he goes to distant places;
+he goes there during his sleep. He does not <em>dream</em>
+that people visit him; they actually come. If a West
+African wakes up in the morning with a tired, bruised
+feeling, this arises, as Miss Kingsley says, from his
+'soul' having been out fighting and got ill-treated.
+The only philosophy of dreaming amongst savage
+races is that of the excursions and incursions of a
+'soul' or double.</p>
+
+<p>Another powerful factor in the development of belief
+in the supernatural is that of man's attempt to
+explain natural happenings. Why do things happen?
+Why does the sun rise and set, why does rain fall,
+thunder crash, rivers flow? Note the way in which
+a child answers similar questions, and one is on the
+track of the primitive intelligence. If man's own
+movements are caused by a 'soul' or double, then
+other things must also move because they possess a
+'soul.' If an answer is to be found at all, it is only
+along these lines that the primitive mind is able to<!-- Page 46 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_46" id="Page_46">[46]</a></span>
+find it. And, once the answer is given, there are a
+thousand and one things occurring that lend it apparent
+support. Resemblances in nature, coincidences,
+echoes, shadows, etc., all give their support to this
+primitive hypothesis&mdash;the only one possible in the
+circumstances, and the one still endorsed by the majority
+of the world's population.</p>
+
+<p>Particularly strong endorsement of this belief is supplied
+by disease and abnormal nervous states. Instances
+to illustrate this are innumerable, but from the numerous
+cases cited by Spencer I select the following:
+Among the Amazulus convulsions are believed to be
+caused by ancestral spirits. With Asiatic races epileptics
+are regarded as possessed by demons. With
+the Kirghiz the involuntary muscular movements of
+a woman in childbirth are believed to be caused by a
+spirit taking possession of the body. The Samoans
+attribute all madness to possession. The Congo people
+have the same notion of epilepsy. The East Africans
+believe that falling sickness is due to spirits.<a name="FNanchor_17_17" id="FNanchor_17_17"></a><a href="#Footnote_17_17" class="fnanchor">[17]</a> In
+Rajputana, says Mr. W. Crooke, disease is generally
+attributed to Khor or the agency of offended spirits.
+The Mahadeo Kolis of Ahmadnagar believe that every
+malady or disease that seizes man, woman, or child, or
+cattle, is caused either by evil spirits or by an angry
+god. The Bijapur Veddas have a yearly feast to their
+ancestors to prevent the dead bringing sickness into
+the house.<a name="FNanchor_18_18" id="FNanchor_18_18"></a><a href="#Footnote_18_18" class="fnanchor">[18]</a> "A Catholic missionary," says Professor
+Frazer, "observes that in New Guinea the <i>nepir</i>, or
+sorcerer, is everywhere.... Nothing happens without
+the sorcerer's intervention; wars, marriage, death, expeditions,<!-- Page 47 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_47" id="Page_47">[47]</a></span>
+fishing, hunting, always and everywhere
+the sorcerer."<a name="FNanchor_19_19" id="FNanchor_19_19"></a><a href="#Footnote_19_19" class="fnanchor">[19]</a></p>
+
+<p>In Ancient Egypt, Chaldea, and Assyria there is
+ample evidence that the same belief flourished. Everywhere
+we find the exorcist and the witch-doctor existing
+as natural consequents of the belief that disease
+has a supernatural origin. We see it in both the teaching
+and practice of the early Christian Church. That
+great father of the Church, Origen, says: "It is demons
+which produce famine, unfruitfulness, corruption of
+the air, and pestilence." St. Augustine said that "All
+diseases of Christians are to be ascribed to demons."
+The Church of England still retains in its Articles an
+authorisation for the expulsion of demons; and a
+number of charms yet in wide use amongst civilised
+nations show how persistent is this belief. For centuries
+there existed all over Europe sacred pools, wells,
+grottos, etc., all bearing eloquent witness to the deep-seated
+belief that disease was of supernatural origin,
+and was to be conquered by supernatural means.</p>
+
+<p>Enough has been said to indicate the kind of environment
+in which primitive man moves, and also to
+understand why ideas concerning the supernatural
+exert such an enormous influence in early society. In
+a world where everything was yet to be learned, man's
+first attempts at understanding himself and his fellows
+were necessarily blundering and tentative. His
+first attempts at explanation are expressed in terms
+of his own nature. He sees himself, his own passions,
+strengths, and weaknesses reflected in the nature
+around him. This is the outstanding, dominating fact
+in primitive life. Leave out this consideration and<!-- Page 48 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_48" id="Page_48">[48]</a></span>
+primitive sociology becomes a chaos. Admit it, and
+we see the reason why social institutions assumed
+the form they took, and also a key to much that happens
+in subsequent human history. In primitive life
+religious beliefs are not something separate from other
+forms of social life; so far as man seeks consciously
+to shape that life they are to him an essential part
+of it. And the mistake once made is perpetuated.
+The initial blunder once committed, daily experience
+seems to give it constant justification. In the absence
+of knowledge concerning natural forces every event,&mdash;particularly
+if unusual,&mdash;every case of disease, endorses
+and strengthens the mistake made. A psychological
+fatality drives the human race along the wrong
+path of investigation, and only very slowly is the mistake
+rectified. One cannot see how it could have been
+otherwise. The only corrective is knowledge, and
+knowledge is a plant of slow growth. This psychological
+first step was man's first attempt to frame a
+theory of things satisfactory to his intellect&mdash;an
+attempt that, beginning in the crude animism of the
+savage, ends in the verifiable laws of modern science.</p>
+
+<p>From the point of view of our present enquiry two
+things are to be noted. The first is that man's conviction
+of the nearness of a supernatural world began
+in his lack of knowledge concerning the nature of
+natural forces. Of this there can be little doubt. One
+can take all the facts upon which primitive mankind
+built, and still builds, its theories of supernaturalism,
+and show that they may be explained in a quite different
+manner. The movements of the planets, the
+rush of comets, the presence of disaster, the thousand
+and one operations of natural forces no longer suggest<!-- Page 49 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_49" id="Page_49">[49]</a></span>
+to educated minds the action of personal beings. The
+whole data of the primitive theory of things have been
+rejected. The premises were false, and the conclusions
+necessarily false also.</p>
+
+<p>The second point is that from the earliest times one
+of the strongest proofs of human contact with a supernatural
+world has been found in the existence of abnormal
+or pathological states of mind. These may
+have sometimes arisen quite naturally; at other times
+they have been deliberately induced. How much the
+perpetuation of religious beliefs as a whole owes to this
+factor has never yet been adequately realised. That
+it has had a very great influence seems beyond dispute.
+For it seems certain that had not "proofs" of
+a supernatural world been offered in the shape of
+visions, ecstatic states, etc., religious beliefs would
+hardly have exercised the power that has been theirs.
+The number of people who are able to maintain a
+strong consciousness of the truth of religion, merely
+looking at it as a philosophy of existence, is naturally
+very few. The great majority require more tangible
+evidence if their belief is to be kept alive and active.
+And curiously enough, the very growth of a naturalistic
+explanation has driven a great many to find the
+evidence they desired in those abnormal states of mind
+that seemed to defy scientific analysis. In succeeding
+chapters evidence will be given to show to what extent
+this kind of evidence for the supernatural has been
+offered and accepted. It will be seen, as Professor
+Tylor points out, that the line of religious development
+is continuous. The latest forms stretch back in
+an unbroken line to the earliest. And if this proves
+nothing else, it at least proves that consequences do<!-- Page 50 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_50" id="Page_50">[50]</a></span>
+not always die out with the conditions that gave them
+birth. It was the world of the savage that gave birth
+to the supernatural. But the supernatural is still with
+us, even though the world that gave it birth has disappeared.
+We retain conclusions based on admittedly
+false premises.</p>
+
+<div class="footnotes">
+<h3>Footnotes:<br />
+<span class="skip">[<a href="#Page_51">Skip</a>]</span>
+</h3>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_14_14" id="Footnote_14_14"></a><a href="#FNanchor_14_14"><span class="label">[14]</span></a> <cite>Lectures on the Early History of the Kingship</cite>, pp. 36-7.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_15_15" id="Footnote_15_15"></a><a href="#FNanchor_15_15"><span class="label">[15]</span></a> <cite>West African Studies</cite>, pp. 394-6.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_16_16" id="Footnote_16_16"></a><a href="#FNanchor_16_16"><span class="label">[16]</span></a> See an interesting article on this point by W. H. R. Rivers
+on "The Primitive Conception of Death," in <cite>The Hibbert Journal</cite>
+for Jan. 1912.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_17_17" id="Footnote_17_17"></a><a href="#FNanchor_17_17"><span class="label">[17]</span></a> <cite>Principles of Sociology</cite>, vol. i.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_18_18" id="Footnote_18_18"></a><a href="#FNanchor_18_18"><span class="label">[18]</span></a> <cite>Popular Religion and Folklore of Northern India</cite>, i. p. 124.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_19_19" id="Footnote_19_19"></a><a href="#FNanchor_19_19"><span class="label">[19]</span></a> <cite>Golden Bough</cite>, 3rd ed., i. 337.</p></div>
+</div>
+
+<p><!-- Page 51 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_51" id="Page_51">[51]</a></span></p>
+<h2>CHAPTER <span class="cgap">THREE</span><br />
+THE RELIGION OF MENTAL DISEASE</h2>
+
+<p>"It is an interesting problem,"
+says Professor J. H. Leuba, "to determine what influences
+have led theologians to anchor their beliefs
+upon the proposition that religious experience differs
+from other forms of consciousness in that it gives one
+an <em>immediate</em> knowledge of the external existence of
+certain objects of belief, although they do not fall under
+the senses, and an immediate knowledge of the
+truth of certain historical facts."<a name="FNanchor_20_20" id="FNanchor_20_20"></a><a href="#Footnote_20_20" class="fnanchor">[20]</a> This is, indeed, an
+interesting problem, and, we may add, one of growing
+importance, since there is a pronounced tendency on
+the part of present-day exponents of religion to rest
+their case almost entirely upon the immediacy of
+their religious consciousness. This conception of a
+certain order of experience, however, is not and cannot
+have always existed. A belief may be so widely
+and so generally diffused that it is accepted without
+resistance, and, as it would almost seem, in the
+absence of evidence. But its intuitive character is
+only superficial, and disappears on careful examination.
+The mere vogue of a belief constitutes in itself
+a kind of evidence, and for many people the most
+powerful kind of evidence. But the conviction itself
+has a history, and it is in the unravelling of that history,
+in the discovery of the class of facts upon which
+the conviction has been built, that the work lies. And
+when this is done it will be found that our intuitions
+are invariably based upon a continuous&mdash;even though
+partly unconscious&mdash;appeal to facts. Sometimes it
+will, of course, be found that a renewed and deliberate
+appeal to the facts in question will justify the conviction.<!-- Page 52 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_52" id="Page_52">[52]</a></span>
+At other times it will be found that the facts
+demand an altogether new interpretation. For centuries
+all the observed facts supported a conviction
+that the earth was flat. It was a fresh scrutiny of the
+facts in the light of a new conception that revolutionised
+human opinion on the subject.</p>
+
+<p>What, then, is the history, and what are the facts
+upon which the belief that religious experience brings
+man into contact with a kind of existence not given
+in ordinary experience, is based? The kind of answer
+that will be given to this question has already been
+indicated. Religious beliefs are in their origin of the
+nature of an induction from an observed order. The
+induction is not the result of that careful collection
+of facts, leading up to an equally careful generalisation
+and subsequent verification, which is a characteristic
+of modern science, but it is an induction none
+the less. The primitive mind is not so much engaged
+in seeking an explanation of certain experiences, as
+it has an explanation forced upon it. To picture the
+savage as inventing a theory in the sense in which
+Darwin propounded the theory of Natural Selection
+is to quite misconceive the nature of the savage intelligence.
+But to conceive the savage as having a certain
+explanation suggested by the pressure of repeated
+experiences, and that this explanation subsequently
+assumes the character of a fixed belief, is well
+within the scope of the facts known to us. In this
+stage of culture the existence of supernatural beings
+is as much a deduction from experience as any modern
+scientific generalisation. Certain things are seen,
+certain feelings are experienced, and the conclusion
+is that they are the products of supernatural agency.<!-- Page 53 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_53" id="Page_53">[53]</a></span>
+From this point of view religion is no more than a
+primitive science. It is the first stage of that long
+series of generalisations which, beginning with crude
+animism, ends with the discoveries of a Copernicus,
+a Newton, a Darwin, or a Spencer. It is a history that
+begins with vitalism and ends with mechanism. We
+commence with a world in which there exists a chaotic
+assemblage of independent personal forces, and
+end with a universe that is self-acting, self-adjusting,
+self-contained, and in which science makes no allowance
+for the operation of intelligence save such as
+meets us in animal organisation.</p>
+
+<p>Now amongst the facts that suggest to the primitive
+intelligence the operation of 'spiritual' forces are
+those connected with the human organism itself in
+both its normal and abnormal states. But it is important
+to note&mdash;particularly so for the understanding
+of the part played by ecstatic religious phenomena
+in comparatively recent times&mdash;that once the
+occurrence of a certain state of mind is conceived as
+the product of intercourse between man and spirits,
+there is every inducement to cultivate these frames
+of mind whenever renewed intercourse is desired.
+This does not imply, at least in the earlier stages,
+conscious imposture. Generally the operator imposes
+on himself as much as he imposes on others. Noting
+that privation of body, or torture of mind, or the use of
+certain herbs is followed by visions or ecstasy, it is believed,
+not that the vision is the product of the practice,
+but that the practice is the condition of illumination.</p>
+
+<p>This attitude of mind is fairly paralleled by what
+takes place at the ordinary spiritualistic <i>seance</i>. Those
+attending are advised that the chief condition of a<!-- Page 54 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_54" id="Page_54">[54]</a></span>
+communication with the inhabitants of the other
+world is a passive state of mind. This passivity cannot
+exclude expectancy, since it is only assumed in
+order that something may occur. If nothing occurs,
+if no communications are received, it is because the
+requisite conditions have not been fulfilled, and the
+sceptic is met with much semi-scientific jargon as to
+conditions being necessary to every scientific investigation.
+The fact that this passivity and expectancy,
+with other attendant circumstances, not the least of
+which is the contagious influence of a number of
+people with a similar mental disposition, opens the
+way to self-delusion is ignored. Then when the expected
+and desired result follows, the mental attitude
+cultivated is taken as the condition of communication
+with the spiritual world, instead of its being, in
+all probability, the true cause of what is experienced.
+In this way the story of supernatural intercourse runs
+clear and unbroken from primitive savagery to its
+survival in modern civilisation. When Professor Tylor
+says, "The conception of the human soul is, as
+to its most essential nature, continuous from the philosophy
+of the savage thinker to that of the modern
+professor of theology,"<a name="FNanchor_21_21" id="FNanchor_21_21"></a><a href="#Footnote_21_21" class="fnanchor">[21]</a> he makes a statement that is
+true of the whole story of supernatural intercourse in
+all its varied manifestations.</p>
+
+<p>The chief distinction between primitive and modern
+man lies in the consideration that in the first case the
+blunder is inevitable, in the latter case the remedy lies
+to hand. How could primitive man be aware of the
+real connection between the use of certain drugs or
+herbs and an excitation or depression of the activities<!-- Page 55 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_55" id="Page_55">[55]</a></span>
+of the nervous system? He does observe consequences,
+but he is quite ignorant of causes. Even to-day
+their full consequences are unknown; and it is absurd
+to expect that savage humanity should have been
+better informed. And even when a more rational theory
+exists, the practice persists under various forms.
+This is a principle that receives vivid illustration from
+the history of religions. The modern believer in
+mystical states of consciousness no longer advocates
+the use of drugs, and even fasting is going out of
+fashion. But we still have a continuation of the primitive
+practice in the shape of insistence on the cultivation
+of abnormal frames of mind if we are to experience
+a consciousness of communion with an alleged
+supersensible reality. That is, we are to achieve by a
+mental discipline what the savage or the medieval
+monk achieved by coarser and more obvious methods.
+To withdraw the mind from the normal influence of
+everyday life is to expose it to the play of hallucination
+and delusion. There is really no vital difference
+between unhealthy, solitary brooding on a given subject
+and drugging the mind with hashish. This class of
+modern mystic is one with the savage in an inability
+to recognise that the illumination is the product of
+the discipline, not the mere condition of its possession.
+Between the drug of the savage, the fasting and self-torture
+of the medieval monk and the prayerful meditation
+of the modern mystic, the difference is only
+that of changed times and altered conditions. The
+method is the same throughout.</p>
+
+<p>The truth of this has been well put by Tylor:&mdash;</p>
+
+<p>"The religious beliefs of the lower races are in no
+small measure based on the evidence of visions and<!-- Page 56 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_56" id="Page_56">[56]</a></span>
+dreams, regarded as actual intercourse with spiritual
+being. From the earliest stages of culture we find religion
+in close alliance with ecstatic physical conditions.
+These are brought on by various means of interference
+with the healthy action of body and mind, and it
+is scarcely needful to remind the reader that, according
+to philosophic theories antecedent to those of
+modern medicine, such morbid disturbances are explained
+as symptoms of divine visitation, or at least of
+superhuman spirituality. Among the strongest means
+of disturbing the functions of the mind so as to produce
+ecstatic vision, is fasting, accompanied, as it
+usually is, with other privations, and with prolonged
+solitary contemplation in the desert or in the forest.
+Among the ordinary vicissitudes of savage life, the
+wild hunter has many a time to try involuntarily the
+effects of such a life for days together, and under these
+circumstances he soon comes to see and talk with
+phantoms which are to him invisible spirits. The secret
+of spiritual intercourse thus learnt, he has thence-forth
+but to reproduce the cause in order to renew the
+effects."<a name="FNanchor_22_22" id="FNanchor_22_22"></a><a href="#Footnote_22_22" class="fnanchor">[22]</a></p>
+
+<p>As a means, then, of strengthening and perpetuating
+a consciousness of intercourse with the spiritual
+world, we have to reckon with, not merely the accidental
+occurrence of abnormal nervous conditions, but with
+their deliberate cultivation. The practice is world-wide,
+and persists in some form or other in all ages.
+Thus we find the Australians and many tribes of North
+American Indians use tobacco for this purpose. In
+Western Siberia a species of fungi, the 'fly Agaric,' so
+called because it is often steeped and the solution used<!-- Page 57 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_57" id="Page_57">[57]</a></span>
+to destroy house flies, is used to produce religious
+ecstasy. Its action on the muscular system is stimulatory,
+and it greatly excites the nervous system.<a name="FNanchor_23_23" id="FNanchor_23_23"></a><a href="#Footnote_23_23" class="fnanchor">[23]</a> An
+early Spanish observer says of the ancient Mexicans
+that they used a kind of mushroom, "which are eaten
+raw, and on account of being bitter, they drink after
+them, or eat with them a little honey of bees, and shortly
+after they see a thousand visions."<a name="FNanchor_24_24" id="FNanchor_24_24"></a><a href="#Footnote_24_24" class="fnanchor">[24]</a> The mushroom
+was called the "bread of the gods." The Californian
+Indians give children tobacco, in order to receive instruction
+from the resulting visions. North American
+Indians held intoxication by tobacco to be supernatural
+ecstasy, and the dreams of men in this state to
+be inspired. The Darien Indians use the seeds of the
+Datura Sanguinea to induce visions. In Peru the
+priests prepared themselves for intercourse with the
+gods by partaking of a narcotic drink from the same
+plant. In Guiana the priest was prepared for his functions
+by fasting and flagellation, and was afterwards
+dosed with tobacco juice.<a name="FNanchor_25_25" id="FNanchor_25_25"></a><a href="#Footnote_25_25" class="fnanchor">[25]</a> In India the Laws of Manu
+give explicit instructions as to the means of producing
+visions. Chief of these is the use of the 'Soma' drink.
+This is prepared from the flower of the lotus. The sap
+of this, says De Candolle, would be poisonous if taken
+in large quantities, but in small doses merely induces
+hallucination. Opium and hashish, a preparation of the
+hemp plant, have been in general use among Eastern
+peoples, as a means of producing ecstasy from remote
+antiquity. Opium, it is well known, produces an<!-- Page 58 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_58" id="Page_58">[58]</a></span>
+extraordinary state of exaltation, intensifying the sense
+of one's personality, and inducing a pleasurable consciousness
+of mental strength and clarity. Under its
+influence, as De Quincey said, time lengthens to infinity
+and space swells to immensity.<a name="FNanchor_26_26" id="FNanchor_26_26"></a><a href="#Footnote_26_26" class="fnanchor">[26]</a> Belladonna, a
+drug much used by medieval witches and sorcerers,
+has also had its vogue for purely religious purposes.<!-- Page 59 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_59" id="Page_59">[59]</a></span>
+With the Greeks the laurel was sacred to Æsculapius.
+Those who wished to ask counsel of the god appeared
+before the altar crowned with laurel and chewing its
+leaves. Before prophesying, the Greek priestesses
+drank a preparation of laurel water. This contains, although
+it was, of course, unknown to them, two toxic
+substances&mdash;prussic acid and the volatile oil of laurel.
+The first would induce convulsions, the second,
+hallucinatory visions. The two combined were calculated
+to produce with both subject and observer a
+profound impression of spiritual illumination and
+possession.</p>
+
+<p>It is unnecessary to multiply examples of the action
+of various drugs or herbs on the nervous system, or to
+cite the people who use them. Enough has been said
+to indicate how widespread is the practice, and the
+consequences are not hard to foresee. A very moderate
+development of intelligence would enable men to associate
+certain consequences with the use of particular
+drugs, but a very considerable amount of knowledge
+would be required to explain why these consequences
+were produced. In a social environment saturated
+with superstition the explanation lies ready to hand,
+and is accepted without question. A people that sees
+spiritual agency in all the familiar phenomena of nature
+are certainly not less likely to trace its influence in
+the mysterious and unaccountable effects of narcotics
+and stimulants. And each repeated experiment provides
+additional proof. Man thus not only believes
+himself to be surrounded by a spiritual world; he is
+actually able to enter into communication with it by
+methods that are defined in the clearest possible manner.
+Every repetition strengthens the delusion and<!-- Page 60 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_60" id="Page_60">[60]</a></span>
+even when the delusion, as such, is exploded, the temper
+of mind induced by it persists.</p>
+
+<p>Various other methods are employed to induce
+a feeling of religious exaltation. Prominent among
+these are dancing and singing. Dancing in connection
+with religious ceremonies is now generally outgrown
+in the civilised world, but singing is still the vogue. That
+is, singing is not, it must be remembered, practised
+from any desire to cultivate a love of music, although it
+may appeal to music-lovers. Still, its avowed purpose
+is to induce a feeling of devoutness in the congregation.
+The hypnotic consequences of a body of people singing
+in unison, or the soothing, mystical effect of certain
+airs from a choir upon a congregation, are recognised
+in practice if not in theory. This is a phenomenon that
+is not, of course, exclusively associated with religion.
+In this as in other instances religion only utilises the
+ordinary qualities of human nature. But in all cases
+the purpose and the result are the same. That is, the
+subject is placed for the time being in a supernormal
+condition, and the mild state of passivity or enthusiasm
+created makes him more susceptible to the influence
+brought to bear upon him. This is true of religious
+singing and chanting, from the forest gatherings of the
+primitive savage down to the more sedate and elaborate
+assemblages in church or chapel.</p>
+
+<p>Primitive dancing had both a sexual and religious
+significance, although, as will be seen later, in the
+primitive mind the sexual functions themselves are
+very closely associated with supernatural agency.
+Tylor is of opinion that originally men and women
+dance in order to express their feelings and wishes,<a name="FNanchor_27_27" id="FNanchor_27_27"></a><a href="#Footnote_27_27" class="fnanchor">[27]</a>
+<!-- Page 61 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_61" id="Page_61">[61]</a></span>
+but it is certain it very early and universally became
+associated with religious ceremonies, and that because
+of the ecstasy induced. In some cases drug-taking
+and dancing go together. In others, reliance is placed
+on dancing alone. This latter is the case with the
+'devil dancers' of Ceylon. In Africa the witch doctor
+discovers who has been guilty of sorcery by the aid
+of inspiration furnished during a dance. The whirling
+dance of the Eastern dervish is well known. Dancing
+also figures in the Bible. The Jews danced around the
+golden calf (Ex. xxxii. 19) in a state of nudity. David,
+too, danced naked before the Lord. Dancing was also
+part of the religious ceremonies attendant on the
+worship of Dionysos or Bacchus.<a name="FNanchor_28_28" id="FNanchor_28_28"></a><a href="#Footnote_28_28" class="fnanchor">[28]</a> Along with the
+drinking of certain vegetable decoctions, dancing
+formed an important part of the witches' saturnalia
+during the medieval period. When in a state of frenzy,
+partly drug induced and partly the product of exhilaration
+caused by wild dancing, visions of Satan followed.
+In the dancing mania of the fourteenth century,
+the sufferers saw visions of heaven opened, with Jesus
+and the Virgin enthroned. Dancing was one of the
+prominent characteristics of the French Convulsionnaires
+in the eighteenth century. In more recent times
+we have the dancing and singing connected with the
+Methodist revival. In modern instances the dancing
+seems to have been consequent on religious excitement
+rather than precedent to it, but in earlier times
+there is no doubt that it was deliberately practised as
+a means of producing a state of exaltation.</p>
+
+<p>Among the commonest methods of inducing a sense<!-- Page 62 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_62" id="Page_62">[62]</a></span>
+of religious exaltation is the practice of fasting. In
+various guises, this is the most persistent form of religious
+self-torture. Amongst more civilised people
+the reason given for fasting is that it is a form of repentance,
+the genuineness of which is attested by
+voluntary punishment. But originally there seems
+little reason to doubt that it was adopted for a different
+purpose. It was valued not because the fasting
+person felt that he had done anything for which it was
+necessary to repent, but because it was believed to
+bring people into closer touch with the spiritual world.
+There is, of course, a very obvious reason for this belief.
+A lowered vitality is favourable to hallucinations
+of every description. A shipwrecked sailor is placed,
+by no act of his own, in precisely the same condition
+as is the primitive medicine man or the medieval saint
+by his own volition. It has always been recognised,
+and by none more readily than by the great religious
+teachers of the world, that a well-nourished body is
+inimical to what they chose to term "spiritual development."
+The historic Christian outcry against
+fleshly indulgence has much more in it than a revolt
+against mere sensualism. A well-fed body has been
+deprecated because it closed the avenue to spiritual
+illumination. Hence it is that fasting has found such
+favour in all religious systems. The ascetic saw more
+because, by reducing the body to an abnormal state,
+he provided the conditions for seeing more. The Zulu
+maxim, "A stuffed body cannot see secret things,"
+really expresses in a sentence the philosophy of the
+matter.</p>
+
+<p>Among the Blackfoot Indians of North America,
+when a boy reaches puberty he is sent away from<!-- Page 63 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_63" id="Page_63">[63]</a></span>
+his father's lodge in search of a spiritual protector
+or totem. Seeking a secluded spot, he abstains from
+food until he is favoured in a dream with a vision of
+some animal or bird, which is at once adopted by
+him.<a name="FNanchor_29_29" id="FNanchor_29_29"></a><a href="#Footnote_29_29" class="fnanchor">[29]</a> This custom obtains with most of the North
+American tribes. Among these tribes, also, the soothsayer
+prepares himself by fasting for the ecstatic state
+in which the spirits give their messages through him.
+The ordinary member of the tribe who wants anything
+will fast until he is assured in a dream that it
+will be granted him. Similarly, the Malay, to procure
+supernatural intercourse, retires to the jungle and abstains
+from food. The Zulu doctor prepares for intercourse
+with the tribal spirits by spare diet or solitary
+fasts. Fasting is part of the ordinary regimen of the
+Hindu yogi. Of certain Indian tribes we are told that
+before proceeding on an expedition they "observe a
+rigorous fast, or rather abstain from every kind of food
+for four days. In this interval their imagination is
+exalted to delirium; whether it be through bodily
+weakness or the natural effect of delirium, they pretend
+to have strange visions. The elders and sages of
+the tribe, being called upon to interpret these dreams,
+draw from them omens more or less favourable to the
+success of the enterprise; and their explanations are
+received as oracles, by which the expedition will be
+faithfully regulated."<a name="FNanchor_30_30" id="FNanchor_30_30"></a><a href="#Footnote_30_30" class="fnanchor">[30]</a> Amongst the Samoans, when
+rain was required, the priests blackened themselves
+all over, exhumed a dead body, took the skeleton to a
+cave and poured water over it. They had to fast and
+remain in the cave until it rained. Sometimes they<!-- Page 64 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_64" id="Page_64">[64]</a></span>
+died under the experiment, but they generally chose
+the showery months for their rain-making.<a name="FNanchor_31_31" id="FNanchor_31_31"></a><a href="#Footnote_31_31" class="fnanchor">[31]</a></p>
+
+<p>In both the Old and New Testaments fasting figures
+largely. The encounter of Jesus with Satan is preceded
+by a forty days' fast. St. Catherine of Sienna
+began regular fasts at a very early age. Santa Teresa
+kept lengthy fasts every year. The fasting of the
+monks and nuns during the epidemic period of monasticism
+is too well known to call for more than a mere
+reference. Perhaps the most curious religious reason
+given for fasting is that cited by a writer from a monkish
+chronicler:&mdash;</p>
+
+<p>"As a coach goes faster when it is empty, a man by
+fasting can be better united to God; for it is a principle
+with geometers that a round body can never touch a
+plane except in one point.... A belly too well filled
+becomes round, it cannot touch God except in one
+point; but fasting flattens the belly until it is united
+with the surface of God at all points."<a name="FNanchor_32_32" id="FNanchor_32_32"></a><a href="#Footnote_32_32" class="fnanchor">[32]</a></p>
+
+<p>George Fox, the founder of the Society of Friends,
+confesses that he "fasted much" and "walked abroad
+in solitary places," and "frequently in the night walked
+about mournfully by myself." After much brooding
+and fasting, he heard a voice which said, "There is one,
+even Jesus Christ, that can speak to thy condition."
+Such an experience is not at all surprising, seeing the
+method pursued to acquire it. Less fasting and brooding,
+with more genial intercourse with his fellows,
+might easily have prevented Fox, as it has prevented
+others, hearing heavenly voices proffering him counsel.
+Such an experience is well within the reach of anyone<!-- Page 65 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_65" id="Page_65">[65]</a></span>
+who cares to acquire it. Tylor has well said that
+"So long as fasting is continued as a religious rite, so
+long the consequences in morbid mental exaltation
+will continue the old savage doctrine that morbid
+phantasy is supernatural experience. Bread and meat
+would have robbed the ascetic of many an angel's
+visit; the opening of the refectory door must many a
+time have closed the gate of heaven to his gaze." No
+one will question the truth of this principle, so long as
+we are dealing with uncivilised mankind. Many, however,
+shrink from acknowledging that the practices
+current in more civilised times are disguised illustrations
+of the same principle of interpretation, which
+descends direct from savages, and but for them would
+never have existed.</p>
+
+<p>Commenting on the practices of certain savage
+medicine-men, a missionary remarks:&mdash;</p>
+
+<p>"It always appeared probable to me that these
+rogues, from long fasting, contract a weakness of brain,
+a giddiness, a kind of delirium, which makes them
+imagine that they are gifted with superior wisdom,
+and give themselves out for physicians. They impose
+upon themselves first, and afterwards upon others."<a name="FNanchor_33_33" id="FNanchor_33_33"></a><a href="#Footnote_33_33" class="fnanchor">[33]</a></p>
+
+<p>This is shrewdly said, and is a good example of the
+readiness with which obvious truths are recognised
+when they do not clash with religious prepossessions.
+The difficulty for others is to discern any real line of
+demarcation between the practices of civilised and
+uncivilised. So far as one can see, the only real distinction
+is that the method employed by savages is
+open. That followed by civilised people is more or less
+disguised. But derangement of function is derangement<!-- Page 66 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_66" id="Page_66">[66]</a></span>
+of function, no matter how produced. And if we
+decline to believe that a savage holds genuine intercourse
+with a spiritual world, as a consequence of this
+derangement, in what way are we justified in accepting
+the testimony of a Christian visionary to similar
+intercourse, when the derangement is in his case no
+less clear? It is a case of accepting both, or neither.
+The sane and scientific conclusion seems to lie in the
+following from Dr. Henry Maudsley:&mdash;</p>
+
+<p>"Now that the mental functions are known to be
+inseparably connected with nervous substrata, disposed
+and united in the brain in the most orderly
+fashion, superordinate, co-ordinate, and subordinate&mdash;the
+whole a complex organisation of confederate
+nerve centres, each capable of more or less independent
+action&mdash;a natural interpretation presents itself.
+The extraordinary states of mental disintegration
+evince the separate and irregular function of certain
+mental nerve tracts, or grouped nerve tracts with which
+goes necessarily a coincident suspension, partial or
+complete, of the functions of all the rest; the supernatural
+incubus, therefore, neither demoniac nor divine,
+only morbid. Thus the strange nervous seizures, with
+their mental concomitants, not being outside the range
+of positive research, but interesting events within it,
+become useful natural experiments to throw an instructive
+light upon the intricate functions of the most
+complex organ in the world&mdash;the human brain. Steadily
+are the researches of pathology driving the supernatural
+back into its last and most obscure retreat;
+for they prove that in the extremest ecstasies there
+is neither <em>theolepsy</em> nor <em>diabolepsy</em>, nor any other
+<em>lepsy</em> in the sense of possession of the individual by<!-- Page 67 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_67" id="Page_67">[67]</a></span>
+an external power; what there is truly is a <em>psycholepsy</em>."<a name="FNanchor_34_34" id="FNanchor_34_34"></a><a href="#Footnote_34_34" class="fnanchor">[34]</a></p>
+
+<p>States of exaltation produced by the aid of drugs,
+fasting, or other forms of self-torture come naturally
+under the category of deliberately induced states of
+mind, owing to the conviction that spiritual knowledge
+may be gained in this way. But there are other
+states that arise naturally and which foster the same
+conviction. It has already been pointed out that the
+generally accepted theory with uncivilised peoples is
+that all disease is due to the action of malevolent spirits.
+There is no need now to repeat proof of this, and
+in any case it lies to hand in any work that deals with
+uncivilised life. Nor need we go back to uncivilised
+times for evidence. One requires only to look but a
+very little way into the history of any country to find
+the supernaturalistic theory of disease in full swing,
+and even to-day one may discover indications of its
+once general rule. Its importance to the present enquiry
+lies in the part it has played in building up in
+the religious consciousness a general conviction of
+religious truth that does not disappear even when it
+is seen that the evidence upon which it rests is faulty.
+Just as the inhabitants of a Welsh village have their
+general belief in religion strengthened by the semi-hysterical
+speeches of an Evan Roberts, and the convulsive
+capers of a whole congregation, so in all ages
+people have found endorsement of their belief in a supernatural
+world in the existence of cases the pathological
+nature of which admits of no doubt. Belief in
+the supernatural character of specific nervous conditions
+or mental states may disappear, but the fact<!-- Page 68 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_68" id="Page_68">[68]</a></span>
+that this belief has been general for a time leaves behind
+a certain psychological residuum in favour of supernaturalism
+in general.</p>
+
+<p>The connection between the priest and the physician
+is naturally a very ancient one. The priest, indeed,
+is the primitive physician, the belief that diseases
+are supernaturally caused indicating him as the
+agent of their cure. And it is only to be expected that
+when the attempt is made to divert the treatment of
+disease from priestly hands the effort should be met
+with determined opposition. Quite naturally, too, the
+first gropings after a scientific theory of disease show
+a curious mixture of rationalism and superstition.
+Thus, in Greece, the temple hospitals devoted to the
+mythical Æsculapius, which were situated at Epidaurus,
+Pergamus, Cyrene, Corinth, and many other
+places, served as colleges, hospitals, and places of worship.
+Sufferers slept in the temples in the hopes of receiving messages
+from the gods, and the priests themselves
+professed to have ecstatic visions which enabled
+them to prescribe for those afflicted.<a name="FNanchor_35_35" id="FNanchor_35_35"></a><a href="#Footnote_35_35" class="fnanchor">[35]</a> Great emphasis
+was placed on bathing, light, air, and food, and it
+is pretty clear that the priests had begun to mix both
+faith and physic in a most perplexing manner.</p>
+
+<p>The definite separation of medicine from magic and
+religion begins with Hippocrates. His theory of disease
+was simple. He did not deny that there might be
+a supernatural side to disease; he insisted that there
+was always a natural one, and that this was the side
+with which we should be concerned. Each disorder,<!-- Page 69 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_69" id="Page_69">[69]</a></span>
+he said, had its own physical conditions, and he laid
+down the rule that we "ought to study the nature of
+man, what he is with reference to that which he eats
+and drinks, and to all his other occupations and habits,
+and to the consequences resulting from each."<a name="FNanchor_36_36" id="FNanchor_36_36"></a><a href="#Footnote_36_36" class="fnanchor">[36]</a> In
+Egypt, also, very considerable advance was made in
+the same direction. Probably a good deal of their
+knowledge resulted from the practice of embalming,
+in spite of the priestly interdict on dissection. At all
+events, there is no doubt that considerable advance
+had been made. Herophilus and Erasistratus wrote of
+the structure of the heart, and described its connection
+with the veins and arteries. The two kinds of
+nerves, motor and sensory, were described, and the influence
+of foods, etc., as influencing health, dwelt on.
+Insanity was also dealt with as due to natural and
+controllable causes, and the effects of colour and music
+in dealing with mania noted.<a name="FNanchor_37_37" id="FNanchor_37_37"></a><a href="#Footnote_37_37" class="fnanchor">[37]</a> Had this advance
+been followed, the history of European civilisation
+might have been different from what it was. Plagues,
+epidemics, and diseases, with their far-reaching social
+and political consequences,&mdash;consequences that are
+too little noted, or even understood, by historians,&mdash;might
+have met with adequate resistance, and some
+would never have occurred.</p>
+
+<p><!-- Page 70 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_70" id="Page_70">[70]</a></span>
+The Pagan schools of medicine came to an untimely,
+although in some cases a lingering, end. "The introduction
+of Christianity," says a medical writer,
+"had an undoubted influence on the course of medical
+science; for the Christian was taught to recognise,
+in every bodily infirmity, the dispensation of the
+Almighty, and in the calm, abstracted pursuits of
+those holy men who passed their time in prayer and
+meditation, a propitiation: hence medicine fell into
+the hands of monks and anchorites, who assumed
+to themselves, exclusively, the power of interpreting
+all natural phenomena as indications of the Divine
+Will, and pretended to possess some occult and supernatural
+means of curing disease."<a name="FNanchor_38_38" id="FNanchor_38_38"></a><a href="#Footnote_38_38" class="fnanchor">[38]</a> Reversing the
+natural order of things, the physician was replaced by
+the priest. The supernaturalistic theory was revived,
+and held its own for well on a thousand years. For
+every complaint the Church provided a specific in the
+shape of a charm, an incantation, or a saint. St. Apollonia
+for toothache, St. Avertin for lunacy, St.
+Benedict for stone, St. Clara for sore eyes, St. Herbert
+for hydrophobia, St. John for epilepsy, St. Maur for
+gout, St. Pernel for agues, St. Genevieve for fevers, St.
+Sebastian for plague, etc.<a name="FNanchor_39_39" id="FNanchor_39_39"></a><a href="#Footnote_39_39" class="fnanchor">[39]</a> The height of absurdity
+was reached when, in spite of the monopoly of the
+treatment of disease by the priesthood, the Council
+of Rheims (1119) actually forbade monks to study
+medicine. This was followed by the Council of Beziers
+(1246) prohibiting Christians applying for relief to
+Jewish physicians, at a time when practically the only
+doctors of ability in Christendom were Jews. In 1243<!-- Page 71 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_71" id="Page_71">[71]</a></span>
+the Dominicans banished all books on medicine from
+their monasteries. Innocent <span class="ucsmcap">III.</span> forbade physicians
+practising except under the supervision of an ecclesiastic.
+Honorius (1222) forbade priests the study of
+medicine; and at the end of the thirteenth Century
+Boniface <span class="ucsmcap">VIII.</span> interdicted surgery as atheistical. The
+ill-treatment and opposition experienced by the great
+Vesalius at the hands of the Church, on account of his
+anatomical researches, is one of the saddest chapters
+in the history of science.<a name="FNanchor_40_40" id="FNanchor_40_40"></a><a href="#Footnote_40_40" class="fnanchor">[40]</a></p>
+
+<p>When the sight of bodily disease strengthened and
+confirmed belief in the supernatural, mental disease
+must have offered still more convincing evidence.
+Among uncivilised people we know that this is so.
+To quote again from the indispensable Tylor:&mdash;</p>
+
+<p>"The possessed man ... rationally finds a spiritual
+cause for his sufferings.... Especially when the mysterious
+unseen power throws him helpless on the
+ground, jerks and writhes him in convulsions, makes
+him leap upon the bystanders with a giant's strength
+and a wild beast's ferocity, impels him with distorted
+face and frantic gesture, and voice not his own nor
+seemingly even human, to pour forth wild incoherent
+raving, or with thought and eloquence beyond his
+sober faculties to command, to counsel, to foretell&mdash;such
+a one seems to those who watch him, and even
+to himself, to have become the mere instrument of a
+spirit which has seized him or entered into him, a
+possessing demon in whose personality the patient
+believes so implicitly that he often imagines a personal
+name for it, which it can declare when it speaks in<!-- Page 72 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_72" id="Page_72">[72]</a></span>
+its own voice and character through his organs of
+speech."<a name="FNanchor_41_41" id="FNanchor_41_41"></a><a href="#Footnote_41_41" class="fnanchor">[41]</a></p>
+
+<p>It was this conception of insanity, universally current
+in the uncivilised world, that was revived with
+fearful intensity in the early Christian Church, and
+which certainly served its purpose in intensifying the
+genuine belief in supernaturalism. Jesus had given
+His followers power to expel demons "In My name,"
+and this power of exorcism was one upon which the
+early Christians specially prided themselves. It is with
+unconscious sarcasm that Dean Trench puts the question,
+If one of the disciples "were to enter a madhouse
+now, how many of the sufferers there he might recognise
+as 'possessed'?"<a name="FNanchor_42_42" id="FNanchor_42_42"></a><a href="#Footnote_42_42" class="fnanchor">[42]</a> One may safely say that he would
+regard all as under the dominion of evil spirits. No
+other cause of insanity appears to have been recognised,
+and the Church devised the most elaborate
+formulæ for casting out demons. The assumed demoniac
+was prayed over, incensed, and evil-smelling
+drugs burned under his nose. A set form of objurgation
+then followed:&mdash;</p>
+
+<p>"Thou lustful and stupid one.... Thou lean sow,
+famine-stricken and most impure.... Thou wrinkled
+beast, of all beasts the most beastly.... Thou bestial
+and foolish drunkard.... Thou sooty spirit from
+Tartarus.... I cast thee down, O Tartarean boor, into
+the infernal kitchen.... Loathsome cobbler ...
+filthy sow ... envious crocodile.... Malodorous
+drudge ... swollen toad ... lousy swineherd," etc.
+etc.<a name="FNanchor_43_43" id="FNanchor_43_43"></a><a href="#Footnote_43_43" class="fnanchor">[43]</a></p>
+
+<p><!-- Page 73 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_73" id="Page_73">[73]</a></span>
+Then followed the exorcism proper:&mdash;</p>
+
+<p>"By the Apocalypse of Jesus Christ, which God
+hath given to make known unto His servants those
+things which are shortly to be ... I exorcise you, ye
+angels of untold perversity.... May all the devils
+that are thy foes rush forth upon thee and drag thee
+down to hell!... May the Holy One trample on thee
+and hang thee up in an infernal fork, as was done to
+the five kings of the Amorites!... May God set a
+nail to your skull, and pound it with a hammer as Jael
+did to Sisera!... May Sother break thy head and
+cut off thy hands, as was done to the cursed Dagon!...
+May God hang thee in a hellish yoke, as seven
+men were hanged by the sons of Saul!"<a name="FNanchor_44_44" id="FNanchor_44_44"></a><a href="#Footnote_44_44" class="fnanchor">[44]</a></p>
+
+<p>Marcus Aurelius mentions as one of his debts to
+the philosopher Diognetus that he had taught him
+"not to give credit to vulgar tales of prodigies and incantations,
+and evil spirits cast out by magicians or
+pretenders to sorcery, and such kind of impostors."<a name="FNanchor_45_45" id="FNanchor_45_45"></a><a href="#Footnote_45_45" class="fnanchor">[45]</a>
+What would have been the thoughts of the great
+emperor, could he have revisited the earth two centuries
+after his death and seen the then civilised world
+enveloped in a mental atmosphere in which such ideas
+as those above described could live?</p>
+
+<p>All over Europe for centuries lunatics were whipped,
+and otherwise ill-treated, in the hopes of expelling
+the demons that were troubling them. The
+seventy-second Canon of the Church of England still
+provides that no unlicensed person shall "cast out any
+devil or devils" under pain of penalties prescribed.
+A Bishop of Beauvais, in the fifteenth century, not
+only caused five devils to come out of one person, but<!-- Page 74 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_74" id="Page_74">[74]</a></span>
+actually induced them to sign a document promising
+not to molest this particular sufferer again. Tremendous,
+again, were the labours of the Jesuit Fathers of
+Vienna, who boasted that they had cast out no less
+than 12,652 'living devils.' Such arithmetical exactitude
+silences all hostile comment. In some parts
+of Scotland, as late as 1783, lunatics were left all night
+in the churchyard, with a holy bell over their heads.
+In Cornwall, St. Nun's pool was famous for the cure
+of lunatics. The poor devils were tied hand and foot
+and doused in the water until they were cured&mdash;or
+killed. Even the embraces of prostitutes, for some
+peculiar reason, were recommended as a cure for
+insanity.<a name="FNanchor_46_46" id="FNanchor_46_46"></a><a href="#Footnote_46_46" class="fnanchor">[46]</a> In 1788, in Bristol, a drunken epileptic,
+one George Larkins, was brought into church, and
+seven clergymen solemnly set themselves to the
+task of exorcising the possessing demon. Whereupon
+Satan swore 'by his infernal den'&mdash;an oath, says
+the chronicler, nowhere to be found but in Bunyan.
+Under date of October 25, 1739, John Wesley
+also relates how he was sent for and assisted at
+the expulsion of a demon from the body of a young girl.</p>
+
+<p>Of all nervous diseases that of epilepsy appears to
+have been most favourable to the encouragement of
+a belief in spiritual agency. One medical authority
+whose experience enables him to speak with a peculiar
+degree of authority has pointed out that with epilepsy
+there is often an exaltation of the religious
+sentiments.<a name="FNanchor_47_47" id="FNanchor_47_47"></a><a href="#Footnote_47_47" class="fnanchor">[47]</a>
+A more recent writer, Dr. Bernard Hollander,<!-- Page 75 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_75" id="Page_75">[75]</a></span>
+asserts that epileptics are "highly religious."<a name="FNanchor_48_48" id="FNanchor_48_48"></a><a href="#Footnote_48_48" class="fnanchor">[48]</a>
+Sir T. S. Clouston also points out that strong religious
+emotionalism often accompanies epilepsy.<a name="FNanchor_49_49" id="FNanchor_49_49"></a><a href="#Footnote_49_49" class="fnanchor">[49]</a> Another
+eminent physician, while pointing out that "a
+high degree of intelligence, amounting even to genius,
+has in some cases been associated with epilepsy,"
+observes that "the epileptic is apt to be influenced
+greatly by the mystical and awe-inspiring, and he is
+disposed to morbid piety."<a name="FNanchor_50_50" id="FNanchor_50_50"></a><a href="#Footnote_50_50" class="fnanchor">[50]</a></p>
+
+<p>Every medical man is acquainted with the close relation
+that exists between epilepsy and all kinds of
+hallucinations and delusions, and it would be more
+than surprising if in an environment where the religious
+interpretation of things is paramount, or with a
+patient of strong religious convictions, these delusions
+did not take a religious form. And of all nervous
+disorders epilepsy seems most favourable for producing
+this. Under its influence hallucination attacks
+every one of the senses with a varying degree of intensity.
+"The patient hears voices, and generally
+words expressing definite ideas, though he is often
+unable to properly refer them to any speaking person.
+Sometimes instead of external sounds or voices,
+the patient has a consciousness of an internal voice
+that may be as real to him as any external auditory
+perception. At first the voices may be indistinct, but
+upon constant repetition and evolution from sub-conscious
+thought they acquire intensity, eventually
+dominating the life of the individual."<a name="FNanchor_51_51" id="FNanchor_51_51"></a><a href="#Footnote_51_51" class="fnanchor">[51]</a> Dr. Ball says:
+<!-- Page 76 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_76" id="Page_76">[76]</a></span>
+"One patient perceives at the beginning of the attack
+a toothed wheel, in the middle of which there appears
+a human face making strange contortions; another
+sees a series of smiling landscapes. In some cases it
+is the sense of hearing which is affected;&mdash;the patient
+hears voices or strange noises. Others are warned
+by the sense of smell that the fit is going to commence."<a name="FNanchor_52_52" id="FNanchor_52_52"></a><a href="#Footnote_52_52" class="fnanchor">[52]</a></p>
+
+<p>Sometimes these hallucinations of sight and hearing
+are in curious contrast with each other. "Not
+rarely," says Dr. Conolly Norman, "a patient has
+visual hallucinations of a cheering kind&mdash;as of God
+or angels; yet his auditory hallucinations are full of
+blasphemy, mockery, and insult."<a name="FNanchor_53_53" id="FNanchor_53_53"></a><a href="#Footnote_53_53" class="fnanchor">[53]</a></p>
+
+<p>Dr. Maudsley thus describes the general symptoms
+accompanying an epileptic attack:&mdash;</p>
+
+<p>"The patient's senses are possessed with hallucinations,
+his ganglionic central cells being in a
+state of what may be called convulsive action; before
+the eyes are blood-red flames of fire, amidst
+which whoever happens to present himself appears
+as a devil or otherwise horribly transformed; the
+ears are filled with a terribly roaring noise, or resound
+with a voice imperatively commanding him
+to save himself; the smell is one of sulphurous
+stifling, and the desperate and violent actions are
+the convulsive reaction to such fearful hallucinations."<a name="FNanchor_54_54" id="FNanchor_54_54"></a><a href="#Footnote_54_54" class="fnanchor">[54]</a></p>
+
+<p>If anyone will bear in mind the numerous descriptions<!-- Page 77 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_77" id="Page_77">[77]</a></span>
+of religious visions, written in all good faith, and
+the behaviour of many an assumed 'inspired' character,
+he will have little difficulty in realising how
+easily, to a people unacquainted with the real character
+of such phenomena, epilepsy lends itself to a
+religious interpretation. It must also be borne in
+mind that the consequences of vivid hallucinations
+experienced during epilepsy do not always disappear
+with the attack to which they were originally
+due.</p>
+
+<p>It is certain that from the earliest times cases of
+what are undoubtedly epilepsy have been taken as
+positive indications of supernatural influence. "There
+is," says Emanuel Deutsch, "a peculiar something
+supposed to inhere in epilepsy. The Greeks called
+it a divine disease. Bacchantic and chorybantic furor
+were God-inspired stages. The Pythia uttered her
+oracles under the most distressing signs. Symptoms
+of convulsion were ever needed as a sign of the divine."<a name="FNanchor_55_55" id="FNanchor_55_55"></a><a href="#Footnote_55_55" class="fnanchor">[55]</a>
+Much of the evidence for the supernatural in
+the New Testament rests upon cases that are obviously
+pathological in character. A man brings his
+son to Jesus and describes how "ofttimes he falleth
+into the fire, and oft into the water" (Matt. xvii. 15),
+and in another place (Mark ix. 18) the same patient is
+described as having a dumb spirit, "and wheresoever
+he taketh him, he teareth him; and he foameth, and
+gnasheth with his teeth, and pineth away." The response
+to the father's appeal for help is an exorcism
+of the possessing spirit such as one meets with in all
+savage culture. Between possession by a malignant
+spirit and domination by a god, the difference is clearly<!-- Page 78 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_78" id="Page_78">[78]</a></span>
+one of terminology alone. And at the side of the
+New Testament case just cited one may place this
+account from Polynesia, written by a very competent
+observer, and a missionary:&mdash;</p>
+
+<p>"As soon as the god was supposed to have entered
+the priest, the latter became violently agitated and
+worked himself up to the highest pitch of apparent
+frenzy; the muscles of the limbs seemed convulsed,
+the body swelled, the countenance became terrific,
+the features distorted, the eyes wild and strained. In
+this state he often rolled on the earth, foaming at
+the mouth, as if labouring under the influence of the
+divinity by whom he was possessed, and in shrill cries,
+and often violent and indistinct sounds, revealed the
+will of the god."<a name="FNanchor_56_56" id="FNanchor_56_56"></a><a href="#Footnote_56_56" class="fnanchor">[56]</a></p>
+
+<p>Advancing to a higher culture stage than that
+indicated in the last passage, there is much evidence
+that Mohammed was subject to hallucinations,
+and many authorities have indicated epilepsy as
+their source. There is a tradition that someone
+who saw Mohammed while he was receiving one
+of his revelations observed that he seemed unconscious
+and was red in the face. Mohammed himself
+said:&mdash;</p>
+
+<p>"Inspiration descendeth upon me in two ways.
+Sometimes Gabriel cometh and communicateth the
+revelation unto me, as one man unto another, and this
+is easy; at other times it affecteth me like the ringing
+of a bell, penetrating my very heart, and rending
+me as it were in pieces; and this it is which grievously
+afflicteth me."</p>
+
+<p>Emanuel Deutsch, although, in a passage already<!-- Page 79 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_79" id="Page_79">[79]</a></span>
+cited, recognising the religious significance
+attached to epilepsy, has the following curious comment:&mdash;</p>
+
+<p>"Mohammed was epileptic; and vast ingenuity
+and medical knowledge have been lavished upon this
+point as explanatory of Mohammed's mission and
+success. We, for our own part, do not think that epilepsy
+ever made a man appear a prophet to himself
+or even to the people of the East; or, for the matter of
+that, inspired him with the like heart-moving words
+and glorious pictures. Quite the contrary. It was
+taken as a sign of demons within&mdash;demons, 'Devs,'
+devils to whom all manner of diseases were ascribed
+throughout the antique world."</p>
+
+<p>This seems very largely to miss the point at issue.
+Of course, no one would claim that Mohammed's success
+was due to epilepsy, or even that the very severe
+forms of epilepsy were favourable to inducing a conviction
+of revelation. But the disease assumes various
+forms, and in some cases it is expressed in the form
+of a period of mental excitement and general irritability.
+All that is claimed is that, given the complaint
+in its less severe forms in one with whom religious beliefs
+are strong, there are present all the conditions
+for attributing the resulting hallucinations to personal
+revelation or ecstatic vision. And it is also true that
+while some patients after emerging from a fit of epilepsy
+are in a dazed or confused condition, others have
+a very clear recollection of all they have seen and
+heard. Mohammed simply took the current explanation
+of cases of nervous derangement, and being a
+man of strong religious feeling, naturally gave his visions
+a religious interpretation. All the rest has to be<!-- Page 80 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_80" id="Page_80">[80]</a></span>
+explained in terms of the innate genius of the man
+and of the circumstances of his time.</p>
+
+<p>A similar case to the above is that of Emanuel
+Swedenborg. His followers naturally resent the ascription
+of his visions and voices to a pathologic origin,
+and point to his pronounced mental ability. And
+certainly no one who is at all acquainted with the
+writings of Swedenborg will question his great mental
+power, amounting at times to positive genius. But
+here, again, we have strong religious conviction in
+alliance with pathological conditions. Swedenborg's
+communications with celestial beings were of a more
+frequent and more ordered character than Mohammed's,
+but there is the same general likeness between
+them. Of his first revelation he writes:&mdash;</p>
+
+<p>"At ten o'clock I lay down in bed and was somewhat
+better; half an hour after I heard a clamour
+under my head; I thought that then the tempter went
+away; immediately there came over me a rigor so
+strong from the head and the whole body, with some
+din, and this several times. I found that something
+holy was over me. I thereupon fell asleep, and at about
+twelve, one, or two o'clock in the night there came over
+me so strong a shivering from head to foot, as if many
+winds rushed together, which shook me, was indescribable,
+and prostrated me upon my face. Then, while I
+was prostrated, I was in a moment quite awake, and saw
+that I was cast down, and wondered what it meant.
+And I spoke as if I was awake, but found that the
+word was put into my mouth, and I said, 'Omnipotent
+Jesus Christ, as of Thy great grace Thou condescendest to
+come to so great a sinner, make me worthy
+of this grace!' I held my hands together and prayed,<!-- Page 81 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_81" id="Page_81">[81]</a></span>
+and then came a hand which squeezed my hands
+hard; immediately thereupon I continued in prayer."<a name="FNanchor_57_57" id="FNanchor_57_57"></a><a href="#Footnote_57_57" class="fnanchor">[57]</a></p>
+
+<p>Swedenborg confessed to repeated walks and talks
+with celestial visitants, and, of course, all thought of
+imposture must be put on one side. What one has to
+consider is whether we are to accept these experiences
+as hallucinations or not. On the one side no further evidence
+seems possible than the profound faith of the
+man himself, his recognised mental ability, and the belief
+of his followers. And against this it must be urged
+that the most complete honesty is no guarantee against
+self-deception, while ability and even genius are not
+at all incompatible with a pathologic strain. And in
+addition it must be borne in mind that these hallucinations
+are, after all, part of a very large class. Men of
+very little ability and influence experience substantially
+the same visions; they occur all over the world,
+under all conditions of culture, and always express
+the personal idiosyncrasies of the subject and reflect
+the character of his social environment. One may safely
+say that had Swedenborg lived a century later, while
+he might still have gone through the same mental and
+physical experiences, he himself would have given a
+very different interpretation of them.</p>
+
+<p>St. Paul, Professor James points out, "certainly had
+once an epileptoid, if not an epileptic seizure." One
+needs to add to this that the seizure occurred at the one
+critical moment of his life which eventuated in his conversion
+from Judaism to Christianity. Mary Magdalene,
+the first who brought tidings of the resurrection,<!-- Page 82 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_82" id="Page_82">[82]</a></span>
+had been delivered of seven devils. Luther's religious
+opinions were, of course, quite apart from his physical
+state, sound or unsound. Still, even with him the reality
+of supernatural intercourse became intensely vivid
+as a result of nervous affections. His latest biographer
+points out that as a youth while in the monastery he
+was seized with something that might well have been
+an epileptic fit, and that although there is no record
+of a return of this, he did suffer from ordinary fits of
+fainting.<a name="FNanchor_58_58" id="FNanchor_58_58"></a><a href="#Footnote_58_58" class="fnanchor">[58]</a> He confesses to have been much troubled,
+at twenty-two years of age, with giddiness and noises
+in the ear, which he attributed to the devil. And right
+through his life he attributed similar experiences to
+the same source. Bunyan confesses that even during
+childhood the Lord "did scare and affright me with
+fearful dreams, and did terrify me with dreadful
+visions." George Fox, founder of the Society of
+Friends, describes how, in the middle of winter, when
+approaching Lichfield, "the Word of the Lord was
+like a fire in me," and as he went through the town,
+"there seemed to me to be a channel of blood running
+down the streets, and the market-place appeared like
+a pool of blood." Reflecting on the meaning of the
+vision, he remembered that, "In the Emperor Diocletian's
+time a thousand Christians were martyred at
+Lichfield. So I was to go without my shoes through
+the channel of their blood in the market-place, that I
+might raise up the blood of these martyrs which had
+been shed above a thousand years before."<a name="FNanchor_59_59" id="FNanchor_59_59"></a><a href="#Footnote_59_59" class="fnanchor">[59]</a></p>
+
+<p><!-- Page 83 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_83" id="Page_83">[83]</a></span>
+In none of these cases could it be fairly claimed that
+the religious conviction, as such, was the consequence
+of the hallucinations experienced. But it can scarcely
+be questioned that these served to strengthen it to an
+enormous extent. These trances, ecstasies, visions,
+were accepted by the subjects as proofs of their 'divine
+mission,' and were so accepted by multitudes of their
+followers. In their absence religion would most probably
+have failed to be the fiercely irruptive force in life
+that it has been. The religious idea has, so to speak
+given hallucination a standing and an authority in life
+it would not have possessed in its absence. In the case
+of men of ordinary capacity these visions possess little
+authority. But in the case of men of extraordinary
+capacity, men like Luther, Mohammed, Fox, Swedenborg,&mdash;who
+must in any case have stood superior to
+their fellows,&mdash;these hallucinations are then under
+favouring social conditions invested with enormous
+authority. And there is no doubt about the fact that
+religious leaders have been peculiarly subject to these
+psychical variations. This is pointed out by Professor
+James in the following passage:&mdash;</p>
+
+<p>"Even more perhaps than other kinds of genius,
+religious leaders have been subject to abnormal psychical
+visitations. Invariably they have been creatures
+of exalted emotional sensibility. Often they have led
+a discordant inner life, and had melancholy during a
+part of their career. They have known no measure,
+been liable to obsessions and fixed ideas; and frequently
+they have fallen into trances, heard voices, seen
+visions, and presented all sorts of peculiarities which
+are ordinarily classed as pathological. Often, moreover,
+these pathological features in their career have<!-- Page 84 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_84" id="Page_84">[84]</a></span>
+helped to give them their religious authority and influence."<a name="FNanchor_60_60" id="FNanchor_60_60"></a><a href="#Footnote_60_60" class="fnanchor">[60]</a></p>
+
+<p>Well, in what way are we to discriminate between
+the visions of a religious person, admittedly of an abnormal
+disposition, subject to fits of melancholy, etc.,
+and presenting "all sorts of peculiarities ordinarily
+classed as pathological," and the hallucinations of an
+admittedly pathologic subject? Why should the ordinary
+classification break down at this point? Dr.
+Granger, dealing with this aspect of the question, says:
+"The religious genius is not proved to be morbid by
+the extent to which he diverges from the average
+type."<a name="FNanchor_61_61" id="FNanchor_61_61"></a><a href="#Footnote_61_61" class="fnanchor">[61]</a> Quite so, genius <em>must</em> depart from the average
+type in order to be genius. But the statement is quite
+beside the point at issue. It is not a mere divergence
+from the average type that warrants one in assuming
+that much passing for divine illumination owes its
+origin to pathological conditions, but the fact that it is
+possible to affiliate certain cases of religious exaltation
+with these conditions. Hallucinations are common to
+all forms of ecstasy, and ecstasy is not confined to religion.
+Given a one-sided mental activity, intense concentration
+on one or a few analogous ideas, combined
+with a lowered nervous sensibility, and we have all
+the conditions present favourable to hallucination.<a name="FNanchor_62_62" id="FNanchor_62_62"></a><a href="#Footnote_62_62" class="fnanchor">[62]</a>
+These hallucinations may occur in connection with
+any topic that engrosses the subject's mind. In every
+other direction their true nature is recognised and admitted.
+In connection with religious belief alone, it is
+held that they bring the subject into touch with a<!-- Page 85 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_85" id="Page_85">[85]</a></span>
+supersensual world of reality. What possible scientific
+warranty is there for any such distinction?</p>
+
+<p>Let us take, as an example, one of James's own
+cases, which he admits is 'distinctly pathological,'
+but without allowing this admission to disturb his
+general conclusion. The case is that of Suso, a famous
+fourteenth-century mystic. As a young man he wore
+a hair shirt and an iron chain next the skin. Later he
+had made a leathern garment studded with one hundred
+and fifty nails, points inward. The garment was
+made very tight, and he used it to sleep in. To prevent
+himself throwing it off during sleep he procured a
+pair of leather gloves studded with tacks, so that if he
+attempted to get rid of the dress the tacks would penetrate
+his flesh. Next he had made a wooden cross,
+with thirty protruding nails, to emulate the sufferings
+of Jesus. He procured an old door to sleep on. In winter
+he suffered from the frost. His feet were full of
+sores, his legs became dropsical, his knees bloody and
+seared, his loins covered with scars, his hands tremulous.
+During twenty years he fed scantily upon the
+coarsest food, slept in the most uncomfortable places,
+and during the whole of the time never took a bath.
+No wonder that after his fortieth year he was favoured
+with a series of visions from God. Would not one
+be surprised if any other result than this had been
+achieved? And Suso's case is only one of thousands,
+many of not so extreme a character, others quite as
+bad.</p>
+
+<p>In the case of Catherine of Sienna the austerities began
+earlier than with Suso. As a child she flogged herself,
+and was favoured with visions before she reached
+her teens. Santa Teresa, as a young woman, prayed<!-- Page 86 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_86" id="Page_86">[86]</a></span>
+to God to send her an illness, and describes how she
+remained for days in a trance, during which time her
+tongue was bitten in many places. She describes how,
+during these trances, her body became to her light,
+and she remained rigid. "It was altogether impossible
+for me to hinder it; for my world would be carried
+absolutely away, and ordinarily even my head,
+as it were, after it."<a name="FNanchor_63_63" id="FNanchor_63_63"></a><a href="#Footnote_63_63" class="fnanchor">[63]</a> These are typical examples from
+a very large number of cases. The annals of monasticism
+are filled with accounts of self-inflicted tortures,
+with the one end in view, and in serious belief that their
+experiences brought them into touch with a reality
+denied them under normal conditions. The practice
+not only quickened their own sense of the reality of
+religion, it served the same purpose for thousands of
+others pursuing the course of ordinary social existence.
+"Religious teachers," says Francis Galton, "by
+enforcing celibacy, fasting, and solitude, have done
+their best towards making men mad, and they have
+always largely succeeded in inducing morbid mental
+conditions among their followers."<a name="FNanchor_64_64" id="FNanchor_64_64"></a><a href="#Footnote_64_64" class="fnanchor">[64]</a></p>
+
+<p>The phenomenon is thus continuous and, in its
+essentials, unchanging. From the most primitive
+times there has been a close association between the
+belief in divine illumination and spiritual intercourse,
+and mental states that are unquestionably pathological.
+Following this there has been a more or less deliberate
+cultivation of these states in the desire to
+renew communion with a spiritual world hidden
+from man's normal senses. In this there need be no
+deliberate imposture. When imposture does occur, it<!-- Page 87 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_87" id="Page_87">[87]</a></span>
+would be at a later culture stage. At the beginning
+there is nothing but misunderstanding. First in order
+of time comes the crude animistic interpretation of almost
+every phase of human activity. So far as primitive
+life is concerned, the evidence of this is simply
+overwhelming. Next, as Tylor has pointed out, from
+believing that the occurrence of certain mental states
+provides the conditions of communication with an unseen
+world to the deliberate creation of those states is
+a natural and an easy step. There is thus set on foot a
+deliberate culture of the supernatural. This cultivation
+of abnormal states of mind once initiated persists,
+now in one form, now in another, but is substantially
+the same throughout. Whether we are dealing with
+the crude practices of the savage, the less crude, but
+still obvious methods of solitary living and bodily
+maceration of the medieval monk, or the morbid and
+unhealthy dwelling upon a single idea which remains
+one of the conditions of 'illumination' to-day, we are
+confronted with the same thing. In every case the object&mdash;unconscious,
+maybe&mdash;is the provision of conditions
+that render hallucination and illusion a practical
+certainty. In connection with non-religious matters
+the unhealthiness of mind, distortion of vision, and unreliability
+of judgment induced by methods akin to
+those named is now generally recognised. We have
+yet to see the same thing as generally recognised in
+connection with religious beliefs. We see in addition
+that a great many of those experiences, once accepted
+as clear evidence of supernatural communication, are
+more properly explainable in terms of nervous derangement.
+In such cases there is neither celestial
+illumination nor diabolic communion, neither&mdash;to use<!-- Page 88 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_88" id="Page_88">[88]</a></span>
+Maudsley's phrase&mdash;theolepsy nor diabolepsy, only
+psycholepsy. In the present chapter we have been
+striving to apply this principle to a little wider field
+than is usual. We have been studying the misinterpretation,
+in terms of religion, of abnormal or pathological
+states of mind, and observing how far these
+have contributed to building up and perpetuating a
+conviction of the possibility of supernatural intercourse.
+We have yet to trace the same principle of misinterpretation
+in the sexual and social life of mankind.</p>
+
+<div class="footnotes">
+<h3>Footnotes:<br />
+<span class="skip">[<a href="#Page_89">Skip</a>]</span>
+</h3>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_20_20" id="Footnote_20_20"></a><a href="#FNanchor_20_20"><span class="label">[20]</span></a> <cite>A Psychological Study of Religion</cite>, p. 234.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_21_21" id="Footnote_21_21"></a><a href="#FNanchor_21_21"><span class="label">[21]</span></a> <cite>Primitive Culture</cite>, i. p. 501.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_22_22" id="Footnote_22_22"></a><a href="#FNanchor_22_22"><span class="label">[22]</span></a> <cite>Primitive Culture</cite>, ii. p. 410.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_23_23" id="Footnote_23_23"></a><a href="#FNanchor_23_23"><span class="label">[23]</span></a> Some very curious information concerning the use of this
+and other fungi is given by Dr. J. G. Bourke in his <cite>Scatologic
+Rites</cite>, pp. 69-75.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_24_24" id="Footnote_24_24"></a><a href="#FNanchor_24_24"><span class="label">[24]</span></a> Cited by Bourke, p. 90.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_25_25" id="Footnote_25_25"></a><a href="#FNanchor_25_25"><span class="label">[25]</span></a> Tylor, ii. pp. 417-9.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_26_26" id="Footnote_26_26"></a><a href="#FNanchor_26_26"><span class="label">[26]</span></a> For a clear account of the effects of hemp preparations, calculated
+to produce a feeling of religious ecstasy, the reader should
+consult Dr. Hale White's <cite>Text-Book of Pharmacology</cite>, 1901,
+pp. 318-22. The effects of opium are thus described by another
+writer: "Opium, in those who are capable of stimulation by it,
+gives rise to a pleasurable feeling, something like that which is
+produced by wine in not excessive doses; but the excitement derived
+from it, instead of tending to some highest point, remains
+stationary for hours, and in place of the slight incoherence of
+thought always present in those who are exhilarated with wine,
+the most perfect harmony is established among all the conceptions.
+There is an extraordinary stimulation of the pure intellect,
+and not merely of the power of expression. The opium-eater
+seems to have had the eyes of his spirit opened, to have acquired
+a gift of insight into things that to mere mortals are inexplicable.
+The most remote parts of consciousness come into clear light;
+the finer shades of personality, those that had been unknown
+even to the opium-eater himself, are brought into view and become
+distinct; the smallest details of the things around take new
+significance, and are seen to be profoundly important; their
+analogies with other phenomena of nature are revealed. It is
+the same with the moral as with the intellectual being; that also
+becomes indefinitely exalted. An absolute balance of the faculties
+seems to have been attained. The whole man <em>is</em> what in his
+ordinary state he only tends to be; he has realised the highest
+perfection of which he is capable; only his 'best self' now remains;
+his lower self has been left behind without need of the
+purgatorial fire of contention with the environment to destroy
+it."&mdash;T. Whittaker, <cite>Essays and Notices, Psychological and Philosophical</cite>,
+p. 367.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_27_27" id="Footnote_27_27"></a><a href="#FNanchor_27_27"><span class="label">[27]</span></a> <cite>Anthropology</cite>, p. 296.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_28_28" id="Footnote_28_28"></a><a href="#FNanchor_28_28"><span class="label">[28]</span></a> For a general account of religious dances, see Major-General
+Forlong's <cite>Faiths of Man</cite>, art. "Dancing."</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_29_29" id="Footnote_29_29"></a><a href="#FNanchor_29_29"><span class="label">[29]</span></a> Catlin, <cite>North American Indians</cite>, i. p. 36.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_30_30" id="Footnote_30_30"></a><a href="#FNanchor_30_30"><span class="label">[30]</span></a> Cited by Frazer, <cite>Taboo and the Perils of the Soul</cite>, p. 161.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_31_31" id="Footnote_31_31"></a><a href="#FNanchor_31_31"><span class="label">[31]</span></a> Turner's <cite>Samoa</cite>, p. 345-6.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_32_32" id="Footnote_32_32"></a><a href="#FNanchor_32_32"><span class="label">[32]</span></a> Brady, <cite>Clavis Calendaria</cite>, vol. i. p. 223.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_33_33" id="Footnote_33_33"></a><a href="#FNanchor_33_33"><span class="label">[33]</span></a> Cited by Tylor, <cite>Primitive Culture</cite>, ii. pp. 412-3.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_34_34" id="Footnote_34_34"></a><a href="#FNanchor_34_34"><span class="label">[34]</span></a> <cite>Natural Causes and Supernatural Seemings</cite>, p. 277.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_35_35" id="Footnote_35_35"></a><a href="#FNanchor_35_35"><span class="label">[35]</span></a> A very good account of the methods followed in these places
+will be found in Miss Hamilton's <cite>Incubation, or the Cure of Diseases
+in Pagan Temples and Christian Churches</cite>, 1906.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_36_36" id="Footnote_36_36"></a><a href="#FNanchor_36_36"><span class="label">[36]</span></a> Grote, <cite>History of Greece</cite>, vol. i. p. 359 and vol. v. p. 232.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_37_37" id="Footnote_37_37"></a><a href="#FNanchor_37_37"><span class="label">[37]</span></a> "The ancient Egyptians and Greeks," says Dr. Maudsley,
+"used humane and rational methods of treatment; it was only after
+the Christian doctrine of possession by devils had taken hold
+of the minds of men that the worst sort of treatment, of which
+history gives account, came into force" (<cite>Pathology of Mind</cite>, p.
+523). For a general account of Egyptian medicine see the chapter
+on Egypt in Dr. Berdoe's <cite>Origin and Growth of the Healing
+Art</cite>.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_38_38" id="Footnote_38_38"></a><a href="#FNanchor_38_38"><span class="label">[38]</span></a> Meryon, <cite>The History of Medicine</cite>, vol. i. p. 67.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_39_39" id="Footnote_39_39"></a><a href="#FNanchor_39_39"><span class="label">[39]</span></a> <cite>Ibid.</cite>, vol. i. p. 104.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_40_40" id="Footnote_40_40"></a><a href="#FNanchor_40_40"><span class="label">[40]</span></a> See Sir Michael Foster's <cite>Lectures on the History of Physiology</cite>,
+chap. i.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_41_41" id="Footnote_41_41"></a><a href="#FNanchor_41_41"><span class="label">[41]</span></a> <cite>Primitive Culture</cite>, ii. 124.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_42_42" id="Footnote_42_42"></a><a href="#FNanchor_42_42"><span class="label">[42]</span></a> <cite>On the Miracles</cite>, p. 168.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_43_43" id="Footnote_43_43"></a><a href="#FNanchor_43_43"><span class="label">[43]</span></a> Cited by White, who gives original authorities, <cite>Warfare
+of Science with Theology</cite>, ii. 107.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_44_44" id="Footnote_44_44"></a><a href="#FNanchor_44_44"><span class="label">[44]</span></a> White, ii. 108.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_45_45" id="Footnote_45_45"></a><a href="#FNanchor_45_45"><span class="label">[45]</span></a> <cite>Meditations</cite>, bk. i.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_46_46" id="Footnote_46_46"></a><a href="#FNanchor_46_46"><span class="label">[46]</span></a> Fort's <cite>Medical Economy during the Middle Ages</cite>, p. 345.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_47_47" id="Footnote_47_47"></a><a href="#FNanchor_47_47"><span class="label">[47]</span></a> Dr. Howden, Medical Superintendent of the Montrose
+Lunatic Asylum, in <cite>Journal of Mental Science</cite>, 1873.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_48_48" id="Footnote_48_48"></a><a href="#FNanchor_48_48"><span class="label">[48]</span></a> <cite>First Signs of Insanity</cite>, p. 293.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_49_49" id="Footnote_49_49"></a><a href="#FNanchor_49_49"><span class="label">[49]</span></a> <cite>Clinical Lectures on
+Mental Diseases</cite>, p. 428. The whole of chapter xi. is very pertinent.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_50_50" id="Footnote_50_50"></a><a href="#FNanchor_50_50"><span class="label">[50]</span></a> Dr. R. Jones, in Allbutt's <cite>System of Medicine</cite>, vol.
+viii. p. 335</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_51_51" id="Footnote_51_51"></a><a href="#FNanchor_51_51"><span class="label">[51]</span></a> Dr. Hollander, <cite>First Signs of Insanity</cite>, pp. 64-5.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_52_52" id="Footnote_52_52"></a><a href="#FNanchor_52_52"><span class="label">[52]</span></a> Cited by Ireland, <cite>The Blot on the Brain</cite>, p. 39.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_53_53" id="Footnote_53_53"></a><a href="#FNanchor_53_53"><span class="label">[53]</span></a> Allbutt's
+<cite>System of Medicine</cite>, viii. 395.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_54_54" id="Footnote_54_54"></a><a href="#FNanchor_54_54"><span class="label">[54]</span></a> <cite>Physiology of Mind</cite>,
+p. 251. See also Dr. Mercier's <cite>The Nervous System and the
+Mind</cite>, p. 55.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_55_55" id="Footnote_55_55"></a><a href="#FNanchor_55_55"><span class="label">[55]</span></a> <cite>Literary Remains</cite>, p. 83.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_56_56" id="Footnote_56_56"></a><a href="#FNanchor_56_56"><span class="label">[56]</span></a> W. Ellis, <cite>Polynesian Researches</cite>, ii. 235-6.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_57_57" id="Footnote_57_57"></a><a href="#FNanchor_57_57"><span class="label">[57]</span></a> Dr. H. Maudsley has gone fully into the case of Swedenborg
+in an article in the <cite>Journal of Mental Science</cite> for July and October
+1869, since reprinted in his <cite>Body and Mind</cite>.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_58_58" id="Footnote_58_58"></a><a href="#FNanchor_58_58"><span class="label">[58]</span></a> See <cite>Luther</cite>, by H. Grisar, 1913, vol. i. pp. 16-7.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_59_59" id="Footnote_59_59"></a><a href="#FNanchor_59_59"><span class="label">[59]</span></a> For other cases, and a general account of the relations between
+pathologic states and religious delusion, see Lombroso,
+<cite>Man of Genius</cite>, chap. iv. pt. iii.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_60_60" id="Footnote_60_60"></a><a href="#FNanchor_60_60"><span class="label">[60]</span></a> <cite>Varieties of Religious Experience</cite>, pp. 6-7.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_61_61" id="Footnote_61_61"></a><a href="#FNanchor_61_61"><span class="label">[61]</span></a> <cite>The Soul
+of a Christian</cite>, p. 13.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_62_62" id="Footnote_62_62"></a><a href="#FNanchor_62_62"><span class="label">[62]</span></a> See Parish's <cite>Hallucinations and
+Illusions</cite>, pp. 38-9.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_63_63" id="Footnote_63_63"></a><a href="#FNanchor_63_63"><span class="label">[63]</span></a> <cite>Saint Teresa</cite>, by H. Joly, pp. 25, 26, and 58.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_64_64" id="Footnote_64_64"></a><a href="#FNanchor_64_64"><span class="label">[64]</span></a> <cite>Inquiries into Human Faculty</cite>, 1883, p. 68.</p></div>
+</div>
+
+<p><!-- Page 89 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_89" id="Page_89">[89]</a></span></p>
+<h2>CHAPTER <span class="cgap">FOUR</span><br />
+SEX &amp; RELIGION IN PRIMITIVE LIFE</h2>
+
+<p>The connection between sexual
+feeling and religious belief is ancient, intimate, and
+sustained. It has impressed itself on many observers
+who have approached the subject from widely different
+points of view. Some have treated the connection
+as purely accidental, and as having no more than a
+mere historical interest. Others have used it as illustrating
+the way in which so sacred a subject as religion
+may suffer degradation in degenerate hands.
+Others of a more scientific temper have dealt with the
+relations between sexualism and religion as illustrations
+of a mere perversion. A deal may be said in
+favour of this last point of view. We know, as a matter
+of fact, that such cases of perversion do exist, in what
+form and to what extent will be discussed later. We
+are also aware that strong feeling which cannot find
+vent in one direction will secure expression in another.
+The annals of Roman Catholicism contain accounts
+of numerous persons who have sought refuge
+in a monastery or a nunnery as the result of disappointment
+in love, and it would be foolish to conclude
+that strong amorous feelings are annihilated because
+there is a change in the object to which they are directed.
+Paul was not a different man from the Saul of
+pre-conversion days, but the same person with his
+energies directed into a new channel. Protestantism
+is without the obvious outlets for unsatisfied sexual
+feeling such as is provided by Roman Catholicism,
+but it provides other outlets. Religious service as a
+whole remains, and intense religious devotion may
+very often owe its origin to sources undreamt of by
+the devotee.</p>
+
+<p><!-- Page 90 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_90" id="Page_90">[90]</a></span>
+Between religious beliefs and sexual feelings the
+connection is, however, wider and deeper, than the
+relation expressed by mere perversion. Neither is the
+relation one of mere accident. An examination of the
+facts in the light of adequate scientific knowledge,
+combined with a due perception of primitive human
+psychology and sociology, have shown that the two
+things are united at their source. One eminent medical
+writer asserts that "in a certain sense, the history
+of religion can be regarded as a peculiar mode of manifestation
+of the human sexual instinct."<a name="FNanchor_65_65" id="FNanchor_65_65"></a><a href="#Footnote_65_65" class="fnanchor">[65]</a> Another
+writer substantially endorses this by the remark that
+"in a certain sense the religious life is an irradiation
+of the reproductive instinct."<a name="FNanchor_66_66" id="FNanchor_66_66"></a><a href="#Footnote_66_66" class="fnanchor">[66]</a> How easily one glides
+into the other very little observation of life or study
+of history will show. The language of devotion and of
+amatory passion is often identical, and seems to serve
+equally well for either purpose. The significance of
+this fact is often obscured by our having etherealised
+the conception of love, and so losing sight of its physiological
+basis. And, having hidden it from sight,
+we, not unnaturally, fail to give it due consideration.
+This is, in its way, a fatal blunder. The sex life of man
+and woman is too large a fact and too pervasive a force
+to be ignored with safety. Ignorance combined with
+prudery conspires to perpetuate what ignorance alone
+began; and the sex life, in both its normal and abnormal
+manifestations, has been perpetually exploited
+in the interests of supernaturalism.</p>
+
+<p>The evidence that may be adduced in favour of
+what has been said is vast, and covers a wide range.<!-- Page 91 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_91" id="Page_91">[91]</a></span>
+Historically it covers such facts as the relations between
+primitive religious beliefs and the sexual life,
+and the multiplication of sects of a markedly erotic
+character during periods of religious enthusiasm.
+"Even the most casual students of religion," says Professor
+G. B. Cutten, "must have observed an apparently intimate
+connection between religious and sexual
+emotions, and not a few have read with amazement
+the abnormal cults which have had the sexual
+element as a foundation for their denominational dissent."<a name="FNanchor_67_67" id="FNanchor_67_67"></a><a href="#Footnote_67_67" class="fnanchor">[67]</a>
+A phenomenon so striking as to force itself on
+the notice of the most 'casual students' raises the presumption
+that the relation between the two sets of
+facts is rather more than that of 'apparent' intimacy.
+When in the course of history two things appear together
+over and over again, one is surely justified in
+assuming that there is some underlying principle responsible
+for the association. The search for this principle
+leads to the next class of evidence&mdash;the psychological.
+In this we are concerned with the relation
+between the sexual feelings and the religious idea, an
+association not always expressed through the comparatively
+harmless medium of language. And, finally,
+we have the evidence derived from pathology,
+where we are able to discern a perverted sexuality
+masquerading as religious fervour.</p>
+
+<p>In a previous chapter there has been pointed out
+the kind of mental environment in which primitive
+man moves. As one of the earliest forms of systematised
+thinking, religion dominates all other forms of
+mental activity. In savage culture there is hardly a
+single event into which religious considerations do<!-- Page 92 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_92" id="Page_92">[92]</a></span>
+not enter. The savage does not merely believe in a
+supernatural world, he lives in it; it is as real to him as
+anything around him, and far more potent in its action.
+Above all, it is important to bear in mind that although
+one is compelled to speak of the natural and the
+supernatural when dealing with early beliefs, no such
+separation is present to the primitive intelligence.
+The division between the natural and the supernatural
+in the external world is the reflection of a corresponding
+division in the world of thought, and this
+arises only at a subsequent stage. What is afterwards
+recognised as the supernatural pervades everything.
+In a sense it is everything, since most of what occurs
+is by the agency or connivance of animistic
+forces.</p>
+
+<p>In such a world, where even the ordinary events of
+life have a supernatural significance, the strange and
+sometimes terrifying phenomena of sexual life carry
+peculiarly strong evidences of supernatural activity.
+Events which are to the modern mind the most obvious
+consequences of sex life are to the primitive
+mind proofs of supernatural or ghostly agency. Nothing,
+for example, would appear less open to misconception
+than the connection between sexual relations
+and the birth of children. Yet, on this head, Mr. Sidney
+Hartland has produced a mass of evidence, gathered
+from all parts of the world, and leading to the
+conclusion that in the most primitive stages of human
+culture, conception and birth are ascribed to direct
+supernatural influence. Setting out from a study of the
+world-wide vogue of the belief in supernatural birth&mdash;contained
+in the author's earlier work, <cite>The Legend of
+Perseus</cite>&mdash;Mr. Hartland finds in this a survival of a<!-- Page 93 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_93" id="Page_93">[93]</a></span>
+culture stage in which all birth is believed to be supernatural.
+Survivals of this belief that birth is a phenomenon
+independent of the union of the sexes are found
+in the existence of numerous semi-magical devices to
+obtain children, still practised in many parts of Europe,
+and which were practised on a much more extensive
+scale during the medieval period; in the ignorance
+of man concerning physiological functions in
+general, the existence of Motherright which appears
+to have universally antedated Fatherright&mdash;the origin
+of which he traces to economic causes, and to the animistic
+nature of primitive beliefs in general.<a name="FNanchor_68_68" id="FNanchor_68_68"></a><a href="#Footnote_68_68" class="fnanchor">[68]</a></p>
+
+<p>Such a conclusion is not without verification from
+the beliefs of existing savages. The Bahau of Central
+Borneo have no notion of the real duration of pregnancy,
+and date its commencement only from the
+time of its becoming visible. The Niol-Niol of Dampier
+Land in North-Western Australia hold birth to
+be independent of sexual intercourse. It is engendered
+by a pre-existing spirit through the agency of a
+medicine man. The North Queenslanders have a similar
+belief. They believe a child to be sent in answer to
+the husband's prayer as a punishment to his wife
+when he is vexed with her. On the Proserpine River
+the Blacks believe that a child is the gift of a supernatural
+being called Kunya. In South Queensland
+the Euahlayi believe that spirits congregate at certain
+spots and pounce on passing women, and so are born.
+On the Slave Coast of West Africa the Awunas say
+that a child derives the lower jaw from the mother; all
+the rest comes from the spirits. Among these people
+and others that might be named paternity exists in<!-- Page 94 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_94" id="Page_94">[94]</a></span>
+name, but it implies something entirely different to
+what it afterwards connotes. Mr. Hartland gives numerous
+instances of this curious fact, and points out that
+"the attention of mankind would not be early or easily
+fastened upon the procreative process. It is lengthy,
+extending over months during which the observer's
+attention would be inevitably diverted by a variety
+of objects, most of them of far more pressing import....
+The sexual passion would be gratified instinctively
+without any thought of the consequences, and
+in an overwhelming proportion of cases without the
+consequence of pregnancy at all. When that consequence
+occurred it would not be visible for weeks or
+months after the act which produced it. A hundred
+other events might have taken place in the interval
+which would be likely to be credited with the result
+by one wholly ignorant of natural laws."</p>
+
+<p>There seems, therefore, fair grounds for Mr. Hartland's
+conclusion that:&mdash;</p>
+
+<p>"for generations and æons the truth that a child is only
+born in consequence of an act of sexual union, that the
+birth of a child is the natural consequence of such an
+act performed in favouring circumstances, and that
+every child must be the result of such an act and of no
+other cause, was not realised by mankind, that down
+to the present day it is imperfectly realised by some
+peoples, and that there are still others among whom
+it is unknown."</p>
+
+<p>This, however, is but one of the ways in which supernatural
+beliefs become associated with sexual phenomena.
+In truth, there is not a stage of any importance
+in the sexual life of men and women where the same
+association does not transpire. There is, for example,<!-- Page 95 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_95" id="Page_95">[95]</a></span>
+the important phenomenon of puberty&mdash;important
+from both a physiological and sociological point of
+view. Pubic ceremonies of some kind are found all
+over the world, and in all forms, from those current
+amongst savages up to the contemporary practice of
+confirmation in the Christian Church. At all stages
+the period of puberty is the time of initiation. With
+uncivilised peoples a very general rule is the separation
+of the sexes, with fasting. Mr. Stanley Hall in his elaborate
+work on <cite>Adolescence</cite> has dealt very exhaustively
+with these customs, with which we shall be more
+closely concerned when we come to deal with the subject
+of conversion. At present it is only necessary to
+point out that the governing idea is that at puberty
+the boy and the girl are brought into special relationship
+with the tribal spirits, the proof of which relationship
+lies in the sexual functions originated.</p>
+
+<p>With boys, once puberty is attained, the sexual development
+is orderly and unobtrusive. In the case of
+girls certain recurring phenomena make the essential
+fact of sex much more impressive to the primitive
+mind, with far-reaching sociological consequences.
+"Ignorance of the nature of female periodicity," says
+A. E. Crawley, "leads man to consider it as the flow of
+blood from a wound, naturally, or more usually, supernaturally
+produced."<a name="FNanchor_69_69" id="FNanchor_69_69"></a><a href="#Footnote_69_69" class="fnanchor">[69]</a> In Siam an evil spirit is believed
+to be the cause of the wound. Amongst the
+Chiriguanas the girl fasts, while women beat the floor
+with sticks in order to drive away "the snake that has
+wounded the girl." Similar beliefs are found very
+generally among people in a low stage of culture, and
+customs and beliefs still surviving among people more<!-- Page 96 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_96" id="Page_96">[96]</a></span>
+advanced point to the conclusion that convictions of
+the same kind were once fairly universal. It is this
+function, combined with the function of childbirth,
+that brings woman into close contact with the supernatural
+world, makes her an object of fear and wonder
+to primitive man, accounts for a number of the customs
+and beliefs associated with her, and finally helps to
+determine her social position. It is because her periodicity
+is taken as evidence of her communion with
+spiritual forces that special precautions have to be
+taken concerning her. She becomes spiritually contagious.
+Thus, the natives of New Britain, while engaged
+in making fish-traps, carefully avoid all women.
+They believe that if a woman were even to touch a fish-trap,
+it would catch nothing. Amongst the Maoris, if
+a man touched a menstruous woman, he would be taboo
+'an inch thick.' An Australian black fellow, who
+discovered that his wife had lain on his blanket at her
+menstrual period, killed her, and died of terror himself
+within a fortnight. In Uganda the pots which a woman
+touches while the impurity of childbirth or menstruation
+is on her, are destroyed. With many North American
+Indians the use of weapons touched by women
+during these times would bring misfortune. A menstruating
+woman is with them the object they dread
+most. In Tahiti women are secluded. In some cases
+she is too dangerous to be even touched by others, and
+food is given her at the end of a stick. With the Pueblo
+Indians contact with a woman at these times exposes
+a man to attacks from an evil spirit, and he may pass
+on the infection to others.<a name="FNanchor_70_70" id="FNanchor_70_70"></a><a href="#Footnote_70_70" class="fnanchor">[70]</a></p>
+
+<p><!-- Page 97 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_97" id="Page_97">[97]</a></span>
+It is needless to multiply instances; the same general
+reason governs all, and this has been clearly expressed
+by Dr. Frazer:&mdash;</p>
+
+<p>"The object of secluding women at menstruation is
+to neutralise the dangerous influence which is supposed
+to emanate from them at such times. The general
+effect of these rules is to keep the women suspended,
+so to say, between heaven and earth. Whether
+enveloped in her hammock and slung up to the roof,
+as in South America, or elevated above the ground in
+a dark and narrow cage, as in New Zealand, she may
+be considered to be out of the way of doing mischief,
+since being shut off both from the earth and from the
+sun, she can poison neither of these great sources of life
+by her deadly contagion. The precautions thus taken
+to isolate and insulate the girl are dictated by regard
+for her own safety as well as for the safety of others....
+In short, the girl is viewed as charged with a powerful
+force which, if not kept within bounds, may prove the
+destruction both of the girl herself and all with whom
+she comes in contact. To repress this force within the
+limits necessary for the safety of all concerned is the
+object of the taboos in question."</p>
+
+<p>The savage is far too logical in his methods to allow
+such an idea to end here. If a woman is so highly
+charged with spiritual infection as to be dangerous at
+certain frequently recurring periods, she may be more
+or less dangerous between these periods. As Havelock
+Ellis says: "Instead of being regarded as a being who
+at periodic intervals becomes the victim of a spell of
+impurity, the conception of impurity becomes amalgamated
+with the conception of woman; she is, as
+Tertullian puts it, <i>Janua diaboli</i>; and this is the attitude<!-- Page 98 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_98" id="Page_98">[98]</a></span>
+which still persisted in medieval days."<a name="FNanchor_71_71" id="FNanchor_71_71"></a><a href="#Footnote_71_71" class="fnanchor">[71]</a> This is
+to be expected from what one knows of the workings
+of the primitive intelligence, but it is surprising to find
+Mr. Ellis continue by saying, on apparently good
+grounds, that "the belief in the periodically recurring
+impurity of women has by no means died out to-day.
+Among a very large section of the women of the middle
+and lower classes of England and other countries
+it is firmly believed that the touch of a menstruating
+woman will contaminate; only a few years since, in
+the course of a correspondence on this subject in the
+<cite>British Medical Journal</cite> (1878), even medical men
+were found to state from personal observation that
+they had no doubt whatever on this point. Thus, one
+doctor, who expressed surprise that any doubt could
+be thrown on the point, wrote, after quoting cases of
+spoiled hams, etc., presumed to be due to this cause,
+which had come under his own personal observation:
+'For two thousand years the Italians have had this
+idea of menstruating women. We English hold to it,
+the Americans have it, also the Australians. Now, I
+should like to know the country where the evidence
+of any such observation is unknown.'" Evidently
+animism is a more persistent frame of mind than
+most people are inclined to believe.</p>
+
+<p>It is certain, however, that this conception of woman's
+nature is dominant in the lower stages of culture.
+She is spiritually dangerous, and the principle of 'taboo'
+is made to cover a great many of her relations to
+man. In Tahiti a woman was not allowed to touch the
+weapons or fishing implements of men. Amongst the
+Todas women are not permitted to touch the cattle. If<!-- Page 99 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_99" id="Page_99">[99]</a></span>
+a wife touches the food of her husband, among the
+Hindus, the food is unfit to be eaten. An Eskimo
+wife dare not eat with her husband. In New Zealand
+wives were not allowed to eat with the males lest their
+taboo should kill them. Many tribes are careful to refrain
+from contact with women before going to fight.
+They believe that this would rob them and their weapons
+of strength. Other practices followed by savages
+before going to war forbid one assuming that this abstention
+is due to any rational fear of dissipating their
+energies. Instead of conserving their strength they
+weaken themselves by the many privations they undergo
+before fighting, in order to ensure victory. Professor
+Frazer well says:&mdash;</p>
+
+<p>"When we observe what pains these misguided
+savages took to unfit themselves for the business of
+war by abstaining from food, denying themselves
+rest, and lacerating their bodies, we shall probably
+not be disposed to attribute their practice of continence
+in war to a rational fear of dissipating their
+bodily energies by indulgence in the lusts of the
+flesh."<a name="FNanchor_72_72" id="FNanchor_72_72"></a><a href="#Footnote_72_72" class="fnanchor">[72]</a></p>
+
+<p>The conception of woman as one heavily charged
+with supernatural potentialities, and, therefore, a
+source of danger to the community, seems to lie at the
+basis of the widespread belief in the religious 'uncleanness'
+of women. The real significance of the
+word 'unclean' in religious ritual has been obscured
+by our modern use of it in a hygienic or ethical sense.
+In reality it is but an illustration of the principle of
+'taboo,' and 'taboo' may extend to anything, good
+or bad, useful or useless, hygienically clean or unclean.<!-- Page 100 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_100" id="Page_100">[100]</a></span>
+The primary meaning of 'taboo,' a Polynesian word,
+is something that is set aside or forbidden. The field
+covered by this word among savage and semi-savage
+races is, as Robertson Smith points out, "very wide,
+for there is no part of life in which the savage does not
+feel himself surrounded by mysterious agencies and
+recognise the need of walking warily."<a name="FNanchor_73_73" id="FNanchor_73_73"></a><a href="#Footnote_73_73" class="fnanchor">[73]</a> Anything
+may thus become the object of a 'taboo.' Weapons,
+food, animals, places, special relations of one person
+to another at certain times and under certain conditions.
+It is enough that some special or particular degree
+of supernatural influence is associated with the
+object in question. The ancient Jews, for example, in
+prohibiting the eating of swine's flesh, were as far as
+possible removed in their thought from any connection
+with dietetics. They were simply following the well-known
+savage custom that the totem of a tribe is
+sacred. The pig was a totem with many of the Semitic
+tribes, and must not, therefore, be eaten.<a name="FNanchor_74_74" id="FNanchor_74_74"></a><a href="#Footnote_74_74" class="fnanchor">[74]</a> It was not
+an unclean animal, in the modern sense, it was a 'holy'
+animal. With the Syrians the dove was so holy that
+even to touch it made a man 'unclean' for a whole day.
+No North American Indian will eat of the flesh of an
+animal that is a tribal totem, except under grave
+necessity, and even then with elaborate religious ceremonies.
+So, "a prohibition to eat the flesh of an animal
+of a certain species, that has its ground not in natural
+loathing but in religious horror and reverence, implies
+that something divine is ascribed to every animal of the<!-- Page 101 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_101" id="Page_101">[101]</a></span>
+species. And what seems to us to be a natural loathing often
+turns out, in the case of primitive peoples, to
+be based on a religious <em>taboo</em>, and to have its origin not
+in feelings of contemptuous disgust, but of reverential
+dread."<a name="FNanchor_75_75" id="FNanchor_75_75"></a><a href="#Footnote_75_75" class="fnanchor">[75]</a></p>
+
+<p>The real significance of 'unclean' in connection
+with religious ritual is 'holy', something that partakes
+in a special manner of supernatural influence and
+therefore involves a certain danger in contact. As the
+writer just cited observes:&mdash;</p>
+
+<p>"The acts that cause uncleanness are exactly the
+same which among savage nations place a man under
+taboo.... These acts are often involuntary, and often
+innocent, or even necessary to society. The savage,
+accordingly, imposes a taboo on a woman in childbed,
+or during her courses ... simply because birth and
+everything connected with the propagation of the
+species on the one, and disease and death on the other
+hand, seem to involve the action of supernatural agencies
+of a dangerous kind. If he attempts to explain,
+he does so by supposing that on these occasions spirits
+of deadly power are present; at all events the persons
+involved seem to him to be sources of mysterious danger,
+which has all the characters of an infection, and
+may extend to other people unless due precautions
+are observed.... It has nothing to do with respect
+for the gods, but springs from mere terror of the supernatural
+influences associated with the woman's physical
+condition."<a name="FNanchor_76_76" id="FNanchor_76_76"></a><a href="#Footnote_76_76" class="fnanchor">[76]</a></p>
+
+<p><!-- Page 102 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_102" id="Page_102">[102]</a></span>
+It is interesting to observe the manner in which this
+notion of the sacramentally 'unclean' nature of woman
+has affected her religious status, and by inference,
+her social status likewise. Among the Australians
+women are shut out from any part in the religious
+ceremonies. In the Sandwich Isles a woman's
+touch made a sacrifice unclean. If a Hindu woman
+touches a sacred image the divinity is destroyed. In
+Fiji women are excluded from the temples. The Papuans
+have the same custom. The Ainus of Japan allow
+a woman to prepare the sacrifice, but not to offer
+it. Women are excluded from many Mohammedan
+mosques. Among the Jews women have no part in
+the religious ceremonies. In the Christian Church
+women were excluded from the priestly office. A
+Council held at Auxerre at the end of the sixth century
+forbade women touching the Eucharist with their bare
+hands, and in various churches they were forbidden
+to approach the altar during Mass.<a name="FNanchor_77_77" id="FNanchor_77_77"></a><a href="#Footnote_77_77" class="fnanchor">[77]</a> In the gospels
+Jesus forbids the woman to touch Him, after the resurrection,
+although Thomas was allowed to feel His
+wounds. "The Church of the Middle Ages did not
+hesitate to provide itself with eunuchs in order to
+supply cathedral choirs with the soprano tones inhering
+by nature in women alone."<a name="FNanchor_78_78" id="FNanchor_78_78"></a><a href="#Footnote_78_78" class="fnanchor">[78]</a> The 'Churching' of
+women still in vogue has its origin in the same superstition
+that childbirth endows woman with a supernatural
+influence which must be removed in the interests
+of others. This ceremony was formerly called
+"The Order of the Purification of Women," and was
+read at the church door before the woman entered the<!-- Page 103 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_103" id="Page_103">[103]</a></span>
+building. Its connection with the ideas indicated
+above is obvious. The Tahitian practice of excluding
+women from intercourse with others for two or three
+weeks after childbirth, with similar practices amongst
+uncivilised peoples all over the world, led with various
+modifications up to the current practice of churching.
+They show that in the opinion of primitive
+peoples "a woman at and after childbirth is pervaded
+by a certain dangerous influence which can infect anything
+and anybody she touches; so that in the interests
+of the community it becomes necessary to
+seclude her from society for a while, until the virulence
+of the infection has passed away, when, after submitting
+to certain rites of purification, she is again free to
+mingle with her fellows."<a name="FNanchor_79_79" id="FNanchor_79_79"></a><a href="#Footnote_79_79" class="fnanchor">[79]</a> The gradual change of
+this ceremony, from a getting rid of a dangerous supernatural
+infection to returning thanks for a natural
+danger passed, is on all fours with what takes place in
+other directions in relation to religious ideas and
+practices.</p>
+
+<p>The important part played by this conception of
+woman's nature may be traced in the fierce invective
+directed against her in the early Christian writings.
+Of course, by that time society had reached a stage
+when the primitive form of this belief had been outgrown,
+but ideas and attitudes of mind persist long
+after their originating conditions have disappeared.
+In this particular case we have the primitive idea expressed
+in a form suitable to altered circumstances, and
+the primitive feeling seeking new warranty in ethical or
+social considerations. But in the main the old notion
+is there. Woman is a creature threatening danger<!-- Page 104 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_104" id="Page_104">[104]</a></span>
+to man's spiritual welfare.<a name="FNanchor_80_80" id="FNanchor_80_80"></a><a href="#Footnote_80_80" class="fnanchor">[80]</a> In this connection we may
+note an observation of Westermarck's during his residence
+among the country people of Morocco. He
+was struck, he says, with the superstitious fear the
+men had of women. They are supposed to be much
+better versed in magic, and therefore one ran greater
+danger in offending them. The curses of women are,
+generally, much more feared than those of men. To
+this we have a parallel in Christianity which so often
+revived and strengthened the lower religious beliefs.
+During the witch mania an overwhelming proportion
+of those charged with and executed for sorcery were
+women. As a matter of fact, women were more prone
+than men to credit themselves with possessing supernatural
+power. But the theological explanation was
+that the devil had more power over women than men.
+This was, obviously, a heritage from the primitive belief
+above described.<a name="FNanchor_81_81" id="FNanchor_81_81"></a><a href="#Footnote_81_81" class="fnanchor">[81]</a></p>
+
+<p>Another way in which religion becomes closely
+associated with sexualism is through the widely diffused
+phallic worship. The worship of the generative
+power in the form of stones, pillars, and carved representations
+of the male and female sexual organs plays
+an unquestionably important part in the history of
+religion, however hardly pressed it may have been by
+some enthusiastic theorisers. "The farther back we
+go," says Mr. Hargrave Jennings, "in the history of
+every country, the deeper we explore into all religions,<!-- Page 105 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_105" id="Page_105">[105]</a></span>
+ancient as well as modern, we stumble the more frequently
+upon the incessantly intensifying distinct
+traces of this supposedly indecent mystic worship."<a name="FNanchor_82_82" id="FNanchor_82_82"></a><a href="#Footnote_82_82" class="fnanchor">[82]</a>
+On the lower Congo, says Sir H. H. Johnston:&mdash;</p>
+
+<p>"Phallic worship in various forms prevails. It is not
+associated with any rites that might be called particularly
+obscene; and on the coast, where manners and
+morals are particularly corrupt, the phallus cult is no
+longer met with. In the forests between Manyanga
+and Stanley Pool it is not rare to come upon a little
+rustic temple, made of palm fronds and poles, within
+which male and female figures, nearly or quite life size,
+may be seen, with disproportionate genital organs,
+the figures being intended to represent the male and
+female principle. Around these carved and painted
+statues are many offerings, plates, knives, and cloth,
+and frequently also the phallic symbol may be seen
+dangling from the rafters. There is not the slightest
+suspicion of obscenity in all this, and anyone qualifying
+this worship of the generative power as obscene
+does so hastily and ignorantly. It is a solemn mystery
+to the Congo native, a force but dimly understood,
+and, like all mysterious natural manifestations, it is
+a power that must be propitiated and persuaded to his
+good."<a name="FNanchor_83_83" id="FNanchor_83_83"></a><a href="#Footnote_83_83" class="fnanchor">[83]</a></p>
+
+<p>The Egyptian religion was permeated with phallicism.
+In India phallic worship is widely scattered.
+In Benares, the sacred city, "everywhere, in the temples,
+in the little shrines in the street, the emblem of the
+Creator is phallic." Symbols of the male and female
+sexual organs, the Lingam and the Yoni, have been objects<!-- Page 106 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_106" id="Page_106">[106]</a></span>
+of worship in India from the earliest times. With
+the Sakti ceremonies, Hindu religion dispenses with
+symbols, and devotion is paid to a naked woman selected
+for the occasion.<a name="FNanchor_84_84" id="FNanchor_84_84"></a><a href="#Footnote_84_84" class="fnanchor">[84]</a> This worship of a nude female
+is a very familiar phenomenon in the history of
+religion. Some of the early Christian sects were said
+to have practised it, and it is a feature of some Russian
+religious sects to-day. The subject will be dealt with
+more fully hereafter.</p>
+
+<p>In ancient Rome, in the month of April, "when the
+fertilising powers of nature begin to operate, and its
+powers to be visibly developed, a festival in honour of
+Venus took place; in it the phallus was carried in a
+cart, and led in procession by the Roman ladies to the
+temple of Venus outside the Colline gate, and then
+presented by them to the sexual part of the goddess."<a name="FNanchor_85_85" id="FNanchor_85_85"></a><a href="#Footnote_85_85" class="fnanchor">[85]</a>
+In the Greek Bacchic religious processions
+huge phalli were carried in a chariot drawn by bulls,
+and surrounded by women and girls singing songs of
+praise. Phallic worship was also associated with the
+cults of Dionysos and Eleusis. It is met with among
+the ancient Mexicans and Peruvians, and also among
+the North American tribes. The famous Black Stone
+of Mecca, to which religious honours are paid, is also
+said by authorities to be a phallic symbol. The stone
+set up by Jacob (Gen. xxviii. 18-9) falls into the same
+category. References to phallic worship may be found
+in many parts of the Bible, and authoritative writers
+like Mr. Hargrave Jennings and Major-General Forlong
+have not hesitated to assert that the god of the<!-- Page 107 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_107" id="Page_107">[107]</a></span>
+Jewish Ark was a sexual symbol. Seeing the extent
+to which phallic worship exists in other religions, it
+would be surprising did this not also exist in the early
+Jewish religion.</p>
+
+<p>In Christendom we have evidence of the perpetuation
+of the phallic cult in the decree of Mans, 1247,
+and of the Synod of Tours, 1396, against its practice.
+Quite unsuccessfully, however. Indeed, the architecture
+of medieval churches bear in their ornamentation
+numerous evidences of the failure at suppression.
+Of course, much of this ornamentation may have been
+due to mere imitation, but often enough it was deliberate.
+"The scholar," says Bonwick, "who gazed
+to-day at the roof of Temple Church, London, had the
+illustration before him. A symbol there, repeatedly
+displayed, is the popular Hindu one to express sex
+worship."<a name="FNanchor_86_86" id="FNanchor_86_86"></a><a href="#Footnote_86_86" class="fnanchor">[86]</a> The belief found expression in other ways
+than ornamentation. When Sir William Hamilton
+visited Naples in 1781 he found in Isernia a Christian
+custom in vogue which he described in a letter to Sir
+William Banks, and which admitted of no doubt as
+to its Priapic character. Every September was celebrated
+a festival in the Church of SS. Cosmus and Damianus.
+During the progress of the festival vendors
+paraded the streets offering small waxen phalli, which
+were bought by the devout and placed in the church,
+much as candles are still purchased and given. At the
+same time, prayers are offered to St. Como by those
+who desire children. In Midlothian, in 1268, the clergy
+instructed their flock to sprinkle water with a dog's
+phallus in order to avert a murrain. The same practice
+existed in Inverkeithing, and in Easter week<!-- Page 108 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_108" id="Page_108">[108]</a></span>
+priest and people danced round a wooden phallus.<a name="FNanchor_87_87" id="FNanchor_87_87"></a><a href="#Footnote_87_87" class="fnanchor">[87]</a>
+Mr. Westropp, quoting an eighteenth-century writer,<a name="FNanchor_88_88" id="FNanchor_88_88"></a><a href="#Footnote_88_88" class="fnanchor">[88]</a>
+says: "When the Huguenots took Embrun, they found
+among the relics of the principal church a Priapus, of
+three pieces in the ancient fashion, the top of which
+was worn away from being constantly washed with
+wine." The temple of St. Eutropius, destroyed by the
+Huguenots, is said to have contained a similar figure.
+From Mr. Sidney Hartland's collection of practices
+for obtaining children I take the following:&mdash;</p>
+
+<p>"At Bourg-Dieu, in the diocese of Bourges, a similar
+saint" (similar to the priapean figure previously described)
+"was called Guerlichon or Greluchon. There
+after nine days' devotions women stretched themselves
+on the horizontal figure of the saint, and then
+scraped the phallus for mixture in water as a drink.
+Other saints were worshipped elsewhere in France
+with equivalent rites. Down to the Revolution there
+stood at Brest a chapel of Saint Guignolet containing
+a priapean statue of the holy man. Women who were,
+or feared to be, sterile used to go and scrape a little of
+the prominent member, which they put into a glass
+of water from the well and drank. The same practice
+was followed at the Chapel of Saint Pierre-à-Croquettes
+in Brabant until 1837, when the archæologist
+Schayes called attention to it, and thereupon the ecclesiastical
+authorities removed the cause of scandal.
+Women have, however, still continued to make votive
+offerings of pins down almost, if not quite, to the
+present day. At Antwerp stood at the gateway to the
+Church of Saint Walburga in the Rue des Pêcheurs a<!-- Page 109 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_109" id="Page_109">[109]</a></span>
+statue, the sexual organ of which had been entirely
+scraped away by women for the same purpose."<a name="FNanchor_89_89" id="FNanchor_89_89"></a><a href="#Footnote_89_89" class="fnanchor">[89]</a></p>
+
+<p>From what has been said, it will not be difficult to
+understand the existence of the custom of religious
+prostitution. Considering the sexual impulse as specially
+connected with a supernatural force, man pays it
+religious honour, and comes to identify its manifestations
+as an expression of the supernatural and also as
+an act of worship towards it. In India the practice
+existed, when most temples had their 'bayadères.'
+In ancient Chaldea every woman was compelled to
+prostitute herself once in her life in the temple of the
+goddess Mylitta&mdash;the Chaldean Venus. This custom
+existed elsewhere, and by it the woman was compelled
+to remain within the temple enclosures until some man
+chose her, from whom she received a piece of money.
+The money, of course, belonged to the temple.<a name="FNanchor_90_90" id="FNanchor_90_90"></a><a href="#Footnote_90_90" class="fnanchor">[90]</a> In
+Greece, Carthage, Syria, etc., we find the same custom.
+Among the Jews, so orthodox a commentary as
+Smith's <cite>Bible Dictionary</cite> admits that the 'Kadechim'
+attached to the temple were prostitutes. The frequent
+references to the service of the 'groves' surrounding
+the temple irresistibly suggest their likeness to the
+groves around the temples of Mylitta, and their use
+for the same purpose.</p>
+
+<p><!-- Page 110 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_110" id="Page_110">[110]</a></span>
+There is no necessity to prolong the subject,<a name="FNanchor_91_91" id="FNanchor_91_91"></a><a href="#Footnote_91_91" class="fnanchor">[91]</a> nor
+is it necessary to my purpose to discuss the origin of
+phallic worship. It is enough to have shown the manner
+in which, from the very earliest times, religious
+belief and sexual phenomena have been connected in
+the closest possible manner. In this respect it is only
+on all fours with the relation of religion to phenomena
+in general, but here the attitude of mind is accentuated
+and prolonged by the startling facts of
+sexual development. The connection becomes consequently
+so close it is not surprising to find that the
+association has persisted down to the present time,
+and moods that have their origin in the sexual life
+are frequently attributed to religious influences. The
+primitive intelligence, frankly seeing in the phenomena
+of sex a manifestation of the supernatural, sees
+here a continuous endorsement of religious life. The
+more sophisticated mind raised above this point of
+view continues, with modifications, the primitive practices,
+and in ignorance of the physiological causes of its
+own states is only too ready to interpret ebullitions
+of sex feeling as evidence of the divine.</p>
+
+<div class="note">
+<h3><a name="NOTE_TO_PAGE_104" id="NOTE_TO_PAGE_104"></a>NOTE TO <a href="#Page_104">PAGE 104</a>.</h3>
+
+<p>It is strange that so little attention has been paid to these primitive
+beliefs as important factors in determining the social
+position of women. It is too generally assumed that because
+woman is physically weaker than man it is her weakness that<!-- Page 111 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_111" id="Page_111">[111]</a></span>
+has determined her subordination. Both the advocates and the
+opponents of 'Woman's Rights' appear to have reached a common
+agreement on this point. During some of the debates in
+the House of Commons, for example, it was openly stated by
+prominent politicians, as an axiom of political philosophy, that
+all laws rest upon a basis of force, and if men say they will not
+obey woman-made laws there is no power that can compel them
+to do so. On the other side, women, while appealing to what they
+properly call higher considerations, themselves dwell upon the
+physical weakness of woman as the reason for her subordination
+in the past. Both parties are helped in their arguments by
+the facile division of social history into two periods, an earlier
+one in which club law plays the chief part, and a later period
+when mental and moral qualities assume a dominating position.
+The consequence is, runs the argument, that each sex has to
+battle with the dead weight of tradition and custom. The woman
+is oppressed by the tradition of subordination to the male;
+the man is inspired by that of dominance over the female.</p>
+
+<p>It is when we ask for evidence of this that we see how flimsy
+the case is. Social phenomena in either civilised or uncivilised
+society furnishes no proof that institutions and customs rest upon
+a basis of physical force. The rulership of a tribe often rests
+with the old men of a tribe; with some tribes the women are consulted,
+and invariably custom and tradition plays a powerful
+part. The notion that the primitive chief is the primitive strong
+man of the tribe is as baseless as the belief in an original social
+contract, and owes its existence to the same kind of fanciful
+speculation. As Frazer says, "it is one of those facile theories
+which the arm-chair philosopher concocts with his feet on the
+fender without taking the trouble to consult the facts." The
+primitive chief may be a strong man. The tribal council or chief
+may use force or rely upon physical force to enforce certain decrees,
+just as the modern king or parliament may call on the
+help of policeman or soldier, but this no more proves that their
+rule is based upon force than Mr. Asquith's premiership proves
+his physical superiority to the rest of the Cabinet.</p></div>
+
+<p>All political life, and to a smaller degree all social
+life, involves the direction of force, but neither appeal<!-- Page 112 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_112" id="Page_112">[112]</a></span>
+to force for an ultimate justification, nor do social
+institutions originate in an act of force. It is one of
+the commonplaces of historical study that when an
+institution is actually forced upon a people it very
+quickly becomes inoperative. Other things equal,
+one group of people may overcome another group
+because of physical superiority, but the conquest over,
+the question as to which group shall really rule, or
+which set of institutions shall survive, is settled on
+quite different grounds. The history of almost any
+country will give examples of the absorption of the
+conqueror by the conquered, and the bringing of imported
+institutions into line with native life and feeling.
+Fundamentally the relations binding people
+together into a society are not physical, but psychological.
+Society rests upon the foundations of a
+common mental life&mdash;upon sympathy, beliefs, the desire
+for companionship, etc. As Professor J. M. Baldwin
+puts it, the fundamental social facts are not <em>things</em>,
+but <em>thoughts</em>.<a name="FNanchor_92_92" id="FNanchor_92_92"></a><a href="#Footnote_92_92" class="fnanchor">[92]</a> As a member of a social group man is
+born into an environment that is essentially psychological,
+and his attitude not only towards his fellow
+human beings, but towards nature in general, is determined
+by the psychological contents of the society to
+which he belongs.</p>
+
+<p>Now if the relation of one man to another is not determined
+by physical superiority and inferiority, if the
+relations of classes within a society are not determined
+in this manner, why should it be assumed that as a sex
+woman's position is fixed by this means? It seems
+more reasonable to assume that some other principle<!-- Page 113 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_113" id="Page_113">[113]</a></span>
+than that of club law, a principle set in operation very
+early in the history of civilisation, fixed the main lines
+upon which the relations of the sexes were to develop,
+however much other forces helped its operation. I believe
+this desired factor is to be found in the superstitious
+notions savages develop concerning the nature
+and function of woman, and which society only very
+slowly outgrows. For, as Frazer says: "The continuity
+of human development has been such that most,
+if not all, of the great institutions which still form the
+framework of a civilised society have their roots in
+savagery, and have been handed down to us in these
+later days through countless generations, assuming
+new outward forms in the process of transmission,
+but remaining in their inmost core substantially unchanged."</p>
+
+<p>In considering the play of primitive ideas as determining
+the lines of human evolution several things
+must be kept clearly in mind. One is that the course
+of biological development has made woman, as a sex,
+dependent upon man, as a sex, for protection and
+support. This is true quite apart from economic considerations
+or from those arising from the relative
+physical strength of the sexes. The prime function of
+woman, biologically, is that of motherhood. She is,
+so to speak, mother in a much more important and
+more pervasive sense than man is father. In the case
+of woman, her functions are of necessity subordinated
+to this one. With man this is not the case. It is with
+the woman that the nutrition of the child rests before
+birth, and a large portion of her strength is expended
+in the discharge of this function. The same is true for
+some period immediately after birth. Again to use a<!-- Page 114 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_114" id="Page_114">[114]</a></span>
+biological illustration, during the period of child-bearing
+and child-rearing the relation of the man to the
+woman may be likened to that which exists between
+the germ cells and the somatic cells. As the latter is
+the medium of protection and the conveyer of nutrition
+in relation to the former, so it falls to the male to
+protect and in some degree to provide for the woman
+as child-bearer. It would not, of course, be impossible
+for woman to provide for herself, but it would detract
+so considerably from social efficiency that any group
+in which it was done would soon disappear. It is the
+nature and supreme function of woman that makes
+her dependent upon man. And even though the
+dreams of some were realised, and society as a whole
+cared for woman in the discharge of this function, the
+issue would not be changed. It would mean that instead
+of a woman being dependent upon one man she
+would be dependent upon all men. Nor are the substantial
+facts of the situation changed by anyone
+pointing out that all women do not and cannot under
+ordinary circumstances become wives and mothers.
+Human nature will always develop on the lines of the
+normal functions of men and women, and there can be
+no question in this case as to what these are.</p>
+
+<p>I have used the word 'dependence,' but this does
+not, of necessity, involve either subordination or subjection.
+It may provide the condition of either or of
+both, but the dependence of the woman on the man
+is, as I have said, biologically inescapable. Her subjection
+is quite another question. Dependence may
+be mutual. One class of society may be dependent
+upon another class, but the two may move on a perfect
+level of equality. And with uncivilised peoples<!-- Page 115 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_115" id="Page_115">[115]</a></span>
+the evidence goes to prove that, while the spheres of
+the sexes are more clearly differentiated than with us,
+this difference is seldom if ever expressed in terms of
+superior and inferior. Savages would say, as civilised
+people still say, there are many things that it is wrong
+for a woman to do, and they would add there are also
+things that a man must not do. They would be as
+shocked at woman doing certain things as some people
+among ourselves were when women first began to
+speak at public meetings. Their disapproval would
+not rest on the ground that these things were 'unwomanly',
+nor upon any question of weakness or strength,
+of inferiority or superiority, but for another and, to
+the savage, very urgent reason.</p>
+
+<p>One can very easily exaggerate the extent of the
+subjection of women among uncivilised people. As a
+matter of fact, it usually is exaggerated. Not all travellers
+are capable of accurate observation, and very
+many are led astray by what are really superficial aspects
+of savage life. They are so impressed by the contemplation
+of a state of affairs different from our own
+that they mistake mere lines of demarcation for a
+moral valuation. Many travellers, for example, observing
+that women are strictly forbidden to do this
+or that, conclude that the woman has no rights as
+against the man. As in nearly all these cases the man
+is as strictly forbidden to encroach on the woman's
+sphere, one might as reasonably reverse the statement
+and dwell upon male subjection. As a matter of fact,
+both furnish examples of the all-powerful principle of
+'taboo.' Some things are taboo to the man, others to
+the woman. And the key to the problem lies in the
+nature and origin of these taboos. But taboo does not<!-- Page 116 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_116" id="Page_116">[116]</a></span>
+extinguish rights; it confirms them. Under its operation, far
+from its being the truth that women are without
+status or rights or power, her position and rights
+are clearly marked, generally recognised, and quickly
+enforced. Some examples of this may be noted.</p>
+
+<p>A Kaffir woman when ill-treated possesses the
+right of asylum with her parents, and remains there
+until the husband makes atonement. The same thing
+holds of the West African Fulahs. In the Marquesas
+a woman is prohibited the use of canoes; on the other
+hand, men are prohibited frequenting certain places
+belonging to the women. In Nicaragua no man may
+enter the woman's market-place under penalty of a
+beating. With most of the North-American tribes a
+woman has supreme power inside the lodge. The
+husband possesses no power of interference. In most
+cases the husband cannot give away anything belonging
+to the lodge without first getting the consent of
+his wife. With the Nootkas, women are consulted on
+all matters of business. Livingstone relates his surprise
+on finding that a native would not accompany
+him on a journey because he could not get his wife's
+consent. He found this to be one of the customs of the
+tribe to which the man belonged. Among the Kandhs
+of India nothing public is done without consulting the
+women. In the Pellew Islands the head of the family
+can do nothing of importance without consulting the
+oldest female relative. Among the Hottentots women
+have supreme rule in the house. If a man oversteps
+the line, his female relatives inflict a fine, which is paid
+to the wife. With the Bechuanas the mother of the
+chief is present at all councils, and he can hardly decide
+anything without her consent. These are only a<!-- Page 117 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_117" id="Page_117">[117]</a></span>
+few of the cases that might be cited, but they are sufficient
+to show that the common view of women among
+savages as without recognised status, or power, needs
+very serious qualification. Of course, ill-treatment of
+women does occur with uncivilised as with civilised
+people, and she may suffer from the expression of
+brutal passion or superior strength, but an examination
+of the facts justifies Starcke's opinion that "we
+are not justified in assuming that the savage feels a
+contempt for women in virtue of her sex."</p>
+
+<p>In primitive life, in short, the dominant idea is not
+that of superiority in relation to woman, but that of
+difference. She is different from man, and this difference
+involves consequences of the gravest character,
+and against which due precautions must be taken.
+Superiority and inferiority are much later conceptions;
+they belong to a comparatively civilised period,
+and their development offers an admirable example
+of the way in which customs based on sheer superstitions
+become transformed into a social prejudice,
+with the consequent creation of numerous excuses
+for their perpetuation. What that initial prejudice is&mdash;a
+prejudice so powerful that it largely determines
+the future status of woman&mdash;has already been pointed
+out. Her place in society is marked out in uncivilised
+times by the powerful superstitions connected with
+sexual functions. Not that she is weaker&mdash;although
+that is, of course, plain&mdash;nor that she is inferior, a
+thought which scarcely exists with uncivilised peoples,
+but that she is dangerous, particularly so during
+her functional crises and in childbirth. And being
+dangerous, because charged with a supernatural influence
+inimical to others, she is excluded from<!-- Page 118 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_118" id="Page_118">[118]</a></span>
+certain occupations, and contact with her has to be
+carefully regulated. I agree with Mr. Andrew Lang
+that in the regulations concerning women amongst
+uncivilised people we have another illustration of the
+far-reaching principle of taboo (<cite>Social Origins and
+Primal Law</cite>, p. 239) she suffers because of her sex,
+and because of the superstitious dread to which her
+sex nature gives birth.</p>
+
+<p>Of course, at a later stage other considerations begin
+to operate. Where, for example, as amongst the
+Kaffirs, women are not permitted to touch cattle because
+of this assumed spiritual infection, and where a
+man's wealth is measured by the cattle he possesses,
+it is easy to see that this would constitute a force
+preventing the political and social equality of the
+sexes. The pursuits from which women were primarily
+excluded for purely religious reasons would in
+course of time come to be looked upon as man's inalienable
+possessions. And here her physical weakness
+would play its part; for she could not take, as man
+could withhold, by force. Even when the primitive
+point of view is discarded, the social prejudices engendered
+by it long remains. And social prejudices,
+as we all know, are the hardest of all things to destroy.</p>
+
+<p>A final consideration needs to be stated. This is
+that the customs determined by the views of woman
+(above outlined) fall into line, in a rough-and-ready
+fashion, with the biological tendency to consecrate
+the female to the function of motherhood and conserve
+her energies to that end, leaving other kinds of
+work to the male. It would be an obvious advantage
+to a tribe in which woman, relieved from the necessity
+of physical struggle for food and defence, was<!-- Page 119 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_119" id="Page_119">[119]</a></span>
+able to attend to children and the more peaceful side
+of family life. Children would not only benefit thereby,
+but the home with all its civilising, humanising
+influences would develop more rapidly. Assuming
+variations in tribal life in this direction, there is no
+question as to which tribe that would stand the better
+chance of survival. The development of life has proceeded
+here as elsewhere by differentiation and specialisation;
+and while the tasks demanding the more
+sustained physical exertions were left to man, and to
+the performance of which his sexual nature offered no
+impediment, woman became more and more specialised
+for maternity and domestic occupations. This, I
+hasten to add, is not at all intended as a plea for denying
+to women the right to participate in the wider
+social life of the species. I am trying to explain a
+social phase, and neither justifying nor condemning
+its perpetuation.</p>
+
+<div class="footnotes">
+<h3>Footnotes:<br />
+<span class="skip">[<a href="#Page_120">Skip</a>]</span>
+</h3>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_65_65" id="Footnote_65_65"></a><a href="#FNanchor_65_65"><span class="label">[65]</span></a> Dr. Iwan Bloch, <cite>The Sexual Life of Our Time</cite>, p. 97.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_66_66" id="Footnote_66_66"></a><a href="#FNanchor_66_66"><span class="label">[66]</span></a> E. D. Starbuck, <cite>The Psychology of Religion</cite>, p. 401.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_67_67" id="Footnote_67_67"></a><a href="#FNanchor_67_67"><span class="label">[67]</span></a> <cite>The Psychological Phenomena of Christianity</cite>, p. 419.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_68_68" id="Footnote_68_68"></a><a href="#FNanchor_68_68"><span class="label">[68]</span></a> <cite>Primitive Paternity</cite>, 2 vols., 1909-10.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_69_69" id="Footnote_69_69"></a><a href="#FNanchor_69_69"><span class="label">[69]</span></a> <cite>The Mystic Rose</cite>, p. 191.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_70_70" id="Footnote_70_70"></a><a href="#FNanchor_70_70"><span class="label">[70]</span></a> See Frazer's <cite>Taboo and the Perils of the Soul</cite>, pp. 145-63,
+and Crawley's <cite>Mystic Rose</cite>.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_71_71" id="Footnote_71_71"></a><a href="#FNanchor_71_71"><span class="label">[71]</span></a> <cite>Man and Woman</cite>, p. 15.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_72_72" id="Footnote_72_72"></a><a href="#FNanchor_72_72"><span class="label">[72]</span></a> <cite>Taboo</cite>, pp. 163-4.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_73_73" id="Footnote_73_73"></a><a href="#FNanchor_73_73"><span class="label">[73]</span></a> <cite>Religion of the Semites</cite>, p. 142.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_74_74" id="Footnote_74_74"></a><a href="#FNanchor_74_74"><span class="label">[74]</span></a> A long list of animals that were sacred to various Semitic
+tribes has been compiled by Robertson Smith, <cite>Kinship and
+Marriage in Early Arabia</cite>, pp. 194-201.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_75_75" id="Footnote_75_75"></a><a href="#FNanchor_75_75"><span class="label">[75]</span></a> Robertson Smith, <cite>Kinship and Marriage in Early Arabia</cite>,
+pp. 306-7.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_76_76" id="Footnote_76_76"></a><a href="#FNanchor_76_76"><span class="label">[76]</span></a> <cite>Religion of the Semites</cite>, pp. 427-9. For a fuller
+discussion of the subject, see <cite>Studies in the Psychology of Sex</cite>,
+by Havelock Ellis, 1901.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_77_77" id="Footnote_77_77"></a><a href="#FNanchor_77_77"><span class="label">[77]</span></a> Westermarck, <cite>Origin and Development of the Moral Ideas</cite>,
+p. 666.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_78_78" id="Footnote_78_78"></a><a href="#FNanchor_78_78"><span class="label">[78]</span></a> Westermarck, p. 666.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_79_79" id="Footnote_79_79"></a><a href="#FNanchor_79_79"><span class="label">[79]</span></a> Frazer, <cite>Taboo</cite>, p. 150.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_80_80" id="Footnote_80_80"></a><a href="#FNanchor_80_80"><span class="label">[80]</span></a> See the Rev. Principal Donaldson's <cite>Woman: her Position
+and Influence in Ancient Greece and Rome, and among the Early
+Christians</cite>, bk. iii.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_81_81" id="Footnote_81_81"></a><a href="#FNanchor_81_81"><span class="label">[81]</span></a> For the general influence of these beliefs
+about woman in determining her social position, see <a href="#NOTE_TO_PAGE_104">note
+at the end of this chapter</a>.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_82_82" id="Footnote_82_82"></a><a href="#FNanchor_82_82"><span class="label">[82]</span></a> <cite>The Worship of Priapus</cite>, Pref. p. 9.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_83_83" id="Footnote_83_83"></a><a href="#FNanchor_83_83"><span class="label">[83]</span></a> <cite>The River Congo</cite>, p. 405.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_84_84" id="Footnote_84_84"></a><a href="#FNanchor_84_84"><span class="label">[84]</span></a> A description of the Sakti ceremony is given by Major-General
+Forlong, <cite>Faiths of Man</cite>, iii. pp. 228-9.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_85_85" id="Footnote_85_85"></a><a href="#FNanchor_85_85"><span class="label">[85]</span></a> Westropp, <cite>Primitive Symbolism</cite>, p. 30.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_86_86" id="Footnote_86_86"></a><a href="#FNanchor_86_86"><span class="label">[86]</span></a> <cite>Egyptian Belief and Modern Thought</cite>, p. 256.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_87_87" id="Footnote_87_87"></a><a href="#FNanchor_87_87"><span class="label">[87]</span></a> Forlong, <cite>Faiths of Man</cite>, iii. p. 66.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_88_88" id="Footnote_88_88"></a><a href="#FNanchor_88_88"><span class="label">[88]</span></a> <cite>Primitive Symbolism</cite>, p. 36.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_89_89" id="Footnote_89_89"></a><a href="#FNanchor_89_89"><span class="label">[89]</span></a> <cite>Primitive Paternity</cite>, i. pp. 63-4.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_90_90" id="Footnote_90_90"></a><a href="#FNanchor_90_90"><span class="label">[90]</span></a> Major-General Forlong agrees with many other authorities
+in tracing our custom of kissing under the mistletoe to this ancient
+practice. "The mistletoe," he says, "marks in one sense
+Venus's temple, for any girl may be kissed if caught under its
+sprays&mdash;a practice, though modified, which recalls to us that
+horrid one mentioned by Herodotus, where all women were for
+once at least the property of the man who sought them in Mylitta's
+temple."&mdash;<cite>Rivers of Life</cite>, i. p. 91.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_91_91" id="Footnote_91_91"></a><a href="#FNanchor_91_91"><span class="label">[91]</span></a> Those who desire further and more detailed information may
+consult Forlong's great work, <cite>The Rivers of Life</cite>, Payne Knight's
+<cite>Worship of Priapus</cite>, Westropp and Wake's <cite>Phallicism in Ancient
+Religion</cite>, Brown's <cite>Dionysiak Myth</cite>, Westropp's <cite>Primitive
+Symbolism</cite>, R. A. Campbell's <cite>Phallic Worship</cite>, Hargrave Jennings's
+<cite>Worship of Priapus</cite>, etc.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_92_92" id="Footnote_92_92"></a><a href="#FNanchor_92_92"><span class="label">[92]</span></a> A good discussion of the topic will be found in this author's
+<cite>Social and Ethical Interpretations in Mental Development</cite>.</p></div>
+</div>
+
+<p><!-- Page 120 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_120" id="Page_120">[120]</a></span></p>
+
+<h2>CHAPTER <span class="cgap">FIVE</span><br />
+THE INFLUENCE OF SEXUAL AND PATHOLOGIC
+STATES ON RELIGIOUS BELIEF</h2>
+
+<p>In the preceding chapter we have
+been concerned with the various ways in which the
+phenomena attendant on the sexual life of man and
+woman become associated with religious beliefs. As
+a force that arises in the life of each individual, and
+intrudes, as it were, into consciousness, the phenomena
+of sex fill primitive man with an amazement
+that is not unmixed with terror. In strict accord with
+primitive psychology sexual phenomena are conceived
+as more or less connected with the supernatural
+world, and becoming thus entwined with religious
+convictions are made the nucleus of a number of superstitious
+ceremonies. The connection is close and
+obvious so long as we restrict our survey to uncivilised
+humanity. The only room for doubt or discussion
+is the exact meaning of certain ceremonies, or the
+order of certain phases of development. It is when
+we take man in a more advanced stage that obscurity
+gathers and difficulties arise. The sexual life is no
+longer lived, as it were, openly. Symbolism and mysticism
+develop; a more complex social life provides
+disguised outlets for primitive and indestructible feelings.
+Sexualism, instead of being something to be
+glorified, and, so to speak, annotated by religious
+ceremonies, becomes something to be hidden or decried.
+Ignored it may be. Decried it may be; but it
+will not be denied. That is a practical impossibility in
+the case of so powerful and so pervasive a fact as sex.
+We may disguise its expression, but only too often
+the disguise is the equivalent of undesirable and unhealthy
+manifestations.</p>
+
+<p><!-- Page 121 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_121" id="Page_121">[121]</a></span>
+The modern history of religion offers a melancholy
+illustration of the truth of the last sentence, and it is
+quite clearly exhibited in the history of Christianity
+itself. From the beginning it strove to suppress the
+power of sexual feeling. It was an enemy against
+whom one had to be always on guard, one that had to
+be crushed, or at least kept in subjection in the interests
+of spiritual development. And yet the very
+intensity of the efforts at suppression defeated the
+object aimed at. With some of the leaders of early
+Christianity sex became an obsession. Long dwelling
+upon its power made them unduly and unhealthily
+conscious of its presence. Instead of sex taking its
+place as one of the facts of life, which like most other
+facts might be good or bad as circumstances determined,
+it was so much dwelt upon as to often dwarf
+everything else. Asceticism is, after all, mainly a reversed
+sensualism, or at least confesses the existence
+of a sensualism that must not be allowed expression
+lest its manifestation becomes overpowering. Mortification
+confesses the supremacy of sense as surely
+as gratification. Moreover, mortification of sense as
+preached by the great ascetics does not prevent that
+most dangerous of all forms of gratification, the sensualism
+of the imagination. That remains, and is apt
+to gain in strength since the fundamentally healthful
+energies are denied legitimate and natural modes
+of expression. Thus it is that we find developing
+social life not always providing a healthy outlet for
+the sexual life, and thus it is that the intense striving
+of religious leaders against the power of the sexual
+impulse has often forced it into strange and harmful
+forms of expression. So we find throughout the<!-- Page 122 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_122" id="Page_122">[122]</a></span>
+history of religion, not only that a deal of what
+has passed for supernatural illumination to have
+undoubtedly had its origin in perverted sexual feeling,
+but the constant emergence of curious religio-erotic
+sects whose strange mingling of eroticism
+and religion has scandalised many, and offered a
+lesson to all had they but possessed the wit to discern
+it.</p>
+
+<p>Although there is an understandable disinclination,
+amounting with some to positive revulsion, to recognise
+the sexual origin of much that passes for religious
+fervour, the fact is well known to competent medical
+observers, as the following citations will show.
+More than a generation since a well-known medical
+authority said:&mdash;</p>
+
+<p>"I know of no fact in pathology more striking and
+more terrifying than the way in which the phenomena
+of the ecstatic&mdash;which have often been seized upon by
+sentimental theorisers as proofs of spiritual exaltation&mdash;may
+be plainly seen to bridge the gulf between
+the innocent foolery of ordinary hypnotic patients and
+the degraded and repulsive phenomena of nymphomania
+and satyriasis."<a name="FNanchor_93_93" id="FNanchor_93_93"></a><a href="#Footnote_93_93" class="fnanchor">[93]</a></p>
+
+<p>Dr. C. Norman also observes:&mdash;</p>
+
+<p>"Ecstasy, as we see in cases of acute mental disease,
+is probably always connected with sexual excitement,
+if not with sexual depravity. The same association
+is seen in less extreme cases, and one of the
+commonest features in the conversation of acutely
+maniacal women is the intermingling of erotic and
+religious ideas."<a name="FNanchor_94_94" id="FNanchor_94_94"></a><a href="#Footnote_94_94" class="fnanchor">[94]</a></p>
+
+<p><!-- Page 123 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_123" id="Page_123">[123]</a></span>
+This opinion is fully endorsed by Sir Francis Galton:&mdash;</p>
+
+<p>"It has been noticed that among the morbid organic
+conditions which accompany the show of excessive
+piety and religious rapture in the insane, none are so
+frequent as disorders of the sexual organisation. Conversely,
+the frenzies of religious revivals have not infrequently ended
+in gross profligacy. The encouragement
+of celibacy by the fervent leaders of most creeds, utilises
+in an unconscious way the morbid connection
+between an over-restraint of the sexual desires and
+impulses towards extreme devotion."<a name="FNanchor_95_95" id="FNanchor_95_95"></a><a href="#Footnote_95_95" class="fnanchor">[95]</a></p>
+
+<p>Dr. Auguste Forel, the eminent German specialist,
+points out that&mdash;</p>
+
+<p>"When we study the religious sentiment profoundly,
+especially in the Christian religion, and Catholicism
+in particular, we find at each step its astonishing
+connection with eroticism. We find it in the exalted
+adoration of holy women, such as Mary Magdalene,
+Marie de Bethany, for Jesus, in the holy legends, in
+the worship of the Virgin Mary in the Middle Ages,
+and especially in art. The ecstatic Madonnas in our
+art galleries cast their fervent regards on Jesus or on
+the heavens. The expression in Murillo's 'Immaculate
+Conception' may be interpreted by the highest
+voluptuous exaltation of love as well as by holy transfiguration.
+The 'saints' of Correggio regard the Virgin
+with an amorous ardour which may be celestial, but
+appears in reality extremely terrestrial and human."<a name="FNanchor_96_96" id="FNanchor_96_96"></a><a href="#Footnote_96_96" class="fnanchor">[96]</a></p>
+
+<p>Another German authority remarks:&mdash;</p>
+
+<p>"I venture to express my conviction that we<!-- Page 124 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_124" id="Page_124">[124]</a></span>
+should rarely err if, in a case of religious melancholy,
+we assumed the sexual apparatus to be implicated."<a name="FNanchor_97_97" id="FNanchor_97_97"></a><a href="#Footnote_97_97" class="fnanchor">[97]</a></p>
+
+<p>Dr. Bevan Lewis points out how frequently religious
+exaltation occurs with women at puberty, and religious
+melancholia at the period of sexual decline.
+And Dr. Charles Mercier puts the interchangeability
+of sexual and religious feelings in the following passage:&mdash;</p>
+
+<p>"Religious observances provide an alternative, into
+which the amatory instinct can be easily and naturally
+diverted. The emotions and instinctive desires,
+which finds expression in courtship, is a vast body of
+vague feeling, which is at first undirected.... It is a
+voluminous state of exaltation that demands enthusiastic
+action. This is the state antecedent to falling
+in love, and if an object presents himself or herself, the
+torrent of emotion is directed into amatory passion.
+But if no object appears, or if the selected object is denied,
+then religious observances yield a very passable
+substitute for the expression of the emotion. Religious
+observances provide the sensuous atmosphere, the
+call for self-renunciation, the means of expressing
+powerful and voluminous feeling, that the potential
+or disappointed lover needs. The madrigal is transformed
+into the hymn; the adornment of the person
+that should have gone to allure the beloved now takes
+the shape of ecclesiastical vestments; the reverence
+that should have been paid to the loved one is transformed
+to a higher object; the enthusiasm that would
+have expanded in courtship is expressed in worship;
+the gifts that would have been made, the services that<!-- Page 125 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_125" id="Page_125">[125]</a></span>
+would have been rendered to the loved one, are transferred
+to the Church."<a name="FNanchor_98_98" id="FNanchor_98_98"></a><a href="#Footnote_98_98" class="fnanchor">[98]</a></p>
+
+<p>Dr. Krafft-Ebing, after dwelling upon the substantial
+identity of sexual love and religious emotion, summarises
+his conclusions by saying:&mdash;</p>
+
+<p>"Religious and sexual hyperæsthesia at the acme of
+development show the same volume of intensity and
+the same quality of excitement, and may, therefore,
+under given circumstances interchange. Both will in
+certain pathologic states degenerate into cruelty."<a name="FNanchor_99_99" id="FNanchor_99_99"></a><a href="#Footnote_99_99" class="fnanchor">[99]</a></p>
+
+<p>Even so orthodox a writer as the Rev. S. Baring-Gould
+points out that&mdash;</p>
+
+<p>"The existence of that evil, which, knowing the constitution
+of man, we should expect to find prevalent
+in mysticism, the experience of all ages has shown following,
+dogging its steps inevitably. So slight is the
+film that separates religion from sensual passion, that
+uncontrolled spiritual fervour roars readily into a blaze
+of licentiousness."<a name="FNanchor_100_100" id="FNanchor_100_100"></a><a href="#Footnote_100_100" class="fnanchor">[100]</a></p>
+
+<p>No useful purpose would be served by lengthening
+this list of citations. Enough has been said to show
+that the point of view expressed is one endorsed by
+many sober, competent, and responsible observers.
+There exists among them a general, and one may add
+a growing, recognition of the important truth that the
+connection between religious and sexual feeling is of
+the closest character, and that one is very often mistaken
+for the other. Asceticism, usually taken as evidence
+to the reverse, is on the contrary, confirmative.
+The ascetic often presents us with a flagrant case of
+eroto-mania, expressing itself in terms of religion.<!-- Page 126 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_126" id="Page_126">[126]</a></span>
+It is highly significant that the biographies of Christian
+saints should furnish so many cases of men and
+women of strong sensual passions, and whose ascetic
+devotion was only the reaction from almost unbridled
+sensualism. No wonder that in the temptations experienced
+by the monks the figures of nude women so
+often appeared before their heated imaginations. Sexual
+feeling suppressed in one direction broke out in
+another. Feelings, in themselves perfectly normal, became,
+as a consequence of repression and misdirection,
+pathologic. And one consequence of this was that
+many of the early Christian writers brought to the
+consideration of the subject of sex a concentration of
+mind that resulted in disquisitions of such a nature
+that it is impossible to do more than refer to them. The
+sexual relation instead of being refined was coarsened.
+Marriage was viewed in its lowest form, more as a
+concession to the weakness of the flesh than as a desirable
+state for all men and women. Nor can it be
+said, after many centuries, that these ideas are quite
+eradicated from present-day life.</p>
+
+<p>A field of investigation that yields much illuminating
+information is the biographies of the saints and
+of other religious characters. In many of these cases
+the acceptance of sexual feeling for religious illumination
+is very clear. Thus of St. Gertrude, a Benedictine
+nun of the thirteenth century, we read:&mdash;</p>
+
+<p>"One day at chapel she heard supernaturally sung
+the words, '<i>Sanctus, Sanctus, Sanctus</i>.' The Son of
+God, leaning towards her like a sweet lover, and giving
+to her soul the softest kiss, said to her at the second
+<i>Sanctus</i>, 'In the <i>Sanctus</i> addressed to My person, receive
+with this all the sanctity of My divinity and of<!-- Page 127 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_127" id="Page_127">[127]</a></span>
+My humanity.'... And the following Sunday, while
+she was thanking God for this favour, behold the
+Son of God, more beauteous than thousands of
+angels, takes her to His arms as if He were proud
+of her, and presents her to God the Father, and in
+that perfection of sanctity with which He had endowed
+her."<a name="FNanchor_101_101" id="FNanchor_101_101"></a><a href="#Footnote_101_101" class="fnanchor">[101]</a></p>
+
+<p>Of Juliana of Norwich, who was granted a revelation
+in 1373, we are told that she had for long 'ardently
+desired' a bodily sight of the Lord upon the
+cross; and that finally Jesus appeared to her and said,
+"I love thee and thou lovest Me, and our love shall
+never be disparted in two."<a name="FNanchor_102_102" id="FNanchor_102_102"></a><a href="#Footnote_102_102" class="fnanchor">[102]</a> So, again, in the case of
+Sister Jeanne des Anges, Superior of the Convent of
+Ursulines of Loudun, and the principal character in
+the famous Grandier witchcraft case, we have a detailed
+account, in her own words, of the lascivious
+dreams, unclean suggestions, etc.&mdash;all attributed to
+Satan&mdash;and alternating with impressions of bodily
+union with Jesus.<a name="FNanchor_103_103" id="FNanchor_103_103"></a><a href="#Footnote_103_103" class="fnanchor">[103]</a> Marie de L'Incarnation addresses
+Jesus as follows:&mdash;</p>
+
+<p>"Oh, my love, when shall I embrace you? Have you
+no pity on the torments that I suffer? Alas! alas! My
+love! My beauty! My life! Instead of healing my pain,
+you take pleasure in it. Come, let me embrace you, and
+die in your sacred arms."<a name="FNanchor_104_104" id="FNanchor_104_104"></a><a href="#Footnote_104_104" class="fnanchor">[104]</a></p>
+
+<p>Veronica Juliani, beatified by Pope Pius <span class="ucsmcap">II.</span>, took a
+real lamb to bed with her, kissed it, and suckled it at
+her breasts. St. Catherine of Genoa threw herself on
+the ground to cool herself, crying out, "Love, love, I<!-- Page 128 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_128" id="Page_128">[128]</a></span>
+can bear it no longer." She also confessed to a peculiar
+longing towards her confessor.<a name="FNanchor_105_105" id="FNanchor_105_105"></a><a href="#Footnote_105_105" class="fnanchor">[105]</a></p>
+
+<p>The blessed Mary Alacoque, foundress of the
+Sacred Heart, was subject from early life to a number
+of complaints&mdash;rheumatism, palsy, pains in the side,
+ulceration of the legs&mdash;and experienced visions early
+in her career. As a child she had so vivid a sense of
+modesty that the mere sight of a man offended her.
+At seventeen she took to wearing a knotted cord
+drawn so tightly that she could neither eat nor breathe
+without pain. She compressed her arms so tightly with
+iron chains that she could not remove them without
+anguish. "I made," she says, "a bed of potsherds, on
+which I slept with extreme pleasure." She fasted and
+tortured herself in a variety of ways, and the more her
+physical disorders increased the more numerous became
+her visions. Before she was eighteen years of
+age, in 1671, she entered a nunnery. From the time
+she donned the habit of a novice she was 'blessed'
+with visions. "Our Lord showed me that that day was
+the day of our spiritual wedding; He forthwith gave me
+to understand that He wished to make me taste all the
+sweetness of the caresses of His love. In reality, those
+divine caresses were from that moment so excessive,
+that they often put me out of myself." "Once," says
+one of her biographers, "having retired into her chamber,
+she threw off the clothes with which she had bedecked
+herself during the day, when the Son of God
+showed Himself to her in the state in which He was
+after His cruel flagellation&mdash;that is, with His body all
+wounded, torn, gory&mdash;and He said to her that it was
+her vanities that had brought Him into that condition."<!-- Page 129 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_129" id="Page_129">[129]</a></span>
+In one of these visions Jesus took the head
+of Mary, pressed it to His bosom, spoke to her in
+passionate words, opened her side and took out her
+heart, plunged it into His own, and then replaced
+it. He then explained His design of founding the
+Order of the Sacred Heart. Ever after, Mary was
+conscious of a pain in her side and a burning
+sensation in her chest&mdash;two plain symptoms of hysteria.<a name="FNanchor_106_106" id="FNanchor_106_106"></a><a href="#Footnote_106_106" class="fnanchor">[106]</a></p>
+
+<p>Santa Teresa, who died at the early age of thirty-three,
+and in whose family more than one case of well-developed
+neurasthenia can be traced, was favoured
+with 'messages' at a very early age. She believed some
+of these were temptations from the devil suggesting
+an 'honourable alliance.' A nervous breakdown followed
+directly after entrance into a convent. She was
+then twenty years of age, was subject to fainting fits
+and longed for illness as a sign of divine favour. She
+was subject to convulsions, and soon after taking the
+veil fell into a cataleptic trance, which lasted three
+days. She was thought to be dead, but at the end
+of the time sat up and told those around that
+she had visited both heaven and hell, and seen the
+joys of the blessed and the torments of the damned.
+It is at least suggestive that, in spite of the longing
+for personal communion with Jesus, her first
+experience of the ecstasy of divine love was experienced
+after discovering a 'very realistic' picture
+of a martyred saint&mdash;St. Joseph. The significance
+of the intense contemplation of a tortured body&mdash;possibly
+made by one whose sexual nature was<!-- Page 130 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_130" id="Page_130">[130]</a></span>
+undergoing a process of suppression&mdash;is unmistakable.<a name="FNanchor_107_107" id="FNanchor_107_107"></a><a href="#Footnote_107_107" class="fnanchor">[107]</a></p>
+
+<p>On these and similar cases Professor William James
+makes the following comment:&mdash;</p>
+
+<p>"To the medical mind these ecstasies signify nothing
+but suggested hypnoid states, on an intellectual
+basis of superstition, and a corporeal one of degeneration
+and hysteria. Undoubtedly these pathological
+conditions have existed in many and possibly in all
+the cases, but that fact tells us nothing about the value
+for knowledge of the consciousness which they induce.
+To pass a spiritual judgment upon these states, we
+must not content ourselves with superficial medical
+talk, but enquire into their fruits for life."<a name="FNanchor_108_108" id="FNanchor_108_108"></a><a href="#Footnote_108_108" class="fnanchor">[108]</a></p>
+
+<p>Now the question is really not what these ecstasies
+suggest to the 'medical mind,' as though that were a
+type of mind quite unfitted to pass judgment. It is a
+question of what the facts suggest to any mind judging
+the behaviour of a person under the influence of
+strong religious emotion exactly as it would judge
+anyone under any other strong emotional pressure.
+And if it be possible to explain these states in terms
+of known physiological and mental action, what warranty
+have we for rejecting this and preferring in its
+stead an explanation that is both unprovable and
+unnecessary? And one would be excused for thinking
+that cases which certainly involve some sort of
+abnormal nervous action are precisely those in which
+the medical mind should be called on to express an
+opinion. What is meant by passing 'a spiritual judgment'<!-- Page 131 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_131" id="Page_131">[131]</a></span>
+upon these states is not exactly clear, unless
+it means judging them in terms of the historic supernatural
+interpretation. But that is precisely the interpretation
+which is challenged by the 'medical mind.'</p>
+
+<p>I do not see how any enquiry "into their fruits for
+life" can affect a rational estimate of the nature of
+these mystical states. Mysticism adds nothing to the
+native disposition of a person. It merely gives their
+energies a new turn, a new direction. What they were
+before the experience they remain, substantially,
+afterwards. That is why we find religious mystics of
+every variety. Some energetically practical; others
+dreamily unpractical. Professor James admits this in
+saying that "the other-worldliness encouraged by the
+mystical consciousness makes this over-abstraction
+from practical life peculiarly liable to befall mystics in
+whom the character is naturally passive and the intellect
+feeble; but in natively strong minds and characters
+we find quite opposite results."<a name="FNanchor_109_109" id="FNanchor_109_109"></a><a href="#Footnote_109_109" class="fnanchor">[109]</a> And when it
+is further admitted that "the mystical feeling of enlargement,
+union, and emancipation has no specific
+intellectual content whatever of its own," but "is capable
+of forming matrimonial alliances with material
+furnished by the most diverse philosophies and theologies,
+provided only they can find a place in their
+framework for its peculiar emotional mood," mysticism
+seems reduced to an emotional development on
+all fours with emotional development in other directions.
+It is not peculiar to religious minds because "it
+has no specific intellectual content." It is amorphous,
+so to speak. And it may form diverse 'matrimonial
+alliances' precisely because it does not point to a<!-- Page 132 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_132" id="Page_132">[132]</a></span>
+hidden world of reality, but is merely indicative of
+tense emotional moods. In the face of nature the non-theistic
+Richard Jeffries experiences all the feelings
+of mental enlargement and emotional transports that
+Mary Alacoque or Santa Teresa experienced in their
+visions of the 'Risen Christ.'</p>
+
+<p>It is idle, then, to sneer at 'medical materialism,'
+and stigmatise it as superficial. Many people are constitutionally
+afraid of words, and there is nothing that
+arouses prejudice so quickly as a name. But it is really
+not a question of materialism, medical or non-medical.
+It is a mere matter of applying knowledge and
+common sense to the cases before us. Are we to take
+the subject's explanation of his or her mental states as
+authoritative, so far as their nature is concerned; or
+are we to treat them as symptoms demanding the
+skilled analysis of the specialist? If the former, how
+can we differentiate between the mystic and the admittedly
+hysterical patient? If the latter, what ground
+is there for placing the mystic in a category of his own?
+Rational and scientific analysis will certainly take far
+more notice of the nature of the feelings excited than
+of the object towards which they are directed. Here
+is the case of a young lady, given by Dr. Moreau, in his
+<cite>Morbid Psychology</cite>:&mdash;</p>
+
+<p>"During my long hours of sleeplessness in the night
+my beloved Saviour began to make Himself manifest
+to me. Pondering over the meditations of St. François
+de Sales on the <cite>Song of Songs</cite>, I seemed to feel all my
+faculties suspended, and crossing my arms upon my
+chest, I awaited in a sort of dread what might be revealed
+to me.... I saw the Redeemer veritably in the
+flesh.... He extended Himself beside me, pressed me<!-- Page 133 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_133" id="Page_133">[133]</a></span>
+so closely that I could feel His crown of thorns, and
+the nails in His feet and hands, while He pressed His
+lips over mine, giving me the most ravishing kiss of a
+divine Spouse, and sending a delicious thrill through
+my entire body."<a name="FNanchor_110_110" id="FNanchor_110_110"></a><a href="#Footnote_110_110" class="fnanchor">[110]</a></p>
+
+<p>Get rid of the narcotising effect of theological associations
+by eliminating the name of Jesus and other
+religious terms from this case, and from the others already
+cited, and no one would have the least doubt as
+to their real nature. Given a condition of physical
+health in these cases, with conditions that favoured
+social activity, healthy intercourse with the opposite
+sex, culminating in marriage and parenthood, can
+there be any doubt that this species of religious ecstasy
+would have been non-existent? If, as Tylor says,
+the refectory door would many a time have closed the
+gates of heaven, happy family life would in a vast
+number of cases have prevented those religio-erotic
+trances which have played so powerful a part in the
+history of supernaturalism. Most people will agree
+with Dr. Maudsley:&mdash;</p>
+
+<p>"The ecstatic trances of such saintly women as
+Catherine Sienne and St. Theresa, in which they believed
+themselves to be visited by their Saviour and
+to be received as veritable spouses into His bosom,
+were, though they knew it not, little better than vicarious
+sexual orgasm; a condition of things which the intense
+contemplation of the naked male figure, carved
+or sculptured in all its proportions on a cross, is more
+fitted to produce in young women of susceptible nervous
+temperament than people are apt to consider.
+Every experienced physician must have met with instances<!-- Page 134 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_134" id="Page_134">[134]</a></span>
+of single and childless women who have devoted
+themselves with extraordinary zeal to habitual
+religious exercises, and who, having gone insane as a
+culmination of their emotional fervour, have straightway
+exhibited the saddest mixture of religious and
+erotic symptoms&mdash;a boiling over of lust in voice, face,
+gestures, under the pitiful degradation of disease....
+The fanatical religious sects, such as the Shakers and
+the like, which spring up from time to time in communities
+and disgust them by the offensive way in
+which they mingle love and religion, are inspired in
+great measure by sexual feeling; on the one hand,
+there is probably the cunning of a hypocritical knave,
+or the self-deception of a half-insane one, using the
+weaknesses of weak women to minister to his vanity
+or his lust under a religious guise; on the other hand,
+there is an exaggerated self-feeling, often rooted in
+the sexual passion, which is unwittingly fostered under
+the cloak of religious emotion, and which is apt to conduct
+to madness or to sin. In such cases the holy kiss
+owes its warmth to the sexual impulse, which inspires
+it, consciously or unconsciously, and the mystical religious
+union of the sexes is fitted to issue in a less
+spiritual union."<a name="FNanchor_111_111" id="FNanchor_111_111"></a><a href="#Footnote_111_111" class="fnanchor">[111]</a></p>
+
+<p>Many manuals of devotion will be found to furnish
+the same kind of evidence as biographical narratives
+concerning the intimate relations that exists between
+sexuality and religious feeling. What has just been
+said may be repeated here, namely, that if the religious
+associations were dispelled, there would be no
+mistaking the nature of feelings that originated much<!-- Page 135 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_135" id="Page_135">[135]</a></span>
+of this class of writing, or the feelings to which they
+appeal. The serious fact is that the appeal is there
+whether we recognise it or not, and it is a question
+worthy of serious consideration whether the unwary
+imagination of the young may be not as surely debauched
+by certain books of devotion as by a frankly
+erotic production. It is not without reason that
+d'Israeli the elder, in an essay omitted from all editions
+of his book after the first, remarked that "poets
+are amorous, lovers are poetical, but saints are both."<a name="FNanchor_112_112" id="FNanchor_112_112"></a><a href="#Footnote_112_112" class="fnanchor">[112]</a>
+Take, for example, the following from a collection of
+old English homilies, dating from the thirteenth and
+fourteenth centuries:&mdash;</p>
+
+<p>"Jesus, my holy love, my sure sweetness! Jesus, my
+heart, my joy, my soul-heal! Jesus, sweet Jesus, my
+darling, my life, my light, my balm, my honey-drop!...
+Kindle me with the blaze of Thy enlightening love.
+Let me be Thy leman, and teach me to love Thee....
+Oh, that I might behold how Thou stretchedst Thyself
+for me on the cross. Oh, that I might cast myself<!-- Page 136 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_136" id="Page_136">[136]</a></span>
+between those same arms, so very wide outspread....
+Oh, that I were in Thy arms, in Thy arms so stretchedst
+and outspread on the cross."</p>
+
+<p>Or this, from the same collection:&mdash;</p>
+
+<p>"Sweet Jesus, my love, my darling, my Lord, my
+Saviour, my balm, sweeter is the remembrance of Thee
+than honey in the mouth. Who is there that may not
+love Thy lovely face? Whose heart is so hard that may
+not melt at the remembrance of Thee? Oh! who may
+not love Thee, lovely Jesus? Jesus, my precious darling,
+my love, my life, my beloved, my most worthy of
+love, my heart's balm, Thou art lovesome in countenance,
+Thou art altogether bright. All angels' life is to
+look upon Thy face, for Thy cheer is so marvellously
+lovesome and pleasant to look upon.... Thou art so
+bright, and so white that the sun would be pale if compared
+to Thy blissful countenance. If I, then, love any
+man for beauty, I will love Thee, my dear life, my
+mother's fairest son."<a name="FNanchor_113_113" id="FNanchor_113_113"></a><a href="#Footnote_113_113" class="fnanchor">[113]</a></p>
+
+<p>The language of erotic piety figures much more
+prominently in Roman Catholic medieval writings
+than in Protestant literature. This is not because an
+appeal to the same feelings is absent from the religious
+literature of Protestantism, it is mainly due to the
+fact that more modern conditions leads to a less intense
+religious appeal, while the broadening of social
+life encourages a more natural outlet for all aspects
+of human nature. Still, the following expression of a
+young lady convert of Wesley's offers a fair parallel to
+the specimen given above. It is taken from Southey's
+<cite>Life of Wesley</cite>:&mdash;</p>
+
+<p><!-- Page 137 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_137" id="Page_137">[137]</a></span>
+"Oh, mighty, powerful, happy change! The love
+of God was shed abroad in my heart, and a flame
+kindled there with pains so violent, and yet so very
+ravishing, that my body was almost torn asunder. I
+sweated, I trembled, I fainted, I sang. Oh, I thought
+my head was a fountain of water. I was dissolved in
+love. My beloved is mine, and I am His. He has all
+charms; He has ravished my heart; He is my comforter,
+my friend, my all. Oh, I am sick of love. He is
+altogether lovely, the chiefest among ten thousand.
+Oh, how Jesus fills, Jesus extends, Jesus overwhelms
+the soul in which He lives."</p>
+
+<p>The <cite>Imitation of Christ</cite> has been described by more
+than one writer as a manual of eroticism, and certainly
+the chapters "The Wonderful Effects of Divine
+Love," and "Of the Proof of a True Lover," might
+well be cited in defence of this view. In the following
+canticle of St. Francis of Assisi it does not seem possible
+to distinguish a substantial difference between it
+and a frankly avowed love poem:&mdash;</p>
+
+<div class="poem"><div class="stanza">
+<span class="i0">"Into love's furnace I am cast,<br /></span>
+<span class="i1">Into love's furnace I am cast,<br /></span>
+<span class="i1">I burn, I languish, pine, and waste.<br /></span>
+<span class="i1">Oh, love divine, how sharp thy dart!<br /></span>
+<span class="i1">How deep the wound that galls my heart!<br /></span>
+<span class="i1">As wax in heat, so, from above,<br /></span>
+<span class="i1">My smitten soul dissolves in love.<br /></span>
+<span class="i1">I live, yet languishing I die,<br /></span>
+<span class="i1">While in thy furnace bound I lie."<a name="FNanchor_114_114" id="FNanchor_114_114"></a><a href="#Footnote_114_114" class="fnanchor">[114]</a><br /></span>
+</div></div>
+
+<p>It would certainly be possible to furnish exact parallels
+from volumes of secular verse that would be strictly
+'taboo' among those who fail to see anything objectionable
+in verses like the above when written in connection<!-- Page 138 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_138" id="Page_138">[138]</a></span>
+with religion. Such people fail to recognise
+that their attractiveness lies in the hidden appeal to
+amatory feeling, and owe their origin to the suppressed
+or perverted sexual passion of their author. We
+must not allow ourselves to be blinded by the consideration
+as to whether the object of adoration be an
+earthly or a heavenly one. Men and women have not
+distinct feelings that are aroused as their objective differs,
+but the same feelings directed now in one direction,
+now in another. The direction of these feelings,
+their exciting cause, are sheer environmental accidents.
+How can one resist the implications of the following,
+from a devotional work widely circulated amongst
+the women of France:&mdash;</p>
+
+<div class="poem"><div class="stanza">
+<span class="i0">"Praise to Jesus, praise His power,<br /></span>
+<span class="i1">Praise His sweet allurements.<br /></span>
+<span class="i1">Praise to Jesus, when His goodness<br /></span>
+<span class="i1">Reduces me to nakedness;<br /></span>
+<span class="i1">Praise to Jesus when He says to me,<br /></span>
+<span class="i1">My sister, my dove, my beautiful one!<br /></span>
+<span class="i1">Praise to Jesus in all my steps,<br /></span>
+<span class="i1">Praise to His amorous charms.<br /></span>
+<span class="i1">Praise to Jesus when His loving mouth<br /></span>
+<span class="i1">Touches mine in a loving kiss.<br /></span>
+<span class="i1">Praise to Jesus when His gentle caresses<br /></span>
+<span class="i1">Overwhelm me with chaste joys.<br /></span>
+<span class="i1">Praise to Jesus when at His leisure<br /></span>
+<span class="i1">He allows me to kiss Him."<a name="FNanchor_115_115" id="FNanchor_115_115"></a><a href="#Footnote_115_115" class="fnanchor">[115]</a><br /></span>
+</div></div>
+
+<p>Against this we may place the following hymn, sung
+at an American camp meeting of some thousands of
+persons between the ages of fourteen and twenty-five:&mdash;</p>
+
+<p><!-- Page 139 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_139" id="Page_139">[139]</a></span></p>
+<div class="poem"><div class="stanza">
+<span class="i0">"Blessed Lily of the Valley, oh, how fair is He;<br /></span>
+<span class="i3">He is mine, I am His.<br /></span>
+<span class="i1">Sweeter than the angels' music is His voice to me;<br /></span>
+<span class="i3">He is mine, I am His.<br /></span>
+<span class="i1">Where the lilies fair are blooming by the waters calm<br /></span>
+<span class="i1">There He leads me and upholds me by His strong right arm.<br /></span>
+</div><div class="stanza">
+<span class="i1">All the air is love around me&mdash;I can feel no harm;<br /></span>
+<span class="i3">He is mine, I am His."<a name="FNanchor_116_116" id="FNanchor_116_116"></a><a href="#Footnote_116_116" class="fnanchor">[116]</a><br /></span>
+</div></div>
+
+<p>Special significance is given to this reference by the
+age of those who composed the gathering. This period
+embraces the years during which sexual maturity is
+attained, and the organism experiences important
+physiological and psychological changes. The consequence
+is that the atmosphere is, so to say, charged
+with unsuspected sex feeling, and it is not surprising
+that many complaints have been made of immorality
+following such gatherings. The organism is then peculiarly
+liable to suggestion in all forms. Along with
+the imitativeness of early years there is something of
+the decisive initiative of maturity. These qualities
+wisely guided might be turned to the great advantage
+of both the individual and of the community. Mere
+incitement by religious revivalism can result in little
+else than misdirection and injury. It should be the most
+obvious of truths that the attractiveness of hymns such
+as the one given, with the keen delight in the suggested
+pictures, lies in their yielding&mdash;all unknown, perhaps,
+to those participating&mdash;satisfaction to feelings that
+are very frequently imperious in their demands, and
+are at all times astonishingly pervasive in their influence.</p>
+
+<p>Much valuable light is thrown upon this aspect of<!-- Page 140 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_140" id="Page_140">[140]</a></span>
+the subject by a study of human behaviour under the
+influence of actual disease. Of late years much useful
+work has been done in this direction, and our knowledge
+of normal psychology greatly helped by a study
+of abnormal mental states.<a name="FNanchor_117_117" id="FNanchor_117_117"></a><a href="#Footnote_117_117" class="fnanchor">[117]</a> This is mainly because
+in disease we are able to observe the operation of tendencies
+that are unobscured by the restraints and inhibitions
+created by education and social convention.
+And one of the most striking, and to many startling,
+things observed is the close relation existing between
+erotic mania and religious delusion. The person who
+at one time feels himself under direct religious inspiration,
+or who imagines himself to be the incarnation
+of a divine personage, will at another time exhibit the
+most shocking obscenity in action and language. Sir
+T. S. Clouston furnishes a very striking case of this
+character, which he cites in order to show "the common
+mixture of religious and sexual emotion."<a name="FNanchor_118_118" id="FNanchor_118_118"></a><a href="#Footnote_118_118" class="fnanchor">[118]</a> I do not
+reproduce it here because of its grossly obscene
+character; but, save for coarseness of language, it
+does not differ materially from illustrations already
+given. Almost any of the text-books will supply cases
+illustrating the connection between sexualism and religion,
+a connection generally recognised as the opinions
+cited already clearly show.</p>
+
+<p>Dr. Mercier, in dealing with the connection between
+sexualism and religion, which he says "has long been
+recognised, but never accounted for," traces it to a
+feeling of, or desire for self-sacrifice common to both.<!-- Page 141 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_141" id="Page_141">[141]</a></span>
+Certainly sacrifice in some form&mdash;of food, weapons,
+land, money, or bodily inconvenience&mdash;is a feature
+present in every religion more or less. And it is quite
+certain that not merely the fact, but the desire for some
+amount of sacrifice, forms "an integral, fundamental,
+and preponderating element" in the sexual emotion.
+Dr. Mercier further believes that the benevolence
+founded on religious emotion has its origin in sexual
+emotion, which is, again, extremely likely. This community
+of origin would allow for the transformation of
+one into the other, and supplies a key to the language
+of lover-like devotion and self-abnegation which is so
+prominent in religious devotional literature. The importance
+attached to dress is also very suggestive;
+for here, again, the element of sacrifice expresses itself
+in the cultivation of a studied repulsiveness to
+the normal attractiveness of costume. "Thus," says
+Dr. Mercier, "we find that the self-sacrificial vagaries
+of the rejected lover and of the religious devotee own
+a common origin and nature. The hook and spiny
+kennel of the fakir, the pillar of St. Simeon Stylites,
+the flagellum of the monk, the sombre garments of the
+nun, the silence of the Trappists, the defiantly hideous
+costume of the hallelujah lass, and the mortified sobriety
+of the district visitor, have at bottom the same
+origin as the rags of Cardenio, the cage of Don Quixote
+de la Mancha, and the yellow stockings and crossed
+garters of Malvolio."<a name="FNanchor_119_119" id="FNanchor_119_119"></a><a href="#Footnote_119_119" class="fnanchor">[119]</a></p>
+
+<p>Professor Granger, who at times comes very near
+the truth, says:&mdash;</p>
+
+<p>"There is something profoundly philosophical in
+the use of <cite>The Song of Songs</cite> to typify the communion<!-- Page 142 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_142" id="Page_142">[142]</a></span>
+of the soul with its ideal. The passion which is expressed
+by the Shulamite for her earthly lover in such
+glowing phrases becomes the type of the love of the
+soul towards God."<a name="FNanchor_120_120" id="FNanchor_120_120"></a><a href="#Footnote_120_120" class="fnanchor">[120]</a></p>
+
+<p>One fails to see the profoundly philosophic nature
+of the selection. The <cite>Song of Songs</cite> is a frankly erotic
+love poem, written with no other aim than is common
+to such poetry, and its spiritualisation is due to the
+same process of reinterpretation that is applied to
+other parts of the Bible in order to make them agreeable
+to modern thought. Had it not been in the Bible,
+Christians would have found it neither profoundly
+philosophical nor spiritually illuminating; and, as a
+matter of fact, similar effusions are selected by Christians
+from non-Christian writings as proofs of their
+sensual character. The real significance of its use in
+religious worship is that it gives a marked expression
+to feelings that crave an outlet. And the lesson is that
+sexual feeling cannot be eliminated from life; it can
+only be diverted or disguised. Some expression it will
+find&mdash;here in open perversion resulting in positive
+vice, there in obsession that leads to a half-insane asceticism,
+and elsewhere the creation of the unconsciously
+salacious with an unhealthy fondness for dabbling
+in questions that refer to the illicit relations of
+the sexes.</p>
+
+<p>"One of the reasons why popular religion in England,"
+says Professor Granger, "seems to be coming
+to the limits of its power, is that it has contented itself
+so largely with the commonplace motives which, after
+all, find sufficient exercise in the ordinary duties of
+life." Here, again, is a curious obtuseness to a plain<!-- Page 143 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_143" id="Page_143">[143]</a></span>
+but important truth. With what else should a healthy
+religion associate itself but the ordinary motives or
+feelings of human life? With what else has religion
+always associated itself? Far from that being the
+source of the weakness of modern religion, it is its only
+genuine source of strength. If religion can so associate
+itself with the ordinary facts and feelings of life that
+these are unintelligible or poorer without religion,
+then religious people have nothing to fear. But if it
+be true, as Professor Granger implies, that life in its
+normal moods can receive complete gratification apart
+from religion, then the outlook is very different. From
+a merely historic point of view it is true that as men
+have found explanations of phenomena, and gratifications
+of feelings apart from religion, the latter has lost
+a deal of its power. This is seen in the growth of the
+physical sciences, and also, although in a smaller measure,
+in sociology and morals.</p>
+
+<p>This, however, opens up the enquiry, previously
+indicated, as to how far the whole range of human
+life may be satisfactorily explained in the complete
+absence of religion or supernaturalism. And with this
+we are not now directly concerned. What we are concerned
+with is to show that from one direction at least
+supernaturalism has derived strength from a misinterpretation
+of the facts. These facts, once interpreted as
+clear evidence for supernaturalism, are now seen to be
+susceptible to a different explanation. But they have
+nevertheless played their part in creating as part of
+the social heritage a diffused sense of the reality of
+supernatural intercourse. It is not, then, a question of
+religion losing power because it has contented itself
+with commonplace motives, and because these have<!-- Page 144 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_144" id="Page_144">[144]</a></span>
+now found satisfaction in ordinary life. It is rather a
+question of the adequacy of science to deal with facts
+that have been taken to lie outside the scientific order.
+Has science the knowledge or the ability to deal with
+the extraordinary as well as with the ordinary facts of
+life? I believe it has. The facts we have passed in
+review <em>are</em> amenable to scientific treatment, for the
+reason that they belong to a class with which the
+physician of to-day finds himself in constant contact.
+And it is too often overlooked that the belief in the
+existence and influence of a supersensible world is
+itself only a theory put forward in explanation of
+certain classes of facts, and like all theories it becomes
+superfluous once a simpler theory is made possible.</p>
+
+<div class="footnotes">
+<h3>Footnotes:<br />
+<span class="skip">[<a href="#Page_145">Skip</a>]</span>
+</h3>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_93_93" id="Footnote_93_93"></a><a href="#FNanchor_93_93"><span class="label">[93]</span></a> Article in <cite>The Lancet</cite>, Jan. 11, 1873.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_94_94" id="Footnote_94_94"></a><a href="#FNanchor_94_94"><span class="label">[94]</span></a> Article in Tuke's <cite>Dictionary of Psychological Medicine</cite>.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_95_95" id="Footnote_95_95"></a><a href="#FNanchor_95_95"><span class="label">[95]</span></a> <cite>Inquiries into Human Faculty</cite>, pp. 66-7.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_96_96" id="Footnote_96_96"></a><a href="#FNanchor_96_96"><span class="label">[96]</span></a> <cite>The Sexual Question</cite>, pp. 354-5.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_97_97" id="Footnote_97_97"></a><a href="#FNanchor_97_97"><span class="label">[97]</span></a> Cited by Havelock Ellis, <cite>Psychology of Sex</cite>, pp. 233-4.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_98_98" id="Footnote_98_98"></a><a href="#FNanchor_98_98"><span class="label">[98]</span></a> <cite>Conduct and its Disorders</cite>, pp. 368-9.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_99_99" id="Footnote_99_99"></a><a href="#FNanchor_99_99"><span class="label">[99]</span></a> <cite>Psychopathia-Sexualis</cite>, pp. 9-11.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_100_100" id="Footnote_100_100"></a><a href="#FNanchor_100_100"><span class="label">[100]</span></a> <cite>Lost and Hostile Gospels</cite>, Preface.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_101_101" id="Footnote_101_101"></a><a href="#FNanchor_101_101"><span class="label">[101]</span></a> Cited by James, <cite>Varieties</cite>, pp. 345-6.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_102_102" id="Footnote_102_102"></a><a href="#FNanchor_102_102"><span class="label">[102]</span></a> Inge, <cite>Christian Mysticism</cite>, pp. 201-9.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_103_103" id="Footnote_103_103"></a><a href="#FNanchor_103_103"><span class="label">[103]</span></a> See Ellis, <cite>Psychology of Sex</cite>, pp. 240-2.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_104_104" id="Footnote_104_104"></a><a href="#FNanchor_104_104"><span class="label">[104]</span></a> Parkman's <cite>Jesuits in North America</cite>, p. 175.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_105_105" id="Footnote_105_105"></a><a href="#FNanchor_105_105"><span class="label">[105]</span></a> Krafft-Ebing, <cite>Psychopathia-Sexualis</cite>, p. 8.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_106_106" id="Footnote_106_106"></a><a href="#FNanchor_106_106"><span class="label">[106]</span></a> See L. Asseline's <cite>Mary Alacoque and the Worship of the
+Sacred Heart of Jesus</cite>.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_107_107" id="Footnote_107_107"></a><a href="#FNanchor_107_107"><span class="label">[107]</span></a> See <cite>St. Teresa of Spain</cite>, by H. H. Colvill, and <cite>Saint Teresa</cite>,
+by H. Joly.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_108_108" id="Footnote_108_108"></a><a href="#FNanchor_108_108"><span class="label">[108]</span></a> <cite>Varieties</cite>, p. 413.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_109_109" id="Footnote_109_109"></a><a href="#FNanchor_109_109"><span class="label">[109]</span></a> <cite>Varieties</cite>, p. 413.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_110_110" id="Footnote_110_110"></a><a href="#FNanchor_110_110"><span class="label">[110]</span></a> Cited by J. F. Nisbet, <cite>The Insanity of Genius</cite>, p. 248.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_111_111" id="Footnote_111_111"></a><a href="#FNanchor_111_111"><span class="label">[111]</span></a> <cite>Pathology of Mind</cite>, p. 144. Also Mercier, <cite>Sanity and Insanity</cite>,
+pp. 223, 281.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_112_112" id="Footnote_112_112"></a><a href="#FNanchor_112_112"><span class="label">[112]</span></a> <cite>Miscellanies</cite>, 1796, p. 365. From the same essay I take the
+following: "Even the ceremonies of religion, both in ancient
+and in modern times, have exhibited the grossest indecencies.
+Priests in all ages have been the successful panders of the human
+heart, and have introduced in the solemn worship of the divinity,
+incitements, gratifications, and representations, which the
+pen of the historian must refuse to describe. Often has the
+sensible Catholic blushed amidst his devotions, and I have seen
+chapels surrounded by pictures of lascivious attitudes, and the
+obsolete amours of saints revived by the pencil of some Aretine....
+Their homilies were manuals of love, and the more religious
+they became, the more depraved were their imaginations. In
+the nunnery the love of Jesus was the most abandoned of passions,
+and the ideal espousal was indulged at the cost of the
+feeble heart of many a solitary beauty" (pp. 369-70).</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_113_113" id="Footnote_113_113"></a><a href="#FNanchor_113_113"><span class="label">[113]</span></a> From a collection published by the Early English Text
+Society, 1868, pp. 182-4, 268.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_114_114" id="Footnote_114_114"></a><a href="#FNanchor_114_114"><span class="label">[114]</span></a> G. A. Coe, <cite>The Spiritual Life</cite>, p. 210.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_115_115" id="Footnote_115_115"></a><a href="#FNanchor_115_115"><span class="label">[115]</span></a> <cite>Les Perles de Saint François de Sales</cite>, 1871. Cited by Bloch,
+p. 111.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_116_116" id="Footnote_116_116"></a><a href="#FNanchor_116_116"><span class="label">[116]</span></a> Davenport's <cite>Primitive Traits in Religious Revivals</cite>, p. 29.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_117_117" id="Footnote_117_117"></a><a href="#FNanchor_117_117"><span class="label">[117]</span></a> See, for example, <cite>Conduct and its Disorders</cite>, by Dr. C.
+Mercier; <cite>Psycho-Pathological Researches</cite>, by Dr. Boris Sidis;
+and <cite>Abnormal Psychology</cite>, by I. H. Coriat.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_118_118" id="Footnote_118_118"></a><a href="#FNanchor_118_118"><span class="label">[118]</span></a> <cite>Clinical Lectures on Mental Diseases</cite>, p. 584.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_119_119" id="Footnote_119_119"></a><a href="#FNanchor_119_119"><span class="label">[119]</span></a> <cite>Sanity and Insanity</cite>, chap. viii.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_120_120" id="Footnote_120_120"></a><a href="#FNanchor_120_120"><span class="label">[120]</span></a> <cite>The Soul of a Christian</cite>, p. 178.</p></div>
+</div>
+
+<p><!-- Page 145 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_145" id="Page_145">[145]</a></span></p>
+
+<h2>CHAPTER <span class="cgap">SIX</span><br />
+THE STREAM OF TENDENCY</h2>
+
+<p>It should hardly need pointing
+out that the facts presented in the last chapter are not
+offered as an attempt at the&mdash;to use Professor William
+James's expression&mdash;"reinterpretation of religion as
+perverted sexuality." Nor, so far as the present writer
+is aware, has anyone ever so presented them. The expression,
+indeed, seems almost a deliberate mis-statement
+of a position in order to make its rebuttal easier.
+Obviously the idea of religion must be already in existence
+before it could be utilised for the purpose of
+explaining any group of phenomena. But if the biographic
+and other facts described have any value whatever,
+they are at least strong presumptive evidence in
+favour of the position that in very many cases a perverted
+or unsatisfied sexuality has been at the root of
+a great deal of the world's emotional piety. Of course,
+the strong religious belief must be in existence before-hand.
+But given this, and add thereto a sexual nature
+imperious in its demands and yet denied legitimate
+outlet, and we have the conditions present for its promptings
+being interpreted as the fruits of supernatural
+influence. It is not a reinterpretation of <em>religion</em> that is
+attempted, but a reinterpretation of phenomena that
+have been erroneously called religious. And on all
+sides the need for this reinterpretation is becoming
+clear. Over sixty years ago Renan wrote, "A rigorous
+psychological analysis would class the innate religious
+instinct of women in the same category with the sexual
+instinct,"<a name="FNanchor_121_121" id="FNanchor_121_121"></a><a href="#Footnote_121_121" class="fnanchor">[121]</a> and since then a very much more detailed
+knowledge of both physiology and psychology<!-- Page 146 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_146" id="Page_146">[146]</a></span>
+has furnished a multitude of data for an exhaustive
+study of the whole question.</p>
+
+<p>In the present chapter our interest is mainly historical.
+And for various reasons, chief amongst which is
+that interested readers may the more easily follow up
+the study should they feel so inclined, the survey has
+been restricted to the history of that religion with which
+we are best acquainted&mdash;Christianity. Moreover, if we
+are to form a correct judgment of the part played in the
+history of religions by the misinterpretations already
+noted, it is necessary to trace the extent to which they
+have influenced men and women in a collective capacity.
+For the striking fact is that, in spite of the purification
+of the sexual relations being one of the avowed
+objects of Christianity, in spite, too, of the attempts of
+the official churches to suppress them, the history of
+Christianity has been dogged by outbreaks of sexual
+extravagance, by the continuous emergence of erotico-religious
+sects, claiming Christian teachings as the
+authority for their actions. We need not discuss the
+legitimacy of their inferences. We are concerned solely
+with a chronicle of historic facts so far as they can be
+ascertained; and these have a certain significance of
+their own, as events, quite apart from their reasonableness
+or desirability.</p>
+
+<p>A part cause of the movements we are about to describe
+may have been a violent reaction against an
+extravagant asceticism. Something may also be due
+to the fact that over-concentration of mind upon a
+particular evil is apt to defeat its end by the mere force
+of unconscious suggestion in the contrary direction.
+But in all probability much was due to the presence
+of certain elements inherited by Christianity from the<!-- Page 147 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_147" id="Page_147">[147]</a></span>
+older religions. At any rate, those whose minds are
+filled with the idea that sexual extravagance on a collective
+scale and under the cloak of religion is either a
+modern phenomenon, or was unknown to the early history
+of Christianity, would do well to revise their opinions in the
+light of ascertainable facts. No less a person
+than the Rev. S. Baring-Gould has reminded us that
+criticism discloses "on the shining face of primitive
+Christianity rents and craters undreamt of in our old
+simplicity," and also asserts "that there was in the
+breast of the newborn Church an element of antinomianism,
+not latent, but in virulent activity, is a fact as
+capable of demonstration as any conclusion in a science
+which is not exact."<a name="FNanchor_122_122" id="FNanchor_122_122"></a><a href="#Footnote_122_122" class="fnanchor">[122]</a></p>
+
+<p>There would be little value in a study of these erotico-religious
+movements if they involved only a detection
+of individual lust consciously using religion as
+a cloak for its gratification. Such a conclusion is a
+fatally easy one, but it does little justice to the chief
+people concerned, and it is quite lacking in historical
+perspective. In most cases the initiators of these
+strange sects have put forward a philosophy of religion
+as a justification of their teaching, and only a slight
+knowledge of this is enough to prove that we are face
+to face with a phenomenon of much greater significance
+than mere immorality. This may be recognised
+even in the pages of the New Testament itself. It is
+not a practice that is there denounced; it is a teaching
+that is repudiated. And one sees the same thing
+at later periods. The conviction on the one side that
+certain actions are unlawful, is met on the other side
+with the conviction that they are perfectly legitimate.<!-- Page 148 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_148" id="Page_148">[148]</a></span>
+Conviction is met with conviction. Each side expresses
+itself in terms of religion; the ethical aspect is incidental
+or subordinate. It is a contest of opposing religious
+beliefs and practices.</p>
+
+<p>The real nature of the conflict is often obscured by
+the fact of social opinion and the social forces generally
+being on the side of the more normal expression
+of sexual life. This, however, is no more than a necessity
+of the situation. The continuance of a healthful
+social life is dependent upon the maintenance of a
+certain balance in the relations of the sexes, and anything
+that strikes at this strikes at social life as a whole.
+In such cases we have, therefore, to allow for the operation
+of social selection, which is always on the side of
+the more normal type. From this it follows that although
+a small body of people may exemplify a variation
+that is in itself socially disastrous, the main forces
+of social life will prevent its ever assuming large dimensions.
+Moreover, a large body of people, such as is
+represented by a church holding a commanding position
+in society, will be forced to come to terms with the
+permanent tendencies of social life, and will either suppress
+undesirable variations or expel them. It thus
+happens that while the larger and more dominant
+churches have been on the side of normal, regularised
+expressions of the sexual life, abnormal variations have
+constantly arisen and have been denounced by them.
+But the significant feature is that they have arisen
+within the churches, and most commonly during periods
+of great religious stress or excitement.</p>
+
+<p>These tendencies, as the Rev. S. Baring-Gould has
+pointed out, existed in the very earliest days of Christianity.
+It is quite apparent from Paul's writings that<!-- Page 149 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_149" id="Page_149">[149]</a></span>
+as early as the date of the First Epistle to the Corinthians
+some of the more objectionable features of the
+older Pagan worship had shown themselves in the
+Church. The doctrine of 'spiritual wifehood' appeared
+at a very early date in the Church, and its teachers
+cited even St. Paul himself as their authority. Their
+claim was based upon Paul's declaration (1 Cor. ix. 5)
+that he had power to lead about "a sister, a wife, as
+well as other apostles, and as the brethren of the Lord
+and Cephas." Curiously enough, commentators have
+never agreed as to what Paul meant by this expression.
+The word translated may mean either wife, or sister,
+or woman. Had it been wife in the ordinary sense, it
+does not appear that at that date there would have
+been any room for scandal. The clear fact is, however,
+that others claimed a like privilege; the privilege was
+not always restricted to one woman, and the practice,
+if not general, became not uncommon, and furnished
+the ground for scandal for a long period. Two epistles,
+wrongly attributed to St. Clement of Rome, and dating
+from some time in the second century, condemn
+the practice of young people living together under the
+cloak of religion, and specially warns virgins against
+cohabiting with the clergy and so giving offence. That
+the practice was difficult to suppress is shown by its
+being condemned by several church councils&mdash;Antioch
+in 210, Nicea in 325, and Elvira in 350.<a name="FNanchor_123_123" id="FNanchor_123_123"></a><a href="#Footnote_123_123" class="fnanchor">[123]</a> At a
+later date a much more elaborate theory has been
+built on Paul's claim. The Pauline Church has found
+several expressions both in England and America
+within recent times.<a name="FNanchor_124_124" id="FNanchor_124_124"></a><a href="#Footnote_124_124" class="fnanchor">[124]</a> These sects have claimed that<!-- Page 150 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_150" id="Page_150">[150]</a></span>
+both St. Paul and the woman with whom he travelled
+were in a state of grace, and, therefore, above all law.
+We do not mean the maintenance of an ascetic relationship,
+but the normal relation of husband and wife.
+It is really the doctrine of 'Free Love' with a spiritual
+warranty instead of a secular one.</p>
+
+<p>This doctrine of religious 'Free Love' rests upon
+a twofold basis. First, it was held that, apart from a
+wife after the flesh, one might also have a wife after the
+spirit, and this spiritual union might exist side by side
+with the fleshly one, and with different persons. A
+great impetus appears to have been given to this theory
+from Germany, many of the originators of the American
+sects of Free Lovers being Germans. Secondly,
+it was held that a Christian in a state of grace was absolved
+from laws that were binding upon other people.
+His actions were no longer subject to the categories
+of right and wrong; as it was said, to one in a state of
+grace all things were lawful, even though all things
+might not be expedient. Some went the length of
+teaching that not only were all things lawful, but all
+things were desirable. Separating by a sharp division
+things that influenced the soul from things that influenced
+the body, it was openly taught by some of the
+early sects that nothing done by the body could injure
+the soul, and so could not affect its salvation.
+Reversing the practice of asceticism, which sought to
+crush bodily passions by a course of deprivation, it
+was taught that all kinds of forbidden conduct might
+be practised in order to demonstrate the soul's superiority.
+There is no question whatever that this tendency
+was very prominent in the early Christian
+Church. It was not there as something hidden, some<!-- Page 151 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_151" id="Page_151">[151]</a></span>thing
+of which men ought to be ashamed; it was an
+avowed teaching, claiming full religious sanction.
+"The Church," says Baring-Gould, "trembled on the
+verge of becoming an immoral sect." The same writer
+also says:&mdash;</p>
+
+<p>"This <em>teaching</em> of immorality in the Church is a
+startling feature, and it seems to have been pursued by
+some who called themselves apostles as well as by
+those who assumed to be prophets. In the Corinthian
+Church even the elders encouraged incest. Now, it is
+not possible to explain this phenomenon except on
+the ground that Paul's argument as to the Law being
+overridden had been laid hold of and elevated into a
+principle. These teachers did not wink at lapses into
+immorality, but defiantly urged on the converts to
+the Gospel to commit adultery, fornication, and all
+uncleanness ... as a protest against those who contended
+that the moral law as given on the tables was
+still binding upon the Church."<a name="FNanchor_125_125" id="FNanchor_125_125"></a><a href="#Footnote_125_125" class="fnanchor">[125]</a></p>
+
+<p>A certain detachment from modern conditions,
+and from modern frames of mind, is essential to an
+adequate appreciation of what has been said. Looking
+at these events through the distorting medium of
+an altogether different social atmosphere, one is apt
+to attribute them to the operation of lawless desire,
+and so have done with it. This, however, is to overlook
+the fact that we are dealing with a society in which
+sexual symbols were common in religious worship,
+and in which theories of the religious life were propounded
+and accepted which to-day would be regarded
+as little less than maniacal. Unquestionably
+even then, once the situation had established itself it<!-- Page 152 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_152" id="Page_152">[152]</a></span>
+would be utilised by those of a coarser nature for mere
+sensual gratification. But practices such as we know
+existed, on the scale we have every reason for believing
+they were, could never have been had they not
+taken the form of an intense conviction. To assume
+otherwise is equal to arguing that because men have
+entered the Church from mere love of power or lust for
+wealth, the Church owed its establishment to the
+play of these motives. It is true that those who opposed
+these religio-erotic sects accused them of immorality,
+but it is the form these teachings assumed
+to the members of the impeached sects, not how they
+appeared to their enemies, that is important. Eroticism
+taught and practised as a religious conviction&mdash;that is
+the essential and significant feature of the situation.
+Not to grasp this is to fail to realise the vital fact embodied
+in the phenomena under consideration. We
+are not dealing with mere sensualists, even though
+we may be dealing with what is largely an expression
+of sensualism. It is sensualism expressed as, and sanctioned
+by, religious conviction that is the vital fact of
+the situation.</p>
+
+<p>One of the earliest Christian institutions around
+which scandals gathered was that of the Agapæ, or
+love-feasts. From the outset the Pagan writers asserted
+that these love-feasts were new versions of
+various old orgiastic practices, some of which were
+still current, others of which had been suppressed by
+the Roman government. There is no doubt that they
+were the grounds of very serious accusations against
+the Christians. On the other hand, it must be remembered
+that, at the outset at least, these charges were
+indignantly rejected by the Christians. The Agapæ<!-- Page 153 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_153" id="Page_153">[153]</a></span>
+were called indiscriminately Feasts of Love and
+Feasts of Charity. Each member, male and female,
+greeted each other with a holy kiss, and the institution
+was described by Tertullian as "a support of love, a
+solace of purity, a check on riches, a discipline of weakness."
+These love-feasts were held on important occasions,
+such as a marriage, a death, or the anniversary
+of a martyrdom. Some churches celebrated them
+weekly. From the Acts of the Apostles we learn that
+the feasts began about nightfall, and continued till after
+midnight, or even till daybreak. It was only natural
+that mixed assemblies of men and women that
+gathered in this manner, and where there was eating
+and drinking, should create scandal. It is absolutely
+certain that some of this scandal had a basis in fact.
+The Rev. S. Baring-Gould confesses that "at Corinth,
+and certainly elsewhere, among excitable people, the
+wine, the heat, the exaltation of emotion, led to orgiastic
+ravings, the jabbering of disconnected, unintelligible
+words, to fits, convulsions, pious exclamations,
+and incoherent ravings." And unless St. Paul was deliberately
+slandering his fellow-believers worse things
+than these occurred.</p>
+
+<p>Generally, even by non-Christian writers, it has been
+assumed that the Agapæ commenced as a perfectly
+harmless, even admirable institution, and afterwards
+degenerated, and so gave genuine cause for scandal.
+It is not easy to see that this opinion rests on anything
+better than a mere prejudice. It is true that there is no
+unmistakable evidence to the contrary, but no clear
+evidence is to be found in its behalf. The Agapæ was
+not, after all, an essentially Christian institution. Similar
+gatherings existed among the Pagans, more or less<!-- Page 154 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_154" id="Page_154">[154]</a></span>
+orgiastic in character. And even though at first some
+of the more extreme forms were avoided amongst the
+Christians, it is not improbable, on the face of it, that
+some kind of sexual extravagance or symbolism was
+present from the outset. At any rate, as I have said,
+the charges were made, first by Pagans, afterwards by
+Christians against other Christians. The charges were
+persistent, and were made in districts far removed
+from each other. Says Lecky: "When the Pagans accused
+the Christians of indulging in orgies of gross licentiousness,
+the first apologist, while repudiating the
+charge, was careful to add, of the heretics, 'Whether
+or not these people commit those shameful acts ...
+I know not.' In a few years the language of doubt
+and insinuation was exchanged for that of direct assertion;
+and if we may believe St. Irenæus and St.
+Clement of Alexandria, the followers of Carpocrates,
+the Marcionites, and some other gnostic sects habitually
+indulged, in their secret meetings, in acts of impurity
+and licentiousness as hideous and as monstrous
+as can be conceived, and their conduct was one of the
+causes of the persecution of the orthodox."<a name="FNanchor_126_126" id="FNanchor_126_126"></a><a href="#Footnote_126_126" class="fnanchor">[126]</a> Tertullian
+accused some of the sects of practising incestuous
+intercourse at the Agapæ. Ambrose compared
+the institution to the Pagan Parentalia. Clement says,
+probably referring to the Agapæ, "the shameless use
+of the rite occasions foul suspicion and evil reports."
+The first epistle on Virginity by the Pseudo-Clement
+(probably written in the second century) admits the
+existence of immorality by saying, "Others eat and
+drink with them (<i>i.e.</i> the virgins) at feasts, and indulge
+in loose behaviour and much uncleanness, such<!-- Page 155 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_155" id="Page_155">[155]</a></span>
+as ought not to be among those who have elected holiness
+for themselves." Justin Martyr, referring to certain
+sects, says more cautiously: "Whether or not these
+people commit these shameful acts (the putting out of
+lights, and indulging in promiscuous intercourse) I
+know not." Others are more precise in their charges.
+That the Agapæ became the legitimate cause of complaint
+is admitted by all. The only question is whether
+it was the institution itself or the public mind in relation
+to it that underwent a change. Eventually, on the
+avowed ground of evil conduct, the Agapæ were forbidden
+by the Council of Carthage, 391, of Orleans,
+541, and of Constantinople, 680.</p>
+
+<p>The whole subject is obscure, but the one certain
+and significant thing is that charges of licentiousness
+were connected with the Agapæ from the outset.
+These may at first have been unfounded or exaggerated.
+On the other hand, it is quite probable that just
+as Christianity continued Pagan ceremonies in other
+directions, so there was also a carrying over into the
+Church of some of the sexual rites and ceremonies
+connected with earlier forms of worship. And we know
+that the principle of Antinomianism, a prolific cause
+of evil at all times, was active amongst the Christians
+from the outset.</p>
+
+<p>It is almost impossible to say at this distance how
+many sects exhibiting marked erotic tendencies appeared
+in the early Christian centuries. Many must
+have disappeared and left no trace of their existence.
+But there can be no question that they were fairly numerous.
+The extensive sect, or sects, of the gnostics
+contained in its teachings elements that at least paved
+the way for the conduct with which other Christians<!-- Page 156 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_156" id="Page_156">[156]</a></span>
+charged them, although the charges made may not
+have been true of all. To some of the gnostic sects belongs
+the teaching&mdash;quite in accord with the doctrine
+of the evil nature of the world, that liberation from the
+'Law' was one of the first conditions of spiritual freedom.
+From this came the teaching, subsequently held
+by numerous other sects, that those born of the Spirit
+could not be defiled by any acts of the flesh, and that
+so-called vicious actions were rather to be encouraged
+as providing experience useful to spiritual welfare.
+Some branches of the gnostics had 'spiritual marriages,'
+similar to what existed in India in the Sakti
+rites already described. Thus the Adamites, a rather
+obscure gnostic sect of the second century, attempted
+to imitate the Edenic state by condemning marriage
+and abandoning clothing. Their assemblies were held
+underground, and on entering the place of worship
+both sexes stripped themselves naked, and in that
+state performed their ceremonies. They called their
+church Paradise, from which all dissentients were
+promptly expelled. The Adamites themselves claimed
+that their object was to extirpate desire by familiarising
+the senses to strict control. Their religious opponents
+gave a very different account of the practice,
+and it is not difficult to realise, whatever may have
+been the motive of the founders, the consequences of
+such a practice. It is curious, by the way, to observe
+how strong religious excitement seems to lead people
+to discard clothing. Thus, during the Crusade of 1203-42
+the women crusaders rushed about the streets in
+a state of nudity.<a name="FNanchor_127_127" id="FNanchor_127_127"></a><a href="#Footnote_127_127" class="fnanchor">[127]</a> During the wars of the League in
+France, men and women walked naked in procession<!-- Page 157 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_157" id="Page_157">[157]</a></span>
+headed by the clergy.<a name="FNanchor_128_128" id="FNanchor_128_128"></a><a href="#Footnote_128_128" class="fnanchor">[128]</a> Other examples of this curious
+practice might be given.</p>
+
+<p>The Nicolaitanes, a second-century sect referred to
+in the New Testament (Rev. ii. 14), were accused of
+practising religious prostitution. So also were the
+Manichæans, a very numerous sect, against whom
+the charges were of a much more detailed character.
+With them the ceremonial violation of a virgin is said
+to have formed a part of their regular ritual, and that
+their meetings frequently ended in an orgy of promiscuous
+intercourse.<a name="FNanchor_129_129" id="FNanchor_129_129"></a><a href="#Footnote_129_129" class="fnanchor">[129]</a> As both these acts are found in
+connection with other religious ceremonies, and, as
+will be seen later, have persisted until recent times,
+the story does not sound so incredible as otherwise
+it might. The difficulty of deciding definitely is intensified
+by the fact of the Manichæans being split into a
+number of sects, and statements true of some might
+be untrue of others. So we find St. Augustine, who had
+been a Manichæan, declaring that if all did not practise
+licentious rites, one sect (the Catharists) did, believing
+that they could only mortify the flesh by the exercise
+of bad instincts, since the flesh proceeded from demons.
+St. Augustine himself confesses to have taken part in
+various phallic ceremonies before his conversion. "I
+myself," he says, "when a young man used to go sometimes
+to the sacrilegious entertainments and spectacles;
+I saw the priests raving in religious excitement,
+and heard the choristers; I took pleasure in the shameful
+games which were celebrated in honour of gods
+and goddesses, of the Virgin C&#339;lestia, and of Berecynthia,
+the mother of all gods. And on the day consecrated<!-- Page 158 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_158" id="Page_158">[158]</a></span>
+to her purification, there were sung before
+her couch productions so obscene and filthy to the ear&mdash;I
+do not say of the mother of the gods, but of the
+mother of any senator or honest man&mdash;nay, so impure
+that not even the mother of the foul-mouthed
+players themselves could have formed one of the audience."<a name="FNanchor_130_130" id="FNanchor_130_130"></a><a href="#Footnote_130_130" class="fnanchor">[130]</a></p>
+
+<p>The Carpocratians, who claimed to be a branch of
+the Gnostics, taught that faith and charity were alone
+necessary virtues: all others were useless. There is
+nothing evil in itself, and life only becomes complete
+when all so-called blemishes are fully displayed in
+conduct. Their leader "not only allowed his disciples
+a full liberty to sin, but recommended a vicious course
+of life as a matter of obligation and necessity; asserting
+that eternal salvation was only attainable by those
+who had committed all sorts of crimes.... It was the
+will of God that all things should be possessed in common,
+the female sex not excepted."<a name="FNanchor_131_131" id="FNanchor_131_131"></a><a href="#Footnote_131_131" class="fnanchor">[131]</a></p>
+
+<p>A little later we have the sect of the Agapetæ. They
+rejected marriage as an institution, and permitted
+unrestrained intercourse between the sexes. St. Jerome,
+alluding to this sect, says: "It is a shame even to
+allude to the true facts. Whence did the pest of the
+Agapetæ creep into the Church? Whence is this new
+title of wives without marriage rites? Whence this
+new class of concubines? I will infer more. Whence
+these harlots cleaving to one man? They occupy the
+same house, a single chamber, often a single bed, and
+call us suspicious if we think anything of it. The
+brother deserts his virgin sister, the virgin despises
+her unmarried brother, and seeks a stranger, and since<!-- Page 159 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_159" id="Page_159">[159]</a></span>
+they pretend to be aiming at the same object, they ask
+for the spiritual consolation of each other that they
+may enjoy the pleasures of the flesh."<a name="FNanchor_132_132" id="FNanchor_132_132"></a><a href="#Footnote_132_132" class="fnanchor">[132]</a></p>
+
+<p>This form of extravagance does not appear to have
+been limited to a single sect. It was more or less general
+during the ascendancy of asceticism. Tertullian
+says that the desire to enjoy the reputation of virginity
+led to much immorality, the effects of which were concealed
+by infanticide. The Council of Antioch lamented
+the practice of unmarried men and women sharing
+the same room. In 450, the Anchorites of Palestine are
+described as herding together without distinction of
+sex, and with no garments but a breech-clout.<a name="FNanchor_133_133" id="FNanchor_133_133"></a><a href="#Footnote_133_133" class="fnanchor">[133]</a> The
+practice of priests travelling about with women,
+mothers and wives, and the scandals created thereby,
+is referred to in regulation after regulation. Although
+legislated against, it never entirely disappeared, and
+eventually led to a recognised priestly concubinage&mdash;recognised,
+that is, by public opinion, although condemned
+by the Church.</p>
+
+<p>There is no need to go over even the names of all the
+numerous sects that appeared during the early centuries
+manifesting curious features concerning sexual
+relations. When suppressed in one form they reappeared
+in another, and were unusually prominent during
+seasons of religious unrest. Many of the teachings
+already noted made their appearance again with the
+"Brethren of the Free Spirit" in the thirteenth, fourteenth,
+and fifteenth centuries. Some of these sects
+took their stand on the Pauline teaching, "The law of
+the spirit of life in Jesus Christ hath made me free from<!-- Page 160 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_160" id="Page_160">[160]</a></span>
+the law of sin and death," and claimed freedom from
+sin, no matter what their actions. The "Brethren of
+the Free Spirit" carried women about with them,
+held midnight assemblies, and, according to Mosheim,
+attended these meetings in a state of nudity. The
+Ranters, the Spirituels of Geneva, the Berghards, the
+Flagellants, the Molinists, were all accused of sexual
+misconduct in their assemblies. One of the specific
+teachings of the last-named body, as condemned by the
+Inquisition, ran as follows: "God, to humble us, permits
+in certain perfect souls that the devil should make
+them commit certain acts. In this case, and in others,
+which without the permission of God, would be guilty,
+there is no sin because there is no consent. It may
+happen, that this violent movement, which excites to
+carnal acts, may take place in two persons, a man and
+a woman, at the same instant."<a name="FNanchor_134_134" id="FNanchor_134_134"></a><a href="#Footnote_134_134" class="fnanchor">[134]</a></p>
+
+<p>It has been pointed out that the dominant Church
+made continuous efforts to suppress these sects, but
+the remarkable thing is that they should so often reappear,
+and always with strong claims to existence
+on the basis of religious conviction. That a number
+of men and women should seek gratification of their
+sensual feelings in ways not countenanced by the laws
+of normal life need not excite surprise. There always
+have been and always will be such. But to do this in the
+name of religion, and with a persistency as great as
+that of the religious idea itself, is a phenomenon that
+surely deserves more attention than it ordinarily receives.
+Nor can it be said with justice that these sects
+began in mere conscious lust. They ended there, true;
+more or less disguised, it may always have been present,<!-- Page 161 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_161" id="Page_161">[161]</a></span>
+but those who initiated them believed that they
+were justified in doing so by religious principles, and
+appealed to those principles to justify their conduct.
+Why should this have been the case? Why should conduct
+of which men and women are ashamed in the social
+sphere, and which their social sense promptly condemns,
+in the religious sphere be crowned with the
+dignity of lofty principles and fought for with the fervour
+of intense conviction? So long as theologians
+leave that question unanswered, their arguments are
+simply wide of the real issue.</p>
+
+<p>Naturally, the closer we get to our own day, and to
+times when religious feeling is more vigorously controlled
+by purely social forces, these manifestations of
+sexuality become less frequent, less widely spread,
+and more transient in character. Still they do occur.
+For reasons that do not concern us here, America has
+in recent years been a favourable ground for these
+religio-sexual developments. A sympathetic account
+of many of these American sects will be found in Hepworth
+Dixon's <cite>Spiritual Wives</cite>, with accounts of similar
+sects in Germany and England. In some cases
+many of the features of the early Christian sects were
+reproduced, even to the length of young women sharing
+the bedrooms of their spiritual guides. All took
+Paul as their principal authority. J. H. Noyes, one
+of the best known and most representative of these
+teachers, laid down the main principles of his teachings
+thus:&mdash;</p>
+
+<p>"When the will of God is done on earth as it is in
+heaven, there will be no marriage. The marriage supper
+of the Lamb is a feast at which every dish is free
+to every guest. Exclusiveness, jealousy, quarrelling,<!-- Page 162 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_162" id="Page_162">[162]</a></span>
+have no place there, for the same reason as that which
+forbids the guests at a thanksgiving dinner to claim
+each his separate dish, and quarrel with the rest for his
+rights. In a holy community there is no more reason
+why sexual intercourse should be restrained by law,
+than why eating and drinking should be; and there is
+as little occasion for shame in the one case as in the
+other.... The guests of the marriage supper may have
+each his favourite dish, each a dish of his own procuring,
+and that without the jealousy of exclusiveness.
+I call a certain woman my wife; she is yours; she is
+Christ's; and in Him she is the bride of all saints. She
+is dear in the hands of a stranger, and according to my
+promise to her I rejoice."<a name="FNanchor_135_135" id="FNanchor_135_135"></a><a href="#Footnote_135_135" class="fnanchor">[135]</a></p>
+
+<p>In a letter to Mr. Hepworth Dixon, J. H. Noyes
+claims the "right of religious inspiration to shape
+society and dictate the form of family life," and with
+probable accuracy says that the origin of these American
+sects is to be found in revivals:&mdash;</p>
+
+<p>"The philosophy of the matter seems to be this:
+Revivals are theocratic in their very nature; they introduce
+God into human affairs.... In the conservative
+theory of revivals, this power is restricted to the
+conversion of souls; but in actual experience it goes,
+or tends to go, into all the affairs of life.... Religious
+love is very near neighbour to sexual love, and they
+always get mixed in the intimacies and social excitements
+of revivals. The next thing a man wants, after
+he has found the salvation of his soul, is to find his Eve
+and his Paradise.... The course of things may be restated
+thus: Revivals lead to religious love; religious
+love excites the passions; the converts, finding themselves<!-- Page 163 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_163" id="Page_163">[163]</a></span>
+in theocratic liberty, begin to look about for
+their mates and their liberty."<a name="FNanchor_136_136" id="FNanchor_136_136"></a><a href="#Footnote_136_136" class="fnanchor">[136]</a></p>
+
+<p>With regard to the beginnings of these modern
+movements of "Spiritual Wifehood," all involving the
+abrogation of the normal relations of the sexes, Hepworth
+Dixon writes:&mdash;</p>
+
+<p>"It has not, I think, been noticed by any writer that
+three of the most singular movements in the churches
+of our generation seem to have been connected, more
+or less closely, with the state of mind produced by
+revivals; one in Germany, one in England, and one in
+the United States; movements which resulted, among
+other things, in the establishment of three singular
+societies&mdash;the congregation of Pietists, vulgarly called
+the Mucker, at Königsberg; the brotherhood of Princeites
+at Spaxton; and the Bible Communists at Oneida
+Creek.... They had these chief things in common:
+they began in colleges, they affected the form of family
+life, and they were carried on by clergymen; each
+movement in a place of learning and of theological
+study: that in Germany at the Luther-Kirch of Königsberg,
+that in England at St. David's College, that in
+the United States at Yale College.... These three
+divines, one Lutheran, one Anglican, one Congregational,
+began their work in perfect ignorance of each
+other.... Each movement was regarded by its votaries
+as the most perfect fruit of the revival spirit. In
+truth, the change which came upon the saints from
+their close experience of revival passion, was regarded
+by themselves as in some degree miraculous, equal in
+divine significance to a new creation of the world."<a name="FNanchor_137_137" id="FNanchor_137_137"></a><a href="#Footnote_137_137" class="fnanchor">[137]</a></p>
+
+<p><!-- Page 164 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_164" id="Page_164">[164]</a></span>
+For an almost exact replica of the erotic extravagances
+of some of the early Christian sects, one may
+turn to Russia. The difficulties and dangers of political
+life in Russia are doubtless responsible for having
+made religion such a power among the mass of the
+people, and this will also explain the diversion into
+religious channels of energy that under more favourable
+conditions is expended in social agitation and
+activity. Many of these sects are, of course, of a harmless
+character, mostly originating in an even greater
+love for the past and a more slavish adherence to
+ancient formulas than is displayed by the orthodox
+Church. Some, however, present the wildest excesses
+of sexual theory and practice. Nothing seems too wild
+or too extravagant to become the originating point
+of a new sect. Theories of marriage and sexual relations
+generally are developed with a logical fearlessness
+peculiarly Russian. Among the Bezpopovtsi, a
+numerous sect split up into several branches, opinions
+on marriage vary between regarding it as a mere conventional
+affair, and denouncing it as a hindrance
+to spiritual development. "Between these two extremes,"
+says Mr. Heard, "there is room for the wildest
+and most repulsive theories. Carnal sensuality is
+allied in monstrous union with religious mysticism.
+Free love, independence of the sexes, possession of
+women in common, have been preached and practised.
+Debauchery, as an incidental weakness of human
+nature, has been advocated as the lesser evil;
+libertinism as preferable to concubinage, and the latter
+as better than marriage. One of their most austere
+teachers cynically declares that 'it is wiser to live
+with beasts than to be joined to a wife; to frequent<!-- Page 165 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_165" id="Page_165">[165]</a></span>
+many women in secret, rather than to live with one
+openly.'"<a name="FNanchor_138_138" id="FNanchor_138_138"></a><a href="#Footnote_138_138" class="fnanchor">[138]</a></p>
+
+<p>Another sect called 'Eunuchs' take their stand on
+Matt. xix. 12: "There are some eunuchs, which were
+so born from their mother's womb: and there are some
+eunuchs, which were made eunuchs of men: and there
+be eunuchs, which have made themselves eunuchs for
+the kingdom of heaven's sake. He that is able to receive
+it, let him receive it." This sect believes in and
+practises emasculation as the surest way of attaining
+perfection. Man, they say, should be like the angels,
+without sex and without desire. This practice reminds
+one of an early Christian sect, the Valesians,
+which not only emasculated members of their own
+sect, but performed the same operation forcibly on
+those who fell into their hands.<a name="FNanchor_139_139" id="FNanchor_139_139"></a><a href="#Footnote_139_139" class="fnanchor">[139]</a> The Khlysti, a sect
+which derives its name from the practice of flagellation,
+denounce marriage as unclean, and part of their
+religious ritual is, according to some writers, the worship
+of a naked woman. Baron Von Haxthausen,
+writing in 1856, gives the following description of
+their ceremonies on Easter night:&mdash;</p>
+
+<p>"On this night the Khlysti all assemble for a great
+solemnity, the worship of the mother of God. A virgin,
+fifteen years of age, whom they have induced to act
+the part by tempting promises, is bound and placed
+in a tub of warm water; some old women come, and
+first make a large incision in the left breast, then cut
+it off, and staunch the blood in a wonderfully short
+time. During the operation a mystical picture of the
+Holy Spirit is put into the victim's hand, in order that<!-- Page 166 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_166" id="Page_166">[166]</a></span>
+she may be absorbed in regarding it. The breast
+which has been removed is laid upon a plate and cut
+into small pieces, which are eaten by all the members
+of the sect present; the girl in the tub is then raised
+upon an altar which stands near, and the whole congregation
+dance wildly round it, singing at the same
+time. The jumping then grows madder and wilder,
+till the lights are suddenly extinguished and horrible
+orgies commence."<a name="FNanchor_140_140" id="FNanchor_140_140"></a><a href="#Footnote_140_140" class="fnanchor">[140]</a></p>
+
+<p>The 'Jumpers,' an offshoot of the Khlysti, are much
+more pronounced in their sexual extravagances.
+They openly profess debauchery, for the usual reason,
+that of conquering the flesh by exhaustion and satiety.
+They meet usually by night, and after prayers are
+chanted and hymns sung, the leader commences a
+slow jumping movement, keeping time with a song.
+Then:&mdash;</p>
+
+<p>"The audience, arranged in couples, engaged to
+each other in advance, imitate his example and join
+the strain; the bounds and the singing grow faster
+and louder as it spreads, until, at its height, the elder
+shouts that he hears the voices of angels; the lights
+are extinguished, the jumping ceases, and the scene
+that follows in the darkness defies description. Each
+one yields to his desires, born of inspiration, and therefore
+righteous, and to be gratified; all are brethren
+in Christ, all promptings of the inner spirit are holy;
+incest, even, is no sin. They repudiate marriage,
+and justify their abominations by the Biblical legends<!-- Page 167 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_167" id="Page_167">[167]</a></span>
+of Lot's daughters, Solomon's harem, and the
+like."<a name="FNanchor_141_141" id="FNanchor_141_141"></a><a href="#Footnote_141_141" class="fnanchor">[141]</a></p>
+
+<p>There are many other curious sects in Russia, many
+of which bring us back to the religious atmosphere of
+the European dark ages. But without pursuing a description
+of these to any greater extent, enough has
+been said to show the persistence of the stream of sexualism
+in the history of Christianity. Of course, this
+feature did not enter religion with Christianity. On
+the contrary, I have shown that it was present from
+the earliest times. The association of religion with
+sexual phenomena does not commence as a sexual
+aberration; it only assumes that form at a comparatively
+late stage in religious history. The origin of the
+connection has to be found in that atmosphere of the
+supernatural which envelops primitive life, moulds
+primitive conceptions, and more or less fashions all
+primitive institutions. The sexual side of religious belief
+and religious symbolism only becomes abnormal,
+and even morbid, when the development of social life
+makes possible a truer view of sexuality. In this the
+great churches have, perhaps, unconsciously assisted.
+Their position of social control has compelled them
+to set their faces against the sexual symbolism which
+is so closely associated with early religious history,
+while at the same time countenancing religious fervour
+in general. The consequence has been that small
+bodies of men and women, freed from the restraining
+influence of social responsibility, have developed to
+extravagant length certain phases of religious belief
+that have been generally discountenanced elsewhere.
+Their so doing certainly helps the present-day student<!-- Page 168 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_168" id="Page_168">[168]</a></span>
+to make a more complete survey of all the factors that
+have played their part in religious history than would
+otherwise have been possible. Repulsive as some of
+these features now are, they have helped in their time
+to nourish the general belief in a supernatural order,
+and so to strengthen the general idea to which they
+were affiliated.</p>
+
+<div class="footnotes">
+<h3>Footnotes:<br />
+<span class="skip">[<a href="#Page_169">Skip</a>]</span>
+</h3>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_121_121" id="Footnote_121_121"></a><a href="#FNanchor_121_121"><span class="label">[121]</span></a> <cite>The Future of Science</cite>, p. 465.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_122_122" id="Footnote_122_122"></a><a href="#FNanchor_122_122"><span class="label">[122]</span></a> <cite>Lost and Hostile Gospels</cite>, Preface, p. 7.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_123_123" id="Footnote_123_123"></a><a href="#FNanchor_123_123"><span class="label">[123]</span></a> See Baring-Gould's <cite>Study of St. Paul</cite>, pp. 450-1.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_124_124" id="Footnote_124_124"></a><a href="#FNanchor_124_124"><span class="label">[124]</span></a> See
+Hepworth Dixon's curious work, <cite>Spiritual Wives</cite>, 1888, 2 vols.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_125_125" id="Footnote_125_125"></a><a href="#FNanchor_125_125"><span class="label">[125]</span></a> <cite>Study of St. Paul</cite>, p. 458.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_126_126" id="Footnote_126_126"></a><a href="#FNanchor_126_126"><span class="label">[126]</span></a> <cite>History of European Morals</cite>, i. p. 417.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_127_127" id="Footnote_127_127"></a><a href="#FNanchor_127_127"><span class="label">[127]</span></a> Cutten, <cite>Psychological Christianity</cite>, p. 157.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_128_128" id="Footnote_128_128"></a><a href="#FNanchor_128_128"><span class="label">[128]</span></a> Sanger, <cite>History of Prostitution</cite>, p. 116.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_129_129" id="Footnote_129_129"></a><a href="#FNanchor_129_129"><span class="label">[129]</span></a> See Blunt's <cite>Dictionary of Sects</cite>, art. "Manichæans."</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_130_130" id="Footnote_130_130"></a><a href="#FNanchor_130_130"><span class="label">[130]</span></a> <cite>De Civitate Dei</cite>, ii. 4.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_131_131" id="Footnote_131_131"></a><a href="#FNanchor_131_131"><span class="label">[131]</span></a> Mosheim, <cite>Cent. 2</cite>, chap. v. sec. 4.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_132_132" id="Footnote_132_132"></a><a href="#FNanchor_132_132"><span class="label">[132]</span></a> <cite>Dictionary of Sects</cite>, p. 13.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_133_133" id="Footnote_133_133"></a><a href="#FNanchor_133_133"><span class="label">[133]</span></a> Lea, <cite>Hist. of Sacerdotal Celibacy</cite>, 1884, p. 42.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_134_134" id="Footnote_134_134"></a><a href="#FNanchor_134_134"><span class="label">[134]</span></a> Cited by Michelet, <cite>Priests, Women, and Families</cite>, p. 130.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_135_135" id="Footnote_135_135"></a><a href="#FNanchor_135_135"><span class="label">[135]</span></a> <cite>Spiritual Wives</cite>, ii. pp. 55-6.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_136_136" id="Footnote_136_136"></a><a href="#FNanchor_136_136"><span class="label">[136]</span></a> <cite>Spiritual Wives</cite>, pp. 176-7, 181.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_137_137" id="Footnote_137_137"></a><a href="#FNanchor_137_137"><span class="label">[137]</span></a> <i>Ibid.</i>, pp. 84-6.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_138_138" id="Footnote_138_138"></a><a href="#FNanchor_138_138"><span class="label">[138]</span></a> <cite>The Russian Church and Russian Dissent</cite>, p. 201.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_139_139" id="Footnote_139_139"></a><a href="#FNanchor_139_139"><span class="label">[139]</span></a> Lea, <cite>Hist. of Sacerdotal Celibacy</cite>, p. 40.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_140_140" id="Footnote_140_140"></a><a href="#FNanchor_140_140"><span class="label">[140]</span></a> <cite>Visit to the Russian Empire</cite>, i. p. 254. Merejkowski, in his
+historical novel, <cite>Peter and Alexis</cite>, gives a more detailed account
+of the sexual ceremonies of this sect. See also Heard's description,
+<cite>Russian Church</cite>, p. 258.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_141_141" id="Footnote_141_141"></a><a href="#FNanchor_141_141"><span class="label">[141]</span></a> <cite>Russian Church and Russian Dissent</cite>, p. 262.</p></div>
+</div>
+
+<p><!-- Page 169 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_169" id="Page_169">[169]</a></span></p>
+
+<h2>CHAPTER <span class="cgap">SEVEN</span><br />
+CONVERSION</h2>
+
+<p>From what has been already said,
+it should be clear that a complete understanding of religious
+phenomena&mdash;whether legitimately or wrongly
+so called&mdash;involves acquaintance with a number of
+factors that are not usually called religious. Man's religious
+beliefs are usually a very composite product;
+they are built up from a number of states of feeling
+and mental convictions, some of which have only an
+accidental connection with the religious idea itself.
+Unfortunately, the training given to professional religious
+teachers rarely equips them for dealing with
+religion from the scientific point of view. Their training
+gives them a knowledge of several ancient languages,
+makes them acquainted with the rise and fall of
+certain doctrines, the nature of Church ritual and the
+like, all of which, while interesting enough in themselves,
+give little more genuine enlightenment than a
+knowledge of the dates of English monarchs provides
+of the character of genuine historic processes. One
+writer pertinently asks:&mdash;</p>
+
+<p>"What does the ordinary seminary graduate know
+of the histology, anatomy, and physiology of the soul?
+Absolutely nothing. He must stumble along through
+years of trying experience and look back over countless
+mistakes before he understands these things even
+in a general way. What does the ordinary graduate
+understand about doubt? It is all classed together,
+whether in adolescents or in hardened sinners, and
+one dose is applied. What does the graduate know
+about sexuality, so closely allied with certain forms
+of religious manifestations? What about ecstasy,
+in its various forms, the numerous methods of faith
+cure thrust upon an illiterate but credulous people,<!-- Page 170 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_170" id="Page_170">[170]</a></span>
+or the significance or insignificance of visions and
+dreams?"<a name="FNanchor_142_142" id="FNanchor_142_142"></a><a href="#Footnote_142_142" class="fnanchor">[142]</a></p>
+
+<p>It is, indeed, not too much to say that a theological
+training tends to prevent a rational comprehension of
+religion in both its normal and abnormal manifestations.
+Religious phenomena are not affiliated to phenomena
+as a whole; they are treated as quite distinct
+from the rest of life, possessing both an independent
+origin and justification. The consequence is that what
+are usually called studies of religion move round and
+round the same circle of ideas, and a revolution is mistaken
+for progress. Genuine enlightenment has come
+to us from men who have attacked the subject from a
+quite different point of view. They recognised that
+whether the religious idea was accepted as true or rejected
+as false, it could not be separated from that host
+of ideas and beliefs which make up the psychological
+side of the social structure. It was to be studied as a
+piece of natural history first of all. Whether it involved
+more than this they left to be settled later. It cannot
+be said that they belittled the <em>power</em> of religion; on
+the contrary, the investigations showed it to be one of
+the most potent of the forces that shape social institutions.
+But they demonstrated the absurdity of placing
+religion in a category of its own. As an objective fact,
+they showed that religion was subject to the same forces
+that determine the form of other objective facts. As
+a culture fact, they traced its connection with corresponding
+phases of social development; and as a psychological
+fact, they demonstrated its workings to be
+in harmony with workings of normal psychological<!-- Page 171 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_171" id="Page_171">[171]</a></span>
+laws. Five thousand years of theological study had
+left the world as ignorant of the nature of religious
+phenomena as it was in the days of ancient Chaldea.
+Fifty years of scientific study has served to make at
+least a broad path through what was hitherto an impenetrable
+jungle.</p>
+
+<p>What has been said holds with peculiar force of the
+subject of conversion. This is not a phenomenon peculiar
+to Christianity, for initiation and conversion accompanies
+religion in all its phases. I do not think
+that it is peculiar to religion even as a whole. A sudden
+discharge of feeling in a special direction leading to a
+changed attitude, more or less permanent towards life,
+may be seen in connection with the non-religious life,
+although it fails to receive the attention bestowed on
+changes that are connected with religion. But if conversion
+is not a peculiarly Christian phenomenon, one
+school of theologians, at least, has raised it to a position
+of peculiar eminence in connection with Christianity.
+They have taken it to be the mark of a person who
+has attained spiritual manhood, and have laid down
+elaborate rules for its achievement. Many theologians
+will agree that this has been almost wholly disastrous.
+On the one side, conversion has been dwelt upon as a
+cataclysmal epoch in a person's life, produced, negatively,
+by an act of self-surrender, and, positively, by
+a supernatural act of grace. This has had the effect of
+blinding people to the real nature of the process, and
+has led to certain evil consequences that must always
+accompany attempts at wholesale conversion. On the
+other hand, it has given rise to a class of professional
+evangelists who count their trophies in 'souls' as a
+Red Indian might count scalps, and who are ignorant<!-- Page 172 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_172" id="Page_172">[172]</a></span>
+of nearly everything except the art of working upon
+the emotions of a crowd of more or less uncultured
+people. Here, for instance, is an account of an American
+evangelist and ex-prize fighter, and evidently a
+great favourite with certain sections of the religious
+public in America. The account is cited by Dr. Cutten
+from a local paper, Illinois:&mdash;</p>
+
+<p>"5843 converts, 683 in a day. Total gift to Mr.
+Sunday, $10,431. Greatest revival in history. Will attract
+the attention of the religious world. Sermon on
+'Booze,' the great effort of the revival! These are all
+headlines to the report of the meeting, which covers
+six columns&mdash;evidently a response to the interest
+shown in 'Billy' Sunday's meetings. The sermon on
+'Booze' is given in full, and the physical exertions of
+the preacher described in detail. He began with his
+coat, vest, tie, and collar off. In a few moments his shirt
+and undershirt were gaping open to the waist, and the
+muscles of his neck and chest were seen working like
+those in the arm of a blacksmith, while perspiration
+poured from every pore. His clothing was soaked, as
+if a hose had been turned on him. He strained, and
+twisted, and reached up and down. Once he was on
+the floor for just a second, in the attitude of crawling,
+to show that all crime crawled out of the saloon; then
+he was on his feet as quickly as a cat could jump. At
+the end of forty-five minutes he mounted a chair,
+reached high, as he shouted, then again was on the
+floor, and dropped prostrate to illustrate a story of a
+drunken man, bounded to his feet again as if steel
+springs filled that lithe, slender, lightning-like body.
+He generally breaks a common kitchen chair in this
+sermon, and this came after a terrible effort, with eyes<!-- Page 173 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_173" id="Page_173">[173]</a></span>
+flashing, face scowling, the picture of hate. He whirled
+the chair over his head, smashed the chair to the platform
+floor, whirled the shattered wreck in the air again,
+and threw it to the ground in front of the pulpit. In
+two minutes men from the front row were tearing the
+wreck to pieces and dividing it up&mdash;a round here, a
+leg there, a piece of the back to another, and so on.
+Later, men carried away in cheering could be seen in
+the audience waving those chair fragments in the air."</p>
+
+<p>This is, of course, an extreme case, although it is but
+an exaggeration of methods in common use among
+these professional revivalists. The whole aim and
+purpose of these men is to arouse in the audience a
+high emotional tension, and any means is acceptable
+that succeeds in doing this. On the part of the congregation
+a large portion go for the express purpose
+of indulging in an emotional debauch. Many attend
+revival after revival, living over again the debauch
+of the last, and treasuring lively expectations of the
+next. Between these and the victim of alcohol tasting
+again his last 'burst,' and seeking opportunities for
+another, there is really little moral or psychological
+distinction. The social consequences of these engineered
+revivals have never been fully worked out, but
+when it is done by some competent person, the conclusions
+will be a revelation to many. One thing is certain:
+to expect really useful social results from such methods
+is verily to look to gather grapes from thistles.</p>
+
+<p>During recent years the phenomena of religious
+conversion have been studied in a more scientific spirit.<a name="FNanchor_143_143" id="FNanchor_143_143"></a><a href="#Footnote_143_143" class="fnanchor">[143]</a>
+Statistics have been compiled and analysed, the<!-- Page 174 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_174" id="Page_174">[174]</a></span>
+frames of mind attendant on conversion arranged
+and studied, with the result that the salient features
+are to be discerned by all who approach the study of
+the subject with a little detachment of mind. One
+outstanding feature of this more scientific enquiry into
+the nature of conversion has been to demonstrate
+that it is almost exclusively a phenomenon of puberty
+and adolescence. Mr. Hall has compiled a lengthy
+list of the ages at which noted religious characters
+experienced what is known as conversion.<a name="FNanchor_144_144" id="FNanchor_144_144"></a><a href="#Footnote_144_144" class="fnanchor">[144]</a> From this
+I take the following examples. Religious conviction
+came to St. Thekla at the age of 18, to St. Agnes at
+13, St. Antony at 18, Martin of Tours at 18, Euphrasia
+at 12, Benedict at 14, Cuthbert at 15, St. Bernard
+at 12, St. Dominic at 15, St. Collette at 20, St.
+Catherine at 7, St. Teresa at 12, St. Francis of Sales
+at 11. In his <cite>Life of Jesus</cite>, Keim also remarks that
+although some of the disciples may have been married,
+most of them were probably about twenty years
+of age.<a name="FNanchor_145_145" id="FNanchor_145_145"></a><a href="#Footnote_145_145" class="fnanchor">[145]</a></p>
+
+<p>Professor Starbuck, placing on one side both historical
+and anthropological aspects, set himself the
+task of examining cases of the present day. A paper
+was sent out asking various questions as to age, state
+of health, frame of mind, before, during, and following
+conversion. The questions were sent to male and female<!-- Page 175 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_175" id="Page_175">[175]</a></span>
+members of different religious denominations.
+In reply, 1265 papers were filled up and returned.
+One result of a scrutiny of these returns was to show
+that the age at which religious conversion was experienced
+began as early as 7 or 8 years, it increased gradually
+till 10 or 11, then a more rapid increase till 18
+or 20, a decline increasing in rapidity to the age
+of 25, and its practical disappearance beyond the age
+of 30. In girls, the period of conversion antedates
+that of boys by about two years.<a name="FNanchor_146_146" id="FNanchor_146_146"></a><a href="#Footnote_146_146" class="fnanchor">[146]</a> Starbuck's conclusion
+is the perfectly valid one that conversion "belongs
+almost exclusively to the years between 10
+and 25," and is distinctly a phenomenon of adolescence.</p>
+
+<p>This conclusion would be borne out by a study of
+almost any revival crusade. Thus a few years ago&mdash;1904&mdash;England
+received a visit from the American
+evangelist, Dr. Torrey. At the conclusion of his visit,
+Sir Robertson Nicol invited opinions from ministers
+in the towns visited by Torrey, and published the
+replies in his paper, <cite>The British Weekly</cite>, on October
+27. There was no attempt whatever to elicit the ages
+of the reported converts; the enquiry was directed to
+the point of ascertaining whether these engineered
+missions had a beneficial effect on church life, or the
+reverse. But incidentally the ages of the converts
+were given in some cases, and one may safely assume
+that in the reports where no age was mentioned the
+facts, if disclosed, would not run counter to the generalisation
+above given. The Rev. T. Towers, Birmingham,
+noted that 16 out of 25 reported converts were<!-- Page 176 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_176" id="Page_176">[176]</a></span>
+children. Rev. A. Le Gros, Rugby, reported: "A number
+of our youngest members, especially amongst
+the young girls, were amongst those who professed
+conversion." Rev. H. Singleton, Smethwick, says:
+"The bulk of the names sent to me were those of children
+under thirteen years of age." Rev. W. G. Percival,
+Lozells Congregational Church, says of the 'inquiry'
+meeting held after the preaching: "The dear little
+things followed one another for inquiry until the place
+was a scene of utter confusion." Reports of a similar
+nature came from other places. The ages were pointed
+out quite incidentally; conversions of youths of 17
+or 18 would not excite comment with these. Were the
+ages of all given, we should, without doubt, find them
+fall into line with Starbuck's and Hall's figures.</p>
+
+<p>Professor James quite accepts this view of conversion.
+The conclusion, he says, "would seem to be the
+only sound one: conversion is in its essence a normal
+adolescent phenomenon, incidental to the passage
+from the child's small universe to the wider intellectual
+and spiritual life of maturity."<a name="FNanchor_147_147" id="FNanchor_147_147"></a><a href="#Footnote_147_147" class="fnanchor">[147]</a> Conversion,
+in the sense of a change from "the child's small universe"
+to the large world of human society, may be a
+normal fact in life, but the really essential fact in the
+enquiry is not the fact of growth, but growth in a
+specific direction. Why should this normal change
+from childhood to maturity be the period during which
+<em>religious</em> conversion is experienced? This question is
+not only ignored by Professor James, it is made more
+confused by his method of stating it. Of course, if all
+people experienced this religious conviction, as all
+people undergo other changes at adolescence, the<!-- Page 177 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_177" id="Page_177">[177]</a></span>
+question would be simplified. But this is obviously
+not the case. A large number of people never experience
+it so long as they are only brought into contact
+with ordinary social forces. Special circumstances
+seem usually to be required to rouse this sense of religious
+conviction. Nearly every story of conversion
+turns upon something unusual, unexpected, or dramatic
+occurring as the exciting cause. The question is,
+therefore, why should the line of growth, general with
+all at adolescence, be, in the case of some, diverted into
+religious channels? A study of the subject from this
+point of view will, I think, show that conversion is
+only normal in the sense that in an environment where
+religious influences are powerful each person is normally
+exposed to it. Those on whom the religious influence
+fails to operate experience the change from
+childhood to adolescence, on to complete maturity,
+without their nature evincing any lack of completeness.
+This is the vital truth of which Professor James
+loses sight, and it is ignored by the vast majority of
+writers who treat of the subject.</p>
+
+<p>Leaving, for a while, the statistical view of conversion,
+we may turn to its other aspects. By the more
+advanced of religious teachers to-day the developments
+attendant on adolescence are taken as supplying
+no more than a favourable occasion for directing
+mind and emotion to definite religious conviction.
+Here the connection is admittedly more or less accidental.
+But by the great majority of theologians there is
+assumed a direct supernatural influence in the states
+of mind developed during adolescence. In more primitive
+times the connection is of a yet closer character.
+Puberty does not at this stage represent what a<!-- Page 178 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_178" id="Page_178">[178]</a></span>
+modern would call an awakening of the religious
+consciousness, but a direct impingement of supernatural
+influence. From one point of view this conception
+still remains part of all religious systems,
+however overlaid it may be with modern ideas concerning
+sexual maturity. And we have, as a mere
+matter of historic fact, a whole series of customs
+commencing with the initiatory customs of savages
+and running right on to the modern practice of confirmation.</p>
+
+<p>In a previous chapter it was pointed out what is the
+savage state of mind in relation to the beginnings of
+sex life as it is manifested in both boys and girls.
+Adolescence does not, to the primitive mind, serve as
+an occasion for the creation of an interest in the religious
+life, it is the sign of direct supernatural influence.
+One consequence of this is the rise of more
+or less elaborate ceremonials marking the initiation
+of youth into direct communion with the spiritual
+forces that govern tribal life.<a name="FNanchor_148_148" id="FNanchor_148_148"></a><a href="#Footnote_148_148" class="fnanchor">[148]</a> Among the Polynesians
+tattooing forms part of the religious ceremony,
+and during the time the marks are healing the boy
+is taboo to the rest of the tribe, owing to his having
+been touched by the gods. With the North American
+Indians the following ceremony seems characteristic:&mdash;</p>
+
+<p>"When a boy has attained the age of fourteen or fifteen
+years he absents himself from his father's lodge,
+lying on the ground in some remote or secluded spot,
+crying to the Great Spirit, and fasting the whole time.
+During this period of peril and abstinence, when he<!-- Page 179 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_179" id="Page_179">[179]</a></span>
+falls asleep, the first animal, bird, or reptile, of which
+he dreams, he considers the Great Spirit has designated
+for his mysterious protector through life."<a name="FNanchor_149_149" id="FNanchor_149_149"></a><a href="#Footnote_149_149" class="fnanchor">[149]</a>
+Similar ceremonies are described by Livingstone
+as existing among the South African tribes. These
+customs are too widespread, and bear too great a
+similarity to be described with reference to many
+races. The variations are unimportant, and such as
+they are they may be studied in the pages of Hall,
+Frazer, and numerous other writers. With girls the
+measures adopted are of a more elaborate character
+than is the case with boys, because, for reasons already
+stated, the occurrence of puberty in girls gives the
+supernatural act a more startling and significant character.
+Hence the strict seclusion of girls almost universally
+practised among uncivilised peoples. The
+precautions taken indicate, as Hartland points out,
+that they are at this period not merely charged with
+a malign influence, but are peculiarly susceptible to
+the onset of powers other than human. And with a
+modification of language the same idea has persisted
+down to our time, even amongst those who would reject
+with indignation the statement that savage ideas
+concerning the nature of puberty form the real basis
+of their own mental attitude.</p>
+
+<p>This truth cannot be too strongly emphasised. To
+ignore it is to miss the whole significance of continuity
+in human institutions and ideas. The ceremonies described
+do, of course, gather round the fact of sexual
+development, but they are not concerned with the
+sexual life, as such. It is sex as a supernatural manifestation
+that is the vital feature of the situation. The<!-- Page 180 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_180" id="Page_180">[180]</a></span>
+governing idea is that puberty marks the direct association
+of the individual with a spiritual world to the
+influence of which the functional changes are due.
+As more accurate conceptions are formed, the older
+and inaccurate one is not altogether discarded. It has
+become incarnate in ceremonies, it is part of the traditional
+psychic life of the people, and the change is one
+of transformation rather than of eradication. In later
+cultural stages the physiological nature of the changes
+are seen, but they are expressed in terms of religion.
+Such expressions as "the soul's awareness of God,"
+"the dawning consciousness of religion," etc., take the
+place of the earlier and more direct animistic interpretation.
+But the essential misinterpretation is retained,
+disguised from careless or uninformed people by the
+use of a modified terminology. But in substance the
+use made of puberty by organised religious forces remains
+the same throughout. We have the same absence
+of a rational explanation in both instances. In
+the one because the state of knowledge makes any
+other impossible; in the other because tradition,
+self-interest, and prejudice prevent its use. It is not
+only in his physical structure that man carries reminiscences
+of a lower form of life; such reminders are
+quite as plentiful in his mental life, and in social institutions.</p>
+
+<p>Even with many who perceive the mechanism of
+conversion its real significance is often missed. For
+the important thing is, not that some people express
+the changes incident to adolescence in terms of religion,
+but that many do not, and also that these find
+complete satisfaction along lines of æsthetic, intellectual,
+or social interest. Yet one often finds it assumed<!-- Page 181 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_181" id="Page_181">[181]</a></span>
+that the difference between the two classes is explained
+by assuming a certain lack of 'spiritual' development
+in the non-religious class. As stated, this is often perilously
+near to impertinence, and in any case is little
+better than the language of a charlatan. In the same
+way, the use of amatory phraseology is often treated
+as the intrusion of the sex element in a sphere
+in which it has no proper place. Enough has already
+been said to furnish good grounds for believing that
+there is much more than this in the phenomenon, and
+that one is justified in treating it as symptomatic of
+the operation of forces of the nature of which the subject
+is quite unaware. The only explanation of the
+facts already cited is that a misinterpretation of sexual
+states lies at the heart of the question. No other
+hypothesis covers the facts; no other hypothesis will
+explain why the larger number of people should find
+complete development in activities that lie outside the
+field of religion.</p>
+
+<p>How easy it is to see the truth and distort it in the
+stating may be seen in the following passage:&mdash;</p>
+
+<p>"Passing over the fact that the period of adolescence
+is noticeably a period of 'susceptibility,' we may take
+as an example of the intrusion or the persistence of
+the sexual elements in conditions of a non-sexual
+kind the frequent association of sexual with religious
+excitement. The appeal made during a religious revival
+to an unconverted person has psychologically
+some resemblance to the attempt of the male to overcome
+the hesitancy of the female. In each case the
+will has to be set aside, and strong suggestive means
+are used; and in both cases the appeal is not of the
+conflict type, but of an intimate, sympathetic, and<!-- Page 182 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_182" id="Page_182">[182]</a></span>
+pleading kind. In the effort to make a moral adjustment,
+it consequently turns out that a technique is
+used which was derived originally from sexual life, and
+the use, so to speak, of the sexual machinery for a
+moral adjustment involves, in some cases, the carrying
+over into the general process of some sexual manifestations."<a name="FNanchor_150_150" id="FNanchor_150_150"></a><a href="#Footnote_150_150" class="fnanchor">[150]</a></p>
+
+<p>The important questions, why religion should so
+powerfully appeal to people at adolescence, why its
+strength should reside so largely in the appeal to
+feelings associated with sexual development, and why
+conversion should be so rarely experienced when the
+period of sexual crisis is past, are quite ignored by Mr.
+Thomas. Yet it is precisely these questions that call
+most loudly for answers, and which, I believe, contain
+the key of the situation.</p>
+
+<p>From many points of view adolescence is perhaps the
+most important epoch in the life of every individual.
+It is a time of great and significant organic growth,
+with the development of new organs and functions,
+and a corresponding transformation of both the emotional
+and intellectual output. So far as the brain, the
+most important organ of all, is concerned, one may
+safely say that before puberty its main function has
+been acquisition. After puberty vast tracts of brain
+tissue become active, and an era of rapid development
+sets in. There is a rapid growth of new nerve connections
+which occasions both physiological and psychological
+unrest.<a name="FNanchor_151_151" id="FNanchor_151_151"></a><a href="#Footnote_151_151" class="fnanchor">[151]</a> An important point to bear in mind,
+also, is that all periods of rapid development involve<!-- Page 183 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_183" id="Page_183">[183]</a></span>
+conditions of relative instability&mdash;one is, in fact, only
+the obverse side of the other. Dr. Mercier says that with
+girls "more or less decided manifestations of hysteria
+are the rule," and with both sexes this instability involves
+a peculiar susceptibility to suggestions and impressions.
+Accompanying the purely physical changes
+the mental and emotional nature undergoes what is
+little less than a transformation. There is less direct
+concern with self, and a more conscious concern with
+others. There is a craving for sympathy, for fellowship,
+a tendency to look at oneself from the outside, so
+to speak, a susceptibility to sights and sounds and
+impressions that formerly had little influence. Each
+one is conscious of new desires, new attractions, expressed
+often only in a vague feeling of unrest, with a
+desire, half shy because half conscious, for the company
+of the opposite sex. The childish desire for protection
+weakens; the more mature desire to protect
+others begins to express itself.</p>
+
+<p>Now, the whole significance of these changes, physical
+and mental, is fundamentally sexual and social.
+Human life, it may be said, has a twofold aspect. As
+a mere animal organism, there is the perpetuation of
+the species, which nature secures by the mere force of
+the sex impulse. As a human being, he is part of a
+social structure, cell in the social tissue, to use Leslie
+Stephen's expressive phrase. And in this direction
+nature secures what is necessary by the presence of
+impulses and cravings as imperious as, and even more
+permanent than, those of mere sex. Of course, in practice
+these two things operate together. By a process of
+selection, the anti-social character is weeded out, and
+the two sets of feelings work together in harmony for<!-- Page 184 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_184" id="Page_184">[184]</a></span>
+the furtherance and the development of the life of the
+species. The species is perpetuated in the interests of
+society; society is perpetuated in the interests of the
+species. Further, it is part of the natural 'plan' that
+there shall be developed impulses and capacities suitable
+to each phase of life as it emerges. Thus it has
+been shown that the lengthening of infancy&mdash;that is,
+the prolongation of the time during which the young
+human being is dependent upon its parents for support
+and protection&mdash;is nature's method of developing
+to a greater degree the capacity of the human animal
+for more complex adjustment. Instead of being launched
+on the world with a number of instincts practically
+fully developed, and so capable of attending to
+its own needs almost as soon as born, man is born with
+few instincts, and a great capacity for education enabling
+him to adjust his conduct to the demands of an
+environment constantly increasing in complexity. In
+the same way it has been shown that the instinct for
+play, practically universal throughout the whole of
+the animal world, is nature's method of preparing the
+young for the more serious business of nature.<a name="FNanchor_152_152" id="FNanchor_152_152"></a><a href="#Footnote_152_152" class="fnanchor">[152]</a> It is,
+therefore, only in line with what is found to be true
+elsewhere that the changes incident to puberty should
+receive their rational interpretation in the necessities
+of social life. That these necessities should be met
+largely by the play of unreasoning impulse is, again,
+quite in line with what occurs in other directions. The
+insistent pressure of social life for thousands of generations
+secures the emergence of needs of the true nature
+of which the individual may be ignorant. In no other<!-- Page 185 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_185" id="Page_185">[185]</a></span>
+way, in fact, could the persistence of the species and of
+human society be secured.</p>
+
+<p>The whole significance, then, of puberty and adolescence
+is the entry of the individual into the larger life
+of the race. It is, too, a statement beyond reasonable
+dispute that if we eliminate religion altogether from
+the environment there is not a single feeling experienced
+at adolescence, not a single intellectual craving,
+that would not undergo full development and receive
+complete satisfaction. The proof of the truth of this
+is that it occurs in a large number of cases. Sacrifice,
+the craving for the ideal, with every other feeling associated
+by many with religion, exist in connection
+with non-religious phases of life. It is idle to argue that
+some people have a craving for religion, and nothing
+but religion will satisfy them. Where an individual is
+in complete ignorance of the nature and significance
+of his own development, and those around him no better
+informed; where, moreover, there are others in a
+position of authority ready with a special interpretation, it
+is not surprising if the religious explanation is
+accepted as the genuine and only one. But in reality
+a sound judgment is formed, not on the basis of what
+some declare they cannot do without, but on the basis
+of what others actually do without, and suffer no observable
+loss in consequence. We do not estimate the
+value of alcohol on the basis of those who declare they
+cannot do without it. The true test is found in those
+who abstain from its use. So, also, in the case of religion.
+That some, even the majority, declare that religious
+belief is essential to their welfare, proves little
+or nothing. Human nature being what it is, and the
+history of society being what it is, it would be surprising<!-- Page 186 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_186" id="Page_186">[186]</a></span>
+were it otherwise. There is much greater significance
+in so large a number of people finding complete
+satisfaction in purely secular activities.</p>
+
+<p>After what has been said of the misinterpretation
+of mental and emotional states in terms of religious
+belief, it is not surprising to find a writer, a clergyman,
+and one with experience of growing boys, express
+himself as follows:&mdash;</p>
+
+<p>"My experience confirms the opinion of the psychologists
+that most boys of the public school age have
+a strongly mystical tendency. This is to be expected,
+on account of the great emotional development of that
+period of life. But it is obscured by the fact that the
+boy is both unwilling and unable to give any verbal
+expression to this tendency. He is unwilling because
+it is something very new and curious in his experience;
+he is often a little frightened of it, and he is exceedingly
+frightened of other people's contempt for it.
+And he is unable, because the words he is accustomed
+to use are valueless in this connection, and he feels
+priggish if he tries to use others.... But, though unexplained, the
+mystical tendency is there, and should be
+appealed to and developed."<a name="FNanchor_153_153" id="FNanchor_153_153"></a><a href="#Footnote_153_153" class="fnanchor">[153]</a></p>
+
+<p>Now, clearly, all that can be reasonably meant by
+saying that a boy of, apparently, from 12 to 16 has a
+mystical tendency, is that the physiological changes
+incident to puberty are accompanied by a mass of
+feeling of a vague and formless character. Naturally,
+his boyish experience is unable to furnish him with
+the means of giving adequate expression to his feelings.
+That can only come with the experience of maturity.
+And with equal inevitability he is at the mercy<!-- Page 187 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_187" id="Page_187">[187]</a></span>
+of the explanation furnished him by those whom he regards
+as his teachers and guides. When he is told that
+this element of 'mysticism' is the awakening of religion
+in his soul, he accepts the explanation precisely
+as he accepts explanations of other things. That this
+'mystical tendency' should be appealed to and developed
+is a statement open to very great doubt. It
+should rather be explained, not perhaps in a brutally
+frank manner, but in a way that would lead the boy to
+see himself as an organic part of society, with definite
+duties and obligations. If this were done, adolescence
+might provide us with the raw material for a
+much greater number of useful and intelligent citizens
+than it does at present. The true nature of the process,
+so elaborately misunderstood by Dr. Temple, is
+clearly outlined by Dr. Mercier:&mdash;</p>
+
+<p>"In connection with normal development, a large
+body of vague and formless feeling arises, and, until
+experience gives it shape, the possessor remains ignorant
+of the source and nature of the feeling. If the circumstances
+are appropriate for the natural outlet and
+expression of the activities, they are expressed in
+affection, and are a source of health and strength to
+the possessor. But if no such outlet exists, the vague,
+voluminous, formless feelings are referred to an occasion
+that is vague, voluminous, and wanting in definite
+form, they are ascribed to the direct influence of the
+Deity, and assume a place in religious emotion."<a name="FNanchor_154_154" id="FNanchor_154_154"></a><a href="#Footnote_154_154" class="fnanchor">[154]</a></p>
+
+<p>Leaving this aspect of the subject for a time, let us
+look more closely at the process of conversion. It has
+already been pointed out that one great feature of adolescence
+is susceptibility to impressions and suggestions.<!-- Page 188 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_188" id="Page_188">[188]</a></span>
+One is not surprised to find, therefore, that in
+Starbuck's collection of cases 34 per cent. of the females
+and 29 per cent. of the males described their conversion
+as being directly due to imitation, social pressure,
+and example. If we were to add to these the
+cases where unconscious imitation and suggestion is
+at work, the proportion would be much greater. Religion, like
+dress, has its modes, and imitation will occur
+in the one direction as readily as in the other. Nothing
+is more striking in the records of conversion than
+the monotony of the language used to describe the
+feelings experienced. It is exactly as though the converts
+had been learning a regular catechism, as in a
+way they have been. Young boys and girls will confess
+their sinful state in language identical with that used
+by one who has actually lived a career of vice and
+crime. Others of an aggressively commonplace character
+will use the language of exalted mysticism suitable
+to an Augustine or a Jacob Boehme. In these
+cases we have not identity of feeling finding expression
+in identity of language; it is pure imitation and
+suggestion without the least regard to the fitness of
+the language employed.</p>
+
+<p>The full power of suggestion would be more fitly
+considered in connection with waves of religious feeling
+that have assumed an epidemic form; but it will
+not be out of place here to call attention to this factor
+in such a recent case as the outbreaks in Wales under
+the leadership of persons such as Evan Roberts. Quite
+apart from the suggestion and imitation operating in
+the gatherings themselves, it is plain that many went
+to the meetings quite prepared to act in accordance
+with what had gone before. Newspapers had published<!-- Page 189 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_189" id="Page_189">[189]</a></span>
+elaborate reports of the 'scenes,' certain manifestations
+were recognised as signs of the "workings of the
+Spirit," with the result that all these operated as powerful
+suggestions, particularly with those of a hysterical
+disposition. And behind this particular revival there
+were the traditions of other revivals, all of which had
+created a heritage as coercive as any purely social tradition.
+A crowd of people in a state of eager expectancy,
+exposed to the assaults of a preacher skilled in
+rousing their emotion to fever pitch, is naturally ready
+to see and hear things that none would see and hear in
+their normal moments. No better field for the study
+of crowd psychology, particularly at the point at which
+it merges into the abnormal, could be imagined than
+the ordinary revival.</p>
+
+<p>In America these revival out breaks seem to assume
+a much more extravagant form than with us. Mr.
+Stanley Hall, for example, thus describes a Kentucky
+camp meeting in which the prevailing term of spiritual
+manifestation was that of 'jerking.' Quoting from
+an eye-witness, he says:&mdash;</p>
+
+<p>"The crowd swarmed all night round the preacher,
+singing, shouting, laughing, some plunging wildly
+over stumps and benches into the forest, shouting
+'Lost, lost!' others leaping and bounding about like
+live fish out of water; others rolling over and over on
+the ground for hours; others lying on the ground and
+talking when they could not move; and yet others beating
+the ground with their heels. As the excitement
+increased, it grew more morbid and took the form of
+'jerkings,' or in others the holy laugh. The jerks began
+with the head, which was thrown violently from
+side to side so rapidly that the features were blurred<!-- Page 190 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_190" id="Page_190">[190]</a></span>
+and the hair almost seemed to snap, and when the sufferer
+struck an obstacle and fell he would bounce about
+like a ball. Saplings were sometimes cut breast high
+for the people to jerk by. In one place the earth about
+the roots of one of them was kicked about as though by
+the feet of a horse stamping flies. One sufferer mounted
+his horse to ride away when the jerks threw him to the
+earth, whence he rose a Christian. A lad, who feigned
+illness to stay away, was dragged there by the spirit
+and his head dashed against the wall till he had to pray.
+A sceptic who cursed and swore was crushed by a falling
+tree. Men fancied themselves dogs, and gathered
+round a tree barking and 'treeing the devil.' They saw
+visions and dreamed dreams, and as the revival waned,
+it left a crop of nervous and hysterical disorders in its
+wake."<a name="FNanchor_155_155" id="FNanchor_155_155"></a><a href="#Footnote_155_155" class="fnanchor">[155]</a></p>
+
+<p>We have nothing quite so extreme as this in British
+revivals, but the home phenomena are not substantially
+different in nature. A medical observer of some of
+the earliest Methodist revivals thus describes the
+symptoms of those who were subject to 'divine'
+seizures under the influence of Wesley and his immediate
+followers:&mdash;</p>
+
+<p>"There came on first a feeling of faintness, with rigor
+and a sense of weight at the pit of the stomach; soon
+after which the patient cried out as though in the
+agonies of labour. The convulsions then began, first
+showing themselves in the muscles of the eyelids,
+though the eyes themselves were fixed and staring.
+The most frightful contortions of the countenance
+followed, and the convulsions now took their course
+downwards, so that the muscles of the trunk and neck<!-- Page 191 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_191" id="Page_191">[191]</a></span>
+were affected, causing a sobbing respiration, which
+was performed with great effort. Tremors and agitations
+ensued, and the patients screamed out violently,
+and tossed their heads from side to side. As the
+complaint increased, it seized the arms, and its victims
+beat their breasts, clasped their hands, and made all
+sorts of strange noises."</p>
+
+<p>To the non-medical religious observer the scenes
+produced a different impression, thus:&mdash;</p>
+
+<p>"When the power of religion began to be spoken of,
+the presence of God really filled the place.... The greatest
+number of them who cried or fell were men; but some
+women and several children felt the power of the same
+Almighty Spirit, and seemed just sinking into hell.
+This occasioned a mixture of sounds, some shrieking,
+some roaring aloud. The most general was a loud breathing,
+like that of people half strangled and gasping for
+life; and, indeed, almost all the cries were like those of
+human creatures dying in bitter anguish.... I stood on
+a pew seat, as did a young man in the opposite pew, an
+able-bodied, fresh, healthy countryman; but in a moment,
+while he seemed to think of nothing less, down
+he dropt with a violence inconceivable. The adjoining
+pews seemed shook with his fall. I heard afterwards
+the stamping of his feet ready to break the boards as he
+lay in strong convulsions at the bottom of the pew....
+Among the children who felt the arrows of the Almighty,
+I saw a sturdy boy, about eight years old, who
+roared above his fellows, and seemed, in his agony, to
+struggle with the strength of a grown man. His face
+was red as scarlet; and almost all on whom God laid
+His hand turned either very red or almost black."<a name="FNanchor_156_156" id="FNanchor_156_156"></a><a href="#Footnote_156_156" class="fnanchor">[156]</a></p>
+
+<p><!-- Page 192 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_192" id="Page_192">[192]</a></span>
+In other instances connected with the same movement,
+a girl is described as "lying on the floor as one
+dead." One woman "tore up the ground with her
+hands, filling them with dust and with the hard-trodden
+grass"; another "roared and screamed in dreadful
+agony." A child, seven years old, "saw visions, and
+astonished the neighbours with her awful manner of
+relating them." John Wesley personally interviewed
+a number of the people seized in this manner, and was
+quite convinced of the supernatural nature of the attacks.
+He said that he had "generally observed more
+or less of these outward symptoms to attend the beginning
+of a general work of God," although he admitted
+that in some cases "Satan mimicked God's work
+in order to discredit the whole work." But whether of
+God or Satan there was no question of their supernatural
+character. Moreover, whatever may be one's
+opinion of these outbreaks, there is one fact that stands
+out clear and indisputable. This is that the Methodist
+revival owed a great deal of its vitality&mdash;as is also
+the case with other religious movements&mdash;to phenomena
+of a distinctly pathologic nature. Subtract from
+these movements all phenomena of the class indicated,
+and such phrases as 'the revival fire' become meaningless.
+Right through history religious conviction
+has been gained in innumerable cases by the operation
+of factors that a more accurate knowledge finds
+can be explained without any reference whatever to
+supernatural forces.</p>
+
+<p>Lest the above examples be dismissed as belonging
+to an old order of things, I subjoin the following account&mdash;from
+a missionary&mdash;of a recent revival scene
+in India:&mdash;</p>
+
+<p><!-- Page 193 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_193" id="Page_193">[193]</a></span>
+"There were people ... on the floor fairly writhing
+over the realisation of sin as it came over them....
+Saturday we were favoured with a wonderful manifestation
+of the Spirit. One of the older girls who had
+had a remarkable experience, went into a trance, with
+her head thrown back, her arms folded, and motionless,
+except for a slight movement of her foot. She
+seemed to be seeing something wonderful, for she
+would marvel at it, and then laugh excitedly.... One
+girl rushed to the back of the vestibule and, lying across
+a bench, with her head and hands against the wall, she
+fairly writhed in agony for two hours before peace
+came to her."<a name="FNanchor_157_157" id="FNanchor_157_157"></a><a href="#Footnote_157_157" class="fnanchor">[157]</a></p>
+
+<p>I do not know on what grounds we are justified in
+calling civilised people who chronicle these outbreaks
+as "a wonderful manifestation of the Spirit." Civilised
+in other respects, in relation to other matters, they
+may be. Civilised in relation to this particular matter
+they certainly are not. Their viewpoint is precisely
+that of the lowest tribe of savages. Savages, indeed,
+could not do more; our 'civilised' missionaries do no
+less. Tylor well says that "such descriptions carry
+us far back in the history of the human mind, showing
+modern men still in ignorant sincerity producing the
+very fits and swoons to which for untold ages savage
+tribes have given religious import. These manifestations
+in modern Europe indeed form part of a revival
+of religion, the religion of mental disease."<a name="FNanchor_158_158" id="FNanchor_158_158"></a><a href="#Footnote_158_158" class="fnanchor">[158]</a></p>
+
+<p>The truth is that the appeals usually made to induce
+conversion, and the methods adopted, tend to
+develop a morbid state of mind, which very easily<!-- Page 194 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_194" id="Page_194">[194]</a></span>
+passes into the pathological. A too insistent habit of
+introspection is always dangerous, and the danger is
+heightened when it takes the form of religious brooding.
+In Dr. Starbuck's collection of cases, seventy-five
+per cent. of the males and sixty per cent. of the females
+confessed to feelings of depression, anxiety, and sadness
+before conversion. This may be attributed partly
+to the harping upon a conviction of sinfulness, which
+in itself is wholly of an unhealthy character. It does
+not indicate moral health, and it is very far from indicating
+physiological health. The following confessions
+are pertinent, and will illustrate both points. I give
+in brackets the ages of the subjects where stated:&mdash;</p>
+
+<p>"I felt the wrath of God resting on me. I called on
+Him for aid, and felt my sins forgiven" (13).</p>
+
+<p>"I couldn't eat, and would lie awake all night."</p>
+
+<p>"Often, very often, I cried myself to sleep" (19).</p>
+
+<p>"Hymns would sound in my ears as if sung" (10).</p>
+
+<p>"I had visions of Christ saying to me, Come to Me,
+My child" (15).</p>
+
+<p>"Just before conversion I was walking along a
+pathway, thinking of religious matters, when suddenly
+the word H-e-l-l was spelled out five yards ahead of
+me" (17).</p>
+
+<p>"I felt a touch of the Divine One, and a voice said
+'Thy sins are forgiven thee; arise and go in peace'"
+(12).</p>
+
+<p>"The thoughts of my condition were terrible" (13).</p>
+
+<p>"For three months it seemed as if God's Spirit had
+withdrawn from me. Fear took hold of me. For a week
+I was on the border of despair" (16).</p>
+
+<p>"A sense of sinfulness and estrangement from God
+grew daily" (15).</p>
+
+<p><!-- Page 195 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_195" id="Page_195">[195]</a></span>
+"Everything went wrong with me; it felt like Sunday
+all the time" (12).</p>
+
+<p>"I felt that something terrible was going to happen"
+(14).</p>
+
+<p>"I fell on my face by a bench and tried to pray.
+Every time I would call on God something like a
+man's hand would strangle me by choking. I thought
+I would surely die if I could not get help. I made one
+final effort to call on God for mercy if I did strangle
+and die, and the last I remember at that time was falling
+back on the ground with that unseen hand on my
+throat. When I came to myself there was a crowd
+around praising God."</p>
+
+<p>A crowd around praising God! For all substantial
+purposes this last might be the description of a state
+of affairs in Central Africa instead of an occurrence
+in a country that claims to be civilised. It is not surprising
+that so great an authority as Sir T. S. Clouston
+gives an emphatic warning against revival services
+and unusual religious meetings, which should
+"on no account be attended by persons with weak
+heads, excitable dispositions, and neurotic constitutions."<a name="FNanchor_159_159" id="FNanchor_159_159"></a><a href="#Footnote_159_159" class="fnanchor">[159]</a>
+Unfortunately it is precisely these classes for
+whom they possess the greatest attractions, and from
+whom the larger number of chronicled cases are drawn.
+The excitement of the revival meeting is as fatal an attraction
+to them as the dram is to the confirmed alcoholist;
+and if the ill-consequences are neither so immediately
+discernible nor as repulsive in character, they are
+none the less present in a large number of cases. The
+emotional strain to which the organism is subjected
+occurs, as the ages of the converts show, precisely at<!-- Page 196 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_196" id="Page_196">[196]</a></span>
+the time when it is least able to bear it safely. The main
+characteristic of adolescence is instability, physical,
+emotional, and intellectual. It is a time of stress and
+strain, of the formation of new feelings and associations
+and desires that crave for expression and gratification.
+The instability of the organic conditions is evidenced
+by the large proportion of nervous disorders
+that occur during adolescence. Adolescent insanity
+is a well-known form of mania, although it is usually
+of brief duration. Sir T. S. Clouston, in his <cite>Neuroses of
+Development</cite>, gives a long list of complaints attendant
+on adolescence, and Sir W. R. Gowers, dealing with
+1450 cases of epilepsy, points out that "three-quarters
+of the cases of epilepsy begin under twenty years, and
+nearly half (46 per cent.) between ten and twenty, the
+maximum being at fourteen, fifteen, and sixteen." Of
+hysteria, the same writer points out that of the total
+cases 50 per cent. occurs from ten to twenty years
+of age, 20 per cent. from twenty to thirty, and only 10
+per cent. from thirty to forty.<a name="FNanchor_160_160" id="FNanchor_160_160"></a><a href="#Footnote_160_160" class="fnanchor">[160]</a></p>
+
+<p>The peculiar danger, then, of the modern appeal for
+conversion is that it is couched in a form likely to do
+the minimum of good and the maximum of harm.
+Where religion exists as a normally operative factor
+of the environment&mdash;as in lower stages of culture&mdash;the
+danger is avoided, because no special machinery
+is required to bring about religious conviction. The
+general social life secures this. But at a later stage,
+when the religious and secular aspects of life become
+separated, with a growing preponderance of the latter,
+religion must be, as it were, specially and forcibly<!-- Page 197 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_197" id="Page_197">[197]</a></span>
+introduced. Whether for good or ill, it is a disturbing
+force. It strives to divert the developing organic
+energies into a new channel. To effect this, it plays
+upon the emotions to an altogether dangerous extent,
+in complete ignorance of the nature of the passions
+excited. In the older form of the religious appeal,
+that in which fear was the chief emotion aroused, it is
+now generally conceded that the consequences were
+wholly bad. But under any form the emotional appeal
+is fraught with danger, since the tendency is for it to
+bring out unsuspected weaknesses in other directions.
+Sir W. R. Gowers wisely points out that "mental
+emotion&mdash;fright, excitement, anxiety&mdash;is the most
+potent cause of epilepsy," which is accounted for by
+bearing in mind "the profoundly disturbing effect of
+alarm on the nervous system, deranging as it does
+almost every function of the nervous system." Persons
+with predispositions to nervous disorders may
+pass with safety through the period of adolescence so
+long as their circumstances provide opportunities for
+healthy occupation with no undue emotional strain.
+But let the former be lacking, and the latter danger
+is always present. The hidden weakness develops,
+and injury more or less permanent follows. There is
+hardly a qualified medical authority in the country
+who would deny the truth of what has been said, although
+many do not care to speak out in relation to
+religious matters. But all would doubtless agree with
+Dr. Mercier that "every revival is attended by its crop
+of cases of insanity, which are the more numerous as
+the revival is more fervent and long continued."<a name="FNanchor_161_161" id="FNanchor_161_161"></a><a href="#Footnote_161_161" class="fnanchor">[161]</a></p>
+
+<p>Something must be said on the moral character of<!-- Page 198 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_198" id="Page_198">[198]</a></span>
+conversions in general. This is, naturally, greatly
+exaggerated, often deliberately so. In the first place,
+confessions of 'sinfulness' in a pre-conversion state,
+when made by youths of both sexes, may be dismissed
+as quite worthless. They are merely using the language
+placed in their mouths by professional evangelists,
+and the similarity of the confessions carry their
+own condemnation. Leading a sinful, or even a vicious
+life, usually means no more than visiting a theatre, or
+a music hall, or playing cards, or non-attendance at
+church, or not troubling about religious doctrines.
+Very often the vague feeling of restlessness incident
+to adolescence is interpreted as due to sin or estrangement
+from God, and after conversion the convert is,
+for purposes of self-glorification, given to magnify the
+benefits and comforts derived from his religious convictions.
+The magnitude of the change increases the
+value of the convert, and with well-known characters
+there has been as great an exaggeration of vices before
+conversion as of virtues subsequently. The way in
+which evangelical Christianity has created a life of
+the wildest dissipation for the earlier years of John
+Bunyan is an instructive instance of this procedure.</p>
+
+<p>So far as older converts are concerned, everyone of
+balanced judgment will regard stories of conversion
+from extreme vice to extreme virtue with the greatest
+suspicion. Character does not change suddenly, although
+there may be cases of 'sports' in the moral
+world as elsewhere. Where some modification of conduct,
+but hardly of character, results, the machinery
+is very obvious, and does not in the least necessitate
+an appeal to the intrusion of a supernatural influence
+for an explanation. The religious gathering opens<!-- Page 199 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_199" id="Page_199">[199]</a></span>&mdash;as
+any non-religious meeting may open&mdash;a new circle
+of associates with different ideals and standards of
+value. So long as the newcomer is desirous of retaining
+the respect of his fresh associates, so long he will
+try to act as they act and think as they think. There
+will be a change of conduct, but not, as I have said, of
+character. Those who look closely will find the same
+character still active. The mean character remains
+mean, the untruthful one remains untruthful. The only
+difference is that these qualities will be expressed in a
+different form. Moreover, the same thing may be seen
+occurring quite apart from religion. Every association
+of men and women exerts precisely the same influence.
+In the army, a regiment that has a reputation for steadiness
+and sobriety develops these qualities in all who
+enter it. Regiments with a reputation for opposite
+qualities do not fail to convert newcomers. A workshop,
+a club, a profession, exerts a precisely similar
+influence. One man finds inspiration in the Bible and
+another in the Newgate Calendar. A man will usually
+be guided by the ideals of his associates, whether these
+ideals be those of a thieves' kitchen or of a philanthropic
+institution. This only means that each individual
+is subject to the influence of the group spirit. For good
+and evil this is one of the deepest and most pregnant
+facts of human nature. The utilisation and distortion
+of this fact in the interests of religious organisations
+has served to prevent its general recognition and the
+wise use of it by the community at large.</p>
+
+<p>Finally, it has to be borne in mind, in view of the
+data given above, that conversion is experienced by
+the individual at that period of life when the more
+social side of human nature is beginning to find expression.<!-- Page 200 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_200" id="Page_200">[200]</a></span>
+In this way the natural growth from the
+small world of childhood to the larger world of adult
+humanity is taken advantage of by religion, and the
+process of inevitable growth is attributed to the influence
+of religious belief. In itself the phenomenon is
+in no degree religious, but wholly social. The process
+is well enough described by Starbuck in the following
+passage&mdash;although there are certain quite unnecessary
+theological implications:&mdash;</p>
+
+<p>"Conversion is the surrender of the personal will to
+be guided by the larger forces of which it is a part.
+These two aspects are often mingled. In both there is
+much in common. There is a sudden revelation and
+recognition of a higher order than that of the personal
+will. The sympathies follow the direction of the new
+insight, and the convert transfers the centre of life and
+activity from the part to the whole. With new insight
+comes new beauty. Beauty and worth awaken love&mdash;love
+for parents, kindred, kind, society, cosmic order,
+truth, and spiritual life. The individual learns to transfer
+himself from a centre of self-activity into an organ
+of revelation of universal being, and to live a life of
+affection for and oneness with the larger life outside.
+As a necessary condition of the spiritual awakening
+is the birth of fresh activity and of a larger self-consciousness,
+which often assert themselves as the dominant
+element in consciousness."<a name="FNanchor_162_162" id="FNanchor_162_162"></a><a href="#Footnote_162_162" class="fnanchor">[162]</a></p>
+
+<p>Adolescence is the golden period of life, because it
+is the age in which the formative influences effect their
+strongest and most permanent impressions. But this
+susceptibility, while pregnant with promise, is because
+of this susceptibility likewise fraught with the possibilities<!-- Page 201 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_201" id="Page_201">[201]</a></span>
+of danger. The developing qualities of mind
+need to be wisely and carefully guided; and it is little
+short of criminal that at this critical juncture so many
+young people should be handed over to the ignorant
+ministrations of professional evangelism. The true
+sociological significance of the development is ignored,
+and it is small wonder that, having wasted this impressionable
+period, so many people should go through
+life with a quite rudimentary sense of social responsibility
+and duty. An American author, speaking of the
+connection between certain brutal manifestations in
+social life in the United States and religious teaching,
+says:&mdash;</p>
+
+<p>"It is well known that lynching in the South is
+carried on largely by the ignorant and baser elements
+of the white population. It is also well known that the
+chief method of religious influence and training of the
+black man and the ignorant white man is impulsive
+and emotional revivalism. It is a highly dangerous situation,
+and deserves the earnest consideration of the
+ecclesiastical statesmen of all denominations which
+work in the South. It will be impossible to protect
+that part of the nation, or any other, from the epidemic
+madness of the lynching mob if the seeds of it are
+sown in the sacred soil of religion.... Their preachers
+are great 'soul-savers,' but they lack the practical sense
+to build up their emotionalised converts into anything
+that approaches a higher life."<a name="FNanchor_163_163" id="FNanchor_163_163"></a><a href="#Footnote_163_163" class="fnanchor">[163]</a></p>
+
+<p>The truth of this passage has a very wide implication.
+It is not alone true that so long as the lower
+kind of revivalism is encouraged, we are unconsciously
+perpetuating certain very ugly manifestations of<!-- Page 202 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_202" id="Page_202">[202]</a></span>
+social life; it is also true that while we give a supernaturalistic
+interpretation of phenomena that are wholly
+physiological and sociological in character, we can
+never make the most of the human material we possess.
+On the one side we have a deplorable encouragement
+of unhealthy emotionalism, and on the other a sheer
+misdirection and misuse of human faculty. The increase
+of self-consciousness, the craving for sympathy
+and communion with one's fellows, the impulse to service
+in the common life of the State, have no genuine
+connection with religion, although all these qualities
+are classified as religious, and are utilised by religious
+organisations. Actually and fundamentally they belong
+to the social side of human nature. As our hands
+are developed for grasping, and the various organs of
+the body for their respective functions, so mental and
+emotional qualities are developed in their due course
+for a rational social life. Biologically and psychologically,
+male and female are at adolescence entering
+into a deeper and more enduring relationship with the
+life of the race. There is no other meaning to the process.</p>
+
+<p>Naturally enough, the vast majority of people express
+their developing nature in accordance with the
+fashion of their environment. If this environmental
+influence were rationally non-religious, the language
+would be that of a non-religious philosophy. As, however,
+supernaturalism, in some form or other, is still a
+potent force we have a contrary result. It is only here
+and there that one is found with the inclination or the
+wit to analyse his or her impulses, and few possess
+enough knowledge to make the analysis profitable.
+There is no wonder that concerning many of the most<!-- Page 203 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_203" id="Page_203">[203]</a></span>
+important phenomena of human life we are still little
+above the level of the fetish worshipper. We may have
+a more elaborate phraseology, but the old ideas are still
+operative. The consequence is that each newcomer
+finds certain ideas and forms of speech ready for his
+acceptance, and is handed over, bound hand and foot,
+to influences that are the least capable of sane direction.
+We do not merely sacrifice our first-born; we
+immolate the whole of our progeny. The ignorant
+past plays into the hands of the designing present; the
+present conspires with the past to rob the future of the
+good that might result from the growth of a wiser and
+a better race.</p>
+
+<p>Were society really enlightened and genuinely civilised,
+the truth of what has been said would be recognised
+as soon as stated. It would, indeed, be unnecessary
+to labour what would then be a generally recognised
+truth. But the mass of the people are not genuinely
+enlightened, our civilisation is largely a veneer,
+and numerous agencies prevent our reaping the full
+benefit of our available knowledge. Thus it happens
+that in place of an explanation of human qualities in
+terms of biologic and social evolution, we find current
+an explanation that is based upon pre-scientific ideas.
+Because our less instructed ancestors accounted for
+various manifestations of human qualities as due to a
+supernatural influence, we continue to perpetuate the
+delusion. We teach youth to express itself in terms
+of supernaturalism, and then treat the language and
+the fact as inseparable. In this respect, sociology is
+passing through a phase from which some of the sciences
+have finally emerged. In physics and astronomy,
+for instance, the fact has been separated from the supernatural<!-- Page 204 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_204" id="Page_204">[204]</a></span>
+explanation, and shown to be independent
+of it. An exploitation of social life in the interests of
+supernaturalism is still in active operation. It is this
+that is really the central truth of the situation. And
+in ignoring this truth we expose a growing generation
+to the worst possible of educative influences, at a time
+when a wiser control would be preparing it for an intelligent
+participation in the serious and enduring
+work of social organisation.</p>
+
+<div class="footnotes">
+<h3>Footnotes:<br />
+<span class="skip">[<a href="#Page_205">Skip</a>]</span>
+</h3>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_142_142" id="Footnote_142_142"></a><a href="#FNanchor_142_142"><span class="label">[142]</span></a> Dr. G. B. Cutten, <cite>The Psychological Phenomena of Christianity</cite>,
+pp. 7-8.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_143_143" id="Footnote_143_143"></a><a href="#FNanchor_143_143"><span class="label">[143]</span></a> The most elaborate study of this character known to the
+present writer is Mr. G. Stanley Hall's <cite>Adolescence</cite>, in two volumes.
+The bulk of the work is, however, terrifying to some, and
+the cost prohibitive to many. For the general reader of limited
+leisure and means, Professor Starbuck's smaller volume, <cite>The
+Psychology of Religion</cite>, presents the salient facts in a brief and
+satisfactory manner. It is lacking, however, on the anthropological
+side, a view that is well presented by Dr. Stanley Hall.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_144_144" id="Footnote_144_144"></a><a href="#FNanchor_144_144"><span class="label">[144]</span></a> See <cite>Adolescence</cite>, i. p. 528.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_145_145" id="Footnote_145_145"></a><a href="#FNanchor_145_145"><span class="label">[145]</span></a> Vol. iii. p. 279.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_146_146" id="Footnote_146_146"></a><a href="#FNanchor_146_146"><span class="label">[146]</span></a> <cite>Psychology of Religion</cite>, chap. iii. Hall's figures are given in
+the second volume of his work, pp. 288-92.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_147_147" id="Footnote_147_147"></a><a href="#FNanchor_147_147"><span class="label">[147]</span></a> <cite>Varieties</cite>, p. 199.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_148_148" id="Footnote_148_148"></a><a href="#FNanchor_148_148"><span class="label">[148]</span></a> An elaborate list of these ceremonies in both the savage and
+civilised worlds has been compiled by Mr. Hall, ii. chap. xiii.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_149_149" id="Footnote_149_149"></a><a href="#FNanchor_149_149"><span class="label">[149]</span></a> Catlin, <cite>North American Indians</cite>, i. p. 36; see also ii. p. 347.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_150_150" id="Footnote_150_150"></a><a href="#FNanchor_150_150"><span class="label">[150]</span></a> W. I. Thomas, <cite>Sex and Society</cite>, pp. 115-6.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_151_151" id="Footnote_151_151"></a><a href="#FNanchor_151_151"><span class="label">[151]</span></a> For a good summary, see Donaldson's <cite>Growth of the Brain</cite>,
+pp. 241-48.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_152_152" id="Footnote_152_152"></a><a href="#FNanchor_152_152"><span class="label">[152]</span></a> See on this subject the two fine works by Karl Groos, <cite>The
+Play of Animals</cite>, <cite>The Play of Man</cite>.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_153_153" id="Footnote_153_153"></a><a href="#FNanchor_153_153"><span class="label">[153]</span></a> W. Temple, <cite>Repton School Sermons</cite>.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_154_154" id="Footnote_154_154"></a><a href="#FNanchor_154_154"><span class="label">[154]</span></a> <cite>Sanity and Insanity</cite>, p. 281.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_155_155" id="Footnote_155_155"></a><a href="#FNanchor_155_155"><span class="label">[155]</span></a> <cite>Adolescence</cite>, ii. pp. 286-7.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_156_156" id="Footnote_156_156"></a><a href="#FNanchor_156_156"><span class="label">[156]</span></a> Southey's <cite>Life of Wesley</cite>, chap. xxiv.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_157_157" id="Footnote_157_157"></a><a href="#FNanchor_157_157"><span class="label">[157]</span></a> From <cite>The Examiner</cite> of September 6, 1906, cited by Cutten,
+p. 185.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_158_158" id="Footnote_158_158"></a><a href="#FNanchor_158_158"><span class="label">[158]</span></a> <cite>Primitive Culture</cite>, ii. p. 422.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_159_159" id="Footnote_159_159"></a><a href="#FNanchor_159_159"><span class="label">[159]</span></a> <cite>Clinical Lectures</cite>, p. 39.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_160_160" id="Footnote_160_160"></a><a href="#FNanchor_160_160"><span class="label">[160]</span></a> <cite>Manual of Diseases of the Nervous System</cite>, 1893, pp. 732
+and 785.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_161_161" id="Footnote_161_161"></a><a href="#FNanchor_161_161"><span class="label">[161]</span></a> <cite>Sanity and Insanity</cite>, p. 282.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_162_162" id="Footnote_162_162"></a><a href="#FNanchor_162_162"><span class="label">[162]</span></a> <cite>Psychology of Religion</cite>, pp. 146-7.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_163_163" id="Footnote_163_163"></a><a href="#FNanchor_163_163"><span class="label">[163]</span></a> <cite>Primitive Traits in Religious Revivals.</cite></p></div>
+</div>
+
+<p><!-- Page 205 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_205" id="Page_205">[205]</a></span></p>
+
+<h2>CHAPTER <span class="cgap">EIGHT</span><br />
+
+RELIGIOUS EPIDEMICS</h2>
+
+<p>Under pressure of scientific analysis
+the old distinction between the individual and
+society bids fair to break down, or to maintain itself as
+no more than a convenience of classification. It is now
+being recognised that a society is something more
+than a mere aggregate of self-contained units, and that
+the individual is quite inexplicable apart from the social
+group. It is the latter which gives the former his
+individuality. His earliest impressions are derived
+from the life of the group, and as he grows so he comes
+more and more under the influence of social forces.
+The consequence is that the key to a very large part
+of the phenomena of human nature is to be found in a
+study of group life. We may abstract the individual
+for purposes of examination, much as a physiologist
+may study the heart or the liver apart from the body
+from which it has been taken. But ultimately it is in
+relation to the whole that the true significance and
+value of the part is to be discerned.</p>
+
+<p>In this corporate life imitation and suggestion play
+a powerful part. With children, by far the larger part
+of their education consists of sheer imitation, nor do
+adults ever develop beyond its influence. Suggestion
+is a factor that is more operative in youth and maturity
+than in early childhood, and is exhibited in a
+thousand and one subtle and unexpected ways. Both
+these forces are essential to an orderly, and to a progressive,
+social life; but they may just as easily become
+the cause of movements that are retrogressive, and
+even anti-social in character. An epidemic of suicide
+or of murder is as easily initiated as an epidemic of
+philanthropy. Let a person commit suicide in a striking<!-- Page 206 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_206" id="Page_206">[206]</a></span>
+and unusual manner, and there will soon be others
+following his example. Given a favourable environment,
+there is no idea, however unreal, that will not
+find advocates; no example, however strange or disgusting,
+that will not find imitators. The more uniform
+the society, the more powerful the suggestion, the
+easier the imitation. That is why a crowd, acting as
+a crowd, is nearly always made up of people drawn
+from the same social stratum, each unit already familiar
+with certain ideals and belief. Under such conditions
+a crowd will assume all the characteristics of a
+psychological entity. As Gustave Le Bon has pointed
+out, a crowd will do collectively what none of its constituent
+units would ever dream of doing singly.<a name="FNanchor_164_164" id="FNanchor_164_164"></a><a href="#Footnote_164_164" class="fnanchor">[164]</a> It
+becomes capable of deeds of heroism or of savage
+cruelty. It will sacrifice itself or others with indifference.
+Above all, the mere fact of moving in a mass
+gives the individual a sense of power, a certainty of
+being in the right that he can&mdash;save under exceptional
+circumstances&mdash;never acquire while alone. The intellect
+is subdued, inhibition is inoperative, the instincts
+are given free play, and their movement is determined
+in turn by suggestions not unlike those with which a
+trained hypnotist influences his subject.</p>
+
+<p>In the phenomena of contagion words and symbols
+play a powerful part. They are both a rallying-point
+and an outlet for the emotions of a crowd. These
+words or symbols may be wholly incongruous with
+the real needs of a people, but provided they are sufficiently
+familiar they will serve their purpose. And
+the more primitive the type of mind represented by
+the mass of the people the more powerfully these symbols<!-- Page 207 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_207" id="Page_207">[207]</a></span>
+operate. Shakespeare's portrayal of the crowd
+in <cite>Julius Cæsar</cite> remains eternally true. The skilled
+orator, playing on old feelings, using familiar terms,
+and invoking familiar ideas, finds a crowd quite plastic
+to his hands. It is for these reasons that there is so
+keen a struggle with political and social parties for a
+monopoly of good rallying cries, and a readiness to
+fix objectionable titles on their opponents. Patriotism,
+Little Englander, Jingo, The Church in Danger,
+Godless Education, etc. etc. Causes are materially
+helped or injured by these means. There is little or
+no consideration given to their justice or reasonableness;
+it is the image aroused that does the work.</p>
+
+<p>Psychological epidemics may in some cases be justly
+called normal in character. That is, they depend
+upon factors that are always in operation and which
+form a part of every social structure. A war fever or a
+commercial panic falls under this head. In other instances
+they depend upon abnormal conditions, upon
+the workings, perhaps, of some obscure nervous disease,
+and are of a pathological description. In yet
+other cases they represent a mixture of both. In such
+cases, for example, as that of the Medieval Flagellants
+or of the Dancing Mania, the presence of pathological
+elements is unmistakable. But neither of these epidemics
+could have occurred without a certain social
+preparation, and unless they had called into operation
+those principles of crowd psychology to which science
+has within recent years turned its attention, and which
+are normal factors in every society. These three classes
+of epidemics may be found in connection with subjects
+other than religious, but I am at present concerned
+with them only in that relation, and to point out that,<!-- Page 208 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_208" id="Page_208">[208]</a></span>
+in spite of their undesirable or admittedly pathologic
+character, they have yet served to keep supernaturalism
+alive and active.</p>
+
+<p>During the Christian period of European history
+by far the most important of all epidemics, as it was
+indeed the earliest, was monasticism. This takes front
+rank because of its extent, the degree to which it prepared
+the ground for subsequent outbreaks, and because
+of its indirect, and, I think, too little noticed,
+social consequences. It may safely be said that no
+other movement has so powerfully affected European
+society as has the monasticism of the early Christian
+centuries. It cannot, of course, be urged that Christianity
+originated monasticism. India and Egypt had
+its ascetic practices and celibate priesthood long before
+the birth of Christianity, and indeed gave Christianity
+the pattern from which to work. But the main
+stream of social life remained unaffected to any considerable
+extent by this asceticism. The social and
+domestic virtues received full recognition from the upholders
+of the monastic life, and there is no evidence
+that asceticism ever assumed an epidemic form. It
+has often been the lot of the Christian Church to give
+a more intense expression to religious tendencies already
+existing, and this was so in the case before us.
+At any rate, it was left for the Christian Church to give
+to monasticism the character of an epidemic, to treat
+the purely social and domestic virtues as a positive
+hindrance to the religious life, seriously to disturb
+national well-being, and to come perilously near destroying
+civilisation.</p>
+
+<p>The origin of ascetic practices has already been
+indicated in a previous chapter. It has there been<!-- Page 209 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_209" id="Page_209">[209]</a></span>
+pointed out that the deliberate torture of mind and
+body arose from the belief that the induced states
+brought man into direct communion with supernatural
+powers, and that this element has continued
+in almost every religion in the world. Says Baring-Gould:&mdash;</p>
+
+<p>"The ascetic instinct is intimately united with the
+religious instinct. There is scarcely a religion of ancient
+and modern times, certain forms of Protestantism
+excepted, that does not recognise asceticism as
+an element in its system.... Brahmanism has its order
+of ascetics.... Mohammedanism has its fakirs, subduing
+the flesh by their austerities, and developing the
+spirit by their contemplation and prayers. Fasting
+and self-denial were observances required of the
+Greeks, who desired initiation into the mysteries....
+The scourge was used before the altars of Artemis
+and over the tomb of Pelops. The Egyptian priests
+passed their novitiate in the deserts, and when not engaged
+in their religious functions were supposed to
+spend their time in caves. They renounced all commerce
+with the world, and lived in contemplation,
+temperance, and frugality, and in absolute poverty....
+The Peruvians were required to fast before sacrificing
+to the gods, and to bind themselves by vows of chastity
+and abstinence from nourishing food.... There were
+ascetic orders for old men and nunneries for widows
+among the Totomacs, monastic orders among Toltecs
+dedicated to the service of Quetzalcoatl, and others
+among the Aztecs consecrated to Tezcatlipoca."<a name="FNanchor_165_165" id="FNanchor_165_165"></a><a href="#Footnote_165_165" class="fnanchor">[165]</a></p>
+
+<p>It was argued by Bingham, a learned eighteenth-century
+ecclesiastical historian, that although asceticism<!-- Page 210 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_210" id="Page_210">[210]</a></span>
+was known and practised in individual cases from
+the earliest period of Christian history, it did not establish
+itself within the Church until the fourth century.
+It is not a matter of great consequence to the subject
+under discussion whether this be so or not. It is at least
+certain that Christian teaching contained within itself
+all the elements for such a development, which was
+bound, sooner or later, to transpire. The antithesis between
+the flesh and the spirit, the conception of the
+world as given over to Satan, the ascetic teaching of
+Paul, with the value placed upon suffering and privation
+as spiritually disciplinary forces, could not but
+create in a society permeated with a special type of supernaturalism,
+that asceticism which became so marked
+a feature of medieval Christianity. And it is certain
+also that in no other instance has asceticism proved itself
+so grave a danger to social order and security. Allowing
+for what Lecky calls the 'glaring mendacity' of
+the lives of the saints, a description that applies more
+or less to all the ecclesiastical writings of the early
+centuries, it is evident that the number of monks, their
+ferocity, and general practices, were enough to constitute
+a grave social danger. It is said that St. Pachomius
+had 7000 monks under his direct rule; that in the
+time of Jerome 50,000 monks gathered together at the
+Easter festival; that one Egyptian city mustered
+20,000 nuns and 10,000 monks, and that the monastic
+population of Egypt at one time equalled in
+number the rest of the inhabitants. At a later date,
+within fifty years of its institution, the Franciscan
+Order possessed 8000 houses, with 200,000 members.
+In the twelfth century the Cluniacs had 2000 monasteries
+in France. In England, as late as 1546, Hooper,<!-- Page 211 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_211" id="Page_211">[211]</a></span>
+afterwards Bishop of Gloucester, declared that there
+were no less than 10,000 nuns in England. Every
+country in Europe possessed a larger or smaller army
+of men and women whose ideals were in direct conflict
+with nearly all that makes for a sane and progressive
+civilisation.</p>
+
+<p>The general character of the monk during the full
+swing of the ascetic epidemic has been well sketched
+by Lecky. His summary here will save a more extended
+exposition:&mdash;</p>
+
+<p>"There is perhaps no phase in the moral history of
+mankind of a deeper and more painful interest than
+this ascetic epidemic. A hideous, sordid, and emaciated
+maniac, without knowledge, without patriotism,
+without natural affection, passing his life in a
+long routine of useless and atrocious self-torture, and
+quailing before the ghastly phantoms of his delirious
+brain, had become the ideal of the nations which had
+known the writings of Plato and Cicero, and the lives
+of Socrates and Cato. For about two centuries, the
+hideous maceration of the body was regarded as the
+highest proof of excellence. St. Jerome declares, with
+a thrill of admiration, how he had seen a monk, who
+for thirty years had lived exclusively on a small portion
+of barley bread and of mouldy water; another
+who lived in a hole and never ate more than five figs
+for his daily repast; a third who cut his hair only on
+Easter Sunday, who never washed his clothes, who
+never changed his tunic till it fell to pieces, who
+starved himself till his eyes grew dim, and his skin
+like a pumice stone.... For six months, it is said,
+St. Macarius of Alexandria slept in a marsh, and exposed
+his naked body to the stings of venomous flies....<!-- Page 212 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_212" id="Page_212">[212]</a></span>
+His disciple, St. Eusebius, carried one hundred
+and fifty pounds of iron, and lived for three years in a
+dried-up well.... St. Besarion spent forty days and
+nights in the middle of thorn bushes, and for forty
+days and nights never lay down when he slept....
+Some saints, like St. Marcian, restricted themselves to
+one meal a day, so small that they continually suffered
+the pangs of hunger.... Some of the hermits lived in
+deserted dens of wild beasts, others in dried-up wells,
+while others found a congenial resting-place among
+the tombs. Some disdained all clothes, and crawled abroad
+like the wild beasts, covered only by their matted
+hair. The cleanliness of the body was regarded as a
+pollution of the soul, and the saints who were most admired
+had become one hideous mass of clotted filth. St.
+Athanasius relates with enthusiasm how St. Antony,
+the patriarch of monachism, had never, to extreme old
+age, been guilty of washing his feet.... St. Abraham,
+the hermit, however, who lived for fifty years after his
+conversion, rigidly refused from that date to wash either
+his face or his feet.... St. Ammon had never seen
+himself naked. A famous virgin, named Sylvia, though
+she was sixty years old, and though bodily sickness
+was a consequence of her habits, resolutely refused,
+on religious principles, to wash any part of her body
+except her fingers. St. Euphraxia joined a convent of
+one hundred and thirty nuns, who never washed their
+feet, and who shuddered at the mention of a bath."<a name="FNanchor_166_166" id="FNanchor_166_166"></a><a href="#Footnote_166_166" class="fnanchor">[166]</a></p>
+
+<p><!-- Page 213 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_213" id="Page_213">[213]</a></span>
+It is difficult to realise what it is exactly that some
+writers have in their minds when they praise the purity
+of the ascetic ideal, and lament its degradation as
+though society lost something of great value thereby.
+The examples cited realised that ideal as well as it
+could be realised, and its anti-social character is unmistakable.
+If it is intended to imply that an element of
+self-denial or self-discipline is essential to healthy
+development, that is admitted, but this is not the
+ascetic ideal; it is that of temperance as taught by the
+best of the ancient philosophers. What the ascetic
+aimed at was not self-development, but self-suppression.
+The discipline of the monk was only another
+name for the cultivation of a frame of mind
+unhealthy and anti-social. Eventually, the rapidity
+with which this mania spread, the fact that for several
+centuries it raged as a veritable epidemic, carried
+with it the germs of a corrective. The more numerous
+monks and nuns became, the more certain it became
+that many of them would develop passions and propensities
+they professed to despise. The love of ease
+and wealth, the lust of power and pride of place, was
+sure to find expression, and if by the degradation of
+the ascetic ideal is meant the fact that the preachers
+of poverty, and humility, and meekness, became the
+wealthiest, the most powerful, the most corrupt, and
+the most tyrannical order in Christendom, the reason
+is that not even monasticism could prevent ordinary<!-- Page 214 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_214" id="Page_214">[214]</a></span>
+human passions from finding expression. They might
+be suppressed in the case of a few; it became impossible
+with a multitude. That they found expression
+in so disastrous a form was due to the fact that the
+disciplinary agent of these passions, a developed social
+consciousness, played so small a part in the life of
+the monk.</p>
+
+<p>It is no part of my present purpose to trace the full
+consequences of the ascetic epidemic. Some of these
+consequences, however, have a more or less direct
+bearing upon this enquiry, and it is necessary to say
+something upon them. One enduring and inevitable
+consequence of monasticism has not, I think, been
+adequately noted by many writers. This is its influence
+on the ideal of marriage, on the family, and on
+the domestic virtues. In India and Egypt celibacy
+had been closely associated with the religious life, but
+the ascetic was regarded as a man peculiarly apart
+from his fellows, and the family continued to be held
+in great honour, even by religious writers. Christianity
+provided for the first time a body of writers who made
+a direct attack upon marriage as obstructing the supreme
+duty of spiritual development. The Rev. Principal
+Donaldson, in his generally excellent book on
+<cite>Woman</cite>, professes to find some difficulty in accounting
+for the growth among the early Christians of the
+feeling in favour of celibacy. He remarks that "no
+one with the New Testament as his guide could venture
+to assert that marriage was wrong." Not wrong,
+certainly; but anyone with the New Testament before
+him would be justified in asserting marriage to be inferior
+to celibacy. It is at most taken for granted; it
+is neither commended nor recommended, and of its<!-- Page 215 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_215" id="Page_215">[215]</a></span>
+social value there is never a glimpse. And there is
+much on the other side. Paul's teaching is strongly
+in favour of celibacy, and marriage is only advised to
+avoid a greater evil. In the Book of <cite>Revelation</cite> there
+is a reference to the 144,000 saints who wait on "the
+Lamb," and who "were not defiled with women, but
+were virgins." Certainly the New Testament does not
+condemn marriage, but it is idle to pretend that those
+who preached the celibate ideal failed to find therein a
+warranty for their teaching.</p>
+
+<p>The historic fact is, however, that the early Christian
+leaders were, in the main, ardent advocates of celibacy.
+The social importance of marriage being ignored, its
+functions became those of ministering to sexual passion
+and the perpetuation of the race. In view of the
+supposed approaching end of the world, the desirability
+of this last was questioned, and in the name of
+purity the former was strongly denounced. It is from
+these points of view that Tertullian describes children
+as "burdens which are to most of us perilous as being
+unsuitable to faith," and wives as women of the second
+degree of modesty who had fallen into wedlock. Jerome
+said that marriage was at best a sin, and all that
+could be done was to excuse and purify it. Epiphanius
+said that the Church was based upon virginity as upon
+a corner-stone. Augustine was of opinion that celibates
+would shine in heaven like dazzling stars. Married
+people were declared, by another authority, to
+be incapable of salvation. The most powerful and
+most influential of writers concurred that the sexual
+relation was an almost fatal obstacle to religious salvation.</p>
+
+<p>Hardly any movement ever struck so hard against<!-- Page 216 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_216" id="Page_216">[216]</a></span>
+social well-being as did this teaching of celibacy.
+Wives were encouraged to desert their husbands,
+husbands to forsake their wives, children their parents.
+Parents, in turn, were exhorted to devote their children
+to the monastic life; and although at first children
+who had been so condemned were allowed to return
+to the world, should they desire it, on reaching maturity,
+this liberty was taken from them by the fourth
+Council of Toledo in 633.<a name="FNanchor_167_167" id="FNanchor_167_167"></a><a href="#Footnote_167_167" class="fnanchor">[167]</a> Some few of the Christian
+writers protested against children being taught to forsake
+their parents in this manner, but the general
+spirit of the time was in its favour.</p>
+
+<p>"Children were nursed and trained to expect at
+every instant more than human interferences; their
+young energies had ever before them examples of
+asceticism, to which it was the glory, the true felicity
+of life, to aspire. The thoughtful child had all his mind
+thus preoccupied ... wherever there was gentleness,
+modesty, the timidity of young passion, repugnance
+to vice, an imaginative temperament, a consciousness
+of unfitness to wrestle with the rough realities of life,
+the way lay invitingly open.... It lay through perils,
+but was made attractive by perpetual wonders. It was
+awful, but in its awfulness lay its power over the young
+mind. It learned to trample down that last bond which
+united the child to common humanity, filial reverence;
+the fond and mysterious attachment of the child
+and the mother, the inborn reverence of the son to
+the father. It is the highest praise of St. Fulgentius
+that he overcame his mother's tenderness by religious
+cruelty."<a name="FNanchor_168_168" id="FNanchor_168_168"></a><a href="#Footnote_168_168" class="fnanchor">[168]</a></p>
+
+<p><!-- Page 217 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_217" id="Page_217">[217]</a></span>
+The full warranty for Dean Milman's stricture is
+seen in the following passage from St. Jerome:&mdash;</p>
+
+<p>"Though your little nephew twine his arms around
+your neck; though your mother, with dishevelled hair,
+and tearing her robe asunder, point to the breast with
+which she suckled you; though your father fall down
+on the threshold before you, pass on over your father's
+body. Fly with tearless eyes to the banner of the
+cross. In this matter cruelty is the only piety.... Your
+widowed sister may throw her gentle arms around
+you.... Your father may implore you to wait but a
+short time to bury those near to you, who will soon
+be no more; your weeping mother may recall your
+childish days, and may point to her shrunken breast
+and to her wrinkled brow. Those around you may
+tell you that all the household rests upon you. Such
+chains as these the love of God and the fear of hell can
+easily break. You say that Scripture orders you to
+obey your parents, but he who loves them more than
+Christ loses his soul. The enemy brandishes a sword
+to slay me. Shall I think of a mother's tears?"<a name="FNanchor_169_169" id="FNanchor_169_169"></a><a href="#Footnote_169_169" class="fnanchor">[169]</a></p>
+
+<p>Gibbon said of the ascetic movement that the Pagan
+world regarded with astonishment a society that
+perpetuated itself without marriage. Unfortunately
+this perpetuation was secured by the sacrifice of some
+of the dearest interests of the race. For, in general,
+one may say that idealistic teaching of any kind appeals
+most powerfully to those who are least in need
+of it. The world would at any time lose little, and
+might possibly gain much, were it possible to restrain
+a certain class from parentage. But there is no evidence
+that monasticism ever had its effect on that<!-- Page 218 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_218" id="Page_218">[218]</a></span>
+kind of people; the presumption is indeed in the contrary
+direction. The careless and brutal hear and are
+unaffected. The more thoughtful and desirable alone
+are influenced. And there can be little doubt that the
+Church in appealing to certain aspects of human nature
+dissuaded from parentage those who were most
+fitted for the task. There was a practical survival of
+the unfittest. Nothing is more striking, in fact, in the
+early history of Christianity than the comparative
+absence of home life and of the domestic ideals. Dean
+Milman remarked that in all the discussion concerning
+celibacy he could not recall a single instance where
+the social aspects appear to have occurred to the disputants.
+The Dean's remark applies to some extent
+to a much later period of Christian history than
+the one to which he refers. That much-admired evangelical
+classic, Bunyan's <cite>Pilgrim's Progress</cite>, for example,
+shows a curious obliviousness to the value of
+family and social life. But neglect of the socialising
+and refining influence of family life leads inevitably to
+a hardening of character and a brutalising of life in
+general. The ferocious nature of the theological disputes
+of the early Christian period never fail to arouse
+the comments of historians. But there was really
+nothing to soften or restrain them. Everything was
+dominated by the theological interest. And we owe
+it in no small measure to the vogue of the monk that
+the tolerance of Pagan times, with its widespread respect
+for truth-seeking, was replaced by the narrow
+intolerance of the medieval period, an intolerance
+which has never really been eradicated from any
+part of Christian Europe.</p>
+
+<p>In counting this as one of the consequences of the<!-- Page 219 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_219" id="Page_219">[219]</a></span>
+Christian preaching of celibacy, I am supported by
+no less an authority than the late Sir Francis Galton.
+In his epoch-marking work, <cite>Hereditary Genius</cite>, this
+writer says:&mdash;</p>
+
+<p>"The long period of the Dark Ages under which
+Europe has lain is due, I believe, in a very considerable
+degree, to the celibacy enjoined by the religious
+orders on their votaries. Whenever a man or woman
+was possessed of a gentle nature that fitted him or her
+to deeds of charity, to meditation, to literature, or to
+art, the social condition of the time was such that they
+had no refuge elsewhere than in the bosom of the
+Church. But she chose to preach and exact celibacy.
+The consequence was that these gentle natures had
+no continuance, and thus by a policy so singularly unwise
+and suicidal that I am hardly able to speak of it
+without impatience, the Church brutalised the breed
+of our forefathers. She acted precisely as if she had
+aimed at selecting the rudest portion of the community
+to be alone the parents of future generations. She
+practised the arts that breeders would use, who aimed
+at creating ferocious, currish, and stupid nature. No
+wonder that club law prevailed for centuries over Europe;
+the wonder rather is that enough good remained
+in the veins of Europeans to enable their race to
+rise to its very moderate level of natural morality."<a name="FNanchor_170_170" id="FNanchor_170_170"></a><a href="#Footnote_170_170" class="fnanchor">[170]</a></p>
+
+<p>The consequences of asceticism on morals were almost
+wholly disastrous. There is no intention of endorsing
+the vulgar Protestant prejudice of every convent
+being a brothel, and all monks and nuns as given
+over to a vicious life, but there is no question that a
+very widespread demoralisation existed amongst the<!-- Page 220 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_220" id="Page_220">[220]</a></span>
+religious orders, that this existed from the very earliest
+times, and that it was an inevitable consequence of so
+large a number of people professing the ascetic life.
+This is not a history of morals, and it is needless to
+enter into a detailed account of the state of morality
+during the prevalence of asceticism. But the absence
+of any favourable influence exerted by asceticism on
+conduct is well illustrated in the description of Salvianus,
+Bishop of Marseilles at the close of the fifth
+century, of the condition of society in his day. Gaul,
+Spain, Italy, and Africa are depicted as sunk in an
+overmastering sensuality. Rome is represented as
+the sewer of the nations, and in the African Church,
+he says, the most diligent search can scarce discover
+one chaste among thousands. And this, it must be
+borne in mind, was the African Church, which under
+the care of Augustine had been specially nurtured in
+the most rigid asceticism. Four hundred years later
+the state of monastic morals is sufficiently indicated
+by a regulation of St. Theodore Studita prohibiting
+the entrance of female animals into monasteries.<a name="FNanchor_171_171" id="FNanchor_171_171"></a><a href="#Footnote_171_171" class="fnanchor">[171]</a> A
+regulation passed in Paris at a Council held in 1212
+enforces the same lesson by forbidding monks or nuns
+sleeping two in a bed. The avowed object of this was
+to repress offences of the most disgusting description.<a name="FNanchor_172_172" id="FNanchor_172_172"></a><a href="#Footnote_172_172" class="fnanchor">[172]</a>
+In 1208 an order was issued prohibiting mothers or
+other female relatives residing with priests, on account
+of the frequent scandals arising. Offences became so
+numerous and so open that it was with relief that laymen
+saw priests openly select concubines. That at
+least gave a promise of some protection to domestic
+life. In some of the Swiss cantons it actually became<!-- Page 221 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_221" id="Page_221">[221]</a></span>
+the practice to compel a new pastor, on taking up his
+charge, to select a concubine as a necessary protection
+to the females under his care. The same practice existed
+in Spain.<a name="FNanchor_173_173" id="FNanchor_173_173"></a><a href="#Footnote_173_173" class="fnanchor">[173]</a></p>
+
+<p>There is, as Lea rightly says, no injustice in holding
+the Church mainly responsible for the laxity of morals
+which is characteristic of medieval society. It had
+unbounded and unquestioned power, and this with
+its wealth and privileges might have made medieval
+society the purest in the world. As it was, "the period
+of its unquestioned domination over the conscience of
+Europe was the very period in which licence among
+the Teutonic races was most unchecked. A church
+which, though founded on the Gospel, and wielding
+the illimitable power of the Roman hierarchy, could
+yet allow the feudal principle to extend to the <i>jus
+primæ noctis</i> or <i>droit de marquette</i>, and whose ministers
+in their character of temporal seigneurs could
+even occasionally claim the disgusting right, was evidently
+exercising its influence, not for good, but for
+evil."</p>
+
+<p>On civic life and the civic virtues the influence of
+asceticism was equally disastrous. "A candid examination,"
+says Lecky, "will show that the Christian civilisation
+has been as inferior to the Pagan ones in civic
+and intellectual virtues as it has been superior to them
+in the virtues of humanity and chastity." One may
+reasonably question the latter part of this statement,
+bearing in mind the facts just pointed out, but the first
+part admits of overwhelming proof. Celibacy is not
+chastity, and it is difficult to see how the coarsening of
+character described by Lecky himself can be consistent<!-- Page 222 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_222" id="Page_222">[222]</a></span>
+with a heightened humanity. But there can be
+small doubt that the growth of the Christian Church
+spelt disaster to the civic life and institutions of the
+Empire. Nothing the Romans did was more admirable
+than their organisation of municipal life. They
+avoided the common blunder of imposing on all a
+uniform organisation, and so gave free play to local
+feeling and custom so far as was consistent with imperial
+order and peace. Civic life became, as a consequence,
+well ordered and persistent. It was far less
+corrupt than administration in the capital, and freedom
+persisted in the provincial towns for long after its
+practical disappearance in Rome itself. Indeed, but
+for the antagonism of Christianity, it is probable that
+the urban municipalities might have provided the impetus
+for the rejuvenation of the Empire.<a name="FNanchor_174_174" id="FNanchor_174_174"></a><a href="#Footnote_174_174" class="fnanchor">[174]</a></p>
+
+<p>From the outset, the early Christian movement
+stood as a whole apart from the civic life of the Empire,
+while the ascetic waged a constant warfare against it.
+"According to monastic view of Christianity," says
+Milman, "the total abandonment of the world, with all
+its ties and duties, as well as its treasures, its enjoyments,
+and objects of ambition, advanced rather than
+diminished the hopes of salvation." The object was
+individual salvation, not social regeneration. When
+people were praised for breaking the closest of family
+ties in their desire for salvation, it would be absurd to
+suppose that social duties and obligations would remain
+exempt. The Christian ascetic was ready enough
+to risk his own life, or to take the life of others, on account
+of minute points of doctrinal difference, but<!-- Page 223 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_223" id="Page_223">[223]</a></span>
+he was deaf to the call of patriotism or the demands
+of civic life. Theology became the one absorbing
+topic; and as monasticism assumed more menacing
+proportions, the monk became the dominating figure,
+paralysing by his presence the healthful activities of
+masses of the people. Speaking of the Eastern Empire,
+although his words apply with almost equal
+truth wherever the Church was supreme, Milman
+says:&mdash;</p>
+
+<p>"That which is the characteristic sign of the times
+as a social and political, as well as a religious, phenomenon,
+is the complete dominion assumed by the
+monks in the East over the public mind.... The monks,
+in fact, exercise the most complete tyranny, not merely
+over the laity, but over bishops and patriarchs, whose
+rule, though nominally subject to it, they throw off
+whenever it suits their purposes.... Monks in Alexandria,
+monks in Antioch, monks in Constantinople,
+decide peremptorily on orthodoxy and heterodoxy....
+Persecution is universal; persecution by every
+means of violence and cruelty; the only question is in
+whose hands is the power to persecute.... Bloodshed,
+murder, treachery, assassination, even during the public
+worship of God&mdash;these are the frightful means by
+which each party strives to maintain its opinions and
+to defeat its adversary. Ecclesiastical and civil authority
+are alike paralysed by combinations of fanatics
+ready to suffer or to inflict death, utterly unapproachable
+by reason."<a name="FNanchor_175_175" id="FNanchor_175_175"></a><a href="#Footnote_175_175" class="fnanchor">[175]</a></p>
+
+<p>Against such combinations of ignorance, fanaticism,
+and ferocity, the few remaining lovers of secular
+progress were powerless. Patriotism became a mere<!-- Page 224 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_224" id="Page_224">[224]</a></span>
+name, and organised civic life an almost forgotten aspiration.
+What the Pagan world had understood by a
+'good man' was one who spent himself in the service
+of his country. The Christian understood by it one who
+succeeded in saving his own soul, even at the sacrifice
+of family and friends. Vampire-like, monasticism fed
+upon the life-blood of the Empire. The civic life and
+patriotism of old Rome became a mere tradition, to inspire
+long after the men of the Renaissance and of the
+French Revolution.</p>
+
+<p>Finally, asceticism exerted a powerful influence on
+religion itself. That it served to strengthen and perpetuate
+the life of religion there can be little doubt. However
+strongly some people may have resented the
+monastic ideal, it nevertheless gave increased strength
+and vitality to the religious idea. To begin with, it
+offered for centuries a very powerful obstacle to the
+development of those progressive and scientific ideas
+that have made such advances in all centres of civilisation
+during the past two or three centuries. To the
+common mind it brought home the supremacy of religion
+in a way that nothing else could. The mere sight
+of monarch and noble yielding homage to the monk,
+acknowledging his supremacy in what was declared to
+be the chief interest in life, the interference of the monk
+in every department of life, saturated society with
+supernaturalism. And although at a later period the
+rapacity, dissoluteness, and tyranny of the monkish
+orders led to revolt, by that time the imagination of all
+had been thoroughly impressed with the value of religion.
+Even to-day current theology is permeated with
+the monkish notions of self-denial, self-sacrifice, and
+contempt of the world's comfort and beauty as belonging<!-- Page 225 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_225" id="Page_225">[225]</a></span>
+to the essence of pure religion. The lives of the
+saints still remain the storehouse of ideals for the religious
+preacher. In spite of their absurd practices and
+disgusting penances, later generations have not failed
+to hold them up as examples. They have been used
+to impress the imagination of their successors, as they
+were used to impress the minds of their contemporaries.
+The fact of Thomas à Beckett wearing a hair shirt
+running with vermin has not prevented his being held
+up as an example of the power of religion. People fear
+ghosts long after they cease to believe in them; they
+pay unreasoning homage to a crown long after intellectual
+development has robbed the kingly office of its
+primitive significance; all the recent developments of
+democracy have not abolished the Englishman's constitutional
+crick in the neck at the sight of a nobleman.
+Nor is supernaturalism expunged from a society because
+the conditions that gave it birth have passed
+away. A religious epidemic is not analogous to those
+physical disorders which deposit an antitoxin and so
+protect against future attacks. It resembles rather
+those disorders that permanently weaken, and so invite
+repeated assaults. The ascetic epidemic passed
+away; but, before doing so, it thoroughly saturated with
+supernaturalism the social atmosphere and impressed
+its power upon the public mind. It gave supernaturalism
+a new and longer lease of life, and paved the way
+for other outbreaks, of a less general, but still of a thoroughly
+epidemic character.</p>
+
+<div class="footnotes">
+<h3>Footnotes:<br />
+<span class="skip">[<a href="#Page_226">Skip</a>]</span>
+</h3>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_164_164" id="Footnote_164_164"></a><a href="#FNanchor_164_164"><span class="label">[164]</span></a> See <cite>The Psychology of Peoples</cite> and <cite>The Crowd</cite>.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_165_165" id="Footnote_165_165"></a><a href="#FNanchor_165_165"><span class="label">[165]</span></a> <cite>Origin and Development of Religious Belief</cite>, i. pp. 343-8.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_166_166" id="Footnote_166_166"></a><a href="#FNanchor_166_166"><span class="label">[166]</span></a> <cite>History of European Morals</cite>, ii. pp. 107-10. For a careful
+description of the monastic discipline in its more normal aspects,
+see Bingham's Works, vol. ii. bk. vi. Gibbon gives his usual
+brilliant summary of the movement in chapter xxxvii. of the <cite>Decline
+and Fall</cite>. A host of facts similar to those cited by Lecky
+will be found in <cite>The Book of Paradise</cite>, 2 vols., trans. by Wallis
+Budge. Lea's <cite>History of Sacerdotal Celibacy</cite> gives the classical
+and authoritative account of the moral consequences of the
+practice of celibacy. For a vivid picture of the psychology of the
+ascetic, see Flaubert's great romance, <cite>St. Antony</cite>.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_167_167" id="Footnote_167_167"></a><a href="#FNanchor_167_167"><span class="label">[167]</span></a> Cited by Lecky, ii. p. 131.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_168_168" id="Footnote_168_168"></a><a href="#FNanchor_168_168"><span class="label">[168]</span></a> Dean Milman, <cite>Hist. of Latin Christianity</cite>, ii. pp. 81-2.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_169_169" id="Footnote_169_169"></a><a href="#FNanchor_169_169"><span class="label">[169]</span></a> Lecky, ii. pp. 134-5.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_170_170" id="Footnote_170_170"></a><a href="#FNanchor_170_170"><span class="label">[170]</span></a> <cite>Hereditary Genius</cite>, 1869, p. 357.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_171_171" id="Footnote_171_171"></a><a href="#FNanchor_171_171"><span class="label">[171]</span></a> Lea, p. 109.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_172_172" id="Footnote_172_172"></a><a href="#FNanchor_172_172"><span class="label">[172]</span></a> Lea, p. 332.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_173_173" id="Footnote_173_173"></a><a href="#FNanchor_173_173"><span class="label">[173]</span></a> See Lea, pp. 353-4.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_174_174" id="Footnote_174_174"></a><a href="#FNanchor_174_174"><span class="label">[174]</span></a> For a fine sketch of Roman municipal life, see Dill's <cite>Roman
+Society from Nero to Marcus Aurelius</cite>, chap. ii.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_175_175" id="Footnote_175_175"></a><a href="#FNanchor_175_175"><span class="label">[175]</span></a> <cite>Hist. of Latin Christianity</cite>, i. pp. 317-8.</p></div>
+</div>
+
+<p><!-- Page 226 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_226" id="Page_226">[226]</a></span></p>
+
+<h2>CHAPTER <span class="cgap">NINE</span><br />
+RELIGIOUS EPIDEMICS&mdash;(<i>CONCLUDED</i>)</h2>
+
+<p>It is not easy to overestimate the
+influence of monasticism on subsequent religious history.
+The lives of its votaries provided examples of
+almost every conceivable kind of self-torture or semi-maniacal
+behaviour. It had made the world thoroughly
+familiar with extravagance of action as the symptom
+of intense religious conviction. And its influence
+on social development had been such that the susceptibility
+of the public mind to suggestions was as a raw
+wound in the presence of a powerful irritant. Such an
+institution as the Inquisition could only have maintained
+itself among a people thoroughly familiar with
+supernaturalism, and to whom its preservation was the
+first and most sacred of duties.</p>
+
+<p>A society habituated to the commanding presence
+of the monk, fed upon stories of their miraculous encounters
+with celestial and diabolic visitants, and so
+accustomed to regard the priesthood as in a very peculiar
+sense the mouthpiece of divinity, was well prepared
+for such a series of events as the crusades for the
+recovery of the Holy Land. Pilgrimages to the burial-places
+of saints, and to spots connected, by legend or
+otherwise, with Christian history, had long been in
+vogue, and formed a source of both revenue to the
+Church and of inspiration to the faithful. As early as
+833 a guide-book had been prepared called the <cite>Itinerary
+from Bordeaux to Jerusalem</cite>, and along the route
+marked convents and shelters for the pilgrims were established.
+A lucrative traffic in relics of every description
+had also been established, and any interference
+with this touched the Church in its tenderest point.
+Added to which the expected end of the world in the<!-- Page 227 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_227" id="Page_227">[227]</a></span>
+year 1000 had the effect of still further increasing the
+crowd of pilgrims to the Holy Land, where it was firmly
+believed the second advent would take place.</p>
+
+<p>In the eleventh century a tax was imposed on all
+Christians visiting Jerusalem. There were also reports
+of Christian pilgrims being ill-treated. Recent events
+in Europe have shown with what ease Christian feeling
+may be roused against a Mohammedan power,
+and it was considerably easier to do this in the eleventh
+century. Between them, Pope Urban <span class="ucsmcap">II.</span> and Peter the
+Hermit&mdash;the former acting mainly from political motives;
+the latter from a spirit of sheer fanaticism&mdash;succeeded
+in rousing Europe to a maniacal desire for the
+recovery of the Holy Land. And for nearly two hundred
+years the world saw a series of crusades on as absurd
+an errand as ever engaged the energies of mankind.
+Every class of society participated, and it is calculated
+that no less than two millions of lives were sacrificed.</p>
+
+<p>Ordinary histories lean to representing the crusades
+as a series of armed expeditions, led by princes, nobles,
+and kings. But this gives a quite inaccurate conception
+of the movement, during its early stages, at all
+events. In reality it was a true psychological epidemic.
+No custom, however ancient, no duty, no law, was
+allowed to stand before the crusading mania. In every
+village the clergy fed the mania, promising eternal rewards
+to all who took up the burden of the cross. Old
+and young, the strong and the sick, the rich and the
+poor were enrolled. Urban had told them that "under
+their General, Jesus Christ," they would march to certain
+victory. Absolution for all sins was promised to
+all who joined; and, as Gibbon says, "at the voice of<!-- Page 228 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_228" id="Page_228">[228]</a></span>
+their pastor, the robber, the incendiary, the homicide,
+arose by thousands to redeem their souls by repeating
+on the infidels the same deeds which they had exercised
+against their Christian brethren." Until experience
+had taught them better, little precautions were
+taken to provide food or arms. Huge concourses of
+people,<a name="FNanchor_176_176" id="FNanchor_176_176"></a><a href="#Footnote_176_176" class="fnanchor">[176]</a> some led by a goose and a goat, into which it
+was believed the Holy Ghost had entered, set out for
+the Holy Land, so ignorant that at every large town or
+city they enquired, "Is this Zion?" Although a religious
+expedition, small regard was paid to decency or
+humanity. Defenceless cities <i>en route</i> were sacked.
+Women were outraged, men and children killed. The
+Jews were murdered wholesale. Almost universally
+the slaughter of Jews at home were preparatory to
+crusading abroad. Germany, Hungary, and Bulgaria,
+although providing contingents for the crusading
+army, suffered heavily by the passage of these undisciplined,
+lawless crowds. As one writer says:&mdash;</p>
+
+<p>"If they had devoted themselves to the service of
+God, they convinced the inhabitants on their line of
+march that they had ceased to regard the laws of man.
+They considered themselves privileged to gratify every
+wish and every lust as it arose. They recognised
+no rights of property, they felt no gratitude for hospitality,
+and they possessed no sense of honour. They
+violated the wives and daughters of their hosts when
+they were kindly treated, they devastated the lands of
+friends whom they had converted into enemies, they
+resorted to wanton robbery and destruction in revenge
+for calamities which they had brought upon themselves.<!-- Page 229 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_229" id="Page_229">[229]</a></span>
+They believed that they proved their superiority
+to the Mohammedans by torturing the defenceless
+Jews; and this was the only exploit in which the first
+divisions of the crusaders could boast of success....
+To the leaders, who could not write their own names,
+deception and treachery were as familiar as force; to
+their followers rapine and murder were so congenial
+that, in the absence of Saracens, Jews, or townsfolk, it
+seemed but a professional pastime to kill or to rob a
+companion in arms."<a name="FNanchor_177_177" id="FNanchor_177_177"></a><a href="#Footnote_177_177" class="fnanchor">[177]</a></p>
+
+<p>And of the behaviour of the crusaders on the first
+capture of Jerusalem, 1099, Dean Milman writes:&mdash;</p>
+
+<p>"No barbarian, no infidel, no Saracen, ever perpetrated
+such wanton and cold-blooded atrocities of cruelty
+as the wearers of the Cross of Christ (who, it is said, had
+fallen on their knees and burst into a pious hymn at
+the first view of the Holy City) on the capture of that
+city. Murder was mercy, rape tenderness, simple plunder
+the mere assertion of the conqueror's right. Children
+were seized by their legs, some of them plucked
+from their mother's breasts, and dashed against the
+walls, or whirled from the battlements. Others were
+obliged to leap from the walls; some tortured, roasted
+by slow fires. They ripped up prisoners to see if they
+had swallowed gold. Of 70,000 Saracens there were
+not left enough to bury the dead; poor Christians
+were hired to perform the office. Everyone surprised
+in the Temple was slaughtered, till the reek from the
+dead drove away the slayers. The Jews were burned
+alive in their synagogue."<a name="FNanchor_178_178" id="FNanchor_178_178"></a><a href="#Footnote_178_178" class="fnanchor">[178]</a></p>
+
+<p>The most remarkable of all the crusades, and the<!-- Page 230 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_230" id="Page_230">[230]</a></span>
+one that best shows the character of the epidemic, was
+the children's crusade of 1212. It was said that the sins
+of the crusaders had caused their failure, and priests
+went about France and Germany calling upon the
+children to do what the sins of their fathers had prevented
+them accomplishing. The children were told
+that the sea would dry up to give them passage, and
+the infidels be stricken by the Lord on their approach.
+A peasant lad, Stephen of Cloyes, received
+the usual vision, and was ordered to lead the crusade.
+Commencing with the children around Paris, he collected
+some 30,000 followers, and without money or
+food commenced the march. At the same time an
+army of children, 40,000 strong, was gathered together
+at Cologne. The result of the crusade may be told
+in a few words. About 6000 of the French contingent,
+having reached Marseilles, were offered a passage by
+some shipowners. Several of the ships foundered,
+others reached shore, and the boys were sold into
+slavery. The girls were reserved for a more sinister
+fate. Thousands of the children died in attempting a
+march over the Alps. A mere remnant succeeded in
+reaching home, ruined in both mind and body. Well
+might Fuller say: "This crusade was done by the instinct
+of the devil, who, as it were, desired a cordial of
+children's blood, to comfort his weak stomach, long
+cloyed with murdering of men."<a name="FNanchor_179_179" id="FNanchor_179_179"></a><a href="#Footnote_179_179" class="fnanchor">[179]</a></p>
+
+<p>On both the social and the religious side the consequences
+were important. For the first time large bodies
+of men, taught to regard all those who were outside
+Christendom as beneath consideration, came into contact
+with a people possessing an art, an industry, a<!-- Page 231 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_231" id="Page_231">[231]</a></span>
+culture far superior to their own. As Draper says:
+"Even down to the meanest camp follower, everyone
+must have recognised the difference between what
+they had anticipated and what they had found. They
+had seen undaunted courage, chivalrous bearing, intellectual
+culture far higher than their own. They had
+been in lands filled with prodigies of human skill.
+They did not melt down into the populations to whom
+they returned without imparting to them a profound
+impression destined to make itself felt in the course of
+time."<a name="FNanchor_180_180" id="FNanchor_180_180"></a><a href="#Footnote_180_180" class="fnanchor">[180]</a> Hitherto Mohammedan culture had only influenced
+Christendom through the medium of the
+Spanish schools and universities. Now the influence
+became more general. A taste for greater comfort developed.
+Commerce grew; literature improved. We
+approach the period of the Renaissance, and to that
+new birth the crusades, despite their intolerance and
+brutality, offered a contribution of no small value.</p>
+
+<p>On the other hand, and for a time, the power of the
+Church grew greater. The impetus given to superstitious
+hopes and fears made on all hands for the wealth
+of the Church. Much was made over to the Church as
+a free gift. Much was pawned to it. Much also was
+entrusted by those who went to the Holy Land, never
+to return, in which case the Church became the designated
+or undesignated heir. "In every way the all-absorbing
+Church was still gathering in wealth, encircling
+new land within her hallowed pale, the one steady
+merchant who in this vast traffic and sale of personal
+and of landed property never made a losing venture,
+but went on accumulating and still accumulating, and
+for the most part withdrawing the largest portion of<!-- Page 232 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_232" id="Page_232">[232]</a></span>
+the land in every kingdom into a separate estate, which
+claimed exemption from all burthens of the realm,
+until the realm was compelled into measures, violent
+often and iniquitous in their mode, but still inevitable."<a name="FNanchor_181_181" id="FNanchor_181_181"></a><a href="#Footnote_181_181" class="fnanchor">[181]</a></p>
+
+<p>Next, the crusades set their seal upon the justice
+of religious wars, and established an enduring alliance
+between militarism and religion. The military profession
+became surrounded with all the ceremonies and
+paraphernalia of religion, without being in the least
+humanised by the alliance. The knight received his
+arms blessed by the Church, he was sworn to defend
+the Church, and he was as ready to turn his weapons
+against heretics in Europe as against infidels in Syria.
+Military persecutions of heretics assumed the form of
+a mania. There were crusades against the Moors in
+Spain, against the Albigenses, and against other heretics.
+As Bryce remarks: "The religious feeling which
+the crusades evoked&mdash;a feeling which became the origin
+of the great orders of chivalry, and somewhat later
+of the two great orders of mendicant friars&mdash;turned
+wholly against the opponents of ecclesiastical claims,
+and was made to work the will of the Holy See, which
+had blessed and organised the project."<a name="FNanchor_182_182" id="FNanchor_182_182"></a><a href="#Footnote_182_182" class="fnanchor">[182]</a> The expedition
+against King John by Philip of France was undertaken
+at the behest of the Pope, and was called a
+crusade. The attempt of Spain to crush the Netherlands
+was called a crusade. So was the Armada that
+was fitted out against England.</p>
+
+<p>More than all, a stamp of permanency was given to
+popular superstition. For two centuries people had
+seen expedition after expedition fitted out to accomplish<!-- Page 233 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_233" id="Page_233">[233]</a></span>
+an avowedly religious purpose. They had been
+taught that to die in defence of religion, or in the attempt
+to achieve a religious object, was the noblest of
+deaths. They had seen the greatest in Europe setting
+forth at the command of the Church. Signs and wonders
+had abounded to prove the heaven-blessed character
+of the crusades. They had seen the Church
+growing steadily in power, and every possible means
+had been utilised to increase the flame of religious
+fanaticism. Expeditions might fail, but failure did
+not cure fanaticism. It fed it; the crusaders returned,
+chastened in some respects, but still sufficiently full of
+religious zeal to be ready to battle against the unbeliever
+and the heretic at the behest of the Church.
+And it was not the policy of the Church to allow this
+fanaticism to remain unemployed. Even though it
+might ultimately lose, the Church and superstition
+profited enormously by the crusading spirit. It strengthened
+the general sense of the supernatural, even
+while creating tendencies that were destined to limit
+its sway. Above all, it prepared the way for other religious
+epidemics. These were more circumscribed in
+area, and less lengthy in their duration; but their existence
+was made possible and easy by the centuries
+during which, first monasticism, and later the crusading
+mania, had dominated the public mind.</p>
+
+<p>The crusades had hardly been brought to a close
+before continental Europe witnessed an outbreak, in
+epidemic form, of a practice that had been long associated
+with monastic discipline. The use of the whip
+as a form of religious discipline had always played a
+part in conventual and monastic life. On the one
+hand, it formed part of that insensate desire to torture<!-- Page 234 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_234" id="Page_234">[234]</a></span>
+the body which went to make up the ascetic ideal;
+on the other hand, the fondness for whipping bare
+flesh and for being whipped has a distinctly pathologic
+character. The subject is rather too unsavoury to
+dwell upon, but it has long been established that there
+is a close connection between the whipping of certain
+parts of the body and the production of intense sexual
+pleasure.<a name="FNanchor_183_183" id="FNanchor_183_183"></a><a href="#Footnote_183_183" class="fnanchor">[183]</a> And it is also clear that the life led by
+monks and nuns was such as to encourage sexual
+aberrations of various forms. Moreover, when once
+the practice of whipping became a public spectacle,
+and assumed an epidemic form, imitation, combined
+with intense religious faith, would operate very powerfully.</p>
+
+<p>In the fourteenth century Europe was visited by
+the Black Plague. In countries utterly devoid of sanitation,
+where baths were practically unknown and
+personal habits of the filthiest, the plague found a
+fruitful soil. Nearly a quarter of the population died,
+and corpses were so numerous that huge pits were dug
+and hundreds buried together. It was amid the general
+terror and demoralisation caused by this visitation
+that the sect of the Flagellants arose. Calling
+themselves the Brotherhood of the Flagellants, or the
+Brethren of the Cross, wearing dark garments with
+red crosses front and back, they traversed the cities of
+the Continent carrying whips to which small pieces of
+iron were fixed. England appears to have been the
+only country in which they failed to establish themselves.
+Elsewhere their numbers grew with formidable
+rapidity. At Spires two hundred boys, under
+twelve years of age, influenced probably by the example<!-- Page 235 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_235" id="Page_235">[235]</a></span>
+of the children's crusade, formed themselves
+into a brotherhood and marched through some of the
+German cities. In Italy over 20,000 people marched
+from Florence in one of these processions; from Modena,
+over 25,000. Some of them professed to work
+miracles. Everywhere, while the mania lasted, they
+were warmly welcomed, the inhabitants of towns and
+cities ringing the bells and flocking in crowds to hear
+the preaching and witness the whippings.</p>
+
+<p>The proceedings of the Flagellants in all countries
+were very similar. They marched from town to town,
+men and women and children stripped to the waist&mdash;sometimes
+entirely naked&mdash;praying incessantly and
+whipping each other. "Not only during the day, but
+even by night, and in the severest winter, they traversed
+the cities with torches and banners, in thousands
+and tens of thousands, headed by their priests,
+and prostrated themselves before the altars." At other
+times they proceeded to the market-place, arranged
+themselves on the ground in circles, assuming attitudes
+in accordance with their real or supposed crimes.
+After each had been whipped, "one of them, in conclusion,
+stood up to read a letter, which it was pretended
+an angel had brought from heaven to St. Peter's
+Church, at Jerusalem, stating that Christ, who was
+sore displeased at the sins of man, had granted, at the
+intercession of the Holy Virgin and of the angels,
+that all who should wander about for thirty-four days
+and scourge themselves should be partakers of the
+Divine grace." In the end the movement became so
+obnoxious to the Church, and so troublesome to the
+civil authorities, that both combined to secure its suppression.</p>
+
+<p><!-- Page 236 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_236" id="Page_236">[236]</a></span>
+Equally significant in the history of religion is the
+dancing mania, which broke out as the mania for
+flagellation was subsiding. The function of dancing
+in primitive religious ceremonial has been pointed
+out in a previous chapter. It is there a common and
+obvious method of both creating and expressing a
+high state of nervous excitability. In later times religious
+dancing becomes more purely hypnotic in
+character, and suggestion plays a powerful part. During
+the medieval period the conditions were peculiarly
+favourable to the prevalence of psychological
+epidemics. Plagues, more or less severe, were of frequent
+occurrence. Between 1119 and 1340, Italy
+alone had no less than sixteen such visitations. Smallpox
+and leprosy were also common. The public mind
+was morbidly sensitive to signs and portents and saturated
+to an almost incredible degree with superstition.
+The public processions of the Church, its penances,
+and practices were all calculated to fire the imagination,
+and produce a mixed and dangerous condition
+of fear and expectancy. Moreover, dancing mania, on
+a small scale, had made its appearance on several previous
+occasions, and the public mind was thus in a
+way prepared for a more serious outbreak.</p>
+
+<p>The great dancing mania of 1374 occurred immediately
+after the revels connected with the semi-Pagan
+festival of St. John. Bacchanalian dances formed one
+of the accompaniments of the festival of St. John, and
+made, so to speak, a natural starting-point for the epidemic.
+Hecker, who gives a very elaborate account of
+the dancing mania as it appeared in various countries,
+thus describes the behaviour of those afflicted:&mdash;</p>
+
+<p>"They formed circles, hand in hand, and, appearing<!-- Page 237 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_237" id="Page_237">[237]</a></span>
+to have lost control over their senses, continued
+dancing, regardless of all bystanders, for hours together,
+in wild delirium, until at length they fell to the
+ground in a state of exhaustion.... While dancing,
+they neither saw nor heard, being insensible to external
+impressions, but were haunted by visions, their
+fancies conjuring up spirits whose names they shrieked
+out; and some of them afterwards asserted that
+they felt as if they had been immersed in a stream of
+blood, which obliged them to leap so high. Others,
+during the paroxysm, saw the heavens open and the
+Saviour enthroned with the Virgin Mary."<a name="FNanchor_184_184" id="FNanchor_184_184"></a><a href="#Footnote_184_184" class="fnanchor">[184]</a></p>
+
+<p>At Aix-la-Chapelle, Cologne, and Metz, says the
+same writer:&mdash;</p>
+
+<p>"Peasants left their ploughs, mechanics their workshops,
+housewives their domestic duties, to join the
+wild revels. Secret desires were excited, and but too
+often found opportunities for wild enjoyment; and
+numerous beggars, stimulated by vice and misery,
+availed themselves of this new complaint to gain a
+temporary livelihood. Girls and boys quitted their
+parents, and servants their masters, to amuse themselves
+at the dances of those possessed, and greedily
+imbibed the poison of mental infection. Above a hundred
+unmarried women were seen raving about in
+consecrated and unconsecrated places, and the consequences
+were soon perceived."<a name="FNanchor_185_185" id="FNanchor_185_185"></a><a href="#Footnote_185_185" class="fnanchor">[185]</a></p>
+
+<p>Once attacked, the hypnotic character of the complaint
+was shown by its annual recurrence. Again to
+quote Hecker:&mdash;</p>
+
+<p>"Most of those affected were only annually visited<!-- Page 238 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_238" id="Page_238">[238]</a></span>
+by attacks; and the occasion of them was so manifestly
+referable to the prevailing notions of that period that,
+if the unqualified belief in the agency of saints could
+have been abolished, they would not have had any
+return of the complaint. Throughout the whole of
+June, prior to the festival of St. John, patients felt a
+disquietude and restlessness which they were unable
+to overcome. They were dejected, timid, and anxious;
+wandered about in an unsettled state, being tormented
+with twitching pains, which seized them suddenly
+in different parts, and eagerly expected the eve of St.
+John's Day, in the confident hope that by dancing at
+the altars of this saint they would be freed from all
+their sufferings. This hope was not disappointed; and
+they remained, for the rest of the year, exempt from
+any further attack."<a name="FNanchor_186_186" id="FNanchor_186_186"></a><a href="#Footnote_186_186" class="fnanchor">[186]</a></p>
+
+<p>In addition to John the Baptist, the dancing disease
+was also connected with another saint&mdash;St. Vitus.
+He is said to have been martyred about 303, and a
+body, reputed to be his, was transported to France in
+the ninth century. It is said that just before he was
+killed he prayed that all who would commemorate
+the day of his death should be protected from the
+dancing mania. Whereupon a voice from heaven was
+heard to say, "Vitus, thy prayer is accepted." The
+fact that the prayer was offered a thousand years before
+the dancing mania appeared is a circumstance
+that to the eye of faith merely heightened its value.</p>
+
+<p>Within recent times epidemics of dancing have
+been more local, less persistent, and of necessity not
+so public in their display, but nearly always their appearance
+has been in connection with displays of religious<!-- Page 239 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_239" id="Page_239">[239]</a></span>
+fervour. In most cases the dancing has tended
+more to a species of 'jumping,' and&mdash;although this
+may be due to more careful observation&mdash;has been
+accompanied by actions of a clearly epileptoid nature.
+One of the most famous of these outbreaks was that
+of the French Convulsionnaires, which lasted from
+1727 to the Revolution. In 1727, a popular, but half-crazy
+priest, François de Paris, died. During his life
+Paris had fasted and scourged himself, lived in a hut
+that was seldom or never cleansed, showed the same
+lack of cleanliness in his person, and often went about
+half naked. Very shortly after his death, it was said
+that miracles began to take place at his grave in the
+cemetery of St. Médard. People gathered round the
+tomb day after day, and one young girl was seized
+with convulsions. (She is called a girl in the narrative,
+but she was a mature virgin of forty-two years of age.)
+Afterwards other miracles followed in rapid succession.
+Some fell in fits, others swallowed pieces of coal
+or flint, some were cured of diseases. From the description
+of the behaviour of some of these devotees
+there seems to have been a considerable amount of
+sexual feeling mixed up with the display. Sometimes,
+we are told, those seized "bounded from the ground
+like fish out of water; this was so frequently imitated
+at a later period that the women and girls, when they
+expected such violent contortions, not wishing to appear
+indecent, put on gowns made like sacks, closed
+at the feet. If they received any bruises by falling
+down, they were healed with earth taken from the
+grave of the uncanonised saint. They usually, however,
+showed great agility in this respect; and it is
+scarcely necessary to remark that the female sex especially<!-- Page 240 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_240" id="Page_240">[240]</a></span>
+was distinguished by all kinds of leaping, and
+almost inconceivable contortions of body. Some spun
+round on their feet with incredible rapidity, as is related
+of the dervishes. Others ran with their heads against
+walls, or curved their bodies like rope dancers, so that
+their heels touched their shoulders."</p>
+
+<p>Women figured very prominently among the Convulsionnaires,
+particularly when the epidemic passed
+from convulsive dancing to prophecy, and thence to
+various forms of self-torture. Women stretched themselves
+on the floor, while other women, and even men,
+jumped upon their bodies. Others were beaten with
+clubs and bars of iron. Some actually underwent
+crucifixion on repeated occasions. They were stretched
+on wooden crosses, and nails three inches long
+driven through hands and feet. Some of the occurrences
+remind one of what is now seen to take place
+under hypnotic influence. People labouring under
+strong excitement, it is known, become insensible to
+pain.</p>
+
+<p>Outbreaks of jumping and dancing followed the
+introduction of Methodist preachers into country districts
+in the eighteenth century. In Wales, a sect of
+'Jumpers' originated from this cause, and many of
+the American 'Jumpers' and 'Dancers' seem to have
+had their origin from this Welsh outbreak. In all such
+cases the spread of the mania was helped, if not made
+possible, by the preachers. They themselves looked
+upon these exhibitions as manifestations of the power
+of God, and so encouraged their hearers in their behaviour.
+Not every minister has the common sense
+of the Shetland preacher cited by Hecker. An epileptic
+woman had a fit in church, which a number of<!-- Page 241 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_241" id="Page_241">[241]</a></span>
+others hailed as a manifestation of the power of God.
+Sunday after Sunday the same thing occurred with
+other women, the number of the sufferers steadily increasing.
+The thing threatened to assume such proportions,
+and to become so great a nuisance, he announced
+that attendants would be at hand who would
+dip women in the lake who happened to be seized.
+This threat proved a most powerful form of exorcism.
+Not one woman was affected. Similar conduct might
+have been quite as efficacious in preventing many
+religious manifestations that have assumed epidemic
+proportions.</p>
+
+<p>Unfortunately, the influence of preachers and religious
+teachers was most usually cast in the other
+direction. Very often, of course, they were no better
+informed than their congregations; at other times they
+undoubtedly encouraged the delusion for interested
+reasons. The most striking recent illustration of this
+latter behaviour was seen in the Welsh revival led by
+Evan Roberts. Of this man's mental condition there
+could be little doubt. Just as little doubt could there
+be that the behaviour of the congregations was wholly
+due to the power of suggestions upon weak and excitable
+natures. Yet scarcely a preacher in Britain said
+a word in disapproval. Hundreds of them used the
+outbreak to illustrate the power of religion. Many
+prominent preachers travelled down to Wales and returned
+telling of the great manifestations of 'spiritual
+power' they had witnessed. How little removed such
+behaviour is from that of the savage watching with
+awe the actions of one suffering from epilepsy or insanity,
+readers of the foregoing pages will be in a position
+to judge.</p>
+
+<p><!-- Page 242 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_242" id="Page_242">[242]</a></span>
+From the middle of the third century onward, Europe
+had been subject to wave after wave of religious
+fanaticism. All along, religious belief had been verified
+and strengthened by the occurrence of phenomena
+that now admittedly fall within the purview
+of the pathologist. And from one point of view the
+secularisation of life served but to emphasise the dependence
+of religion upon the occurrence of these abnormal
+conditions. For the more surely the phenomena
+of nature and of social life were brought within
+the scope of a scientific generalisation, the more people
+began to look for the life of religion in conditions that
+were removed from the normal. But, above all, this
+long succession of waves of fanaticism served to permeate
+the general mind with supernaturalism. Each
+one cleared the way for a successor. And in the next
+chapter we have to deal with one that, in some respects,
+is the most remarkable of all, viz., that of the belief in
+witchcraft.</p>
+
+<div class="footnotes">
+<h3>Footnotes:<br />
+<span class="skip">[<a href="#Page_243">Skip</a>]</span>
+</h3>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_176_176" id="Footnote_176_176"></a><a href="#FNanchor_176_176"><span class="label">[176]</span></a> It is estimated that 275,000 people formed the van of the
+first crusade.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_177_177" id="Footnote_177_177"></a><a href="#FNanchor_177_177"><span class="label">[177]</span></a> L. O. Pike, <cite>History of Crime in England</cite>, i. pp. 164-9.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_178_178" id="Footnote_178_178"></a><a href="#FNanchor_178_178"><span class="label">[178]</span></a> <cite>History of Latin Christianity</cite>, iv. p. 188.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_179_179" id="Footnote_179_179"></a><a href="#FNanchor_179_179"><span class="label">[179]</span></a> <cite>History of the Holy War</cite>, bk. iii.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_180_180" id="Footnote_180_180"></a><a href="#FNanchor_180_180"><span class="label">[180]</span></a> <cite>Intellectual Development of Europe</cite>, 1872, p. 425.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_181_181" id="Footnote_181_181"></a><a href="#FNanchor_181_181"><span class="label">[181]</span></a> Milman, iv. p. 199.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_182_182" id="Footnote_182_182"></a><a href="#FNanchor_182_182"><span class="label">[182]</span></a> <cite>Holy Roman Empire</cite>, p. 164.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_183_183" id="Footnote_183_183"></a><a href="#FNanchor_183_183"><span class="label">[183]</span></a> See Bloch, <cite>Sexual Life of our Time</cite>, pp. 568-74.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_184_184" id="Footnote_184_184"></a><a href="#FNanchor_184_184"><span class="label">[184]</span></a> <cite>Epidemics of the Middle Ages</cite>, pp. 87-8.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_185_185" id="Footnote_185_185"></a><a href="#FNanchor_185_185"><span class="label">[185]</span></a> Hecker, p. 91.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_186_186" id="Footnote_186_186"></a><a href="#FNanchor_186_186"><span class="label">[186]</span></a> <cite>Epidemics</cite>, p. 105.</p></div>
+</div>
+
+<p><!-- Page 243 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_243" id="Page_243">[243]</a></span></p>
+
+<h2>CHAPTER <span class="cgap">TEN</span><br />
+THE WITCH MANIA</h2>
+
+<p>In all stages of religious history
+the witch and the wizard are familiar figures. It is of
+no importance to our present enquiry whether magic
+precedes religion or not. It is at all events certain that
+they are very closely connected, and that conditions
+which foster the belief in magic likewise serve to
+strengthen religious belief. Witchcraft, as Tylor says,
+is part and parcel of savage life. Death is very frequently
+attributed to the magical action of wizards,
+and the savage lives in perpetual fear lest some of his
+belongings, or some part of his person, should be bewitched
+by malevolent sorcerers. Sir Richard Burton
+says that in East Africa his experience taught him that
+among the negroes, what with slavery and what with
+black magic, no one, especially in old age, is safe from
+being burnt at a day's notice. When from savage life
+we mount to societies enjoying a higher culture, we
+still find the witch and the wizard in evidence. Both
+in Greece and Rome the belief in witchcraft existed.
+There were made direct laws against its practice,
+although neither the Greeks nor the Romans stained
+their civilisation with the judicial murder of thousands
+of victims such as occurred later in Christian
+Europe.</p>
+
+<p>But the belief in witchcraft is continuous. So also
+are the methods practised, and the modes of detection.
+The proofs offered in support of sorcery in the seventeenth
+century are precisely similar to those credited
+by savages in the lowest stage of human culture. The
+power of transformation possessed by the accused, the
+ability to bewitch through the possession of hairs belonging
+to the afflicted person, the making of little
+effigies and driving sharp instruments into them, and<!-- Page 244 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_244" id="Page_244">[244]</a></span>
+so affecting the corresponding parts of people, transportation
+through the air, etc., all belong to the belief
+in and practice of witchcraft wherever found. Had a
+Fijian been transported to a seat on the judicial bench
+by the side of Sir Matthew Hale, when that judge condemned
+two old women to death for witchcraft, he
+would have found himself in a quite congenial atmosphere.
+Allowing for difference in language, he would
+have found the evidence similar to that with which he
+was familiar, and he would have been able to endorse
+the judge's remarks with tales of his own experience.
+On this point, the level of culture attained by savages,
+and that of the inhabitants of the overwhelming majority
+of European countries little more than two hundred
+years ago, were substantially the same. Even to-day
+cases are continually occurring which prove that
+advances in knowledge and civilisation have not left
+this ancient superstition without supporters.</p>
+
+<p>In subscribing to the belief in witchcraft, the Christian
+Church thus fell into line with earlier forms of religious
+belief. The peculiar feature it represents is that
+it came into existence when the belief in witchcraft was
+losing its hold on the more cultured classes. Had it not
+allied itself with this tendency, no such thing as the
+witch mania of the medieval period could have existed.
+In sober truth, it brought about a veritable renaissance
+of the cruder theories of demonism, while
+its intolerance of opposition succeeded in stifling the
+voice of criticism for centuries. The primitive theory
+which holds that man is surrounded by hosts of spiritual
+agencies, mostly of a malevolent nature, was revived
+and fully endorsed by all Christian teachers. In
+the commonest, as well as in the rarest events of life,<!-- Page 245 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_245" id="Page_245">[245]</a></span>
+this supernatural activity was manifest. In both the
+Old and New Testament the belief in demoniacal
+agency was endorsed. Moreover, the fact that Christianity
+was not a creed seeking to live as one of many
+others, but a religion struggling for complete mastery,
+gave further impetus to the belief. An easy explanation
+for the miracles and marvels that occurred in connection
+with non-Christian beliefs was that they were
+the work of demons. The Christian felt himself to be
+fighting not so much human antagonists as so many
+embodiments of satanic power. And after the establishment
+of Christianity it is probable that much that
+went on under cover of witch assemblies, a more detailed
+knowledge than we possess would prove to be
+really the clandestine exercise of prescribed forms of
+faith. The old saying, "The sin of witchcraft is as the
+sin of rebellion," has more in it than meets the eye.
+There is little real difference between the magic that
+appears as piety and the magic that is denounced as
+sorcery, except that one is permitted and the other is
+not. And it is almost a law of religious development
+that the gods of one religion become the demons of its
+successor.</p>
+
+<p>But while witchcraft has existed in all ages, it existed
+in a much milder form than that which we find in
+the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries. First of all,
+there is the fact to which attention has already been
+directed, namely, the concentration of the public mind
+upon various forms of supernaturalism. Every aspect
+of life was more or less under the direct influence of
+the Church, and no teaching was tolerated that conflicted
+with her doctrines. And it was to the interest
+of the Church perpetually to emphasise the reality of<!-- Page 246 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_246" id="Page_246">[246]</a></span>
+either angelic or diabolic activity. Even in the case
+of those who showed a tendency to revolt against
+Church rule there was no exception to this. If anything,
+the belief was more pronounced. Next, the fifteenth
+and sixteenth centuries saw a rising tide of
+heresy against which the Church was compelled to
+battle; and to ascribe this alleged perversion of Christian
+doctrines to the malevolence of Satan offered the
+line of least resistance&mdash;just as the heretics attributed
+the power of the Church itself to the same source.
+Whatever diminution ensued in the general flood of
+superstition, as a consequence of the quarrel between
+Protestant and Catholic, was, so far as the disputants
+were concerned, incidental and even undesired. On
+the one point of demonism there existed complete
+unanimity, and the sceptic fared equally hard with
+both parties. In such an environment the wildest tales
+of sorcery became credible; and nothing illustrates
+this more forcibly than the fact that many of those
+tortured and condemned for sorcery actually believed
+themselves capable of performing the marvels laid to
+their charge. Added to these factors, we have to note
+that social conditions were also extremely favourable.
+Moral ties were as loose as they could reasonably be;
+and the attitude of the Church towards the sexual relation
+had forced both the religious and the non-religious
+mind into wholly unhealthy channels. This last
+aspect of the subject has been little dealt with, but it
+is unquestionably a very real one. A German writer
+says:&mdash;</p>
+
+<p>"Whilst in the fifteenth and the beginning of the
+sixteenth centuries, as those well acquainted with the
+state of morals during this period can all confirm, a<!-- Page 247 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_247" id="Page_247">[247]</a></span>
+most unbounded freedom was dominant in sexual relations,
+the State and the Church were desirous of
+compelling the people to keep better order by the use
+of actual force, and by religious compulsion. So forced
+a transformation in so vital a matter necessarily resulted
+in a reaction of the worst kind, and forced into
+secret channels the impulse which it had attempted to
+suppress. This reaction occurred, moreover, with an
+elemental force. There resulted widespread sexual
+violence and seduction, hesitating at nothing, often
+insanely daring, in which everywhere the devil was
+supposed to help; everyone's head was turned in this
+way; the uncontrolled lust of debauchees found vent
+in secret bacchanalian associations and orgies, wherein
+many, with or without masquerade, played the part
+of Satan; shameful deeds were perpetrated by excited
+women and by procuresses and prostitutes ready for
+any kind of immoral abomination; add to these sexual
+orgies the most widely diffused web of a completely
+developed theory of witchcraft, and the systematic
+strengthening of the widely prevalent belief in the
+devil&mdash;all these things, woven in a labyrinthine connection,
+made it possible for thousands upon thousands
+to be murdered by a disordered justice and to
+be sacrificed to delusion."<a name="FNanchor_187_187" id="FNanchor_187_187"></a><a href="#Footnote_187_187" class="fnanchor">[187]</a></p>
+
+<p>To those who look closely into the subject of medieval
+witchcraft the presence of a strong sexual element
+is undeniable. When we examine contemporary accounts
+of the 'Sabbath,' some of which are so gross as
+to be unprintable, we find a portion of the proceedings<!-- Page 248 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_248" id="Page_248">[248]</a></span>
+to be of a marked erotic character. The figure of Satan
+often enough reminds one of the pagan Priapus, and
+the ceremonies bear a strong resemblance to the ancient
+ones, with the mixture of Christian language and
+symbolism inevitable under such circumstances. Promiscuous
+intercourse between the sexes was said to
+occur at the witches' gatherings; and, indeed, unless
+some sort of sexual extravagance occurred, it is hard
+to account for both the persistency of the gatherings
+and of the reports concerning them. The most probable
+theory is, as I have just said, that these gatherings
+were covers for a continuance of the older sex worship.
+Many customs connected therewith lingered on in the
+Church itself, and it is not a wild assumption that they
+existed in a less adulterated and more extravagant
+form outside.</p>
+
+<p>Universal as the belief in witchcraft has been, it was
+not until the close of the fifteenth century that it assumed
+what may be justly called an epidemic form.
+The famous Bull of Pope Innocent <span class="ucsmcap">VIII.</span> was not unconnected
+in its origin with the growth of heresy. This
+precious document, issued in 1484, declares:&mdash;</p>
+
+<p>"It has come to our ears that very many persons of
+both sexes, deviating from the Catholic Faith, abuse
+themselves with demons, Incubus and Succubus; and
+by incantations, charms, and conjurations, and other
+wicked superstitions, by criminal acts and offences,
+have caused the offspring of women and of the lower
+animals, the fruits of the earth, the grape, and the products
+of various plants, men, women, and other animals
+of different kinds, vineyards, meadows, pasture land,
+corn and other vegetables of the earth, to perish, be
+oppressed, and utterly destroyed; that they torture<!-- Page 249 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_249" id="Page_249">[249]</a></span>
+men and women with cruel pains and torments, internal
+as well as external; that they hinder the proper
+intercourse of the sexes, and the propagation of the
+human species. Moreover, they are in the habit of denying
+the very faith itself. We, therefore, willing to
+provide by opportune remedies, according as it falls to
+our office, by our apostolical authority, by the tenor of
+these presents, do appoint and decree that they be convicted,
+imprisoned, punished, and mulcted according
+to their offences."</p>
+
+<p>It was this Pope who commissioned the inquisitor,
+Sprenger, to root out witches. Sprenger, with two
+others, acting on the authority of the Popes, drew up
+the famous work, <cite>The Witch Hammer</cite>, which provided
+the basis for all subsequent works on the detection
+and punishment of witches.<a name="FNanchor_188_188" id="FNanchor_188_188"></a><a href="#Footnote_188_188" class="fnanchor">[188]</a> The folly and iniquity
+of the book is almost unbelievable, although it is quite
+matched by subsequent productions. It even provides
+for the silence of people under torture. If they confess
+when tortured, the case is complete. But if they do not
+confess, this diabolic production lays it down that this
+is because witches who have given themselves up to
+the devil are insensible to pain. Even the evidence
+of children was admitted. And although in ordinary
+trials the evidence of criminals was barred, it was to be
+freely allowed in trials for sorcery. Everything that
+ingenuity could suggest or brutality execute was provided
+for.</p>
+
+<p>From the issue of <cite>The Witch Hammer</cite> until the
+middle of the seventeenth century, a period of about
+one hundred and fifty years, an epidemic of witchcraft<!-- Page 250 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_250" id="Page_250">[250]</a></span>
+raged. People of all ages and of all classes of society
+became implicated, and for some time, at least, accusation
+meant conviction. An almost unbelievably large
+number were executed. Says Lecky:&mdash;</p>
+
+<p>"In almost every province of Germany, but especially
+in those where clerical influence predominated,
+the persecution raged with a fearful intensity. Seven
+thousand witches are said to have been burned at
+Trèves, six hundred by a single bishop in Bamberg,
+and nine hundred in a single year in the bishopric of
+Würzburg.... At Toulouse, the seat of the Inquisition,
+four hundred persons perished for sorcery at a single
+execution, and fifty at Douay in a single year. Remy,
+a judge of Nancy, boasted that he put to death eight
+hundred witches in sixteen years.... In Italy, a thousand
+persons were executed in a single year in the province
+of Como; and in other parts of the country the
+severity of the inquisitors at last created an absolute
+rebellion.... In Geneva, which was then ruled by a
+bishop, five hundred alleged witches were executed
+in three months; forty-eight were burned at Constance
+or Ravensburg, and eighty in the little town of Valery
+in Saxony. In 1670, seventy persons were condemned
+in Sweden, and a large proportion of them burnt."<a name="FNanchor_189_189" id="FNanchor_189_189"></a><a href="#Footnote_189_189" class="fnanchor">[189]</a></p>
+
+<p>In England, from 1603 to 1680, it is estimated that
+seventy thousand persons were put to death for sorcery.<a name="FNanchor_190_190" id="FNanchor_190_190"></a><a href="#Footnote_190_190" class="fnanchor">[190]</a>
+Grey, the editor of <cite>Hudibras</cite>, says that he had
+himself seen a list of three thousand who were put to
+death during the Long Parliament. The celebrated
+witch-finder, Mathew Hopkins, hung sixty in one year
+in the county of Suffolk. In Scotland, for thirty-nine<!-- Page 251 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_251" id="Page_251">[251]</a></span>
+years, the number killed annually averaged about two
+hundred. This, of course, does not take into account
+the number who were hounded to death by persecution
+of a popular kind, or whose lives were made so
+wearisome that death must have come as a release.
+But the most remarkable, and the most horrible, of
+witchcraft executions occurred in Würzburg in February
+1629. No less than one hundred and sixty-two
+witches were burned in a succession of <i>autos-da-fé</i>.
+Among these, the reports disclose that there were actually
+thirty-four children. The following details give
+the actual ages of some of them:&mdash;</p>
+
+<table frame="box" rules="groups" summary="Children burned as witches at Würzburg in February 1629">
+<colgroup /><colgroup /><colgroup />
+<thead>
+<tr><th class="t1">Burning.</th>  <th class="t1">Number.</th>  <th class="t1">Children.</th></tr>
+</thead>
+<tbody>
+<tr><td class="pr">7th</td>       <td align="center">7</td>       <td>1 Girl, aged 12.</td></tr>
+<tr><td class="pr">13th</td>       <td align="center">4</td>       <td>1 Girl of 10 and another.</td></tr>
+<tr><td class="pr">15th</td>       <td align="center">2</td>       <td>1 Boy of 12.</td></tr>
+<tr><td class="pr">18th</td>       <td align="center">6</td>       <td>2 Boys of 10, girl of 14.</td></tr>
+<tr><td class="pr">19th</td>       <td align="center">6</td>       <td>2 Boys, 10 and 12.</td></tr>
+<tr><td class="pr">20th</td>       <td align="center">6</td>       <td>2 Boys.</td></tr>
+<tr><td class="pr">23rd</td>       <td align="center">9</td>       <td>3 Boys, 9, 10, and 14.</td></tr>
+<tr><td class="pr">24th</td>       <td align="center">7</td>       <td>2 Boys, brought from hospital.</td></tr>
+<tr><td class="pr">26th</td>       <td align="center">8</td>       <td>Little boy and girl.</td></tr>
+<tr><td class="pr">27th</td>       <td align="center">7</td>       <td>2 Boys, 8 and 9.</td></tr>
+<tr><td class="pr">28th</td>       <td align="center">6</td>       <td>Blind girl and infant.<a name="FNanchor_191_191" id="FNanchor_191_191"></a><a href="#Footnote_191_191" class="fnanchor">[191]</a></td></tr>
+</tbody>
+</table>
+
+<p>The vast majority of those executed for sorcery
+were women. At all times witches have been more numerous
+than wizards, owing to their assumed closer
+connection with the world of supernatural beings. It
+was said, "For one sorcerer, ten thousand sorceresses,"
+and Christian writers were ready to explain why.
+Woman had a greater affinity with the devil from the<!-- Page 252 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_252" id="Page_252">[252]</a></span>
+outset. It was through woman that Satan had seduced
+Adam, and it was only to be expected that he would
+employ the same instrument on subsequent occasions.
+<cite>The Witch Hammer</cite> has a special chapter devoted
+to the consideration of why women are more given to
+sorcery than men, and quotes freely from the Fathers
+to prove that this follows from her nature. James <span class="ucsmcap">I.</span> in
+his <cite>Demonologia</cite> follows Sprenger in accounting for
+the number of witches. "The reason is easy. For as
+that sex is frailer than man is, so it is easier to be entrapped
+in the gross snares of the devil, as was over-well
+proved to be true by the serpent's deceiving of Eve
+at the beginning, which makes him the homelier with
+the sex sensine." To be old, or ugly, or unpopular, to
+have any peculiar deformity or mark, was to invite
+persecution, and, in an overwhelming majority of instances,
+conviction followed accusation.</p>
+
+<p>It is a significant comment upon the popular belief
+that Protestantism, as a form of religious belief, was
+the product of an enlightened rational life, that it was
+only with the advance of Protestantism that the belief
+in witchcraft assumed an epidemic form. This may
+be partly due to the greater direct dependence upon
+the Bible, in which satanic influence&mdash;particularly in
+the New Testament&mdash;plays so large a part. In the
+Roman Church, exorcism remained a regular part of
+the functions of the priest; the Church was filled with
+accounts of satanic conflicts, but diabolic intercourse
+seems to have been mainly limited to saintly characters
+and priests. Protestantism which, theoretically,
+made every man his own priest, raised the belief in
+satanic agency to an obsession. And wherever Protestantism
+established itself there was an immediate<!-- Page 253 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_253" id="Page_253">[253]</a></span>
+and marked increase in the number of cases of witchcraft.
+In England, if we omit a doubtful law of the
+tenth century, there existed no regular law against
+witchcraft until 1541. It remained a purely ecclesiastical
+offence. Seventeen years later, the year of Elizabeth's
+accession, Bishop Jewell, preaching before the
+Queen, drew attention to the increase of sorcery. "It
+may please Your Grace," he said, "to understand that
+witches and sorcerers, within these last few years, are
+marvellously increased within Your Grace's realm.
+Your Grace's subjects pine away even to the death,
+their colour fadeth, their flesh rotteth, their senses are
+bereft. I pray God they never practise further than upon
+the subject." And he added, "These eyes have seen
+most evident and manifest marks of their wickedness."
+A measure was passed through Parliament the same
+year, making enchantments and witchcraft felony.
+The first year of James <span class="ucsmcap">I.</span> saw the passing of the
+'Witch Act,' under which subsequent executions took
+place, and which remained in force until nearly the
+middle of the eighteenth century.</p>
+
+<p>With scarce an exception, the leaders of Protestantism
+encouraged the belief in witches and urged their
+extermination as a religious and civil duty. With
+Luther, in spite of the sturdy common sense he manifested
+in some directions, belief in the activity of Satan
+amounted to an obsession. He saw Satan everywhere
+in everything. The devil appeared to him while writing,
+disturbed his rest by the rattling of pans, and prevented
+his pursuing his studies by hammering on his
+skull. When a storm arose, Luther declared, "'Tis the
+devil who has done this; the winds are nothing else
+but good or bad spirits." Suicides, he said, were often<!-- Page 254 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_254" id="Page_254">[254]</a></span>
+those strangled by the devil. Moreover, "The devil
+can so completely assume the human form when he
+wants to deceive us, that we may very well lie with
+what seems to be a woman of real flesh and blood, and
+yet all the while 'tis only the devil in the shape of a
+woman." The devil could also become the father of
+children. Luther says that he knew of one such case,
+and added, "I would have that child thrown into the
+Moldau at the risk of being held its murderer."<a name="FNanchor_192_192" id="FNanchor_192_192"></a><a href="#Footnote_192_192" class="fnanchor">[192]</a></p>
+
+<p>In America, Protestantism manifested the same influence.
+Of course, the settlers took the superstition
+of witchcraft with them, but it underwent no diminution
+in a new land. Increase Mather and his celebrated
+son, Cotton Mather, were the principal agents in stirring
+up the belief to frenzy point, and a commission
+was appointed to rout out witches and suppress their
+practices. There was soon a plentiful supply of victims.
+One woman was charged with "giving a look towards
+the great meeting-house of Salem, and immediately
+a demon entered the house and tore down part of it."
+It seems that a bit of the wooden wainscotting had
+fallen down. In the case of Giles Corey, who refused
+to plead guilty, torture was used. He was pressed to
+death, and when his tongue protruded from his mouth
+the sheriff thrust it back with his walking-stick. Many
+people were executed, and the ministers of Boston
+and Charlestown drew up an address warmly thanking
+the commission for its zeal, and expressing the
+hope that it would never be relaxed.</p>
+
+<p>Certainly the commission did what it could to earn
+the thanks given. A shipmaster making for Maryland
+with emigrants encountered unusually rough<!-- Page 255 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_255" id="Page_255">[255]</a></span>
+weather. An old woman, one Mary Lee, was accused
+of raising the storm, and drowned as a witch. A woman
+walked a long distance over muddy roads without
+soiling her dress. "I scorn to be drabbled," she said,
+and was hanged as a reward. George Burroughs
+could lift a barrel by inserting his finger in the bunghole.
+He was hanged for a wizard. Bridget Bishop
+was charged with appearing before John Louder at
+midnight and grievously oppressing him. Louder's
+evidence against the woman also included the fact
+that he saw a black pig approach his door, and when
+he went to kick it the pig vanished. He was also
+tempted by a black thing with the body of a monkey,
+the feet of a cock, and the face of a man. On going out
+of his back door he saw the said Bridget Bishop going
+towards her house. The evidence was deemed quite
+conclusive. Another witness said that being in bed
+on the Lord's Day, he saw a woman, Susanna Martin,
+come in at the window and jump down on the floor. She
+took hold of the witness's foot, and drawing his body
+into a heap, lay upon him for nearly two hours, so that
+he could neither move nor hear. In most of these cases
+torture was applied, and confessions were obtained.
+These confessions often implicated others, but when
+the witches took to accusing those in high places, and
+even ministers of religion, the need for discrimination
+was realised. Once a critical judgment was aroused,
+the mania began to subside&mdash;Cotton Mather fighting
+manfully for the belief to the end.</p>
+
+<p>The impetus given by Protestantism to witch-hunting
+in Scotland was most marked. Scotch witchcraft,
+says Lecky, was the offspring of Scotch Puritanism,
+and faithfully reflected the character of its parent.<!-- Page 256 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_256" id="Page_256">[256]</a></span>
+The clergy nowhere possessed greater power, and
+nowhere used it more assiduously to fan the flame
+against witchcraft. Buckle says:&mdash;</p>
+
+<p>"Of all the means of intimidation employed by the
+Scotch clergy, none was more efficacious than the doctrines
+they propounded respecting evil spirits and
+future punishments. On these subjects they constantly
+uttered the most appalling threats. The language
+which they used was calculated to madden men with
+fear, and to drive them to the depths of despair....
+It was generally believed that the world was overrun
+by evil spirits, who not only went up and down the
+earth, but also lived in the air, and whose business it
+was to tempt mankind. Their number was infinite,
+and they were to be found in all places, and in all
+seasons. At their head was Satan himself, whose delight
+it was to appear in person, ensnaring or terrifying
+everyone he met. With this object he assumed
+various forms. One day he would visit the earth as a
+black dog; another day, as a raven; on another, he
+would be heard in the distance roaring like a bull. He
+appeared sometimes as a white man in black clothes,
+and sometimes he appeared as a black man in black
+clothes, when it was remarked that his voice was
+ghostly, and that one of his feet was cloven. His
+stratagems were endless. For, in the opinion of divines,
+his cunning increased with his age, and, having been
+studying for more than 5000 years, he had now attained
+to unexampled dexterity."<a name="FNanchor_193_193" id="FNanchor_193_193"></a><a href="#Footnote_193_193" class="fnanchor">[193]</a></p>
+
+<p>Witchcraft was declared by the Scotch Parliament
+in 1563 to be punishable by death. And, naturally,
+the more zealous and active the search for witches,<!-- Page 257 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_257" id="Page_257">[257]</a></span>
+the more numerous they became. In the search the
+clergy and the kirk-sessions led the way. In 1587 the
+General Assembly, having before them a case of witchcraft
+in which the evidence was insufficient, deputed
+James Melville to travel on the coast side and collect
+evidence in favour of the prosecution. It also ordered
+that the presbyteries should proceed in all severity
+against such magistrates as liberated convicted witches.
+As in England so here, a body of men came into
+existence whose business it was to travel the country
+and detect witches. Anonymous accusations were invited,
+the clergy "placing an empty box in church, to
+receive a billet with the sorcerer's name, and the date
+and description of his deeds."<a name="FNanchor_194_194" id="FNanchor_194_194"></a><a href="#Footnote_194_194" class="fnanchor">[194]</a> In 1603 "at the College
+of Auld Abirdene" every minister was ordered to
+make "subtill and privie inquisition," concerning the
+number of witches in his parish, and report the same
+forthwith. Nothing that could whet the appetite for
+the hunt was neglected. William Johnston, baron,
+bailie "of the regalitie and barronie of Broughton,"
+was awarded the goods of all who should be "lawfullie
+convict be assyses of notorious and common witches,
+haunting and resorting devilles and witches."<a name="FNanchor_195_195" id="FNanchor_195_195"></a><a href="#Footnote_195_195" class="fnanchor">[195]</a> The
+lives of thousands of people were rendered unbearable,
+and the complaint of one, Margaret Miall, that
+"she desyres not to live, because nobody will converse
+with her, seeing she is under the reputation of a witch,"
+must have represented the feelings of many.</p>
+
+<p>It was not only for working ill that people were
+accused of witchcraft and executed; ill or well made
+little difference. In Edinburgh in 1623 it was charged<!-- Page 258 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_258" id="Page_258">[258]</a></span>
+against Thomas Grieve that he had relieved many
+sicknesses and grievous diseases by sorcery and witchcraft.
+"He took sickness off a woman in Fife, and put
+it upon a cow, which thereafter ran mad and died."
+He also cured a child of a disease "by straiking back
+the hair of his head, and wrapping him in an anointed
+cloth, and by that means putting him asleep," and thus
+through his devilry and witchcraft, cured the child.
+Other charges of a similar kind were brought against
+Grieve, who was found guilty and hanged on the Castle
+Hill.<a name="FNanchor_196_196" id="FNanchor_196_196"></a><a href="#Footnote_196_196" class="fnanchor">[196]</a> At the same place, a year previous, Margaret
+Wallace was also sentenced to be hanged and burned,
+on the same kind of charge, and for "practising devilry,
+incantation, and witchcraft, especially forbidden by
+the laws of Almighty God, and the municipal laws of
+this realm."</p>
+
+<p>The following bill of costs for burning two women,
+Jane Wischert and Isabel Cocker, in Aberdeen, has a
+certain melancholy interest:&mdash;</p>
+
+<table border="0" summary="Bill for the burning of two witches">
+<tr><td></td><td></td>       <th class="t2">£</th>  <th class="t2"><i>s.</i></th> <th class="t2"><i>d.</i></th></tr>
+
+<tr><td>Item</td> <td>for 20 loads of Peatts to burn them</td>             <td class="plr">2</td><td class="plr">0</td><td class="plr">0</td></tr>
+<tr><td align="center">"</td>  <td>for ane boll of colles</td>             <td class="plr">1</td><td class="plr">4</td><td class="plr">0</td></tr>
+<tr><td align="center">"</td>  <td>for four tar barrells</td>              <td class="plr">0</td><td class="plr">6</td><td class="plr">8</td></tr>
+<tr><td align="center">"</td>  <td>for fir and win barrells</td>           <td class="plr">0</td><td class="plr">16</td><td class="plr">8</td></tr>
+<tr><td align="center">"</td>  <td>for a staick and the dressing of it</td><td class="plr">0</td><td class="plr">16</td><td class="plr">0</td></tr>
+<tr><td align="center">"</td>  <td>for four fathoms of towis</td>          <td class="plr">4</td><td class="plr">0</td><td class="plr">0</td></tr>
+<tr><td align="center">"</td>  <td>to Jon Justice for their execution</td> <td class="plr">0</td><td class="plr">13</td><td class="plr">4</td></tr>
+</table>
+
+<p>In England, no less than in Scotland, America, and
+on the Continent, much learned testimony might be
+cited in defence of witchcraft. The great Sir Thomas
+Browne said in the most famous of his writings: "For
+my part I have ever believed, and do now know, that
+there are witches. They that doubt of these do not only<!-- Page 259 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_259" id="Page_259">[259]</a></span>
+deny them, but spirits; and are obliquely and upon
+consequence, a sort, not of infidels, but atheists."<a name="FNanchor_197_197" id="FNanchor_197_197"></a><a href="#Footnote_197_197" class="fnanchor">[197]</a>
+Henry More, the great Platonist, asserted that they
+who deny the agency of witches are "puffed up with
+nothing but ignorance, vanity, and stupid infidelity."
+Ralph Cudworth, one of the greatest scholars of the
+latter part of the seventeenth century, said that they
+who denied the possibility of satanic intercourse "can
+hardly escape the suspicion of some hankering towards
+atheism."<a name="FNanchor_198_198" id="FNanchor_198_198"></a><a href="#Footnote_198_198" class="fnanchor">[198]</a> Writing nearly a century later, when
+the English law merely prosecuted as rogues and vagabonds
+those who pretended to witchcraft, Blackstone
+thought it necessary to point out that this alteration
+did not deny the possibility of the offence, and
+added:&mdash;</p>
+
+<p>"To deny this would be to contradict the revealed
+word of God in various passages both of the Old and
+New Testaments; and the thing itself is a truth in which
+every nation in the world hath in its turn borne testimony;
+either by examples seemingly well attested, or
+by prohibitory laws which at least suppose the possibility
+of a commerce with evil spirits."<a name="FNanchor_199_199" id="FNanchor_199_199"></a><a href="#Footnote_199_199" class="fnanchor">[199]</a></p>
+
+<p>About the same time Wesley gave the world his
+famous declaration on the subject:&mdash;</p>
+
+<p>"It is true likewise that the English in general, and indeed
+most of the men of learning in Europe, have given
+up all accounts of witches and apparitions as mere old
+wives' fables. I am sorry for it, and I willingly take this
+opportunity of entering my solemn protest against this
+violent compliment which so many who believe the
+Bible pay to those who do not believe it. I owe them<!-- Page 260 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_260" id="Page_260">[260]</a></span>
+no such service. I take knowledge that these are at
+the bottom of the outcry which has been raised and
+with such insolence spread through the land in direct
+opposition, not only to the Bible, but to the suffrage
+of the wisest and best of men in all ages and nations.
+They well know (whether Christians know it or not)
+that the giving up of witchcraft is in effect giving up
+the Bible."<a name="FNanchor_200_200" id="FNanchor_200_200"></a><a href="#Footnote_200_200" class="fnanchor">[200]</a></p>
+
+<p>The evidence upon which the convictions for witchcraft
+rested were almost incredibly stupid, as the punishments
+were almost unbelievably brutal. If the crops
+failed, or the milk turned sour; if the head of a local
+magnate ached, or a minister of the gospel fell sick; if
+a woman was childless, or a child taken with a fit; if a
+cow sickened, or sheep died suddenly, some poor woman
+was pretty certain to be seized, and tortured until
+she confessed her alleged crime. A mole or wart on any
+part of the body was a sure sign of commerce with the
+devil. It was believed that on the body of every witch
+was a spot insensible to pain. To discover this she
+was stripped, pins were run into the body, and when
+excess of pain had produced numbness, some such
+spot was pretty certain to be found. Men regularly
+took up with this work in both England and Scotland,
+and their fame as 'prickers' depended upon the
+number of witches they unearthed. If a suspected
+witch kept a black cat, did not shed tears, or could not
+repeat the Lord's Prayer correctly, these were pretty
+sure signs of guilt. A more serious test was the ordeal
+by water. This was a favourite and general test, and
+was highly recommended by that learned fool, James
+the First. In this the right hand was tied to the left<!-- Page 261 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_261" id="Page_261">[261]</a></span>
+foot, the left hand to the right foot. She was then
+thrown into a pond. If she floated she was a witch,
+and was either hanged or burned. If she sank, she was
+innocent&mdash;and was drowned. Another test was to tie
+a woman's legs across, and she was so seated on them
+that they bore the entire weight of her body. In this
+position she was kept for hours, and on the first sign
+of pain condemned as a witch.</p>
+
+<p>If none of these tests were adopted, torture was used.
+There was the boot&mdash;a frame of iron or wood in which
+the leg was placed and wedges driven in until the limb
+was smashed. A variation of this was to place the leg
+in an iron boot and slowly heat it over a fire. There was
+the thumbscrew, an instrument which smashed the
+thumb to pulp by the turning of a screw. More barbarous
+still was the bridle. This was an iron hoop passing over
+the head, with four prongs, two pointing to the
+tongue and palate, and one to either cheek. The suspected
+witch was then chained to the wall, and watchers
+appointed to prevent her sleeping. The slightest movement
+caused the greatest torture, and in the vast majority
+of cases a confession was secured. In obstinate
+cases pressing between heavy stones was adopted.</p>
+
+<p>One of the most famous of these witch-finders was
+the celebrated Mathew Hopkins before referred to.
+He was appointed to the work by Parliament during
+the time of the Commonwealth, and styled himself
+'witch-finder general.' Hopkins travelled round the
+country, much like an assize judge, putting up at the
+principal inns, and at the expense of the local authorities.
+His charge was twenty shillings a visit, whether
+he found witches or not. If he discovered any, there
+was a further charge of twenty shillings for every witch<!-- Page 262 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_262" id="Page_262">[262]</a></span>
+brought to execution. His favourite method of detection
+was that of floating. But another of Hopkins's tests
+was the following: The suspected witch was placed
+cross-legged on a stool in the centre of the room.
+She was closely watched and kept without food for
+four-and-twenty hours. Doors and windows remained
+open to watch for the entrance of some of the devil's
+imps. These might come in the form of a fly, a wasp, a
+moth, or some other insect. The work of the watchers
+was to kill every insect that came into the room. But
+if one escaped, it was clear proof that this was one
+of the witch's familiars.</p>
+
+<p>Wherever Hopkins travelled numerous convictions
+followed. These were so numerous that suspicion was
+aroused, not of the genuineness of the convictions, but
+of Hopkins's knowledge concerning the locality of the
+witches. In defence he published in 1647 a tract entitled
+"The Discovery of Witches; in answer to several
+Queries lately delivered to the Judge of Assize for the
+County of Norfolk; and now published by Mathew
+Hopkins, Witchfinder, for the benefit of the whole
+Kingdom." The charge against Hopkins was that he
+had been supplied by the devil with a memorandum
+of all the witches, and so was able to find them where
+others failed. Absurd as the charge was, it found credence,
+and although his end is wrapped in obscurity, it
+is said that he was finally seized himself on a charge of
+sorcery, tried by his own favourite water test&mdash;and
+floated. One cannot but hope that tradition is in this
+case trustworthy.</p>
+
+<p>It is difficult, nowadays, to realise the gravity with
+which these trials were undertaken. An outline of a
+very famous witch trial, before an eminent judge in the<!-- Page 263 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_263" id="Page_263">[263]</a></span>
+latter part of the seventeenth century, will best serve
+as an illustration. Before me there lies a little tract of
+some sixty pages, printed "for William Shrewsbury
+at the Bible in Duck Lane," and bearing on the title
+page the following description:&mdash;</p>
+
+<p>"At the Assizes and general gaol delivery, held at
+Bury St. Edmunds for the County of Suffolk, the
+Tenth day of March, in the Sixteenth Year of the Reign
+of our Sovereign, Lord King Charles <span class="ucsmcap">II.</span>, before Mathew
+Hale, Knight, Lord Chief Baron of His Majesties
+Court of Exchequer; Rose Callender and Amy Duny,
+Widows, both of Leystoff, in the county aforesaid, were
+severally indicted for bewitching Elizabeth and Anne
+Durent, Jane Bocking, Susan Chandler, William Durent,
+Elizabeth and Deborah Pacy and the said Callender
+and Duny, being arrainged upon the same indictments,
+pleaded not guilty; and afterwards upon
+a long evidence, were found guilty, and thereupon had
+judgment to dye for the same."</p>
+
+<p>Both the women charged were old. The charges
+were as follows: The mother of the infant, William
+Durent, sworn and examined in open court, deposed
+that about the 10th of March, having special occasion
+to go from home, left her child in the care of Amy
+Duny, giving her special occasion not to give her child
+the breast. Nevertheless, Amy Duny did acquaint
+her mother on her return that she had given the child
+the breast, and on being reprimanded "used many
+high expressions and threatening speeches towards
+her; telling her that she had as good have done otherwise
+than to have found fault with her ... and that very
+night her son fell into strange fits of swounding ... and
+so continued for several weeks." Much troubled, the<!-- Page 264 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_264" id="Page_264">[264]</a></span>
+mother consulted a Dr. Jacob, of Yarmouth, who advised
+her to hang up the child's blanket, at night to
+wrap the child in it, and if she found anything therein
+to throw it in the fire. A very large toad was found,
+which on being put in the fire "made a great and horrible
+noise, and after a space there was a flashing in the
+fire like gunpowder ... and thereupon the toad was no
+more seen or heard." More wonderful still, "the next
+day there came a young woman and told this deponnent
+that her aunt (meaning the said Amy) was in a
+most lamentable condition, having her face all scorched
+with fire." And on the mother enquiring of Amy
+Duny how this had happened, Amy replied, "she might
+thank her for it, for that she was the cause thereof, but
+that she should live to see some of her children dead,
+or else upon crutches." It was further alleged "that
+not long after this deponnent was taken with lameness
+in both her legges, from the knees downwards, and that
+she was fain to go upon crutches ... and so continued
+till the time of the Assizes, that the witch came to be
+tried."</p>
+
+<p>Concerning the bewitching of Elizabeth and Deborah
+Pacy, aged eleven and nine, their father declared
+that Deborah was suddenly taken with lameness. One
+day while the girl was resting outside the house, "Amy
+Duny came to the deponnent's house to buy some herrings;
+but, being denied, she went away discontented....
+But at the very same instant of time, the said child
+was taken with most violent fits, feeling extreme pain
+in her stomach, like the pricking of pins, and shrieking
+out in a dreadful manner like unto a whelp." As the
+result of this and other ailments from which the child
+suffered, the father accused Amy Duny of being a<!-- Page 265 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_265" id="Page_265">[265]</a></span>
+witch, and she was placed in the stocks. Being placed
+in the stocks, further threats were uttered, and both
+children were afflicted with fits. Upon recovery they
+"would cough extremely, and bring up much phlegm
+and crooked pins, and one time a twopenny nail with
+a very broad head; which pins (amounting to forty or
+more), together with the twopenny nail, were produced
+in court, with the affirmation of the said deponnent
+that he was present when the said nail was vomited
+up, and also most of the pins.... In this manner the said
+children continued for the space of two months, during
+which time, in their intervals, this deponnent would
+cause them to read some chapters from the New Testament.
+Whereupon he observed that they would read
+till they came to the name of Lord or Jesus or Christ,
+and then, before they could pronounce either of the
+said words, they would suddenly fall into their fits.
+But when they came to the name of Satan or Devil,
+they would clap their fingers upon the book, crying
+out, 'This bites, but makes me speak right well!'"</p>
+
+<p>Much more evidence of a similar kind was offered
+during the course of the trial, with details of a too
+indelicate character for reproduction concerning the
+search made on the women's bodies for devil's marks.
+During the whole of the trial there were present in
+court a number of distinguished people, amongst them
+Sir Thomas Browne. The latter, being "desired to give
+his opinion, what he did conceive of him; was clearly
+of opinion that the persons were bewitched, and said
+that in Denmark there had lately been a great discovery
+of witches, who used the very same way of afflicting
+persons, by conveying pins into them, and crooked as
+these pins were, with needles and nails. And his<!-- Page 266 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_266" id="Page_266">[266]</a></span>
+opinion was that the devil in such cases did work upon
+the bodies of men and women as on a natural foundation,
+to stir up and excite such humours superabounding
+in their bodies to a great excess, whereby he did in
+an extraordinary manner afflict them with such distempers
+as their bodies were most subject to, as particularly
+appeared in these children."</p>
+
+<p>Sir Mathew Hale, one of the greatest lawyers of his
+day, in directing the jury, told them "he would not
+repeat the evidence unto them, lest by so doing he
+should wrong the evidence one way or the other. Only
+this acquainted them. First, whether or no these
+children were bewitched? Secondly, whether the prisoners
+at the bar were guilty of it? That there were
+such creatures he made no doubt at all. For, first, the
+Scriptures had affirmed as much. Secondly, the wisdom
+of all nations had provided laws against such
+persons, which is an argument of their confidence of
+such a crime. And such had been the judgment of this
+kingdom, as appears by that Act of Parliament which
+had provided punishments proportionable to the quality
+of the offence. And desired them strictly to observe
+their evidence, and desired the great God of
+Heaven to direct their hearts in this weighty thing they
+had in hand; for to condemn the innocent and let the
+guilty go free were both an abomination before the
+Lord." The jury took no more than half an hour to
+consider their verdict, and brought in both women
+guilty upon all counts. The judge expressed his complete
+satisfaction with the verdict, and sentenced them
+to be hanged&mdash;a sentence duly carried out a fortnight
+later.</p>
+
+<p>This is the last notable trial in English history. A<!-- Page 267 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_267" id="Page_267">[267]</a></span>
+witch was burned later than the date of this trial, and
+the last one actually condemned was in 1712. But in
+this case, on the representation of the judge who tried
+the issue, the verdict was formally set aside. By that
+time people were beginning to realise the wisdom of
+Montaigne's counsel, written at the commencement of
+the witch epidemic:&mdash;</p>
+
+<p>"How much more natural and more likely do I find
+it that two men should lie than one in twelve hours
+should pass with the winds from east to west? How
+much more natural that our understanding may, by
+the volubility of our loose, capering mind, be transported
+from its place than one of us should, flesh and
+bones as we are, by a strange spirit be carried upon a
+broom through a tunnel or a chimney."</p>
+
+<p>In England the Witch Act of 1604 was not formally
+repealed until 1736. In Scotland the last witch legally
+executed was in 1722. Captain Ross, Sheriff of Sutherland,
+has the doubtful honour of having condemned
+her to the stake. But fifty years later than this&mdash;1773&mdash;the
+Associated Presbytery passed a resolution deploring
+the fact that witchcraft was falling into disrepute.
+In Germany the last witch was executed in
+1749, by decapitation. The last trial for witchcraft in
+Massachusetts was as late as 1793. These dates refer,
+of course, to legal proceedings. Examples of the existence
+of this belief are continually being recorded in
+newspapers, although they now only rank as solitary
+reminiscences of one of the most degrading and brutalising
+beliefs that European history records.</p>
+
+<p>I have not aimed at giving a history of the witch
+mania&mdash;indeed, a scientific history of witchcraft, one
+that will make plain the nature of the various factors<!-- Page 268 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_268" id="Page_268">[268]</a></span>
+involved, has yet to be written. I have only dwelt
+upon it for the purpose of enforcing the lesson of how
+materially such an epidemic must have contributed
+to give permanence to religious belief in general. It is
+certain that such an epidemic could not occur save in
+a society saturated with supernaturalism. It is equally
+certain that once such an epidemic occurs it must in
+turn strengthen the tendency towards supernaturalistic
+beliefs. Thanks to the long reign of the religious
+idea, and to the overwhelming influence of the Church,
+the people of Europe were prepared for such an outbreak.
+And it should be clear that the prevalence of
+such beliefs, even though they may be afterwards discarded,
+favours the perpetuation of religious belief as
+a whole. The particular form of a belief that is prevalent
+for a time may disappear, but the temper of mind
+induced by its reign remains. And absurd as the
+belief in witches capering through the air on broomsticks,
+changing themselves into black cats, raising
+storms, and causing sickness&mdash;absurd though all this
+may be, it yet serves to keep alive the temper of mind
+on which supernaturalism lives.</p>
+
+<div class="footnotes">
+<h3>Footnotes:<br />
+<span class="skip">[<a href="#Page_269">Skip</a>]</span>
+</h3>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_187_187" id="Footnote_187_187"></a><a href="#FNanchor_187_187"><span class="label">[187]</span></a> Cited by Bloch, <cite>Sexual Life of our Time</cite>, p. 120. Michelet
+has also dealt with this matter in his vivid and picturesque work,
+<cite>The Sorceress</cite>.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_188_188" id="Footnote_188_188"></a><a href="#FNanchor_188_188"><span class="label">[188]</span></a> A lengthy account of this work is given by Ennemoser in his
+<cite>History of Magic</cite>, vol. ii.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_189_189" id="Footnote_189_189"></a><a href="#FNanchor_189_189"><span class="label">[189]</span></a> <cite>Rise and Influence of Rationalism</cite>, i. pp. 3-6.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_190_190" id="Footnote_190_190"></a><a href="#FNanchor_190_190"><span class="label">[190]</span></a> H. Williams, <cite>The Superstitions of Witchcraft</cite>, p. 214.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_191_191" id="Footnote_191_191"></a><a href="#FNanchor_191_191"><span class="label">[191]</span></a> T. Wright, <cite>Narratives of Sorcery and Magic</cite>.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_192_192" id="Footnote_192_192"></a><a href="#FNanchor_192_192"><span class="label">[192]</span></a> Michelet, <cite>Life of Luther</cite>, chap. vi.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_193_193" id="Footnote_193_193"></a><a href="#FNanchor_193_193"><span class="label">[193]</span></a> <cite>History of Civilisation</cite>, chap. xix.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_194_194" id="Footnote_194_194"></a><a href="#FNanchor_194_194"><span class="label">[194]</span></a> Dalyell, <cite>Darker Superstitions of Scotland</cite>, p. 623.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_195_195" id="Footnote_195_195"></a><a href="#FNanchor_195_195"><span class="label">[195]</span></a> Dalyell, p. 628.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_196_196" id="Footnote_196_196"></a><a href="#FNanchor_196_196"><span class="label">[196]</span></a> Pitcairn's <cite>Criminal Trials</cite>, vol. iii.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_197_197" id="Footnote_197_197"></a><a href="#FNanchor_197_197"><span class="label">[197]</span></a> <cite>Religio Medici</cite>, pt. i. sec. 30.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_198_198" id="Footnote_198_198"></a><a href="#FNanchor_198_198"><span class="label">[198]</span></a> <cite>True Intellectual System</cite>, ii. p. 650.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_199_199" id="Footnote_199_199"></a><a href="#FNanchor_199_199"><span class="label">[199]</span></a> <cite>Commentaries</cite>, Stephen's Edition, i. p. 238.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_200_200" id="Footnote_200_200"></a><a href="#FNanchor_200_200"><span class="label">[200]</span></a> <cite>Journal</cite>, 1768.</p></div>
+</div>
+
+<p><!-- Page 269 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_269" id="Page_269">[269]</a></span></p>
+
+<h2>CHAPTER <span class="cgap">ELEVEN</span><br />
+SUMMARY &amp; CONCLUSION</h2>
+
+<p>The study of religion falls naturally
+and easily into two parts. The first is a question
+of origin. Under what conditions did the hypothesis
+that supernatural beings control the life of man come
+into existence? We know that in civilised times religious
+beliefs are in the nature of an inheritance. A
+member of any civilised society finds them here when
+he is born, he grows up with them, generally accepting
+them without question, or effecting certain modifications
+in the form in which he continues to hold
+them. If we treat religion as a hypothesis, advanced as
+other hypotheses are advanced, to account for a certain
+class of facts, then we can safely say that religion is one
+of the earliest in the history of human thought. And
+its antiquity and universality preclude us from seeking
+an explanation of its origin in the mental life of
+civilised humanity. Whether the religious hypothesis
+can or cannot be justified by an appeal to civilised intelligence,
+it is plain it did not begin there. Its beginnings
+are earlier than any existing civilisation; and in
+its most general form may be said to be as old as mankind
+itself. Consequently, if any satisfactory explanation
+of the origin of the religious idea is to be found,
+it must be sought amid the very earliest conditions
+of human society.</p>
+
+<p>Now whatever the differences of opinion concerning
+matters of detail, there is substantial agreement
+amongst European anthropologists upon one important
+point. They all agree that the conception of supernatural,
+or 'spiritual,' beings owes its beginning to the
+ignorance of primitive man concerning both his own
+nature and the nature of the world around him. The<!-- Page 270 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_270" id="Page_270">[270]</a></span>
+beginnings of human experience suggest questions
+that can only be satisfactorily answered by the accumulated
+experience of many generations. These questions
+do not materially differ from those that face men
+to-day. The why and wherefore of things are always
+with us; life propounds the same problem to all; it is
+the replies alone that vary, and the nature of these replies
+is determined by the knowledge at our disposal.
+The difference is not in nature but in man. The answers
+given by primitive man to these eternal questions are
+a complete inversion of those of his better informed
+descendants. The conception of natural force, of mechanical
+necessity, is as yet unborn, and the primitive
+thinker everywhere assumes the operation of personal
+beings as responsible for all that occurs. This is
+not so much the product of careful and elaborate philosophising,
+it is closer akin to the <i>naive</i> thinking of a
+child concerning a thunderstorm. Primitive thought
+accepts the universal operation of living and intelligent
+forces as an unquestionable fact. Modern thought
+tends more and more surely in the direction of regarding
+the universe as a complex of self-adjusting, non-conscious
+forces. Primitive thought assumes a supernatural
+agency as the cause of disease, and seeks,
+logically, to placate it by prayer or coerce it by magic.
+Modern thought turns to test-tube and microscope,
+searches for the malignant germ, and manufactures
+an antitoxin. The history of human thought is, as
+Huxley said, a record of the substitution of mechanical
+for vitalistic processes. The beginning of
+religion is found in connection with the latter. A
+genuine science commences with the emergence of
+the former.</p>
+
+<p><!-- Page 271 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_271" id="Page_271">[271]</a></span>
+With this aspect of the matter I have not, however,
+been specially concerned. It has been left on one side
+in order to concentrate attention upon another and
+a more neglected aspect of the subject&mdash;that of the
+conditions that have served to perpetuate the religious
+idea. Grant, what cannot be well denied in the face of
+modern investigation, that ideas of the supernatural
+began in primitive delusion. How comes it that this
+idea has not by now disappeared from civilised society?
+What are the causes that have given it such a lengthy
+lease of life? Experience has shown that all really
+verifiable knowledge counts as an asset of naturalism,
+and is so far opposed to supernaturalism. Moreover,
+the history of science has been such that one feels justified
+in the assumption that, given time and industry,
+there are no phenomena that are not susceptible to a
+naturalistic explanation. Why, then, has not supernaturalism
+died out? Even the religious idea cannot
+persist without evidence of some kind being offered in
+its behalf. This evidence may be to a better instructed
+mind inconclusive or irrelevant, but evidence of some
+sort there must have been all along, and must still be.
+Granted that the religious idea began with primitive
+mankind, granted also that it was based on a mistaken
+interpretation of natural phenomena, these
+reasons are quite insufficient to explain why thousands
+of generations later that idea is still with us. "Our
+fathers have told us" offers to the average mind a
+strong appeal, but surely the children will require some
+further proof than this. What kind of evidence is it
+that throughout the ages religious people have accepted
+as conclusive? A study of primitive psychology
+shows clearly enough how the religious idea vitalised<!-- Page 272 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_272" id="Page_272">[272]</a></span>
+the facts. What we next have to discern is the class
+of facts that have kept the religious idea alive.</p>
+
+<p>The foregoing pages constitute an attempt to answer
+this question. The need for some such investigation
+was clearly shown by the publication of the late
+Professor William James's <cite>Varieties of Religious Experience</cite>
+and its reception by the religious press of the
+country as an epoch-marking work. As a mere collection
+of documents, the work is interesting enough. But
+its critical value is extremely small. How religious
+visionaries have felt, or what has been their experiences,
+can only furnish the mere data of an enquiry,
+and <em>their explanation of the cause of their experiences is
+a part of the data</em>. This, apparently, Professor James
+overlooked; and it will be noted by critical readers of
+his book that it proceeds on the assumption that the
+statements of religious visionaries are to be taken, not
+only as true concerning their subjective experiences
+at a given time, but also as approximately true as to
+the causes of their mental states. This, of course, by
+no means follows. A scientific enquiry cannot separate
+mental conditions from the subject's interpretation of
+their causation. Whether this interpretation is genuine
+or not must be decided finally by an appeal to what
+is known of the laws of mental life, under both normal
+and abnormal conditions. If these are adequate to explain
+the "Varieties of Religious Experience," there
+is no need whatever to assume the operation of a supernatural
+agency. Nor does calling this agency 'transcendent'
+or 'supermundane' make any substantial
+difference. For, in this connection, these are only
+names that serve to disguise a visitant of a highly undesirable
+character.</p>
+
+<p><!-- Page 273 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_273" id="Page_273">[273]</a></span>
+The evidence on behalf of a naturalistic explanation
+of religious phenomena has been purposely stated
+in a suggestive rather than in an exhaustive manner.
+The main lines of evidence are threefold. First, there
+is the indisputable fact that in the lower stages of culture
+all mental and bodily diseases are universally
+attributed to spiritual agency. This explanation holds
+the field; it is the only one possible at the time, and
+it is not replaced until a comparatively late stage of
+human history. But of special importance is the fact
+that a belief does not die out suddenly. It is only
+destroyed very slowly, and even after the facts upon
+which the belief was originally based have been otherwise
+interpreted, the attitude of mind engendered by
+the long reign of a belief remains. It has by that time
+become part of the intellectual environment. Theories
+of a quasi-philosophic or quasi-scientific character are
+elaborated, and give to the original belief something
+of a rational air. Even to-day the extent to which
+superstitious practices still gather round the subject
+of disease is known only to the curious in such matters.
+Not that the original reason is given for the practice.
+In nearly every case a different one is invented. To
+take only a single example. We still find saffron tea
+largely used in cases of measles. All medical men are
+aware that it possesses not the slightest curative value.
+Students of folklore are aware that it has its origin in
+the theory of sympathetic cures. Its redeeming feature
+is that it is harmless; so we find it still in common
+use, and the recovery of a child from measles is often
+enough attributed to the potency of the concoction.
+So with the relation of disease to the persistence of the
+belief in the supernatural. The conclusion that<!-- Page 274 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_274" id="Page_274">[274]</a></span>
+disease&mdash;whether bodily or mental&mdash;is due to the agency
+of spirits is one that follows from the existence of the
+religious idea; but in turn the observed facts react and
+strengthen the religious belief. Every case of disease
+becomes to the primitive mind an unanswerable proof
+in favour of the original hypothesis. The disease is
+there, and the only explanation possible is in terms of
+the animistic idea. And all the time the religious idea
+is becoming more deeply embedded in the social consciousness,
+more firmly established as a social fact.</p>
+
+<p>The next line of evidence is that furnished by what
+I have called the culture of the supernatural. By some
+means or other&mdash;probably by accident in the first instance&mdash;it
+is discovered that certain herbs and vegetable
+drugs have a peculiar effect on one's mental state.
+Those who use them see or hear things other people
+do not normally hear or see. Abstention from food
+and other bodily privations produce similar results.
+What is the inevitable conclusion? The only one possible
+under the existing conditions is that communication
+has been set up with an invisible world from which
+one is shut off under normal conditions. From this
+to the next step is obvious and easy. If a drug, or a
+fast, brings one into communication with the supernatural
+world, one has only to repeat the conditions
+in order to repeat the experience. And repeated they
+are in all religions, with, at most, those modifications
+induced by changed times and circumstances. This
+is why fasting and other forms of 'fleshly mortification'
+play so large a part in the history of religion.
+The savage medicine man, the Hindu fakir, the medieval
+saint, all create their ecstasies by the simple plan
+of disturbing the normal operations of the nervous<!-- Page 275 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_275" id="Page_275">[275]</a></span>
+system. It is not, of course, implied that this is done
+with a full consciousness of all that is involved in the
+practice. The derangement is to them the condition
+of the supernatural manifestation, not the physiological
+and psychological cause of the experience.</p>
+
+<p>The third main line of evidence is connected with
+the phenomena of sexuality. It has been shown that
+in early stages of culture man everywhere connects the
+phenomena of the sexual life with the activity of supernatural
+forces. Following the lines of investigation
+indicated by Mr. Sidney Hartland, we saw reason to
+believe that the primitive conception of procreation is
+not that afterwards prevalent, but that of assuming the
+birth of a child to be due to the direct action of spiritual
+beings on the mother. Proofs of this are found in
+existing beliefs among primitive peoples, in the magical
+practices so widely current to obtain children, and
+in numerous other customs connected with childbirth.
+The phenomenon of puberty in the male and of menstruation
+in the female gives a terrifying reality to this
+belief. But still more important is the fact that a great
+deal of assumed religious feeling is found on analysis
+to be little more than masked sexuality. The connection
+between eroticism and piety has been noted over
+and over again by medical observers in the cases that
+have been brought professionally under their notice.
+And it is hardly less marked in a large number of instances
+that are usually classed as normal. Thus great
+religious teachers have often emphasised the value of
+a celibate life as a means of furthering religious devotion,
+and nearly all have treated it with marked
+respect. The reason given for this is that marriage
+involves a greater absorption in material or worldly<!-- Page 276 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_276" id="Page_276">[276]</a></span>
+cares, while celibacy leaves one free to full devotion to
+the spiritual. But the bottom reason for it is that
+sexual and domestic feelings, lacking their proper outlet
+in marriage and family life, run with greater force
+in the outlet provided by religion. So it happens that
+we find unmarried men and women, devoted to the
+religious life, expressing themselves towards Jesus or
+the Virgin in language which, separated from its religious
+associations, leaves no doubt as to its origin in
+unsatisfied sexual feeling. In these cases we are dealing
+with a perversion of one of the deepest of human
+instincts. And it is one of the commonest of observations
+in psychology that when a feeling is denied outlet
+through its proper channel it finds vent in some
+other direction, and is to that extent masked or disguised.</p>
+
+<p>Allied to the fact of perversion is that of misinterpretation.
+In the chapter on <i>Conversion</i> we have seen
+how largely this occurs at the period of adolescence.
+The significant features of adolescence are a development
+of the sexual nature and an awakening of a consciousness
+of race kinship. Connected with these, and
+flowing from them, is a more or less rapid development
+of what are called the altruistic feelings, the individual
+becoming less self-centred and more concerned for the
+well-being of others. From an evolutionary point it
+is easy to read the fundamental meaning of these
+transformations, although in the course of social development
+they have become overlaid with a number
+of secondary characteristics. Still, in a completely
+rationalised social life, with adequate knowledge concerning
+the nature of adolescence, every care would
+be taken to direct these developing energies into<!-- Page 277 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_277" id="Page_277">[277]</a></span>
+purely social channels. Adolescence is the great formative
+period; it is then that imitation and suggestion
+play their most important parts, and it is then that
+the foundations may be laid of a really good and useful
+citizenship. If we fail then, we fail completely.</p>
+
+<p>In a society where supernaturalism still exerts considerable
+power another, and a more disastrous, policy
+is pursued. Every endeavour is made by religious
+organisations to exploit adolescence in their own interest.
+Thousands of priests, often, no doubt, with the
+best of motives, are engaged in impressing upon the
+youthful mind an entirely erroneous notion of the
+character and the direction of the feelings experienced.
+The sense of restlessness, consequent upon a period
+of great physiological disturbance, is utilised to create
+an unhealthy 'conviction of sin,' or the need of 'getting
+right with God.' Social duties and obligations are
+made incidental rather than fundamental. Activities
+that should be consciously directed to a social end
+are diverted into religious channels, and one consequence
+of this, as we have seen, is a large crop of nervous
+disorders that might be avoided were a healthier
+outlet provided. In this the modern priest is acting
+precisely as his savage forerunner acted. As the
+savage medicine man associates sexual phenomena
+with the activity of the tribal ghosts, so the modern
+priest often associates the psychological conditions
+that accompany adolescence with a supernatural influence.
+The distinction between the two is a purely
+verbal one. In neither case is there a recognition of
+the nature of the processes actually at work; in both
+cases the phenomena are used to emphasise the reality
+and activity of the supernatural. In both cases the<!-- Page 278 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_278" id="Page_278">[278]</a></span>
+social feelings are disguised by the religious interpretation
+given, with the result that instead of adolescence
+being, as it should be, the period of a conscious entry
+into the larger social life, it only too often marks the
+beginning of a lifelong servitude to retrogressive
+forces.</p>
+
+<p>These are the main lines along which, I conceive,
+the study of the pathologic elements that enter into
+the history of religion must be studied. And so long
+as we restrict our study to the lower culture stages the
+evidence is clear and unmistakable. It is when we
+reach the higher stages of civilisation that the problem
+becomes more difficult. For although it is possible to
+detect the same factors at work they are expressed in
+a different way, and affiliated to current philosophic
+and even scientific ideas. Thus, it would be readily
+admitted by most people nowadays that visions seen
+by a fasting man, or by a taker of drugs, or by one
+suffering from some nervous disorder, were wholly
+inadmissible as evidence. So far we have advanced
+beyond the point of view of primitive races. But the
+testimony of one who by constantly dwelling upon a
+single idea, and by excluding rational and corrective
+influences, has brought about a quite abnormal state
+of mind, is still counted of value by theologians. Much
+of the current cant concerning 'mysticism' may be
+cited in illustration of this. Exactly what mysticism
+is no one appears to know. Definitions are numerous
+and varied. So far as most mystics are concerned the
+definition of Harnack&mdash;"Mysticism is rationalism applied
+to a sphere beyond reason"&mdash;appears to hit the
+mark, although how reason can be used in a sphere to
+which it does not apply is precisely one of those unintelligible<!-- Page 279 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_279" id="Page_279">[279]</a></span>
+statements that so delights those with
+yearnings after the ineffable. The normal mind will
+probably find more satisfaction in John Stuart Mill's
+description of mysticism as being "neither more nor
+less than ascribing objective existence to the subjective
+creations of the mind, and believing that by watching
+and contemplating these ideas of its own making,
+it can read what takes place in the world without."</p>
+
+<p>But the general claim of 'mystics,' and, indeed, of
+supernaturalists generally, is that they are, in virtue
+of the exercise of certain qualities or 'faculties,' either
+inoperative at certain times, or absent in the case of
+normal folk, able to perceive a truth not perceptible
+to people less fortunately endowed. And these
+claims, I have no hesitation in saying, are wholly false.
+There are all degrees of development of human faculty,
+but it is substantially the same with all. There is no
+royal road to truth in this direction more than in others.
+Truth is reached in the same way by all, and although
+an induction may in the case of certain well-dowered
+individuals be so rapid as to rank as an 'intuition,' a
+careful analysis destroys the illusion.</p>
+
+<p>When we clear away from the claims of the 'mystic'
+all the superfluities of language that are there, and so
+reduce these claims to their lowest and plainest terms,
+we find ourselves face to face with the claim of the
+supernaturalist as it has existed from savage times onward.
+The method remains true to itself. In the first
+instance, we have the claim to illumination based upon
+direct interference with the normal workings of the
+mind. In the next stage, we find this interference still
+marked, but less direct. Finally, we have the unhealthy
+operation of fixed ideas, and the exclusion of all conditions<!-- Page 280 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_280" id="Page_280">[280]</a></span>
+that would prevent the operation of hallucination
+or illusion. But the method remains the same
+throughout, and it is equally sterile throughout. In
+all history these mystical states of illumination have
+discovered no verifiable truth; they have never at
+any time advanced human knowledge in the smallest
+degree. And the reason for this is plain: The brain of
+the mystic, like that of the non-mystic, can only work
+on the basis of its acquired knowledge or experience.
+It can create nothing new; it can declare no truth that
+is not in the nature of an induction from existing knowledge.
+All that the religious mystic can accomplish
+after brooding upon inherited religious beliefs is to
+create new combinations, or effect certain modifications
+or developments of them, and by continued
+contemplation endow his subjective creations with an
+objective existence. That is why the Christian mystic
+remains a Christian. The Mohammedan mystic remains
+a Mohammedan. The 'supersensible reality'
+is always of the kind consonant with their inherited
+beliefs and their social environment. That is also why
+mysticism has its fashions like all other forms of religious
+extravagance. And as he is "applying rationalism
+to a sphere above reason," the mystic may
+give full vent to his imaginative powers. That which is
+above reason may defy reasonable disproof. To some,
+however, it has the disadvantage of not admitting of
+reasonable verification. There is nothing here but
+the primitive delusion operating under changed conditions.</p>
+
+<p>In addition, to the lines of investigation followed in
+the foregoing pages, a great deal might be said as to
+how far the religious idea has been perpetuated by an<!-- Page 281 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_281" id="Page_281">[281]</a></span>
+exploitation of purely social qualities. It must be obvious
+to even the cursory student that a great deal of
+what is now being put forward as religious is really no
+more than a sociology with a religious label. The feeling
+for truth, beauty, justice, the desire for social intercourse,
+are all treated as expressions of religious conviction.
+All sorts of social reforms are urged in the
+name of religion, and the degree of success achieved
+dwelt upon as fruits of the religious spirit. But in no
+legitimate sense of the word can these things be called
+religious. They may or may not be consonant with
+the existing religion, but in themselves they are very
+clearly the outcome of man's social nature, and would
+exist even though religion disappeared entirely. The
+appeals made to man's moral sense, to his sense of justice,
+to his sympathies, are thus fundamentally appeals
+made to his social nature, and so far as the religious
+appeal is placed upon this basis it becomes an exploitation
+of the social consciousness. Unfortunately, the
+long association of religious forms with social life and
+institutions, due ultimately to the immense power of
+supernaturalism in early society, this, combined with
+early education, makes it a matter of no small difficulty
+for the average man or woman to separate the
+two things.</p>
+
+<p>Finally, let us imagine for a moment that the course
+of human history had been different to what it actually
+has been. Suppose that by some miracle humanity
+had started its career in full possession of that knowledge
+of nature which has been so laboriously accumulated.
+In that case, would the belief in the supernatural
+have ever existed? Would the thousand and one 'spiritual
+beings' of primitive society have ever had being?<!-- Page 282 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_282" id="Page_282">[282]</a></span>
+And if not called into being then, from what other
+source could they have been derived? Is there anything
+in later scientific knowledge that would ever have
+suggested the supernatural? We know there is not; we
+know that the whole of modern science is an emphatic
+protest against its existence. Unfortunately the scientist
+does not come first, but last; and by the time he
+appears, the supernatural has made good its foothold;
+it has permeated human institutions, and has bitten
+so deeply into habits of thought as to make its eradication
+the most difficult of all tasks.</p>
+
+<p>Let us carry our imagining yet a step further. Imagine
+that even after primitive ignorance had created
+the supernatural, it had come to an abrupt stop when
+man had emerged from the purely savage stage. Suppose
+a generation born, not without knowledge of
+what their progenitors believed, but with a sufficient
+knowledge of their own to correct their ancestor's
+errors. Suppose that generation in a position to recognise
+disease, insanity, delusion, hysteria, hallucination
+for what they are. Assume them to be under
+no delusion concerning the nature of man, physically
+or mentally. Would the religious idea have persisted
+in the way that it has done? Granted religion would still
+have continued to exist as an ultimate philosophy of
+nature that appealed to some minds, as other systems
+of philosophy number their disciples, would it have
+been the dominating power it has been? What under
+such conditions would have become of that evidence
+for the supernatural, accepted generation after generation,
+but which is now rejected by all educated minds?
+Where would have been that long array of seers, prophets,
+illuminants, whose credentials have been found<!-- Page 283 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_283" id="Page_283">[283]</a></span>
+in states of mind that are now seen to have been pathological
+in character? For remember it was not always&mdash;very
+seldom, in fact&mdash;the justice, or the reasonableness
+of the teachings set forth, that won support,
+but generally the 'signs and wonders' that were
+pointed to as evidence of the divine commission of
+the teachers. Assume, then, that these 'signs and
+wonders' had been wanting, and that for thousands
+of years people had looked at natural phenomena
+from the point of view of the educated mind of to-day,
+what would have been the present position of the religious
+idea? Would it not have been like a tree divorced
+from the soil?</p>
+
+<p>Well, we know that the course of history has been
+far different from what I have assumed to be the case.
+We know that the savage dies out very slowly, and that
+even in civilised States to-day he is honoured in the existence
+of a whole army of representatives. Each generation
+moves along the road marked out by its predecessors,
+and broadens or lengthens it to but a small
+extent. For many, many generations people went on
+adopting the conclusions of the savage concerning
+man and the universe, and finding proofs of the soundness
+of those conclusions in exactly the same kind of
+experiences. The beliefs thus engendered were wild
+and absurd&mdash;admittedly so, and many of such a nature
+that educated people are now ashamed of them.
+But such as they were, they served the purpose of perpetuating
+the belief in the supernatural, and so served
+to strengthen the general religious idea. Of that there
+can be no reasonable doubt. For the influence of beliefs
+that have been long held does not end with the
+intellectual perception of their falsity. A belief such<!-- Page 284 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_284" id="Page_284">[284]</a></span>
+as witchcraft dies out, but by that time it has done its
+work in familiarising the general mind with the reality
+of the supernatural, and so prepares the ground for
+other harvests. These long centuries of superstitious
+beliefs have left behind in society a psychological residuum
+that is at all times an obstacle and is sometimes
+fatal to scientific thinking. We are like men who have
+obtained freedom after almost a lifetime of slavery.
+We may be no longer in any real danger of the lash,
+but fear of the whip has become part of our nature,
+and we shrink without cause. So with all those now
+admitted delusions that have been described in the
+foregoing pages, and which for generations were
+asserted without question. They bit deeply in to social
+institutions; the temper of mind they induced became
+part of our social heritage. They perpetuated the
+long reign of supernaturalism, and still interpose a
+serious obstacle to sane and helpful conceptions of
+man and the universe.</p>
+
+<p><!-- Page 285 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_285" id="Page_285">[285]</a></span></p>
+<h2>INDEX</h2>
+
+<ul>
+<li>Adolescence and Religion, <a href="#Page_177">177-8</a>, <a href="#Page_181">181</a>, <a href="#Page_276">276-7</a>.</li>
+
+<li>Adolescence and Primitive Customs, <a href="#Page_178">178</a>.</li>
+
+<li>Adolescence and Nervous Disorders, <a href="#Page_196">196-7</a>.</li>
+
+<li>Adolescence, Social Significance of, <a href="#Page_183">183-5</a>.</li>
+
+<li>Agapæ, <a href="#Page_152">152</a>.</li>
+
+<li>Asceticism, <a href="#Page_121">121</a>, <a href="#Page_125">125</a>, <a href="#Page_146">146</a>, <a href="#Page_208">208-13</a>.</li>
+
+<li>Asceticism and Purity, <a href="#Page_213">213</a>.</li>
+
+<li>Asceticism, Influence on Religion, <a href="#Page_224">224-5</a>.</li>
+
+<li>Augustine, <a href="#Page_157">157</a>.</li>
+
+<li>Authority, Conflict with Science, <a href="#Page_viii">viii</a>.</li>
+</ul>
+
+<ul>
+<li>Baring-Gould, S., <a href="#Page_147">147</a>, <a href="#Page_153">153</a>, <a href="#Page_209">209</a>.</li>
+
+<li>Baring-Gould, S., on Mysticism and Sexualism, <a href="#Page_125">125</a>, <a href="#Page_151">151</a>.</li>
+
+<li>Brinton, D. G., on Origin of Religion, <a href="#Page_14">14</a>.</li>
+
+<li>Bryce, J., <a href="#Page_232">232</a>.</li>
+
+<li>Buckle, T. H., <a href="#Page_256">256</a>.</li>
+</ul>
+
+<ul>
+<li>Catherine of Sienna, <a href="#Page_85">85</a>, <a href="#Page_129">129</a>.</li>
+
+<li>Celibacy, <a href="#Page_214">214-5</a>.</li>
+
+<li>Celibacy, Results on Morals, <a href="#Page_220">220-3</a>.</li>
+
+<li>Celibacy, Social Consequences of, <a href="#Page_216">216-9</a>, <a href="#Page_220">220-3</a>.</li>
+
+<li>Clouston, Sir T. S., on Revivals, <a href="#Page_195">195</a>.</li>
+
+<li>Clouston, Sir T. S., on the Connection between Sexualism and Religion, <a href="#Page_140">140</a>.</li>
+
+<li>Conversion, Pathological Nature of, <a href="#Page_194">194</a>.</li>
+
+<li>Conversion and Adolescence, <a href="#Page_32">32</a>, <a href="#Page_176">176-7</a>, <a href="#Page_276">276</a>.</li>
+
+<li>Conversion, Theological Notions of, <a href="#Page_169">169-71</a>.</li>
+
+<li>Conversion, Ages of Converts, <a href="#Page_174">174-5</a>, <a href="#Page_194">194-5</a>.</li>
+
+<li>Conversion, Statistics of, <a href="#Page_173">173-5</a>.</li>
+
+<li>Conversion and Imitation, <a href="#Page_188">188</a>.</li>
+
+<li>Conversion, Social Aspects of, <a href="#Page_200">200</a>.</li>
+
+<li>Convulsionnaires (The), <a href="#Page_239">239</a>.</li>
+
+<li>Crowd Psychology, <a href="#Page_206">206</a>.</li>
+
+<li>Crusades, Character of, <a href="#Page_227">227-9</a>.</li>
+
+<li>Crusades, Children's, <a href="#Page_230">230</a>.</li>
+
+<li>Crusades, Consequences of, <a href="#Page_232">232-3</a>.</li>
+
+<li>Cudworth, R., <a href="#Page_259">259</a>.</li>
+</ul>
+
+<ul>
+<li>Dalyell, J. G., <a href="#Page_257">257</a>.</li>
+
+<li>Dancing and Religious Ecstasy, <a href="#Page_60">60-1</a>.</li>
+
+<li>Dancing Epidemics, <a href="#Page_236">236-40</a>.</li>
+
+<li>Death, Savage Ideas of, <a href="#Page_44">44</a>.</li>
+
+<li>Demoniacs, <a href="#Page_77">77</a>.</li>
+
+<li>Disease, Theory of, amongst Primitive Peoples, <a href="#Page_46">46</a>.</li>
+
+<li>Disease, Theory of, amongst the Early Christians, <a href="#Page_47">47</a>.</li>
+
+<li>D'Israeli, I., on Sexualism and Religion, <a href="#Page_17">17</a>, <a href="#Page_135">135</a>.</li>
+
+<li>Draper, J. W., <a href="#Page_231">231</a>.</li>
+
+<li>Drugs, their use in the history of Religion, <a href="#Page_57">57</a>.</li>
+</ul>
+
+<ul>
+<li>Environment, <a href="#Page_36">36</a>, <a href="#Page_38">38</a>.</li>
+
+<li>Environment, Nature of Primitive, <a href="#Page_39">39</a>.</li>
+
+<li>Epilepsy, Influence of, in fostering Supernaturalism, <a href="#Page_74">74-9</a>.</li>
+
+<li>Epilepsy, Opinion of Dr. Hollander, <a href="#Page_75">75</a>.</li>
+
+<li>Epilepsy, Opinion of Sir T. S. Clouston, <a href="#Page_75">75</a>.</li>
+
+<li>Epilepsy, Opinion of Dr. C. Norman, <a href="#Page_76">76</a>.</li>
+
+<li>Epilepsy, Opinion of Emanuel Deutsch, <a href="#Page_77">77</a>, <a href="#Page_79">79</a>.</li>
+
+<li>Epilepsy in New Testament, <a href="#Page_77">77</a>.</li>
+
+<li>Erotic Sects, <a href="#Page_155">155-60</a>, <a href="#Page_165">165</a>.</li>
+
+<li>Eroticism and Supernaturalism, <a href="#Page_126">126-8</a>, <a href="#Page_132">132</a>, <a href="#Page_136">136-9</a>.</li>
+
+<li>Evidence for the Supernatural, <a href="#Page_2">2</a>, <a href="#Page_271">271</a>.</li>
+</ul>
+
+<ul>
+<li>Fasting, <a href="#Page_61">61-5</a>.</li>
+
+<li>Flagellation, <a href="#Page_234">234-5</a>.</li>
+
+<li>Forlong, Maj.-Gen., <a href="#Footnote_90_90">109 <i>n.</i></a></li>
+
+<li>Fox, George, Account of Visions, <a href="#Page_82">82</a>.</li>
+
+<li>Frazer, J. G., <a href="#Page_39">39</a>, <a href="#Page_46">46</a>, <a href="#Page_97">97</a>, <a href="#Page_99">99</a>, <a href="#Page_111">111</a>.</li>
+
+<li><!-- Page 286 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_286" id="Page_286">[286]</a></span>
+Free Love&mdash;Religious, <a href="#Page_150">150</a>, <a href="#Page_161">161-4</a>.</li>
+</ul>
+
+<ul>
+<li>Galton, Francis, on Religious and Morbid States, <a href="#Page_86">86</a>.</li>
+
+<li>Galton, Francis, <a href="#Page_219">219</a>.</li>
+
+<li>Gibbon, E., <a href="#Page_227">227</a>.</li>
+
+<li>Gowers, Sir W. R., <a href="#Page_197">197</a>.</li>
+
+<li>Granger, Prof., <a href="#Page_84">84</a>, <a href="#Page_141">141-3</a>.</li>
+</ul>
+
+<ul>
+<li>Hallucinations, <a href="#Page_23">23-4-5</a>, <a href="#Page_62">62</a>, <a href="#Page_84">84</a>.</li>
+
+<li>Hecker, J. F. C., <a href="#Page_236">236-7</a>.</li>
+
+<li>Hopkins, Mathew, <a href="#Page_261">261-2</a>.</li>
+
+<li>Human Qualities, Identity of, <a href="#Page_6">6</a>.</li>
+</ul>
+
+<ul>
+<li>Interpretation, Growth of Scientific, <a href="#Page_xiii">xiii</a>.</li>
+
+<li>Ireland, Dr. W. W., on Hallucinations, <a href="#Page_23">23-4</a>.</li>
+</ul>
+
+<ul>
+<li>James, W., <a href="#Page_10">10</a>, <a href="#Page_11">11</a>, <a href="#Page_14">14</a>, <a href="#Page_15">15</a>, <a href="#Page_16">16</a>, <a href="#Page_17">17</a>, <a href="#Page_21">21</a>, <a href="#Page_81">81</a>, <a href="#Page_83">83</a>, <a href="#Page_130">130</a>, <a href="#Page_131">131</a>, <a href="#Page_145">145</a>, <a href="#Page_175">175-6</a>, <a href="#Page_272">272</a>.</li>
+</ul>
+
+<ul>
+<li>Kingsley, Mary, on Primitive Thought, <a href="#Page_42">42</a>.</li>
+</ul>
+
+<ul>
+<li>Lea, H. C., <a href="#Page_220">220-1</a>.</li>
+
+<li>Le Bon, Gustave, on Crowd Psychology, <a href="#Page_206">206</a>.</li>
+
+<li>Lecky, W. E. H., <a href="#Page_154">154</a>, <a href="#Page_212">212</a>, <a href="#Page_221">221</a>.</li>
+
+<li>Luther and Demonism, <a href="#Page_25">25</a>, <a href="#Page_58">58</a>, <a href="#Page_82">82</a>, <a href="#Page_253">253</a>.</li>
+</ul>
+
+<ul>
+<li>Maudsley, H., on the Relation between Nervous States and Ecstasy, <a href="#Page_66">66</a>, <a href="#Page_76">76</a>, <a href="#Page_133">133</a>.</li>
+
+<li>Medicine and the Church, <a href="#Page_70">70-1</a>.</li>
+
+<li>Menstruation, <a href="#Page_95">95-6-7-8</a>.</li>
+
+<li>Mental States, Reality of, <a href="#Page_xi">xi</a>, <a href="#Page_7">7</a>, <a href="#Page_22">22</a>.</li>
+
+<li>Mercier, C., Connection between Sexualism and Religion, <a href="#Page_124">124</a>, <a href="#Page_140">140-1</a>, <a href="#Page_187">187</a>, <a href="#Page_197">197</a>.</li>
+
+<li>Milman, H. H., <a href="#Page_219">219</a>, <a href="#Page_222">222-3</a>, <a href="#Page_225">225-6</a>, <a href="#Page_229">229</a>, <a href="#Page_232">232</a>.</li>
+
+<li>Mind, Theories of, <a href="#Page_x">x</a>.</li>
+
+<li>Mistletoe, Origin of Kissing under, <a href="#Footnote_90_90">109 <i>n.</i></a></li>
+
+<li>Mohammed, his Account of Inspiration, <a href="#Page_78">78</a>, <a href="#Page_81">81</a>.</li>
+
+<li>Monasticism, <a href="#Page_225">225</a>.</li>
+
+<li>Monasticism and the Family, <a href="#Page_216">216-7</a>, <a href="#Page_219">219</a>, <a href="#Page_222">222-3</a>.</li>
+
+<li>Monasticism and Morals, <a href="#Page_220">220</a>.</li>
+
+<li>Mysticism, <a href="#Page_131">131</a>, <a href="#Page_279">279-80</a>.</li>
+
+<li>Mysticism and the Abnormal, <a href="#Page_55">55</a>.</li>
+
+<li>Mysticism and Puberty, <a href="#Page_186">186</a>.</li>
+
+<li>Mysticism, Definitions of, <a href="#Page_278">278-9</a>.</li>
+
+<li>Mystics, Claims of, <a href="#Page_xi">xi</a>.</li>
+</ul>
+
+<ul>
+<li>Opium, Effects of, <a href="#Page_58">58</a>.</li>
+</ul>
+
+<ul>
+<li>Pathological States and Religious Belief, <a href="#Page_5">5</a>, <a href="#Page_49">49</a>.</li>
+
+<li>Pathological Aspects of Revivals, <a href="#Page_190">190-1-2-3</a>, <a href="#Page_201">201</a>.</li>
+
+<li>Pathology of Religion, Need of, <a href="#Page_3">3</a>.</li>
+
+<li>Phallicism, <a href="#Page_104">104-5-6-7-8-9</a>.</li>
+
+<li>Pike, L. O., on Character of Crusaders, <a href="#Page_229">229</a>.</li>
+
+<li>Procreation, Primitive Beliefs concerning, <a href="#Page_93">93-4</a>.</li>
+
+<li>Psychological Epidemics, <a href="#Page_207">207</a>.</li>
+
+<li>Psychology, Normal and Abnormal, <a href="#Page_3">3</a>.</li>
+
+<li>Psychology as a Social Force, <a href="#Page_37">37-8</a>.</li>
+
+<li>Puberty, <a href="#Page_180">180-6</a>.</li>
+
+<li>Puberty Customs, <a href="#Page_62">62</a>, <a href="#Page_95">95</a>, <a href="#Page_96">96</a>.</li>
+</ul>
+
+<ul>
+<li>Religion, Definition of, <a href="#Page_1">1</a>.
+<ul>
+  <li>Association of, with Non-religious Forces, <a href="#Page_4">4</a>.</li>
+  <li>and Intuition, <a href="#Page_51">51</a>.</li>
+  <li>and Puberty, <a href="#Page_180">180</a>.</li>
+  <li>and Dancing, <a href="#Page_60">60-1-2</a>.</li>
+  <li>and Fasting, <a href="#Page_63">63-4-5</a>.</li>
+  <li>and Environment, <a href="#Page_199">199</a>, <a href="#Page_202">202</a>.</li>
+  <li>in Primitive Life, <a href="#Page_40">40</a>, <a href="#Page_44">44-5-6</a>, <a href="#Page_53">53</a>.</li>
+  <li>its Connection with Pathological Conditions, <a href="#Page_8">8</a>, <a href="#Page_14">14</a>, <a href="#Page_68">68-9</a>, <a href="#Page_70">70-1-2-3-4</a>.</li>
+</ul></li>
+
+<li>Religious Faculty, Fallacy of, <a href="#Page_7">7</a>, <a href="#Page_19">19</a>, <a href="#Page_20">20</a>.</li>
+
+<li>Religious Idea and Modern Thought, <a href="#Page_vii">vii</a>.</li>
+
+<li><!-- Page 287 --><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_287" id="Page_287">[287]</a></span>
+Renan, E., <a href="#Page_145">145</a>.</li>
+
+<li>Revivalistic Religion, <a href="#Page_163">163</a>, <a href="#Page_172">172</a>, <a href="#Page_189">189</a>, <a href="#Page_190">190</a>, <a href="#Page_193">193</a>, <a href="#Page_201">201</a>.</li>
+
+<li>Russian Sects, <a href="#Page_164">164-7</a>.</li>
+</ul>
+
+<ul>
+<li>Saints, Medical Uses of, <a href="#Page_70">70</a>.</li>
+
+<li>Santa Teresa, <a href="#Page_85">85</a>.</li>
+
+<li>Science, Function of, <a href="#Page_xi">xi-xii</a>.</li>
+
+<li>Sexualism and Religious Belief, <a href="#Page_9">9</a>, <a href="#Page_11">11-2</a>, <a href="#Page_89">89-90</a>, <a href="#Page_120">120</a>, <a href="#Page_121">121</a>, <a href="#Page_125">125-9</a>, <a href="#Page_145">145</a>, <a href="#Page_275">275</a>.</li>
+
+<li>Sexualism and Religious Belief, Opinion of Dr. Norman, <a href="#Page_122">122</a>;
+<ul>
+  <li>of Dr. Forel, <a href="#Page_123">123</a>;</li>
+  <li>of Dr. Mercier, <a href="#Page_124">124</a>;</li>
+  <li>of Dr. Krafft-Ebing, <a href="#Page_125">125</a>;</li>
+  <li>of Dr. Maudsley, <a href="#Page_133">133-4</a>.</li>
+</ul></li>
+
+<li>Smith, W. R., on the Meaning of 'Unclean,' <a href="#Page_101">101</a>.</li>
+
+<li>Sociability, Significance of, <a href="#Page_35">35</a>.</li>
+
+<li>Social Life and Religious Theories, <a href="#Page_13">13</a>, <a href="#Page_281">281</a>.</li>
+
+<li>Spencer, H., <a href="#Page_37">37</a>, <a href="#Page_46">46</a>.</li>
+
+<li>Spiritual Wifehood, <a href="#Page_148">148-9</a>.</li>
+
+<li>Spiritualism, <a href="#Page_53">53-4</a>.</li>
+
+<li>Starbuck, E. D., on Conversion, <a href="#Page_174">174</a>, <a href="#Page_200">200</a>.</li>
+
+<li>Sully, J., <a href="#Page_20">20</a>.</li>
+
+<li>Supernaturalism, Causes of Persistence of, <a href="#Page_271">271</a>, <a href="#Page_273">273</a>, <a href="#Page_277">277</a>, <a href="#Page_282">282</a>.</li>
+
+<li>Supernaturalism, Consequences of, <a href="#Page_283">283-4</a>.</li>
+
+<li>Supernaturalism, Persistence of, <a href="#Page_2">2</a>.</li>
+
+<li>Suso, Austerities of, <a href="#Page_85">85</a>.</li>
+
+<li>Swedenborg, E., <a href="#Page_80">80</a>.</li>
+
+<li>Symonds, J. A., Experience under Chloroform, <a href="#Page_29">29</a>.</li>
+</ul>
+
+<ul>
+<li>Theologians, Attitude towards Science, <a href="#Page_ix">ix</a>.</li>
+
+<li>Thomas, W. I., <a href="#Page_182">182</a>.</li>
+
+<li>Tylor, E. B., <a href="#Page_1">1</a>, <a href="#Page_49">49</a>, <a href="#Page_54">54</a>, <a href="#Page_55">55</a>, <a href="#Page_71">71</a>, <a href="#Page_182">182</a>, <a href="#Page_193">193</a>.</li>
+</ul>
+
+<ul>
+<li>Unclean, Religious Significance of, <a href="#Page_100">100-1</a>.</li>
+</ul>
+
+<ul>
+<li>Whittaker, T., on the Effects of Opium, <a href="#Page_58">58</a>.</li>
+
+<li>Williams, A., <a href="#Page_250">250</a>.</li>
+
+<li>Witchcraft, <a href="#Page_27">27</a>, <a href="#Page_243">243</a>.
+<ul>
+  <li>Pathology of, <a href="#Page_246">246-7</a>.</li>
+  <li>and Christian Church, <a href="#Page_244">244</a>.</li>
+  <li>Bull of Innocent <span class="ucsmcap">VIII.</span>, <a href="#Page_248">248</a>.</li>
+  <li>Extent of Epidemic, <a href="#Page_250">250</a>.</li>
+  <li>and Sir Thomas Browne, <a href="#Page_265">265</a>.</li>
+  <li>and Montaigne, <a href="#Page_267">267</a>.</li>
+  <li>and Sir M. Hale, <a href="#Page_266">266</a>.</li>
+  <li>and John Wesley, <a href="#Page_259">259</a>.</li>
+  <li>and Luther, <a href="#Page_253">253</a>.</li>
+  <li>and Protestantism, <a href="#Page_252">252-3</a>.</li>
+  <li>Scottish, <a href="#Page_255">255-6-7-8</a>, <a href="#Page_267">267</a>.</li>
+  <li>American, <a href="#Page_254">254-5</a>.</li>
+  <li>Children burned for, <a href="#Page_251">251</a>.</li>
+  <li>Description of Trial, <a href="#Page_263">263-6</a>.</li>
+  <li>Legislation in England, <a href="#Page_253">253</a>, <a href="#Page_267">267</a>.</li>
+</ul>
+</li>
+
+<li>Witches, Methods of Detection, <a href="#Page_260">260-1</a>.</li>
+
+<li>Witches, Number killed, <a href="#Page_250">250-1</a>.</li>
+
+<li>Woman, Christian Church and, <a href="#Page_102">102</a>.</li>
+
+<li>Woman, why considered religiously unclean, <a href="#Page_103">103</a>.</li>
+
+<li>Woman, a Source of Spiritual Infection, <a href="#Page_99">99</a>.</li>
+
+<li>Woman, Influence of Religious Beliefs in determining her Social Position, <a href="#Page_102">102-3</a>, <a href="#Page_110">110-9</a>.</li>
+
+<li>Woman, Position among Primitive Peoples, <a href="#Page_115">115</a>.</li>
+
+<li>Wright, T., <a href="#Page_251">251</a>.</li>
+</ul>
+
+<div class="tn">
+<h3>Transcriber's Note:</h3>
+
+<p>The following corrections were made:</p>
+
+<ul>
+<li><a href="#Page_21">p. 21</a>: extra open quote removed (In what sense)</li>
+<li><a href="#Page_24">p. 24</a>: Dr. W. H. Ireland to Dr. W. W. Ireland (as given by Dr. W. W. Ireland)</li>
+<li><a href="#Page_25">p. 25</a>: Nuremburg to Nuremberg (came from Nuremberg), to match cited text</li>
+<li><a href="#Page_46">p. 46</a>: Crook to Crooke (says Mr. W. Crooke)</li>
+<li><a href="#Page_46">p. 46</a>: Ahmadnager to Ahmadnagar (Mahadeo Kolis of Ahmadnagar)</li>
+<li><a href="#Page_57">p. 57</a>: DeCandolle to De Candolle (says De Candolle)</li>
+<li>p. 58 (<a href="#Footnote_26_26">Footnote 26</a>): Pharmæcology to Pharmacology (Text-Book of Pharmacology)</li>
+<li><a href="#Page_70">p. 70</a>: Persel to Pernel (St. Pernel for agues), to match cited text</li>
+<li><a href="#Page_75">p. 75</a>: everyone to every one (every one of the senses)</li>
+<li><a href="#Page_76">p. 76</a>: Connolly to Conolly (Dr. Conolly Norman)</li>
+<li>pp. 86 (<a href="#Footnote_63_63">Footnote 63</a>), and 130 (<a href="#Footnote_107_107">Footnote 107</a>): Joli to Joly (H. Joly)</li>
+<li>p. 101 (<a href="#Footnote_76_76">Footnote 76</a>): on to in (Studies in the Psychology of Sex)</li>
+<li><a href="#Page_114">p. 114</a>: is to are (Nor are the substantial facts)</li>
+<li>p. 123 (<a href="#Footnote_96_96">Footnote 96</a>): Problem to Question (The Sexual Question)</li>
+<li>pp. <a href="#Page_125">125</a>, 128 (<a href="#Footnote_105_105">Footnote 105</a>), and <a href="#Page_287">287</a> (Index): Kraft-Ebing to Krafft-Ebing</li>
+<li><a href="#Page_127">p. 127</a>: Loudon to Loudun (Convent of Ursulines of Loudun)</li>
+<li>p. 127 (<a href="#Footnote_104_104">Footnote 104</a>): of America to in North America (Jesuits in North America)</li>
+<li><a href="#Page_128">p. 128</a>: Alacocque to Alacoque (The blessed Mary Alacoque)</li>
+<li>p. 149 (<a href="#Footnote_123_123">Footnote 123</a>): Life of St. Paul to Study of St. Paul</li>
+<li>p. 166 (<a href="#Footnote_140_140">Footnote 140</a>): Churches to Church (Heard's description, Russian Church)</li>
+<li><a href="#Page_178">p. 178</a>: tatooing to tattooing (tattooing forms part of the religious ceremony)</li>
+<li>p. 182 (<a href="#Footnote_151_151">Footnote 151</a>): missing 4 added in 241 (pp. 241-48)</li>
+<li><a href="#Page_209">p. 209</a>: Brahminism to Brahmanism (Brahmanism has its order of ascetics), to match cited text</li>
+<li><a href="#Page_209">p. 209</a>: missing close quote added (consecrated to Tezcatlipoca.")</li>
+<li>p. 249 (<a href="#Footnote_188_188">Footnote 188</a>): Enenmoser to Ennemoser (is given by Ennemoser)</li>
+<li>p. 250 (<a href="#Footnote_190_190">Footnote 190</a>): A. Williams, The Superstition of Witchcraft to H. Williams, The Superstitions of Witchcraft</li>
+<li>p. 251 (<a href="#Footnote_191_191">Footnote 191</a>): History to Narratives (Narratives of Sorcery and Magic)</li>
+<li>pp. <a href="#Page_263">263</a>, <a href="#Page_264">264</a>: Tacy to Pacy (Elizabeth and Deborah Pacy)</li>
+<li><a href="#Page_286">p. 286</a> (Index): Ireland, Dr. W. H. to Ireland, Dr. W. W.</li>
+<li><a href="#Page_286">p. 286</a> (Index): Millman, H. H. to Milman, H. H.</li>
+</ul>
+<p>Irregularities in hyphenation (e.g. supernormal vs. super-normal) and
+misquotations have not been corrected. Unless it was found that
+the error also occurred in the cited text, misspellings have been
+corrected.</p>
+<p>Although Footnote 81 (originally on p. 104) refers
+to a "note at the end of this chapter," the "NOTE TO PAGE 104" begins on
+p. 110, several pages before the chapter ends. This has not been
+changed.</p>
+<p>Footnotes markers have been changed from symbols (in the
+original) to numerals.</p>
+<p>The format of chapter headings has been standardized.</p>
+
+</div>
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+<pre>
+
+
+
+
+
+End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of Religion & Sex, by Chapman Cohen
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+The Project Gutenberg EBook of Religion & Sex, by Chapman Cohen
+
+This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with
+almost no restrictions whatsoever.  You may copy it, give it away or
+re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included
+with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org
+
+
+Title: Religion & Sex
+       Studies in the Pathology of Religious Development
+
+Author: Chapman Cohen
+
+Release Date: October 21, 2009 [EBook #30306]
+
+Language: English
+
+Character set encoding: ASCII
+
+*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK RELIGION & SEX ***
+
+
+
+
+Produced by Marilynda Fraser-Cunliffe, S.D., and the Online
+Distributed Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+  THE OPEN MIND LIBRARY
+
+  BEING A SERIES OF WORKS DEALING WITH
+  QUESTIONS AS HANDLED BY DIFFERENT
+  SCHOOLS OF THOUGHT, IN RELIGION,
+  ETHICS, PHILOSOPHY & PSYCHOLOGY
+
+
+
+
+        RELIGION & SEX
+
+   STUDIES IN THE PATHOLOGY
+   OF RELIGIOUS DEVELOPMENT
+       BY CHAPMAN COHEN
+
+    T. N. FOULIS, PUBLISHER
+  LONDON, EDINBURGH, & BOSTON
+
+
+_Published October 1919_
+
+_Printed by_ MORRISON & GIBB LIMITED, _Edinburgh_
+
+
+
+
+THE LIST OF CHAPTERS
+
+
+     I. SCIENCE & THE SUPERNATURAL              _page_ 1
+
+    II. THE PRIMITIVE MIND & ITS ENVIRONMENT          35
+
+   III. THE RELIGION OF MENTAL DISEASE                51
+
+    IV. SEX & RELIGION IN PRIMITIVE LIFE              89
+
+     V. THE INFLUENCE OF SEXUAL & PATHOLOGIC
+         STATES ON RELIGIOUS BELIEF                  120
+
+    VI. THE STREAM OF TENDENCY                       145
+
+   VII. CONVERSION                                   169
+
+  VIII. RELIGIOUS EPIDEMICS                          205
+
+    IX. RELIGIOUS EPIDEMICS--(_concluded_)           226
+
+     X. THE WITCH MANIA                              243
+
+    XI. SUMMARY & CONCLUSION                         269
+
+
+
+
+PREFACE
+
+
+In spite of all that has been done in the way of applying scientific
+principles to religious ideas, there is much that yet remains to be
+accomplished. Generally speaking science has only dealt with the subject
+of religion in its more normal and more regularised forms. The last
+half-century has produced many elaborate and fruitful studies of the
+origin of religious ideas, while comparative mythology has shown a close
+and suggestive relationship between creeds and symbols that were once
+believed to have nothing in common. But beyond these fields of research
+there is at least one other that has hitherto been denied the attention
+it richly deserves. When the anthropologist has described those
+conditions of primitive culture amid which he believes religious ideas
+took their origin, and the comparative mythologist has shown us the
+similarities and inter-relations of widely separated creeds, religious
+beliefs have yet to submit to the test of a scientific psychology, the
+function of which is to determine how far the same principles apply to
+all phases of mental life whether religious or non-religious. Moreover,
+in addition to the normal psychical life of man, there is that vast
+borderland in which the normal merges into the abnormal, and the healthy
+state into a pathologic one. That there is a physiology of religion is
+now generally admitted; but that there is also a pathology of religion
+is not so generally recognised. The present work seeks to emphasise this
+last aspect. It does not claim to be more than an outline of the
+subject--a sketch map of a territory that others may fill in more
+completely.
+
+From another point of view the following pages may be regarded as an
+attempt more completely to apply scientific principles to religious
+beliefs. And it would be idle to hope that such an attempt could be made
+without incurring much hostile criticism. In connection with most other
+subjects the help of science is welcomed; in connection with religion
+science is still regarded as more or less of an intruder, profaning a
+sacred subject with vulgar tests and impertinent enquiries. This must
+almost inevitably follow when one has to face the opposition of
+thousands of men who have been trained to regard themselves as the
+authorised exponents of all that pertains to religion, but whose
+training fails to supply them with a genuine scientific equipment. It
+should, however, be clear that an attitude of hostility to science,
+veiled or open, cannot be maintained. Mere authority has fallen on evil
+days, and in all directions is being freely challenged. There is
+increasing dislike to systems of thought that shrink from examination,
+and to conclusions that cannot withstand the most rigorous
+investigation. And if science really has anything of value to say on
+this question it cannot be held to silence for ever. Sooner or later the
+need for its assistance will be felt, and the self-elected authority of
+an order must give way. It is, moreover, impossible for science with its
+claim, sometimes avowed, but always implied, to cover the whole of life,
+to forego so large a territory as that of religion. For there can be no
+reasonable question that religion has played, and still plays a large
+part in the life of the race. Whatever be the nature of religion,
+science is bound either to deal with it or confess its main task to be
+hopeless.
+
+Whether or not it is possible to apply known scientific principles to
+the whole of religion will be a matter of opinion; but the attempt is at
+least worth making. So much that appeared to be beyond the reach of
+science has been ultimately brought within its ken, so many things that
+seemed to stand in a class by themselves have been finally brought under
+some more comprehensive generalisation, and so become part of the
+'cosmic machine,' that one is impelled to believe that given time and
+industry the same will result here. And it should never be forgotten
+that one aspect of scientific progress has been the taking over of large
+tracts of territory that religion once regarded as peculiarly its own;
+and just as psychology and pathology were found to hold the key to an
+understanding of such a phenomenon as witchcraft, so we may yet realise
+that a true explanation of religious phenomena is to be found, not in
+some supernatural world, but in the workings of natural forces
+imperfectly understood.
+
+The defences set up by theologians against the scientific advance may be
+summarised under two heads. It is claimed that the 'facts' of the
+religious life belong to a world of inner experience, to a state of
+spiritual development which brings the subject into touch with a
+super-sensuous world not open to the normal human being, and with which
+science, as ordinarily understood, is incompetent to deal. In essence
+this is a very old position, and contains the kernel of 'mysticism' in
+all ages, from the savage state onward. This position involves a very
+obvious begging of the question at issue. It assumes that all attempts
+to correlate religious phenomena with phenomena in general have failed,
+and that all future attempts are similarly doomed to failure. Of course
+nothing of the kind has been shown. On the contrary, the aim of the
+present work is to show that no dividing line can be drawn between those
+states of mind that have been and are classed as religious, and those
+that are admittedly non-religious. For various reasons I have dealt
+almost entirely with those conditions that are admittedly pathological,
+but I believe it would be possible to prove the same of all normal
+frames of mind and emotional states. Any human quality may be enlisted
+in the service of religion, but there are none that are specifically
+religious. It is a pure assumption that the religious visionary
+possesses qualities that are either absent or rudimentary in other
+persons. Human faculty is everywhere identical although the form in
+which it is expressed differs according to education, the presence of
+certain dominating ideas, and the general influence of one's
+environment. To admit the claim of the mystic is to surrender all hope
+of a scientific co-ordination of life. It is quite fatal to the
+scientific ideal and involves the re-introduction into nature of a
+dualism the removal of which has been one of the most marked advantages
+of scientific thinking.
+
+Moreover, whatever views we may hold as to the ultimate nature of 'mind'
+the dependence of all frames of mind upon the brain and nervous system
+is now generally accepted. We may hold various theories as to the nature
+of mind, we may, with the late William James, treat the brain as merely
+a 'transmissive' organ, but even on that assumption--on behalf of which
+not a shred of positive evidence has been offered--the frames of mind
+expressed are determined by the nervous mechanism, and thus the laws of
+mental phenomena become ultimately the laws of the operation of the
+nervous system. The 'facts' of the religious life thus become part of
+the facts of psychology as a whole. Its 'laws' will form part of
+psychological laws as a whole, and religious experiences must be handed
+over for examination and classification to the psychologist who in turn
+relies for help and understanding on various associated branches of
+science.
+
+Closely allied to the claim of the 'mystic' that his experiences bring
+him into touch with a world of super-sensuous reality, is the attempt to
+prove that science is incapable of dealing with anything but "in the
+first place, the endless ascertainment of facts and the physical
+conditions under which they occur, and in the second place to the
+criticism of error." Well, no one denies that it is part of the work of
+science to ascertain facts, or even that its work consists in
+ascertaining facts and framing 'laws' that will explain them. But why
+are we to limit science to _physical_ facts only? All facts are not
+physical. If I have a head-ache, the unpleasant feeling is a fact. If I
+feel hot or cold, angry or pleased, think one thing ugly or another
+beautiful, my feelings are as much 'facts' as anything else that exists.
+Nay, if I fancy I see a ghost, or a vision, these also are 'facts' so
+far as my mental state at the time is concerned. So also are my beliefs
+about all manner of things, and often the most important facts with
+which I am connected. Facts may be objective or subjective. They may
+exist in relation to all minds normally constituted, or they may exist
+in relation to my own mind only; or, yet again, they may exist only in
+relation to certain states of mind, but they do not, nevertheless, cease
+to be facts.
+
+Now the business of science is to collect facts--all facts--classify
+them, and frame generalisations that will explain their groupings and
+modes of operation. It talks of the facts of the physical world, the
+facts of the biological world, the facts of the psychological world, and
+so forth. This last group comprises all sorts of feelings and ideas,
+beliefs and experiences. Some of these facts it calls false, others it
+calls true--that is, they are true when they hold good of all men and
+women normally constituted, they are not true when they hold good of
+isolated individuals only, and can be seen to be the product of
+misinterpreted experience, or arise from a derangement--permanent or
+temporary--of the nervous system. But true or false they remain facts of
+the mental life. They must be collected, grouped, and explained exactly
+as other facts are collected, grouped, and explained. They fall within
+the scope of science, to be dealt with by scientific methods.
+
+There is really no escape from the position that so far as religious
+'facts' are parts of mental life, religion becomes logically a
+department of psychology. The substantial identity of all mental facts
+is quite unaffected by their being directed to this or that special
+object. As mental facts they are part of the material that it is the
+work of science to reduce to order. And as mental facts religious
+phenomena are seen to follow the same 'laws' that govern mental
+phenomena in general. It is perfectly true that we cannot test and
+measure the material of psychology with the same definiteness and
+accuracy that the chemist applies to the subject-matter of his
+department; but that may be due to want of knowledge, or to the extreme
+complexity and variability of the matter with which we are dealing. And
+if it were true that the same tests could not be applied in psychology
+that are applied elsewhere, this would be no cause for scientific
+despair. It would only mean that fresh tests would have to be devised
+for a new group of facts, as every other science has already, as a
+matter of fact, created its own special standard of value.
+
+The second of the two lines of defence consists in the bold assertion
+that the religious interpretation of subjective phenomena is itself in
+the nature of a true scientific induction. The methods of science are
+not repudiated, but welcomed. But it is argued that the non-religious
+explanation of religious phenomena breaks down hopelessly, while the
+religious explanation fully covers and explains the facts. If this were
+true, nothing more remains to be said, and we must accept this dualistic
+scheme, however repugnant it may be to orthodox scientific ideas. But is
+it true? Is it a fact that the non-religious explanation breaks down so
+completely? Hitherto the course of events has been in the contrary
+direction. It is the religious explanation that has, over and over
+again, been shown to be unreliable, the non-religious explanation that
+has been finally established. Insanity and epilepsy, once universally
+ascribed to a supernatural order of being, have been reduced to the
+level of nervous disorders. All the phenomena of 'possession' are still
+with us, it is only our understanding of them that has altered. And
+before it is admitted that the phenomena described as religious can
+never be affiliated to the phenomena described as non-religious, it must
+be shown--beyond all possibility of doubt--that their explanation in
+terms of known forces is impossible. As I have said in the body of this
+work, the question at issue is essentially one of interpretation. The
+'facts' of the religious life are admitted. Science no more questions
+the reality of the visions of the medieval mystic than it questions the
+visions of the non-mystic admittedly suffering from neural derangement.
+The crucial question is whether we have any good reason for separating
+the two, and while we dismiss the one as hallucination accept the other
+as introducing us to another order of being? I do not think there is the
+slightest ground for any such differentiation, and I have given in the
+following pages what I conceive to be good reasons for so thinking. And
+I hope that the fact of the explanations there offered running counter
+to the traditional one will not prevent readers weighing with the utmost
+care the proofs that are offered.
+
+
+
+
+RELIGION AND SEX
+
+CHAPTER ONE
+
+SCIENCE AND THE SUPERNATURAL
+
+
+Accepting Professor Tylor's famous minimum definition of religion as
+"the belief in Spiritual Beings," it is safe to say that religious
+belief constitutes one of the largest facts in human history. No other
+single subject has occupied so large a share of man's conscious life, no
+other subject has absorbed so much of his energy. In very early stages
+of culture religious belief is universal in the fullest sense of the
+word. It shapes all primitive institutions; it dominates life from the
+cradle to the grave, and creates a shadow-land beyond the grave from
+which the dead continue to influence the actions of the living. At a
+later stage of culture we see a distinction being drawn between the
+natural and the supernatural, the secular and the spiritual, and the
+beginning of an antagonism that is still with us. Of all antagonisms
+conceived by the brain of man this is the deepest and the most
+irreconcilable. Each feels that the growth of the other threatens its
+own supremacy, with the result that advance from either side has been
+contested with the greatest obstinacy and determination. And although it
+is true that at present the supernatural is very largely "suspect," it
+is still powerful. Nor is its influence confined to the lower strata of
+European society. It has very many representatives among the higher
+culture, disguised it may be under various pseudo-philosophic forms.
+Altogether we may say that the supernatural has never been without its
+"cloud of witnesses." At all times there have been individuals, or
+groups of individuals, who have believed themselves, and have been
+believed by others, to be in touch with another order of existence than
+that with which people are normally in contact. And apart from these
+specially favoured persons, the wide vogue of the belief in good and
+evil portents, in lucky and unlucky days, the attraction of the "occult"
+in fiction and in fact, all serve as evidence that belief in the
+supernatural is still a force with which one has to reckon.
+
+To what causes are we to attribute the persistence of this belief in the
+supernatural? It is useless replying that its persistence is evidence of
+its truth. That clearly begs the whole question at issue. Mere social
+heredity will doubtless count for much in this direction. Men do not
+start their thinking afresh with each generation. It is based upon that
+of preceding generations; it follows set forms, and is generally
+influenced by that network of ideas and beliefs into which we are born
+and from which none of us ever completely escapes. Still that is hardly
+enough in itself to account for the persistence of supernaturalism.
+Assuming that originally there existed what was accepted as good
+evidence for the existence of a supernatural, it is hardly credible that
+every subsequent generation went on accepting it merely because one
+generation received evidence of its existence. As organs atrophy for
+want of exercise, so do beliefs die out in time for want of proof. Some
+kind of evidence must have been continually forthcoming in order to keep
+the belief alive and active. It is not a question of whether the
+evidence was good or bad. All evidence, it is important to bear in mind,
+is good to some one. The "facts" upon which thousands of people were put
+to death for witchcraft would not be considered evidence to anyone
+nowadays, but they were once accepted as good ground for conviction.
+
+What kind of evidence is it, then, that has been accepted as proof of
+the supernatural? Or, to return to Tylor's definition of religion,
+seeing that the belief in spiritual beings has persisted in every
+generation, upon what kind of evidence has this belief been nourished?
+Various replies might be given to this question, all of which may
+contain some degree of truth, or an aspect of a general truth. In the
+present enquiry I am concerned with one line of investigation only, one
+that has been strangely neglected, but which yet, I am convinced,
+promises fruitful results. In other directions it has been established
+that a great aid to an understanding of the human organism in times of
+health is to study its activities under conditions of disease. Abnormal
+psychology is now a recognised branch of psychology in general, and a
+glance through almost any recent text-book will show that the two form
+parts of a natural whole. The normal and the abnormal are in turn used
+to throw light on each other. And it appears to the present writer that
+in the matter of religious beliefs a much clearer understanding of their
+nature, and also of some of the conditions of their perpetuation, may be
+gained by a study of what has happened, and is happening, in the light
+of mental pathology.
+
+To some, of course, the bare idea of there being a pathology of religion
+will appear an entirely unwarrantable assumption. On the other hand, the
+scientific study of all phases of religions having made so great headway
+it is hoped that a larger number will be prepared for a discussion of
+the subject from a point of view which, if not quite new, is certainly
+not common. Of course, such a discussion, even if the author quite
+succeeds in demonstrating the truth of his thesis, will still leave the
+origin of the religious idea an open question. For the present we are
+not concerned directly with the origin of the religious idea, but with
+an examination of some of the causes that have served to perpetuate it,
+and to trace the influence in the history of religion of states of mind,
+both personal and collective, that are now admittedly abnormal or
+pathological in character. The legitimacy of the enquiry cannot be
+questioned. As to its value and significance, that every reader must
+determine for himself.
+
+One may put the essential idea of the following pages in a
+sentence:--Given the religious idea as already existing, in what way,
+and to what extent has its development been affected by forces that are
+not in themselves religious, and which modern thought definitely
+separates from religion?
+
+Under civilised and uncivilised conditions we find religious beliefs
+constantly associated with various forces--social, ethical, and
+psychological. Very seldom is there any serious attempt to separate them
+and assign to each their respective value; nor, indeed, is the task at
+any time an easy one. The difficulty is made the greater by the way in
+which writers so enlarge the meaning of "religion" that it is made to
+include almost everything for which one feels admiration or respect.
+This practice is neither helpful nor accurate. Human nature under all
+aspects of intellectual conviction presents the same fundamental
+characteristics, and a definition to be of value, while of necessity
+inclusive, must also be decisively exclusive. It must unite, but it must
+also separate. And many current definitions of religion, while they may
+bear testimony to the amiability of those who frame them, are quite
+destitute of scientific value. In any case, the association of the
+religious idea with non-religious forces is a fact too patent to admit
+of denial; and the important task is to determine their reciprocal
+influence. In actual life this separation has been secured by the
+development of the various branches of positive thought--ethics,
+psychology, etc., all of which were once directly under the control of
+religion. What remains to be done is to separate in theory what has
+already been separated in fact, with such additions as a more critical
+knowledge may suggest as advisable.
+
+Far more suggestive, however, than the association of religion with what
+we may call the normal social forces, is its connection with conditions
+that are now clearly recognised as abnormal. From the earliest times we
+find the use of drugs and stimulants, the practice of fasting and
+self-torture, with other methods of depressing or stimulating the action
+of the nervous system, accepted as well-recognised methods of inducing a
+sense of religious illumination, or the feeling that one is in direct
+communion with a supernatural order of existence. Equally significant is
+the world-wide acceptance--right up to recent times--of purely
+pathological states as evidence of supernatural intercourse. About these
+two sets of facts there can be no reasonable doubt. Over and over again
+we can observe how the promptings of disease are taken for the voice of
+divinity, and men and women who to-day would be handed over to the care
+of the physician hailed as an incarnation of deity. In modern asylums
+we find one of the commonest of delusions to be that of the insane
+person who imagines himself to be a specially selected instrument of
+deity. In such instances the causal influence of pathological conditions
+is admitted. On the other hand, we have belonging to the more normal
+type the person who claims a supernatural origin for many of his actions
+and states of mind. And between these two extremes lie a whole series of
+gradations. They exist in all stages of culture, and it is difficult to
+see by what rule of logic or of experience one can say where the normal
+ends and the abnormal begins. If we assume the inference of the normal
+person concerning the origin of his mental states to be correct, it
+seems difficult to deny the possibility of those of the insane person
+having a similar origin, although distorted by the influence of disease.
+If, on the other hand, we say the insane person is wholly wrong as to
+the origin of his mental states, may we not also assume that the normal
+person has likewise erred as to the cause of his emotions or ideas?
+
+Two considerations may be urged in support of this conclusion. In the
+first place, there is the fact of the fundamental identity of human
+qualities under all conditions of their manifestation. It is too often
+assumed--sometimes it is explicitly claimed--that one with what is
+called "a strong religious nature" possesses some quality of mind absent
+or undeveloped in those of an opposite type. This assumption is quite
+unwarrantable. The religious man is marked off from the non-religious
+man, not by the possession of distinct mental qualities, but solely by
+holding different ideas concerning the cause and significance of his
+mental states. There is no such thing as a religious "faculty," but
+only qualities of mind expressed in terms of the religious idea. If I am
+conscious of a strong desire to work on behalf of the social betterment
+of my fellows, I may account for this either by attributing it to having
+inherited a nature modified by generations of social intercourse, or on
+the hypothesis that I am an instrument in the hands of a superhuman
+personality. But in either case the qualities manifested remain the
+same. Love and hatred, fear and courage, honesty and roguery, with all
+other human qualities, may be expressed in terms of religion, or they
+may be expressed in non-religious terms. It is the cause to which they
+are attributed, or the object to which they are directed, that marks off
+the religious from the non-religious person.
+
+The second point is that the whole issue arises on a conflict of
+interpretations. If I question the reality of the visions or states of
+illumination experienced by Santa Teresa, I am not questioning that, so
+far as the saint herself was concerned, these states of exaltation were
+real. All mental states--whether arising under normal or abnormal
+conditions--are quite real to those who experience them. The visions of
+the hashish-eater are real, while they last; so are those of the victim
+of delirium tremens. All I question is their genuineness as
+corresponding to an objective reality. Over the mind of the subject
+these visions may exercise an absolute sway. As to their occurrence, he
+or she is the final and absolute authority. There can be no question
+here. But when we proceed from the occurrence of these visions to the
+question of their causation, then we are on entirely different ground.
+Here it is not a question of their genuineness, or of their power, but
+a question of how we are to interpret them. The honesty and
+singlemindedness of these "inspired" characters may be admitted, but
+honesty or singlemindedness is no guarantee of accuracy. We do not need
+to ask whether the peasant girl of Lourdes experienced a vision of the
+Madonna, but we do need to ask whether there was anything in her mental
+history, social surroundings, or nervous state that would account for
+the vision. All the "facts" of the religious life may be admitted; the
+sole question at issue is whether an adequate interpretation of at least
+some of them may not be found in terms of a purely scientific
+psychology.
+
+Taking, then, the religious idea as already existing, the following
+pages will be devoted to an examination of the extent to which this idea
+has been associated with forces and conditions that were plainly
+pathological. In very many individual cases it will not be difficult to
+trace a vivid sense of the supernatural to the presence of abnormal
+nervous states, sometimes deliberately induced, at other times arising
+of themselves. And it is a matter of mere historical observation that
+such individual cases have operated most powerfully to strengthen the
+belief in the supernatural with others. The example of Lourdes is a case
+in point. All Protestants will agree that the peasant girl's vision was
+a sheer hallucination. And yet there can be no question that this vision
+has served to strengthen the faith of many thousands of others in the
+nearness of the supernatural. And it needs but little effort of the
+imagination to realise how powerful such examples must have been in ages
+when medical science was in its infancy, and the more subtle operations
+of the nervous system completely unknown.
+
+This question, I repeat, is distinct from the much larger and wider
+enquiry of the origin of religion. A fairly lengthy experience of the
+capacity of the general mind for missing the real point at issue
+prevents my being too sanguine as to the efficiency of the most explicit
+avowal of one's purpose, but the duty of taking precautions nevertheless
+remains. And in elaborating an unfamiliar view of the nature of much of
+the world's so-called religious phenomena, the possibility of
+misconception is multiplied enormously. Still, a writer must do what he
+can to guard against misunderstanding, and in the most emphatic manner
+it must be said that it is not my purpose to prove, nor is it my belief,
+that religion springs from perverted sexuality, nor that the study of
+religion is no more than an exercise in pathology. Nothing is further
+from the writer's mind than so essentially preposterous a claim. Neither
+sexuality, no matter how powerful, nor disease, no matter how
+pronounced, can account for the religious idea. That has an entirely
+separate and independent origin. This should be plain to anyone who has
+but a merely casual acquaintance with the history of religion. It is,
+however, a very different thing to enquire as to the part played in the
+history of religion by morbid nervous states or perverted sexual
+feeling. That is an enquiry both legitimate and desirable; and it is one
+that promises to shed light on aspects of the subject otherwise very
+obscure. And certainly, if so-called religious feelings do not admit of
+explanation in terms of a scientific psychology, nothing remains but to
+recognise religion as something quite apart from normal life, to hand
+it over to the custody of word-spinning "Mystics," and so surrender all
+possibility of a rational understanding of either its nature or its
+history.
+
+In saying what I have concerning the probability of misconception, I
+have had specially in mind the attack made by the late Professor William
+James on what he called the "medical materialists." In that remarkable
+piece of religious yellow-journalism, _The Varieties of Religious
+Experience_, Professor James says of those who take up the position that
+a great deal of what has been accepted by the world as religious
+inspiration or exaltation can be accounted for as the products of
+disordered nervous states or perverted sexual feeling, "We are surely
+all familiar in a general way with this method of discrediting states of
+mind for which we have an antipathy. We all use it in some degree in
+criticising persons whose states of mind we regard as overstrained. But
+when other people criticise our own exalted soul-flights by calling them
+'nothing but' expressions of our organic disposition, we feel outraged
+and hurt, for we know that, whatever be our organism's peculiarities,
+our mental states have their substantive value as revelations of the
+living truth; and we wish that all this medical materialism could be
+made to hold its tongue." Again, "Few conceptions are less instructive
+than this re-interpretation of religion as perverted sexuality.... It is
+true that in the vast collection of religious phenomena, some are
+undisguisedly amatory--_e.g._ sex deities and obscene rites in
+polytheism, and ecstatic feelings of union with the Saviour in a few
+Christian Mystics. But then why not equally call religion an aberration
+of the digestive functions, and prove one's point by the worship of
+Bacchus and Ceres, or by the ecstatic feelings of some other saints
+about the Eucharist?" Or, seeing that the Bible is full of the language
+of respiratory oppression, "one might almost as well interpret religion
+as a perversion of the respiratory function." And if it is pointed out
+that active interest in religion synchronises with adolescence, "the
+retort again is easy.... The interest in mechanics, physics, chemistry,
+logic, philosophy, and sociology, which springs up during adolescent
+years along with that in poetry and religion, is also a perversion of
+the sexual instinct."[1]
+
+Excellent fooling, this, but little else. I do not know that anyone has
+ever claimed that religion took its origin in sexual feeling, or that
+this would alone provide an explanation of historical religion. All that
+anyone has ever urged is that a deal of so-called religious feeling,
+past and present, can be shown to be due to unsatisfied or perverted
+sexual feeling--which is a very different statement, and one of which
+the truth may be demonstrated from Professor James's own pages. But
+between saying that certain feelings are wrongly interpreted in terms of
+an already existing idea, and saying that the idea itself is nothing but
+these same feelings transformed, there is an obvious and important
+difference. In every case the religious idea is taken for granted. Its
+origin is a quite different subject of enquiry. But once the idea is in
+existence there is always the probability of evidence for its truth
+being found in the wrong direction. The analogy of the digestive and
+respiratory organs is clever, but futile. The belief that much which
+has passed for religious feeling is perverted sexuality is not based
+merely upon the language employed. The language is only symptomatic. The
+terminology of respiration and digestion when used in connection with
+religion is frankly and palpably symbolic. That of sexual love is as
+often frankly literal, and can be correlated with the actual state of
+the person using it. Digestion and respiration must go on in any case;
+but it is precisely the point at issue whether with a different sexual
+life these so-called religious ecstatic states would have been
+experienced. When we find religious characters of strongly marked
+amorous dispositions, but leading an ascetic life, using toward the
+object of their adoration terms usually associated with strong sexual
+feeling, it does not seem extravagant to find here a little more than
+what may be covered by mere symbolism. Would the medieval monk have been
+tempted by Satan in the form of beautiful women had he been happily
+married? Would Santa Teresa or Catherine of Sienna have used the
+language they did use to express their relations to Jesus had they been
+wives and mothers? Such questions admit of one answer, which is, in its
+way, decisive. Professor James admits that modern psychology holds as a
+general postulate "there is not a single one of our states of mind, high
+or low, healthy or morbid, that has not some organic process as its
+condition."[2] The 'medical materialist' can ask for no more than this.
+But this being granted, on what ground are we to be forbidden finding in
+these same organic processes the condition of the visions and ecstatic
+states with which _The Varieties of Religious Experience_ is so largely
+concerned?
+
+Again, it may be granted that adolescence brings with it an awakening of
+the whole mental life, not of religion alone. But the analogy goes no
+further, and, in any case, it begs the question. The full significance
+of the connection will be seen when we come to deal with initiation in
+primitive times and conversion in the modern period. At present it
+suffices to point out that the interest in art, in science, in
+literature, in sociology, are ends in themselves, and one need go no
+further than the developing mental life for an explanation. But the
+essential question here is whether this growing life can or cannot find
+complete satisfaction quite apart from religion. A developing interest
+in the larger social life is common to all, and to some extent this is
+secured by the pressure of forces that are simply inescapable. On the
+other hand, an interest in religion only exists with some, and then it
+may usually be traced to a conscious direction of their energies.
+Moreover, those who show no special interest in religion evince no lack
+of anything--save in religious terms. In every respect they exhibit the
+same mental and emotional qualities as their fellows. The only
+discernible difference is that while in the one case adolescent nature
+is expressed in terms of religion, in the other case it is expressed in
+terms of a larger social life.
+
+The question here might be put thus: Given a generation not taught to
+express its growing life in terms of religion, could adequate and
+satisfactory expression be found in the social life to which adolescence
+is unquestionably an introduction? Many would answer unhesitatingly,
+yes. They would argue that what are called the religious feelings, are
+normal social feelings exploited in the interests of the religious idea.
+They would deny that there is any such thing as a religious quality of
+mind. Any mental quality may be directed to a religious end, but all may
+find complete expression and satisfaction in a non-religious social
+life. This is the real question at issue, and yet Professor James never
+once, in the whole of his 500 pages, addresses himself to it.
+
+Apart from sex, there is the important question of the relation between
+abnormal and morbid nervous states and religious illumination. How far
+has the one been mistaken for the other? To what extent have people
+accepted the outcome of pathological conditions as proofs of intercourse
+with an unseen spiritual world? There is no doubt that among uncivilised
+people this is usually, if not invariably, the case. And our knowledge
+of the relations between the nervous system and mental states--imperfect
+as it still is--is so recent, that it is not surprising that fasting,
+self-torture, solitary meditation, etc., because of the states of mind
+to which they give rise, have been universally valued as aids to the
+religious life. Dr. D. G. Brinton says:--
+
+"When I say that all religions depend for their origin and continuation
+directly upon inspiration, I state an historic fact. It may be known
+under other names, of credit or discredit, as mysticism, ecstasy,
+rhapsody, demoniac possession, the divine afflatus, the gnosis, or, in
+its latest christening, 'cosmic consciousness.' All are but expressions
+of a belief that knowledge arises, words are uttered or actions
+performed not through conscious ideation or reflective purpose, but
+through the promptings of a power above or beyond the individual
+mind."[3]
+
+The connection between very many, at least, of these inspirational moods
+and pathological states is too obvious to be ignored. Professor James
+admits that "we cannot possibly ignore these pathological aspects of the
+subject." His notice of them, however, reminds one of the preacher who
+advised his hearers to look a certain difficulty boldly in the face--and
+pass on. No serious attempt is made to deal with them. A huge mass of
+"religious experiences" is thrown at the reader's head without any
+adequate explanation. It is a glorified revival meeting in an expensive
+volume. The testimony of a crowd of religious enthusiasts of all ages is
+accepted at practically face value. Thus, a religious writer who
+experiences the fairly common feeling of exaltation during a storm at
+sea, and explains his carelessness of danger as resulting from his
+"certainty of eternal life,"[4] is gravely cited as evidence of the
+working of the religious consciousness. What, then, are we to make of
+those who experience a similar feeling, but who are without the
+certainty of eternal life? The declaration of St. Ignatius that a single
+hour of meditation taught him more of the truth of "heavenly things than
+all the teachings of the doctors" is given as evidence of mystic
+illumination.[5] So with numerous other cases. We are even informed that
+"nitrous oxide and ether, especially nitrous oxide, when sufficiently
+diluted with air, stimulate the mystical consciousness in an
+extraordinary degree."[6] There seems no reason why the same claim
+should not be made on behalf of whisky. If one were not assured to the
+contrary, one might conclude that Professor James wrote this volume to
+poke fun at the whole tribe of mystics and their followers.
+
+The use made by Professor James of his long list of cases is the more
+remarkable, since he quite correctly points out that there are no
+religious feelings, only feelings directed towards a religious end. But
+if this be so, how are we justified in taking the accounts of religious
+visionaries as correct descriptions of the nature of their own mental
+states? Clearly, we need a study of these cases quite apart from the
+mystical interpretation of them. Instead of a study Professor James
+presents us with a catalogue--useful from a documentary point of view,
+but useless to any other end. And he is so averse to subjecting his
+examples to analysis that, when the extravagance of certain cases are
+glaring, he warns us that it is unfair to impute narrowness of mind as a
+vice of the individual, because in "religious and theological matters he
+probably absorbs his narrowness from his generation."[7] Granted; only
+one would like to know what reason there is for not deriving virtues as
+well as vices from the same source? And, deeper enquiry still, may not
+the religious interpretation itself be a product of the special
+environment of the period?
+
+The study of religious phenomena from the point of view above indicated
+is of first-rate importance. But although much has been said,
+parenthetically and inferentially, on the subject by various writers,
+the enquiry has never been exhaustively or systematically pursued. This
+is not due to any lack of material; that is abundant among both savage
+and civilised peoples. Perhaps it is because, while it has been
+considered permissible to point out that certain individuals have
+mistaken their own morbid states for evidence of divine illumination,
+too much ill-will would have been aroused had the powerful part played
+by this factor in religious development as a whole been pointed out.
+Still less admissible would it have been to point out, as will be done
+in succeeding chapters, that the deliberate culture of abnormal states
+of mind has been a part of the ritual of religions from the most
+primitive to the most recent times. In this connection it is worth
+noting that a very clear and shrewd essay on the connection between love
+and religious devotion by Isaac d'Israeli, which appeared in the first
+issue of the _Miscellanies of Literature_, was quietly eliminated from
+subsequent editions.
+
+My purpose, therefore, is to give Professor James's query--"Under just
+what biographic conditions did the sacred writers bring forth their
+contributions to the holy volume? and what had they exactly in their
+several individual minds, when they delivered their utterances?"[8]--a
+wider scope. What are the conditions, biographic and social, under which
+certain persons have imagined themselves, and have been believed by
+others, to be specially favoured with divine illumination? The majority
+of people, it may safely be said, are conscious of no such experience.
+In what respect, then, do the favoured few differ from their fellows?
+Must we assume that by some rare quality of natural endowment, or by
+some unusual development of faculty, they are brought into touch with a
+wider and deeper reality? Or are we to seek a less romantic explanation
+with the aid of known tendencies and forces in human nature? And,
+further, as this minority are not conscious of divine illumination all
+the time, what is it that differentiates their normal state from their
+abnormal condition?
+
+These are pertinent questions, and demand answer. But no answer of real
+value will be found in ordinary religious writings. Rhapsodical eulogies
+of religion tell us nothing; less than nothing that is useful, since
+theories that obtain in such quarters are based upon the absolute
+veracity of the phenomena under consideration. We may gather from this
+direction what religious people say or do, but not why they say or do
+these things. A description of the states of mind of religious people,
+such as is given by Professor James, is interesting enough, but it is
+their causation that is of fundamental importance. And their causation
+is only to be understood by associating them with other and more
+fundamental processes. Within recent years psychology owes much of the
+advance made to a closer study of the physiology of the nervous system,
+and if genuine advance is to be made in our understanding of religious
+phenomena we must adopt the same plan of investigation. We do not, for
+example, understand the nature of demoniacal possession by a mere
+collation of cases. It is only when we put them side by side with
+similar cases that now come under the control of the physician, and
+associate them with certain peculiar nervous conditions, and a
+particular social environment, that we find ourselves within sight of a
+rational explanation. Without adopting this plan we are in the position
+of one trying to determine the nature of a locomotive in complete
+ignorance of its internal mechanism. Yet this is precisely the position
+of the professional exponent of religion. As a student the budding
+divine has his head filled with historic creeds, and texts, and dogmas,
+and doctrines, none of which can possibly tell him anything of the real
+nature of religion. On the contrary, they act as so many obstacles to
+his acquiring real knowledge in later life. And it is a striking fact
+that while the professional astronomer, biologist, or physicist each
+adds to our knowledge of the subject that falls within his respective
+department, we owe little or nothing of our knowledge of the nature of
+religion to the professional theologian.
+
+To put the whole matter in a sentence, the study of religion must be
+affiliated to the study of life as a whole. If possible, we must get at
+the determining factors that lead one person to expend his energy on
+religion and see supernatural influence in a thousand and one details of
+his life, while another person, with apparently the same mental
+qualities, finds complete satisfaction in another direction, and is
+conscious of no such supernatural influence. It is scientifically
+inadmissible to posit a "religious faculty" organically ear-marked for
+religious use. Something of this kind is evidently in the minds of those
+who explain Darwin's agnosticism as due to atrophy of his religious
+sense, consequent on over-absorption in scientific pursuits, and who
+also argue that the "religious faculty," like a physiological structure,
+increases in efficiency with use and atrophies with disuse. There is no
+reason for believing that, had Darwin been profoundly religious, his
+mental qualities would have been different to what they were. They would
+have been expressed in a different form, that is all. As I have already
+said, there are no such things as specifically religious qualities of
+the mind. There may be hope or fear or love or hatred or terror or
+devotion or wonder in relation to religion, but they are precisely the
+same mental qualities that meet us in relation to other things. The old
+"faculty" psychology is dead, and the religious faculty must go with
+it.[9] Mental qualities may be roused to activity in connection with a
+belief in the supernatural, or they may be expressed in connection with
+mundane associations. Even the belief in the supernatural is only an
+expression of the same qualities of mind that with fuller knowledge
+result in a scientific generalisation. Whatever be the exciting cause,
+mental qualities themselves remain unchanged.
+
+In the present enquiry we are not concerned with a disproval of the
+religious idea, but with an examination of the conditions of its
+expression; less with the varieties of religious experience than with
+the nature of its manifestations. How far may religious experience be
+explained as a misinterpretation of normal non-religious life? To what
+extent have pathological nervous states influenced the building up of
+the religious consciousness? There can be no question that the
+last-named factor is an important one. This is admitted by Professor
+James in the following passage:--
+
+"You will in point of fact hardly find a religious leader of any kind in
+whose life there is no record of automatisms. I speak not merely of
+savage priests and prophets, whose followers regard automatic utterance
+and action as by itself tantamount to inspiration, I speak of leaders of
+thought and subjects of intellectualised experience. St. Paul had his
+visions, his ecstasies, his gifts of tongues, small as was the
+importance he attached to the latter. The whole array of Christian
+saints and heresiarchs, including the greatest, the Bernards, the
+Loyolas, the Luthers, the Foxes, the Wesleys, had their visions, voices,
+rapt conditions, guiding impressions, and 'openings.' They had these
+things because they had exalted sensibility, and to such things persons
+of exalted sensibility are liable."[10]
+
+The fact is unquestionable, but the question remains, In what sense were
+these people exalted? Did their exalted sensibility really bring them
+into touch with a form of existence hidden from persons of a coarser
+fibre? Or did it belong to a class of cases which in a more violent form
+comes within the province of the physician? The subjects, says Professor
+James, "actually feel themselves played upon by powers beyond their
+will. The evidence is dynamic; the god or spirit moves the very organs
+of their body.... We have distinct professions of being under the
+direction of a foreign power, and serving as its mouthpiece." Of course
+we have, but for diagnostic purposes such professions are quite
+valueless. What these people are conscious of, and all they are
+conscious of, is a series of feelings of a more or less unusual kind.
+Equally convinced was the medieval demoniac that a spirit moved the very
+organs of his body. Equally convinced is the modern spiritualist medium
+that his body is controlled by a disembodied spirit. It is not a
+question of the actuality of certain states, but of their origin. The
+intense conviction of the subject of the seizure is, as evidence, quite
+irrelevant. The subjective state is always real, whether it belongs to a
+saint in ecstasy or a drunkard in delirium tremens. There are no states
+of mind more "real" while they last than those due to opium or hashish.
+But it is never suggested that this is evidence of their veracity. In
+such cases the testimony of a skilled outsider is of far greater value
+than the conviction of the visionary. We are bound to appeal to Paul,
+and Loyola, and Fox, and Wesley to know what their feelings were,
+because here they are the supreme authorities. But we must consult
+others to discover why they experienced these feelings. An illusion is
+no more than a false interpretation of a real subjective experience;
+although many are inclined to treat the rejection of the interpretation
+as equivalent to a charge of imposture or deliberate lying.
+
+It is also a matter of demonstration that these religious experiences
+are strictly determined by environmental conditions. Thousands of
+Christians have been favoured with visions of Jesus or of the Christian
+heaven in their dying moments. Millions of Jews and Mohammedans have
+lived and died without any such experience--the very persons to whom,
+from an evidential point of view--such visions would be most useful. The
+spiritual experience is determined by the pre-existing religious belief.
+When belief in a personal devil was general, visions of Satan were
+common. The evidence for personal conflicts with Satan is of precisely
+the same nature and strength as is the evidence for intercourse with
+deity. When the belief in Satan died out, visions and conflicts with him
+ceased. How can we discriminate between the two classes of cases? Why
+should the testimony of a great Christian character that he is conscious
+of intercourse with deity be more authoritative than the testimony of,
+perhaps, the same person on other occasions, of conflict with a personal
+devil? Moreover, visions and a sense of contact with a super-normal
+world are not peculiar to the religious character. It is a common
+feature of a general psychopathic condition. Medical works are filled
+with such instances. And it is only to be expected that when the
+psychopath is of a deeply religious nature the affection will find a
+religious expression. What is clearly needed is an explanation that will
+cover the phenomenon as it appears in both a religious and a
+non-religious form.
+
+We may take as illustrative of what has been said the following case as
+given by Dr. W. W. Ireland. It is that of a Berlin bookseller who placed
+on record a clear description of his impressions while in ill-health,
+and which entirely ceased on recovery. His delusions mostly took the
+form of human figures; of these he says:--
+
+"I saw, in the full use of my senses, and (after I had got the better of
+the fright which at first seized me, and the disagreeable effects which
+it caused) even in the greatest composure of mind, for almost two
+months, constantly and involuntarily, a number of human and other
+apparitions--nay, I even heard their voices. For the most part I saw
+human figures of both sexes; they commonly passed to and fro, as if they
+had no connection with each other, like people at a fair where all is
+bustle. Sometimes they appeared to have business with one another. Once
+or twice I saw amongst them persons on horseback, and dogs and birds;
+these figures all appeared to me in their natural size, as distinctly as
+if they had existed in real life, with the several tints on the
+uncovered parts of the body, and with all the different kinds and
+colours of clothes."[11]
+
+Here we have the case of a man who was under no misconception as to the
+nature of his visions. But it is safe to say that had he been of a less
+practical and analytic turn of mind, had he been, moreover, deeply
+interested in religious matters, we might have had an altogether
+different presentation of the facts.
+
+In the next instance, also given by Dr. Ireland, we have a religious
+explanation given of somewhat similar experiences:--
+
+"A poor woman complained to me that she was continually persecuted by
+the devils who let loose at her all sorts of blasphemies, and, indeed,
+all the worse the more she exerted herself not to attend to them; but
+often, also, when she was talking and active. She had already been to a
+clergyman who should exorcise the devil, and who had judiciously
+directed her to me. I asked in which ear the devil always talked to her.
+She was surprised at the question, which she had never started for
+herself, but now recognised that it always occurred in the left ear. I
+explained to her that it was an affection of the ear which now and then
+occurs, but she was doubtful."[12]
+
+Here we have a distinctly physical affection ascribed to supernatural
+agency. In this case the inference is promptly corrected by the
+physician. But given a different environment, an atmosphere permeated
+with a belief in the supernatural, an absence of adequate scientific
+advice, and the more primitive explanation is certain to prevail. In the
+next instance--that of Martin Luther--we have just this conjuncture of
+circumstances, with the inevitable result. Writing of his experience in
+1530, Luther says:--
+
+"When I was in Coburg in 1530, I was tormented with a noise in my ear,
+just as though there was some wind tearing through my head. The devil
+had something to do with it.... When I try to work, my head becomes
+filled with all sorts of whizzing, buzzing, thundering noises, and if I
+did not leave off on the instant I should faint away. For the last two
+or three days I have not been able to even look at a letter. My head has
+lessened down to a very short chapter; soon it will be only a paragraph,
+then only a syllable, then nothing at all. The day your letter came from
+Nuremberg I had another visit from the devil.... This time the evil one
+got the better of me, drove me out of my bed, and compelled me to seek
+the face of man."[13]
+
+There is no need to quote more of this class of cases, at least for the
+present. Their name is legion. One could, in fact, construct an
+ascending series of cases, all agreeing in their symptom, and differing
+only in the explanation offered. The series would commence with the
+explanation of a possessing spirit, and end with that of a deranged
+nervous system. Ignorant of the nature, or even of the existence, of a
+nervous system, primitive man explains abnormal mental states as due to
+a malignant spirit. Martin Luther, George Fox, or John Bunyan, living at
+a time when the activity of evil spirits was a firmly held doctrine,
+attribute their infirmities to satanic influence. We are in the true
+line of descent. To-day we have with us every one of the phenomena on
+which the satanic theory rested, but they are described, and prescribed
+for, in medical works instead of manuals of exorcism. The
+supernaturalist theory gives way to that of the expert neurologist. The
+exorcist is replaced by the physician. Instead of expelling an intruding
+demon, we have to repair a deranged system. We cannot argue that while
+these affections remain constant in character their causes may have been
+different in other ages from what they are now. That is pure absurdity.
+To claim that the religious mystic is in moments of exaltation brought
+into contact with a "deeper reality" is to invite the retort that one
+might make a similar claim on behalf of the inmates of a lunatic asylum.
+We cannot, with any pretence to rationality, accept the verdicts of both
+the neurologist and the exorcist. If we agree that certain states of
+mind to-day have their origin in neural disorder, on what ground can we
+believe that similar mental states occurring a thousand or two thousand
+years ago were due to supernatural stimulation? We may be told that
+there are more things in heaven and earth than are dreamed of in our
+philosophy. This may be true, and while it is an observation that would
+not occur to a fool, it needs no supreme wisdom for its excogitation,
+and as generally used it is an excuse for idle speculation and grotesque
+theory. Far more useful is the lesson, sadly needed, that there are few
+things in heaven or earth that will not yield their secret to a method
+of investigation that is sanely conceived and diligently employed.
+
+The utter uselessness of accepting at its face value anyone's
+explanation of the nature of his subjective experience, is well shown by
+the once universal belief in witchcraft. If there is a single belief on
+behalf of which a mass of apparently unimpeachable evidence could be
+produced, it is this one. It has run its course throughout the whole
+world. It is still accepted by probably half the human race. In our own
+country eminent men, not alone theologians, but doctors, lawyers,
+statesmen, and men of letters, have given their solemn testimony in its
+favour. Thousands of people have been bewitched, and their symptoms
+described by thousands of others. More remarkable still, those accused
+have often enough confessed their guilt. Every possible corroboration
+has been given to this belief, and yet it is now scouted by educated
+persons all over the civilised world. Even religious teachers accept the
+explanation that these witchcraft cases were due to distinctly
+pathological conditions, and to the power of suggestion operating upon
+uninformed minds during an unenlightened age. But communications with
+spiritual beings rest on no better foundation than communication with
+Satan. Whether the alleged illumination be diabolic or angelic, the
+evidence for either, or both, is the same. The testimony of a man like
+the Rev. R. J. Campbell that he is conscious of a divine influence in
+his life is of no greater value than that of the medieval peasant who
+felt himself tormented by Satan. The one person is no better authority
+than is the other on such a topic. Both are the heirs of the ages,
+inheritors of a superstition that goes back to the most primitive ages
+of mankind, only modified in its expression by the culture of
+contemporary life.
+
+There is nothing new under the sun, and human nature remains
+substantially unchanged generation after generation. All the phenomena
+on which the belief in witchcraft was based, remain. Cases of delusion
+are common, and the power of suggestion is an established fact in
+psychology. All that has happened is this: taking the facts on which the
+belief was based, modern science has shown them to be explainable
+without the slightest reference to the supernatural. And this is the
+principle that must be applied in other directions. Old occurrences must
+be explained in the light of new knowledge. This is the accepted rule in
+other directions, and it is of peculiar value in relation to religious
+beliefs. To know what religious people have thought and felt and said
+gives us no more than the data for a scientific study of the subject. To
+know _why_ they thought and felt and spoke thus is what we really need
+to understand. But if we are to do this we must relate phases of mind
+that are called religious to other phases of a non-religious character.
+I believe it is quite possible to do this. From medical records and from
+numerous biographies it is possible to parallel all the experiences of
+the religious mystic. We can see the same sense of exaltation, the same
+conviction of illumination, the same belief that one is the tool of a
+superior power. Take, as merely illustrative of this, the case of J.
+Addington Symonds, as narrated by Professor James, who cites it as an
+example of a "mystical experience with chloroform." Symonds tells us
+that until he was twenty-eight years of age he was liable to extreme
+states of exaltation concerning the nature of self. (It is worth while
+pointing out that Sir James Crichton-Browne expresses the opinion that
+Symonds's higher nerve centres were in some degree enfeebled by these
+abnormal states.) In addition to this confession he placed on record an
+interesting experience while under the influence of chloroform. He
+says:--
+
+"After the choking and stifling had passed away, I seemed at first in a
+state of utter blankness; then came flashes of intense light,
+alternating with blankness, and with a keen sense of vision of what was
+going on in the room around me, but no sensation of touch. I thought
+that I was near death; when suddenly my soul became aware of God who was
+manifestly dealing with me, handling me, so to speak, in an intense
+personal reality. I felt him streaming in like light upon me.... I
+cannot describe the ecstasy I felt. Then, as I gradually awoke from the
+influence of the anaesthetic, the old sense of my relation with the
+world began to return, the new sense of my relation to God began to
+fade.... Only think of it. To have felt for that long dateless ecstasy
+of vision the very God, in all purity, tenderness, and truth, and
+absolute love, and then to find that I had after all had no revelation,
+but that I had been tricked by the abnormal excitement of my brain."
+
+With a slight variation of expression this confession might have come
+direct from the lips of the most pronounced mystic. There is no question
+of the intense reality of the experience. That was as vivid as anything
+that ever occurred to any saint in the calendar. Still, no one will
+dream of claiming that the way to get _en rapport_ with the higher
+mysteries is by way of a dose of chloroform. The distinction here is
+that Symonds knew and described the cause of his experience. And no one
+will question that the phrase "tricked by the abnormal excitement of my
+brain" covers the ground. Of course, there is always the easy retort
+that saints and mystics did not use chloroform to produce their visions.
+True, but chloroform is not the only agent by means of which a person
+may be thrown into an abnormal state. Other means may be used; and as a
+matter of fact, the use of herbs and drugs, as methods of producing
+ecstatic states, have obtained in religious ceremonies from the most
+primitive times. As we shall see later, tobacco, hashish, coca, laurel
+water, and similar agents have been largely utilised for this purpose.
+And when this plan is not adopted--although very often the two things
+run side by side--we find fasting and other forms of self-torture
+practised because of the abnormal conditions produced.
+
+It is not argued or implied that in all this there was of necessity
+deliberate imposture. That would imply the possession of greater
+knowledge than actually existed. But it was known that ecstatic states
+followed the use of certain drugs, or were consequent on certain
+austerities, and they were valued because they were believed to bring
+people into communion with a hidden spiritual world. In this way there
+has always been going on a more or less deliberate culture of the
+supernatural, in more primitive times by crude and easily recognisable
+means, later by methods that are more subtle in character and more
+difficult of detection. But the method of inducing a sense of
+"spiritual" illumination by means of practices alien to the normal life
+of man remains unchanged throughout. The collation of the conditions
+under which mystical states of mind are experienced among savages with
+similar experiences among the higher races, proves at once that this
+statement contains no exaggeration of the facts.
+
+The continuity of the phenomena is, indeed, of profound significance,
+and is too often ignored. It is often asserted that we have to explain
+the lower by the higher, and we can only understand the significance of
+religion in its lower forms by bearing in mind the higher
+manifestations. This is sheer fallacy. In nature the higher develops out
+of the lower, of which it is compounded. In biology, for example, it is
+now generally conceded that the secret of animal life lies in the cell.
+This may be modified in all kinds of directions, the resulting organic
+structure may be of the utmost complexity, but the basis remains
+unchanged. So, too, with a great deal of so-called religious phenomena.
+The story is not only continuous, but the same elements remain unchanged
+with only those modifications initiated by a changed environment. And
+just as we are driven back to the cell to explain organic structure, so
+for an understanding of the phenomena under consideration we must study
+their primitive elements. Analysis must precede synthesis here as
+elsewhere.
+
+A survey of the subject is not at all exhausted by a study of abnormal
+conditions, so far as these have entered into the life of religion.
+There still remains the study of perfectly normal frames of mind that
+are misinterpreted and diverted into religious channels. The importance
+of this will be seen more clearly when we come to deal with the subject
+of conversion. That "conversion" is a phenomenon of adolescence is now
+settled beyond all reasonable doubt. Statistics are conclusive on this
+point. But the advocate of revivalism quite misses the true significance
+of the fact. Current religious literature is full of quite meaningless
+chatter concerning the change of view, the larger and more unselfish
+activities, that arise as a consequence of conversion. There is really
+no evidence that the changes indicated have any connection with
+conversion. All that does happen can be more simply and more adequately
+explained as resulting from physiological and psychological changes in
+terms of racial and social evolution. The whole significance of
+adolescence lies in the bursting into activity of feelings hitherto
+dormant, and the quickening of a desire for communion with a larger
+social life. The individual becomes less self-centred, more alive to,
+and more responsive to the claims of others; he displays tendencies
+towards what the world calls self-sacrifice, but which mean, in the
+truest sense, self-realisation. That these changes are often expressed
+in terms of religion is undeniable. This, however, may be no more than
+an environmental accident, quite as much so as was the case when
+epilepsy was explained in terms of possession.
+
+So far as one can see, there are no feelings or impulses characteristic
+of adolescence that could not receive complete satisfaction in a
+rationally ordered social life. To-day it usually happens that the
+strongest expressed influences brought to bear upon the individual are
+of a religious kind, with the result that adolescent human nature is
+most apt to express itself in religious language. It must always be
+borne in mind that we are all as dependent upon our environment for the
+form in which our explanation of things is cast, as we are for the
+language in which we express those ideas. The whole enquiry opened is a
+very wide one, with which I can only deal parenthetically. It is really
+an enquiry as to how far the religious theory of human nature rests upon
+a wrong interpretation of perfectly normal feelings, or to what extent
+supernaturalistic ideas are perpetuated by the exploitation--innocent
+exploitation, maybe--of man's social nature. It is extremely probable
+that a deeper knowledge, a more accurate analysis of human qualities,
+will disclose the truth that man is a social animal in a much more
+profound sense than has usually attached to that phrase, and the
+expression of these qualities in terms of religious beliefs, or in terms
+of non-religious beliefs, is wholly determined by the knowledge current
+in the society in which he moves.
+
+I conclude this chapter with one more attempt to avoid misunderstanding.
+For purposes of clarity it will be necessary to consider various factors
+out of relation to other factors. But it should hardly need pointing out
+that in actual life such a separation does not obtain. The organism
+functions as a whole; each part acts upon and is acted upon by every
+other part. Life in action is a synthesis, and one resorts to analysis
+only for the purpose of more adequate comprehension. It is not,
+moreover, pretended that any one of the factors described in the
+following pages will explain religion, nor even that all of them
+combined will do so. The origin of the religious idea is a quite
+different enquiry, and is adequately dealt with in the writings of men
+like Tylor, Frazer, Spencer, and other representatives of the various
+schools of anthropologists. My present purpose is of a more restricted
+kind. It is that of tracing the operation of various processes, some
+normal, but most of them abnormal, that have in all ages been accepted
+as evidence for the supernatural. That the religious idea has been
+associated with these processes, and that for multitudes they have
+served as strong evidence of its truth, cannot be denied. And an
+examination of this aspect of the history of religion ought not to be
+ignored, however unpalatable such a study may be to certain
+supersensitive minds.
+
+
+FOOTNOTES:
+
+[1] _Varieties of Religious Experience_, pp. 11-3.
+
+[2] _Varieties_, p. 14.
+
+[3] _Religions of Primitive Peoples_, p. 50.
+
+[4] Page 288.
+
+[5] Page 410.
+
+[6] Page 387.
+
+[7] Page 370.
+
+[8] _Varieties_, p. 4.
+
+[9] "The hypothesis of faculties ... must be regarded as productive of
+much error in psychology. It has led to the false supposition that
+mental activity, instead of being one and the same throughout its
+manifold phases, is a juxtaposition of totally distinct activities,
+answering to a bundle of detached powers, somehow standing side by side,
+and exerting no influence on one another. Sometimes this absolute
+separation of the parts of mind has gone so far as to personify the
+several faculties as though they were distinct entities."--Sully,
+_Outlines of Psychology_, p. 26.
+
+[10] _Varieties_, p. 478.
+
+[11] _The Blot upon the Brain_, p. 4.
+
+[12] _The Blot upon the Brain_, p. 16.
+
+[13] Cited by Dr. Ireland, p. 49.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER TWO
+
+THE PRIMITIVE MIND & ITS ENVIRONMENT
+
+
+Ever since the time of Aristotle it has been an accepted truth that man
+is a social animal. Not only is individual human nature such that it
+craves for intercourse with its kind, but it can only be effectively
+understood in the light of those thousands of generations of associated
+life that lie behind us all. As an isolated object, considered, that is,
+apart from his fellows, man is more or less of a myth. At any rate, he
+would not be the man we know and so may well be left out of account. Man
+as we know him is essentially a member of a group; he is a part of a
+really organic structure inasmuch as the characteristics of each part
+are determined by its relations to the whole, and the characteristics of
+the whole determined by a synthesis of the qualities of the parts.
+
+But while there is agreement in the fact, there is a considerable
+divergence of opinion as to its nature. What is the nature of this fact
+of sociability? What is the character of the force that binds the
+members of a group so closely together? By some, the cause of
+sociability is found in the pressure exerted upon all by purely external
+forces. The need for protection, it is said, drives human beings
+together, and thus in course of time the feeling of sociability is
+developed. This seems much like mistaking a consequence for a cause. It
+certainly leaves unanswered the question _Why_ should people have drawn
+together in the face of danger? Most certainly collective action
+strengthens the capacity for defence; and it also increases the
+certainty of obtaining the means of subsistence. Such consequences
+furnish a justification, so to speak, of group life, but they disclose
+neither its nature nor its cause. And most certainly they do not bring
+us into touch with the fundamental qualities of _human_ society. The
+need for food, shelter, or protection will not differentiate the
+gregarious from the non-gregarious forms of life, nor the social from
+the merely gregarious. All forms of life require food, protection, and
+shelter; they are part of animal economics. There is nothing
+specifically human about them.
+
+We may reach what I conceive to be the truth in another way. Environment
+is to-day almost a cant word. It is very largely used, and, as one might
+expect, largely misunderstood. Without actually saying it in so many
+words, a vast number of people seem to conceive the environment as
+consisting of the purely material surroundings of man. This is to
+overlook a most important fact. Even in the lowest stages of human
+society, where man's power over natural forces is of the poorest kind,
+it is not an exact statement of the case, and it is profoundly untrue
+when we take society in its higher developments. If we take the lowest
+existing savage race we find that its attitude towards life, what it
+does, and what it refrains from doing, is the product of a certain
+mental attitude, which is itself the outcome of a number of inherited
+ideas and customs. A number of white people, placed in exactly the same
+material environment and faced with exactly the same external
+circumstances, bring a different psychological inheritance into play,
+and act in an entirely different manner. If we transport a Chinaman into
+England, or an Englishman into China, we find that both of them possess
+the same biological and material needs whether in their native country
+or elsewhere. Yet this community of needs does not make the Chinaman a
+member of English society, nor an Englishman a member of Chinese
+society. They are one in virtue of certain broad human characteristics;
+they are divided by certain qualities characteristic of their special
+groups. Each society is marked by the possession of certain
+psychological characteristics--a number of specific beliefs and
+emotional developments--without which its distinctive group character
+disappears. This is true of groups within the State; it is true of the
+State as a whole; it is true, on the most general scale of all, of the
+race.
+
+In other words, the distinguishing feature of human society is the
+possession of a psychological medium. The adaptations that the human
+being must make are mainly of a psychological character. Their _form_
+may be partly determined by external conditions, but this does not
+affect the general truth. Whether we take man in a civilised or in an
+uncivilised state we find the important thing about him to be his
+relations to his fellows. He is not merely a member of a tribe or a
+society, but he thinks that society's thoughts, he feels their emotions,
+his individual life is an expression of the psychical life of the group
+to which he belongs. And his transactions with nature are an expression
+of the ideas and beliefs current in the society of which he is a part.
+
+The recognition of this truth was one of the outstanding contributions
+of Herbert Spencer to the science of sociology. Whereas other writers
+had stressed the power of the environment, as a purely material thing,
+in shaping human institutions, Spencer placed chief stress upon the
+emotional and intellectual life of primitive man as determining their
+beginnings. He showed how man's feelings and beliefs about himself, and
+about his fellows, and about the world of living forces with which he
+believed himself to be surrounded, were the all-important factors of
+social evolution. And the subsequent history of society has been such
+that scientific sociology is very largely the study of the growth and
+elaboration of an essentially psychical environment. The lower animal
+world--except so far as we allow for the operation of instincts--has,
+broadly, only the existence of other animals and the physical
+surroundings for its environment. With man it is vastly different. Owing
+primarily to language, the environment of the man of to-day is made up
+in part of the ideas of men who lived and died thousands of years ago.
+The use of clothing and the invention of tools would alone make mind a
+dominant fact in human life. But apart from these things, the great fact
+of social heredity, in virtue of which one generation enjoys the
+acquired culture of preceding generations, and without which
+civilisation would have no existence, is a great and dominant _mental_
+fact. Our institutions, our customs, are transmitted to us as so many
+psychic facts. Every new invention, every fresh culture acquisition, is
+helping to strengthen and broaden the psychical environment of man. Each
+newcomer is born into it; it moulds his nature and determines his life,
+as his own career and his own acquisition help to mould the life of his
+successors. Whether the phenomena be simple or complex, whether we are
+dealing with man in a civilised or in an uncivilised state, there is no
+escape from the general truth that man is everywhere under the
+domination of his mental life.
+
+So far as this enquiry is concerned, we need only deal with one aspect
+of the psychological medium in which primitive human life moves. And so
+far as primitive mankind seeks to control the movements of social life,
+there can be no question that this is done under the impulsion of that
+class of beliefs which we call religious. The operation of religious
+belief in savage society is neither spasmodic nor local. It is, on the
+contrary, universal and persistent. It influences every event of daily
+life with a force that the modern mind finds very difficult to
+appreciate. In almost every action the savage feels himself to be in
+touch with a supersensual world of living beings that exert a direct and
+inescapable influence. And any study of human evolution that is to be of
+real value must take this circumstance into consideration to a far
+greater extent than is usually done. Professor Frazer, dealing with the
+origin of various social institutions, rightly observes that "we are
+only beginning to understand the mind of the savage, and therefore the
+mind of our savage forefathers who created these institutions and handed
+them down to us," and warns us that "a knowledge of the truth may
+involve a reconstruction of society such as we can hardly dream of." He
+also warns us that we have at all times, in dealing with social origins,
+to "reckon with the influence of superstition, which pervades the life
+of the savage and has contributed to build up the social organism to an
+incalculable extent."[14]
+
+In emphasising this it must not be taken to imply that because social
+institutions and human actions are in primitive times moulded by
+religious beliefs, they stand to them in a relation of complete
+dependence. It only means that the psychological medium is of such a
+character that supernaturalistic reasons are found for doings things
+that are susceptible to a totally different explanation. The facts of
+life are expressed in terms of supernaturalism. Birth, marriage, death,
+social cohesion, leadership, health and disease, are all natural facts,
+and the mere play of social selection determines the weeding out of
+practices that are sufficiently adverse to tribal well-being to threaten
+its security. But in primitive times all these facts are allied with
+religious beliefs, and to the primitive mind the religious belief
+becomes the chief feature connected with them. As a matter of fact, this
+is far from an uncommon feature of social life to-day. The amount of
+supernaturalism current is still very large; and one still finds people
+explaining some of the plainest facts of social life in terms of
+supernaturalistic beliefs. It is all part of the truth that man is
+always under the domination of the psychological forces.
+
+This being granted, the enquiry immediately presents itself, How comes
+it that the facts of social life should be expressed in terms of
+supernaturalism? Why do these facts not immediately present themselves
+in their true nature? To answer this question one must bear in mind a
+yet further truth. This is that the explanation which man offers to
+himself or to others of phenomena must always be in terms of current
+knowledge. A modern called upon to explain a storm, an eclipse, or a
+disease, does so in terms of current physical or biological science.
+This is done in virtue of a mass of prepared knowledge, slowly
+accumulated by preceding generations, and which forms part of his social
+heritage. Primitive man likewise explains things in terms of current
+knowledge, but in his case the amount of reliable information is of a
+very scanty and generally erroneous description. The inherited knowledge
+which enables a modern schoolboy to start life with what would have been
+an outfit to an ancient philosopher, had yet to be created. Instead of
+finding, as we find, tools ready to hand, replies prepared to questions
+that may arise, primitive mankind must create its own tools and prepare
+its own answers. And in consequence of this the social environment,
+which at all times determines the form of man's mental output, is with
+primitive man radically different from our own. But however the form
+varies there is agreement on this one point--in both cases phenomena are
+explained in terms of known forces; the reasoning of each is determined
+by the knowledge of each. The laws of mental life remain the same in all
+stages of culture. The brain functions identically whether we take the
+savage or the scientist. In a general way the savage intelligence is as
+rational as that of a modern thinker. The difference is dependent upon
+the accuracy and extent of the information possessed by each. Hence the
+vital difference in the conclusions reached. Hence, too, the dominance
+of supernaturalism in primitive times.
+
+The great distinction between primitive and scientific thinking may be
+expressed in a sentence--the modern mind explains man by the world,
+primitive thought explained the world by man. In the one case we move
+from within outward, in the other from without inward. We are not now
+concerned with semi-metaphysical idealistic theories that would reduce
+the "whole choir of heaven and furniture of earth" to the creation of
+mental activity, but with the plain, understandable truth that the
+human organism is fashioned by the environment in which it dwells. And
+there is amongst those capable of expressing an authoritative
+opinion--an agreement supported by evidence that has simply nothing
+against it--that the world of primitive man is overpoweringly animistic.
+In the absence of that mass of scientifically verified knowledge which
+forms part of our social heritage, humanity commences its intellectual
+career by endowing natural forces with the qualities possessed by
+itself. The forces conceived are living ones. They are to be dreaded
+exactly as human beings are to be dreaded; to be appeased or
+circumvented by the same methods that man applies to his fellows. The
+problem before the savage is thus a very real one. In essence it is the
+problem that is ever before humanity--that of subjugating forces to its
+own welfare. Primitive man is not, however, concerned with the
+elaboration of theories; nor is he consumed with vague 'spiritual
+yearnings.' His difficulty is how to control or placate those invisible
+but very real powers upon which he believes everything depends. He would
+willingly ignore them if he could, and would cheerfully dispense with
+their presence altogether if he believed that things would proceed as
+well in their absence. But there they are, inescapable facts that have
+to be reckoned with.
+
+The general outlook of the primitive mind is well put by Miss Mary
+Kingsley in the following passage:--
+
+"To the African the Universe is made up of matter permeated by spirit.
+Everything happens by the direct action of spirit. The thing he does
+himself is done by the spirit within him acting on his body ...
+everything that is done by other things is done by their spirit
+associated with their particular mass of matter.... The native will
+point out to you a lightning-stricken tree and tell you that its spirit
+has been killed. He will tell you, when the earthen cooking pot is
+broken, it has lost its spirit. If his weapon fails him, it is because
+someone has stolen its spirit or made it weak by means of his influence
+on spirits of the same class.... In every action of his life he shows
+you how he lives with a great spirit world around him. You see him
+before he starts out to fight rubbing stuff into his weapon to
+strengthen the spirit that is in it; telling it the while what care he
+has taken of it.... You see him leaning over the face of the water
+talking to its spirit with proper incantations, asking it when it meets
+an enemy of his to upset his canoe and destroy him.... If a man is
+knocked on the head with a club, or shot by an arrow or a bullet, the
+cause of death is clearly the malignity of persons using these weapons;
+and so it is easy to think that a man killed by the falling of a tree,
+or by the upsetting of a canoe in the surf, or in a whirlpool in the
+river is also a victim of some being using these things as weapons. For
+a man holding this view, it seems both natural and easy to regard
+disease as a manifestation of the wrath of some invisible being, and to
+construct that intricate system which we find among the Africans, and
+agree to call Witchcraft, Fetish, or Juju."[15]
+
+Miss Kingsley is here dealing specifically with West Africa, but her
+description applies in a general way to uncivilised people all over the
+world. There is much closer resemblance between the beliefs of
+uncivilised peoples than between civilised ones, because the conditions
+are much more alike. And under substantially identical conditions the
+human mind has everywhere reached substantially identical conclusions.
+The philosophy of the savage is simple, comprehensive, and, given the
+data, logical. He does not divide the world into the natural and the
+supernatural; it is all one. At most, he has only the seen and the
+unseen. The supernatural, as a distinct category, only appears when a
+definite knowledge of the natural has arisen to which it can be opposed.
+He has no such distinction as that of the material and the immaterial;
+so far as he thinks of these things, the invisible is only a finer form
+of the visible. Of one thing, however, he is perfectly convinced, and
+this is that he is at all times surrounded by a host of invisible
+agencies to which all occurrences are due, and with whom he must come to
+terms. Even death wears a different aspect to the primitive mind from
+that which it presents to the modern. To us death puts a sharp and
+abrupt termination to life. To the primitive mind death involves no such
+ending.[16] Death is no more of a break than is sleep; and at all times
+the conception of an annihilation of personality requires a marked
+degree of mental power. So with the savage--the 'dead' man simply goes
+on living. He may be incarnated in some natural object, or he may simply
+go on living as one of the innumerable company of tribal ghosts. But he
+remains a force to be reckoned with, and the need for dealing with these
+ghostly personages is one of the ever-present problems of primitive
+sociology, and brings us very near the beginnings of all religious
+beliefs and ceremonies--if it does not form their real starting-point.
+
+On one point all modern schools of anthropologists are agreed. This is
+that man's first conception of the supernatural--or what afterwards
+ranks as such--is derived from a purely mistaken interpretation of
+natural phenomena. In this they have returned to the standpoint of
+Hobbes, that "fear of things invisible" forms the "natural seed of
+religion." One source of origin of this belief in a supernatural world
+is certainly found in the phenomena of dreaming. To the savage his
+dreams are as real as his waking experiences. He does not _dream_ he
+goes to distant places; he goes there during his sleep. He does not
+_dream_ that people visit him; they actually come. If a West African
+wakes up in the morning with a tired, bruised feeling, this arises, as
+Miss Kingsley says, from his 'soul' having been out fighting and got
+ill-treated. The only philosophy of dreaming amongst savage races is
+that of the excursions and incursions of a 'soul' or double.
+
+Another powerful factor in the development of belief in the supernatural
+is that of man's attempt to explain natural happenings. Why do things
+happen? Why does the sun rise and set, why does rain fall, thunder
+crash, rivers flow? Note the way in which a child answers similar
+questions, and one is on the track of the primitive intelligence. If
+man's own movements are caused by a 'soul' or double, then other things
+must also move because they possess a 'soul.' If an answer is to be
+found at all, it is only along these lines that the primitive mind is
+able to find it. And, once the answer is given, there are a thousand
+and one things occurring that lend it apparent support. Resemblances in
+nature, coincidences, echoes, shadows, etc., all give their support to
+this primitive hypothesis--the only one possible in the circumstances,
+and the one still endorsed by the majority of the world's population.
+
+Particularly strong endorsement of this belief is supplied by disease
+and abnormal nervous states. Instances to illustrate this are
+innumerable, but from the numerous cases cited by Spencer I select the
+following: Among the Amazulus convulsions are believed to be caused by
+ancestral spirits. With Asiatic races epileptics are regarded as
+possessed by demons. With the Kirghiz the involuntary muscular movements
+of a woman in childbirth are believed to be caused by a spirit taking
+possession of the body. The Samoans attribute all madness to possession.
+The Congo people have the same notion of epilepsy. The East Africans
+believe that falling sickness is due to spirits.[17] In Rajputana, says
+Mr. W. Crooke, disease is generally attributed to Khor or the agency of
+offended spirits. The Mahadeo Kolis of Ahmadnagar believe that every
+malady or disease that seizes man, woman, or child, or cattle, is caused
+either by evil spirits or by an angry god. The Bijapur Veddas have a
+yearly feast to their ancestors to prevent the dead bringing sickness
+into the house.[18] "A Catholic missionary," says Professor Frazer,
+"observes that in New Guinea the _nepir_, or sorcerer, is everywhere....
+Nothing happens without the sorcerer's intervention; wars, marriage,
+death, expeditions, fishing, hunting, always and everywhere the
+sorcerer."[19]
+
+In Ancient Egypt, Chaldea, and Assyria there is ample evidence that the
+same belief flourished. Everywhere we find the exorcist and the
+witch-doctor existing as natural consequents of the belief that disease
+has a supernatural origin. We see it in both the teaching and practice
+of the early Christian Church. That great father of the Church, Origen,
+says: "It is demons which produce famine, unfruitfulness, corruption of
+the air, and pestilence." St. Augustine said that "All diseases of
+Christians are to be ascribed to demons." The Church of England still
+retains in its Articles an authorisation for the expulsion of demons;
+and a number of charms yet in wide use amongst civilised nations show
+how persistent is this belief. For centuries there existed all over
+Europe sacred pools, wells, grottos, etc., all bearing eloquent witness
+to the deep-seated belief that disease was of supernatural origin, and
+was to be conquered by supernatural means.
+
+Enough has been said to indicate the kind of environment in which
+primitive man moves, and also to understand why ideas concerning the
+supernatural exert such an enormous influence in early society. In a
+world where everything was yet to be learned, man's first attempts at
+understanding himself and his fellows were necessarily blundering and
+tentative. His first attempts at explanation are expressed in terms of
+his own nature. He sees himself, his own passions, strengths, and
+weaknesses reflected in the nature around him. This is the outstanding,
+dominating fact in primitive life. Leave out this consideration and
+primitive sociology becomes a chaos. Admit it, and we see the reason why
+social institutions assumed the form they took, and also a key to much
+that happens in subsequent human history. In primitive life religious
+beliefs are not something separate from other forms of social life; so
+far as man seeks consciously to shape that life they are to him an
+essential part of it. And the mistake once made is perpetuated. The
+initial blunder once committed, daily experience seems to give it
+constant justification. In the absence of knowledge concerning natural
+forces every event,--particularly if unusual,--every case of disease,
+endorses and strengthens the mistake made. A psychological fatality
+drives the human race along the wrong path of investigation, and only
+very slowly is the mistake rectified. One cannot see how it could have
+been otherwise. The only corrective is knowledge, and knowledge is a
+plant of slow growth. This psychological first step was man's first
+attempt to frame a theory of things satisfactory to his intellect--an
+attempt that, beginning in the crude animism of the savage, ends in the
+verifiable laws of modern science.
+
+From the point of view of our present enquiry two things are to be
+noted. The first is that man's conviction of the nearness of a
+supernatural world began in his lack of knowledge concerning the nature
+of natural forces. Of this there can be little doubt. One can take all
+the facts upon which primitive mankind built, and still builds, its
+theories of supernaturalism, and show that they may be explained in a
+quite different manner. The movements of the planets, the rush of
+comets, the presence of disaster, the thousand and one operations of
+natural forces no longer suggest to educated minds the action of
+personal beings. The whole data of the primitive theory of things have
+been rejected. The premises were false, and the conclusions necessarily
+false also.
+
+The second point is that from the earliest times one of the strongest
+proofs of human contact with a supernatural world has been found in the
+existence of abnormal or pathological states of mind. These may have
+sometimes arisen quite naturally; at other times they have been
+deliberately induced. How much the perpetuation of religious beliefs as
+a whole owes to this factor has never yet been adequately realised. That
+it has had a very great influence seems beyond dispute. For it seems
+certain that had not "proofs" of a supernatural world been offered in
+the shape of visions, ecstatic states, etc., religious beliefs would
+hardly have exercised the power that has been theirs. The number of
+people who are able to maintain a strong consciousness of the truth of
+religion, merely looking at it as a philosophy of existence, is
+naturally very few. The great majority require more tangible evidence if
+their belief is to be kept alive and active. And curiously enough, the
+very growth of a naturalistic explanation has driven a great many to
+find the evidence they desired in those abnormal states of mind that
+seemed to defy scientific analysis. In succeeding chapters evidence will
+be given to show to what extent this kind of evidence for the
+supernatural has been offered and accepted. It will be seen, as
+Professor Tylor points out, that the line of religious development is
+continuous. The latest forms stretch back in an unbroken line to the
+earliest. And if this proves nothing else, it at least proves that
+consequences do not always die out with the conditions that gave them
+birth. It was the world of the savage that gave birth to the
+supernatural. But the supernatural is still with us, even though the
+world that gave it birth has disappeared. We retain conclusions based on
+admittedly false premises.
+
+
+FOOTNOTES:
+
+[14] _Lectures on the Early History of the Kingship_, pp. 36-7.
+
+[15] _West African Studies_, pp. 394-6.
+
+[16] See an interesting article on this point by W. H. R. Rivers on "The
+Primitive Conception of Death," in _The Hibbert Journal_ for Jan. 1912.
+
+[17] _Principles of Sociology_, vol. i.
+
+[18] _Popular Religion and Folklore of Northern India_, i. p. 124.
+
+[19] _Golden Bough_, 3rd ed., i. 337.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER THREE
+
+THE RELIGION OF MENTAL DISEASE
+
+
+"It is an interesting problem," says Professor J. H. Leuba, "to
+determine what influences have led theologians to anchor their beliefs
+upon the proposition that religious experience differs from other forms
+of consciousness in that it gives one an _immediate_ knowledge of the
+external existence of certain objects of belief, although they do not
+fall under the senses, and an immediate knowledge of the truth of
+certain historical facts."[20] This is, indeed, an interesting problem,
+and, we may add, one of growing importance, since there is a pronounced
+tendency on the part of present-day exponents of religion to rest their
+case almost entirely upon the immediacy of their religious
+consciousness. This conception of a certain order of experience,
+however, is not and cannot have always existed. A belief may be so
+widely and so generally diffused that it is accepted without resistance,
+and, as it would almost seem, in the absence of evidence. But its
+intuitive character is only superficial, and disappears on careful
+examination. The mere vogue of a belief constitutes in itself a kind of
+evidence, and for many people the most powerful kind of evidence. But
+the conviction itself has a history, and it is in the unravelling of
+that history, in the discovery of the class of facts upon which the
+conviction has been built, that the work lies. And when this is done it
+will be found that our intuitions are invariably based upon a
+continuous--even though partly unconscious--appeal to facts. Sometimes
+it will, of course, be found that a renewed and deliberate appeal to the
+facts in question will justify the conviction. At other times it will
+be found that the facts demand an altogether new interpretation. For
+centuries all the observed facts supported a conviction that the earth
+was flat. It was a fresh scrutiny of the facts in the light of a new
+conception that revolutionised human opinion on the subject.
+
+What, then, is the history, and what are the facts upon which the belief
+that religious experience brings man into contact with a kind of
+existence not given in ordinary experience, is based? The kind of answer
+that will be given to this question has already been indicated.
+Religious beliefs are in their origin of the nature of an induction from
+an observed order. The induction is not the result of that careful
+collection of facts, leading up to an equally careful generalisation and
+subsequent verification, which is a characteristic of modern science,
+but it is an induction none the less. The primitive mind is not so much
+engaged in seeking an explanation of certain experiences, as it has an
+explanation forced upon it. To picture the savage as inventing a theory
+in the sense in which Darwin propounded the theory of Natural Selection
+is to quite misconceive the nature of the savage intelligence. But to
+conceive the savage as having a certain explanation suggested by the
+pressure of repeated experiences, and that this explanation subsequently
+assumes the character of a fixed belief, is well within the scope of the
+facts known to us. In this stage of culture the existence of
+supernatural beings is as much a deduction from experience as any modern
+scientific generalisation. Certain things are seen, certain feelings are
+experienced, and the conclusion is that they are the products of
+supernatural agency. From this point of view religion is no more than a
+primitive science. It is the first stage of that long series of
+generalisations which, beginning with crude animism, ends with the
+discoveries of a Copernicus, a Newton, a Darwin, or a Spencer. It is a
+history that begins with vitalism and ends with mechanism. We commence
+with a world in which there exists a chaotic assemblage of independent
+personal forces, and end with a universe that is self-acting,
+self-adjusting, self-contained, and in which science makes no allowance
+for the operation of intelligence save such as meets us in animal
+organisation.
+
+Now amongst the facts that suggest to the primitive intelligence the
+operation of 'spiritual' forces are those connected with the human
+organism itself in both its normal and abnormal states. But it is
+important to note--particularly so for the understanding of the part
+played by ecstatic religious phenomena in comparatively recent
+times--that once the occurrence of a certain state of mind is conceived
+as the product of intercourse between man and spirits, there is every
+inducement to cultivate these frames of mind whenever renewed
+intercourse is desired. This does not imply, at least in the earlier
+stages, conscious imposture. Generally the operator imposes on himself
+as much as he imposes on others. Noting that privation of body, or
+torture of mind, or the use of certain herbs is followed by visions or
+ecstasy, it is believed, not that the vision is the product of the
+practice, but that the practice is the condition of illumination.
+
+This attitude of mind is fairly paralleled by what takes place at the
+ordinary spiritualistic _seance_. Those attending are advised that the
+chief condition of a communication with the inhabitants of the other
+world is a passive state of mind. This passivity cannot exclude
+expectancy, since it is only assumed in order that something may occur.
+If nothing occurs, if no communications are received, it is because the
+requisite conditions have not been fulfilled, and the sceptic is met
+with much semi-scientific jargon as to conditions being necessary to
+every scientific investigation. The fact that this passivity and
+expectancy, with other attendant circumstances, not the least of which
+is the contagious influence of a number of people with a similar mental
+disposition, opens the way to self-delusion is ignored. Then when the
+expected and desired result follows, the mental attitude cultivated is
+taken as the condition of communication with the spiritual world,
+instead of its being, in all probability, the true cause of what is
+experienced. In this way the story of supernatural intercourse runs
+clear and unbroken from primitive savagery to its survival in modern
+civilisation. When Professor Tylor says, "The conception of the human
+soul is, as to its most essential nature, continuous from the philosophy
+of the savage thinker to that of the modern professor of theology,"[21]
+he makes a statement that is true of the whole story of supernatural
+intercourse in all its varied manifestations.
+
+The chief distinction between primitive and modern man lies in the
+consideration that in the first case the blunder is inevitable, in the
+latter case the remedy lies to hand. How could primitive man be aware of
+the real connection between the use of certain drugs or herbs and an
+excitation or depression of the activities of the nervous system? He
+does observe consequences, but he is quite ignorant of causes. Even
+to-day their full consequences are unknown; and it is absurd to expect
+that savage humanity should have been better informed. And even when a
+more rational theory exists, the practice persists under various forms.
+This is a principle that receives vivid illustration from the history of
+religions. The modern believer in mystical states of consciousness no
+longer advocates the use of drugs, and even fasting is going out of
+fashion. But we still have a continuation of the primitive practice in
+the shape of insistence on the cultivation of abnormal frames of mind if
+we are to experience a consciousness of communion with an alleged
+supersensible reality. That is, we are to achieve by a mental discipline
+what the savage or the medieval monk achieved by coarser and more
+obvious methods. To withdraw the mind from the normal influence of
+everyday life is to expose it to the play of hallucination and delusion.
+There is really no vital difference between unhealthy, solitary brooding
+on a given subject and drugging the mind with hashish. This class of
+modern mystic is one with the savage in an inability to recognise that
+the illumination is the product of the discipline, not the mere
+condition of its possession. Between the drug of the savage, the fasting
+and self-torture of the medieval monk and the prayerful meditation of
+the modern mystic, the difference is only that of changed times and
+altered conditions. The method is the same throughout.
+
+The truth of this has been well put by Tylor:--
+
+"The religious beliefs of the lower races are in no small measure based
+on the evidence of visions and dreams, regarded as actual intercourse
+with spiritual being. From the earliest stages of culture we find
+religion in close alliance with ecstatic physical conditions. These are
+brought on by various means of interference with the healthy action of
+body and mind, and it is scarcely needful to remind the reader that,
+according to philosophic theories antecedent to those of modern
+medicine, such morbid disturbances are explained as symptoms of divine
+visitation, or at least of superhuman spirituality. Among the strongest
+means of disturbing the functions of the mind so as to produce ecstatic
+vision, is fasting, accompanied, as it usually is, with other
+privations, and with prolonged solitary contemplation in the desert or
+in the forest. Among the ordinary vicissitudes of savage life, the wild
+hunter has many a time to try involuntarily the effects of such a life
+for days together, and under these circumstances he soon comes to see
+and talk with phantoms which are to him invisible spirits. The secret of
+spiritual intercourse thus learnt, he has thence-forth but to reproduce
+the cause in order to renew the effects."[22]
+
+As a means, then, of strengthening and perpetuating a consciousness of
+intercourse with the spiritual world, we have to reckon with, not merely
+the accidental occurrence of abnormal nervous conditions, but with their
+deliberate cultivation. The practice is world-wide, and persists in some
+form or other in all ages. Thus we find the Australians and many tribes
+of North American Indians use tobacco for this purpose. In Western
+Siberia a species of fungi, the 'fly Agaric,' so called because it is
+often steeped and the solution used to destroy house flies, is used to
+produce religious ecstasy. Its action on the muscular system is
+stimulatory, and it greatly excites the nervous system.[23] An early
+Spanish observer says of the ancient Mexicans that they used a kind of
+mushroom, "which are eaten raw, and on account of being bitter, they
+drink after them, or eat with them a little honey of bees, and shortly
+after they see a thousand visions."[24] The mushroom was called the
+"bread of the gods." The Californian Indians give children tobacco, in
+order to receive instruction from the resulting visions. North American
+Indians held intoxication by tobacco to be supernatural ecstasy, and the
+dreams of men in this state to be inspired. The Darien Indians use the
+seeds of the Datura Sanguinea to induce visions. In Peru the priests
+prepared themselves for intercourse with the gods by partaking of a
+narcotic drink from the same plant. In Guiana the priest was prepared
+for his functions by fasting and flagellation, and was afterwards dosed
+with tobacco juice.[25] In India the Laws of Manu give explicit
+instructions as to the means of producing visions. Chief of these is the
+use of the 'Soma' drink. This is prepared from the flower of the lotus.
+The sap of this, says De Candolle, would be poisonous if taken in large
+quantities, but in small doses merely induces hallucination. Opium and
+hashish, a preparation of the hemp plant, have been in general use among
+Eastern peoples, as a means of producing ecstasy from remote antiquity.
+Opium, it is well known, produces an extraordinary state of exaltation,
+intensifying the sense of one's personality, and inducing a pleasurable
+consciousness of mental strength and clarity. Under its influence, as De
+Quincey said, time lengthens to infinity and space swells to
+immensity.[26] Belladonna, a drug much used by medieval witches and
+sorcerers, has also had its vogue for purely religious purposes. With
+the Greeks the laurel was sacred to AEsculapius. Those who wished to ask
+counsel of the god appeared before the altar crowned with laurel and
+chewing its leaves. Before prophesying, the Greek priestesses drank a
+preparation of laurel water. This contains, although it was, of course,
+unknown to them, two toxic substances--prussic acid and the volatile oil
+of laurel. The first would induce convulsions, the second, hallucinatory
+visions. The two combined were calculated to produce with both subject
+and observer a profound impression of spiritual illumination and
+possession.
+
+It is unnecessary to multiply examples of the action of various drugs or
+herbs on the nervous system, or to cite the people who use them. Enough
+has been said to indicate how widespread is the practice, and the
+consequences are not hard to foresee. A very moderate development of
+intelligence would enable men to associate certain consequences with the
+use of particular drugs, but a very considerable amount of knowledge
+would be required to explain why these consequences were produced. In a
+social environment saturated with superstition the explanation lies
+ready to hand, and is accepted without question. A people that sees
+spiritual agency in all the familiar phenomena of nature are certainly
+not less likely to trace its influence in the mysterious and
+unaccountable effects of narcotics and stimulants. And each repeated
+experiment provides additional proof. Man thus not only believes himself
+to be surrounded by a spiritual world; he is actually able to enter into
+communication with it by methods that are defined in the clearest
+possible manner. Every repetition strengthens the delusion and even
+when the delusion, as such, is exploded, the temper of mind induced by
+it persists.
+
+Various other methods are employed to induce a feeling of religious
+exaltation. Prominent among these are dancing and singing. Dancing in
+connection with religious ceremonies is now generally outgrown in the
+civilised world, but singing is still the vogue. That is, singing is
+not, it must be remembered, practised from any desire to cultivate a
+love of music, although it may appeal to music-lovers. Still, its avowed
+purpose is to induce a feeling of devoutness in the congregation. The
+hypnotic consequences of a body of people singing in unison, or the
+soothing, mystical effect of certain airs from a choir upon a
+congregation, are recognised in practice if not in theory. This is a
+phenomenon that is not, of course, exclusively associated with religion.
+In this as in other instances religion only utilises the ordinary
+qualities of human nature. But in all cases the purpose and the result
+are the same. That is, the subject is placed for the time being in a
+supernormal condition, and the mild state of passivity or enthusiasm
+created makes him more susceptible to the influence brought to bear upon
+him. This is true of religious singing and chanting, from the forest
+gatherings of the primitive savage down to the more sedate and elaborate
+assemblages in church or chapel.
+
+Primitive dancing had both a sexual and religious significance,
+although, as will be seen later, in the primitive mind the sexual
+functions themselves are very closely associated with supernatural
+agency. Tylor is of opinion that originally men and women dance in order
+to express their feelings and wishes,[27] but it is certain it very
+early and universally became associated with religious ceremonies, and
+that because of the ecstasy induced. In some cases drug-taking and
+dancing go together. In others, reliance is placed on dancing alone.
+This latter is the case with the 'devil dancers' of Ceylon. In Africa
+the witch doctor discovers who has been guilty of sorcery by the aid of
+inspiration furnished during a dance. The whirling dance of the Eastern
+dervish is well known. Dancing also figures in the Bible. The Jews
+danced around the golden calf (Ex. xxxii. 19) in a state of nudity.
+David, too, danced naked before the Lord. Dancing was also part of the
+religious ceremonies attendant on the worship of Dionysos or
+Bacchus.[28] Along with the drinking of certain vegetable decoctions,
+dancing formed an important part of the witches' saturnalia during the
+medieval period. When in a state of frenzy, partly drug induced and
+partly the product of exhilaration caused by wild dancing, visions of
+Satan followed. In the dancing mania of the fourteenth century, the
+sufferers saw visions of heaven opened, with Jesus and the Virgin
+enthroned. Dancing was one of the prominent characteristics of the
+French Convulsionnaires in the eighteenth century. In more recent times
+we have the dancing and singing connected with the Methodist revival. In
+modern instances the dancing seems to have been consequent on religious
+excitement rather than precedent to it, but in earlier times there is no
+doubt that it was deliberately practised as a means of producing a state
+of exaltation.
+
+Among the commonest methods of inducing a sense of religious exaltation
+is the practice of fasting. In various guises, this is the most
+persistent form of religious self-torture. Amongst more civilised people
+the reason given for fasting is that it is a form of repentance, the
+genuineness of which is attested by voluntary punishment. But originally
+there seems little reason to doubt that it was adopted for a different
+purpose. It was valued not because the fasting person felt that he had
+done anything for which it was necessary to repent, but because it was
+believed to bring people into closer touch with the spiritual world.
+There is, of course, a very obvious reason for this belief. A lowered
+vitality is favourable to hallucinations of every description. A
+shipwrecked sailor is placed, by no act of his own, in precisely the
+same condition as is the primitive medicine man or the medieval saint by
+his own volition. It has always been recognised, and by none more
+readily than by the great religious teachers of the world, that a
+well-nourished body is inimical to what they chose to term "spiritual
+development." The historic Christian outcry against fleshly indulgence
+has much more in it than a revolt against mere sensualism. A well-fed
+body has been deprecated because it closed the avenue to spiritual
+illumination. Hence it is that fasting has found such favour in all
+religious systems. The ascetic saw more because, by reducing the body to
+an abnormal state, he provided the conditions for seeing more. The Zulu
+maxim, "A stuffed body cannot see secret things," really expresses in a
+sentence the philosophy of the matter.
+
+Among the Blackfoot Indians of North America, when a boy reaches puberty
+he is sent away from his father's lodge in search of a spiritual
+protector or totem. Seeking a secluded spot, he abstains from food until
+he is favoured in a dream with a vision of some animal or bird, which is
+at once adopted by him.[29] This custom obtains with most of the North
+American tribes. Among these tribes, also, the soothsayer prepares
+himself by fasting for the ecstatic state in which the spirits give
+their messages through him. The ordinary member of the tribe who wants
+anything will fast until he is assured in a dream that it will be
+granted him. Similarly, the Malay, to procure supernatural intercourse,
+retires to the jungle and abstains from food. The Zulu doctor prepares
+for intercourse with the tribal spirits by spare diet or solitary fasts.
+Fasting is part of the ordinary regimen of the Hindu yogi. Of certain
+Indian tribes we are told that before proceeding on an expedition they
+"observe a rigorous fast, or rather abstain from every kind of food for
+four days. In this interval their imagination is exalted to delirium;
+whether it be through bodily weakness or the natural effect of delirium,
+they pretend to have strange visions. The elders and sages of the tribe,
+being called upon to interpret these dreams, draw from them omens more
+or less favourable to the success of the enterprise; and their
+explanations are received as oracles, by which the expedition will be
+faithfully regulated."[30] Amongst the Samoans, when rain was required,
+the priests blackened themselves all over, exhumed a dead body, took the
+skeleton to a cave and poured water over it. They had to fast and remain
+in the cave until it rained. Sometimes they died under the experiment,
+but they generally chose the showery months for their rain-making.[31]
+
+In both the Old and New Testaments fasting figures largely. The
+encounter of Jesus with Satan is preceded by a forty days' fast. St.
+Catherine of Sienna began regular fasts at a very early age. Santa
+Teresa kept lengthy fasts every year. The fasting of the monks and nuns
+during the epidemic period of monasticism is too well known to call for
+more than a mere reference. Perhaps the most curious religious reason
+given for fasting is that cited by a writer from a monkish chronicler:--
+
+"As a coach goes faster when it is empty, a man by fasting can be better
+united to God; for it is a principle with geometers that a round body
+can never touch a plane except in one point.... A belly too well filled
+becomes round, it cannot touch God except in one point; but fasting
+flattens the belly until it is united with the surface of God at all
+points."[32]
+
+George Fox, the founder of the Society of Friends, confesses that he
+"fasted much" and "walked abroad in solitary places," and "frequently in
+the night walked about mournfully by myself." After much brooding and
+fasting, he heard a voice which said, "There is one, even Jesus Christ,
+that can speak to thy condition." Such an experience is not at all
+surprising, seeing the method pursued to acquire it. Less fasting and
+brooding, with more genial intercourse with his fellows, might easily
+have prevented Fox, as it has prevented others, hearing heavenly voices
+proffering him counsel. Such an experience is well within the reach of
+anyone who cares to acquire it. Tylor has well said that "So long as
+fasting is continued as a religious rite, so long the consequences in
+morbid mental exaltation will continue the old savage doctrine that
+morbid phantasy is supernatural experience. Bread and meat would have
+robbed the ascetic of many an angel's visit; the opening of the
+refectory door must many a time have closed the gate of heaven to his
+gaze." No one will question the truth of this principle, so long as we
+are dealing with uncivilised mankind. Many, however, shrink from
+acknowledging that the practices current in more civilised times are
+disguised illustrations of the same principle of interpretation, which
+descends direct from savages, and but for them would never have existed.
+
+Commenting on the practices of certain savage medicine-men, a missionary
+remarks:--
+
+"It always appeared probable to me that these rogues, from long fasting,
+contract a weakness of brain, a giddiness, a kind of delirium, which
+makes them imagine that they are gifted with superior wisdom, and give
+themselves out for physicians. They impose upon themselves first, and
+afterwards upon others."[33]
+
+This is shrewdly said, and is a good example of the readiness with which
+obvious truths are recognised when they do not clash with religious
+prepossessions. The difficulty for others is to discern any real line of
+demarcation between the practices of civilised and uncivilised. So far
+as one can see, the only real distinction is that the method employed by
+savages is open. That followed by civilised people is more or less
+disguised. But derangement of function is derangement of function, no
+matter how produced. And if we decline to believe that a savage holds
+genuine intercourse with a spiritual world, as a consequence of this
+derangement, in what way are we justified in accepting the testimony of
+a Christian visionary to similar intercourse, when the derangement is in
+his case no less clear? It is a case of accepting both, or neither. The
+sane and scientific conclusion seems to lie in the following from Dr.
+Henry Maudsley:--
+
+"Now that the mental functions are known to be inseparably connected
+with nervous substrata, disposed and united in the brain in the most
+orderly fashion, superordinate, co-ordinate, and subordinate--the whole
+a complex organisation of confederate nerve centres, each capable of
+more or less independent action--a natural interpretation presents
+itself. The extraordinary states of mental disintegration evince the
+separate and irregular function of certain mental nerve tracts, or
+grouped nerve tracts with which goes necessarily a coincident
+suspension, partial or complete, of the functions of all the rest; the
+supernatural incubus, therefore, neither demoniac nor divine, only
+morbid. Thus the strange nervous seizures, with their mental
+concomitants, not being outside the range of positive research, but
+interesting events within it, become useful natural experiments to throw
+an instructive light upon the intricate functions of the most complex
+organ in the world--the human brain. Steadily are the researches of
+pathology driving the supernatural back into its last and most obscure
+retreat; for they prove that in the extremest ecstasies there is neither
+_theolepsy_ nor _diabolepsy_, nor any other _lepsy_ in the sense of
+possession of the individual by an external power; what there is truly
+is a _psycholepsy_."[34]
+
+States of exaltation produced by the aid of drugs, fasting, or other
+forms of self-torture come naturally under the category of deliberately
+induced states of mind, owing to the conviction that spiritual knowledge
+may be gained in this way. But there are other states that arise
+naturally and which foster the same conviction. It has already been
+pointed out that the generally accepted theory with uncivilised peoples
+is that all disease is due to the action of malevolent spirits. There is
+no need now to repeat proof of this, and in any case it lies to hand in
+any work that deals with uncivilised life. Nor need we go back to
+uncivilised times for evidence. One requires only to look but a very
+little way into the history of any country to find the supernaturalistic
+theory of disease in full swing, and even to-day one may discover
+indications of its once general rule. Its importance to the present
+enquiry lies in the part it has played in building up in the religious
+consciousness a general conviction of religious truth that does not
+disappear even when it is seen that the evidence upon which it rests is
+faulty. Just as the inhabitants of a Welsh village have their general
+belief in religion strengthened by the semi-hysterical speeches of an
+Evan Roberts, and the convulsive capers of a whole congregation, so in
+all ages people have found endorsement of their belief in a supernatural
+world in the existence of cases the pathological nature of which admits
+of no doubt. Belief in the supernatural character of specific nervous
+conditions or mental states may disappear, but the fact that this
+belief has been general for a time leaves behind a certain psychological
+residuum in favour of supernaturalism in general.
+
+The connection between the priest and the physician is naturally a very
+ancient one. The priest, indeed, is the primitive physician, the belief
+that diseases are supernaturally caused indicating him as the agent of
+their cure. And it is only to be expected that when the attempt is made
+to divert the treatment of disease from priestly hands the effort should
+be met with determined opposition. Quite naturally, too, the first
+gropings after a scientific theory of disease show a curious mixture of
+rationalism and superstition. Thus, in Greece, the temple hospitals
+devoted to the mythical AEsculapius, which were situated at Epidaurus,
+Pergamus, Cyrene, Corinth, and many other places, served as colleges,
+hospitals, and places of worship. Sufferers slept in the temples in the
+hopes of receiving messages from the gods, and the priests themselves
+professed to have ecstatic visions which enabled them to prescribe for
+those afflicted.[35] Great emphasis was placed on bathing, light, air,
+and food, and it is pretty clear that the priests had begun to mix both
+faith and physic in a most perplexing manner.
+
+The definite separation of medicine from magic and religion begins with
+Hippocrates. His theory of disease was simple. He did not deny that
+there might be a supernatural side to disease; he insisted that there
+was always a natural one, and that this was the side with which we
+should be concerned. Each disorder, he said, had its own physical
+conditions, and he laid down the rule that we "ought to study the nature
+of man, what he is with reference to that which he eats and drinks, and
+to all his other occupations and habits, and to the consequences
+resulting from each."[36] In Egypt, also, very considerable advance was
+made in the same direction. Probably a good deal of their knowledge
+resulted from the practice of embalming, in spite of the priestly
+interdict on dissection. At all events, there is no doubt that
+considerable advance had been made. Herophilus and Erasistratus wrote of
+the structure of the heart, and described its connection with the veins
+and arteries. The two kinds of nerves, motor and sensory, were
+described, and the influence of foods, etc., as influencing health,
+dwelt on. Insanity was also dealt with as due to natural and
+controllable causes, and the effects of colour and music in dealing with
+mania noted.[37] Had this advance been followed, the history of European
+civilisation might have been different from what it was. Plagues,
+epidemics, and diseases, with their far-reaching social and political
+consequences,--consequences that are too little noted, or even
+understood, by historians,--might have met with adequate resistance, and
+some would never have occurred.
+
+The Pagan schools of medicine came to an untimely, although in some
+cases a lingering, end. "The introduction of Christianity," says a
+medical writer, "had an undoubted influence on the course of medical
+science; for the Christian was taught to recognise, in every bodily
+infirmity, the dispensation of the Almighty, and in the calm, abstracted
+pursuits of those holy men who passed their time in prayer and
+meditation, a propitiation: hence medicine fell into the hands of monks
+and anchorites, who assumed to themselves, exclusively, the power of
+interpreting all natural phenomena as indications of the Divine Will,
+and pretended to possess some occult and supernatural means of curing
+disease."[38] Reversing the natural order of things, the physician was
+replaced by the priest. The supernaturalistic theory was revived, and
+held its own for well on a thousand years. For every complaint the
+Church provided a specific in the shape of a charm, an incantation, or a
+saint. St. Apollonia for toothache, St. Avertin for lunacy, St. Benedict
+for stone, St. Clara for sore eyes, St. Herbert for hydrophobia, St.
+John for epilepsy, St. Maur for gout, St. Pernel for agues, St.
+Genevieve for fevers, St. Sebastian for plague, etc.[39] The height of
+absurdity was reached when, in spite of the monopoly of the treatment of
+disease by the priesthood, the Council of Rheims (1119) actually forbade
+monks to study medicine. This was followed by the Council of Beziers
+(1246) prohibiting Christians applying for relief to Jewish physicians,
+at a time when practically the only doctors of ability in Christendom
+were Jews. In 1243 the Dominicans banished all books on medicine from
+their monasteries. Innocent III. forbade physicians practising except
+under the supervision of an ecclesiastic. Honorius (1222) forbade
+priests the study of medicine; and at the end of the thirteenth Century
+Boniface VIII. interdicted surgery as atheistical. The ill-treatment and
+opposition experienced by the great Vesalius at the hands of the Church,
+on account of his anatomical researches, is one of the saddest chapters
+in the history of science.[40]
+
+When the sight of bodily disease strengthened and confirmed belief in
+the supernatural, mental disease must have offered still more convincing
+evidence. Among uncivilised people we know that this is so. To quote
+again from the indispensable Tylor:--
+
+"The possessed man ... rationally finds a spiritual cause for his
+sufferings.... Especially when the mysterious unseen power throws him
+helpless on the ground, jerks and writhes him in convulsions, makes him
+leap upon the bystanders with a giant's strength and a wild beast's
+ferocity, impels him with distorted face and frantic gesture, and voice
+not his own nor seemingly even human, to pour forth wild incoherent
+raving, or with thought and eloquence beyond his sober faculties to
+command, to counsel, to foretell--such a one seems to those who watch
+him, and even to himself, to have become the mere instrument of a spirit
+which has seized him or entered into him, a possessing demon in whose
+personality the patient believes so implicitly that he often imagines a
+personal name for it, which it can declare when it speaks in its own
+voice and character through his organs of speech."[41]
+
+It was this conception of insanity, universally current in the
+uncivilised world, that was revived with fearful intensity in the early
+Christian Church, and which certainly served its purpose in intensifying
+the genuine belief in supernaturalism. Jesus had given His followers
+power to expel demons "In My name," and this power of exorcism was one
+upon which the early Christians specially prided themselves. It is with
+unconscious sarcasm that Dean Trench puts the question, If one of the
+disciples "were to enter a madhouse now, how many of the sufferers there
+he might recognise as 'possessed'?"[42] One may safely say that he would
+regard all as under the dominion of evil spirits. No other cause of
+insanity appears to have been recognised, and the Church devised the
+most elaborate formulae for casting out demons. The assumed demoniac was
+prayed over, incensed, and evil-smelling drugs burned under his nose. A
+set form of objurgation then followed:--
+
+"Thou lustful and stupid one.... Thou lean sow, famine-stricken and most
+impure.... Thou wrinkled beast, of all beasts the most beastly.... Thou
+bestial and foolish drunkard.... Thou sooty spirit from Tartarus.... I
+cast thee down, O Tartarean boor, into the infernal kitchen....
+Loathsome cobbler ... filthy sow ... envious crocodile.... Malodorous
+drudge ... swollen toad ... lousy swineherd," etc. etc.[43]
+
+Then followed the exorcism proper:--
+
+"By the Apocalypse of Jesus Christ, which God hath given to make known
+unto His servants those things which are shortly to be ... I exorcise
+you, ye angels of untold perversity.... May all the devils that are thy
+foes rush forth upon thee and drag thee down to hell!... May the Holy
+One trample on thee and hang thee up in an infernal fork, as was done to
+the five kings of the Amorites!... May God set a nail to your skull, and
+pound it with a hammer as Jael did to Sisera!... May Sother break thy
+head and cut off thy hands, as was done to the cursed Dagon!... May God
+hang thee in a hellish yoke, as seven men were hanged by the sons of
+Saul!"[44]
+
+Marcus Aurelius mentions as one of his debts to the philosopher
+Diognetus that he had taught him "not to give credit to vulgar tales of
+prodigies and incantations, and evil spirits cast out by magicians or
+pretenders to sorcery, and such kind of impostors."[45] What would have
+been the thoughts of the great emperor, could he have revisited the
+earth two centuries after his death and seen the then civilised world
+enveloped in a mental atmosphere in which such ideas as those above
+described could live?
+
+All over Europe for centuries lunatics were whipped, and otherwise
+ill-treated, in the hopes of expelling the demons that were troubling
+them. The seventy-second Canon of the Church of England still provides
+that no unlicensed person shall "cast out any devil or devils" under
+pain of penalties prescribed. A Bishop of Beauvais, in the fifteenth
+century, not only caused five devils to come out of one person, but
+actually induced them to sign a document promising not to molest this
+particular sufferer again. Tremendous, again, were the labours of the
+Jesuit Fathers of Vienna, who boasted that they had cast out no less
+than 12,652 'living devils.' Such arithmetical exactitude silences all
+hostile comment. In some parts of Scotland, as late as 1783, lunatics
+were left all night in the churchyard, with a holy bell over their
+heads. In Cornwall, St. Nun's pool was famous for the cure of lunatics.
+The poor devils were tied hand and foot and doused in the water until
+they were cured--or killed. Even the embraces of prostitutes, for some
+peculiar reason, were recommended as a cure for insanity.[46] In 1788,
+in Bristol, a drunken epileptic, one George Larkins, was brought into
+church, and seven clergymen solemnly set themselves to the task of
+exorcising the possessing demon. Whereupon Satan swore 'by his infernal
+den'--an oath, says the chronicler, nowhere to be found but in Bunyan.
+Under date of October 25, 1739, John Wesley also relates how he was sent
+for and assisted at the expulsion of a demon from the body of a young
+girl.
+
+Of all nervous diseases that of epilepsy appears to have been most
+favourable to the encouragement of a belief in spiritual agency. One
+medical authority whose experience enables him to speak with a peculiar
+degree of authority has pointed out that with epilepsy there is often an
+exaltation of the religious sentiments.[47] A more recent writer, Dr.
+Bernard Hollander, asserts that epileptics are "highly religious."[48]
+Sir T. S. Clouston also points out that strong religious emotionalism
+often accompanies epilepsy.[49] Another eminent physician, while
+pointing out that "a high degree of intelligence, amounting even to
+genius, has in some cases been associated with epilepsy," observes that
+"the epileptic is apt to be influenced greatly by the mystical and
+awe-inspiring, and he is disposed to morbid piety."[50]
+
+Every medical man is acquainted with the close relation that exists
+between epilepsy and all kinds of hallucinations and delusions, and it
+would be more than surprising if in an environment where the religious
+interpretation of things is paramount, or with a patient of strong
+religious convictions, these delusions did not take a religious form.
+And of all nervous disorders epilepsy seems most favourable for
+producing this. Under its influence hallucination attacks every one of
+the senses with a varying degree of intensity. "The patient hears
+voices, and generally words expressing definite ideas, though he is
+often unable to properly refer them to any speaking person. Sometimes
+instead of external sounds or voices, the patient has a consciousness of
+an internal voice that may be as real to him as any external auditory
+perception. At first the voices may be indistinct, but upon constant
+repetition and evolution from sub-conscious thought they acquire
+intensity, eventually dominating the life of the individual."[51] Dr.
+Ball says: "One patient perceives at the beginning of the attack a
+toothed wheel, in the middle of which there appears a human face making
+strange contortions; another sees a series of smiling landscapes. In
+some cases it is the sense of hearing which is affected;--the patient
+hears voices or strange noises. Others are warned by the sense of smell
+that the fit is going to commence."[52]
+
+Sometimes these hallucinations of sight and hearing are in curious
+contrast with each other. "Not rarely," says Dr. Conolly Norman, "a
+patient has visual hallucinations of a cheering kind--as of God or
+angels; yet his auditory hallucinations are full of blasphemy, mockery,
+and insult."[53]
+
+Dr. Maudsley thus describes the general symptoms accompanying an
+epileptic attack:--
+
+"The patient's senses are possessed with hallucinations, his ganglionic
+central cells being in a state of what may be called convulsive action;
+before the eyes are blood-red flames of fire, amidst which whoever
+happens to present himself appears as a devil or otherwise horribly
+transformed; the ears are filled with a terribly roaring noise, or
+resound with a voice imperatively commanding him to save himself; the
+smell is one of sulphurous stifling, and the desperate and violent
+actions are the convulsive reaction to such fearful hallucinations."[54]
+
+If anyone will bear in mind the numerous descriptions of religious
+visions, written in all good faith, and the behaviour of many an assumed
+'inspired' character, he will have little difficulty in realising how
+easily, to a people unacquainted with the real character of such
+phenomena, epilepsy lends itself to a religious interpretation. It must
+also be borne in mind that the consequences of vivid hallucinations
+experienced during epilepsy do not always disappear with the attack to
+which they were originally due.
+
+It is certain that from the earliest times cases of what are undoubtedly
+epilepsy have been taken as positive indications of supernatural
+influence. "There is," says Emanuel Deutsch, "a peculiar something
+supposed to inhere in epilepsy. The Greeks called it a divine disease.
+Bacchantic and chorybantic furor were God-inspired stages. The Pythia
+uttered her oracles under the most distressing signs. Symptoms of
+convulsion were ever needed as a sign of the divine."[55] Much of the
+evidence for the supernatural in the New Testament rests upon cases that
+are obviously pathological in character. A man brings his son to Jesus
+and describes how "ofttimes he falleth into the fire, and oft into the
+water" (Matt. xvii. 15), and in another place (Mark ix. 18) the same
+patient is described as having a dumb spirit, "and wheresoever he taketh
+him, he teareth him; and he foameth, and gnasheth with his teeth, and
+pineth away." The response to the father's appeal for help is an
+exorcism of the possessing spirit such as one meets with in all savage
+culture. Between possession by a malignant spirit and domination by a
+god, the difference is clearly one of terminology alone. And at the
+side of the New Testament case just cited one may place this account
+from Polynesia, written by a very competent observer, and a
+missionary:--
+
+"As soon as the god was supposed to have entered the priest, the latter
+became violently agitated and worked himself up to the highest pitch of
+apparent frenzy; the muscles of the limbs seemed convulsed, the body
+swelled, the countenance became terrific, the features distorted, the
+eyes wild and strained. In this state he often rolled on the earth,
+foaming at the mouth, as if labouring under the influence of the
+divinity by whom he was possessed, and in shrill cries, and often
+violent and indistinct sounds, revealed the will of the god."[56]
+
+Advancing to a higher culture stage than that indicated in the last
+passage, there is much evidence that Mohammed was subject to
+hallucinations, and many authorities have indicated epilepsy as their
+source. There is a tradition that someone who saw Mohammed while he was
+receiving one of his revelations observed that he seemed unconscious and
+was red in the face. Mohammed himself said:--
+
+"Inspiration descendeth upon me in two ways. Sometimes Gabriel cometh
+and communicateth the revelation unto me, as one man unto another, and
+this is easy; at other times it affecteth me like the ringing of a bell,
+penetrating my very heart, and rending me as it were in pieces; and this
+it is which grievously afflicteth me."
+
+Emanuel Deutsch, although, in a passage already cited, recognising the
+religious significance attached to epilepsy, has the following curious
+comment:--
+
+"Mohammed was epileptic; and vast ingenuity and medical knowledge have
+been lavished upon this point as explanatory of Mohammed's mission and
+success. We, for our own part, do not think that epilepsy ever made a
+man appear a prophet to himself or even to the people of the East; or,
+for the matter of that, inspired him with the like heart-moving words
+and glorious pictures. Quite the contrary. It was taken as a sign of
+demons within--demons, 'Devs,' devils to whom all manner of diseases
+were ascribed throughout the antique world."
+
+This seems very largely to miss the point at issue. Of course, no one
+would claim that Mohammed's success was due to epilepsy, or even that
+the very severe forms of epilepsy were favourable to inducing a
+conviction of revelation. But the disease assumes various forms, and in
+some cases it is expressed in the form of a period of mental excitement
+and general irritability. All that is claimed is that, given the
+complaint in its less severe forms in one with whom religious beliefs
+are strong, there are present all the conditions for attributing the
+resulting hallucinations to personal revelation or ecstatic vision. And
+it is also true that while some patients after emerging from a fit of
+epilepsy are in a dazed or confused condition, others have a very clear
+recollection of all they have seen and heard. Mohammed simply took the
+current explanation of cases of nervous derangement, and being a man of
+strong religious feeling, naturally gave his visions a religious
+interpretation. All the rest has to be explained in terms of the innate
+genius of the man and of the circumstances of his time.
+
+A similar case to the above is that of Emanuel Swedenborg. His followers
+naturally resent the ascription of his visions and voices to a
+pathologic origin, and point to his pronounced mental ability. And
+certainly no one who is at all acquainted with the writings of
+Swedenborg will question his great mental power, amounting at times to
+positive genius. But here, again, we have strong religious conviction in
+alliance with pathological conditions. Swedenborg's communications with
+celestial beings were of a more frequent and more ordered character than
+Mohammed's, but there is the same general likeness between them. Of his
+first revelation he writes:--
+
+"At ten o'clock I lay down in bed and was somewhat better; half an hour
+after I heard a clamour under my head; I thought that then the tempter
+went away; immediately there came over me a rigor so strong from the
+head and the whole body, with some din, and this several times. I found
+that something holy was over me. I thereupon fell asleep, and at about
+twelve, one, or two o'clock in the night there came over me so strong a
+shivering from head to foot, as if many winds rushed together, which
+shook me, was indescribable, and prostrated me upon my face. Then, while
+I was prostrated, I was in a moment quite awake, and saw that I was cast
+down, and wondered what it meant. And I spoke as if I was awake, but
+found that the word was put into my mouth, and I said, 'Omnipotent Jesus
+Christ, as of Thy great grace Thou condescendest to come to so great a
+sinner, make me worthy of this grace!' I held my hands together and
+prayed, and then came a hand which squeezed my hands hard; immediately
+thereupon I continued in prayer."[57]
+
+Swedenborg confessed to repeated walks and talks with celestial
+visitants, and, of course, all thought of imposture must be put on one
+side. What one has to consider is whether we are to accept these
+experiences as hallucinations or not. On the one side no further
+evidence seems possible than the profound faith of the man himself, his
+recognised mental ability, and the belief of his followers. And against
+this it must be urged that the most complete honesty is no guarantee
+against self-deception, while ability and even genius are not at all
+incompatible with a pathologic strain. And in addition it must be borne
+in mind that these hallucinations are, after all, part of a very large
+class. Men of very little ability and influence experience substantially
+the same visions; they occur all over the world, under all conditions of
+culture, and always express the personal idiosyncrasies of the subject
+and reflect the character of his social environment. One may safely say
+that had Swedenborg lived a century later, while he might still have
+gone through the same mental and physical experiences, he himself would
+have given a very different interpretation of them.
+
+St. Paul, Professor James points out, "certainly had once an epileptoid,
+if not an epileptic seizure." One needs to add to this that the seizure
+occurred at the one critical moment of his life which eventuated in his
+conversion from Judaism to Christianity. Mary Magdalene, the first who
+brought tidings of the resurrection, had been delivered of seven
+devils. Luther's religious opinions were, of course, quite apart from
+his physical state, sound or unsound. Still, even with him the reality
+of supernatural intercourse became intensely vivid as a result of
+nervous affections. His latest biographer points out that as a youth
+while in the monastery he was seized with something that might well have
+been an epileptic fit, and that although there is no record of a return
+of this, he did suffer from ordinary fits of fainting.[58] He confesses
+to have been much troubled, at twenty-two years of age, with giddiness
+and noises in the ear, which he attributed to the devil. And right
+through his life he attributed similar experiences to the same source.
+Bunyan confesses that even during childhood the Lord "did scare and
+affright me with fearful dreams, and did terrify me with dreadful
+visions." George Fox, founder of the Society of Friends, describes how,
+in the middle of winter, when approaching Lichfield, "the Word of the
+Lord was like a fire in me," and as he went through the town, "there
+seemed to me to be a channel of blood running down the streets, and the
+market-place appeared like a pool of blood." Reflecting on the meaning
+of the vision, he remembered that, "In the Emperor Diocletian's time a
+thousand Christians were martyred at Lichfield. So I was to go without
+my shoes through the channel of their blood in the market-place, that I
+might raise up the blood of these martyrs which had been shed above a
+thousand years before."[59]
+
+In none of these cases could it be fairly claimed that the religious
+conviction, as such, was the consequence of the hallucinations
+experienced. But it can scarcely be questioned that these served to
+strengthen it to an enormous extent. These trances, ecstasies, visions,
+were accepted by the subjects as proofs of their 'divine mission,' and
+were so accepted by multitudes of their followers. In their absence
+religion would most probably have failed to be the fiercely irruptive
+force in life that it has been. The religious idea has, so to speak
+given hallucination a standing and an authority in life it would not
+have possessed in its absence. In the case of men of ordinary capacity
+these visions possess little authority. But in the case of men of
+extraordinary capacity, men like Luther, Mohammed, Fox, Swedenborg,--who
+must in any case have stood superior to their fellows,--these
+hallucinations are then under favouring social conditions invested with
+enormous authority. And there is no doubt about the fact that religious
+leaders have been peculiarly subject to these psychical variations. This
+is pointed out by Professor James in the following passage:--
+
+"Even more perhaps than other kinds of genius, religious leaders have
+been subject to abnormal psychical visitations. Invariably they have
+been creatures of exalted emotional sensibility. Often they have led a
+discordant inner life, and had melancholy during a part of their career.
+They have known no measure, been liable to obsessions and fixed ideas;
+and frequently they have fallen into trances, heard voices, seen
+visions, and presented all sorts of peculiarities which are ordinarily
+classed as pathological. Often, moreover, these pathological features in
+their career have helped to give them their religious authority and
+influence."[60]
+
+Well, in what way are we to discriminate between the visions of a
+religious person, admittedly of an abnormal disposition, subject to fits
+of melancholy, etc., and presenting "all sorts of peculiarities
+ordinarily classed as pathological," and the hallucinations of an
+admittedly pathologic subject? Why should the ordinary classification
+break down at this point? Dr. Granger, dealing with this aspect of the
+question, says: "The religious genius is not proved to be morbid by the
+extent to which he diverges from the average type."[61] Quite so, genius
+_must_ depart from the average type in order to be genius. But the
+statement is quite beside the point at issue. It is not a mere
+divergence from the average type that warrants one in assuming that much
+passing for divine illumination owes its origin to pathological
+conditions, but the fact that it is possible to affiliate certain cases
+of religious exaltation with these conditions. Hallucinations are common
+to all forms of ecstasy, and ecstasy is not confined to religion. Given
+a one-sided mental activity, intense concentration on one or a few
+analogous ideas, combined with a lowered nervous sensibility, and we
+have all the conditions present favourable to hallucination.[62] These
+hallucinations may occur in connection with any topic that engrosses the
+subject's mind. In every other direction their true nature is recognised
+and admitted. In connection with religious belief alone, it is held that
+they bring the subject into touch with a supersensual world of reality.
+What possible scientific warranty is there for any such distinction?
+
+Let us take, as an example, one of James's own cases, which he admits is
+'distinctly pathological,' but without allowing this admission to
+disturb his general conclusion. The case is that of Suso, a famous
+fourteenth-century mystic. As a young man he wore a hair shirt and an
+iron chain next the skin. Later he had made a leathern garment studded
+with one hundred and fifty nails, points inward. The garment was made
+very tight, and he used it to sleep in. To prevent himself throwing it
+off during sleep he procured a pair of leather gloves studded with
+tacks, so that if he attempted to get rid of the dress the tacks would
+penetrate his flesh. Next he had made a wooden cross, with thirty
+protruding nails, to emulate the sufferings of Jesus. He procured an old
+door to sleep on. In winter he suffered from the frost. His feet were
+full of sores, his legs became dropsical, his knees bloody and seared,
+his loins covered with scars, his hands tremulous. During twenty years
+he fed scantily upon the coarsest food, slept in the most uncomfortable
+places, and during the whole of the time never took a bath. No wonder
+that after his fortieth year he was favoured with a series of visions
+from God. Would not one be surprised if any other result than this had
+been achieved? And Suso's case is only one of thousands, many of not so
+extreme a character, others quite as bad.
+
+In the case of Catherine of Sienna the austerities began earlier than
+with Suso. As a child she flogged herself, and was favoured with visions
+before she reached her teens. Santa Teresa, as a young woman, prayed to
+God to send her an illness, and describes how she remained for days in a
+trance, during which time her tongue was bitten in many places. She
+describes how, during these trances, her body became to her light, and
+she remained rigid. "It was altogether impossible for me to hinder it;
+for my world would be carried absolutely away, and ordinarily even my
+head, as it were, after it."[63] These are typical examples from a very
+large number of cases. The annals of monasticism are filled with
+accounts of self-inflicted tortures, with the one end in view, and in
+serious belief that their experiences brought them into touch with a
+reality denied them under normal conditions. The practice not only
+quickened their own sense of the reality of religion, it served the same
+purpose for thousands of others pursuing the course of ordinary social
+existence. "Religious teachers," says Francis Galton, "by enforcing
+celibacy, fasting, and solitude, have done their best towards making men
+mad, and they have always largely succeeded in inducing morbid mental
+conditions among their followers."[64]
+
+The phenomenon is thus continuous and, in its essentials, unchanging.
+From the most primitive times there has been a close association between
+the belief in divine illumination and spiritual intercourse, and mental
+states that are unquestionably pathological. Following this there has
+been a more or less deliberate cultivation of these states in the desire
+to renew communion with a spiritual world hidden from man's normal
+senses. In this there need be no deliberate imposture. When imposture
+does occur, it would be at a later culture stage. At the beginning
+there is nothing but misunderstanding. First in order of time comes the
+crude animistic interpretation of almost every phase of human activity.
+So far as primitive life is concerned, the evidence of this is simply
+overwhelming. Next, as Tylor has pointed out, from believing that the
+occurrence of certain mental states provides the conditions of
+communication with an unseen world to the deliberate creation of those
+states is a natural and an easy step. There is thus set on foot a
+deliberate culture of the supernatural. This cultivation of abnormal
+states of mind once initiated persists, now in one form, now in another,
+but is substantially the same throughout. Whether we are dealing with
+the crude practices of the savage, the less crude, but still obvious
+methods of solitary living and bodily maceration of the medieval monk,
+or the morbid and unhealthy dwelling upon a single idea which remains
+one of the conditions of 'illumination' to-day, we are confronted with
+the same thing. In every case the object--unconscious, maybe--is the
+provision of conditions that render hallucination and illusion a
+practical certainty. In connection with non-religious matters the
+unhealthiness of mind, distortion of vision, and unreliability of
+judgment induced by methods akin to those named is now generally
+recognised. We have yet to see the same thing as generally recognised in
+connection with religious beliefs. We see in addition that a great many
+of those experiences, once accepted as clear evidence of supernatural
+communication, are more properly explainable in terms of nervous
+derangement. In such cases there is neither celestial illumination nor
+diabolic communion, neither--to use Maudsley's phrase--theolepsy nor
+diabolepsy, only psycholepsy. In the present chapter we have been
+striving to apply this principle to a little wider field than is usual.
+We have been studying the misinterpretation, in terms of religion, of
+abnormal or pathological states of mind, and observing how far these
+have contributed to building up and perpetuating a conviction of the
+possibility of supernatural intercourse. We have yet to trace the same
+principle of misinterpretation in the sexual and social life of mankind.
+
+
+FOOTNOTES:
+
+[20] _A Psychological Study of Religion_, p. 234.
+
+[21] _Primitive Culture_, i. p. 501.
+
+[22] _Primitive Culture_, ii. p. 410.
+
+[23] Some very curious information concerning the use of this and other
+fungi is given by Dr. J. G. Bourke in his _Scatologic Rites_, pp. 69-75.
+
+[24] Cited by Bourke, p. 90.
+
+[25] Tylor, ii. pp. 417-9.
+
+[26] For a clear account of the effects of hemp preparations, calculated
+to produce a feeling of religious ecstasy, the reader should consult Dr.
+Hale White's _Text-Book of Pharmacology_, 1901, pp. 318-22. The effects
+of opium are thus described by another writer: "Opium, in those who are
+capable of stimulation by it, gives rise to a pleasurable feeling,
+something like that which is produced by wine in not excessive doses;
+but the excitement derived from it, instead of tending to some highest
+point, remains stationary for hours, and in place of the slight
+incoherence of thought always present in those who are exhilarated with
+wine, the most perfect harmony is established among all the conceptions.
+There is an extraordinary stimulation of the pure intellect, and not
+merely of the power of expression. The opium-eater seems to have had the
+eyes of his spirit opened, to have acquired a gift of insight into
+things that to mere mortals are inexplicable. The most remote parts of
+consciousness come into clear light; the finer shades of personality,
+those that had been unknown even to the opium-eater himself, are brought
+into view and become distinct; the smallest details of the things around
+take new significance, and are seen to be profoundly important; their
+analogies with other phenomena of nature are revealed. It is the same
+with the moral as with the intellectual being; that also becomes
+indefinitely exalted. An absolute balance of the faculties seems to have
+been attained. The whole man _is_ what in his ordinary state he only
+tends to be; he has realised the highest perfection of which he is
+capable; only his 'best self' now remains; his lower self has been left
+behind without need of the purgatorial fire of contention with the
+environment to destroy it."--T. Whittaker, _Essays and Notices,
+Psychological and Philosophical_, p. 367.
+
+[27] _Anthropology_, p. 296.
+
+[28] For a general account of religious dances, see Major-General
+Forlong's _Faiths of Man_, art. "Dancing."
+
+[29] Catlin, _North American Indians_, i. p. 36.
+
+[30] Cited by Frazer, _Taboo and the Perils of the Soul_, p. 161.
+
+[31] Turner's _Samoa_, p. 345-6.
+
+[32] Brady, _Clavis Calendaria_, vol. i. p. 223.
+
+[33] Cited by Tylor, _Primitive Culture_, ii. pp. 412-3.
+
+[34] _Natural Causes and Supernatural Seemings_, p. 277.
+
+[35] A very good account of the methods followed in these places will be
+found in Miss Hamilton's _Incubation, or the Cure of Diseases in Pagan
+Temples and Christian Churches_, 1906.
+
+[36] Grote, _History of Greece_, vol. i. p. 359 and vol. v. p. 232.
+
+[37] "The ancient Egyptians and Greeks," says Dr. Maudsley, "used humane
+and rational methods of treatment; it was only after the Christian
+doctrine of possession by devils had taken hold of the minds of men that
+the worst sort of treatment, of which history gives account, came into
+force" (_Pathology of Mind_, p. 523). For a general account of Egyptian
+medicine see the chapter on Egypt in Dr. Berdoe's _Origin and Growth of
+the Healing Art_.
+
+[38] Meryon, _The History of Medicine_, vol. i. p. 67.
+
+[39] _Ibid._, vol. i. p. 104.
+
+[40] See Sir Michael Foster's _Lectures on the History of Physiology_,
+chap. i.
+
+[41] _Primitive Culture_, ii. 124.
+
+[42] _On the Miracles_, p. 168.
+
+[43] Cited by White, who gives original authorities, _Warfare of Science
+with Theology_, ii. 107.
+
+[44] White, ii. 108.
+
+[45] _Meditations_, bk. i.
+
+[46] Fort's _Medical Economy during the Middle Ages_, p. 345.
+
+[47] Dr. Howden, Medical Superintendent of the Montrose Lunatic Asylum,
+in _Journal of Mental Science_, 1873.
+
+[48] _First Signs of Insanity_, p. 293.
+
+[49] _Clinical Lectures on Mental Diseases_, p. 428. The whole of
+chapter xi. is very pertinent.
+
+[50] Dr. R. Jones, in Allbutt's _System of Medicine_, vol. viii. p. 335
+
+[51] Dr. Hollander, _First Signs of Insanity_, pp. 64-5.
+
+[52] Cited by Ireland, _The Blot on the Brain_, p. 39.
+
+[53] Allbutt's _System of Medicine_, viii. 395.
+
+[54] _Physiology of Mind_, p. 251. See also Dr. Mercier's _The Nervous
+System and the Mind_, p. 55.
+
+[55] _Literary Remains_, p. 83.
+
+[56] W. Ellis, _Polynesian Researches_, ii. 235-6.
+
+[57] Dr. H. Maudsley has gone fully into the case of Swedenborg in an
+article in the _Journal of Mental Science_ for July and October 1869,
+since reprinted in his _Body and Mind_.
+
+[58] See _Luther_, by H. Grisar, 1913, vol. i. pp. 16-7.
+
+[59] For other cases, and a general account of the relations between
+pathologic states and religious delusion, see Lombroso, _Man of Genius_,
+chap. iv. pt. iii.
+
+[60] _Varieties of Religious Experience_, pp. 6-7.
+
+[61] _The Soul of a Christian_, p. 13.
+
+[62] See Parish's _Hallucinations and Illusions_, pp. 38-9.
+
+[63] _Saint Teresa_, by H. Joly, pp. 25, 26, and 58.
+
+[64] _Inquiries into Human Faculty_, 1883, p. 68.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER FOUR
+
+SEX & RELIGION IN PRIMITIVE LIFE
+
+
+The connection between sexual feeling and religious belief is ancient,
+intimate, and sustained. It has impressed itself on many observers who
+have approached the subject from widely different points of view. Some
+have treated the connection as purely accidental, and as having no more
+than a mere historical interest. Others have used it as illustrating the
+way in which so sacred a subject as religion may suffer degradation in
+degenerate hands. Others of a more scientific temper have dealt with the
+relations between sexualism and religion as illustrations of a mere
+perversion. A deal may be said in favour of this last point of view. We
+know, as a matter of fact, that such cases of perversion do exist, in
+what form and to what extent will be discussed later. We are also aware
+that strong feeling which cannot find vent in one direction will secure
+expression in another. The annals of Roman Catholicism contain accounts
+of numerous persons who have sought refuge in a monastery or a nunnery
+as the result of disappointment in love, and it would be foolish to
+conclude that strong amorous feelings are annihilated because there is a
+change in the object to which they are directed. Paul was not a
+different man from the Saul of pre-conversion days, but the same person
+with his energies directed into a new channel. Protestantism is without
+the obvious outlets for unsatisfied sexual feeling such as is provided
+by Roman Catholicism, but it provides other outlets. Religious service
+as a whole remains, and intense religious devotion may very often owe
+its origin to sources undreamt of by the devotee.
+
+Between religious beliefs and sexual feelings the connection is,
+however, wider and deeper, than the relation expressed by mere
+perversion. Neither is the relation one of mere accident. An examination
+of the facts in the light of adequate scientific knowledge, combined
+with a due perception of primitive human psychology and sociology, have
+shown that the two things are united at their source. One eminent
+medical writer asserts that "in a certain sense, the history of religion
+can be regarded as a peculiar mode of manifestation of the human sexual
+instinct."[65] Another writer substantially endorses this by the remark
+that "in a certain sense the religious life is an irradiation of the
+reproductive instinct."[66] How easily one glides into the other very
+little observation of life or study of history will show. The language
+of devotion and of amatory passion is often identical, and seems to
+serve equally well for either purpose. The significance of this fact is
+often obscured by our having etherealised the conception of love, and so
+losing sight of its physiological basis. And, having hidden it from
+sight, we, not unnaturally, fail to give it due consideration. This is,
+in its way, a fatal blunder. The sex life of man and woman is too large
+a fact and too pervasive a force to be ignored with safety. Ignorance
+combined with prudery conspires to perpetuate what ignorance alone
+began; and the sex life, in both its normal and abnormal manifestations,
+has been perpetually exploited in the interests of supernaturalism.
+
+The evidence that may be adduced in favour of what has been said is
+vast, and covers a wide range. Historically it covers such facts as the
+relations between primitive religious beliefs and the sexual life, and
+the multiplication of sects of a markedly erotic character during
+periods of religious enthusiasm. "Even the most casual students of
+religion," says Professor G. B. Cutten, "must have observed an
+apparently intimate connection between religious and sexual emotions,
+and not a few have read with amazement the abnormal cults which have had
+the sexual element as a foundation for their denominational
+dissent."[67] A phenomenon so striking as to force itself on the notice
+of the most 'casual students' raises the presumption that the relation
+between the two sets of facts is rather more than that of 'apparent'
+intimacy. When in the course of history two things appear together over
+and over again, one is surely justified in assuming that there is some
+underlying principle responsible for the association. The search for
+this principle leads to the next class of evidence--the psychological.
+In this we are concerned with the relation between the sexual feelings
+and the religious idea, an association not always expressed through the
+comparatively harmless medium of language. And, finally, we have the
+evidence derived from pathology, where we are able to discern a
+perverted sexuality masquerading as religious fervour.
+
+In a previous chapter there has been pointed out the kind of mental
+environment in which primitive man moves. As one of the earliest forms
+of systematised thinking, religion dominates all other forms of mental
+activity. In savage culture there is hardly a single event into which
+religious considerations do not enter. The savage does not merely
+believe in a supernatural world, he lives in it; it is as real to him as
+anything around him, and far more potent in its action. Above all, it is
+important to bear in mind that although one is compelled to speak of the
+natural and the supernatural when dealing with early beliefs, no such
+separation is present to the primitive intelligence. The division
+between the natural and the supernatural in the external world is the
+reflection of a corresponding division in the world of thought, and this
+arises only at a subsequent stage. What is afterwards recognised as the
+supernatural pervades everything. In a sense it is everything, since
+most of what occurs is by the agency or connivance of animistic forces.
+
+In such a world, where even the ordinary events of life have a
+supernatural significance, the strange and sometimes terrifying
+phenomena of sexual life carry peculiarly strong evidences of
+supernatural activity. Events which are to the modern mind the most
+obvious consequences of sex life are to the primitive mind proofs of
+supernatural or ghostly agency. Nothing, for example, would appear less
+open to misconception than the connection between sexual relations and
+the birth of children. Yet, on this head, Mr. Sidney Hartland has
+produced a mass of evidence, gathered from all parts of the world, and
+leading to the conclusion that in the most primitive stages of human
+culture, conception and birth are ascribed to direct supernatural
+influence. Setting out from a study of the world-wide vogue of the
+belief in supernatural birth--contained in the author's earlier work,
+_The Legend of Perseus_--Mr. Hartland finds in this a survival of a
+culture stage in which all birth is believed to be supernatural.
+Survivals of this belief that birth is a phenomenon independent of the
+union of the sexes are found in the existence of numerous semi-magical
+devices to obtain children, still practised in many parts of Europe, and
+which were practised on a much more extensive scale during the medieval
+period; in the ignorance of man concerning physiological functions in
+general, the existence of Motherright which appears to have universally
+antedated Fatherright--the origin of which he traces to economic causes,
+and to the animistic nature of primitive beliefs in general.[68]
+
+Such a conclusion is not without verification from the beliefs of
+existing savages. The Bahau of Central Borneo have no notion of the real
+duration of pregnancy, and date its commencement only from the time of
+its becoming visible. The Niol-Niol of Dampier Land in North-Western
+Australia hold birth to be independent of sexual intercourse. It is
+engendered by a pre-existing spirit through the agency of a medicine
+man. The North Queenslanders have a similar belief. They believe a child
+to be sent in answer to the husband's prayer as a punishment to his wife
+when he is vexed with her. On the Proserpine River the Blacks believe
+that a child is the gift of a supernatural being called Kunya. In South
+Queensland the Euahlayi believe that spirits congregate at certain spots
+and pounce on passing women, and so are born. On the Slave Coast of West
+Africa the Awunas say that a child derives the lower jaw from the
+mother; all the rest comes from the spirits. Among these people and
+others that might be named paternity exists in name, but it implies
+something entirely different to what it afterwards connotes. Mr.
+Hartland gives numerous instances of this curious fact, and points out
+that "the attention of mankind would not be early or easily fastened
+upon the procreative process. It is lengthy, extending over months
+during which the observer's attention would be inevitably diverted by a
+variety of objects, most of them of far more pressing import.... The
+sexual passion would be gratified instinctively without any thought of
+the consequences, and in an overwhelming proportion of cases without the
+consequence of pregnancy at all. When that consequence occurred it would
+not be visible for weeks or months after the act which produced it. A
+hundred other events might have taken place in the interval which would
+be likely to be credited with the result by one wholly ignorant of
+natural laws."
+
+There seems, therefore, fair grounds for Mr. Hartland's conclusion
+that:--
+
+"for generations and aeons the truth that a child is only born in
+consequence of an act of sexual union, that the birth of a child is the
+natural consequence of such an act performed in favouring circumstances,
+and that every child must be the result of such an act and of no other
+cause, was not realised by mankind, that down to the present day it is
+imperfectly realised by some peoples, and that there are still others
+among whom it is unknown."
+
+This, however, is but one of the ways in which supernatural beliefs
+become associated with sexual phenomena. In truth, there is not a stage
+of any importance in the sexual life of men and women where the same
+association does not transpire. There is, for example, the important
+phenomenon of puberty--important from both a physiological and
+sociological point of view. Pubic ceremonies of some kind are found all
+over the world, and in all forms, from those current amongst savages up
+to the contemporary practice of confirmation in the Christian Church. At
+all stages the period of puberty is the time of initiation. With
+uncivilised peoples a very general rule is the separation of the sexes,
+with fasting. Mr. Stanley Hall in his elaborate work on _Adolescence_
+has dealt very exhaustively with these customs, with which we shall be
+more closely concerned when we come to deal with the subject of
+conversion. At present it is only necessary to point out that the
+governing idea is that at puberty the boy and the girl are brought into
+special relationship with the tribal spirits, the proof of which
+relationship lies in the sexual functions originated.
+
+With boys, once puberty is attained, the sexual development is orderly
+and unobtrusive. In the case of girls certain recurring phenomena make
+the essential fact of sex much more impressive to the primitive mind,
+with far-reaching sociological consequences. "Ignorance of the nature of
+female periodicity," says A. E. Crawley, "leads man to consider it as
+the flow of blood from a wound, naturally, or more usually,
+supernaturally produced."[69] In Siam an evil spirit is believed to be
+the cause of the wound. Amongst the Chiriguanas the girl fasts, while
+women beat the floor with sticks in order to drive away "the snake that
+has wounded the girl." Similar beliefs are found very generally among
+people in a low stage of culture, and customs and beliefs still
+surviving among people more advanced point to the conclusion that
+convictions of the same kind were once fairly universal. It is this
+function, combined with the function of childbirth, that brings woman
+into close contact with the supernatural world, makes her an object of
+fear and wonder to primitive man, accounts for a number of the customs
+and beliefs associated with her, and finally helps to determine her
+social position. It is because her periodicity is taken as evidence of
+her communion with spiritual forces that special precautions have to be
+taken concerning her. She becomes spiritually contagious. Thus, the
+natives of New Britain, while engaged in making fish-traps, carefully
+avoid all women. They believe that if a woman were even to touch a
+fish-trap, it would catch nothing. Amongst the Maoris, if a man touched
+a menstruous woman, he would be taboo 'an inch thick.' An Australian
+black fellow, who discovered that his wife had lain on his blanket at
+her menstrual period, killed her, and died of terror himself within a
+fortnight. In Uganda the pots which a woman touches while the impurity
+of childbirth or menstruation is on her, are destroyed. With many North
+American Indians the use of weapons touched by women during these times
+would bring misfortune. A menstruating woman is with them the object
+they dread most. In Tahiti women are secluded. In some cases she is too
+dangerous to be even touched by others, and food is given her at the end
+of a stick. With the Pueblo Indians contact with a woman at these times
+exposes a man to attacks from an evil spirit, and he may pass on the
+infection to others.[70]
+
+It is needless to multiply instances; the same general reason governs
+all, and this has been clearly expressed by Dr. Frazer:--
+
+"The object of secluding women at menstruation is to neutralise the
+dangerous influence which is supposed to emanate from them at such
+times. The general effect of these rules is to keep the women suspended,
+so to say, between heaven and earth. Whether enveloped in her hammock
+and slung up to the roof, as in South America, or elevated above the
+ground in a dark and narrow cage, as in New Zealand, she may be
+considered to be out of the way of doing mischief, since being shut off
+both from the earth and from the sun, she can poison neither of these
+great sources of life by her deadly contagion. The precautions thus
+taken to isolate and insulate the girl are dictated by regard for her
+own safety as well as for the safety of others.... In short, the girl is
+viewed as charged with a powerful force which, if not kept within
+bounds, may prove the destruction both of the girl herself and all with
+whom she comes in contact. To repress this force within the limits
+necessary for the safety of all concerned is the object of the taboos in
+question."
+
+The savage is far too logical in his methods to allow such an idea to
+end here. If a woman is so highly charged with spiritual infection as to
+be dangerous at certain frequently recurring periods, she may be more or
+less dangerous between these periods. As Havelock Ellis says: "Instead
+of being regarded as a being who at periodic intervals becomes the
+victim of a spell of impurity, the conception of impurity becomes
+amalgamated with the conception of woman; she is, as Tertullian puts it,
+_Janua diaboli_; and this is the attitude which still persisted in
+medieval days."[71] This is to be expected from what one knows of the
+workings of the primitive intelligence, but it is surprising to find Mr.
+Ellis continue by saying, on apparently good grounds, that "the belief
+in the periodically recurring impurity of women has by no means died out
+to-day. Among a very large section of the women of the middle and lower
+classes of England and other countries it is firmly believed that the
+touch of a menstruating woman will contaminate; only a few years since,
+in the course of a correspondence on this subject in the _British
+Medical Journal_ (1878), even medical men were found to state from
+personal observation that they had no doubt whatever on this point.
+Thus, one doctor, who expressed surprise that any doubt could be thrown
+on the point, wrote, after quoting cases of spoiled hams, etc., presumed
+to be due to this cause, which had come under his own personal
+observation: 'For two thousand years the Italians have had this idea of
+menstruating women. We English hold to it, the Americans have it, also
+the Australians. Now, I should like to know the country where the
+evidence of any such observation is unknown.'" Evidently animism is a
+more persistent frame of mind than most people are inclined to believe.
+
+It is certain, however, that this conception of woman's nature is
+dominant in the lower stages of culture. She is spiritually dangerous,
+and the principle of 'taboo' is made to cover a great many of her
+relations to man. In Tahiti a woman was not allowed to touch the weapons
+or fishing implements of men. Amongst the Todas women are not permitted
+to touch the cattle. If a wife touches the food of her husband, among
+the Hindus, the food is unfit to be eaten. An Eskimo wife dare not eat
+with her husband. In New Zealand wives were not allowed to eat with the
+males lest their taboo should kill them. Many tribes are careful to
+refrain from contact with women before going to fight. They believe that
+this would rob them and their weapons of strength. Other practices
+followed by savages before going to war forbid one assuming that this
+abstention is due to any rational fear of dissipating their energies.
+Instead of conserving their strength they weaken themselves by the many
+privations they undergo before fighting, in order to ensure victory.
+Professor Frazer well says:--
+
+"When we observe what pains these misguided savages took to unfit
+themselves for the business of war by abstaining from food, denying
+themselves rest, and lacerating their bodies, we shall probably not be
+disposed to attribute their practice of continence in war to a rational
+fear of dissipating their bodily energies by indulgence in the lusts of
+the flesh."[72]
+
+The conception of woman as one heavily charged with supernatural
+potentialities, and, therefore, a source of danger to the community,
+seems to lie at the basis of the widespread belief in the religious
+'uncleanness' of women. The real significance of the word 'unclean' in
+religious ritual has been obscured by our modern use of it in a hygienic
+or ethical sense. In reality it is but an illustration of the principle
+of 'taboo,' and 'taboo' may extend to anything, good or bad, useful or
+useless, hygienically clean or unclean. The primary meaning of 'taboo,'
+a Polynesian word, is something that is set aside or forbidden. The
+field covered by this word among savage and semi-savage races is, as
+Robertson Smith points out, "very wide, for there is no part of life in
+which the savage does not feel himself surrounded by mysterious agencies
+and recognise the need of walking warily."[73] Anything may thus become
+the object of a 'taboo.' Weapons, food, animals, places, special
+relations of one person to another at certain times and under certain
+conditions. It is enough that some special or particular degree of
+supernatural influence is associated with the object in question. The
+ancient Jews, for example, in prohibiting the eating of swine's flesh,
+were as far as possible removed in their thought from any connection
+with dietetics. They were simply following the well-known savage custom
+that the totem of a tribe is sacred. The pig was a totem with many of
+the Semitic tribes, and must not, therefore, be eaten.[74] It was not an
+unclean animal, in the modern sense, it was a 'holy' animal. With the
+Syrians the dove was so holy that even to touch it made a man 'unclean'
+for a whole day. No North American Indian will eat of the flesh of an
+animal that is a tribal totem, except under grave necessity, and even
+then with elaborate religious ceremonies. So, "a prohibition to eat the
+flesh of an animal of a certain species, that has its ground not in
+natural loathing but in religious horror and reverence, implies that
+something divine is ascribed to every animal of the species. And what
+seems to us to be a natural loathing often turns out, in the case of
+primitive peoples, to be based on a religious _taboo_, and to have its
+origin not in feelings of contemptuous disgust, but of reverential
+dread."[75]
+
+The real significance of 'unclean' in connection with religious ritual
+is 'holy', something that partakes in a special manner of supernatural
+influence and therefore involves a certain danger in contact. As the
+writer just cited observes:--
+
+"The acts that cause uncleanness are exactly the same which among savage
+nations place a man under taboo.... These acts are often involuntary,
+and often innocent, or even necessary to society. The savage,
+accordingly, imposes a taboo on a woman in childbed, or during her
+courses ... simply because birth and everything connected with the
+propagation of the species on the one, and disease and death on the
+other hand, seem to involve the action of supernatural agencies of a
+dangerous kind. If he attempts to explain, he does so by supposing that
+on these occasions spirits of deadly power are present; at all events
+the persons involved seem to him to be sources of mysterious danger,
+which has all the characters of an infection, and may extend to other
+people unless due precautions are observed.... It has nothing to do with
+respect for the gods, but springs from mere terror of the supernatural
+influences associated with the woman's physical condition."[76]
+
+It is interesting to observe the manner in which this notion of the
+sacramentally 'unclean' nature of woman has affected her religious
+status, and by inference, her social status likewise. Among the
+Australians women are shut out from any part in the religious
+ceremonies. In the Sandwich Isles a woman's touch made a sacrifice
+unclean. If a Hindu woman touches a sacred image the divinity is
+destroyed. In Fiji women are excluded from the temples. The Papuans have
+the same custom. The Ainus of Japan allow a woman to prepare the
+sacrifice, but not to offer it. Women are excluded from many Mohammedan
+mosques. Among the Jews women have no part in the religious ceremonies.
+In the Christian Church women were excluded from the priestly office. A
+Council held at Auxerre at the end of the sixth century forbade women
+touching the Eucharist with their bare hands, and in various churches
+they were forbidden to approach the altar during Mass.[77] In the
+gospels Jesus forbids the woman to touch Him, after the resurrection,
+although Thomas was allowed to feel His wounds. "The Church of the
+Middle Ages did not hesitate to provide itself with eunuchs in order to
+supply cathedral choirs with the soprano tones inhering by nature in
+women alone."[78] The 'Churching' of women still in vogue has its origin
+in the same superstition that childbirth endows woman with a
+supernatural influence which must be removed in the interests of others.
+This ceremony was formerly called "The Order of the Purification of
+Women," and was read at the church door before the woman entered the
+building. Its connection with the ideas indicated above is obvious. The
+Tahitian practice of excluding women from intercourse with others for
+two or three weeks after childbirth, with similar practices amongst
+uncivilised peoples all over the world, led with various modifications
+up to the current practice of churching. They show that in the opinion
+of primitive peoples "a woman at and after childbirth is pervaded by a
+certain dangerous influence which can infect anything and anybody she
+touches; so that in the interests of the community it becomes necessary
+to seclude her from society for a while, until the virulence of the
+infection has passed away, when, after submitting to certain rites of
+purification, she is again free to mingle with her fellows."[79] The
+gradual change of this ceremony, from a getting rid of a dangerous
+supernatural infection to returning thanks for a natural danger passed,
+is on all fours with what takes place in other directions in relation to
+religious ideas and practices.
+
+The important part played by this conception of woman's nature may be
+traced in the fierce invective directed against her in the early
+Christian writings. Of course, by that time society had reached a stage
+when the primitive form of this belief had been outgrown, but ideas and
+attitudes of mind persist long after their originating conditions have
+disappeared. In this particular case we have the primitive idea
+expressed in a form suitable to altered circumstances, and the primitive
+feeling seeking new warranty in ethical or social considerations. But in
+the main the old notion is there. Woman is a creature threatening
+danger to man's spiritual welfare.[80] In this connection we may note
+an observation of Westermarck's during his residence among the country
+people of Morocco. He was struck, he says, with the superstitious fear
+the men had of women. They are supposed to be much better versed in
+magic, and therefore one ran greater danger in offending them. The
+curses of women are, generally, much more feared than those of men. To
+this we have a parallel in Christianity which so often revived and
+strengthened the lower religious beliefs. During the witch mania an
+overwhelming proportion of those charged with and executed for sorcery
+were women. As a matter of fact, women were more prone than men to
+credit themselves with possessing supernatural power. But the
+theological explanation was that the devil had more power over women
+than men. This was, obviously, a heritage from the primitive belief
+above described.[81]
+
+Another way in which religion becomes closely associated with sexualism
+is through the widely diffused phallic worship. The worship of the
+generative power in the form of stones, pillars, and carved
+representations of the male and female sexual organs plays an
+unquestionably important part in the history of religion, however hardly
+pressed it may have been by some enthusiastic theorisers. "The farther
+back we go," says Mr. Hargrave Jennings, "in the history of every
+country, the deeper we explore into all religions, ancient as well as
+modern, we stumble the more frequently upon the incessantly intensifying
+distinct traces of this supposedly indecent mystic worship."[82] On the
+lower Congo, says Sir H. H. Johnston:--
+
+"Phallic worship in various forms prevails. It is not associated with
+any rites that might be called particularly obscene; and on the coast,
+where manners and morals are particularly corrupt, the phallus cult is
+no longer met with. In the forests between Manyanga and Stanley Pool it
+is not rare to come upon a little rustic temple, made of palm fronds and
+poles, within which male and female figures, nearly or quite life size,
+may be seen, with disproportionate genital organs, the figures being
+intended to represent the male and female principle. Around these carved
+and painted statues are many offerings, plates, knives, and cloth, and
+frequently also the phallic symbol may be seen dangling from the
+rafters. There is not the slightest suspicion of obscenity in all this,
+and anyone qualifying this worship of the generative power as obscene
+does so hastily and ignorantly. It is a solemn mystery to the Congo
+native, a force but dimly understood, and, like all mysterious natural
+manifestations, it is a power that must be propitiated and persuaded to
+his good."[83]
+
+The Egyptian religion was permeated with phallicism. In India phallic
+worship is widely scattered. In Benares, the sacred city, "everywhere,
+in the temples, in the little shrines in the street, the emblem of the
+Creator is phallic." Symbols of the male and female sexual organs, the
+Lingam and the Yoni, have been objects of worship in India from the
+earliest times. With the Sakti ceremonies, Hindu religion dispenses with
+symbols, and devotion is paid to a naked woman selected for the
+occasion.[84] This worship of a nude female is a very familiar
+phenomenon in the history of religion. Some of the early Christian sects
+were said to have practised it, and it is a feature of some Russian
+religious sects to-day. The subject will be dealt with more fully
+hereafter.
+
+In ancient Rome, in the month of April, "when the fertilising powers of
+nature begin to operate, and its powers to be visibly developed, a
+festival in honour of Venus took place; in it the phallus was carried in
+a cart, and led in procession by the Roman ladies to the temple of Venus
+outside the Colline gate, and then presented by them to the sexual part
+of the goddess."[85] In the Greek Bacchic religious processions huge
+phalli were carried in a chariot drawn by bulls, and surrounded by women
+and girls singing songs of praise. Phallic worship was also associated
+with the cults of Dionysos and Eleusis. It is met with among the ancient
+Mexicans and Peruvians, and also among the North American tribes. The
+famous Black Stone of Mecca, to which religious honours are paid, is
+also said by authorities to be a phallic symbol. The stone set up by
+Jacob (Gen. xxviii. 18-9) falls into the same category. References to
+phallic worship may be found in many parts of the Bible, and
+authoritative writers like Mr. Hargrave Jennings and Major-General
+Forlong have not hesitated to assert that the god of the Jewish Ark was
+a sexual symbol. Seeing the extent to which phallic worship exists in
+other religions, it would be surprising did this not also exist in the
+early Jewish religion.
+
+In Christendom we have evidence of the perpetuation of the phallic cult
+in the decree of Mans, 1247, and of the Synod of Tours, 1396, against
+its practice. Quite unsuccessfully, however. Indeed, the architecture of
+medieval churches bear in their ornamentation numerous evidences of the
+failure at suppression. Of course, much of this ornamentation may have
+been due to mere imitation, but often enough it was deliberate. "The
+scholar," says Bonwick, "who gazed to-day at the roof of Temple Church,
+London, had the illustration before him. A symbol there, repeatedly
+displayed, is the popular Hindu one to express sex worship."[86] The
+belief found expression in other ways than ornamentation. When Sir
+William Hamilton visited Naples in 1781 he found in Isernia a Christian
+custom in vogue which he described in a letter to Sir William Banks, and
+which admitted of no doubt as to its Priapic character. Every September
+was celebrated a festival in the Church of SS. Cosmus and Damianus.
+During the progress of the festival vendors paraded the streets offering
+small waxen phalli, which were bought by the devout and placed in the
+church, much as candles are still purchased and given. At the same time,
+prayers are offered to St. Como by those who desire children. In
+Midlothian, in 1268, the clergy instructed their flock to sprinkle water
+with a dog's phallus in order to avert a murrain. The same practice
+existed in Inverkeithing, and in Easter week priest and people danced
+round a wooden phallus.[87] Mr. Westropp, quoting an eighteenth-century
+writer,[88] says: "When the Huguenots took Embrun, they found among the
+relics of the principal church a Priapus, of three pieces in the ancient
+fashion, the top of which was worn away from being constantly washed
+with wine." The temple of St. Eutropius, destroyed by the Huguenots, is
+said to have contained a similar figure. From Mr. Sidney Hartland's
+collection of practices for obtaining children I take the following:--
+
+"At Bourg-Dieu, in the diocese of Bourges, a similar saint" (similar to
+the priapean figure previously described) "was called Guerlichon or
+Greluchon. There after nine days' devotions women stretched themselves
+on the horizontal figure of the saint, and then scraped the phallus for
+mixture in water as a drink. Other saints were worshipped elsewhere in
+France with equivalent rites. Down to the Revolution there stood at
+Brest a chapel of Saint Guignolet containing a priapean statue of the
+holy man. Women who were, or feared to be, sterile used to go and scrape
+a little of the prominent member, which they put into a glass of water
+from the well and drank. The same practice was followed at the Chapel of
+Saint Pierre-a-Croquettes in Brabant until 1837, when the archaeologist
+Schayes called attention to it, and thereupon the ecclesiastical
+authorities removed the cause of scandal. Women have, however, still
+continued to make votive offerings of pins down almost, if not quite, to
+the present day. At Antwerp stood at the gateway to the Church of Saint
+Walburga in the Rue des Pecheurs a statue, the sexual organ of which
+had been entirely scraped away by women for the same purpose."[89]
+
+From what has been said, it will not be difficult to understand the
+existence of the custom of religious prostitution. Considering the
+sexual impulse as specially connected with a supernatural force, man
+pays it religious honour, and comes to identify its manifestations as an
+expression of the supernatural and also as an act of worship towards it.
+In India the practice existed, when most temples had their 'bayaderes.'
+In ancient Chaldea every woman was compelled to prostitute herself once
+in her life in the temple of the goddess Mylitta--the Chaldean Venus.
+This custom existed elsewhere, and by it the woman was compelled to
+remain within the temple enclosures until some man chose her, from whom
+she received a piece of money. The money, of course, belonged to the
+temple.[90] In Greece, Carthage, Syria, etc., we find the same custom.
+Among the Jews, so orthodox a commentary as Smith's _Bible Dictionary_
+admits that the 'Kadechim' attached to the temple were prostitutes. The
+frequent references to the service of the 'groves' surrounding the
+temple irresistibly suggest their likeness to the groves around the
+temples of Mylitta, and their use for the same purpose.
+
+There is no necessity to prolong the subject,[91] nor is it necessary to
+my purpose to discuss the origin of phallic worship. It is enough to
+have shown the manner in which, from the very earliest times, religious
+belief and sexual phenomena have been connected in the closest possible
+manner. In this respect it is only on all fours with the relation of
+religion to phenomena in general, but here the attitude of mind is
+accentuated and prolonged by the startling facts of sexual development.
+The connection becomes consequently so close it is not surprising to
+find that the association has persisted down to the present time, and
+moods that have their origin in the sexual life are frequently
+attributed to religious influences. The primitive intelligence, frankly
+seeing in the phenomena of sex a manifestation of the supernatural, sees
+here a continuous endorsement of religious life. The more sophisticated
+mind raised above this point of view continues, with modifications, the
+primitive practices, and in ignorance of the physiological causes of its
+own states is only too ready to interpret ebullitions of sex feeling as
+evidence of the divine.
+
+
+NOTE TO PAGE 104.
+
+      It is strange that so little attention has been paid to
+      these primitive beliefs as important factors in determining
+      the social position of women. It is too generally assumed
+      that because woman is physically weaker than man it is her
+      weakness that has determined her subordination. Both the
+      advocates and the opponents of 'Woman's Rights' appear to
+      have reached a common agreement on this point. During some
+      of the debates in the House of Commons, for example, it was
+      openly stated by prominent politicians, as an axiom of
+      political philosophy, that all laws rest upon a basis of
+      force, and if men say they will not obey woman-made laws
+      there is no power that can compel them to do so. On the
+      other side, women, while appealing to what they properly
+      call higher considerations, themselves dwell upon the
+      physical weakness of woman as the reason for her
+      subordination in the past. Both parties are helped in their
+      arguments by the facile division of social history into two
+      periods, an earlier one in which club law plays the chief
+      part, and a later period when mental and moral qualities
+      assume a dominating position. The consequence is, runs the
+      argument, that each sex has to battle with the dead weight
+      of tradition and custom. The woman is oppressed by the
+      tradition of subordination to the male; the man is inspired
+      by that of dominance over the female.
+
+      It is when we ask for evidence of this that we see how
+      flimsy the case is. Social phenomena in either civilised or
+      uncivilised society furnishes no proof that institutions
+      and customs rest upon a basis of physical force. The
+      rulership of a tribe often rests with the old men of a
+      tribe; with some tribes the women are consulted, and
+      invariably custom and tradition plays a powerful part. The
+      notion that the primitive chief is the primitive strong man
+      of the tribe is as baseless as the belief in an original
+      social contract, and owes its existence to the same kind of
+      fanciful speculation. As Frazer says, "it is one of those
+      facile theories which the arm-chair philosopher concocts
+      with his feet on the fender without taking the trouble to
+      consult the facts." The primitive chief may be a strong
+      man. The tribal council or chief may use force or rely upon
+      physical force to enforce certain decrees, just as the
+      modern king or parliament may call on the help of policeman
+      or soldier, but this no more proves that their rule is
+      based upon force than Mr. Asquith's premiership proves his
+      physical superiority to the rest of the Cabinet.
+
+All political life, and to a smaller degree all social life, involves
+the direction of force, but neither appeal to force for an ultimate
+justification, nor do social institutions originate in an act of force.
+It is one of the commonplaces of historical study that when an
+institution is actually forced upon a people it very quickly becomes
+inoperative. Other things equal, one group of people may overcome
+another group because of physical superiority, but the conquest over,
+the question as to which group shall really rule, or which set of
+institutions shall survive, is settled on quite different grounds. The
+history of almost any country will give examples of the absorption of
+the conqueror by the conquered, and the bringing of imported
+institutions into line with native life and feeling. Fundamentally the
+relations binding people together into a society are not physical, but
+psychological. Society rests upon the foundations of a common mental
+life--upon sympathy, beliefs, the desire for companionship, etc. As
+Professor J. M. Baldwin puts it, the fundamental social facts are not
+_things_, but _thoughts_.[92] As a member of a social group man is born
+into an environment that is essentially psychological, and his attitude
+not only towards his fellow human beings, but towards nature in general,
+is determined by the psychological contents of the society to which he
+belongs.
+
+Now if the relation of one man to another is not determined by physical
+superiority and inferiority, if the relations of classes within a
+society are not determined in this manner, why should it be assumed that
+as a sex woman's position is fixed by this means? It seems more
+reasonable to assume that some other principle than that of club law, a
+principle set in operation very early in the history of civilisation,
+fixed the main lines upon which the relations of the sexes were to
+develop, however much other forces helped its operation. I believe this
+desired factor is to be found in the superstitious notions savages
+develop concerning the nature and function of woman, and which society
+only very slowly outgrows. For, as Frazer says: "The continuity of human
+development has been such that most, if not all, of the great
+institutions which still form the framework of a civilised society have
+their roots in savagery, and have been handed down to us in these later
+days through countless generations, assuming new outward forms in the
+process of transmission, but remaining in their inmost core
+substantially unchanged."
+
+In considering the play of primitive ideas as determining the lines of
+human evolution several things must be kept clearly in mind. One is that
+the course of biological development has made woman, as a sex, dependent
+upon man, as a sex, for protection and support. This is true quite apart
+from economic considerations or from those arising from the relative
+physical strength of the sexes. The prime function of woman,
+biologically, is that of motherhood. She is, so to speak, mother in a
+much more important and more pervasive sense than man is father. In the
+case of woman, her functions are of necessity subordinated to this one.
+With man this is not the case. It is with the woman that the nutrition
+of the child rests before birth, and a large portion of her strength is
+expended in the discharge of this function. The same is true for some
+period immediately after birth. Again to use a biological illustration,
+during the period of child-bearing and child-rearing the relation of the
+man to the woman may be likened to that which exists between the germ
+cells and the somatic cells. As the latter is the medium of protection
+and the conveyer of nutrition in relation to the former, so it falls to
+the male to protect and in some degree to provide for the woman as
+child-bearer. It would not, of course, be impossible for woman to
+provide for herself, but it would detract so considerably from social
+efficiency that any group in which it was done would soon disappear. It
+is the nature and supreme function of woman that makes her dependent
+upon man. And even though the dreams of some were realised, and society
+as a whole cared for woman in the discharge of this function, the issue
+would not be changed. It would mean that instead of a woman being
+dependent upon one man she would be dependent upon all men. Nor are the
+substantial facts of the situation changed by anyone pointing out that
+all women do not and cannot under ordinary circumstances become wives
+and mothers. Human nature will always develop on the lines of the normal
+functions of men and women, and there can be no question in this case as
+to what these are.
+
+I have used the word 'dependence,' but this does not, of necessity,
+involve either subordination or subjection. It may provide the condition
+of either or of both, but the dependence of the woman on the man is, as
+I have said, biologically inescapable. Her subjection is quite another
+question. Dependence may be mutual. One class of society may be
+dependent upon another class, but the two may move on a perfect level of
+equality. And with uncivilised peoples the evidence goes to prove that,
+while the spheres of the sexes are more clearly differentiated than with
+us, this difference is seldom if ever expressed in terms of superior and
+inferior. Savages would say, as civilised people still say, there are
+many things that it is wrong for a woman to do, and they would add there
+are also things that a man must not do. They would be as shocked at
+woman doing certain things as some people among ourselves were when
+women first began to speak at public meetings. Their disapproval would
+not rest on the ground that these things were 'unwomanly', nor upon any
+question of weakness or strength, of inferiority or superiority, but for
+another and, to the savage, very urgent reason.
+
+One can very easily exaggerate the extent of the subjection of women
+among uncivilised people. As a matter of fact, it usually is
+exaggerated. Not all travellers are capable of accurate observation, and
+very many are led astray by what are really superficial aspects of
+savage life. They are so impressed by the contemplation of a state of
+affairs different from our own that they mistake mere lines of
+demarcation for a moral valuation. Many travellers, for example,
+observing that women are strictly forbidden to do this or that, conclude
+that the woman has no rights as against the man. As in nearly all these
+cases the man is as strictly forbidden to encroach on the woman's
+sphere, one might as reasonably reverse the statement and dwell upon
+male subjection. As a matter of fact, both furnish examples of the
+all-powerful principle of 'taboo.' Some things are taboo to the man,
+others to the woman. And the key to the problem lies in the nature and
+origin of these taboos. But taboo does not extinguish rights; it
+confirms them. Under its operation, far from its being the truth that
+women are without status or rights or power, her position and rights are
+clearly marked, generally recognised, and quickly enforced. Some
+examples of this may be noted.
+
+A Kaffir woman when ill-treated possesses the right of asylum with her
+parents, and remains there until the husband makes atonement. The same
+thing holds of the West African Fulahs. In the Marquesas a woman is
+prohibited the use of canoes; on the other hand, men are prohibited
+frequenting certain places belonging to the women. In Nicaragua no man
+may enter the woman's market-place under penalty of a beating. With most
+of the North-American tribes a woman has supreme power inside the lodge.
+The husband possesses no power of interference. In most cases the
+husband cannot give away anything belonging to the lodge without first
+getting the consent of his wife. With the Nootkas, women are consulted
+on all matters of business. Livingstone relates his surprise on finding
+that a native would not accompany him on a journey because he could not
+get his wife's consent. He found this to be one of the customs of the
+tribe to which the man belonged. Among the Kandhs of India nothing
+public is done without consulting the women. In the Pellew Islands the
+head of the family can do nothing of importance without consulting the
+oldest female relative. Among the Hottentots women have supreme rule in
+the house. If a man oversteps the line, his female relatives inflict a
+fine, which is paid to the wife. With the Bechuanas the mother of the
+chief is present at all councils, and he can hardly decide anything
+without her consent. These are only a few of the cases that might be
+cited, but they are sufficient to show that the common view of women
+among savages as without recognised status, or power, needs very serious
+qualification. Of course, ill-treatment of women does occur with
+uncivilised as with civilised people, and she may suffer from the
+expression of brutal passion or superior strength, but an examination of
+the facts justifies Starcke's opinion that "we are not justified in
+assuming that the savage feels a contempt for women in virtue of her
+sex."
+
+In primitive life, in short, the dominant idea is not that of
+superiority in relation to woman, but that of difference. She is
+different from man, and this difference involves consequences of the
+gravest character, and against which due precautions must be taken.
+Superiority and inferiority are much later conceptions; they belong to a
+comparatively civilised period, and their development offers an
+admirable example of the way in which customs based on sheer
+superstitions become transformed into a social prejudice, with the
+consequent creation of numerous excuses for their perpetuation. What
+that initial prejudice is--a prejudice so powerful that it largely
+determines the future status of woman--has already been pointed out. Her
+place in society is marked out in uncivilised times by the powerful
+superstitions connected with sexual functions. Not that she is
+weaker--although that is, of course, plain--nor that she is inferior, a
+thought which scarcely exists with uncivilised peoples, but that she is
+dangerous, particularly so during her functional crises and in
+childbirth. And being dangerous, because charged with a supernatural
+influence inimical to others, she is excluded from certain occupations,
+and contact with her has to be carefully regulated. I agree with Mr.
+Andrew Lang that in the regulations concerning women amongst uncivilised
+people we have another illustration of the far-reaching principle of
+taboo (_Social Origins and Primal Law_, p. 239) she suffers because of
+her sex, and because of the superstitious dread to which her sex nature
+gives birth.
+
+Of course, at a later stage other considerations begin to operate.
+Where, for example, as amongst the Kaffirs, women are not permitted to
+touch cattle because of this assumed spiritual infection, and where a
+man's wealth is measured by the cattle he possesses, it is easy to see
+that this would constitute a force preventing the political and social
+equality of the sexes. The pursuits from which women were primarily
+excluded for purely religious reasons would in course of time come to be
+looked upon as man's inalienable possessions. And here her physical
+weakness would play its part; for she could not take, as man could
+withhold, by force. Even when the primitive point of view is discarded,
+the social prejudices engendered by it long remains. And social
+prejudices, as we all know, are the hardest of all things to destroy.
+
+A final consideration needs to be stated. This is that the customs
+determined by the views of woman (above outlined) fall into line, in a
+rough-and-ready fashion, with the biological tendency to consecrate the
+female to the function of motherhood and conserve her energies to that
+end, leaving other kinds of work to the male. It would be an obvious
+advantage to a tribe in which woman, relieved from the necessity of
+physical struggle for food and defence, was able to attend to children
+and the more peaceful side of family life. Children would not only
+benefit thereby, but the home with all its civilising, humanising
+influences would develop more rapidly. Assuming variations in tribal
+life in this direction, there is no question as to which tribe that
+would stand the better chance of survival. The development of life has
+proceeded here as elsewhere by differentiation and specialisation; and
+while the tasks demanding the more sustained physical exertions were
+left to man, and to the performance of which his sexual nature offered
+no impediment, woman became more and more specialised for maternity and
+domestic occupations. This, I hasten to add, is not at all intended as a
+plea for denying to women the right to participate in the wider social
+life of the species. I am trying to explain a social phase, and neither
+justifying nor condemning its perpetuation.
+
+
+FOOTNOTES:
+
+[65] Dr. Iwan Bloch, _The Sexual Life of Our Time_, p. 97.
+
+[66] E. D. Starbuck, _The Psychology of Religion_, p. 401.
+
+[67] _The Psychological Phenomena of Christianity_, p. 419.
+
+[68] _Primitive Paternity_, 2 vols., 1909-10.
+
+[69] _The Mystic Rose_, p. 191.
+
+[70] See Frazer's _Taboo and the Perils of the Soul_, pp. 145-63, and
+Crawley's _Mystic Rose_.
+
+[71] _Man and Woman_, p. 15.
+
+[72] _Taboo_, pp. 163-4.
+
+[73] _Religion of the Semites_, p. 142.
+
+[74] A long list of animals that were sacred to various Semitic tribes
+has been compiled by Robertson Smith, _Kinship and Marriage in Early
+Arabia_, pp. 194-201.
+
+[75] Robertson Smith, _Kinship and Marriage in Early Arabia_, pp. 306-7.
+
+[76] _Religion of the Semites_, pp. 427-9. For a fuller discussion of
+the subject, see _Studies in the Psychology of Sex_, by Havelock Ellis,
+1901.
+
+[77] Westermarck, _Origin and Development of the Moral Ideas_, p. 666.
+
+[78] Westermarck, p. 666.
+
+[79] Frazer, _Taboo_, p. 150.
+
+[80] See the Rev. Principal Donaldson's _Woman: her Position and
+Influence in Ancient Greece and Rome, and among the Early Christians_,
+bk. iii.
+
+[81] For the general influence of these beliefs about woman in
+determining her social position, see note at the end of this chapter.
+
+[82] _The Worship of Priapus_, Pref. p. 9.
+
+[83] _The River Congo_, p. 405.
+
+[84] A description of the Sakti ceremony is given by Major-General
+Forlong, _Faiths of Man_, iii. pp. 228-9.
+
+[85] Westropp, _Primitive Symbolism_, p. 30.
+
+[86] _Egyptian Belief and Modern Thought_, p. 256.
+
+[87] Forlong, _Faiths of Man_, iii. p. 66.
+
+[88] _Primitive Symbolism_, p. 36.
+
+[89] _Primitive Paternity_, i. pp. 63-4.
+
+[90] Major-General Forlong agrees with many other authorities in tracing
+our custom of kissing under the mistletoe to this ancient practice. "The
+mistletoe," he says, "marks in one sense Venus's temple, for any girl
+may be kissed if caught under its sprays--a practice, though modified,
+which recalls to us that horrid one mentioned by Herodotus, where all
+women were for once at least the property of the man who sought them in
+Mylitta's temple."--_Rivers of Life_, i. p. 91.
+
+[91] Those who desire further and more detailed information may consult
+Forlong's great work, _The Rivers of Life_, Payne Knight's _Worship of
+Priapus_, Westropp and Wake's _Phallicism in Ancient Religion_, Brown's
+_Dionysiak Myth_, Westropp's _Primitive Symbolism_, R. A. Campbell's
+_Phallic Worship_, Hargrave Jennings's _Worship of Priapus_, etc.
+
+[92] A good discussion of the topic will be found in this author's
+_Social and Ethical Interpretations in Mental Development_.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER FIVE
+
+THE INFLUENCE OF SEXUAL AND PATHOLOGIC STATES ON RELIGIOUS BELIEF
+
+
+In the preceding chapter we have been concerned with the various ways in
+which the phenomena attendant on the sexual life of man and woman become
+associated with religious beliefs. As a force that arises in the life of
+each individual, and intrudes, as it were, into consciousness, the
+phenomena of sex fill primitive man with an amazement that is not
+unmixed with terror. In strict accord with primitive psychology sexual
+phenomena are conceived as more or less connected with the supernatural
+world, and becoming thus entwined with religious convictions are made
+the nucleus of a number of superstitious ceremonies. The connection is
+close and obvious so long as we restrict our survey to uncivilised
+humanity. The only room for doubt or discussion is the exact meaning of
+certain ceremonies, or the order of certain phases of development. It is
+when we take man in a more advanced stage that obscurity gathers and
+difficulties arise. The sexual life is no longer lived, as it were,
+openly. Symbolism and mysticism develop; a more complex social life
+provides disguised outlets for primitive and indestructible feelings.
+Sexualism, instead of being something to be glorified, and, so to speak,
+annotated by religious ceremonies, becomes something to be hidden or
+decried. Ignored it may be. Decried it may be; but it will not be
+denied. That is a practical impossibility in the case of so powerful and
+so pervasive a fact as sex. We may disguise its expression, but only too
+often the disguise is the equivalent of undesirable and unhealthy
+manifestations.
+
+The modern history of religion offers a melancholy illustration of the
+truth of the last sentence, and it is quite clearly exhibited in the
+history of Christianity itself. From the beginning it strove to suppress
+the power of sexual feeling. It was an enemy against whom one had to be
+always on guard, one that had to be crushed, or at least kept in
+subjection in the interests of spiritual development. And yet the very
+intensity of the efforts at suppression defeated the object aimed at.
+With some of the leaders of early Christianity sex became an obsession.
+Long dwelling upon its power made them unduly and unhealthily conscious
+of its presence. Instead of sex taking its place as one of the facts of
+life, which like most other facts might be good or bad as circumstances
+determined, it was so much dwelt upon as to often dwarf everything else.
+Asceticism is, after all, mainly a reversed sensualism, or at least
+confesses the existence of a sensualism that must not be allowed
+expression lest its manifestation becomes overpowering. Mortification
+confesses the supremacy of sense as surely as gratification. Moreover,
+mortification of sense as preached by the great ascetics does not
+prevent that most dangerous of all forms of gratification, the
+sensualism of the imagination. That remains, and is apt to gain in
+strength since the fundamentally healthful energies are denied
+legitimate and natural modes of expression. Thus it is that we find
+developing social life not always providing a healthy outlet for the
+sexual life, and thus it is that the intense striving of religious
+leaders against the power of the sexual impulse has often forced it into
+strange and harmful forms of expression. So we find throughout the
+history of religion, not only that a deal of what has passed for
+supernatural illumination to have undoubtedly had its origin in
+perverted sexual feeling, but the constant emergence of curious
+religio-erotic sects whose strange mingling of eroticism and religion
+has scandalised many, and offered a lesson to all had they but possessed
+the wit to discern it.
+
+Although there is an understandable disinclination, amounting with some
+to positive revulsion, to recognise the sexual origin of much that
+passes for religious fervour, the fact is well known to competent
+medical observers, as the following citations will show. More than a
+generation since a well-known medical authority said:--
+
+"I know of no fact in pathology more striking and more terrifying than
+the way in which the phenomena of the ecstatic--which have often been
+seized upon by sentimental theorisers as proofs of spiritual
+exaltation--may be plainly seen to bridge the gulf between the innocent
+foolery of ordinary hypnotic patients and the degraded and repulsive
+phenomena of nymphomania and satyriasis."[93]
+
+Dr. C. Norman also observes:--
+
+"Ecstasy, as we see in cases of acute mental disease, is probably always
+connected with sexual excitement, if not with sexual depravity. The same
+association is seen in less extreme cases, and one of the commonest
+features in the conversation of acutely maniacal women is the
+intermingling of erotic and religious ideas."[94]
+
+This opinion is fully endorsed by Sir Francis Galton:--
+
+"It has been noticed that among the morbid organic conditions which
+accompany the show of excessive piety and religious rapture in the
+insane, none are so frequent as disorders of the sexual organisation.
+Conversely, the frenzies of religious revivals have not infrequently
+ended in gross profligacy. The encouragement of celibacy by the fervent
+leaders of most creeds, utilises in an unconscious way the morbid
+connection between an over-restraint of the sexual desires and impulses
+towards extreme devotion."[95]
+
+Dr. Auguste Forel, the eminent German specialist, points out that--
+
+"When we study the religious sentiment profoundly, especially in the
+Christian religion, and Catholicism in particular, we find at each step
+its astonishing connection with eroticism. We find it in the exalted
+adoration of holy women, such as Mary Magdalene, Marie de Bethany, for
+Jesus, in the holy legends, in the worship of the Virgin Mary in the
+Middle Ages, and especially in art. The ecstatic Madonnas in our art
+galleries cast their fervent regards on Jesus or on the heavens. The
+expression in Murillo's 'Immaculate Conception' may be interpreted by
+the highest voluptuous exaltation of love as well as by holy
+transfiguration. The 'saints' of Correggio regard the Virgin with an
+amorous ardour which may be celestial, but appears in reality extremely
+terrestrial and human."[96]
+
+Another German authority remarks:--
+
+"I venture to express my conviction that we should rarely err if, in a
+case of religious melancholy, we assumed the sexual apparatus to be
+implicated."[97]
+
+Dr. Bevan Lewis points out how frequently religious exaltation occurs
+with women at puberty, and religious melancholia at the period of sexual
+decline. And Dr. Charles Mercier puts the interchangeability of sexual
+and religious feelings in the following passage:--
+
+"Religious observances provide an alternative, into which the amatory
+instinct can be easily and naturally diverted. The emotions and
+instinctive desires, which finds expression in courtship, is a vast body
+of vague feeling, which is at first undirected.... It is a voluminous
+state of exaltation that demands enthusiastic action. This is the state
+antecedent to falling in love, and if an object presents himself or
+herself, the torrent of emotion is directed into amatory passion. But if
+no object appears, or if the selected object is denied, then religious
+observances yield a very passable substitute for the expression of the
+emotion. Religious observances provide the sensuous atmosphere, the call
+for self-renunciation, the means of expressing powerful and voluminous
+feeling, that the potential or disappointed lover needs. The madrigal is
+transformed into the hymn; the adornment of the person that should have
+gone to allure the beloved now takes the shape of ecclesiastical
+vestments; the reverence that should have been paid to the loved one is
+transformed to a higher object; the enthusiasm that would have expanded
+in courtship is expressed in worship; the gifts that would have been
+made, the services that would have been rendered to the loved one, are
+transferred to the Church."[98]
+
+Dr. Krafft-Ebing, after dwelling upon the substantial identity of sexual
+love and religious emotion, summarises his conclusions by saying:--
+
+"Religious and sexual hyperaesthesia at the acme of development show the
+same volume of intensity and the same quality of excitement, and may,
+therefore, under given circumstances interchange. Both will in certain
+pathologic states degenerate into cruelty."[99]
+
+Even so orthodox a writer as the Rev. S. Baring-Gould points out that--
+
+"The existence of that evil, which, knowing the constitution of man, we
+should expect to find prevalent in mysticism, the experience of all ages
+has shown following, dogging its steps inevitably. So slight is the film
+that separates religion from sensual passion, that uncontrolled
+spiritual fervour roars readily into a blaze of licentiousness."[100]
+
+No useful purpose would be served by lengthening this list of citations.
+Enough has been said to show that the point of view expressed is one
+endorsed by many sober, competent, and responsible observers. There
+exists among them a general, and one may add a growing, recognition of
+the important truth that the connection between religious and sexual
+feeling is of the closest character, and that one is very often mistaken
+for the other. Asceticism, usually taken as evidence to the reverse, is
+on the contrary, confirmative. The ascetic often presents us with a
+flagrant case of eroto-mania, expressing itself in terms of religion.
+It is highly significant that the biographies of Christian saints should
+furnish so many cases of men and women of strong sensual passions, and
+whose ascetic devotion was only the reaction from almost unbridled
+sensualism. No wonder that in the temptations experienced by the monks
+the figures of nude women so often appeared before their heated
+imaginations. Sexual feeling suppressed in one direction broke out in
+another. Feelings, in themselves perfectly normal, became, as a
+consequence of repression and misdirection, pathologic. And one
+consequence of this was that many of the early Christian writers brought
+to the consideration of the subject of sex a concentration of mind that
+resulted in disquisitions of such a nature that it is impossible to do
+more than refer to them. The sexual relation instead of being refined
+was coarsened. Marriage was viewed in its lowest form, more as a
+concession to the weakness of the flesh than as a desirable state for
+all men and women. Nor can it be said, after many centuries, that these
+ideas are quite eradicated from present-day life.
+
+A field of investigation that yields much illuminating information is
+the biographies of the saints and of other religious characters. In many
+of these cases the acceptance of sexual feeling for religious
+illumination is very clear. Thus of St. Gertrude, a Benedictine nun of
+the thirteenth century, we read:--
+
+"One day at chapel she heard supernaturally sung the words, '_Sanctus,
+Sanctus, Sanctus_.' The Son of God, leaning towards her like a sweet
+lover, and giving to her soul the softest kiss, said to her at the
+second _Sanctus_, 'In the _Sanctus_ addressed to My person, receive with
+this all the sanctity of My divinity and of My humanity.'... And the
+following Sunday, while she was thanking God for this favour, behold the
+Son of God, more beauteous than thousands of angels, takes her to His
+arms as if He were proud of her, and presents her to God the Father, and
+in that perfection of sanctity with which He had endowed her."[101]
+
+Of Juliana of Norwich, who was granted a revelation in 1373, we are told
+that she had for long 'ardently desired' a bodily sight of the Lord upon
+the cross; and that finally Jesus appeared to her and said, "I love thee
+and thou lovest Me, and our love shall never be disparted in two."[102]
+So, again, in the case of Sister Jeanne des Anges, Superior of the
+Convent of Ursulines of Loudun, and the principal character in the
+famous Grandier witchcraft case, we have a detailed account, in her own
+words, of the lascivious dreams, unclean suggestions, etc.--all
+attributed to Satan--and alternating with impressions of bodily union
+with Jesus.[103] Marie de L'Incarnation addresses Jesus as follows:--
+
+"Oh, my love, when shall I embrace you? Have you no pity on the torments
+that I suffer? Alas! alas! My love! My beauty! My life! Instead of
+healing my pain, you take pleasure in it. Come, let me embrace you, and
+die in your sacred arms."[104]
+
+Veronica Juliani, beatified by Pope Pius II., took a real lamb to bed
+with her, kissed it, and suckled it at her breasts. St. Catherine of
+Genoa threw herself on the ground to cool herself, crying out, "Love,
+love, I can bear it no longer." She also confessed to a peculiar
+longing towards her confessor.[105]
+
+The blessed Mary Alacoque, foundress of the Sacred Heart, was subject
+from early life to a number of complaints--rheumatism, palsy, pains in
+the side, ulceration of the legs--and experienced visions early in her
+career. As a child she had so vivid a sense of modesty that the mere
+sight of a man offended her. At seventeen she took to wearing a knotted
+cord drawn so tightly that she could neither eat nor breathe without
+pain. She compressed her arms so tightly with iron chains that she could
+not remove them without anguish. "I made," she says, "a bed of
+potsherds, on which I slept with extreme pleasure." She fasted and
+tortured herself in a variety of ways, and the more her physical
+disorders increased the more numerous became her visions. Before she was
+eighteen years of age, in 1671, she entered a nunnery. From the time she
+donned the habit of a novice she was 'blessed' with visions. "Our Lord
+showed me that that day was the day of our spiritual wedding; He
+forthwith gave me to understand that He wished to make me taste all the
+sweetness of the caresses of His love. In reality, those divine caresses
+were from that moment so excessive, that they often put me out of
+myself." "Once," says one of her biographers, "having retired into her
+chamber, she threw off the clothes with which she had bedecked herself
+during the day, when the Son of God showed Himself to her in the state
+in which He was after His cruel flagellation--that is, with His body all
+wounded, torn, gory--and He said to her that it was her vanities that
+had brought Him into that condition." In one of these visions Jesus
+took the head of Mary, pressed it to His bosom, spoke to her in
+passionate words, opened her side and took out her heart, plunged it
+into His own, and then replaced it. He then explained His design of
+founding the Order of the Sacred Heart. Ever after, Mary was conscious
+of a pain in her side and a burning sensation in her chest--two plain
+symptoms of hysteria.[106]
+
+Santa Teresa, who died at the early age of thirty-three, and in whose
+family more than one case of well-developed neurasthenia can be traced,
+was favoured with 'messages' at a very early age. She believed some of
+these were temptations from the devil suggesting an 'honourable
+alliance.' A nervous breakdown followed directly after entrance into a
+convent. She was then twenty years of age, was subject to fainting fits
+and longed for illness as a sign of divine favour. She was subject to
+convulsions, and soon after taking the veil fell into a cataleptic
+trance, which lasted three days. She was thought to be dead, but at the
+end of the time sat up and told those around that she had visited both
+heaven and hell, and seen the joys of the blessed and the torments of
+the damned. It is at least suggestive that, in spite of the longing for
+personal communion with Jesus, her first experience of the ecstasy of
+divine love was experienced after discovering a 'very realistic' picture
+of a martyred saint--St. Joseph. The significance of the intense
+contemplation of a tortured body--possibly made by one whose sexual
+nature was undergoing a process of suppression--is unmistakable.[107]
+
+On these and similar cases Professor William James makes the following
+comment:--
+
+"To the medical mind these ecstasies signify nothing but suggested
+hypnoid states, on an intellectual basis of superstition, and a
+corporeal one of degeneration and hysteria. Undoubtedly these
+pathological conditions have existed in many and possibly in all the
+cases, but that fact tells us nothing about the value for knowledge of
+the consciousness which they induce. To pass a spiritual judgment upon
+these states, we must not content ourselves with superficial medical
+talk, but enquire into their fruits for life."[108]
+
+Now the question is really not what these ecstasies suggest to the
+'medical mind,' as though that were a type of mind quite unfitted to
+pass judgment. It is a question of what the facts suggest to any mind
+judging the behaviour of a person under the influence of strong
+religious emotion exactly as it would judge anyone under any other
+strong emotional pressure. And if it be possible to explain these states
+in terms of known physiological and mental action, what warranty have we
+for rejecting this and preferring in its stead an explanation that is
+both unprovable and unnecessary? And one would be excused for thinking
+that cases which certainly involve some sort of abnormal nervous action
+are precisely those in which the medical mind should be called on to
+express an opinion. What is meant by passing 'a spiritual judgment'
+upon these states is not exactly clear, unless it means judging them in
+terms of the historic supernatural interpretation. But that is precisely
+the interpretation which is challenged by the 'medical mind.'
+
+I do not see how any enquiry "into their fruits for life" can affect a
+rational estimate of the nature of these mystical states. Mysticism adds
+nothing to the native disposition of a person. It merely gives their
+energies a new turn, a new direction. What they were before the
+experience they remain, substantially, afterwards. That is why we find
+religious mystics of every variety. Some energetically practical; others
+dreamily unpractical. Professor James admits this in saying that "the
+other-worldliness encouraged by the mystical consciousness makes this
+over-abstraction from practical life peculiarly liable to befall mystics
+in whom the character is naturally passive and the intellect feeble; but
+in natively strong minds and characters we find quite opposite
+results."[109] And when it is further admitted that "the mystical
+feeling of enlargement, union, and emancipation has no specific
+intellectual content whatever of its own," but "is capable of forming
+matrimonial alliances with material furnished by the most diverse
+philosophies and theologies, provided only they can find a place in
+their framework for its peculiar emotional mood," mysticism seems
+reduced to an emotional development on all fours with emotional
+development in other directions. It is not peculiar to religious minds
+because "it has no specific intellectual content." It is amorphous, so
+to speak. And it may form diverse 'matrimonial alliances' precisely
+because it does not point to a hidden world of reality, but is merely
+indicative of tense emotional moods. In the face of nature the
+non-theistic Richard Jeffries experiences all the feelings of mental
+enlargement and emotional transports that Mary Alacoque or Santa Teresa
+experienced in their visions of the 'Risen Christ.'
+
+It is idle, then, to sneer at 'medical materialism,' and stigmatise it
+as superficial. Many people are constitutionally afraid of words, and
+there is nothing that arouses prejudice so quickly as a name. But it is
+really not a question of materialism, medical or non-medical. It is a
+mere matter of applying knowledge and common sense to the cases before
+us. Are we to take the subject's explanation of his or her mental states
+as authoritative, so far as their nature is concerned; or are we to
+treat them as symptoms demanding the skilled analysis of the specialist?
+If the former, how can we differentiate between the mystic and the
+admittedly hysterical patient? If the latter, what ground is there for
+placing the mystic in a category of his own? Rational and scientific
+analysis will certainly take far more notice of the nature of the
+feelings excited than of the object towards which they are directed.
+Here is the case of a young lady, given by Dr. Moreau, in his _Morbid
+Psychology_:--
+
+"During my long hours of sleeplessness in the night my beloved Saviour
+began to make Himself manifest to me. Pondering over the meditations of
+St. Francois de Sales on the _Song of Songs_, I seemed to feel all my
+faculties suspended, and crossing my arms upon my chest, I awaited in a
+sort of dread what might be revealed to me.... I saw the Redeemer
+veritably in the flesh.... He extended Himself beside me, pressed me so
+closely that I could feel His crown of thorns, and the nails in His feet
+and hands, while He pressed His lips over mine, giving me the most
+ravishing kiss of a divine Spouse, and sending a delicious thrill
+through my entire body."[110]
+
+Get rid of the narcotising effect of theological associations by
+eliminating the name of Jesus and other religious terms from this case,
+and from the others already cited, and no one would have the least doubt
+as to their real nature. Given a condition of physical health in these
+cases, with conditions that favoured social activity, healthy
+intercourse with the opposite sex, culminating in marriage and
+parenthood, can there be any doubt that this species of religious
+ecstasy would have been non-existent? If, as Tylor says, the refectory
+door would many a time have closed the gates of heaven, happy family
+life would in a vast number of cases have prevented those religio-erotic
+trances which have played so powerful a part in the history of
+supernaturalism. Most people will agree with Dr. Maudsley:--
+
+"The ecstatic trances of such saintly women as Catherine Sienne and St.
+Theresa, in which they believed themselves to be visited by their
+Saviour and to be received as veritable spouses into His bosom, were,
+though they knew it not, little better than vicarious sexual orgasm; a
+condition of things which the intense contemplation of the naked male
+figure, carved or sculptured in all its proportions on a cross, is more
+fitted to produce in young women of susceptible nervous temperament than
+people are apt to consider. Every experienced physician must have met
+with instances of single and childless women who have devoted
+themselves with extraordinary zeal to habitual religious exercises, and
+who, having gone insane as a culmination of their emotional fervour,
+have straightway exhibited the saddest mixture of religious and erotic
+symptoms--a boiling over of lust in voice, face, gestures, under the
+pitiful degradation of disease.... The fanatical religious sects, such
+as the Shakers and the like, which spring up from time to time in
+communities and disgust them by the offensive way in which they mingle
+love and religion, are inspired in great measure by sexual feeling; on
+the one hand, there is probably the cunning of a hypocritical knave, or
+the self-deception of a half-insane one, using the weaknesses of weak
+women to minister to his vanity or his lust under a religious guise; on
+the other hand, there is an exaggerated self-feeling, often rooted in
+the sexual passion, which is unwittingly fostered under the cloak of
+religious emotion, and which is apt to conduct to madness or to sin. In
+such cases the holy kiss owes its warmth to the sexual impulse, which
+inspires it, consciously or unconsciously, and the mystical religious
+union of the sexes is fitted to issue in a less spiritual union."[111]
+
+Many manuals of devotion will be found to furnish the same kind of
+evidence as biographical narratives concerning the intimate relations
+that exists between sexuality and religious feeling. What has just been
+said may be repeated here, namely, that if the religious associations
+were dispelled, there would be no mistaking the nature of feelings that
+originated much of this class of writing, or the feelings to which they
+appeal. The serious fact is that the appeal is there whether we
+recognise it or not, and it is a question worthy of serious
+consideration whether the unwary imagination of the young may be not as
+surely debauched by certain books of devotion as by a frankly erotic
+production. It is not without reason that d'Israeli the elder, in an
+essay omitted from all editions of his book after the first, remarked
+that "poets are amorous, lovers are poetical, but saints are both."[112]
+Take, for example, the following from a collection of old English
+homilies, dating from the thirteenth and fourteenth centuries:--
+
+"Jesus, my holy love, my sure sweetness! Jesus, my heart, my joy, my
+soul-heal! Jesus, sweet Jesus, my darling, my life, my light, my balm,
+my honey-drop!... Kindle me with the blaze of Thy enlightening love. Let
+me be Thy leman, and teach me to love Thee.... Oh, that I might behold
+how Thou stretchedst Thyself for me on the cross. Oh, that I might cast
+myself between those same arms, so very wide outspread.... Oh, that I
+were in Thy arms, in Thy arms so stretchedst and outspread on the
+cross."
+
+Or this, from the same collection:--
+
+"Sweet Jesus, my love, my darling, my Lord, my Saviour, my balm, sweeter
+is the remembrance of Thee than honey in the mouth. Who is there that
+may not love Thy lovely face? Whose heart is so hard that may not melt
+at the remembrance of Thee? Oh! who may not love Thee, lovely Jesus?
+Jesus, my precious darling, my love, my life, my beloved, my most worthy
+of love, my heart's balm, Thou art lovesome in countenance, Thou art
+altogether bright. All angels' life is to look upon Thy face, for Thy
+cheer is so marvellously lovesome and pleasant to look upon.... Thou art
+so bright, and so white that the sun would be pale if compared to Thy
+blissful countenance. If I, then, love any man for beauty, I will love
+Thee, my dear life, my mother's fairest son."[113]
+
+The language of erotic piety figures much more prominently in Roman
+Catholic medieval writings than in Protestant literature. This is not
+because an appeal to the same feelings is absent from the religious
+literature of Protestantism, it is mainly due to the fact that more
+modern conditions leads to a less intense religious appeal, while the
+broadening of social life encourages a more natural outlet for all
+aspects of human nature. Still, the following expression of a young lady
+convert of Wesley's offers a fair parallel to the specimen given above.
+It is taken from Southey's _Life of Wesley_:--
+
+"Oh, mighty, powerful, happy change! The love of God was shed abroad in
+my heart, and a flame kindled there with pains so violent, and yet so
+very ravishing, that my body was almost torn asunder. I sweated, I
+trembled, I fainted, I sang. Oh, I thought my head was a fountain of
+water. I was dissolved in love. My beloved is mine, and I am His. He has
+all charms; He has ravished my heart; He is my comforter, my friend, my
+all. Oh, I am sick of love. He is altogether lovely, the chiefest among
+ten thousand. Oh, how Jesus fills, Jesus extends, Jesus overwhelms the
+soul in which He lives."
+
+The _Imitation of Christ_ has been described by more than one writer as
+a manual of eroticism, and certainly the chapters "The Wonderful Effects
+of Divine Love," and "Of the Proof of a True Lover," might well be cited
+in defence of this view. In the following canticle of St. Francis of
+Assisi it does not seem possible to distinguish a substantial difference
+between it and a frankly avowed love poem:--
+
+    "Into love's furnace I am cast,
+     Into love's furnace I am cast,
+     I burn, I languish, pine, and waste.
+     Oh, love divine, how sharp thy dart!
+     How deep the wound that galls my heart!
+     As wax in heat, so, from above,
+     My smitten soul dissolves in love.
+     I live, yet languishing I die,
+     While in thy furnace bound I lie."[114]
+
+It would certainly be possible to furnish exact parallels from volumes
+of secular verse that would be strictly 'taboo' among those who fail to
+see anything objectionable in verses like the above when written in
+connection with religion. Such people fail to recognise that their
+attractiveness lies in the hidden appeal to amatory feeling, and owe
+their origin to the suppressed or perverted sexual passion of their
+author. We must not allow ourselves to be blinded by the consideration
+as to whether the object of adoration be an earthly or a heavenly one.
+Men and women have not distinct feelings that are aroused as their
+objective differs, but the same feelings directed now in one direction,
+now in another. The direction of these feelings, their exciting cause,
+are sheer environmental accidents. How can one resist the implications
+of the following, from a devotional work widely circulated amongst the
+women of France:--
+
+    "Praise to Jesus, praise His power,
+     Praise His sweet allurements.
+     Praise to Jesus, when His goodness
+     Reduces me to nakedness;
+     Praise to Jesus when He says to me,
+     My sister, my dove, my beautiful one!
+     Praise to Jesus in all my steps,
+     Praise to His amorous charms.
+     Praise to Jesus when His loving mouth
+     Touches mine in a loving kiss.
+     Praise to Jesus when His gentle caresses
+     Overwhelm me with chaste joys.
+     Praise to Jesus when at His leisure
+     He allows me to kiss Him."[115]
+
+Against this we may place the following hymn, sung at an American camp
+meeting of some thousands of persons between the ages of fourteen and
+twenty-five:--
+
+    "Blessed Lily of the Valley, oh, how fair is He;
+            He is mine, I am His.
+     Sweeter than the angels' music is His voice to me;
+            He is mine, I am His.
+     Where the lilies fair are blooming by the waters calm
+     There He leads me and upholds me by His strong right arm.
+
+     All the air is love around me--I can feel no harm;
+            He is mine, I am His."[116]
+
+Special significance is given to this reference by the age of those who
+composed the gathering. This period embraces the years during which
+sexual maturity is attained, and the organism experiences important
+physiological and psychological changes. The consequence is that the
+atmosphere is, so to say, charged with unsuspected sex feeling, and it
+is not surprising that many complaints have been made of immorality
+following such gatherings. The organism is then peculiarly liable to
+suggestion in all forms. Along with the imitativeness of early years
+there is something of the decisive initiative of maturity. These
+qualities wisely guided might be turned to the great advantage of both
+the individual and of the community. Mere incitement by religious
+revivalism can result in little else than misdirection and injury. It
+should be the most obvious of truths that the attractiveness of hymns
+such as the one given, with the keen delight in the suggested pictures,
+lies in their yielding--all unknown, perhaps, to those participating--
+satisfaction to feelings that are very frequently imperious in their
+demands, and are at all times astonishingly pervasive in their
+influence.
+
+Much valuable light is thrown upon this aspect of the subject by a
+study of human behaviour under the influence of actual disease. Of late
+years much useful work has been done in this direction, and our
+knowledge of normal psychology greatly helped by a study of abnormal
+mental states.[117] This is mainly because in disease we are able to
+observe the operation of tendencies that are unobscured by the
+restraints and inhibitions created by education and social convention.
+And one of the most striking, and to many startling, things observed is
+the close relation existing between erotic mania and religious delusion.
+The person who at one time feels himself under direct religious
+inspiration, or who imagines himself to be the incarnation of a divine
+personage, will at another time exhibit the most shocking obscenity in
+action and language. Sir T. S. Clouston furnishes a very striking case
+of this character, which he cites in order to show "the common mixture
+of religious and sexual emotion."[118] I do not reproduce it here
+because of its grossly obscene character; but, save for coarseness of
+language, it does not differ materially from illustrations already
+given. Almost any of the text-books will supply cases illustrating the
+connection between sexualism and religion, a connection generally
+recognised as the opinions cited already clearly show.
+
+Dr. Mercier, in dealing with the connection between sexualism and
+religion, which he says "has long been recognised, but never accounted
+for," traces it to a feeling of, or desire for self-sacrifice common to
+both. Certainly sacrifice in some form--of food, weapons, land, money,
+or bodily inconvenience--is a feature present in every religion more or
+less. And it is quite certain that not merely the fact, but the desire
+for some amount of sacrifice, forms "an integral, fundamental, and
+preponderating element" in the sexual emotion. Dr. Mercier further
+believes that the benevolence founded on religious emotion has its
+origin in sexual emotion, which is, again, extremely likely. This
+community of origin would allow for the transformation of one into the
+other, and supplies a key to the language of lover-like devotion and
+self-abnegation which is so prominent in religious devotional
+literature. The importance attached to dress is also very suggestive;
+for here, again, the element of sacrifice expresses itself in the
+cultivation of a studied repulsiveness to the normal attractiveness of
+costume. "Thus," says Dr. Mercier, "we find that the self-sacrificial
+vagaries of the rejected lover and of the religious devotee own a common
+origin and nature. The hook and spiny kennel of the fakir, the pillar of
+St. Simeon Stylites, the flagellum of the monk, the sombre garments of
+the nun, the silence of the Trappists, the defiantly hideous costume of
+the hallelujah lass, and the mortified sobriety of the district visitor,
+have at bottom the same origin as the rags of Cardenio, the cage of Don
+Quixote de la Mancha, and the yellow stockings and crossed garters of
+Malvolio."[119]
+
+Professor Granger, who at times comes very near the truth, says:--
+
+"There is something profoundly philosophical in the use of _The Song of
+Songs_ to typify the communion of the soul with its ideal. The passion
+which is expressed by the Shulamite for her earthly lover in such
+glowing phrases becomes the type of the love of the soul towards
+God."[120]
+
+One fails to see the profoundly philosophic nature of the selection. The
+_Song of Songs_ is a frankly erotic love poem, written with no other aim
+than is common to such poetry, and its spiritualisation is due to the
+same process of reinterpretation that is applied to other parts of the
+Bible in order to make them agreeable to modern thought. Had it not been
+in the Bible, Christians would have found it neither profoundly
+philosophical nor spiritually illuminating; and, as a matter of fact,
+similar effusions are selected by Christians from non-Christian writings
+as proofs of their sensual character. The real significance of its use
+in religious worship is that it gives a marked expression to feelings
+that crave an outlet. And the lesson is that sexual feeling cannot be
+eliminated from life; it can only be diverted or disguised. Some
+expression it will find--here in open perversion resulting in positive
+vice, there in obsession that leads to a half-insane asceticism, and
+elsewhere the creation of the unconsciously salacious with an unhealthy
+fondness for dabbling in questions that refer to the illicit relations
+of the sexes.
+
+"One of the reasons why popular religion in England," says Professor
+Granger, "seems to be coming to the limits of its power, is that it has
+contented itself so largely with the commonplace motives which, after
+all, find sufficient exercise in the ordinary duties of life." Here,
+again, is a curious obtuseness to a plain but important truth. With
+what else should a healthy religion associate itself but the ordinary
+motives or feelings of human life? With what else has religion always
+associated itself? Far from that being the source of the weakness of
+modern religion, it is its only genuine source of strength. If religion
+can so associate itself with the ordinary facts and feelings of life
+that these are unintelligible or poorer without religion, then religious
+people have nothing to fear. But if it be true, as Professor Granger
+implies, that life in its normal moods can receive complete
+gratification apart from religion, then the outlook is very different.
+From a merely historic point of view it is true that as men have found
+explanations of phenomena, and gratifications of feelings apart from
+religion, the latter has lost a deal of its power. This is seen in the
+growth of the physical sciences, and also, although in a smaller
+measure, in sociology and morals.
+
+This, however, opens up the enquiry, previously indicated, as to how far
+the whole range of human life may be satisfactorily explained in the
+complete absence of religion or supernaturalism. And with this we are
+not now directly concerned. What we are concerned with is to show that
+from one direction at least supernaturalism has derived strength from a
+misinterpretation of the facts. These facts, once interpreted as clear
+evidence for supernaturalism, are now seen to be susceptible to a
+different explanation. But they have nevertheless played their part in
+creating as part of the social heritage a diffused sense of the reality
+of supernatural intercourse. It is not, then, a question of religion
+losing power because it has contented itself with commonplace motives,
+and because these have now found satisfaction in ordinary life. It is
+rather a question of the adequacy of science to deal with facts that
+have been taken to lie outside the scientific order. Has science the
+knowledge or the ability to deal with the extraordinary as well as with
+the ordinary facts of life? I believe it has. The facts we have passed
+in review _are_ amenable to scientific treatment, for the reason that
+they belong to a class with which the physician of to-day finds himself
+in constant contact. And it is too often overlooked that the belief in
+the existence and influence of a supersensible world is itself only a
+theory put forward in explanation of certain classes of facts, and like
+all theories it becomes superfluous once a simpler theory is made
+possible.
+
+
+FOOTNOTES:
+
+[93] Article in _The Lancet_, Jan. 11, 1873.
+
+[94] Article in Tuke's _Dictionary of Psychological Medicine_.
+
+[95] _Inquiries into Human Faculty_, pp. 66-7.
+
+[96] _The Sexual Question_, pp. 354-5.
+
+[97] Cited by Havelock Ellis, _Psychology of Sex_, pp. 233-4.
+
+[98] _Conduct and its Disorders_, pp. 368-9.
+
+[99] _Psychopathia-Sexualis_, pp. 9-11.
+
+[100] _Lost and Hostile Gospels_, Preface.
+
+[101] Cited by James, _Varieties_, pp. 345-6.
+
+[102] Inge, _Christian Mysticism_, pp. 201-9.
+
+[103] See Ellis, _Psychology of Sex_, pp. 240-2.
+
+[104] Parkman's _Jesuits in North America_, p. 175.
+
+[105] Krafft-Ebing, _Psychopathia-Sexualis_, p. 8.
+
+[106] See L. Asseline's _Mary Alacoque and the Worship of the Sacred
+Heart of Jesus_.
+
+[107] See _St. Teresa of Spain_, by H. H. Colvill, and _Saint Teresa_,
+by H. Joly.
+
+[108] _Varieties_, p. 413.
+
+[109] _Varieties_, p. 413.
+
+[110] Cited by J. F. Nisbet, _The Insanity of Genius_, p. 248.
+
+[111] _Pathology of Mind_, p. 144. Also Mercier, _Sanity and Insanity_,
+pp. 223, 281.
+
+[112] _Miscellanies_, 1796, p. 365. From the same essay I take the
+following: "Even the ceremonies of religion, both in ancient and in
+modern times, have exhibited the grossest indecencies. Priests in all
+ages have been the successful panders of the human heart, and have
+introduced in the solemn worship of the divinity, incitements,
+gratifications, and representations, which the pen of the historian must
+refuse to describe. Often has the sensible Catholic blushed amidst his
+devotions, and I have seen chapels surrounded by pictures of lascivious
+attitudes, and the obsolete amours of saints revived by the pencil of
+some Aretine.... Their homilies were manuals of love, and the more
+religious they became, the more depraved were their imaginations. In the
+nunnery the love of Jesus was the most abandoned of passions, and the
+ideal espousal was indulged at the cost of the feeble heart of many a
+solitary beauty" (pp. 369-70).
+
+[113] From a collection published by the Early English Text Society,
+1868, pp. 182-4, 268.
+
+[114] G. A. Coe, _The Spiritual Life_, p. 210.
+
+[115] _Les Perles de Saint Francois de Sales_, 1871. Cited by Bloch, p.
+111.
+
+[116] Davenport's _Primitive Traits in Religious Revivals_, p. 29.
+
+[117] See, for example, _Conduct and its Disorders_, by Dr. C. Mercier;
+_Psycho-Pathological Researches_, by Dr. Boris Sidis; and _Abnormal
+Psychology_, by I. H. Coriat.
+
+[118] _Clinical Lectures on Mental Diseases_, p. 584.
+
+[119] _Sanity and Insanity_, chap. viii.
+
+[120] _The Soul of a Christian_, p. 178.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER SIX
+
+THE STREAM OF TENDENCY
+
+
+It should hardly need pointing out that the facts presented in the last
+chapter are not offered as an attempt at the--to use Professor William
+James's expression--"reinterpretation of religion as perverted
+sexuality." Nor, so far as the present writer is aware, has anyone ever
+so presented them. The expression, indeed, seems almost a deliberate
+mis-statement of a position in order to make its rebuttal easier.
+Obviously the idea of religion must be already in existence before it
+could be utilised for the purpose of explaining any group of phenomena.
+But if the biographic and other facts described have any value whatever,
+they are at least strong presumptive evidence in favour of the position
+that in very many cases a perverted or unsatisfied sexuality has been at
+the root of a great deal of the world's emotional piety. Of course, the
+strong religious belief must be in existence before-hand. But given
+this, and add thereto a sexual nature imperious in its demands and yet
+denied legitimate outlet, and we have the conditions present for its
+promptings being interpreted as the fruits of supernatural influence. It
+is not a reinterpretation of _religion_ that is attempted, but a
+reinterpretation of phenomena that have been erroneously called
+religious. And on all sides the need for this reinterpretation is
+becoming clear. Over sixty years ago Renan wrote, "A rigorous
+psychological analysis would class the innate religious instinct of
+women in the same category with the sexual instinct,"[121] and since
+then a very much more detailed knowledge of both physiology and
+psychology has furnished a multitude of data for an exhaustive study of
+the whole question.
+
+In the present chapter our interest is mainly historical. And for
+various reasons, chief amongst which is that interested readers may the
+more easily follow up the study should they feel so inclined, the survey
+has been restricted to the history of that religion with which we are
+best acquainted--Christianity. Moreover, if we are to form a correct
+judgment of the part played in the history of religions by the
+misinterpretations already noted, it is necessary to trace the extent to
+which they have influenced men and women in a collective capacity. For
+the striking fact is that, in spite of the purification of the sexual
+relations being one of the avowed objects of Christianity, in spite,
+too, of the attempts of the official churches to suppress them, the
+history of Christianity has been dogged by outbreaks of sexual
+extravagance, by the continuous emergence of erotico-religious sects,
+claiming Christian teachings as the authority for their actions. We need
+not discuss the legitimacy of their inferences. We are concerned solely
+with a chronicle of historic facts so far as they can be ascertained;
+and these have a certain significance of their own, as events, quite
+apart from their reasonableness or desirability.
+
+A part cause of the movements we are about to describe may have been a
+violent reaction against an extravagant asceticism. Something may also
+be due to the fact that over-concentration of mind upon a particular
+evil is apt to defeat its end by the mere force of unconscious
+suggestion in the contrary direction. But in all probability much was
+due to the presence of certain elements inherited by Christianity from
+the older religions. At any rate, those whose minds are filled with the
+idea that sexual extravagance on a collective scale and under the cloak
+of religion is either a modern phenomenon, or was unknown to the early
+history of Christianity, would do well to revise their opinions in the
+light of ascertainable facts. No less a person than the Rev. S.
+Baring-Gould has reminded us that criticism discloses "on the shining
+face of primitive Christianity rents and craters undreamt of in our old
+simplicity," and also asserts "that there was in the breast of the
+newborn Church an element of antinomianism, not latent, but in virulent
+activity, is a fact as capable of demonstration as any conclusion in a
+science which is not exact."[122]
+
+There would be little value in a study of these erotico-religious
+movements if they involved only a detection of individual lust
+consciously using religion as a cloak for its gratification. Such a
+conclusion is a fatally easy one, but it does little justice to the
+chief people concerned, and it is quite lacking in historical
+perspective. In most cases the initiators of these strange sects have
+put forward a philosophy of religion as a justification of their
+teaching, and only a slight knowledge of this is enough to prove that we
+are face to face with a phenomenon of much greater significance than
+mere immorality. This may be recognised even in the pages of the New
+Testament itself. It is not a practice that is there denounced; it is a
+teaching that is repudiated. And one sees the same thing at later
+periods. The conviction on the one side that certain actions are
+unlawful, is met on the other side with the conviction that they are
+perfectly legitimate. Conviction is met with conviction. Each side
+expresses itself in terms of religion; the ethical aspect is incidental
+or subordinate. It is a contest of opposing religious beliefs and
+practices.
+
+The real nature of the conflict is often obscured by the fact of social
+opinion and the social forces generally being on the side of the more
+normal expression of sexual life. This, however, is no more than a
+necessity of the situation. The continuance of a healthful social life
+is dependent upon the maintenance of a certain balance in the relations
+of the sexes, and anything that strikes at this strikes at social life
+as a whole. In such cases we have, therefore, to allow for the operation
+of social selection, which is always on the side of the more normal
+type. From this it follows that although a small body of people may
+exemplify a variation that is in itself socially disastrous, the main
+forces of social life will prevent its ever assuming large dimensions.
+Moreover, a large body of people, such as is represented by a church
+holding a commanding position in society, will be forced to come to
+terms with the permanent tendencies of social life, and will either
+suppress undesirable variations or expel them. It thus happens that
+while the larger and more dominant churches have been on the side of
+normal, regularised expressions of the sexual life, abnormal variations
+have constantly arisen and have been denounced by them. But the
+significant feature is that they have arisen within the churches, and
+most commonly during periods of great religious stress or excitement.
+
+These tendencies, as the Rev. S. Baring-Gould has pointed out, existed
+in the very earliest days of Christianity. It is quite apparent from
+Paul's writings that as early as the date of the First Epistle to the
+Corinthians some of the more objectionable features of the older Pagan
+worship had shown themselves in the Church. The doctrine of 'spiritual
+wifehood' appeared at a very early date in the Church, and its teachers
+cited even St. Paul himself as their authority. Their claim was based
+upon Paul's declaration (1 Cor. ix. 5) that he had power to lead about
+"a sister, a wife, as well as other apostles, and as the brethren of the
+Lord and Cephas." Curiously enough, commentators have never agreed as to
+what Paul meant by this expression. The word translated may mean either
+wife, or sister, or woman. Had it been wife in the ordinary sense, it
+does not appear that at that date there would have been any room for
+scandal. The clear fact is, however, that others claimed a like
+privilege; the privilege was not always restricted to one woman, and the
+practice, if not general, became not uncommon, and furnished the ground
+for scandal for a long period. Two epistles, wrongly attributed to St.
+Clement of Rome, and dating from some time in the second century,
+condemn the practice of young people living together under the cloak of
+religion, and specially warns virgins against cohabiting with the clergy
+and so giving offence. That the practice was difficult to suppress is
+shown by its being condemned by several church councils--Antioch in 210,
+Nicea in 325, and Elvira in 350.[123] At a later date a much more
+elaborate theory has been built on Paul's claim. The Pauline Church has
+found several expressions both in England and America within recent
+times.[124] These sects have claimed that both St. Paul and the woman
+with whom he travelled were in a state of grace, and, therefore, above
+all law. We do not mean the maintenance of an ascetic relationship, but
+the normal relation of husband and wife. It is really the doctrine of
+'Free Love' with a spiritual warranty instead of a secular one.
+
+This doctrine of religious 'Free Love' rests upon a twofold basis.
+First, it was held that, apart from a wife after the flesh, one might
+also have a wife after the spirit, and this spiritual union might exist
+side by side with the fleshly one, and with different persons. A great
+impetus appears to have been given to this theory from Germany, many of
+the originators of the American sects of Free Lovers being Germans.
+Secondly, it was held that a Christian in a state of grace was absolved
+from laws that were binding upon other people. His actions were no
+longer subject to the categories of right and wrong; as it was said, to
+one in a state of grace all things were lawful, even though all things
+might not be expedient. Some went the length of teaching that not only
+were all things lawful, but all things were desirable. Separating by a
+sharp division things that influenced the soul from things that
+influenced the body, it was openly taught by some of the early sects
+that nothing done by the body could injure the soul, and so could not
+affect its salvation. Reversing the practice of asceticism, which sought
+to crush bodily passions by a course of deprivation, it was taught that
+all kinds of forbidden conduct might be practised in order to
+demonstrate the soul's superiority. There is no question whatever that
+this tendency was very prominent in the early Christian Church. It was
+not there as something hidden, something of which men ought to be
+ashamed; it was an avowed teaching, claiming full religious sanction.
+"The Church," says Baring-Gould, "trembled on the verge of becoming an
+immoral sect." The same writer also says:--
+
+"This _teaching_ of immorality in the Church is a startling feature, and
+it seems to have been pursued by some who called themselves apostles as
+well as by those who assumed to be prophets. In the Corinthian Church
+even the elders encouraged incest. Now, it is not possible to explain
+this phenomenon except on the ground that Paul's argument as to the Law
+being overridden had been laid hold of and elevated into a principle.
+These teachers did not wink at lapses into immorality, but defiantly
+urged on the converts to the Gospel to commit adultery, fornication, and
+all uncleanness ... as a protest against those who contended that the
+moral law as given on the tables was still binding upon the
+Church."[125]
+
+A certain detachment from modern conditions, and from modern frames of
+mind, is essential to an adequate appreciation of what has been said.
+Looking at these events through the distorting medium of an altogether
+different social atmosphere, one is apt to attribute them to the
+operation of lawless desire, and so have done with it. This, however, is
+to overlook the fact that we are dealing with a society in which sexual
+symbols were common in religious worship, and in which theories of the
+religious life were propounded and accepted which to-day would be
+regarded as little less than maniacal. Unquestionably even then, once
+the situation had established itself it would be utilised by those of a
+coarser nature for mere sensual gratification. But practices such as we
+know existed, on the scale we have every reason for believing they were,
+could never have been had they not taken the form of an intense
+conviction. To assume otherwise is equal to arguing that because men
+have entered the Church from mere love of power or lust for wealth, the
+Church owed its establishment to the play of these motives. It is true
+that those who opposed these religio-erotic sects accused them of
+immorality, but it is the form these teachings assumed to the members of
+the impeached sects, not how they appeared to their enemies, that is
+important. Eroticism taught and practised as a religious
+conviction--that is the essential and significant feature of the
+situation. Not to grasp this is to fail to realise the vital fact
+embodied in the phenomena under consideration. We are not dealing with
+mere sensualists, even though we may be dealing with what is largely an
+expression of sensualism. It is sensualism expressed as, and sanctioned
+by, religious conviction that is the vital fact of the situation.
+
+One of the earliest Christian institutions around which scandals
+gathered was that of the Agapae, or love-feasts. From the outset the
+Pagan writers asserted that these love-feasts were new versions of
+various old orgiastic practices, some of which were still current,
+others of which had been suppressed by the Roman government. There is no
+doubt that they were the grounds of very serious accusations against the
+Christians. On the other hand, it must be remembered that, at the outset
+at least, these charges were indignantly rejected by the Christians. The
+Agapae were called indiscriminately Feasts of Love and Feasts of
+Charity. Each member, male and female, greeted each other with a holy
+kiss, and the institution was described by Tertullian as "a support of
+love, a solace of purity, a check on riches, a discipline of weakness."
+These love-feasts were held on important occasions, such as a marriage,
+a death, or the anniversary of a martyrdom. Some churches celebrated
+them weekly. From the Acts of the Apostles we learn that the feasts
+began about nightfall, and continued till after midnight, or even till
+daybreak. It was only natural that mixed assemblies of men and women
+that gathered in this manner, and where there was eating and drinking,
+should create scandal. It is absolutely certain that some of this
+scandal had a basis in fact. The Rev. S. Baring-Gould confesses that "at
+Corinth, and certainly elsewhere, among excitable people, the wine, the
+heat, the exaltation of emotion, led to orgiastic ravings, the jabbering
+of disconnected, unintelligible words, to fits, convulsions, pious
+exclamations, and incoherent ravings." And unless St. Paul was
+deliberately slandering his fellow-believers worse things than these
+occurred.
+
+Generally, even by non-Christian writers, it has been assumed that the
+Agapae commenced as a perfectly harmless, even admirable institution, and
+afterwards degenerated, and so gave genuine cause for scandal. It is not
+easy to see that this opinion rests on anything better than a mere
+prejudice. It is true that there is no unmistakable evidence to the
+contrary, but no clear evidence is to be found in its behalf. The Agapae
+was not, after all, an essentially Christian institution. Similar
+gatherings existed among the Pagans, more or less orgiastic in
+character. And even though at first some of the more extreme forms were
+avoided amongst the Christians, it is not improbable, on the face of it,
+that some kind of sexual extravagance or symbolism was present from the
+outset. At any rate, as I have said, the charges were made, first by
+Pagans, afterwards by Christians against other Christians. The charges
+were persistent, and were made in districts far removed from each other.
+Says Lecky: "When the Pagans accused the Christians of indulging in
+orgies of gross licentiousness, the first apologist, while repudiating
+the charge, was careful to add, of the heretics, 'Whether or not these
+people commit those shameful acts ... I know not.' In a few years the
+language of doubt and insinuation was exchanged for that of direct
+assertion; and if we may believe St. Irenaeus and St. Clement of
+Alexandria, the followers of Carpocrates, the Marcionites, and some
+other gnostic sects habitually indulged, in their secret meetings, in
+acts of impurity and licentiousness as hideous and as monstrous as can
+be conceived, and their conduct was one of the causes of the persecution
+of the orthodox."[126] Tertullian accused some of the sects of
+practising incestuous intercourse at the Agapae. Ambrose compared the
+institution to the Pagan Parentalia. Clement says, probably referring to
+the Agapae, "the shameless use of the rite occasions foul suspicion and
+evil reports." The first epistle on Virginity by the Pseudo-Clement
+(probably written in the second century) admits the existence of
+immorality by saying, "Others eat and drink with them (_i.e._ the
+virgins) at feasts, and indulge in loose behaviour and much uncleanness,
+such as ought not to be among those who have elected holiness for
+themselves." Justin Martyr, referring to certain sects, says more
+cautiously: "Whether or not these people commit these shameful acts (the
+putting out of lights, and indulging in promiscuous intercourse) I know
+not." Others are more precise in their charges. That the Agapae became
+the legitimate cause of complaint is admitted by all. The only question
+is whether it was the institution itself or the public mind in relation
+to it that underwent a change. Eventually, on the avowed ground of evil
+conduct, the Agapae were forbidden by the Council of Carthage, 391, of
+Orleans, 541, and of Constantinople, 680.
+
+The whole subject is obscure, but the one certain and significant thing
+is that charges of licentiousness were connected with the Agapae from the
+outset. These may at first have been unfounded or exaggerated. On the
+other hand, it is quite probable that just as Christianity continued
+Pagan ceremonies in other directions, so there was also a carrying over
+into the Church of some of the sexual rites and ceremonies connected
+with earlier forms of worship. And we know that the principle of
+Antinomianism, a prolific cause of evil at all times, was active amongst
+the Christians from the outset.
+
+It is almost impossible to say at this distance how many sects
+exhibiting marked erotic tendencies appeared in the early Christian
+centuries. Many must have disappeared and left no trace of their
+existence. But there can be no question that they were fairly numerous.
+The extensive sect, or sects, of the gnostics contained in its teachings
+elements that at least paved the way for the conduct with which other
+Christians charged them, although the charges made may not have been
+true of all. To some of the gnostic sects belongs the teaching--quite in
+accord with the doctrine of the evil nature of the world, that
+liberation from the 'Law' was one of the first conditions of spiritual
+freedom. From this came the teaching, subsequently held by numerous
+other sects, that those born of the Spirit could not be defiled by any
+acts of the flesh, and that so-called vicious actions were rather to be
+encouraged as providing experience useful to spiritual welfare. Some
+branches of the gnostics had 'spiritual marriages,' similar to what
+existed in India in the Sakti rites already described. Thus the
+Adamites, a rather obscure gnostic sect of the second century, attempted
+to imitate the Edenic state by condemning marriage and abandoning
+clothing. Their assemblies were held underground, and on entering the
+place of worship both sexes stripped themselves naked, and in that state
+performed their ceremonies. They called their church Paradise, from
+which all dissentients were promptly expelled. The Adamites themselves
+claimed that their object was to extirpate desire by familiarising the
+senses to strict control. Their religious opponents gave a very
+different account of the practice, and it is not difficult to realise,
+whatever may have been the motive of the founders, the consequences of
+such a practice. It is curious, by the way, to observe how strong
+religious excitement seems to lead people to discard clothing. Thus,
+during the Crusade of 1203-42 the women crusaders rushed about the
+streets in a state of nudity.[127] During the wars of the League in
+France, men and women walked naked in procession headed by the
+clergy.[128] Other examples of this curious practice might be given.
+
+The Nicolaitanes, a second-century sect referred to in the New Testament
+(Rev. ii. 14), were accused of practising religious prostitution. So
+also were the Manichaeans, a very numerous sect, against whom the charges
+were of a much more detailed character. With them the ceremonial
+violation of a virgin is said to have formed a part of their regular
+ritual, and that their meetings frequently ended in an orgy of
+promiscuous intercourse.[129] As both these acts are found in connection
+with other religious ceremonies, and, as will be seen later, have
+persisted until recent times, the story does not sound so incredible as
+otherwise it might. The difficulty of deciding definitely is intensified
+by the fact of the Manichaeans being split into a number of sects, and
+statements true of some might be untrue of others. So we find St.
+Augustine, who had been a Manichaean, declaring that if all did not
+practise licentious rites, one sect (the Catharists) did, believing that
+they could only mortify the flesh by the exercise of bad instincts,
+since the flesh proceeded from demons. St. Augustine himself confesses
+to have taken part in various phallic ceremonies before his conversion.
+"I myself," he says, "when a young man used to go sometimes to the
+sacrilegious entertainments and spectacles; I saw the priests raving in
+religious excitement, and heard the choristers; I took pleasure in the
+shameful games which were celebrated in honour of gods and goddesses, of
+the Virgin Coelestia, and of Berecynthia, the mother of all gods. And
+on the day consecrated to her purification, there were sung before her
+couch productions so obscene and filthy to the ear--I do not say of the
+mother of the gods, but of the mother of any senator or honest man--nay,
+so impure that not even the mother of the foul-mouthed players
+themselves could have formed one of the audience."[130]
+
+The Carpocratians, who claimed to be a branch of the Gnostics, taught
+that faith and charity were alone necessary virtues: all others were
+useless. There is nothing evil in itself, and life only becomes complete
+when all so-called blemishes are fully displayed in conduct. Their
+leader "not only allowed his disciples a full liberty to sin, but
+recommended a vicious course of life as a matter of obligation and
+necessity; asserting that eternal salvation was only attainable by those
+who had committed all sorts of crimes.... It was the will of God that
+all things should be possessed in common, the female sex not
+excepted."[131]
+
+A little later we have the sect of the Agapetae. They rejected marriage
+as an institution, and permitted unrestrained intercourse between the
+sexes. St. Jerome, alluding to this sect, says: "It is a shame even to
+allude to the true facts. Whence did the pest of the Agapetae creep into
+the Church? Whence is this new title of wives without marriage rites?
+Whence this new class of concubines? I will infer more. Whence these
+harlots cleaving to one man? They occupy the same house, a single
+chamber, often a single bed, and call us suspicious if we think anything
+of it. The brother deserts his virgin sister, the virgin despises her
+unmarried brother, and seeks a stranger, and since they pretend to be
+aiming at the same object, they ask for the spiritual consolation of
+each other that they may enjoy the pleasures of the flesh."[132]
+
+This form of extravagance does not appear to have been limited to a
+single sect. It was more or less general during the ascendancy of
+asceticism. Tertullian says that the desire to enjoy the reputation of
+virginity led to much immorality, the effects of which were concealed by
+infanticide. The Council of Antioch lamented the practice of unmarried
+men and women sharing the same room. In 450, the Anchorites of Palestine
+are described as herding together without distinction of sex, and with
+no garments but a breech-clout.[133] The practice of priests travelling
+about with women, mothers and wives, and the scandals created thereby,
+is referred to in regulation after regulation. Although legislated
+against, it never entirely disappeared, and eventually led to a
+recognised priestly concubinage--recognised, that is, by public opinion,
+although condemned by the Church.
+
+There is no need to go over even the names of all the numerous sects
+that appeared during the early centuries manifesting curious features
+concerning sexual relations. When suppressed in one form they reappeared
+in another, and were unusually prominent during seasons of religious
+unrest. Many of the teachings already noted made their appearance again
+with the "Brethren of the Free Spirit" in the thirteenth, fourteenth,
+and fifteenth centuries. Some of these sects took their stand on the
+Pauline teaching, "The law of the spirit of life in Jesus Christ hath
+made me free from the law of sin and death," and claimed freedom from
+sin, no matter what their actions. The "Brethren of the Free Spirit"
+carried women about with them, held midnight assemblies, and, according
+to Mosheim, attended these meetings in a state of nudity. The Ranters,
+the Spirituels of Geneva, the Berghards, the Flagellants, the Molinists,
+were all accused of sexual misconduct in their assemblies. One of the
+specific teachings of the last-named body, as condemned by the
+Inquisition, ran as follows: "God, to humble us, permits in certain
+perfect souls that the devil should make them commit certain acts. In
+this case, and in others, which without the permission of God, would be
+guilty, there is no sin because there is no consent. It may happen, that
+this violent movement, which excites to carnal acts, may take place in
+two persons, a man and a woman, at the same instant."[134]
+
+It has been pointed out that the dominant Church made continuous efforts
+to suppress these sects, but the remarkable thing is that they should so
+often reappear, and always with strong claims to existence on the basis
+of religious conviction. That a number of men and women should seek
+gratification of their sensual feelings in ways not countenanced by the
+laws of normal life need not excite surprise. There always have been and
+always will be such. But to do this in the name of religion, and with a
+persistency as great as that of the religious idea itself, is a
+phenomenon that surely deserves more attention than it ordinarily
+receives. Nor can it be said with justice that these sects began in mere
+conscious lust. They ended there, true; more or less disguised, it may
+always have been present, but those who initiated them believed that
+they were justified in doing so by religious principles, and appealed to
+those principles to justify their conduct. Why should this have been the
+case? Why should conduct of which men and women are ashamed in the
+social sphere, and which their social sense promptly condemns, in the
+religious sphere be crowned with the dignity of lofty principles and
+fought for with the fervour of intense conviction? So long as
+theologians leave that question unanswered, their arguments are simply
+wide of the real issue.
+
+Naturally, the closer we get to our own day, and to times when religious
+feeling is more vigorously controlled by purely social forces, these
+manifestations of sexuality become less frequent, less widely spread,
+and more transient in character. Still they do occur. For reasons that
+do not concern us here, America has in recent years been a favourable
+ground for these religio-sexual developments. A sympathetic account of
+many of these American sects will be found in Hepworth Dixon's
+_Spiritual Wives_, with accounts of similar sects in Germany and
+England. In some cases many of the features of the early Christian sects
+were reproduced, even to the length of young women sharing the bedrooms
+of their spiritual guides. All took Paul as their principal authority.
+J. H. Noyes, one of the best known and most representative of these
+teachers, laid down the main principles of his teachings thus:--
+
+"When the will of God is done on earth as it is in heaven, there will be
+no marriage. The marriage supper of the Lamb is a feast at which every
+dish is free to every guest. Exclusiveness, jealousy, quarrelling, have
+no place there, for the same reason as that which forbids the guests at
+a thanksgiving dinner to claim each his separate dish, and quarrel with
+the rest for his rights. In a holy community there is no more reason why
+sexual intercourse should be restrained by law, than why eating and
+drinking should be; and there is as little occasion for shame in the one
+case as in the other.... The guests of the marriage supper may have each
+his favourite dish, each a dish of his own procuring, and that without
+the jealousy of exclusiveness. I call a certain woman my wife; she is
+yours; she is Christ's; and in Him she is the bride of all saints. She
+is dear in the hands of a stranger, and according to my promise to her I
+rejoice."[135]
+
+In a letter to Mr. Hepworth Dixon, J. H. Noyes claims the "right of
+religious inspiration to shape society and dictate the form of family
+life," and with probable accuracy says that the origin of these American
+sects is to be found in revivals:--
+
+"The philosophy of the matter seems to be this: Revivals are theocratic
+in their very nature; they introduce God into human affairs.... In the
+conservative theory of revivals, this power is restricted to the
+conversion of souls; but in actual experience it goes, or tends to go,
+into all the affairs of life.... Religious love is very near neighbour
+to sexual love, and they always get mixed in the intimacies and social
+excitements of revivals. The next thing a man wants, after he has found
+the salvation of his soul, is to find his Eve and his Paradise.... The
+course of things may be restated thus: Revivals lead to religious love;
+religious love excites the passions; the converts, finding themselves
+in theocratic liberty, begin to look about for their mates and their
+liberty."[136]
+
+With regard to the beginnings of these modern movements of "Spiritual
+Wifehood," all involving the abrogation of the normal relations of the
+sexes, Hepworth Dixon writes:--
+
+"It has not, I think, been noticed by any writer that three of the most
+singular movements in the churches of our generation seem to have been
+connected, more or less closely, with the state of mind produced by
+revivals; one in Germany, one in England, and one in the United States;
+movements which resulted, among other things, in the establishment of
+three singular societies--the congregation of Pietists, vulgarly called
+the Mucker, at Koenigsberg; the brotherhood of Princeites at Spaxton; and
+the Bible Communists at Oneida Creek.... They had these chief things in
+common: they began in colleges, they affected the form of family life,
+and they were carried on by clergymen; each movement in a place of
+learning and of theological study: that in Germany at the Luther-Kirch
+of Koenigsberg, that in England at St. David's College, that in the
+United States at Yale College.... These three divines, one Lutheran, one
+Anglican, one Congregational, began their work in perfect ignorance of
+each other.... Each movement was regarded by its votaries as the most
+perfect fruit of the revival spirit. In truth, the change which came
+upon the saints from their close experience of revival passion, was
+regarded by themselves as in some degree miraculous, equal in divine
+significance to a new creation of the world."[137]
+
+For an almost exact replica of the erotic extravagances of some of the
+early Christian sects, one may turn to Russia. The difficulties and
+dangers of political life in Russia are doubtless responsible for having
+made religion such a power among the mass of the people, and this will
+also explain the diversion into religious channels of energy that under
+more favourable conditions is expended in social agitation and activity.
+Many of these sects are, of course, of a harmless character, mostly
+originating in an even greater love for the past and a more slavish
+adherence to ancient formulas than is displayed by the orthodox Church.
+Some, however, present the wildest excesses of sexual theory and
+practice. Nothing seems too wild or too extravagant to become the
+originating point of a new sect. Theories of marriage and sexual
+relations generally are developed with a logical fearlessness peculiarly
+Russian. Among the Bezpopovtsi, a numerous sect split up into several
+branches, opinions on marriage vary between regarding it as a mere
+conventional affair, and denouncing it as a hindrance to spiritual
+development. "Between these two extremes," says Mr. Heard, "there is
+room for the wildest and most repulsive theories. Carnal sensuality is
+allied in monstrous union with religious mysticism. Free love,
+independence of the sexes, possession of women in common, have been
+preached and practised. Debauchery, as an incidental weakness of human
+nature, has been advocated as the lesser evil; libertinism as preferable
+to concubinage, and the latter as better than marriage. One of their
+most austere teachers cynically declares that 'it is wiser to live with
+beasts than to be joined to a wife; to frequent many women in secret,
+rather than to live with one openly.'"[138]
+
+Another sect called 'Eunuchs' take their stand on Matt. xix. 12: "There
+are some eunuchs, which were so born from their mother's womb: and there
+are some eunuchs, which were made eunuchs of men: and there be eunuchs,
+which have made themselves eunuchs for the kingdom of heaven's sake. He
+that is able to receive it, let him receive it." This sect believes in
+and practises emasculation as the surest way of attaining perfection.
+Man, they say, should be like the angels, without sex and without
+desire. This practice reminds one of an early Christian sect, the
+Valesians, which not only emasculated members of their own sect, but
+performed the same operation forcibly on those who fell into their
+hands.[139] The Khlysti, a sect which derives its name from the practice
+of flagellation, denounce marriage as unclean, and part of their
+religious ritual is, according to some writers, the worship of a naked
+woman. Baron Von Haxthausen, writing in 1856, gives the following
+description of their ceremonies on Easter night:--
+
+"On this night the Khlysti all assemble for a great solemnity, the
+worship of the mother of God. A virgin, fifteen years of age, whom they
+have induced to act the part by tempting promises, is bound and placed
+in a tub of warm water; some old women come, and first make a large
+incision in the left breast, then cut it off, and staunch the blood in a
+wonderfully short time. During the operation a mystical picture of the
+Holy Spirit is put into the victim's hand, in order that she may be
+absorbed in regarding it. The breast which has been removed is laid upon
+a plate and cut into small pieces, which are eaten by all the members of
+the sect present; the girl in the tub is then raised upon an altar which
+stands near, and the whole congregation dance wildly round it, singing
+at the same time. The jumping then grows madder and wilder, till the
+lights are suddenly extinguished and horrible orgies commence."[140]
+
+The 'Jumpers,' an offshoot of the Khlysti, are much more pronounced in
+their sexual extravagances. They openly profess debauchery, for the
+usual reason, that of conquering the flesh by exhaustion and satiety.
+They meet usually by night, and after prayers are chanted and hymns
+sung, the leader commences a slow jumping movement, keeping time with a
+song. Then:--
+
+"The audience, arranged in couples, engaged to each other in advance,
+imitate his example and join the strain; the bounds and the singing grow
+faster and louder as it spreads, until, at its height, the elder shouts
+that he hears the voices of angels; the lights are extinguished, the
+jumping ceases, and the scene that follows in the darkness defies
+description. Each one yields to his desires, born of inspiration, and
+therefore righteous, and to be gratified; all are brethren in Christ,
+all promptings of the inner spirit are holy; incest, even, is no sin.
+They repudiate marriage, and justify their abominations by the Biblical
+legends of Lot's daughters, Solomon's harem, and the like."[141]
+
+There are many other curious sects in Russia, many of which bring us
+back to the religious atmosphere of the European dark ages. But without
+pursuing a description of these to any greater extent, enough has been
+said to show the persistence of the stream of sexualism in the history
+of Christianity. Of course, this feature did not enter religion with
+Christianity. On the contrary, I have shown that it was present from the
+earliest times. The association of religion with sexual phenomena does
+not commence as a sexual aberration; it only assumes that form at a
+comparatively late stage in religious history. The origin of the
+connection has to be found in that atmosphere of the supernatural which
+envelops primitive life, moulds primitive conceptions, and more or less
+fashions all primitive institutions. The sexual side of religious belief
+and religious symbolism only becomes abnormal, and even morbid, when the
+development of social life makes possible a truer view of sexuality. In
+this the great churches have, perhaps, unconsciously assisted. Their
+position of social control has compelled them to set their faces against
+the sexual symbolism which is so closely associated with early religious
+history, while at the same time countenancing religious fervour in
+general. The consequence has been that small bodies of men and women,
+freed from the restraining influence of social responsibility, have
+developed to extravagant length certain phases of religious belief that
+have been generally discountenanced elsewhere. Their so doing certainly
+helps the present-day student to make a more complete survey of all the
+factors that have played their part in religious history than would
+otherwise have been possible. Repulsive as some of these features now
+are, they have helped in their time to nourish the general belief in a
+supernatural order, and so to strengthen the general idea to which they
+were affiliated.
+
+
+FOOTNOTES:
+
+[121] _The Future of Science_, p. 465.
+
+[122] _Lost and Hostile Gospels_, Preface, p. 7.
+
+[123] See Baring-Gould's _Study of St. Paul_, pp. 450-1.
+
+[124] See Hepworth Dixon's curious work, _Spiritual Wives_, 1888, 2
+vols.
+
+[125] _Study of St. Paul_, p. 458.
+
+[126] _History of European Morals_, i. p. 417.
+
+[127] Cutten, _Psychological Christianity_, p. 157.
+
+[128] Sanger, _History of Prostitution_, p. 116.
+
+[129] See Blunt's _Dictionary of Sects_, art. "Manichaeans."
+
+[130] _De Civitate Dei_, ii. 4.
+
+[131] Mosheim, _Cent. 2_, chap. v. sec. 4.
+
+[132] _Dictionary of Sects_, p. 13.
+
+[133] Lea, _Hist. of Sacerdotal Celibacy_, 1884, p. 42.
+
+[134] Cited by Michelet, _Priests, Women, and Families_, p. 130.
+
+[135] _Spiritual Wives_, ii. pp. 55-6.
+
+[136] _Spiritual Wives_, pp. 176-7, 181.
+
+[137] _Ibid._, pp. 84-6.
+
+[138] _The Russian Church and Russian Dissent_, p. 201.
+
+[139] Lea, _Hist. of Sacerdotal Celibacy_, p. 40.
+
+[140] _Visit to the Russian Empire_, i. p. 254. Merejkowski, in his
+historical novel, _Peter and Alexis_, gives a more detailed account of
+the sexual ceremonies of this sect. See also Heard's description,
+_Russian Church_, p. 258.
+
+[141] _Russian Church and Russian Dissent_, p. 262.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER SEVEN
+
+CONVERSION
+
+
+From what has been already said, it should be clear that a complete
+understanding of religious phenomena--whether legitimately or wrongly so
+called--involves acquaintance with a number of factors that are not
+usually called religious. Man's religious beliefs are usually a very
+composite product; they are built up from a number of states of feeling
+and mental convictions, some of which have only an accidental connection
+with the religious idea itself. Unfortunately, the training given to
+professional religious teachers rarely equips them for dealing with
+religion from the scientific point of view. Their training gives them a
+knowledge of several ancient languages, makes them acquainted with the
+rise and fall of certain doctrines, the nature of Church ritual and the
+like, all of which, while interesting enough in themselves, give little
+more genuine enlightenment than a knowledge of the dates of English
+monarchs provides of the character of genuine historic processes. One
+writer pertinently asks:--
+
+"What does the ordinary seminary graduate know of the histology,
+anatomy, and physiology of the soul? Absolutely nothing. He must stumble
+along through years of trying experience and look back over countless
+mistakes before he understands these things even in a general way. What
+does the ordinary graduate understand about doubt? It is all classed
+together, whether in adolescents or in hardened sinners, and one dose is
+applied. What does the graduate know about sexuality, so closely allied
+with certain forms of religious manifestations? What about ecstasy, in
+its various forms, the numerous methods of faith cure thrust upon an
+illiterate but credulous people, or the significance or insignificance
+of visions and dreams?"[142]
+
+It is, indeed, not too much to say that a theological training tends to
+prevent a rational comprehension of religion in both its normal and
+abnormal manifestations. Religious phenomena are not affiliated to
+phenomena as a whole; they are treated as quite distinct from the rest
+of life, possessing both an independent origin and justification. The
+consequence is that what are usually called studies of religion move
+round and round the same circle of ideas, and a revolution is mistaken
+for progress. Genuine enlightenment has come to us from men who have
+attacked the subject from a quite different point of view. They
+recognised that whether the religious idea was accepted as true or
+rejected as false, it could not be separated from that host of ideas and
+beliefs which make up the psychological side of the social structure. It
+was to be studied as a piece of natural history first of all. Whether it
+involved more than this they left to be settled later. It cannot be said
+that they belittled the _power_ of religion; on the contrary, the
+investigations showed it to be one of the most potent of the forces that
+shape social institutions. But they demonstrated the absurdity of
+placing religion in a category of its own. As an objective fact, they
+showed that religion was subject to the same forces that determine the
+form of other objective facts. As a culture fact, they traced its
+connection with corresponding phases of social development; and as a
+psychological fact, they demonstrated its workings to be in harmony with
+workings of normal psychological laws. Five thousand years of
+theological study had left the world as ignorant of the nature of
+religious phenomena as it was in the days of ancient Chaldea. Fifty
+years of scientific study has served to make at least a broad path
+through what was hitherto an impenetrable jungle.
+
+What has been said holds with peculiar force of the subject of
+conversion. This is not a phenomenon peculiar to Christianity, for
+initiation and conversion accompanies religion in all its phases. I do
+not think that it is peculiar to religion even as a whole. A sudden
+discharge of feeling in a special direction leading to a changed
+attitude, more or less permanent towards life, may be seen in connection
+with the non-religious life, although it fails to receive the attention
+bestowed on changes that are connected with religion. But if conversion
+is not a peculiarly Christian phenomenon, one school of theologians, at
+least, has raised it to a position of peculiar eminence in connection
+with Christianity. They have taken it to be the mark of a person who has
+attained spiritual manhood, and have laid down elaborate rules for its
+achievement. Many theologians will agree that this has been almost
+wholly disastrous. On the one side, conversion has been dwelt upon as a
+cataclysmal epoch in a person's life, produced, negatively, by an act of
+self-surrender, and, positively, by a supernatural act of grace. This
+has had the effect of blinding people to the real nature of the process,
+and has led to certain evil consequences that must always accompany
+attempts at wholesale conversion. On the other hand, it has given rise
+to a class of professional evangelists who count their trophies in
+'souls' as a Red Indian might count scalps, and who are ignorant of
+nearly everything except the art of working upon the emotions of a crowd
+of more or less uncultured people. Here, for instance, is an account of
+an American evangelist and ex-prize fighter, and evidently a great
+favourite with certain sections of the religious public in America. The
+account is cited by Dr. Cutten from a local paper, Illinois:--
+
+"5843 converts, 683 in a day. Total gift to Mr. Sunday, $10,431.
+Greatest revival in history. Will attract the attention of the religious
+world. Sermon on 'Booze,' the great effort of the revival! These are all
+headlines to the report of the meeting, which covers six
+columns--evidently a response to the interest shown in 'Billy' Sunday's
+meetings. The sermon on 'Booze' is given in full, and the physical
+exertions of the preacher described in detail. He began with his coat,
+vest, tie, and collar off. In a few moments his shirt and undershirt
+were gaping open to the waist, and the muscles of his neck and chest
+were seen working like those in the arm of a blacksmith, while
+perspiration poured from every pore. His clothing was soaked, as if a
+hose had been turned on him. He strained, and twisted, and reached up
+and down. Once he was on the floor for just a second, in the attitude of
+crawling, to show that all crime crawled out of the saloon; then he was
+on his feet as quickly as a cat could jump. At the end of forty-five
+minutes he mounted a chair, reached high, as he shouted, then again was
+on the floor, and dropped prostrate to illustrate a story of a drunken
+man, bounded to his feet again as if steel springs filled that lithe,
+slender, lightning-like body. He generally breaks a common kitchen chair
+in this sermon, and this came after a terrible effort, with eyes
+flashing, face scowling, the picture of hate. He whirled the chair over
+his head, smashed the chair to the platform floor, whirled the shattered
+wreck in the air again, and threw it to the ground in front of the
+pulpit. In two minutes men from the front row were tearing the wreck to
+pieces and dividing it up--a round here, a leg there, a piece of the
+back to another, and so on. Later, men carried away in cheering could be
+seen in the audience waving those chair fragments in the air."
+
+This is, of course, an extreme case, although it is but an exaggeration
+of methods in common use among these professional revivalists. The whole
+aim and purpose of these men is to arouse in the audience a high
+emotional tension, and any means is acceptable that succeeds in doing
+this. On the part of the congregation a large portion go for the express
+purpose of indulging in an emotional debauch. Many attend revival after
+revival, living over again the debauch of the last, and treasuring
+lively expectations of the next. Between these and the victim of alcohol
+tasting again his last 'burst,' and seeking opportunities for another,
+there is really little moral or psychological distinction. The social
+consequences of these engineered revivals have never been fully worked
+out, but when it is done by some competent person, the conclusions will
+be a revelation to many. One thing is certain: to expect really useful
+social results from such methods is verily to look to gather grapes from
+thistles.
+
+During recent years the phenomena of religious conversion have been
+studied in a more scientific spirit.[143] Statistics have been compiled
+and analysed, the frames of mind attendant on conversion arranged and
+studied, with the result that the salient features are to be discerned
+by all who approach the study of the subject with a little detachment of
+mind. One outstanding feature of this more scientific enquiry into the
+nature of conversion has been to demonstrate that it is almost
+exclusively a phenomenon of puberty and adolescence. Mr. Hall has
+compiled a lengthy list of the ages at which noted religious characters
+experienced what is known as conversion.[144] From this I take the
+following examples. Religious conviction came to St. Thekla at the age
+of 18, to St. Agnes at 13, St. Antony at 18, Martin of Tours at 18,
+Euphrasia at 12, Benedict at 14, Cuthbert at 15, St. Bernard at 12, St.
+Dominic at 15, St. Collette at 20, St. Catherine at 7, St. Teresa at 12,
+St. Francis of Sales at 11. In his _Life of Jesus_, Keim also remarks
+that although some of the disciples may have been married, most of them
+were probably about twenty years of age.[145]
+
+Professor Starbuck, placing on one side both historical and
+anthropological aspects, set himself the task of examining cases of the
+present day. A paper was sent out asking various questions as to age,
+state of health, frame of mind, before, during, and following
+conversion. The questions were sent to male and female members of
+different religious denominations. In reply, 1265 papers were filled up
+and returned. One result of a scrutiny of these returns was to show that
+the age at which religious conversion was experienced began as early as
+7 or 8 years, it increased gradually till 10 or 11, then a more rapid
+increase till 18 or 20, a decline increasing in rapidity to the age of
+25, and its practical disappearance beyond the age of 30. In girls, the
+period of conversion antedates that of boys by about two years.[146]
+Starbuck's conclusion is the perfectly valid one that conversion
+"belongs almost exclusively to the years between 10 and 25," and is
+distinctly a phenomenon of adolescence.
+
+This conclusion would be borne out by a study of almost any revival
+crusade. Thus a few years ago--1904--England received a visit from the
+American evangelist, Dr. Torrey. At the conclusion of his visit, Sir
+Robertson Nicol invited opinions from ministers in the towns visited by
+Torrey, and published the replies in his paper, _The British Weekly_, on
+October 27. There was no attempt whatever to elicit the ages of the
+reported converts; the enquiry was directed to the point of ascertaining
+whether these engineered missions had a beneficial effect on church
+life, or the reverse. But incidentally the ages of the converts were
+given in some cases, and one may safely assume that in the reports where
+no age was mentioned the facts, if disclosed, would not run counter to
+the generalisation above given. The Rev. T. Towers, Birmingham, noted
+that 16 out of 25 reported converts were children. Rev. A. Le Gros,
+Rugby, reported: "A number of our youngest members, especially amongst
+the young girls, were amongst those who professed conversion." Rev. H.
+Singleton, Smethwick, says: "The bulk of the names sent to me were those
+of children under thirteen years of age." Rev. W. G. Percival, Lozells
+Congregational Church, says of the 'inquiry' meeting held after the
+preaching: "The dear little things followed one another for inquiry
+until the place was a scene of utter confusion." Reports of a similar
+nature came from other places. The ages were pointed out quite
+incidentally; conversions of youths of 17 or 18 would not excite comment
+with these. Were the ages of all given, we should, without doubt, find
+them fall into line with Starbuck's and Hall's figures.
+
+Professor James quite accepts this view of conversion. The conclusion,
+he says, "would seem to be the only sound one: conversion is in its
+essence a normal adolescent phenomenon, incidental to the passage from
+the child's small universe to the wider intellectual and spiritual life
+of maturity."[147] Conversion, in the sense of a change from "the
+child's small universe" to the large world of human society, may be a
+normal fact in life, but the really essential fact in the enquiry is not
+the fact of growth, but growth in a specific direction. Why should this
+normal change from childhood to maturity be the period during which
+_religious_ conversion is experienced? This question is not only ignored
+by Professor James, it is made more confused by his method of stating
+it. Of course, if all people experienced this religious conviction, as
+all people undergo other changes at adolescence, the question would be
+simplified. But this is obviously not the case. A large number of people
+never experience it so long as they are only brought into contact with
+ordinary social forces. Special circumstances seem usually to be
+required to rouse this sense of religious conviction. Nearly every story
+of conversion turns upon something unusual, unexpected, or dramatic
+occurring as the exciting cause. The question is, therefore, why should
+the line of growth, general with all at adolescence, be, in the case of
+some, diverted into religious channels? A study of the subject from this
+point of view will, I think, show that conversion is only normal in the
+sense that in an environment where religious influences are powerful
+each person is normally exposed to it. Those on whom the religious
+influence fails to operate experience the change from childhood to
+adolescence, on to complete maturity, without their nature evincing any
+lack of completeness. This is the vital truth of which Professor James
+loses sight, and it is ignored by the vast majority of writers who treat
+of the subject.
+
+Leaving, for a while, the statistical view of conversion, we may turn to
+its other aspects. By the more advanced of religious teachers to-day the
+developments attendant on adolescence are taken as supplying no more
+than a favourable occasion for directing mind and emotion to definite
+religious conviction. Here the connection is admittedly more or less
+accidental. But by the great majority of theologians there is assumed a
+direct supernatural influence in the states of mind developed during
+adolescence. In more primitive times the connection is of a yet closer
+character. Puberty does not at this stage represent what a modern would
+call an awakening of the religious consciousness, but a direct
+impingement of supernatural influence. From one point of view this
+conception still remains part of all religious systems, however overlaid
+it may be with modern ideas concerning sexual maturity. And we have, as
+a mere matter of historic fact, a whole series of customs commencing
+with the initiatory customs of savages and running right on to the
+modern practice of confirmation.
+
+In a previous chapter it was pointed out what is the savage state of
+mind in relation to the beginnings of sex life as it is manifested in
+both boys and girls. Adolescence does not, to the primitive mind, serve
+as an occasion for the creation of an interest in the religious life, it
+is the sign of direct supernatural influence. One consequence of this is
+the rise of more or less elaborate ceremonials marking the initiation of
+youth into direct communion with the spiritual forces that govern tribal
+life.[148] Among the Polynesians tattooing forms part of the religious
+ceremony, and during the time the marks are healing the boy is taboo to
+the rest of the tribe, owing to his having been touched by the gods.
+With the North American Indians the following ceremony seems
+characteristic:--
+
+"When a boy has attained the age of fourteen or fifteen years he absents
+himself from his father's lodge, lying on the ground in some remote or
+secluded spot, crying to the Great Spirit, and fasting the whole time.
+During this period of peril and abstinence, when he falls asleep, the
+first animal, bird, or reptile, of which he dreams, he considers the
+Great Spirit has designated for his mysterious protector through
+life."[149] Similar ceremonies are described by Livingstone as existing
+among the South African tribes. These customs are too widespread, and
+bear too great a similarity to be described with reference to many
+races. The variations are unimportant, and such as they are they may be
+studied in the pages of Hall, Frazer, and numerous other writers. With
+girls the measures adopted are of a more elaborate character than is the
+case with boys, because, for reasons already stated, the occurrence of
+puberty in girls gives the supernatural act a more startling and
+significant character. Hence the strict seclusion of girls almost
+universally practised among uncivilised peoples. The precautions taken
+indicate, as Hartland points out, that they are at this period not
+merely charged with a malign influence, but are peculiarly susceptible
+to the onset of powers other than human. And with a modification of
+language the same idea has persisted down to our time, even amongst
+those who would reject with indignation the statement that savage ideas
+concerning the nature of puberty form the real basis of their own mental
+attitude.
+
+This truth cannot be too strongly emphasised. To ignore it is to miss
+the whole significance of continuity in human institutions and ideas.
+The ceremonies described do, of course, gather round the fact of sexual
+development, but they are not concerned with the sexual life, as such.
+It is sex as a supernatural manifestation that is the vital feature of
+the situation. The governing idea is that puberty marks the direct
+association of the individual with a spiritual world to the influence of
+which the functional changes are due. As more accurate conceptions are
+formed, the older and inaccurate one is not altogether discarded. It has
+become incarnate in ceremonies, it is part of the traditional psychic
+life of the people, and the change is one of transformation rather than
+of eradication. In later cultural stages the physiological nature of the
+changes are seen, but they are expressed in terms of religion. Such
+expressions as "the soul's awareness of God," "the dawning consciousness
+of religion," etc., take the place of the earlier and more direct
+animistic interpretation. But the essential misinterpretation is
+retained, disguised from careless or uninformed people by the use of a
+modified terminology. But in substance the use made of puberty by
+organised religious forces remains the same throughout. We have the same
+absence of a rational explanation in both instances. In the one because
+the state of knowledge makes any other impossible; in the other because
+tradition, self-interest, and prejudice prevent its use. It is not only
+in his physical structure that man carries reminiscences of a lower form
+of life; such reminders are quite as plentiful in his mental life, and
+in social institutions.
+
+Even with many who perceive the mechanism of conversion its real
+significance is often missed. For the important thing is, not that some
+people express the changes incident to adolescence in terms of religion,
+but that many do not, and also that these find complete satisfaction
+along lines of aesthetic, intellectual, or social interest. Yet one often
+finds it assumed that the difference between the two classes is
+explained by assuming a certain lack of 'spiritual' development in the
+non-religious class. As stated, this is often perilously near to
+impertinence, and in any case is little better than the language of a
+charlatan. In the same way, the use of amatory phraseology is often
+treated as the intrusion of the sex element in a sphere in which it has
+no proper place. Enough has already been said to furnish good grounds
+for believing that there is much more than this in the phenomenon, and
+that one is justified in treating it as symptomatic of the operation of
+forces of the nature of which the subject is quite unaware. The only
+explanation of the facts already cited is that a misinterpretation of
+sexual states lies at the heart of the question. No other hypothesis
+covers the facts; no other hypothesis will explain why the larger number
+of people should find complete development in activities that lie
+outside the field of religion.
+
+How easy it is to see the truth and distort it in the stating may be
+seen in the following passage:--
+
+"Passing over the fact that the period of adolescence is noticeably a
+period of 'susceptibility,' we may take as an example of the intrusion
+or the persistence of the sexual elements in conditions of a non-sexual
+kind the frequent association of sexual with religious excitement. The
+appeal made during a religious revival to an unconverted person has
+psychologically some resemblance to the attempt of the male to overcome
+the hesitancy of the female. In each case the will has to be set aside,
+and strong suggestive means are used; and in both cases the appeal is
+not of the conflict type, but of an intimate, sympathetic, and pleading
+kind. In the effort to make a moral adjustment, it consequently turns
+out that a technique is used which was derived originally from sexual
+life, and the use, so to speak, of the sexual machinery for a moral
+adjustment involves, in some cases, the carrying over into the general
+process of some sexual manifestations."[150]
+
+The important questions, why religion should so powerfully appeal to
+people at adolescence, why its strength should reside so largely in the
+appeal to feelings associated with sexual development, and why
+conversion should be so rarely experienced when the period of sexual
+crisis is past, are quite ignored by Mr. Thomas. Yet it is precisely
+these questions that call most loudly for answers, and which, I believe,
+contain the key of the situation.
+
+From many points of view adolescence is perhaps the most important epoch
+in the life of every individual. It is a time of great and significant
+organic growth, with the development of new organs and functions, and a
+corresponding transformation of both the emotional and intellectual
+output. So far as the brain, the most important organ of all, is
+concerned, one may safely say that before puberty its main function has
+been acquisition. After puberty vast tracts of brain tissue become
+active, and an era of rapid development sets in. There is a rapid growth
+of new nerve connections which occasions both physiological and
+psychological unrest.[151] An important point to bear in mind, also, is
+that all periods of rapid development involve conditions of relative
+instability--one is, in fact, only the obverse side of the other. Dr.
+Mercier says that with girls "more or less decided manifestations of
+hysteria are the rule," and with both sexes this instability involves a
+peculiar susceptibility to suggestions and impressions. Accompanying the
+purely physical changes the mental and emotional nature undergoes what
+is little less than a transformation. There is less direct concern with
+self, and a more conscious concern with others. There is a craving for
+sympathy, for fellowship, a tendency to look at oneself from the
+outside, so to speak, a susceptibility to sights and sounds and
+impressions that formerly had little influence. Each one is conscious of
+new desires, new attractions, expressed often only in a vague feeling of
+unrest, with a desire, half shy because half conscious, for the company
+of the opposite sex. The childish desire for protection weakens; the
+more mature desire to protect others begins to express itself.
+
+Now, the whole significance of these changes, physical and mental, is
+fundamentally sexual and social. Human life, it may be said, has a
+twofold aspect. As a mere animal organism, there is the perpetuation of
+the species, which nature secures by the mere force of the sex impulse.
+As a human being, he is part of a social structure, cell in the social
+tissue, to use Leslie Stephen's expressive phrase. And in this direction
+nature secures what is necessary by the presence of impulses and
+cravings as imperious as, and even more permanent than, those of mere
+sex. Of course, in practice these two things operate together. By a
+process of selection, the anti-social character is weeded out, and the
+two sets of feelings work together in harmony for the furtherance and
+the development of the life of the species. The species is perpetuated
+in the interests of society; society is perpetuated in the interests of
+the species. Further, it is part of the natural 'plan' that there shall
+be developed impulses and capacities suitable to each phase of life as
+it emerges. Thus it has been shown that the lengthening of infancy--that
+is, the prolongation of the time during which the young human being is
+dependent upon its parents for support and protection--is nature's
+method of developing to a greater degree the capacity of the human
+animal for more complex adjustment. Instead of being launched on the
+world with a number of instincts practically fully developed, and so
+capable of attending to its own needs almost as soon as born, man is
+born with few instincts, and a great capacity for education enabling him
+to adjust his conduct to the demands of an environment constantly
+increasing in complexity. In the same way it has been shown that the
+instinct for play, practically universal throughout the whole of the
+animal world, is nature's method of preparing the young for the more
+serious business of nature.[152] It is, therefore, only in line with
+what is found to be true elsewhere that the changes incident to puberty
+should receive their rational interpretation in the necessities of
+social life. That these necessities should be met largely by the play of
+unreasoning impulse is, again, quite in line with what occurs in other
+directions. The insistent pressure of social life for thousands of
+generations secures the emergence of needs of the true nature of which
+the individual may be ignorant. In no other way, in fact, could the
+persistence of the species and of human society be secured.
+
+The whole significance, then, of puberty and adolescence is the entry of
+the individual into the larger life of the race. It is, too, a statement
+beyond reasonable dispute that if we eliminate religion altogether from
+the environment there is not a single feeling experienced at
+adolescence, not a single intellectual craving, that would not undergo
+full development and receive complete satisfaction. The proof of the
+truth of this is that it occurs in a large number of cases. Sacrifice,
+the craving for the ideal, with every other feeling associated by many
+with religion, exist in connection with non-religious phases of life. It
+is idle to argue that some people have a craving for religion, and
+nothing but religion will satisfy them. Where an individual is in
+complete ignorance of the nature and significance of his own
+development, and those around him no better informed; where, moreover,
+there are others in a position of authority ready with a special
+interpretation, it is not surprising if the religious explanation is
+accepted as the genuine and only one. But in reality a sound judgment is
+formed, not on the basis of what some declare they cannot do without,
+but on the basis of what others actually do without, and suffer no
+observable loss in consequence. We do not estimate the value of alcohol
+on the basis of those who declare they cannot do without it. The true
+test is found in those who abstain from its use. So, also, in the case
+of religion. That some, even the majority, declare that religious belief
+is essential to their welfare, proves little or nothing. Human nature
+being what it is, and the history of society being what it is, it would
+be surprising were it otherwise. There is much greater significance in
+so large a number of people finding complete satisfaction in purely
+secular activities.
+
+After what has been said of the misinterpretation of mental and
+emotional states in terms of religious belief, it is not surprising to
+find a writer, a clergyman, and one with experience of growing boys,
+express himself as follows:--
+
+"My experience confirms the opinion of the psychologists that most boys
+of the public school age have a strongly mystical tendency. This is to
+be expected, on account of the great emotional development of that
+period of life. But it is obscured by the fact that the boy is both
+unwilling and unable to give any verbal expression to this tendency. He
+is unwilling because it is something very new and curious in his
+experience; he is often a little frightened of it, and he is exceedingly
+frightened of other people's contempt for it. And he is unable, because
+the words he is accustomed to use are valueless in this connection, and
+he feels priggish if he tries to use others.... But, though unexplained,
+the mystical tendency is there, and should be appealed to and
+developed."[153]
+
+Now, clearly, all that can be reasonably meant by saying that a boy of,
+apparently, from 12 to 16 has a mystical tendency, is that the
+physiological changes incident to puberty are accompanied by a mass of
+feeling of a vague and formless character. Naturally, his boyish
+experience is unable to furnish him with the means of giving adequate
+expression to his feelings. That can only come with the experience of
+maturity. And with equal inevitability he is at the mercy of the
+explanation furnished him by those whom he regards as his teachers and
+guides. When he is told that this element of 'mysticism' is the
+awakening of religion in his soul, he accepts the explanation precisely
+as he accepts explanations of other things. That this 'mystical
+tendency' should be appealed to and developed is a statement open to
+very great doubt. It should rather be explained, not perhaps in a
+brutally frank manner, but in a way that would lead the boy to see
+himself as an organic part of society, with definite duties and
+obligations. If this were done, adolescence might provide us with the
+raw material for a much greater number of useful and intelligent
+citizens than it does at present. The true nature of the process, so
+elaborately misunderstood by Dr. Temple, is clearly outlined by Dr.
+Mercier:--
+
+"In connection with normal development, a large body of vague and
+formless feeling arises, and, until experience gives it shape, the
+possessor remains ignorant of the source and nature of the feeling. If
+the circumstances are appropriate for the natural outlet and expression
+of the activities, they are expressed in affection, and are a source of
+health and strength to the possessor. But if no such outlet exists, the
+vague, voluminous, formless feelings are referred to an occasion that is
+vague, voluminous, and wanting in definite form, they are ascribed to
+the direct influence of the Deity, and assume a place in religious
+emotion."[154]
+
+Leaving this aspect of the subject for a time, let us look more closely
+at the process of conversion. It has already been pointed out that one
+great feature of adolescence is susceptibility to impressions and
+suggestions. One is not surprised to find, therefore, that in
+Starbuck's collection of cases 34 per cent. of the females and 29 per
+cent. of the males described their conversion as being directly due to
+imitation, social pressure, and example. If we were to add to these the
+cases where unconscious imitation and suggestion is at work, the
+proportion would be much greater. Religion, like dress, has its modes,
+and imitation will occur in the one direction as readily as in the
+other. Nothing is more striking in the records of conversion than the
+monotony of the language used to describe the feelings experienced. It
+is exactly as though the converts had been learning a regular catechism,
+as in a way they have been. Young boys and girls will confess their
+sinful state in language identical with that used by one who has
+actually lived a career of vice and crime. Others of an aggressively
+commonplace character will use the language of exalted mysticism
+suitable to an Augustine or a Jacob Boehme. In these cases we have not
+identity of feeling finding expression in identity of language; it is
+pure imitation and suggestion without the least regard to the fitness of
+the language employed.
+
+The full power of suggestion would be more fitly considered in
+connection with waves of religious feeling that have assumed an epidemic
+form; but it will not be out of place here to call attention to this
+factor in such a recent case as the outbreaks in Wales under the
+leadership of persons such as Evan Roberts. Quite apart from the
+suggestion and imitation operating in the gatherings themselves, it is
+plain that many went to the meetings quite prepared to act in accordance
+with what had gone before. Newspapers had published elaborate reports
+of the 'scenes,' certain manifestations were recognised as signs of the
+"workings of the Spirit," with the result that all these operated as
+powerful suggestions, particularly with those of a hysterical
+disposition. And behind this particular revival there were the
+traditions of other revivals, all of which had created a heritage as
+coercive as any purely social tradition. A crowd of people in a state of
+eager expectancy, exposed to the assaults of a preacher skilled in
+rousing their emotion to fever pitch, is naturally ready to see and hear
+things that none would see and hear in their normal moments. No better
+field for the study of crowd psychology, particularly at the point at
+which it merges into the abnormal, could be imagined than the ordinary
+revival.
+
+In America these revival out breaks seem to assume a much more
+extravagant form than with us. Mr. Stanley Hall, for example, thus
+describes a Kentucky camp meeting in which the prevailing term of
+spiritual manifestation was that of 'jerking.' Quoting from an
+eye-witness, he says:--
+
+"The crowd swarmed all night round the preacher, singing, shouting,
+laughing, some plunging wildly over stumps and benches into the forest,
+shouting 'Lost, lost!' others leaping and bounding about like live fish
+out of water; others rolling over and over on the ground for hours;
+others lying on the ground and talking when they could not move; and yet
+others beating the ground with their heels. As the excitement increased,
+it grew more morbid and took the form of 'jerkings,' or in others the
+holy laugh. The jerks began with the head, which was thrown violently
+from side to side so rapidly that the features were blurred and the
+hair almost seemed to snap, and when the sufferer struck an obstacle and
+fell he would bounce about like a ball. Saplings were sometimes cut
+breast high for the people to jerk by. In one place the earth about the
+roots of one of them was kicked about as though by the feet of a horse
+stamping flies. One sufferer mounted his horse to ride away when the
+jerks threw him to the earth, whence he rose a Christian. A lad, who
+feigned illness to stay away, was dragged there by the spirit and his
+head dashed against the wall till he had to pray. A sceptic who cursed
+and swore was crushed by a falling tree. Men fancied themselves dogs,
+and gathered round a tree barking and 'treeing the devil.' They saw
+visions and dreamed dreams, and as the revival waned, it left a crop of
+nervous and hysterical disorders in its wake."[155]
+
+We have nothing quite so extreme as this in British revivals, but the
+home phenomena are not substantially different in nature. A medical
+observer of some of the earliest Methodist revivals thus describes the
+symptoms of those who were subject to 'divine' seizures under the
+influence of Wesley and his immediate followers:--
+
+"There came on first a feeling of faintness, with rigor and a sense of
+weight at the pit of the stomach; soon after which the patient cried out
+as though in the agonies of labour. The convulsions then began, first
+showing themselves in the muscles of the eyelids, though the eyes
+themselves were fixed and staring. The most frightful contortions of the
+countenance followed, and the convulsions now took their course
+downwards, so that the muscles of the trunk and neck were affected,
+causing a sobbing respiration, which was performed with great effort.
+Tremors and agitations ensued, and the patients screamed out violently,
+and tossed their heads from side to side. As the complaint increased, it
+seized the arms, and its victims beat their breasts, clasped their
+hands, and made all sorts of strange noises."
+
+To the non-medical religious observer the scenes produced a different
+impression, thus:--
+
+"When the power of religion began to be spoken of, the presence of God
+really filled the place.... The greatest number of them who cried or
+fell were men; but some women and several children felt the power of the
+same Almighty Spirit, and seemed just sinking into hell. This occasioned
+a mixture of sounds, some shrieking, some roaring aloud. The most
+general was a loud breathing, like that of people half strangled and
+gasping for life; and, indeed, almost all the cries were like those of
+human creatures dying in bitter anguish.... I stood on a pew seat, as
+did a young man in the opposite pew, an able-bodied, fresh, healthy
+countryman; but in a moment, while he seemed to think of nothing less,
+down he dropt with a violence inconceivable. The adjoining pews seemed
+shook with his fall. I heard afterwards the stamping of his feet ready
+to break the boards as he lay in strong convulsions at the bottom of the
+pew.... Among the children who felt the arrows of the Almighty, I saw a
+sturdy boy, about eight years old, who roared above his fellows, and
+seemed, in his agony, to struggle with the strength of a grown man. His
+face was red as scarlet; and almost all on whom God laid His hand turned
+either very red or almost black."[156]
+
+In other instances connected with the same movement, a girl is described
+as "lying on the floor as one dead." One woman "tore up the ground with
+her hands, filling them with dust and with the hard-trodden grass";
+another "roared and screamed in dreadful agony." A child, seven years
+old, "saw visions, and astonished the neighbours with her awful manner
+of relating them." John Wesley personally interviewed a number of the
+people seized in this manner, and was quite convinced of the
+supernatural nature of the attacks. He said that he had "generally
+observed more or less of these outward symptoms to attend the beginning
+of a general work of God," although he admitted that in some cases
+"Satan mimicked God's work in order to discredit the whole work." But
+whether of God or Satan there was no question of their supernatural
+character. Moreover, whatever may be one's opinion of these outbreaks,
+there is one fact that stands out clear and indisputable. This is that
+the Methodist revival owed a great deal of its vitality--as is also the
+case with other religious movements--to phenomena of a distinctly
+pathologic nature. Subtract from these movements all phenomena of the
+class indicated, and such phrases as 'the revival fire' become
+meaningless. Right through history religious conviction has been gained
+in innumerable cases by the operation of factors that a more accurate
+knowledge finds can be explained without any reference whatever to
+supernatural forces.
+
+Lest the above examples be dismissed as belonging to an old order of
+things, I subjoin the following account--from a missionary--of a recent
+revival scene in India:--
+
+"There were people ... on the floor fairly writhing over the realisation
+of sin as it came over them.... Saturday we were favoured with a
+wonderful manifestation of the Spirit. One of the older girls who had
+had a remarkable experience, went into a trance, with her head thrown
+back, her arms folded, and motionless, except for a slight movement of
+her foot. She seemed to be seeing something wonderful, for she would
+marvel at it, and then laugh excitedly.... One girl rushed to the back
+of the vestibule and, lying across a bench, with her head and hands
+against the wall, she fairly writhed in agony for two hours before peace
+came to her."[157]
+
+I do not know on what grounds we are justified in calling civilised
+people who chronicle these outbreaks as "a wonderful manifestation of
+the Spirit." Civilised in other respects, in relation to other matters,
+they may be. Civilised in relation to this particular matter they
+certainly are not. Their viewpoint is precisely that of the lowest tribe
+of savages. Savages, indeed, could not do more; our 'civilised'
+missionaries do no less. Tylor well says that "such descriptions carry
+us far back in the history of the human mind, showing modern men still
+in ignorant sincerity producing the very fits and swoons to which for
+untold ages savage tribes have given religious import. These
+manifestations in modern Europe indeed form part of a revival of
+religion, the religion of mental disease."[158]
+
+The truth is that the appeals usually made to induce conversion, and the
+methods adopted, tend to develop a morbid state of mind, which very
+easily passes into the pathological. A too insistent habit of
+introspection is always dangerous, and the danger is heightened when it
+takes the form of religious brooding. In Dr. Starbuck's collection of
+cases, seventy-five per cent. of the males and sixty per cent. of the
+females confessed to feelings of depression, anxiety, and sadness before
+conversion. This may be attributed partly to the harping upon a
+conviction of sinfulness, which in itself is wholly of an unhealthy
+character. It does not indicate moral health, and it is very far from
+indicating physiological health. The following confessions are
+pertinent, and will illustrate both points. I give in brackets the ages
+of the subjects where stated:--
+
+"I felt the wrath of God resting on me. I called on Him for aid, and
+felt my sins forgiven" (13).
+
+"I couldn't eat, and would lie awake all night."
+
+"Often, very often, I cried myself to sleep" (19).
+
+"Hymns would sound in my ears as if sung" (10).
+
+"I had visions of Christ saying to me, Come to Me, My child" (15).
+
+"Just before conversion I was walking along a pathway, thinking of
+religious matters, when suddenly the word H-e-l-l was spelled out five
+yards ahead of me" (17).
+
+"I felt a touch of the Divine One, and a voice said 'Thy sins are
+forgiven thee; arise and go in peace'" (12).
+
+"The thoughts of my condition were terrible" (13).
+
+"For three months it seemed as if God's Spirit had withdrawn from me.
+Fear took hold of me. For a week I was on the border of despair" (16).
+
+"A sense of sinfulness and estrangement from God grew daily" (15).
+
+"Everything went wrong with me; it felt like Sunday all the time" (12).
+
+"I felt that something terrible was going to happen" (14).
+
+"I fell on my face by a bench and tried to pray. Every time I would call
+on God something like a man's hand would strangle me by choking. I
+thought I would surely die if I could not get help. I made one final
+effort to call on God for mercy if I did strangle and die, and the last
+I remember at that time was falling back on the ground with that unseen
+hand on my throat. When I came to myself there was a crowd around
+praising God."
+
+A crowd around praising God! For all substantial purposes this last
+might be the description of a state of affairs in Central Africa instead
+of an occurrence in a country that claims to be civilised. It is not
+surprising that so great an authority as Sir T. S. Clouston gives an
+emphatic warning against revival services and unusual religious
+meetings, which should "on no account be attended by persons with weak
+heads, excitable dispositions, and neurotic constitutions."[159]
+Unfortunately it is precisely these classes for whom they possess the
+greatest attractions, and from whom the larger number of chronicled
+cases are drawn. The excitement of the revival meeting is as fatal an
+attraction to them as the dram is to the confirmed alcoholist; and if
+the ill-consequences are neither so immediately discernible nor as
+repulsive in character, they are none the less present in a large number
+of cases. The emotional strain to which the organism is subjected
+occurs, as the ages of the converts show, precisely at the time when it
+is least able to bear it safely. The main characteristic of adolescence
+is instability, physical, emotional, and intellectual. It is a time of
+stress and strain, of the formation of new feelings and associations and
+desires that crave for expression and gratification. The instability of
+the organic conditions is evidenced by the large proportion of nervous
+disorders that occur during adolescence. Adolescent insanity is a
+well-known form of mania, although it is usually of brief duration. Sir
+T. S. Clouston, in his _Neuroses of Development_, gives a long list of
+complaints attendant on adolescence, and Sir W. R. Gowers, dealing with
+1450 cases of epilepsy, points out that "three-quarters of the cases of
+epilepsy begin under twenty years, and nearly half (46 per cent.)
+between ten and twenty, the maximum being at fourteen, fifteen, and
+sixteen." Of hysteria, the same writer points out that of the total
+cases 50 per cent. occurs from ten to twenty years of age, 20 per cent.
+from twenty to thirty, and only 10 per cent. from thirty to forty.[160]
+
+The peculiar danger, then, of the modern appeal for conversion is that
+it is couched in a form likely to do the minimum of good and the maximum
+of harm. Where religion exists as a normally operative factor of the
+environment--as in lower stages of culture--the danger is avoided,
+because no special machinery is required to bring about religious
+conviction. The general social life secures this. But at a later stage,
+when the religious and secular aspects of life become separated, with a
+growing preponderance of the latter, religion must be, as it were,
+specially and forcibly introduced. Whether for good or ill, it is a
+disturbing force. It strives to divert the developing organic energies
+into a new channel. To effect this, it plays upon the emotions to an
+altogether dangerous extent, in complete ignorance of the nature of the
+passions excited. In the older form of the religious appeal, that in
+which fear was the chief emotion aroused, it is now generally conceded
+that the consequences were wholly bad. But under any form the emotional
+appeal is fraught with danger, since the tendency is for it to bring out
+unsuspected weaknesses in other directions. Sir W. R. Gowers wisely
+points out that "mental emotion--fright, excitement, anxiety--is the
+most potent cause of epilepsy," which is accounted for by bearing in
+mind "the profoundly disturbing effect of alarm on the nervous system,
+deranging as it does almost every function of the nervous system."
+Persons with predispositions to nervous disorders may pass with safety
+through the period of adolescence so long as their circumstances provide
+opportunities for healthy occupation with no undue emotional strain. But
+let the former be lacking, and the latter danger is always present. The
+hidden weakness develops, and injury more or less permanent follows.
+There is hardly a qualified medical authority in the country who would
+deny the truth of what has been said, although many do not care to speak
+out in relation to religious matters. But all would doubtless agree with
+Dr. Mercier that "every revival is attended by its crop of cases of
+insanity, which are the more numerous as the revival is more fervent and
+long continued."[161]
+
+Something must be said on the moral character of conversions in
+general. This is, naturally, greatly exaggerated, often deliberately so.
+In the first place, confessions of 'sinfulness' in a pre-conversion
+state, when made by youths of both sexes, may be dismissed as quite
+worthless. They are merely using the language placed in their mouths by
+professional evangelists, and the similarity of the confessions carry
+their own condemnation. Leading a sinful, or even a vicious life,
+usually means no more than visiting a theatre, or a music hall, or
+playing cards, or non-attendance at church, or not troubling about
+religious doctrines. Very often the vague feeling of restlessness
+incident to adolescence is interpreted as due to sin or estrangement
+from God, and after conversion the convert is, for purposes of
+self-glorification, given to magnify the benefits and comforts derived
+from his religious convictions. The magnitude of the change increases
+the value of the convert, and with well-known characters there has been
+as great an exaggeration of vices before conversion as of virtues
+subsequently. The way in which evangelical Christianity has created a
+life of the wildest dissipation for the earlier years of John Bunyan is
+an instructive instance of this procedure.
+
+So far as older converts are concerned, everyone of balanced judgment
+will regard stories of conversion from extreme vice to extreme virtue
+with the greatest suspicion. Character does not change suddenly,
+although there may be cases of 'sports' in the moral world as elsewhere.
+Where some modification of conduct, but hardly of character, results,
+the machinery is very obvious, and does not in the least necessitate an
+appeal to the intrusion of a supernatural influence for an explanation.
+The religious gathering opens--as any non-religious meeting may open--a
+new circle of associates with different ideals and standards of value.
+So long as the newcomer is desirous of retaining the respect of his
+fresh associates, so long he will try to act as they act and think as
+they think. There will be a change of conduct, but not, as I have said,
+of character. Those who look closely will find the same character still
+active. The mean character remains mean, the untruthful one remains
+untruthful. The only difference is that these qualities will be
+expressed in a different form. Moreover, the same thing may be seen
+occurring quite apart from religion. Every association of men and women
+exerts precisely the same influence. In the army, a regiment that has a
+reputation for steadiness and sobriety develops these qualities in all
+who enter it. Regiments with a reputation for opposite qualities do not
+fail to convert newcomers. A workshop, a club, a profession, exerts a
+precisely similar influence. One man finds inspiration in the Bible and
+another in the Newgate Calendar. A man will usually be guided by the
+ideals of his associates, whether these ideals be those of a thieves'
+kitchen or of a philanthropic institution. This only means that each
+individual is subject to the influence of the group spirit. For good and
+evil this is one of the deepest and most pregnant facts of human nature.
+The utilisation and distortion of this fact in the interests of
+religious organisations has served to prevent its general recognition
+and the wise use of it by the community at large.
+
+Finally, it has to be borne in mind, in view of the data given above,
+that conversion is experienced by the individual at that period of life
+when the more social side of human nature is beginning to find
+expression. In this way the natural growth from the small world of
+childhood to the larger world of adult humanity is taken advantage of by
+religion, and the process of inevitable growth is attributed to the
+influence of religious belief. In itself the phenomenon is in no degree
+religious, but wholly social. The process is well enough described by
+Starbuck in the following passage--although there are certain quite
+unnecessary theological implications:--
+
+"Conversion is the surrender of the personal will to be guided by the
+larger forces of which it is a part. These two aspects are often
+mingled. In both there is much in common. There is a sudden revelation
+and recognition of a higher order than that of the personal will. The
+sympathies follow the direction of the new insight, and the convert
+transfers the centre of life and activity from the part to the whole.
+With new insight comes new beauty. Beauty and worth awaken love--love
+for parents, kindred, kind, society, cosmic order, truth, and spiritual
+life. The individual learns to transfer himself from a centre of
+self-activity into an organ of revelation of universal being, and to
+live a life of affection for and oneness with the larger life outside.
+As a necessary condition of the spiritual awakening is the birth of
+fresh activity and of a larger self-consciousness, which often assert
+themselves as the dominant element in consciousness."[162]
+
+Adolescence is the golden period of life, because it is the age in which
+the formative influences effect their strongest and most permanent
+impressions. But this susceptibility, while pregnant with promise, is
+because of this susceptibility likewise fraught with the possibilities
+of danger. The developing qualities of mind need to be wisely and
+carefully guided; and it is little short of criminal that at this
+critical juncture so many young people should be handed over to the
+ignorant ministrations of professional evangelism. The true sociological
+significance of the development is ignored, and it is small wonder that,
+having wasted this impressionable period, so many people should go
+through life with a quite rudimentary sense of social responsibility and
+duty. An American author, speaking of the connection between certain
+brutal manifestations in social life in the United States and religious
+teaching, says:--
+
+"It is well known that lynching in the South is carried on largely by
+the ignorant and baser elements of the white population. It is also well
+known that the chief method of religious influence and training of the
+black man and the ignorant white man is impulsive and emotional
+revivalism. It is a highly dangerous situation, and deserves the earnest
+consideration of the ecclesiastical statesmen of all denominations which
+work in the South. It will be impossible to protect that part of the
+nation, or any other, from the epidemic madness of the lynching mob if
+the seeds of it are sown in the sacred soil of religion.... Their
+preachers are great 'soul-savers,' but they lack the practical sense to
+build up their emotionalised converts into anything that approaches a
+higher life."[163]
+
+The truth of this passage has a very wide implication. It is not alone
+true that so long as the lower kind of revivalism is encouraged, we are
+unconsciously perpetuating certain very ugly manifestations of social
+life; it is also true that while we give a supernaturalistic
+interpretation of phenomena that are wholly physiological and
+sociological in character, we can never make the most of the human
+material we possess. On the one side we have a deplorable encouragement
+of unhealthy emotionalism, and on the other a sheer misdirection and
+misuse of human faculty. The increase of self-consciousness, the craving
+for sympathy and communion with one's fellows, the impulse to service in
+the common life of the State, have no genuine connection with religion,
+although all these qualities are classified as religious, and are
+utilised by religious organisations. Actually and fundamentally they
+belong to the social side of human nature. As our hands are developed
+for grasping, and the various organs of the body for their respective
+functions, so mental and emotional qualities are developed in their due
+course for a rational social life. Biologically and psychologically,
+male and female are at adolescence entering into a deeper and more
+enduring relationship with the life of the race. There is no other
+meaning to the process.
+
+Naturally enough, the vast majority of people express their developing
+nature in accordance with the fashion of their environment. If this
+environmental influence were rationally non-religious, the language
+would be that of a non-religious philosophy. As, however,
+supernaturalism, in some form or other, is still a potent force we have
+a contrary result. It is only here and there that one is found with the
+inclination or the wit to analyse his or her impulses, and few possess
+enough knowledge to make the analysis profitable. There is no wonder
+that concerning many of the most important phenomena of human life we
+are still little above the level of the fetish worshipper. We may have a
+more elaborate phraseology, but the old ideas are still operative. The
+consequence is that each newcomer finds certain ideas and forms of
+speech ready for his acceptance, and is handed over, bound hand and
+foot, to influences that are the least capable of sane direction. We do
+not merely sacrifice our first-born; we immolate the whole of our
+progeny. The ignorant past plays into the hands of the designing
+present; the present conspires with the past to rob the future of the
+good that might result from the growth of a wiser and a better race.
+
+Were society really enlightened and genuinely civilised, the truth of
+what has been said would be recognised as soon as stated. It would,
+indeed, be unnecessary to labour what would then be a generally
+recognised truth. But the mass of the people are not genuinely
+enlightened, our civilisation is largely a veneer, and numerous agencies
+prevent our reaping the full benefit of our available knowledge. Thus it
+happens that in place of an explanation of human qualities in terms of
+biologic and social evolution, we find current an explanation that is
+based upon pre-scientific ideas. Because our less instructed ancestors
+accounted for various manifestations of human qualities as due to a
+supernatural influence, we continue to perpetuate the delusion. We teach
+youth to express itself in terms of supernaturalism, and then treat the
+language and the fact as inseparable. In this respect, sociology is
+passing through a phase from which some of the sciences have finally
+emerged. In physics and astronomy, for instance, the fact has been
+separated from the supernatural explanation, and shown to be
+independent of it. An exploitation of social life in the interests of
+supernaturalism is still in active operation. It is this that is really
+the central truth of the situation. And in ignoring this truth we expose
+a growing generation to the worst possible of educative influences, at a
+time when a wiser control would be preparing it for an intelligent
+participation in the serious and enduring work of social organisation.
+
+
+FOOTNOTES:
+
+[142] Dr. G. B. Cutten, _The Psychological Phenomena of Christianity_,
+pp. 7-8.
+
+[143] The most elaborate study of this character known to the present
+writer is Mr. G. Stanley Hall's _Adolescence_, in two volumes. The bulk
+of the work is, however, terrifying to some, and the cost prohibitive to
+many. For the general reader of limited leisure and means, Professor
+Starbuck's smaller volume, _The Psychology of Religion_, presents the
+salient facts in a brief and satisfactory manner. It is lacking,
+however, on the anthropological side, a view that is well presented by
+Dr. Stanley Hall.
+
+[144] See _Adolescence_, i. p. 528.
+
+[145] Vol. iii. p. 279.
+
+[146] _Psychology of Religion_, chap. iii. Hall's figures are given in
+the second volume of his work, pp. 288-92.
+
+[147] _Varieties_, p. 199.
+
+[148] An elaborate list of these ceremonies in both the savage and
+civilised worlds has been compiled by Mr. Hall, ii. chap. xiii.
+
+[149] Catlin, _North American Indians_, i. p. 36; see also ii. p. 347.
+
+[150] W. I. Thomas, _Sex and Society_, pp. 115-6.
+
+[151] For a good summary, see Donaldson's _Growth of the Brain_, pp.
+241-48.
+
+[152] See on this subject the two fine works by Karl Groos, _The Play of
+Animals_, _The Play of Man_.
+
+[153] W. Temple, _Repton School Sermons_.
+
+[154] _Sanity and Insanity_, p. 281.
+
+[155] _Adolescence_, ii. pp. 286-7.
+
+[156] Southey's _Life of Wesley_, chap. xxiv.
+
+[157] From _The Examiner_ of September 6, 1906, cited by Cutten, p. 185.
+
+[158] _Primitive Culture_, ii. p. 422.
+
+[159] _Clinical Lectures_, p. 39.
+
+[160] _Manual of Diseases of the Nervous System_, 1893, pp. 732 and 785.
+
+[161] _Sanity and Insanity_, p. 282.
+
+[162] _Psychology of Religion_, pp. 146-7.
+
+[163] _Primitive Traits in Religious Revivals._
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER EIGHT
+
+RELIGIOUS EPIDEMICS
+
+
+Under pressure of scientific analysis the old distinction between the
+individual and society bids fair to break down, or to maintain itself as
+no more than a convenience of classification. It is now being recognised
+that a society is something more than a mere aggregate of self-contained
+units, and that the individual is quite inexplicable apart from the
+social group. It is the latter which gives the former his individuality.
+His earliest impressions are derived from the life of the group, and as
+he grows so he comes more and more under the influence of social forces.
+The consequence is that the key to a very large part of the phenomena of
+human nature is to be found in a study of group life. We may abstract
+the individual for purposes of examination, much as a physiologist may
+study the heart or the liver apart from the body from which it has been
+taken. But ultimately it is in relation to the whole that the true
+significance and value of the part is to be discerned.
+
+In this corporate life imitation and suggestion play a powerful part.
+With children, by far the larger part of their education consists of
+sheer imitation, nor do adults ever develop beyond its influence.
+Suggestion is a factor that is more operative in youth and maturity than
+in early childhood, and is exhibited in a thousand and one subtle and
+unexpected ways. Both these forces are essential to an orderly, and to a
+progressive, social life; but they may just as easily become the cause
+of movements that are retrogressive, and even anti-social in character.
+An epidemic of suicide or of murder is as easily initiated as an
+epidemic of philanthropy. Let a person commit suicide in a striking and
+unusual manner, and there will soon be others following his example.
+Given a favourable environment, there is no idea, however unreal, that
+will not find advocates; no example, however strange or disgusting, that
+will not find imitators. The more uniform the society, the more powerful
+the suggestion, the easier the imitation. That is why a crowd, acting as
+a crowd, is nearly always made up of people drawn from the same social
+stratum, each unit already familiar with certain ideals and belief.
+Under such conditions a crowd will assume all the characteristics of a
+psychological entity. As Gustave Le Bon has pointed out, a crowd will do
+collectively what none of its constituent units would ever dream of
+doing singly.[164] It becomes capable of deeds of heroism or of savage
+cruelty. It will sacrifice itself or others with indifference. Above
+all, the mere fact of moving in a mass gives the individual a sense of
+power, a certainty of being in the right that he can--save under
+exceptional circumstances--never acquire while alone. The intellect is
+subdued, inhibition is inoperative, the instincts are given free play,
+and their movement is determined in turn by suggestions not unlike those
+with which a trained hypnotist influences his subject.
+
+In the phenomena of contagion words and symbols play a powerful part.
+They are both a rallying-point and an outlet for the emotions of a
+crowd. These words or symbols may be wholly incongruous with the real
+needs of a people, but provided they are sufficiently familiar they will
+serve their purpose. And the more primitive the type of mind represented
+by the mass of the people the more powerfully these symbols operate.
+Shakespeare's portrayal of the crowd in _Julius Caesar_ remains eternally
+true. The skilled orator, playing on old feelings, using familiar terms,
+and invoking familiar ideas, finds a crowd quite plastic to his hands.
+It is for these reasons that there is so keen a struggle with political
+and social parties for a monopoly of good rallying cries, and a
+readiness to fix objectionable titles on their opponents. Patriotism,
+Little Englander, Jingo, The Church in Danger, Godless Education, etc.
+etc. Causes are materially helped or injured by these means. There is
+little or no consideration given to their justice or reasonableness; it
+is the image aroused that does the work.
+
+Psychological epidemics may in some cases be justly called normal in
+character. That is, they depend upon factors that are always in
+operation and which form a part of every social structure. A war fever
+or a commercial panic falls under this head. In other instances they
+depend upon abnormal conditions, upon the workings, perhaps, of some
+obscure nervous disease, and are of a pathological description. In yet
+other cases they represent a mixture of both. In such cases, for
+example, as that of the Medieval Flagellants or of the Dancing Mania,
+the presence of pathological elements is unmistakable. But neither of
+these epidemics could have occurred without a certain social
+preparation, and unless they had called into operation those principles
+of crowd psychology to which science has within recent years turned its
+attention, and which are normal factors in every society. These three
+classes of epidemics may be found in connection with subjects other than
+religious, but I am at present concerned with them only in that
+relation, and to point out that, in spite of their undesirable or
+admittedly pathologic character, they have yet served to keep
+supernaturalism alive and active.
+
+During the Christian period of European history by far the most
+important of all epidemics, as it was indeed the earliest, was
+monasticism. This takes front rank because of its extent, the degree to
+which it prepared the ground for subsequent outbreaks, and because of
+its indirect, and, I think, too little noticed, social consequences. It
+may safely be said that no other movement has so powerfully affected
+European society as has the monasticism of the early Christian
+centuries. It cannot, of course, be urged that Christianity originated
+monasticism. India and Egypt had its ascetic practices and celibate
+priesthood long before the birth of Christianity, and indeed gave
+Christianity the pattern from which to work. But the main stream of
+social life remained unaffected to any considerable extent by this
+asceticism. The social and domestic virtues received full recognition
+from the upholders of the monastic life, and there is no evidence that
+asceticism ever assumed an epidemic form. It has often been the lot of
+the Christian Church to give a more intense expression to religious
+tendencies already existing, and this was so in the case before us. At
+any rate, it was left for the Christian Church to give to monasticism
+the character of an epidemic, to treat the purely social and domestic
+virtues as a positive hindrance to the religious life, seriously to
+disturb national well-being, and to come perilously near destroying
+civilisation.
+
+The origin of ascetic practices has already been indicated in a previous
+chapter. It has there been pointed out that the deliberate torture of
+mind and body arose from the belief that the induced states brought man
+into direct communion with supernatural powers, and that this element
+has continued in almost every religion in the world. Says
+Baring-Gould:--
+
+"The ascetic instinct is intimately united with the religious instinct.
+There is scarcely a religion of ancient and modern times, certain forms
+of Protestantism excepted, that does not recognise asceticism as an
+element in its system.... Brahmanism has its order of ascetics....
+Mohammedanism has its fakirs, subduing the flesh by their austerities,
+and developing the spirit by their contemplation and prayers. Fasting
+and self-denial were observances required of the Greeks, who desired
+initiation into the mysteries.... The scourge was used before the altars
+of Artemis and over the tomb of Pelops. The Egyptian priests passed
+their novitiate in the deserts, and when not engaged in their religious
+functions were supposed to spend their time in caves. They renounced all
+commerce with the world, and lived in contemplation, temperance, and
+frugality, and in absolute poverty.... The Peruvians were required to
+fast before sacrificing to the gods, and to bind themselves by vows of
+chastity and abstinence from nourishing food.... There were ascetic
+orders for old men and nunneries for widows among the Totomacs, monastic
+orders among Toltecs dedicated to the service of Quetzalcoatl, and
+others among the Aztecs consecrated to Tezcatlipoca."[165]
+
+It was argued by Bingham, a learned eighteenth-century ecclesiastical
+historian, that although asceticism was known and practised in
+individual cases from the earliest period of Christian history, it did
+not establish itself within the Church until the fourth century. It is
+not a matter of great consequence to the subject under discussion
+whether this be so or not. It is at least certain that Christian
+teaching contained within itself all the elements for such a
+development, which was bound, sooner or later, to transpire. The
+antithesis between the flesh and the spirit, the conception of the world
+as given over to Satan, the ascetic teaching of Paul, with the value
+placed upon suffering and privation as spiritually disciplinary forces,
+could not but create in a society permeated with a special type of
+supernaturalism, that asceticism which became so marked a feature of
+medieval Christianity. And it is certain also that in no other instance
+has asceticism proved itself so grave a danger to social order and
+security. Allowing for what Lecky calls the 'glaring mendacity' of the
+lives of the saints, a description that applies more or less to all the
+ecclesiastical writings of the early centuries, it is evident that the
+number of monks, their ferocity, and general practices, were enough to
+constitute a grave social danger. It is said that St. Pachomius had 7000
+monks under his direct rule; that in the time of Jerome 50,000 monks
+gathered together at the Easter festival; that one Egyptian city
+mustered 20,000 nuns and 10,000 monks, and that the monastic population
+of Egypt at one time equalled in number the rest of the inhabitants. At
+a later date, within fifty years of its institution, the Franciscan
+Order possessed 8000 houses, with 200,000 members. In the twelfth
+century the Cluniacs had 2000 monasteries in France. In England, as late
+as 1546, Hooper, afterwards Bishop of Gloucester, declared that there
+were no less than 10,000 nuns in England. Every country in Europe
+possessed a larger or smaller army of men and women whose ideals were in
+direct conflict with nearly all that makes for a sane and progressive
+civilisation.
+
+The general character of the monk during the full swing of the ascetic
+epidemic has been well sketched by Lecky. His summary here will save a
+more extended exposition:--
+
+"There is perhaps no phase in the moral history of mankind of a deeper
+and more painful interest than this ascetic epidemic. A hideous, sordid,
+and emaciated maniac, without knowledge, without patriotism, without
+natural affection, passing his life in a long routine of useless and
+atrocious self-torture, and quailing before the ghastly phantoms of his
+delirious brain, had become the ideal of the nations which had known the
+writings of Plato and Cicero, and the lives of Socrates and Cato. For
+about two centuries, the hideous maceration of the body was regarded as
+the highest proof of excellence. St. Jerome declares, with a thrill of
+admiration, how he had seen a monk, who for thirty years had lived
+exclusively on a small portion of barley bread and of mouldy water;
+another who lived in a hole and never ate more than five figs for his
+daily repast; a third who cut his hair only on Easter Sunday, who never
+washed his clothes, who never changed his tunic till it fell to pieces,
+who starved himself till his eyes grew dim, and his skin like a pumice
+stone.... For six months, it is said, St. Macarius of Alexandria slept
+in a marsh, and exposed his naked body to the stings of venomous
+flies.... His disciple, St. Eusebius, carried one hundred and fifty
+pounds of iron, and lived for three years in a dried-up well.... St.
+Besarion spent forty days and nights in the middle of thorn bushes, and
+for forty days and nights never lay down when he slept.... Some saints,
+like St. Marcian, restricted themselves to one meal a day, so small that
+they continually suffered the pangs of hunger.... Some of the hermits
+lived in deserted dens of wild beasts, others in dried-up wells, while
+others found a congenial resting-place among the tombs. Some disdained
+all clothes, and crawled abroad like the wild beasts, covered only by
+their matted hair. The cleanliness of the body was regarded as a
+pollution of the soul, and the saints who were most admired had become
+one hideous mass of clotted filth. St. Athanasius relates with
+enthusiasm how St. Antony, the patriarch of monachism, had never, to
+extreme old age, been guilty of washing his feet.... St. Abraham, the
+hermit, however, who lived for fifty years after his conversion, rigidly
+refused from that date to wash either his face or his feet.... St. Ammon
+had never seen himself naked. A famous virgin, named Sylvia, though she
+was sixty years old, and though bodily sickness was a consequence of her
+habits, resolutely refused, on religious principles, to wash any part of
+her body except her fingers. St. Euphraxia joined a convent of one
+hundred and thirty nuns, who never washed their feet, and who shuddered
+at the mention of a bath."[166]
+
+It is difficult to realise what it is exactly that some writers have in
+their minds when they praise the purity of the ascetic ideal, and lament
+its degradation as though society lost something of great value thereby.
+The examples cited realised that ideal as well as it could be realised,
+and its anti-social character is unmistakable. If it is intended to
+imply that an element of self-denial or self-discipline is essential to
+healthy development, that is admitted, but this is not the ascetic
+ideal; it is that of temperance as taught by the best of the ancient
+philosophers. What the ascetic aimed at was not self-development, but
+self-suppression. The discipline of the monk was only another name for
+the cultivation of a frame of mind unhealthy and anti-social.
+Eventually, the rapidity with which this mania spread, the fact that for
+several centuries it raged as a veritable epidemic, carried with it the
+germs of a corrective. The more numerous monks and nuns became, the more
+certain it became that many of them would develop passions and
+propensities they professed to despise. The love of ease and wealth, the
+lust of power and pride of place, was sure to find expression, and if by
+the degradation of the ascetic ideal is meant the fact that the
+preachers of poverty, and humility, and meekness, became the wealthiest,
+the most powerful, the most corrupt, and the most tyrannical order in
+Christendom, the reason is that not even monasticism could prevent
+ordinary human passions from finding expression. They might be
+suppressed in the case of a few; it became impossible with a multitude.
+That they found expression in so disastrous a form was due to the fact
+that the disciplinary agent of these passions, a developed social
+consciousness, played so small a part in the life of the monk.
+
+It is no part of my present purpose to trace the full consequences of
+the ascetic epidemic. Some of these consequences, however, have a more
+or less direct bearing upon this enquiry, and it is necessary to say
+something upon them. One enduring and inevitable consequence of
+monasticism has not, I think, been adequately noted by many writers.
+This is its influence on the ideal of marriage, on the family, and on
+the domestic virtues. In India and Egypt celibacy had been closely
+associated with the religious life, but the ascetic was regarded as a
+man peculiarly apart from his fellows, and the family continued to be
+held in great honour, even by religious writers. Christianity provided
+for the first time a body of writers who made a direct attack upon
+marriage as obstructing the supreme duty of spiritual development. The
+Rev. Principal Donaldson, in his generally excellent book on _Woman_,
+professes to find some difficulty in accounting for the growth among the
+early Christians of the feeling in favour of celibacy. He remarks that
+"no one with the New Testament as his guide could venture to assert that
+marriage was wrong." Not wrong, certainly; but anyone with the New
+Testament before him would be justified in asserting marriage to be
+inferior to celibacy. It is at most taken for granted; it is neither
+commended nor recommended, and of its social value there is never a
+glimpse. And there is much on the other side. Paul's teaching is
+strongly in favour of celibacy, and marriage is only advised to avoid a
+greater evil. In the Book of _Revelation_ there is a reference to the
+144,000 saints who wait on "the Lamb," and who "were not defiled with
+women, but were virgins." Certainly the New Testament does not condemn
+marriage, but it is idle to pretend that those who preached the celibate
+ideal failed to find therein a warranty for their teaching.
+
+The historic fact is, however, that the early Christian leaders were, in
+the main, ardent advocates of celibacy. The social importance of
+marriage being ignored, its functions became those of ministering to
+sexual passion and the perpetuation of the race. In view of the supposed
+approaching end of the world, the desirability of this last was
+questioned, and in the name of purity the former was strongly denounced.
+It is from these points of view that Tertullian describes children as
+"burdens which are to most of us perilous as being unsuitable to faith,"
+and wives as women of the second degree of modesty who had fallen into
+wedlock. Jerome said that marriage was at best a sin, and all that could
+be done was to excuse and purify it. Epiphanius said that the Church was
+based upon virginity as upon a corner-stone. Augustine was of opinion
+that celibates would shine in heaven like dazzling stars. Married people
+were declared, by another authority, to be incapable of salvation. The
+most powerful and most influential of writers concurred that the sexual
+relation was an almost fatal obstacle to religious salvation.
+
+Hardly any movement ever struck so hard against social well-being as
+did this teaching of celibacy. Wives were encouraged to desert their
+husbands, husbands to forsake their wives, children their parents.
+Parents, in turn, were exhorted to devote their children to the monastic
+life; and although at first children who had been so condemned were
+allowed to return to the world, should they desire it, on reaching
+maturity, this liberty was taken from them by the fourth Council of
+Toledo in 633.[167] Some few of the Christian writers protested against
+children being taught to forsake their parents in this manner, but the
+general spirit of the time was in its favour.
+
+"Children were nursed and trained to expect at every instant more than
+human interferences; their young energies had ever before them examples
+of asceticism, to which it was the glory, the true felicity of life, to
+aspire. The thoughtful child had all his mind thus preoccupied ...
+wherever there was gentleness, modesty, the timidity of young passion,
+repugnance to vice, an imaginative temperament, a consciousness of
+unfitness to wrestle with the rough realities of life, the way lay
+invitingly open.... It lay through perils, but was made attractive by
+perpetual wonders. It was awful, but in its awfulness lay its power over
+the young mind. It learned to trample down that last bond which united
+the child to common humanity, filial reverence; the fond and mysterious
+attachment of the child and the mother, the inborn reverence of the son
+to the father. It is the highest praise of St. Fulgentius that he
+overcame his mother's tenderness by religious cruelty."[168]
+
+The full warranty for Dean Milman's stricture is seen in the following
+passage from St. Jerome:--
+
+"Though your little nephew twine his arms around your neck; though your
+mother, with dishevelled hair, and tearing her robe asunder, point to
+the breast with which she suckled you; though your father fall down on
+the threshold before you, pass on over your father's body. Fly with
+tearless eyes to the banner of the cross. In this matter cruelty is the
+only piety.... Your widowed sister may throw her gentle arms around
+you.... Your father may implore you to wait but a short time to bury
+those near to you, who will soon be no more; your weeping mother may
+recall your childish days, and may point to her shrunken breast and to
+her wrinkled brow. Those around you may tell you that all the household
+rests upon you. Such chains as these the love of God and the fear of
+hell can easily break. You say that Scripture orders you to obey your
+parents, but he who loves them more than Christ loses his soul. The
+enemy brandishes a sword to slay me. Shall I think of a mother's
+tears?"[169]
+
+Gibbon said of the ascetic movement that the Pagan world regarded with
+astonishment a society that perpetuated itself without marriage.
+Unfortunately this perpetuation was secured by the sacrifice of some of
+the dearest interests of the race. For, in general, one may say that
+idealistic teaching of any kind appeals most powerfully to those who are
+least in need of it. The world would at any time lose little, and might
+possibly gain much, were it possible to restrain a certain class from
+parentage. But there is no evidence that monasticism ever had its effect
+on that kind of people; the presumption is indeed in the contrary
+direction. The careless and brutal hear and are unaffected. The more
+thoughtful and desirable alone are influenced. And there can be little
+doubt that the Church in appealing to certain aspects of human nature
+dissuaded from parentage those who were most fitted for the task. There
+was a practical survival of the unfittest. Nothing is more striking, in
+fact, in the early history of Christianity than the comparative absence
+of home life and of the domestic ideals. Dean Milman remarked that in
+all the discussion concerning celibacy he could not recall a single
+instance where the social aspects appear to have occurred to the
+disputants. The Dean's remark applies to some extent to a much later
+period of Christian history than the one to which he refers. That
+much-admired evangelical classic, Bunyan's _Pilgrim's Progress_, for
+example, shows a curious obliviousness to the value of family and social
+life. But neglect of the socialising and refining influence of family
+life leads inevitably to a hardening of character and a brutalising of
+life in general. The ferocious nature of the theological disputes of the
+early Christian period never fail to arouse the comments of historians.
+But there was really nothing to soften or restrain them. Everything was
+dominated by the theological interest. And we owe it in no small measure
+to the vogue of the monk that the tolerance of Pagan times, with its
+widespread respect for truth-seeking, was replaced by the narrow
+intolerance of the medieval period, an intolerance which has never
+really been eradicated from any part of Christian Europe.
+
+In counting this as one of the consequences of the Christian preaching
+of celibacy, I am supported by no less an authority than the late Sir
+Francis Galton. In his epoch-marking work, _Hereditary Genius_, this
+writer says:--
+
+"The long period of the Dark Ages under which Europe has lain is due, I
+believe, in a very considerable degree, to the celibacy enjoined by the
+religious orders on their votaries. Whenever a man or woman was
+possessed of a gentle nature that fitted him or her to deeds of charity,
+to meditation, to literature, or to art, the social condition of the
+time was such that they had no refuge elsewhere than in the bosom of the
+Church. But she chose to preach and exact celibacy. The consequence was
+that these gentle natures had no continuance, and thus by a policy so
+singularly unwise and suicidal that I am hardly able to speak of it
+without impatience, the Church brutalised the breed of our forefathers.
+She acted precisely as if she had aimed at selecting the rudest portion
+of the community to be alone the parents of future generations. She
+practised the arts that breeders would use, who aimed at creating
+ferocious, currish, and stupid nature. No wonder that club law prevailed
+for centuries over Europe; the wonder rather is that enough good
+remained in the veins of Europeans to enable their race to rise to its
+very moderate level of natural morality."[170]
+
+The consequences of asceticism on morals were almost wholly disastrous.
+There is no intention of endorsing the vulgar Protestant prejudice of
+every convent being a brothel, and all monks and nuns as given over to a
+vicious life, but there is no question that a very widespread
+demoralisation existed amongst the religious orders, that this existed
+from the very earliest times, and that it was an inevitable consequence
+of so large a number of people professing the ascetic life. This is not
+a history of morals, and it is needless to enter into a detailed account
+of the state of morality during the prevalence of asceticism. But the
+absence of any favourable influence exerted by asceticism on conduct is
+well illustrated in the description of Salvianus, Bishop of Marseilles
+at the close of the fifth century, of the condition of society in his
+day. Gaul, Spain, Italy, and Africa are depicted as sunk in an
+overmastering sensuality. Rome is represented as the sewer of the
+nations, and in the African Church, he says, the most diligent search
+can scarce discover one chaste among thousands. And this, it must be
+borne in mind, was the African Church, which under the care of Augustine
+had been specially nurtured in the most rigid asceticism. Four hundred
+years later the state of monastic morals is sufficiently indicated by a
+regulation of St. Theodore Studita prohibiting the entrance of female
+animals into monasteries.[171] A regulation passed in Paris at a Council
+held in 1212 enforces the same lesson by forbidding monks or nuns
+sleeping two in a bed. The avowed object of this was to repress offences
+of the most disgusting description.[172] In 1208 an order was issued
+prohibiting mothers or other female relatives residing with priests, on
+account of the frequent scandals arising. Offences became so numerous
+and so open that it was with relief that laymen saw priests openly
+select concubines. That at least gave a promise of some protection to
+domestic life. In some of the Swiss cantons it actually became the
+practice to compel a new pastor, on taking up his charge, to select a
+concubine as a necessary protection to the females under his care. The
+same practice existed in Spain.[173]
+
+There is, as Lea rightly says, no injustice in holding the Church mainly
+responsible for the laxity of morals which is characteristic of medieval
+society. It had unbounded and unquestioned power, and this with its
+wealth and privileges might have made medieval society the purest in the
+world. As it was, "the period of its unquestioned domination over the
+conscience of Europe was the very period in which licence among the
+Teutonic races was most unchecked. A church which, though founded on the
+Gospel, and wielding the illimitable power of the Roman hierarchy, could
+yet allow the feudal principle to extend to the _jus primae noctis_ or
+_droit de marquette_, and whose ministers in their character of temporal
+seigneurs could even occasionally claim the disgusting right, was
+evidently exercising its influence, not for good, but for evil."
+
+On civic life and the civic virtues the influence of asceticism was
+equally disastrous. "A candid examination," says Lecky, "will show that
+the Christian civilisation has been as inferior to the Pagan ones in
+civic and intellectual virtues as it has been superior to them in the
+virtues of humanity and chastity." One may reasonably question the
+latter part of this statement, bearing in mind the facts just pointed
+out, but the first part admits of overwhelming proof. Celibacy is not
+chastity, and it is difficult to see how the coarsening of character
+described by Lecky himself can be consistent with a heightened
+humanity. But there can be small doubt that the growth of the Christian
+Church spelt disaster to the civic life and institutions of the Empire.
+Nothing the Romans did was more admirable than their organisation of
+municipal life. They avoided the common blunder of imposing on all a
+uniform organisation, and so gave free play to local feeling and custom
+so far as was consistent with imperial order and peace. Civic life
+became, as a consequence, well ordered and persistent. It was far less
+corrupt than administration in the capital, and freedom persisted in the
+provincial towns for long after its practical disappearance in Rome
+itself. Indeed, but for the antagonism of Christianity, it is probable
+that the urban municipalities might have provided the impetus for the
+rejuvenation of the Empire.[174]
+
+From the outset, the early Christian movement stood as a whole apart
+from the civic life of the Empire, while the ascetic waged a constant
+warfare against it. "According to monastic view of Christianity," says
+Milman, "the total abandonment of the world, with all its ties and
+duties, as well as its treasures, its enjoyments, and objects of
+ambition, advanced rather than diminished the hopes of salvation." The
+object was individual salvation, not social regeneration. When people
+were praised for breaking the closest of family ties in their desire for
+salvation, it would be absurd to suppose that social duties and
+obligations would remain exempt. The Christian ascetic was ready enough
+to risk his own life, or to take the life of others, on account of
+minute points of doctrinal difference, but he was deaf to the call of
+patriotism or the demands of civic life. Theology became the one
+absorbing topic; and as monasticism assumed more menacing proportions,
+the monk became the dominating figure, paralysing by his presence the
+healthful activities of masses of the people. Speaking of the Eastern
+Empire, although his words apply with almost equal truth wherever the
+Church was supreme, Milman says:--
+
+"That which is the characteristic sign of the times as a social and
+political, as well as a religious, phenomenon, is the complete dominion
+assumed by the monks in the East over the public mind.... The monks, in
+fact, exercise the most complete tyranny, not merely over the laity, but
+over bishops and patriarchs, whose rule, though nominally subject to it,
+they throw off whenever it suits their purposes.... Monks in Alexandria,
+monks in Antioch, monks in Constantinople, decide peremptorily on
+orthodoxy and heterodoxy.... Persecution is universal; persecution by
+every means of violence and cruelty; the only question is in whose hands
+is the power to persecute.... Bloodshed, murder, treachery,
+assassination, even during the public worship of God--these are the
+frightful means by which each party strives to maintain its opinions and
+to defeat its adversary. Ecclesiastical and civil authority are alike
+paralysed by combinations of fanatics ready to suffer or to inflict
+death, utterly unapproachable by reason."[175]
+
+Against such combinations of ignorance, fanaticism, and ferocity, the
+few remaining lovers of secular progress were powerless. Patriotism
+became a mere name, and organised civic life an almost forgotten
+aspiration. What the Pagan world had understood by a 'good man' was one
+who spent himself in the service of his country. The Christian
+understood by it one who succeeded in saving his own soul, even at the
+sacrifice of family and friends. Vampire-like, monasticism fed upon the
+life-blood of the Empire. The civic life and patriotism of old Rome
+became a mere tradition, to inspire long after the men of the
+Renaissance and of the French Revolution.
+
+Finally, asceticism exerted a powerful influence on religion itself.
+That it served to strengthen and perpetuate the life of religion there
+can be little doubt. However strongly some people may have resented the
+monastic ideal, it nevertheless gave increased strength and vitality to
+the religious idea. To begin with, it offered for centuries a very
+powerful obstacle to the development of those progressive and scientific
+ideas that have made such advances in all centres of civilisation during
+the past two or three centuries. To the common mind it brought home the
+supremacy of religion in a way that nothing else could. The mere sight
+of monarch and noble yielding homage to the monk, acknowledging his
+supremacy in what was declared to be the chief interest in life, the
+interference of the monk in every department of life, saturated society
+with supernaturalism. And although at a later period the rapacity,
+dissoluteness, and tyranny of the monkish orders led to revolt, by that
+time the imagination of all had been thoroughly impressed with the value
+of religion. Even to-day current theology is permeated with the monkish
+notions of self-denial, self-sacrifice, and contempt of the world's
+comfort and beauty as belonging to the essence of pure religion. The
+lives of the saints still remain the storehouse of ideals for the
+religious preacher. In spite of their absurd practices and disgusting
+penances, later generations have not failed to hold them up as examples.
+They have been used to impress the imagination of their successors, as
+they were used to impress the minds of their contemporaries. The fact of
+Thomas a Beckett wearing a hair shirt running with vermin has not
+prevented his being held up as an example of the power of religion.
+People fear ghosts long after they cease to believe in them; they pay
+unreasoning homage to a crown long after intellectual development has
+robbed the kingly office of its primitive significance; all the recent
+developments of democracy have not abolished the Englishman's
+constitutional crick in the neck at the sight of a nobleman. Nor is
+supernaturalism expunged from a society because the conditions that gave
+it birth have passed away. A religious epidemic is not analogous to
+those physical disorders which deposit an antitoxin and so protect
+against future attacks. It resembles rather those disorders that
+permanently weaken, and so invite repeated assaults. The ascetic
+epidemic passed away; but, before doing so, it thoroughly saturated with
+supernaturalism the social atmosphere and impressed its power upon the
+public mind. It gave supernaturalism a new and longer lease of life, and
+paved the way for other outbreaks, of a less general, but still of a
+thoroughly epidemic character.
+
+
+FOOTNOTES:
+
+[164] See _The Psychology of Peoples_ and _The Crowd_.
+
+[165] _Origin and Development of Religious Belief_, i. pp. 343-8.
+
+[166] _History of European Morals_, ii. pp. 107-10. For a careful
+description of the monastic discipline in its more normal aspects, see
+Bingham's Works, vol. ii. bk. vi. Gibbon gives his usual brilliant
+summary of the movement in chapter xxxvii. of the _Decline and Fall_. A
+host of facts similar to those cited by Lecky will be found in _The Book
+of Paradise_, 2 vols., trans. by Wallis Budge. Lea's _History of
+Sacerdotal Celibacy_ gives the classical and authoritative account of
+the moral consequences of the practice of celibacy. For a vivid picture
+of the psychology of the ascetic, see Flaubert's great romance, _St.
+Antony_.
+
+[167] Cited by Lecky, ii. p. 131.
+
+[168] Dean Milman, _Hist. of Latin Christianity_, ii. pp. 81-2.
+
+[169] Lecky, ii. pp. 134-5.
+
+[170] _Hereditary Genius_, 1869, p. 357.
+
+[171] Lea, p. 109.
+
+[172] Lea, p. 332.
+
+[173] See Lea, pp. 353-4.
+
+[174] For a fine sketch of Roman municipal life, see Dill's _Roman
+Society from Nero to Marcus Aurelius_, chap. ii.
+
+[175] _Hist. of Latin Christianity_, i. pp. 317-8.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER NINE
+
+RELIGIOUS EPIDEMICS--(_CONCLUDED_)
+
+
+It is not easy to overestimate the influence of monasticism on
+subsequent religious history. The lives of its votaries provided
+examples of almost every conceivable kind of self-torture or
+semi-maniacal behaviour. It had made the world thoroughly familiar with
+extravagance of action as the symptom of intense religious conviction.
+And its influence on social development had been such that the
+susceptibility of the public mind to suggestions was as a raw wound in
+the presence of a powerful irritant. Such an institution as the
+Inquisition could only have maintained itself among a people thoroughly
+familiar with supernaturalism, and to whom its preservation was the
+first and most sacred of duties.
+
+A society habituated to the commanding presence of the monk, fed upon
+stories of their miraculous encounters with celestial and diabolic
+visitants, and so accustomed to regard the priesthood as in a very
+peculiar sense the mouthpiece of divinity, was well prepared for such a
+series of events as the crusades for the recovery of the Holy Land.
+Pilgrimages to the burial-places of saints, and to spots connected, by
+legend or otherwise, with Christian history, had long been in vogue, and
+formed a source of both revenue to the Church and of inspiration to the
+faithful. As early as 833 a guide-book had been prepared called the
+_Itinerary from Bordeaux to Jerusalem_, and along the route marked
+convents and shelters for the pilgrims were established. A lucrative
+traffic in relics of every description had also been established, and
+any interference with this touched the Church in its tenderest point.
+Added to which the expected end of the world in the year 1000 had the
+effect of still further increasing the crowd of pilgrims to the Holy
+Land, where it was firmly believed the second advent would take place.
+
+In the eleventh century a tax was imposed on all Christians visiting
+Jerusalem. There were also reports of Christian pilgrims being
+ill-treated. Recent events in Europe have shown with what ease Christian
+feeling may be roused against a Mohammedan power, and it was
+considerably easier to do this in the eleventh century. Between them,
+Pope Urban II. and Peter the Hermit--the former acting mainly from
+political motives; the latter from a spirit of sheer fanaticism--
+succeeded in rousing Europe to a maniacal desire for the recovery
+of the Holy Land. And for nearly two hundred years the world saw
+a series of crusades on as absurd an errand as ever engaged the
+energies of mankind. Every class of society participated, and it is
+calculated that no less than two millions of lives were sacrificed.
+
+Ordinary histories lean to representing the crusades as a series of
+armed expeditions, led by princes, nobles, and kings. But this gives a
+quite inaccurate conception of the movement, during its early stages, at
+all events. In reality it was a true psychological epidemic. No custom,
+however ancient, no duty, no law, was allowed to stand before the
+crusading mania. In every village the clergy fed the mania, promising
+eternal rewards to all who took up the burden of the cross. Old and
+young, the strong and the sick, the rich and the poor were enrolled.
+Urban had told them that "under their General, Jesus Christ," they would
+march to certain victory. Absolution for all sins was promised to all
+who joined; and, as Gibbon says, "at the voice of their pastor, the
+robber, the incendiary, the homicide, arose by thousands to redeem their
+souls by repeating on the infidels the same deeds which they had
+exercised against their Christian brethren." Until experience had taught
+them better, little precautions were taken to provide food or arms. Huge
+concourses of people,[176] some led by a goose and a goat, into which it
+was believed the Holy Ghost had entered, set out for the Holy Land, so
+ignorant that at every large town or city they enquired, "Is this Zion?"
+Although a religious expedition, small regard was paid to decency or
+humanity. Defenceless cities _en route_ were sacked. Women were
+outraged, men and children killed. The Jews were murdered wholesale.
+Almost universally the slaughter of Jews at home were preparatory to
+crusading abroad. Germany, Hungary, and Bulgaria, although providing
+contingents for the crusading army, suffered heavily by the passage of
+these undisciplined, lawless crowds. As one writer says:--
+
+"If they had devoted themselves to the service of God, they convinced
+the inhabitants on their line of march that they had ceased to regard
+the laws of man. They considered themselves privileged to gratify every
+wish and every lust as it arose. They recognised no rights of property,
+they felt no gratitude for hospitality, and they possessed no sense of
+honour. They violated the wives and daughters of their hosts when they
+were kindly treated, they devastated the lands of friends whom they had
+converted into enemies, they resorted to wanton robbery and destruction
+in revenge for calamities which they had brought upon themselves. They
+believed that they proved their superiority to the Mohammedans by
+torturing the defenceless Jews; and this was the only exploit in which
+the first divisions of the crusaders could boast of success.... To the
+leaders, who could not write their own names, deception and treachery
+were as familiar as force; to their followers rapine and murder were so
+congenial that, in the absence of Saracens, Jews, or townsfolk, it
+seemed but a professional pastime to kill or to rob a companion in
+arms."[177]
+
+And of the behaviour of the crusaders on the first capture of Jerusalem,
+1099, Dean Milman writes:--
+
+"No barbarian, no infidel, no Saracen, ever perpetrated such wanton and
+cold-blooded atrocities of cruelty as the wearers of the Cross of Christ
+(who, it is said, had fallen on their knees and burst into a pious hymn
+at the first view of the Holy City) on the capture of that city. Murder
+was mercy, rape tenderness, simple plunder the mere assertion of the
+conqueror's right. Children were seized by their legs, some of them
+plucked from their mother's breasts, and dashed against the walls, or
+whirled from the battlements. Others were obliged to leap from the
+walls; some tortured, roasted by slow fires. They ripped up prisoners to
+see if they had swallowed gold. Of 70,000 Saracens there were not left
+enough to bury the dead; poor Christians were hired to perform the
+office. Everyone surprised in the Temple was slaughtered, till the reek
+from the dead drove away the slayers. The Jews were burned alive in
+their synagogue."[178]
+
+The most remarkable of all the crusades, and the one that best shows
+the character of the epidemic, was the children's crusade of 1212. It
+was said that the sins of the crusaders had caused their failure, and
+priests went about France and Germany calling upon the children to do
+what the sins of their fathers had prevented them accomplishing. The
+children were told that the sea would dry up to give them passage, and
+the infidels be stricken by the Lord on their approach. A peasant lad,
+Stephen of Cloyes, received the usual vision, and was ordered to lead
+the crusade. Commencing with the children around Paris, he collected
+some 30,000 followers, and without money or food commenced the march. At
+the same time an army of children, 40,000 strong, was gathered together
+at Cologne. The result of the crusade may be told in a few words. About
+6000 of the French contingent, having reached Marseilles, were offered a
+passage by some shipowners. Several of the ships foundered, others
+reached shore, and the boys were sold into slavery. The girls were
+reserved for a more sinister fate. Thousands of the children died in
+attempting a march over the Alps. A mere remnant succeeded in reaching
+home, ruined in both mind and body. Well might Fuller say: "This crusade
+was done by the instinct of the devil, who, as it were, desired a
+cordial of children's blood, to comfort his weak stomach, long cloyed
+with murdering of men."[179]
+
+On both the social and the religious side the consequences were
+important. For the first time large bodies of men, taught to regard all
+those who were outside Christendom as beneath consideration, came into
+contact with a people possessing an art, an industry, a culture far
+superior to their own. As Draper says: "Even down to the meanest camp
+follower, everyone must have recognised the difference between what they
+had anticipated and what they had found. They had seen undaunted
+courage, chivalrous bearing, intellectual culture far higher than their
+own. They had been in lands filled with prodigies of human skill. They
+did not melt down into the populations to whom they returned without
+imparting to them a profound impression destined to make itself felt in
+the course of time."[180] Hitherto Mohammedan culture had only
+influenced Christendom through the medium of the Spanish schools and
+universities. Now the influence became more general. A taste for greater
+comfort developed. Commerce grew; literature improved. We approach the
+period of the Renaissance, and to that new birth the crusades, despite
+their intolerance and brutality, offered a contribution of no small
+value.
+
+On the other hand, and for a time, the power of the Church grew greater.
+The impetus given to superstitious hopes and fears made on all hands for
+the wealth of the Church. Much was made over to the Church as a free
+gift. Much was pawned to it. Much also was entrusted by those who went
+to the Holy Land, never to return, in which case the Church became the
+designated or undesignated heir. "In every way the all-absorbing Church
+was still gathering in wealth, encircling new land within her hallowed
+pale, the one steady merchant who in this vast traffic and sale of
+personal and of landed property never made a losing venture, but went on
+accumulating and still accumulating, and for the most part withdrawing
+the largest portion of the land in every kingdom into a separate
+estate, which claimed exemption from all burthens of the realm, until
+the realm was compelled into measures, violent often and iniquitous in
+their mode, but still inevitable."[181]
+
+Next, the crusades set their seal upon the justice of religious wars,
+and established an enduring alliance between militarism and religion.
+The military profession became surrounded with all the ceremonies and
+paraphernalia of religion, without being in the least humanised by the
+alliance. The knight received his arms blessed by the Church, he was
+sworn to defend the Church, and he was as ready to turn his weapons
+against heretics in Europe as against infidels in Syria. Military
+persecutions of heretics assumed the form of a mania. There were
+crusades against the Moors in Spain, against the Albigenses, and against
+other heretics. As Bryce remarks: "The religious feeling which the
+crusades evoked--a feeling which became the origin of the great orders
+of chivalry, and somewhat later of the two great orders of mendicant
+friars--turned wholly against the opponents of ecclesiastical claims,
+and was made to work the will of the Holy See, which had blessed and
+organised the project."[182] The expedition against King John by Philip
+of France was undertaken at the behest of the Pope, and was called a
+crusade. The attempt of Spain to crush the Netherlands was called a
+crusade. So was the Armada that was fitted out against England.
+
+More than all, a stamp of permanency was given to popular superstition.
+For two centuries people had seen expedition after expedition fitted out
+to accomplish an avowedly religious purpose. They had been taught that
+to die in defence of religion, or in the attempt to achieve a religious
+object, was the noblest of deaths. They had seen the greatest in Europe
+setting forth at the command of the Church. Signs and wonders had
+abounded to prove the heaven-blessed character of the crusades. They had
+seen the Church growing steadily in power, and every possible means had
+been utilised to increase the flame of religious fanaticism. Expeditions
+might fail, but failure did not cure fanaticism. It fed it; the
+crusaders returned, chastened in some respects, but still sufficiently
+full of religious zeal to be ready to battle against the unbeliever and
+the heretic at the behest of the Church. And it was not the policy of
+the Church to allow this fanaticism to remain unemployed. Even though it
+might ultimately lose, the Church and superstition profited enormously
+by the crusading spirit. It strengthened the general sense of the
+supernatural, even while creating tendencies that were destined to limit
+its sway. Above all, it prepared the way for other religious epidemics.
+These were more circumscribed in area, and less lengthy in their
+duration; but their existence was made possible and easy by the
+centuries during which, first monasticism, and later the crusading
+mania, had dominated the public mind.
+
+The crusades had hardly been brought to a close before continental
+Europe witnessed an outbreak, in epidemic form, of a practice that had
+been long associated with monastic discipline. The use of the whip as a
+form of religious discipline had always played a part in conventual and
+monastic life. On the one hand, it formed part of that insensate desire
+to torture the body which went to make up the ascetic ideal; on the
+other hand, the fondness for whipping bare flesh and for being whipped
+has a distinctly pathologic character. The subject is rather too
+unsavoury to dwell upon, but it has long been established that there is
+a close connection between the whipping of certain parts of the body and
+the production of intense sexual pleasure.[183] And it is also clear
+that the life led by monks and nuns was such as to encourage sexual
+aberrations of various forms. Moreover, when once the practice of
+whipping became a public spectacle, and assumed an epidemic form,
+imitation, combined with intense religious faith, would operate very
+powerfully.
+
+In the fourteenth century Europe was visited by the Black Plague. In
+countries utterly devoid of sanitation, where baths were practically
+unknown and personal habits of the filthiest, the plague found a
+fruitful soil. Nearly a quarter of the population died, and corpses were
+so numerous that huge pits were dug and hundreds buried together. It was
+amid the general terror and demoralisation caused by this visitation
+that the sect of the Flagellants arose. Calling themselves the
+Brotherhood of the Flagellants, or the Brethren of the Cross, wearing
+dark garments with red crosses front and back, they traversed the cities
+of the Continent carrying whips to which small pieces of iron were
+fixed. England appears to have been the only country in which they
+failed to establish themselves. Elsewhere their numbers grew with
+formidable rapidity. At Spires two hundred boys, under twelve years of
+age, influenced probably by the example of the children's crusade,
+formed themselves into a brotherhood and marched through some of the
+German cities. In Italy over 20,000 people marched from Florence in one
+of these processions; from Modena, over 25,000. Some of them professed
+to work miracles. Everywhere, while the mania lasted, they were warmly
+welcomed, the inhabitants of towns and cities ringing the bells and
+flocking in crowds to hear the preaching and witness the whippings.
+
+The proceedings of the Flagellants in all countries were very similar.
+They marched from town to town, men and women and children stripped to
+the waist--sometimes entirely naked--praying incessantly and whipping
+each other. "Not only during the day, but even by night, and in the
+severest winter, they traversed the cities with torches and banners, in
+thousands and tens of thousands, headed by their priests, and prostrated
+themselves before the altars." At other times they proceeded to the
+market-place, arranged themselves on the ground in circles, assuming
+attitudes in accordance with their real or supposed crimes. After each
+had been whipped, "one of them, in conclusion, stood up to read a
+letter, which it was pretended an angel had brought from heaven to St.
+Peter's Church, at Jerusalem, stating that Christ, who was sore
+displeased at the sins of man, had granted, at the intercession of the
+Holy Virgin and of the angels, that all who should wander about for
+thirty-four days and scourge themselves should be partakers of the
+Divine grace." In the end the movement became so obnoxious to the
+Church, and so troublesome to the civil authorities, that both combined
+to secure its suppression.
+
+Equally significant in the history of religion is the dancing mania,
+which broke out as the mania for flagellation was subsiding. The
+function of dancing in primitive religious ceremonial has been pointed
+out in a previous chapter. It is there a common and obvious method of
+both creating and expressing a high state of nervous excitability. In
+later times religious dancing becomes more purely hypnotic in character,
+and suggestion plays a powerful part. During the medieval period the
+conditions were peculiarly favourable to the prevalence of psychological
+epidemics. Plagues, more or less severe, were of frequent occurrence.
+Between 1119 and 1340, Italy alone had no less than sixteen such
+visitations. Smallpox and leprosy were also common. The public mind was
+morbidly sensitive to signs and portents and saturated to an almost
+incredible degree with superstition. The public processions of the
+Church, its penances, and practices were all calculated to fire the
+imagination, and produce a mixed and dangerous condition of fear and
+expectancy. Moreover, dancing mania, on a small scale, had made its
+appearance on several previous occasions, and the public mind was thus
+in a way prepared for a more serious outbreak.
+
+The great dancing mania of 1374 occurred immediately after the revels
+connected with the semi-Pagan festival of St. John. Bacchanalian dances
+formed one of the accompaniments of the festival of St. John, and made,
+so to speak, a natural starting-point for the epidemic. Hecker, who
+gives a very elaborate account of the dancing mania as it appeared in
+various countries, thus describes the behaviour of those afflicted:--
+
+"They formed circles, hand in hand, and, appearing to have lost control
+over their senses, continued dancing, regardless of all bystanders, for
+hours together, in wild delirium, until at length they fell to the
+ground in a state of exhaustion.... While dancing, they neither saw nor
+heard, being insensible to external impressions, but were haunted by
+visions, their fancies conjuring up spirits whose names they shrieked
+out; and some of them afterwards asserted that they felt as if they had
+been immersed in a stream of blood, which obliged them to leap so high.
+Others, during the paroxysm, saw the heavens open and the Saviour
+enthroned with the Virgin Mary."[184]
+
+At Aix-la-Chapelle, Cologne, and Metz, says the same writer:--
+
+"Peasants left their ploughs, mechanics their workshops, housewives
+their domestic duties, to join the wild revels. Secret desires were
+excited, and but too often found opportunities for wild enjoyment; and
+numerous beggars, stimulated by vice and misery, availed themselves of
+this new complaint to gain a temporary livelihood. Girls and boys
+quitted their parents, and servants their masters, to amuse themselves
+at the dances of those possessed, and greedily imbibed the poison of
+mental infection. Above a hundred unmarried women were seen raving about
+in consecrated and unconsecrated places, and the consequences were soon
+perceived."[185]
+
+Once attacked, the hypnotic character of the complaint was shown by its
+annual recurrence. Again to quote Hecker:--
+
+"Most of those affected were only annually visited by attacks; and the
+occasion of them was so manifestly referable to the prevailing notions
+of that period that, if the unqualified belief in the agency of saints
+could have been abolished, they would not have had any return of the
+complaint. Throughout the whole of June, prior to the festival of St.
+John, patients felt a disquietude and restlessness which they were
+unable to overcome. They were dejected, timid, and anxious; wandered
+about in an unsettled state, being tormented with twitching pains, which
+seized them suddenly in different parts, and eagerly expected the eve of
+St. John's Day, in the confident hope that by dancing at the altars of
+this saint they would be freed from all their sufferings. This hope was
+not disappointed; and they remained, for the rest of the year, exempt
+from any further attack."[186]
+
+In addition to John the Baptist, the dancing disease was also connected
+with another saint--St. Vitus. He is said to have been martyred about
+303, and a body, reputed to be his, was transported to France in the
+ninth century. It is said that just before he was killed he prayed that
+all who would commemorate the day of his death should be protected from
+the dancing mania. Whereupon a voice from heaven was heard to say,
+"Vitus, thy prayer is accepted." The fact that the prayer was offered a
+thousand years before the dancing mania appeared is a circumstance that
+to the eye of faith merely heightened its value.
+
+Within recent times epidemics of dancing have been more local, less
+persistent, and of necessity not so public in their display, but nearly
+always their appearance has been in connection with displays of
+religious fervour. In most cases the dancing has tended more to a
+species of 'jumping,' and--although this may be due to more careful
+observation--has been accompanied by actions of a clearly epileptoid
+nature. One of the most famous of these outbreaks was that of the French
+Convulsionnaires, which lasted from 1727 to the Revolution. In 1727, a
+popular, but half-crazy priest, Francois de Paris, died. During his life
+Paris had fasted and scourged himself, lived in a hut that was seldom or
+never cleansed, showed the same lack of cleanliness in his person, and
+often went about half naked. Very shortly after his death, it was said
+that miracles began to take place at his grave in the cemetery of St.
+Medard. People gathered round the tomb day after day, and one young girl
+was seized with convulsions. (She is called a girl in the narrative, but
+she was a mature virgin of forty-two years of age.) Afterwards other
+miracles followed in rapid succession. Some fell in fits, others
+swallowed pieces of coal or flint, some were cured of diseases. From the
+description of the behaviour of some of these devotees there seems to
+have been a considerable amount of sexual feeling mixed up with the
+display. Sometimes, we are told, those seized "bounded from the ground
+like fish out of water; this was so frequently imitated at a later
+period that the women and girls, when they expected such violent
+contortions, not wishing to appear indecent, put on gowns made like
+sacks, closed at the feet. If they received any bruises by falling down,
+they were healed with earth taken from the grave of the uncanonised
+saint. They usually, however, showed great agility in this respect; and
+it is scarcely necessary to remark that the female sex especially was
+distinguished by all kinds of leaping, and almost inconceivable
+contortions of body. Some spun round on their feet with incredible
+rapidity, as is related of the dervishes. Others ran with their heads
+against walls, or curved their bodies like rope dancers, so that their
+heels touched their shoulders."
+
+Women figured very prominently among the Convulsionnaires, particularly
+when the epidemic passed from convulsive dancing to prophecy, and thence
+to various forms of self-torture. Women stretched themselves on the
+floor, while other women, and even men, jumped upon their bodies. Others
+were beaten with clubs and bars of iron. Some actually underwent
+crucifixion on repeated occasions. They were stretched on wooden
+crosses, and nails three inches long driven through hands and feet. Some
+of the occurrences remind one of what is now seen to take place under
+hypnotic influence. People labouring under strong excitement, it is
+known, become insensible to pain.
+
+Outbreaks of jumping and dancing followed the introduction of Methodist
+preachers into country districts in the eighteenth century. In Wales, a
+sect of 'Jumpers' originated from this cause, and many of the American
+'Jumpers' and 'Dancers' seem to have had their origin from this Welsh
+outbreak. In all such cases the spread of the mania was helped, if not
+made possible, by the preachers. They themselves looked upon these
+exhibitions as manifestations of the power of God, and so encouraged
+their hearers in their behaviour. Not every minister has the common
+sense of the Shetland preacher cited by Hecker. An epileptic woman had a
+fit in church, which a number of others hailed as a manifestation of
+the power of God. Sunday after Sunday the same thing occurred with other
+women, the number of the sufferers steadily increasing. The thing
+threatened to assume such proportions, and to become so great a
+nuisance, he announced that attendants would be at hand who would dip
+women in the lake who happened to be seized. This threat proved a most
+powerful form of exorcism. Not one woman was affected. Similar conduct
+might have been quite as efficacious in preventing many religious
+manifestations that have assumed epidemic proportions.
+
+Unfortunately, the influence of preachers and religious teachers was
+most usually cast in the other direction. Very often, of course, they
+were no better informed than their congregations; at other times they
+undoubtedly encouraged the delusion for interested reasons. The most
+striking recent illustration of this latter behaviour was seen in the
+Welsh revival led by Evan Roberts. Of this man's mental condition there
+could be little doubt. Just as little doubt could there be that the
+behaviour of the congregations was wholly due to the power of
+suggestions upon weak and excitable natures. Yet scarcely a preacher in
+Britain said a word in disapproval. Hundreds of them used the outbreak
+to illustrate the power of religion. Many prominent preachers travelled
+down to Wales and returned telling of the great manifestations of
+'spiritual power' they had witnessed. How little removed such behaviour
+is from that of the savage watching with awe the actions of one
+suffering from epilepsy or insanity, readers of the foregoing pages will
+be in a position to judge.
+
+From the middle of the third century onward, Europe had been subject to
+wave after wave of religious fanaticism. All along, religious belief had
+been verified and strengthened by the occurrence of phenomena that now
+admittedly fall within the purview of the pathologist. And from one
+point of view the secularisation of life served but to emphasise the
+dependence of religion upon the occurrence of these abnormal conditions.
+For the more surely the phenomena of nature and of social life were
+brought within the scope of a scientific generalisation, the more people
+began to look for the life of religion in conditions that were removed
+from the normal. But, above all, this long succession of waves of
+fanaticism served to permeate the general mind with supernaturalism.
+Each one cleared the way for a successor. And in the next chapter we
+have to deal with one that, in some respects, is the most remarkable of
+all, viz., that of the belief in witchcraft.
+
+
+FOOTNOTES:
+
+[176] It is estimated that 275,000 people formed the van of the first
+crusade.
+
+[177] L. O. Pike, _History of Crime in England_, i. pp. 164-9.
+
+[178] _History of Latin Christianity_, iv. p. 188.
+
+[179] _History of the Holy War_, bk. iii.
+
+[180] _Intellectual Development of Europe_, 1872, p. 425.
+
+[181] Milman, iv. p. 199.
+
+[182] _Holy Roman Empire_, p. 164.
+
+[183] See Bloch, _Sexual Life of our Time_, pp. 568-74.
+
+[184] _Epidemics of the Middle Ages_, pp. 87-8.
+
+[185] Hecker, p. 91.
+
+[186] _Epidemics_, p. 105.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER TEN
+
+THE WITCH MANIA
+
+
+In all stages of religious history the witch and the wizard are familiar
+figures. It is of no importance to our present enquiry whether magic
+precedes religion or not. It is at all events certain that they are very
+closely connected, and that conditions which foster the belief in magic
+likewise serve to strengthen religious belief. Witchcraft, as Tylor
+says, is part and parcel of savage life. Death is very frequently
+attributed to the magical action of wizards, and the savage lives in
+perpetual fear lest some of his belongings, or some part of his person,
+should be bewitched by malevolent sorcerers. Sir Richard Burton says
+that in East Africa his experience taught him that among the negroes,
+what with slavery and what with black magic, no one, especially in old
+age, is safe from being burnt at a day's notice. When from savage life
+we mount to societies enjoying a higher culture, we still find the witch
+and the wizard in evidence. Both in Greece and Rome the belief in
+witchcraft existed. There were made direct laws against its practice,
+although neither the Greeks nor the Romans stained their civilisation
+with the judicial murder of thousands of victims such as occurred later
+in Christian Europe.
+
+But the belief in witchcraft is continuous. So also are the methods
+practised, and the modes of detection. The proofs offered in support of
+sorcery in the seventeenth century are precisely similar to those
+credited by savages in the lowest stage of human culture. The power of
+transformation possessed by the accused, the ability to bewitch through
+the possession of hairs belonging to the afflicted person, the making of
+little effigies and driving sharp instruments into them, and so
+affecting the corresponding parts of people, transportation through the
+air, etc., all belong to the belief in and practice of witchcraft
+wherever found. Had a Fijian been transported to a seat on the judicial
+bench by the side of Sir Matthew Hale, when that judge condemned two old
+women to death for witchcraft, he would have found himself in a quite
+congenial atmosphere. Allowing for difference in language, he would have
+found the evidence similar to that with which he was familiar, and he
+would have been able to endorse the judge's remarks with tales of his
+own experience. On this point, the level of culture attained by savages,
+and that of the inhabitants of the overwhelming majority of European
+countries little more than two hundred years ago, were substantially the
+same. Even to-day cases are continually occurring which prove that
+advances in knowledge and civilisation have not left this ancient
+superstition without supporters.
+
+In subscribing to the belief in witchcraft, the Christian Church thus
+fell into line with earlier forms of religious belief. The peculiar
+feature it represents is that it came into existence when the belief in
+witchcraft was losing its hold on the more cultured classes. Had it not
+allied itself with this tendency, no such thing as the witch mania of
+the medieval period could have existed. In sober truth, it brought about
+a veritable renaissance of the cruder theories of demonism, while its
+intolerance of opposition succeeded in stifling the voice of criticism
+for centuries. The primitive theory which holds that man is surrounded
+by hosts of spiritual agencies, mostly of a malevolent nature, was
+revived and fully endorsed by all Christian teachers. In the commonest,
+as well as in the rarest events of life, this supernatural activity was
+manifest. In both the Old and New Testament the belief in demoniacal
+agency was endorsed. Moreover, the fact that Christianity was not a
+creed seeking to live as one of many others, but a religion struggling
+for complete mastery, gave further impetus to the belief. An easy
+explanation for the miracles and marvels that occurred in connection
+with non-Christian beliefs was that they were the work of demons. The
+Christian felt himself to be fighting not so much human antagonists as
+so many embodiments of satanic power. And after the establishment of
+Christianity it is probable that much that went on under cover of witch
+assemblies, a more detailed knowledge than we possess would prove to be
+really the clandestine exercise of prescribed forms of faith. The old
+saying, "The sin of witchcraft is as the sin of rebellion," has more in
+it than meets the eye. There is little real difference between the magic
+that appears as piety and the magic that is denounced as sorcery, except
+that one is permitted and the other is not. And it is almost a law of
+religious development that the gods of one religion become the demons of
+its successor.
+
+But while witchcraft has existed in all ages, it existed in a much
+milder form than that which we find in the sixteenth and seventeenth
+centuries. First of all, there is the fact to which attention has
+already been directed, namely, the concentration of the public mind upon
+various forms of supernaturalism. Every aspect of life was more or less
+under the direct influence of the Church, and no teaching was tolerated
+that conflicted with her doctrines. And it was to the interest of the
+Church perpetually to emphasise the reality of either angelic or
+diabolic activity. Even in the case of those who showed a tendency to
+revolt against Church rule there was no exception to this. If anything,
+the belief was more pronounced. Next, the fifteenth and sixteenth
+centuries saw a rising tide of heresy against which the Church was
+compelled to battle; and to ascribe this alleged perversion of Christian
+doctrines to the malevolence of Satan offered the line of least
+resistance--just as the heretics attributed the power of the Church
+itself to the same source. Whatever diminution ensued in the general
+flood of superstition, as a consequence of the quarrel between
+Protestant and Catholic, was, so far as the disputants were concerned,
+incidental and even undesired. On the one point of demonism there
+existed complete unanimity, and the sceptic fared equally hard with both
+parties. In such an environment the wildest tales of sorcery became
+credible; and nothing illustrates this more forcibly than the fact that
+many of those tortured and condemned for sorcery actually believed
+themselves capable of performing the marvels laid to their charge. Added
+to these factors, we have to note that social conditions were also
+extremely favourable. Moral ties were as loose as they could reasonably
+be; and the attitude of the Church towards the sexual relation had
+forced both the religious and the non-religious mind into wholly
+unhealthy channels. This last aspect of the subject has been little
+dealt with, but it is unquestionably a very real one. A German writer
+says:--
+
+"Whilst in the fifteenth and the beginning of the sixteenth centuries,
+as those well acquainted with the state of morals during this period can
+all confirm, a most unbounded freedom was dominant in sexual relations,
+the State and the Church were desirous of compelling the people to keep
+better order by the use of actual force, and by religious compulsion. So
+forced a transformation in so vital a matter necessarily resulted in a
+reaction of the worst kind, and forced into secret channels the impulse
+which it had attempted to suppress. This reaction occurred, moreover,
+with an elemental force. There resulted widespread sexual violence and
+seduction, hesitating at nothing, often insanely daring, in which
+everywhere the devil was supposed to help; everyone's head was turned in
+this way; the uncontrolled lust of debauchees found vent in secret
+bacchanalian associations and orgies, wherein many, with or without
+masquerade, played the part of Satan; shameful deeds were perpetrated by
+excited women and by procuresses and prostitutes ready for any kind of
+immoral abomination; add to these sexual orgies the most widely diffused
+web of a completely developed theory of witchcraft, and the systematic
+strengthening of the widely prevalent belief in the devil--all these
+things, woven in a labyrinthine connection, made it possible for
+thousands upon thousands to be murdered by a disordered justice and to
+be sacrificed to delusion."[187]
+
+To those who look closely into the subject of medieval witchcraft the
+presence of a strong sexual element is undeniable. When we examine
+contemporary accounts of the 'Sabbath,' some of which are so gross as to
+be unprintable, we find a portion of the proceedings to be of a marked
+erotic character. The figure of Satan often enough reminds one of the
+pagan Priapus, and the ceremonies bear a strong resemblance to the
+ancient ones, with the mixture of Christian language and symbolism
+inevitable under such circumstances. Promiscuous intercourse between the
+sexes was said to occur at the witches' gatherings; and, indeed, unless
+some sort of sexual extravagance occurred, it is hard to account for
+both the persistency of the gatherings and of the reports concerning
+them. The most probable theory is, as I have just said, that these
+gatherings were covers for a continuance of the older sex worship. Many
+customs connected therewith lingered on in the Church itself, and it is
+not a wild assumption that they existed in a less adulterated and more
+extravagant form outside.
+
+Universal as the belief in witchcraft has been, it was not until the
+close of the fifteenth century that it assumed what may be justly called
+an epidemic form. The famous Bull of Pope Innocent VIII. was not
+unconnected in its origin with the growth of heresy. This precious
+document, issued in 1484, declares:--
+
+"It has come to our ears that very many persons of both sexes, deviating
+from the Catholic Faith, abuse themselves with demons, Incubus and
+Succubus; and by incantations, charms, and conjurations, and other
+wicked superstitions, by criminal acts and offences, have caused the
+offspring of women and of the lower animals, the fruits of the earth,
+the grape, and the products of various plants, men, women, and other
+animals of different kinds, vineyards, meadows, pasture land, corn and
+other vegetables of the earth, to perish, be oppressed, and utterly
+destroyed; that they torture men and women with cruel pains and
+torments, internal as well as external; that they hinder the proper
+intercourse of the sexes, and the propagation of the human species.
+Moreover, they are in the habit of denying the very faith itself. We,
+therefore, willing to provide by opportune remedies, according as it
+falls to our office, by our apostolical authority, by the tenor of these
+presents, do appoint and decree that they be convicted, imprisoned,
+punished, and mulcted according to their offences."
+
+It was this Pope who commissioned the inquisitor, Sprenger, to root out
+witches. Sprenger, with two others, acting on the authority of the
+Popes, drew up the famous work, _The Witch Hammer_, which provided the
+basis for all subsequent works on the detection and punishment of
+witches.[188] The folly and iniquity of the book is almost unbelievable,
+although it is quite matched by subsequent productions. It even provides
+for the silence of people under torture. If they confess when tortured,
+the case is complete. But if they do not confess, this diabolic
+production lays it down that this is because witches who have given
+themselves up to the devil are insensible to pain. Even the evidence of
+children was admitted. And although in ordinary trials the evidence of
+criminals was barred, it was to be freely allowed in trials for sorcery.
+Everything that ingenuity could suggest or brutality execute was
+provided for.
+
+From the issue of _The Witch Hammer_ until the middle of the seventeenth
+century, a period of about one hundred and fifty years, an epidemic of
+witchcraft raged. People of all ages and of all classes of society
+became implicated, and for some time, at least, accusation meant
+conviction. An almost unbelievably large number were executed. Says
+Lecky:--
+
+"In almost every province of Germany, but especially in those where
+clerical influence predominated, the persecution raged with a fearful
+intensity. Seven thousand witches are said to have been burned at
+Treves, six hundred by a single bishop in Bamberg, and nine hundred in a
+single year in the bishopric of Wuerzburg.... At Toulouse, the seat of
+the Inquisition, four hundred persons perished for sorcery at a single
+execution, and fifty at Douay in a single year. Remy, a judge of Nancy,
+boasted that he put to death eight hundred witches in sixteen years....
+In Italy, a thousand persons were executed in a single year in the
+province of Como; and in other parts of the country the severity of the
+inquisitors at last created an absolute rebellion.... In Geneva, which
+was then ruled by a bishop, five hundred alleged witches were executed
+in three months; forty-eight were burned at Constance or Ravensburg, and
+eighty in the little town of Valery in Saxony. In 1670, seventy persons
+were condemned in Sweden, and a large proportion of them burnt."[189]
+
+In England, from 1603 to 1680, it is estimated that seventy thousand
+persons were put to death for sorcery.[190] Grey, the editor of
+_Hudibras_, says that he had himself seen a list of three thousand who
+were put to death during the Long Parliament. The celebrated
+witch-finder, Mathew Hopkins, hung sixty in one year in the county of
+Suffolk. In Scotland, for thirty-nine years, the number killed annually
+averaged about two hundred. This, of course, does not take into account
+the number who were hounded to death by persecution of a popular kind,
+or whose lives were made so wearisome that death must have come as a
+release. But the most remarkable, and the most horrible, of witchcraft
+executions occurred in Wuerzburg in February 1629. No less than one
+hundred and sixty-two witches were burned in a succession of
+_autos-da-fe_. Among these, the reports disclose that there were
+actually thirty-four children. The following details give the actual
+ages of some of them:--
+
+  +----------+---------+---------------------------------+
+  | Burning. | Number. |      Children.                  |
+  +----------+---------+---------------------------------+
+  |   7th    |   7     |  1 Girl, aged 12.               |
+  |  13th    |   4     |  1 Girl of 10 and another.      |
+  |  15th    |   2     |  1 Boy of 12.                   |
+  |  18th    |   6     |  2 Boys of 10, girl of 14.      |
+  |  19th    |   6     |  2 Boys, 10 and 12.             |
+  |  20th    |   6     |  2 Boys.                        |
+  |  23rd    |   9     |  3 Boys, 9, 10, and 14.         |
+  |  24th    |   7     |  2 Boys, brought from hospital. |
+  |  26th    |   8     |  Little boy and girl.           |
+  |  27th    |   7     |  2 Boys, 8 and 9.               |
+  |  28th    |   6     |  Blind girl and infant.[191]    |
+  +----------+---------+---------------------------------+
+
+The vast majority of those executed for sorcery were women. At all times
+witches have been more numerous than wizards, owing to their assumed
+closer connection with the world of supernatural beings. It was said,
+"For one sorcerer, ten thousand sorceresses," and Christian writers were
+ready to explain why. Woman had a greater affinity with the devil from
+the outset. It was through woman that Satan had seduced Adam, and it
+was only to be expected that he would employ the same instrument on
+subsequent occasions. _The Witch Hammer_ has a special chapter devoted
+to the consideration of why women are more given to sorcery than men,
+and quotes freely from the Fathers to prove that this follows from her
+nature. James I. in his _Demonologia_ follows Sprenger in accounting for
+the number of witches. "The reason is easy. For as that sex is frailer
+than man is, so it is easier to be entrapped in the gross snares of the
+devil, as was over-well proved to be true by the serpent's deceiving of
+Eve at the beginning, which makes him the homelier with the sex
+sensine." To be old, or ugly, or unpopular, to have any peculiar
+deformity or mark, was to invite persecution, and, in an overwhelming
+majority of instances, conviction followed accusation.
+
+It is a significant comment upon the popular belief that Protestantism,
+as a form of religious belief, was the product of an enlightened
+rational life, that it was only with the advance of Protestantism that
+the belief in witchcraft assumed an epidemic form. This may be partly
+due to the greater direct dependence upon the Bible, in which satanic
+influence--particularly in the New Testament--plays so large a part. In
+the Roman Church, exorcism remained a regular part of the functions of
+the priest; the Church was filled with accounts of satanic conflicts,
+but diabolic intercourse seems to have been mainly limited to saintly
+characters and priests. Protestantism which, theoretically, made every
+man his own priest, raised the belief in satanic agency to an obsession.
+And wherever Protestantism established itself there was an immediate
+and marked increase in the number of cases of witchcraft. In England, if
+we omit a doubtful law of the tenth century, there existed no regular
+law against witchcraft until 1541. It remained a purely ecclesiastical
+offence. Seventeen years later, the year of Elizabeth's accession,
+Bishop Jewell, preaching before the Queen, drew attention to the
+increase of sorcery. "It may please Your Grace," he said, "to understand
+that witches and sorcerers, within these last few years, are
+marvellously increased within Your Grace's realm. Your Grace's subjects
+pine away even to the death, their colour fadeth, their flesh rotteth,
+their senses are bereft. I pray God they never practise further than
+upon the subject." And he added, "These eyes have seen most evident and
+manifest marks of their wickedness." A measure was passed through
+Parliament the same year, making enchantments and witchcraft felony. The
+first year of James I. saw the passing of the 'Witch Act,' under which
+subsequent executions took place, and which remained in force until
+nearly the middle of the eighteenth century.
+
+With scarce an exception, the leaders of Protestantism encouraged the
+belief in witches and urged their extermination as a religious and civil
+duty. With Luther, in spite of the sturdy common sense he manifested in
+some directions, belief in the activity of Satan amounted to an
+obsession. He saw Satan everywhere in everything. The devil appeared to
+him while writing, disturbed his rest by the rattling of pans, and
+prevented his pursuing his studies by hammering on his skull. When a
+storm arose, Luther declared, "'Tis the devil who has done this; the
+winds are nothing else but good or bad spirits." Suicides, he said, were
+often those strangled by the devil. Moreover, "The devil can so
+completely assume the human form when he wants to deceive us, that we
+may very well lie with what seems to be a woman of real flesh and blood,
+and yet all the while 'tis only the devil in the shape of a woman." The
+devil could also become the father of children. Luther says that he knew
+of one such case, and added, "I would have that child thrown into the
+Moldau at the risk of being held its murderer."[192]
+
+In America, Protestantism manifested the same influence. Of course, the
+settlers took the superstition of witchcraft with them, but it underwent
+no diminution in a new land. Increase Mather and his celebrated son,
+Cotton Mather, were the principal agents in stirring up the belief to
+frenzy point, and a commission was appointed to rout out witches and
+suppress their practices. There was soon a plentiful supply of victims.
+One woman was charged with "giving a look towards the great
+meeting-house of Salem, and immediately a demon entered the house and
+tore down part of it." It seems that a bit of the wooden wainscotting
+had fallen down. In the case of Giles Corey, who refused to plead
+guilty, torture was used. He was pressed to death, and when his tongue
+protruded from his mouth the sheriff thrust it back with his
+walking-stick. Many people were executed, and the ministers of Boston
+and Charlestown drew up an address warmly thanking the commission for
+its zeal, and expressing the hope that it would never be relaxed.
+
+Certainly the commission did what it could to earn the thanks given. A
+shipmaster making for Maryland with emigrants encountered unusually
+rough weather. An old woman, one Mary Lee, was accused of raising the
+storm, and drowned as a witch. A woman walked a long distance over muddy
+roads without soiling her dress. "I scorn to be drabbled," she said, and
+was hanged as a reward. George Burroughs could lift a barrel by
+inserting his finger in the bunghole. He was hanged for a wizard.
+Bridget Bishop was charged with appearing before John Louder at midnight
+and grievously oppressing him. Louder's evidence against the woman also
+included the fact that he saw a black pig approach his door, and when he
+went to kick it the pig vanished. He was also tempted by a black thing
+with the body of a monkey, the feet of a cock, and the face of a man. On
+going out of his back door he saw the said Bridget Bishop going towards
+her house. The evidence was deemed quite conclusive. Another witness
+said that being in bed on the Lord's Day, he saw a woman, Susanna
+Martin, come in at the window and jump down on the floor. She took hold
+of the witness's foot, and drawing his body into a heap, lay upon him
+for nearly two hours, so that he could neither move nor hear. In most of
+these cases torture was applied, and confessions were obtained. These
+confessions often implicated others, but when the witches took to
+accusing those in high places, and even ministers of religion, the need
+for discrimination was realised. Once a critical judgment was aroused,
+the mania began to subside--Cotton Mather fighting manfully for the
+belief to the end.
+
+The impetus given by Protestantism to witch-hunting in Scotland was most
+marked. Scotch witchcraft, says Lecky, was the offspring of Scotch
+Puritanism, and faithfully reflected the character of its parent. The
+clergy nowhere possessed greater power, and nowhere used it more
+assiduously to fan the flame against witchcraft. Buckle says:--
+
+"Of all the means of intimidation employed by the Scotch clergy, none
+was more efficacious than the doctrines they propounded respecting evil
+spirits and future punishments. On these subjects they constantly
+uttered the most appalling threats. The language which they used was
+calculated to madden men with fear, and to drive them to the depths of
+despair.... It was generally believed that the world was overrun by evil
+spirits, who not only went up and down the earth, but also lived in the
+air, and whose business it was to tempt mankind. Their number was
+infinite, and they were to be found in all places, and in all seasons.
+At their head was Satan himself, whose delight it was to appear in
+person, ensnaring or terrifying everyone he met. With this object he
+assumed various forms. One day he would visit the earth as a black dog;
+another day, as a raven; on another, he would be heard in the distance
+roaring like a bull. He appeared sometimes as a white man in black
+clothes, and sometimes he appeared as a black man in black clothes, when
+it was remarked that his voice was ghostly, and that one of his feet was
+cloven. His stratagems were endless. For, in the opinion of divines, his
+cunning increased with his age, and, having been studying for more than
+5000 years, he had now attained to unexampled dexterity."[193]
+
+Witchcraft was declared by the Scotch Parliament in 1563 to be
+punishable by death. And, naturally, the more zealous and active the
+search for witches, the more numerous they became. In the search the
+clergy and the kirk-sessions led the way. In 1587 the General Assembly,
+having before them a case of witchcraft in which the evidence was
+insufficient, deputed James Melville to travel on the coast side and
+collect evidence in favour of the prosecution. It also ordered that the
+presbyteries should proceed in all severity against such magistrates as
+liberated convicted witches. As in England so here, a body of men came
+into existence whose business it was to travel the country and detect
+witches. Anonymous accusations were invited, the clergy "placing an
+empty box in church, to receive a billet with the sorcerer's name, and
+the date and description of his deeds."[194] In 1603 "at the College of
+Auld Abirdene" every minister was ordered to make "subtill and privie
+inquisition," concerning the number of witches in his parish, and report
+the same forthwith. Nothing that could whet the appetite for the hunt
+was neglected. William Johnston, baron, bailie "of the regalitie and
+barronie of Broughton," was awarded the goods of all who should be
+"lawfullie convict be assyses of notorious and common witches, haunting
+and resorting devilles and witches."[195] The lives of thousands of
+people were rendered unbearable, and the complaint of one, Margaret
+Miall, that "she desyres not to live, because nobody will converse with
+her, seeing she is under the reputation of a witch," must have
+represented the feelings of many.
+
+It was not only for working ill that people were accused of witchcraft
+and executed; ill or well made little difference. In Edinburgh in 1623
+it was charged against Thomas Grieve that he had relieved many
+sicknesses and grievous diseases by sorcery and witchcraft. "He took
+sickness off a woman in Fife, and put it upon a cow, which thereafter
+ran mad and died." He also cured a child of a disease "by straiking back
+the hair of his head, and wrapping him in an anointed cloth, and by that
+means putting him asleep," and thus through his devilry and witchcraft,
+cured the child. Other charges of a similar kind were brought against
+Grieve, who was found guilty and hanged on the Castle Hill.[196] At the
+same place, a year previous, Margaret Wallace was also sentenced to be
+hanged and burned, on the same kind of charge, and for "practising
+devilry, incantation, and witchcraft, especially forbidden by the laws
+of Almighty God, and the municipal laws of this realm."
+
+The following bill of costs for burning two women, Jane Wischert and
+Isabel Cocker, in Aberdeen, has a certain melancholy interest:--
+
+                                              L.  _s._ _d._
+
+  Item for 20 loads of Peatts to burn them    2    0   0
+    "  for ane boll of colles                 1    4   0
+    "  for four tar barrells                  0    6   8
+    "  for fir and win barrells               0   16   8
+    "  for a staick and the dressing of it    0   16   0
+    "  for four fathoms of towis              4    0   0
+    "  to Jon Justice for their execution     0   13   4
+
+In England, no less than in Scotland, America, and on the Continent,
+much learned testimony might be cited in defence of witchcraft. The
+great Sir Thomas Browne said in the most famous of his writings: "For my
+part I have ever believed, and do now know, that there are witches. They
+that doubt of these do not only deny them, but spirits; and are
+obliquely and upon consequence, a sort, not of infidels, but
+atheists."[197] Henry More, the great Platonist, asserted that they who
+deny the agency of witches are "puffed up with nothing but ignorance,
+vanity, and stupid infidelity." Ralph Cudworth, one of the greatest
+scholars of the latter part of the seventeenth century, said that they
+who denied the possibility of satanic intercourse "can hardly escape the
+suspicion of some hankering towards atheism."[198] Writing nearly a
+century later, when the English law merely prosecuted as rogues and
+vagabonds those who pretended to witchcraft, Blackstone thought it
+necessary to point out that this alteration did not deny the possibility
+of the offence, and added:--
+
+"To deny this would be to contradict the revealed word of God in various
+passages both of the Old and New Testaments; and the thing itself is a
+truth in which every nation in the world hath in its turn borne
+testimony; either by examples seemingly well attested, or by prohibitory
+laws which at least suppose the possibility of a commerce with evil
+spirits."[199]
+
+About the same time Wesley gave the world his famous declaration on the
+subject:--
+
+"It is true likewise that the English in general, and indeed most of the
+men of learning in Europe, have given up all accounts of witches and
+apparitions as mere old wives' fables. I am sorry for it, and I
+willingly take this opportunity of entering my solemn protest against
+this violent compliment which so many who believe the Bible pay to those
+who do not believe it. I owe them no such service. I take knowledge
+that these are at the bottom of the outcry which has been raised and
+with such insolence spread through the land in direct opposition, not
+only to the Bible, but to the suffrage of the wisest and best of men in
+all ages and nations. They well know (whether Christians know it or not)
+that the giving up of witchcraft is in effect giving up the Bible."[200]
+
+The evidence upon which the convictions for witchcraft rested were
+almost incredibly stupid, as the punishments were almost unbelievably
+brutal. If the crops failed, or the milk turned sour; if the head of a
+local magnate ached, or a minister of the gospel fell sick; if a woman
+was childless, or a child taken with a fit; if a cow sickened, or sheep
+died suddenly, some poor woman was pretty certain to be seized, and
+tortured until she confessed her alleged crime. A mole or wart on any
+part of the body was a sure sign of commerce with the devil. It was
+believed that on the body of every witch was a spot insensible to pain.
+To discover this she was stripped, pins were run into the body, and when
+excess of pain had produced numbness, some such spot was pretty certain
+to be found. Men regularly took up with this work in both England and
+Scotland, and their fame as 'prickers' depended upon the number of
+witches they unearthed. If a suspected witch kept a black cat, did not
+shed tears, or could not repeat the Lord's Prayer correctly, these were
+pretty sure signs of guilt. A more serious test was the ordeal by water.
+This was a favourite and general test, and was highly recommended by
+that learned fool, James the First. In this the right hand was tied to
+the left foot, the left hand to the right foot. She was then thrown
+into a pond. If she floated she was a witch, and was either hanged or
+burned. If she sank, she was innocent--and was drowned. Another test was
+to tie a woman's legs across, and she was so seated on them that they
+bore the entire weight of her body. In this position she was kept for
+hours, and on the first sign of pain condemned as a witch.
+
+If none of these tests were adopted, torture was used. There was the
+boot--a frame of iron or wood in which the leg was placed and wedges
+driven in until the limb was smashed. A variation of this was to place
+the leg in an iron boot and slowly heat it over a fire. There was the
+thumbscrew, an instrument which smashed the thumb to pulp by the turning
+of a screw. More barbarous still was the bridle. This was an iron hoop
+passing over the head, with four prongs, two pointing to the tongue and
+palate, and one to either cheek. The suspected witch was then chained to
+the wall, and watchers appointed to prevent her sleeping. The slightest
+movement caused the greatest torture, and in the vast majority of cases
+a confession was secured. In obstinate cases pressing between heavy
+stones was adopted.
+
+One of the most famous of these witch-finders was the celebrated Mathew
+Hopkins before referred to. He was appointed to the work by Parliament
+during the time of the Commonwealth, and styled himself 'witch-finder
+general.' Hopkins travelled round the country, much like an assize
+judge, putting up at the principal inns, and at the expense of the local
+authorities. His charge was twenty shillings a visit, whether he found
+witches or not. If he discovered any, there was a further charge of
+twenty shillings for every witch brought to execution. His favourite
+method of detection was that of floating. But another of Hopkins's tests
+was the following: The suspected witch was placed cross-legged on a
+stool in the centre of the room. She was closely watched and kept
+without food for four-and-twenty hours. Doors and windows remained open
+to watch for the entrance of some of the devil's imps. These might come
+in the form of a fly, a wasp, a moth, or some other insect. The work of
+the watchers was to kill every insect that came into the room. But if
+one escaped, it was clear proof that this was one of the witch's
+familiars.
+
+Wherever Hopkins travelled numerous convictions followed. These were so
+numerous that suspicion was aroused, not of the genuineness of the
+convictions, but of Hopkins's knowledge concerning the locality of the
+witches. In defence he published in 1647 a tract entitled "The Discovery
+of Witches; in answer to several Queries lately delivered to the Judge
+of Assize for the County of Norfolk; and now published by Mathew
+Hopkins, Witchfinder, for the benefit of the whole Kingdom." The charge
+against Hopkins was that he had been supplied by the devil with a
+memorandum of all the witches, and so was able to find them where others
+failed. Absurd as the charge was, it found credence, and although his
+end is wrapped in obscurity, it is said that he was finally seized
+himself on a charge of sorcery, tried by his own favourite water
+test--and floated. One cannot but hope that tradition is in this case
+trustworthy.
+
+It is difficult, nowadays, to realise the gravity with which these
+trials were undertaken. An outline of a very famous witch trial, before
+an eminent judge in the latter part of the seventeenth century, will
+best serve as an illustration. Before me there lies a little tract of
+some sixty pages, printed "for William Shrewsbury at the Bible in Duck
+Lane," and bearing on the title page the following description:--
+
+"At the Assizes and general gaol delivery, held at Bury St. Edmunds for
+the County of Suffolk, the Tenth day of March, in the Sixteenth Year of
+the Reign of our Sovereign, Lord King Charles II., before Mathew Hale,
+Knight, Lord Chief Baron of His Majesties Court of Exchequer; Rose
+Callender and Amy Duny, Widows, both of Leystoff, in the county
+aforesaid, were severally indicted for bewitching Elizabeth and Anne
+Durent, Jane Bocking, Susan Chandler, William Durent, Elizabeth and
+Deborah Pacy and the said Callender and Duny, being arrainged upon the
+same indictments, pleaded not guilty; and afterwards upon a long
+evidence, were found guilty, and thereupon had judgment to dye for the
+same."
+
+Both the women charged were old. The charges were as follows: The mother
+of the infant, William Durent, sworn and examined in open court, deposed
+that about the 10th of March, having special occasion to go from home,
+left her child in the care of Amy Duny, giving her special occasion not
+to give her child the breast. Nevertheless, Amy Duny did acquaint her
+mother on her return that she had given the child the breast, and on
+being reprimanded "used many high expressions and threatening speeches
+towards her; telling her that she had as good have done otherwise than
+to have found fault with her ... and that very night her son fell into
+strange fits of swounding ... and so continued for several weeks." Much
+troubled, the mother consulted a Dr. Jacob, of Yarmouth, who advised
+her to hang up the child's blanket, at night to wrap the child in it,
+and if she found anything therein to throw it in the fire. A very large
+toad was found, which on being put in the fire "made a great and
+horrible noise, and after a space there was a flashing in the fire like
+gunpowder ... and thereupon the toad was no more seen or heard." More
+wonderful still, "the next day there came a young woman and told this
+deponnent that her aunt (meaning the said Amy) was in a most lamentable
+condition, having her face all scorched with fire." And on the mother
+enquiring of Amy Duny how this had happened, Amy replied, "she might
+thank her for it, for that she was the cause thereof, but that she
+should live to see some of her children dead, or else upon crutches." It
+was further alleged "that not long after this deponnent was taken with
+lameness in both her legges, from the knees downwards, and that she was
+fain to go upon crutches ... and so continued till the time of the
+Assizes, that the witch came to be tried."
+
+Concerning the bewitching of Elizabeth and Deborah Pacy, aged eleven and
+nine, their father declared that Deborah was suddenly taken with
+lameness. One day while the girl was resting outside the house, "Amy
+Duny came to the deponnent's house to buy some herrings; but, being
+denied, she went away discontented.... But at the very same instant of
+time, the said child was taken with most violent fits, feeling extreme
+pain in her stomach, like the pricking of pins, and shrieking out in a
+dreadful manner like unto a whelp." As the result of this and other
+ailments from which the child suffered, the father accused Amy Duny of
+being a witch, and she was placed in the stocks. Being placed in the
+stocks, further threats were uttered, and both children were afflicted
+with fits. Upon recovery they "would cough extremely, and bring up much
+phlegm and crooked pins, and one time a twopenny nail with a very broad
+head; which pins (amounting to forty or more), together with the
+twopenny nail, were produced in court, with the affirmation of the said
+deponnent that he was present when the said nail was vomited up, and
+also most of the pins.... In this manner the said children continued for
+the space of two months, during which time, in their intervals, this
+deponnent would cause them to read some chapters from the New Testament.
+Whereupon he observed that they would read till they came to the name of
+Lord or Jesus or Christ, and then, before they could pronounce either of
+the said words, they would suddenly fall into their fits. But when they
+came to the name of Satan or Devil, they would clap their fingers upon
+the book, crying out, 'This bites, but makes me speak right well!'"
+
+Much more evidence of a similar kind was offered during the course of
+the trial, with details of a too indelicate character for reproduction
+concerning the search made on the women's bodies for devil's marks.
+During the whole of the trial there were present in court a number of
+distinguished people, amongst them Sir Thomas Browne. The latter, being
+"desired to give his opinion, what he did conceive of him; was clearly
+of opinion that the persons were bewitched, and said that in Denmark
+there had lately been a great discovery of witches, who used the very
+same way of afflicting persons, by conveying pins into them, and crooked
+as these pins were, with needles and nails. And his opinion was that
+the devil in such cases did work upon the bodies of men and women as on
+a natural foundation, to stir up and excite such humours superabounding
+in their bodies to a great excess, whereby he did in an extraordinary
+manner afflict them with such distempers as their bodies were most
+subject to, as particularly appeared in these children."
+
+Sir Mathew Hale, one of the greatest lawyers of his day, in directing
+the jury, told them "he would not repeat the evidence unto them, lest by
+so doing he should wrong the evidence one way or the other. Only this
+acquainted them. First, whether or no these children were bewitched?
+Secondly, whether the prisoners at the bar were guilty of it? That there
+were such creatures he made no doubt at all. For, first, the Scriptures
+had affirmed as much. Secondly, the wisdom of all nations had provided
+laws against such persons, which is an argument of their confidence of
+such a crime. And such had been the judgment of this kingdom, as appears
+by that Act of Parliament which had provided punishments proportionable
+to the quality of the offence. And desired them strictly to observe
+their evidence, and desired the great God of Heaven to direct their
+hearts in this weighty thing they had in hand; for to condemn the
+innocent and let the guilty go free were both an abomination before the
+Lord." The jury took no more than half an hour to consider their
+verdict, and brought in both women guilty upon all counts. The judge
+expressed his complete satisfaction with the verdict, and sentenced them
+to be hanged--a sentence duly carried out a fortnight later.
+
+This is the last notable trial in English history. A witch was burned
+later than the date of this trial, and the last one actually condemned
+was in 1712. But in this case, on the representation of the judge who
+tried the issue, the verdict was formally set aside. By that time people
+were beginning to realise the wisdom of Montaigne's counsel, written at
+the commencement of the witch epidemic:--
+
+"How much more natural and more likely do I find it that two men should
+lie than one in twelve hours should pass with the winds from east to
+west? How much more natural that our understanding may, by the
+volubility of our loose, capering mind, be transported from its place
+than one of us should, flesh and bones as we are, by a strange spirit be
+carried upon a broom through a tunnel or a chimney."
+
+In England the Witch Act of 1604 was not formally repealed until 1736.
+In Scotland the last witch legally executed was in 1722. Captain Ross,
+Sheriff of Sutherland, has the doubtful honour of having condemned her
+to the stake. But fifty years later than this--1773--the Associated
+Presbytery passed a resolution deploring the fact that witchcraft was
+falling into disrepute. In Germany the last witch was executed in 1749,
+by decapitation. The last trial for witchcraft in Massachusetts was as
+late as 1793. These dates refer, of course, to legal proceedings.
+Examples of the existence of this belief are continually being recorded
+in newspapers, although they now only rank as solitary reminiscences of
+one of the most degrading and brutalising beliefs that European history
+records.
+
+I have not aimed at giving a history of the witch mania--indeed, a
+scientific history of witchcraft, one that will make plain the nature of
+the various factors involved, has yet to be written. I have only dwelt
+upon it for the purpose of enforcing the lesson of how materially such
+an epidemic must have contributed to give permanence to religious belief
+in general. It is certain that such an epidemic could not occur save in
+a society saturated with supernaturalism. It is equally certain that
+once such an epidemic occurs it must in turn strengthen the tendency
+towards supernaturalistic beliefs. Thanks to the long reign of the
+religious idea, and to the overwhelming influence of the Church, the
+people of Europe were prepared for such an outbreak. And it should be
+clear that the prevalence of such beliefs, even though they may be
+afterwards discarded, favours the perpetuation of religious belief as a
+whole. The particular form of a belief that is prevalent for a time may
+disappear, but the temper of mind induced by its reign remains. And
+absurd as the belief in witches capering through the air on broomsticks,
+changing themselves into black cats, raising storms, and causing
+sickness--absurd though all this may be, it yet serves to keep alive the
+temper of mind on which supernaturalism lives.
+
+
+FOOTNOTES:
+
+[187] Cited by Bloch, _Sexual Life of our Time_, p. 120. Michelet has
+also dealt with this matter in his vivid and picturesque work, _The
+Sorceress_.
+
+[188] A lengthy account of this work is given by Ennemoser in his
+_History of Magic_, vol. ii.
+
+[189] _Rise and Influence of Rationalism_, i. pp. 3-6.
+
+[190] H. Williams, _The Superstitions of Witchcraft_, p. 214.
+
+[191] T. Wright, _Narratives of Sorcery and Magic_.
+
+[192] Michelet, _Life of Luther_, chap. vi.
+
+[193] _History of Civilisation_, chap. xix.
+
+[194] Dalyell, _Darker Superstitions of Scotland_, p. 623.
+
+[195] Dalyell, p. 628.
+
+[196] Pitcairn's _Criminal Trials_, vol. iii.
+
+[197] _Religio Medici_, pt. i. sec. 30.
+
+[198] _True Intellectual System_, ii. p. 650.
+
+[199] _Commentaries_, Stephen's Edition, i. p. 238.
+
+[200] _Journal_, 1768.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER ELEVEN
+
+SUMMARY & CONCLUSION
+
+
+The study of religion falls naturally and easily into two parts. The
+first is a question of origin. Under what conditions did the hypothesis
+that supernatural beings control the life of man come into existence? We
+know that in civilised times religious beliefs are in the nature of an
+inheritance. A member of any civilised society finds them here when he
+is born, he grows up with them, generally accepting them without
+question, or effecting certain modifications in the form in which he
+continues to hold them. If we treat religion as a hypothesis, advanced
+as other hypotheses are advanced, to account for a certain class of
+facts, then we can safely say that religion is one of the earliest in
+the history of human thought. And its antiquity and universality
+preclude us from seeking an explanation of its origin in the mental life
+of civilised humanity. Whether the religious hypothesis can or cannot be
+justified by an appeal to civilised intelligence, it is plain it did not
+begin there. Its beginnings are earlier than any existing civilisation;
+and in its most general form may be said to be as old as mankind itself.
+Consequently, if any satisfactory explanation of the origin of the
+religious idea is to be found, it must be sought amid the very earliest
+conditions of human society.
+
+Now whatever the differences of opinion concerning matters of detail,
+there is substantial agreement amongst European anthropologists upon one
+important point. They all agree that the conception of supernatural, or
+'spiritual,' beings owes its beginning to the ignorance of primitive man
+concerning both his own nature and the nature of the world around him.
+The beginnings of human experience suggest questions that can only be
+satisfactorily answered by the accumulated experience of many
+generations. These questions do not materially differ from those that
+face men to-day. The why and wherefore of things are always with us;
+life propounds the same problem to all; it is the replies alone that
+vary, and the nature of these replies is determined by the knowledge at
+our disposal. The difference is not in nature but in man. The answers
+given by primitive man to these eternal questions are a complete
+inversion of those of his better informed descendants. The conception of
+natural force, of mechanical necessity, is as yet unborn, and the
+primitive thinker everywhere assumes the operation of personal beings as
+responsible for all that occurs. This is not so much the product of
+careful and elaborate philosophising, it is closer akin to the _naive_
+thinking of a child concerning a thunderstorm. Primitive thought accepts
+the universal operation of living and intelligent forces as an
+unquestionable fact. Modern thought tends more and more surely in the
+direction of regarding the universe as a complex of self-adjusting,
+non-conscious forces. Primitive thought assumes a supernatural agency as
+the cause of disease, and seeks, logically, to placate it by prayer or
+coerce it by magic. Modern thought turns to test-tube and microscope,
+searches for the malignant germ, and manufactures an antitoxin. The
+history of human thought is, as Huxley said, a record of the
+substitution of mechanical for vitalistic processes. The beginning of
+religion is found in connection with the latter. A genuine science
+commences with the emergence of the former.
+
+With this aspect of the matter I have not, however, been specially
+concerned. It has been left on one side in order to concentrate
+attention upon another and a more neglected aspect of the subject--that
+of the conditions that have served to perpetuate the religious idea.
+Grant, what cannot be well denied in the face of modern investigation,
+that ideas of the supernatural began in primitive delusion. How comes it
+that this idea has not by now disappeared from civilised society? What
+are the causes that have given it such a lengthy lease of life?
+Experience has shown that all really verifiable knowledge counts as an
+asset of naturalism, and is so far opposed to supernaturalism. Moreover,
+the history of science has been such that one feels justified in the
+assumption that, given time and industry, there are no phenomena that
+are not susceptible to a naturalistic explanation. Why, then, has not
+supernaturalism died out? Even the religious idea cannot persist without
+evidence of some kind being offered in its behalf. This evidence may be
+to a better instructed mind inconclusive or irrelevant, but evidence of
+some sort there must have been all along, and must still be. Granted
+that the religious idea began with primitive mankind, granted also that
+it was based on a mistaken interpretation of natural phenomena, these
+reasons are quite insufficient to explain why thousands of generations
+later that idea is still with us. "Our fathers have told us" offers to
+the average mind a strong appeal, but surely the children will require
+some further proof than this. What kind of evidence is it that
+throughout the ages religious people have accepted as conclusive? A
+study of primitive psychology shows clearly enough how the religious
+idea vitalised the facts. What we next have to discern is the class of
+facts that have kept the religious idea alive.
+
+The foregoing pages constitute an attempt to answer this question. The
+need for some such investigation was clearly shown by the publication of
+the late Professor William James's _Varieties of Religious Experience_
+and its reception by the religious press of the country as an
+epoch-marking work. As a mere collection of documents, the work is
+interesting enough. But its critical value is extremely small. How
+religious visionaries have felt, or what has been their experiences, can
+only furnish the mere data of an enquiry, and _their explanation of the
+cause of their experiences is a part of the data_. This, apparently,
+Professor James overlooked; and it will be noted by critical readers of
+his book that it proceeds on the assumption that the statements of
+religious visionaries are to be taken, not only as true concerning their
+subjective experiences at a given time, but also as approximately true
+as to the causes of their mental states. This, of course, by no means
+follows. A scientific enquiry cannot separate mental conditions from the
+subject's interpretation of their causation. Whether this interpretation
+is genuine or not must be decided finally by an appeal to what is known
+of the laws of mental life, under both normal and abnormal conditions.
+If these are adequate to explain the "Varieties of Religious
+Experience," there is no need whatever to assume the operation of a
+supernatural agency. Nor does calling this agency 'transcendent' or
+'supermundane' make any substantial difference. For, in this connection,
+these are only names that serve to disguise a visitant of a highly
+undesirable character.
+
+The evidence on behalf of a naturalistic explanation of religious
+phenomena has been purposely stated in a suggestive rather than in an
+exhaustive manner. The main lines of evidence are threefold. First,
+there is the indisputable fact that in the lower stages of culture all
+mental and bodily diseases are universally attributed to spiritual
+agency. This explanation holds the field; it is the only one possible at
+the time, and it is not replaced until a comparatively late stage of
+human history. But of special importance is the fact that a belief does
+not die out suddenly. It is only destroyed very slowly, and even after
+the facts upon which the belief was originally based have been otherwise
+interpreted, the attitude of mind engendered by the long reign of a
+belief remains. It has by that time become part of the intellectual
+environment. Theories of a quasi-philosophic or quasi-scientific
+character are elaborated, and give to the original belief something of a
+rational air. Even to-day the extent to which superstitious practices
+still gather round the subject of disease is known only to the curious
+in such matters. Not that the original reason is given for the practice.
+In nearly every case a different one is invented. To take only a single
+example. We still find saffron tea largely used in cases of measles. All
+medical men are aware that it possesses not the slightest curative
+value. Students of folklore are aware that it has its origin in the
+theory of sympathetic cures. Its redeeming feature is that it is
+harmless; so we find it still in common use, and the recovery of a child
+from measles is often enough attributed to the potency of the
+concoction. So with the relation of disease to the persistence of the
+belief in the supernatural. The conclusion that disease--whether bodily
+or mental--is due to the agency of spirits is one that follows from the
+existence of the religious idea; but in turn the observed facts react
+and strengthen the religious belief. Every case of disease becomes to
+the primitive mind an unanswerable proof in favour of the original
+hypothesis. The disease is there, and the only explanation possible is
+in terms of the animistic idea. And all the time the religious idea is
+becoming more deeply embedded in the social consciousness, more firmly
+established as a social fact.
+
+The next line of evidence is that furnished by what I have called the
+culture of the supernatural. By some means or other--probably by
+accident in the first instance--it is discovered that certain herbs and
+vegetable drugs have a peculiar effect on one's mental state. Those who
+use them see or hear things other people do not normally hear or see.
+Abstention from food and other bodily privations produce similar
+results. What is the inevitable conclusion? The only one possible under
+the existing conditions is that communication has been set up with an
+invisible world from which one is shut off under normal conditions. From
+this to the next step is obvious and easy. If a drug, or a fast, brings
+one into communication with the supernatural world, one has only to
+repeat the conditions in order to repeat the experience. And repeated
+they are in all religions, with, at most, those modifications induced by
+changed times and circumstances. This is why fasting and other forms of
+'fleshly mortification' play so large a part in the history of religion.
+The savage medicine man, the Hindu fakir, the medieval saint, all create
+their ecstasies by the simple plan of disturbing the normal operations
+of the nervous system. It is not, of course, implied that this is done
+with a full consciousness of all that is involved in the practice. The
+derangement is to them the condition of the supernatural manifestation,
+not the physiological and psychological cause of the experience.
+
+The third main line of evidence is connected with the phenomena of
+sexuality. It has been shown that in early stages of culture man
+everywhere connects the phenomena of the sexual life with the activity
+of supernatural forces. Following the lines of investigation indicated
+by Mr. Sidney Hartland, we saw reason to believe that the primitive
+conception of procreation is not that afterwards prevalent, but that of
+assuming the birth of a child to be due to the direct action of
+spiritual beings on the mother. Proofs of this are found in existing
+beliefs among primitive peoples, in the magical practices so widely
+current to obtain children, and in numerous other customs connected with
+childbirth. The phenomenon of puberty in the male and of menstruation in
+the female gives a terrifying reality to this belief. But still more
+important is the fact that a great deal of assumed religious feeling is
+found on analysis to be little more than masked sexuality. The
+connection between eroticism and piety has been noted over and over
+again by medical observers in the cases that have been brought
+professionally under their notice. And it is hardly less marked in a
+large number of instances that are usually classed as normal. Thus great
+religious teachers have often emphasised the value of a celibate life as
+a means of furthering religious devotion, and nearly all have treated it
+with marked respect. The reason given for this is that marriage involves
+a greater absorption in material or worldly cares, while celibacy
+leaves one free to full devotion to the spiritual. But the bottom reason
+for it is that sexual and domestic feelings, lacking their proper outlet
+in marriage and family life, run with greater force in the outlet
+provided by religion. So it happens that we find unmarried men and
+women, devoted to the religious life, expressing themselves towards
+Jesus or the Virgin in language which, separated from its religious
+associations, leaves no doubt as to its origin in unsatisfied sexual
+feeling. In these cases we are dealing with a perversion of one of the
+deepest of human instincts. And it is one of the commonest of
+observations in psychology that when a feeling is denied outlet through
+its proper channel it finds vent in some other direction, and is to that
+extent masked or disguised.
+
+Allied to the fact of perversion is that of misinterpretation. In the
+chapter on _Conversion_ we have seen how largely this occurs at the
+period of adolescence. The significant features of adolescence are a
+development of the sexual nature and an awakening of a consciousness of
+race kinship. Connected with these, and flowing from them, is a more or
+less rapid development of what are called the altruistic feelings, the
+individual becoming less self-centred and more concerned for the
+well-being of others. From an evolutionary point it is easy to read the
+fundamental meaning of these transformations, although in the course of
+social development they have become overlaid with a number of secondary
+characteristics. Still, in a completely rationalised social life, with
+adequate knowledge concerning the nature of adolescence, every care
+would be taken to direct these developing energies into purely social
+channels. Adolescence is the great formative period; it is then that
+imitation and suggestion play their most important parts, and it is then
+that the foundations may be laid of a really good and useful
+citizenship. If we fail then, we fail completely.
+
+In a society where supernaturalism still exerts considerable power
+another, and a more disastrous, policy is pursued. Every endeavour is
+made by religious organisations to exploit adolescence in their own
+interest. Thousands of priests, often, no doubt, with the best of
+motives, are engaged in impressing upon the youthful mind an entirely
+erroneous notion of the character and the direction of the feelings
+experienced. The sense of restlessness, consequent upon a period of
+great physiological disturbance, is utilised to create an unhealthy
+'conviction of sin,' or the need of 'getting right with God.' Social
+duties and obligations are made incidental rather than fundamental.
+Activities that should be consciously directed to a social end are
+diverted into religious channels, and one consequence of this, as we
+have seen, is a large crop of nervous disorders that might be avoided
+were a healthier outlet provided. In this the modern priest is acting
+precisely as his savage forerunner acted. As the savage medicine man
+associates sexual phenomena with the activity of the tribal ghosts, so
+the modern priest often associates the psychological conditions that
+accompany adolescence with a supernatural influence. The distinction
+between the two is a purely verbal one. In neither case is there a
+recognition of the nature of the processes actually at work; in both
+cases the phenomena are used to emphasise the reality and activity of
+the supernatural. In both cases the social feelings are disguised by
+the religious interpretation given, with the result that instead of
+adolescence being, as it should be, the period of a conscious entry into
+the larger social life, it only too often marks the beginning of a
+lifelong servitude to retrogressive forces.
+
+These are the main lines along which, I conceive, the study of the
+pathologic elements that enter into the history of religion must be
+studied. And so long as we restrict our study to the lower culture
+stages the evidence is clear and unmistakable. It is when we reach the
+higher stages of civilisation that the problem becomes more difficult.
+For although it is possible to detect the same factors at work they are
+expressed in a different way, and affiliated to current philosophic and
+even scientific ideas. Thus, it would be readily admitted by most people
+nowadays that visions seen by a fasting man, or by a taker of drugs, or
+by one suffering from some nervous disorder, were wholly inadmissible as
+evidence. So far we have advanced beyond the point of view of primitive
+races. But the testimony of one who by constantly dwelling upon a single
+idea, and by excluding rational and corrective influences, has brought
+about a quite abnormal state of mind, is still counted of value by
+theologians. Much of the current cant concerning 'mysticism' may be
+cited in illustration of this. Exactly what mysticism is no one appears
+to know. Definitions are numerous and varied. So far as most mystics are
+concerned the definition of Harnack--"Mysticism is rationalism applied
+to a sphere beyond reason"--appears to hit the mark, although how reason
+can be used in a sphere to which it does not apply is precisely one of
+those unintelligible statements that so delights those with yearnings
+after the ineffable. The normal mind will probably find more
+satisfaction in John Stuart Mill's description of mysticism as being
+"neither more nor less than ascribing objective existence to the
+subjective creations of the mind, and believing that by watching and
+contemplating these ideas of its own making, it can read what takes
+place in the world without."
+
+But the general claim of 'mystics,' and, indeed, of supernaturalists
+generally, is that they are, in virtue of the exercise of certain
+qualities or 'faculties,' either inoperative at certain times, or absent
+in the case of normal folk, able to perceive a truth not perceptible to
+people less fortunately endowed. And these claims, I have no hesitation
+in saying, are wholly false. There are all degrees of development of
+human faculty, but it is substantially the same with all. There is no
+royal road to truth in this direction more than in others. Truth is
+reached in the same way by all, and although an induction may in the
+case of certain well-dowered individuals be so rapid as to rank as an
+'intuition,' a careful analysis destroys the illusion.
+
+When we clear away from the claims of the 'mystic' all the superfluities
+of language that are there, and so reduce these claims to their lowest
+and plainest terms, we find ourselves face to face with the claim of the
+supernaturalist as it has existed from savage times onward. The method
+remains true to itself. In the first instance, we have the claim to
+illumination based upon direct interference with the normal workings of
+the mind. In the next stage, we find this interference still marked, but
+less direct. Finally, we have the unhealthy operation of fixed ideas,
+and the exclusion of all conditions that would prevent the operation of
+hallucination or illusion. But the method remains the same throughout,
+and it is equally sterile throughout. In all history these mystical
+states of illumination have discovered no verifiable truth; they have
+never at any time advanced human knowledge in the smallest degree. And
+the reason for this is plain: The brain of the mystic, like that of the
+non-mystic, can only work on the basis of its acquired knowledge or
+experience. It can create nothing new; it can declare no truth that is
+not in the nature of an induction from existing knowledge. All that the
+religious mystic can accomplish after brooding upon inherited religious
+beliefs is to create new combinations, or effect certain modifications
+or developments of them, and by continued contemplation endow his
+subjective creations with an objective existence. That is why the
+Christian mystic remains a Christian. The Mohammedan mystic remains a
+Mohammedan. The 'supersensible reality' is always of the kind consonant
+with their inherited beliefs and their social environment. That is also
+why mysticism has its fashions like all other forms of religious
+extravagance. And as he is "applying rationalism to a sphere above
+reason," the mystic may give full vent to his imaginative powers. That
+which is above reason may defy reasonable disproof. To some, however, it
+has the disadvantage of not admitting of reasonable verification. There
+is nothing here but the primitive delusion operating under changed
+conditions.
+
+In addition, to the lines of investigation followed in the foregoing
+pages, a great deal might be said as to how far the religious idea has
+been perpetuated by an exploitation of purely social qualities. It must
+be obvious to even the cursory student that a great deal of what is now
+being put forward as religious is really no more than a sociology with a
+religious label. The feeling for truth, beauty, justice, the desire for
+social intercourse, are all treated as expressions of religious
+conviction. All sorts of social reforms are urged in the name of
+religion, and the degree of success achieved dwelt upon as fruits of the
+religious spirit. But in no legitimate sense of the word can these
+things be called religious. They may or may not be consonant with the
+existing religion, but in themselves they are very clearly the outcome
+of man's social nature, and would exist even though religion disappeared
+entirely. The appeals made to man's moral sense, to his sense of
+justice, to his sympathies, are thus fundamentally appeals made to his
+social nature, and so far as the religious appeal is placed upon this
+basis it becomes an exploitation of the social consciousness.
+Unfortunately, the long association of religious forms with social life
+and institutions, due ultimately to the immense power of supernaturalism
+in early society, this, combined with early education, makes it a matter
+of no small difficulty for the average man or woman to separate the two
+things.
+
+Finally, let us imagine for a moment that the course of human history
+had been different to what it actually has been. Suppose that by some
+miracle humanity had started its career in full possession of that
+knowledge of nature which has been so laboriously accumulated. In that
+case, would the belief in the supernatural have ever existed? Would the
+thousand and one 'spiritual beings' of primitive society have ever had
+being? And if not called into being then, from what other source could
+they have been derived? Is there anything in later scientific knowledge
+that would ever have suggested the supernatural? We know there is not;
+we know that the whole of modern science is an emphatic protest against
+its existence. Unfortunately the scientist does not come first, but
+last; and by the time he appears, the supernatural has made good its
+foothold; it has permeated human institutions, and has bitten so deeply
+into habits of thought as to make its eradication the most difficult of
+all tasks.
+
+Let us carry our imagining yet a step further. Imagine that even after
+primitive ignorance had created the supernatural, it had come to an
+abrupt stop when man had emerged from the purely savage stage. Suppose a
+generation born, not without knowledge of what their progenitors
+believed, but with a sufficient knowledge of their own to correct their
+ancestor's errors. Suppose that generation in a position to recognise
+disease, insanity, delusion, hysteria, hallucination for what they are.
+Assume them to be under no delusion concerning the nature of man,
+physically or mentally. Would the religious idea have persisted in the
+way that it has done? Granted religion would still have continued to
+exist as an ultimate philosophy of nature that appealed to some minds,
+as other systems of philosophy number their disciples, would it have
+been the dominating power it has been? What under such conditions would
+have become of that evidence for the supernatural, accepted generation
+after generation, but which is now rejected by all educated minds? Where
+would have been that long array of seers, prophets, illuminants, whose
+credentials have been found in states of mind that are now seen to have
+been pathological in character? For remember it was not always--very
+seldom, in fact--the justice, or the reasonableness of the teachings set
+forth, that won support, but generally the 'signs and wonders' that were
+pointed to as evidence of the divine commission of the teachers. Assume,
+then, that these 'signs and wonders' had been wanting, and that for
+thousands of years people had looked at natural phenomena from the point
+of view of the educated mind of to-day, what would have been the present
+position of the religious idea? Would it not have been like a tree
+divorced from the soil?
+
+Well, we know that the course of history has been far different from
+what I have assumed to be the case. We know that the savage dies out
+very slowly, and that even in civilised States to-day he is honoured in
+the existence of a whole army of representatives. Each generation moves
+along the road marked out by its predecessors, and broadens or lengthens
+it to but a small extent. For many, many generations people went on
+adopting the conclusions of the savage concerning man and the universe,
+and finding proofs of the soundness of those conclusions in exactly the
+same kind of experiences. The beliefs thus engendered were wild and
+absurd--admittedly so, and many of such a nature that educated people
+are now ashamed of them. But such as they were, they served the purpose
+of perpetuating the belief in the supernatural, and so served to
+strengthen the general religious idea. Of that there can be no
+reasonable doubt. For the influence of beliefs that have been long held
+does not end with the intellectual perception of their falsity. A belief
+such as witchcraft dies out, but by that time it has done its work in
+familiarising the general mind with the reality of the supernatural, and
+so prepares the ground for other harvests. These long centuries of
+superstitious beliefs have left behind in society a psychological
+residuum that is at all times an obstacle and is sometimes fatal to
+scientific thinking. We are like men who have obtained freedom after
+almost a lifetime of slavery. We may be no longer in any real danger of
+the lash, but fear of the whip has become part of our nature, and we
+shrink without cause. So with all those now admitted delusions that have
+been described in the foregoing pages, and which for generations were
+asserted without question. They bit deeply in to social institutions;
+the temper of mind they induced became part of our social heritage. They
+perpetuated the long reign of supernaturalism, and still interpose a
+serious obstacle to sane and helpful conceptions of man and the
+universe.
+
+
+
+
+INDEX
+
+
+Adolescence and Religion, 177-8, 181, 276-7.
+
+Adolescence and Primitive Customs, 178.
+
+Adolescence and Nervous Disorders, 196-7.
+
+Adolescence, Social Significance of, 183-5.
+
+Agapae, 152.
+
+Asceticism, 121, 125, 146, 208-13.
+
+Asceticism and Purity, 213.
+
+Asceticism, Influence on Religion, 224-5.
+
+Augustine, 157.
+
+Authority, Conflict with Science, viii.
+
+
+Baring-Gould, S., 147, 153, 209.
+
+Baring-Gould, S., on Mysticism and Sexualism, 125, 151.
+
+Brinton, D. G., on Origin of Religion, 14.
+
+Bryce, J., 232.
+
+Buckle, T. H., 256.
+
+
+Catherine of Sienna, 85, 129.
+
+Celibacy, 214-5.
+
+Celibacy, Results on Morals, 220-3.
+
+Celibacy, Social Consequences of, 216-9, 220-3.
+
+Clouston, Sir T. S., on Revivals, 195.
+
+Clouston, Sir T. S., on the Connection between Sexualism and Religion,
+140.
+
+Conversion, Pathological Nature of, 194.
+
+Conversion and Adolescence, 32, 176-7, 276.
+
+Conversion, Theological Notions of, 169-71.
+
+Conversion, Ages of Converts, 174-5, 194-5.
+
+Conversion, Statistics of, 173-5.
+
+Conversion and Imitation, 188.
+
+Conversion, Social Aspects of, 200.
+
+Convulsionnaires (The), 239.
+
+Crowd Psychology, 206.
+
+Crusades, Character of, 227-9.
+
+Crusades, Children's, 230.
+
+Crusades, Consequences of, 232-3.
+
+Cudworth, R., 259.
+
+
+Dalyell, J. G., 257.
+
+Dancing and Religious Ecstasy, 60-1.
+
+Dancing Epidemics, 236-40.
+
+Death, Savage Ideas of, 44.
+
+Demoniacs, 77.
+
+Disease, Theory of, amongst Primitive Peoples, 46.
+
+Disease, Theory of, amongst the Early Christians, 47.
+
+D'Israeli, I., on Sexualism and Religion, 17, 135.
+
+Draper, J. W., 231.
+
+Drugs, their use in the history of Religion, 57.
+
+
+Environment, 36, 38.
+
+Environment, Nature of Primitive, 39.
+
+Epilepsy, Influence of, in fostering Supernaturalism, 74-9.
+
+Epilepsy, Opinion of Dr. Hollander, 75.
+
+Epilepsy, Opinion of Sir T. S. Clouston, 75.
+
+Epilepsy, Opinion of Dr. C. Norman, 76.
+
+Epilepsy, Opinion of Emanuel Deutsch, 77, 79.
+
+Epilepsy in New Testament, 77.
+
+Erotic Sects, 155-60, 165.
+
+Eroticism and Supernaturalism, 126-8, 132, 136-9.
+
+Evidence for the Supernatural, 2, 271.
+
+
+Fasting, 61-5.
+
+Flagellation, 234-5.
+
+Forlong, Maj.-Gen., 109 _n._
+
+Fox, George, Account of Visions, 82.
+
+Frazer, J. G., 39, 46, 97, 99, 111.
+
+Free Love--Religious, 150, 161-4.
+
+
+Galton, Francis, on Religious and Morbid States, 86.
+
+Galton, Francis, 219.
+
+Gibbon, E., 227.
+
+Gowers, Sir W. R., 197.
+
+Granger, Prof., 84, 141-3.
+
+
+Hallucinations, 23-4-5, 62, 84.
+
+Hecker, J. F. C., 236-7.
+
+Hopkins, Mathew, 261-2.
+
+Human Qualities, Identity of, 6.
+
+
+Interpretation, Growth of Scientific, xiii.
+
+Ireland, Dr. W. W., on Hallucinations, 23-4.
+
+
+James, W., 10, 11, 14, 15, 16, 17, 21, 81, 83, 130, 131, 145, 175-6,
+272.
+
+
+Kingsley, Mary, on Primitive Thought, 42.
+
+
+Lea, H. C., 220-1.
+
+Le Bon, Gustave, on Crowd Psychology, 206.
+
+Lecky, W. E. H., 154, 212, 221.
+
+Luther and Demonism, 25, 58, 82, 253.
+
+
+Maudsley, H., on the Relation between Nervous States and Ecstasy, 66,
+76, 133.
+
+Medicine and the Church, 70-1.
+
+Menstruation, 95-6-7-8.
+
+Mental States, Reality of, xi, 7, 22.
+
+Mercier, C., Connection between Sexualism and Religion, 124, 140-1, 187,
+197.
+
+Milman, H. H., 219, 222-3, 225-6, 229, 232.
+
+Mind, Theories of, x.
+
+Mistletoe, Origin of Kissing under, 109 _n._
+
+Mohammed, his Account of Inspiration, 78, 81.
+
+Monasticism, 225.
+
+Monasticism and the Family, 216-7, 219, 222-3.
+
+Monasticism and Morals, 220.
+
+Mysticism, 131, 279-80.
+
+Mysticism and the Abnormal, 55.
+
+Mysticism and Puberty, 186.
+
+Mysticism, Definitions of, 278-9.
+
+Mystics, Claims of, xi.
+
+
+Opium, Effects of, 58.
+
+
+Pathological States and Religious Belief, 5, 49.
+
+Pathological Aspects of Revivals, 190-1-2-3, 201.
+
+Pathology of Religion, Need of, 3.
+
+Phallicism, 104-5-6-7-8-9.
+
+Pike, L. O., on Character of Crusaders, 229.
+
+Procreation, Primitive Beliefs concerning, 93-4.
+
+Psychological Epidemics, 207.
+
+Psychology, Normal and Abnormal, 3.
+
+Psychology as a Social Force, 37-8.
+
+Puberty, 180-6.
+
+Puberty Customs, 62, 95, 96.
+
+
+Religion, Definition of, 1.
+  Association of, with Non-religious Forces, 4.
+  and Intuition, 51.
+  and Puberty, 180.
+  and Dancing, 60-1-2.
+  and Fasting, 63-4-5.
+  and Environment, 199, 202.
+  in Primitive Life, 40, 44-5-6, 53.
+  its Connection with Pathological Conditions, 8, 14, 68-9, 70-1-2-3-4.
+
+Religious Faculty, Fallacy of, 7, 19, 20.
+
+Religious Idea and Modern Thought, vii.
+
+Renan, E., 145.
+
+Revivalistic Religion, 163, 172, 189, 190, 193, 201.
+
+Russian Sects, 164-7.
+
+
+Saints, Medical Uses of, 70.
+
+Santa Teresa, 85.
+
+Science, Function of, xi-xii.
+
+Sexualism and Religious Belief, 9, 11-2, 89-90, 120, 121, 125-9, 145,
+275.
+
+Sexualism and Religious Belief, Opinion of Dr. Norman, 122;
+  of Dr. Forel, 123;
+  of Dr. Mercier, 124;
+  of Dr. Krafft-Ebing, 125;
+  of Dr. Maudsley, 133-4.
+
+Smith, W. R., on the Meaning of 'Unclean,' 101.
+
+Sociability, Significance of, 35.
+
+Social Life and Religious Theories, 13, 281.
+
+Spencer, H., 37, 46.
+
+Spiritual Wifehood, 148-9.
+
+Spiritualism, 53-4.
+
+Starbuck, E. D., on Conversion, 174, 200.
+
+Sully, J., 20.
+
+Supernaturalism, Causes of Persistence of, 271, 273, 277, 282.
+
+Supernaturalism, Consequences of, 283-4.
+
+Supernaturalism, Persistence of, 2.
+
+Suso, Austerities of, 85.
+
+Swedenborg, E., 80.
+
+Symonds, J. A., Experience under Chloroform, 29.
+
+
+Theologians, Attitude towards Science, ix.
+
+Thomas, W. I., 182.
+
+Tylor, E. B., 1, 49, 54, 55, 71, 182, 193.
+
+
+Unclean, Religious Significance of, 100-1.
+
+
+Whittaker, T., on the Effects of Opium, 58.
+
+Williams, A., 250.
+
+Witchcraft, 27, 243.
+  Pathology of, 246-7.
+  and Christian Church, 244.
+  Bull of Innocent VIII., 248.
+  Extent of Epidemic, 250.
+  and Sir Thomas Browne, 265.
+  and Montaigne, 267.
+  and Sir M. Hale, 266.
+  and John Wesley, 259.
+  and Luther, 253.
+  and Protestantism, 252-3.
+  Scottish, 255-6-7-8, 267.
+  American, 254-5.
+  Children burned for, 251.
+  Description of Trial, 263-6.
+  Legislation in England, 253, 267.
+
+Witches, Methods of Detection, 260-1.
+
+Witches, Number killed, 250-1.
+
+Woman, Christian Church and, 102.
+
+Woman, why considered religiously unclean, 103.
+
+Woman, a Source of Spiritual Infection, 99.
+
+Woman, Influence of Religious Beliefs in determining her Social
+Position, 102-3, 110-9.
+
+Woman, Position among Primitive Peoples, 115.
+
+Wright, T., 251.
+
+
+[Transcriber's Note:
+
+The following corrections were made:
+
+p. 21: extra open quote removed (In what sense)
+
+p. 24: Dr. W. H. Ireland to Dr. W. W. Ireland (as given by Dr. W. W.
+Ireland)
+
+p. 25: Nuremburg to Nuremberg (came from Nuremberg), to match cited text
+
+p. 46: Crook to Crooke (says Mr. W. Crooke)
+
+p. 46: Ahmadnager to Ahmadnagar (Mahadeo Kolis of Ahmadnagar)
+
+p. 57: DeCandolle to De Candolle (says De Candolle)
+
+p. 58 (Footnote 26): Pharmaecology (with ae ligature) to Pharmacology
+(Text-Book of Pharmacology)
+
+p. 70: Persel to Pernel (St. Pernel for agues), to match cited text
+
+p. 75: everyone to every one (every one of the senses)
+
+p. 76: Connolly to Conolly (Dr. Conolly Norman)
+
+pp. 86 (Footnote 63), and 130 (Footnote 107): Joli to Joly (H. Joly)
+
+p. 101 (Footnote 76): on to in (Studies in the Psychology of Sex)
+
+p. 114: is to are (Nor are the substantial facts)
+
+p. 123 (Footnote 96): Problem to Question (The Sexual Question)
+
+pp. 125, 128 (Footnote 105), and 287 (Index): Kraft-Ebing to
+Krafft-Ebing
+
+p. 127: Loudon to Loudun (Convent of Ursulines of Loudun)
+
+p. 127 (Footnote 104): of America to in North America (Jesuits in North
+America)
+
+p. 128: Alacocque to Alacoque (The blessed Mary Alacoque)
+
+p. 149 (Footnote 123): Life of St. Paul to Study of St. Paul
+
+p. 166 (Footnote 140): Churches to Church (Heard's description, Russian
+Church)
+
+p. 178: tatooing to tattooing (tattooing forms part of the religious
+ceremony)
+
+p. 182 (Footnote 151): missing 4 added in 241 (pp. 241-48)
+
+p. 209: Brahminism to Brahmanism (Brahmanism has its order of ascetics),
+to match cited text
+
+p. 209: missing close quote added (consecrated to Tezcatlipoca.")
+
+p. 249 (Footnote 188): Enenmoser to Ennemoser (is given by Ennemoser)
+
+p. 250 (Footnote 190): A. Williams, The Superstition of Witchcraft to H.
+Williams, The Superstitions of Witchcraft
+
+p. 251 (Footnote 191): History to Narratives (Narratives of Sorcery and
+Magic)
+
+p. 255: Burroughes to Burroughs (George Burroughs)
+
+pp. 263, 264: Tacy to Pacy (Elizabeth and Deborah Pacy)
+
+p. 286 (Index): Ireland, Dr. W. H. to Ireland, Dr. W. W.
+
+p. 286 (Index): Millman, H. H. to Milman, H. H.
+
+Irregularities in hyphenation (e.g. supernormal vs. super-normal) and
+misquotations have not been corrected. Unless it was found that the
+error also occurred in the cited text, misspellings have been corrected.
+
+Although Footnote 81 (originally on p. 104) refers to a "note at the end
+of this chapter," the "NOTE TO PAGE 104" begins on p. 110, several pages
+before the chapter ends. This has not been changed.
+
+Footnotes markers have been changed from symbols (in the original) to
+numerals.
+
+For the plain text versions, an oe-ligature has been changed to oe
+(Coelestia). For the ASCII version, the following accents and symbols
+have been removed or changed: ae ligatures to ae or AE (aeons,
+aesthetic, Agapae, Agapetae, anaesthetic, archaeologist, Caesar,
+formulae, hyperaesthesia, Irenaeus, Manichaean(s), primae, AEsculapius);
+a grave to a (Pierre-a-Croquettes, Thomas a Beckett); c cedilla to c
+(Francois); e acute to e (autos-da-fe, Medard); e grave to e (bayaderes,
+Treves); e circumflex to e (Pecheurs); o umlaut to oe (Koenigsberg); u
+umlaut to ue (Wuerzburg); pound sign to L.]
+
+
+
+
+
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