Religion and Lust Part 1

Religion and l.u.s.t.

by James Weir.

PREFACE.

_In preparing The Psychical Correlation of Religious Emotion and s.e.xual Desire for its second edition, the author has incorporated in it a considerable amount of additional evidence in support of his theory. He has carefully verified all references; he has endeavored to eliminate all unnecessary material; and, finally, he has changed the style of the work by dividing it into three parts, thus greatly simplifying the text.

He feels under many obligations to his critics, both to those who thought his little book worthy of commendation, and to those who deemed his premises and conclusions erroneous. He feels grateful to the former, because they have caused him to believe that he has added somewhat to the literature of science; he thanks the latter, because in pointing out that which they considered untrue, they have forced him to a new and more searching study of the questions involved, thereby strengthening his belief in the truthfulness of his conclusions._

_To the second edition of The Psychical Correlation of Religious Emotion and s.e.xual Desire, the author has seen fit to add certain other essays.

In preparing these essays for publication, he has borrowed freely from his published papers, therefore, he desires to thank the publishers of the New York Medical Record, Century Magazine, Denver Medical Times, Charlotte Monthly and American Naturalist for granting him permission to use such of his published material (belonging to them) as he saw fit._

_The author asks the indulgence of the reader for certain repet.i.tions in the text. These have not been occasioned by any lack of data, but occur simply because he believes that an argument is rendered stronger and more convincing by the frequent use of the same data whenever and wherever it is possible to use them. When this plan is followed, the reader, so the author believes, becomes familiar with the author's line of thought, and is, consequently, better able to comprehend and appreciate his meaning._

_Finally, the author has been led to the publication of these essays by a firm belief in the truthfulness of the propositions advanced therein.

He may not live to see these propositions accepted, yet he believes that, in the future, perhaps, in worthier and more able hands, they will be so weightily and forcibly elaborated and advanced that their verity will be universally acknowledged._

_"Waveland," September 17, 1897._

PREFACE TO THIRD EDITION.

_The author, after mature consideration, has thought it advisable to confine the subject matter of the Third Edition of Religion and l.u.s.t almost wholly to the psychical correlation of religious emotion and s.e.xual desire. He has eliminated certain of the psychical problems embraced in the First and Second Editions and has added instead a bibliography. The student, he thinks, will find these changes of value, especially in the matter of reference. The author has also added certain data to the thesis of the work, as well as foot-notes; which, he thinks, will strengthen the deductions and conclusions therein enunciated. He has carefully and conscientiously edited and verified all notes and quotations to be found in the book and rests satisfied in the conviction that, whatever may be lacking in his little volume, it will not be "the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth."_

_"Waveland," Owensboro, Ky., Feb. 25, 1905._

CHAPTER I.

THE ORIGIN OF RELIGIOUS FEELING.

I believe that man originated his first ideas of the supernatural from the external phenomena of nature which were perceptible to one or more of his five senses; his first theogony was a natural one and one taken directly from nature. In ideation the primal bases of thought must have been founded, _ab initio_, upon sensual perceptions; hence, must have been materialistic and natural. Spencer, on the contrary, maintains that in man, "the first traceable conception of a supernatural being is the conception of a ghost."[1]

[1] Spencer: _Principles of Sociology_, vol. i, p. 281.

Primitive man's struggle for existence was so very severe that his limited sagacity was fully occupied in obtaining food and shelter; many thousands of years must have pa.s.sed away before he evolved any idea of weapons other than stones and clubs. When he arrived at a psychical acuteness that originated traps, spears, bows and arrows, his struggle for existence became easier and he had leisure to notice the various natural phenomena by which he was surrounded. Man evolved a belief in a G.o.d long before he arrived at a conception of a ghost, double, or soul.

He soon discovered that his welfare was mainly dependent on nature, consequently he began to propitiate nature, and finally ended by creating a system of theogony founded on nature alone.[A]

[A] "Theology and religion are of service in morals and conduct in direct proportion as they have become adapted to our knowledge of natural phenomena"--Lydston: _The Diseases of Society_, p. 68.

"It is an evident historical fact that man _first personified natural phenomena_, and then made use of these personifications to personify his own inward acts, his psychical ideas and conceptions. This was the necessary process, and external idols were formed before those which were internal and peculiar to himself."[2] Sun, moon, and star; mountain, hill, and dale; torrent, waterfall, and rill, all became to him distinct personalities, powerful beings, that might do him great harm or much good. He therefore endeavored to propitiate them, just as a dog endeavors to get the good will of man by abjectly crawling toward him on his belly and licking his feet. There was no element of true wors.h.i.+p in the propitiatory offerings of primitive man; in the beginning he was essentially a materialist--he became a spiritualist later on.

Man's first religion must have been, necessarily, a material one; he wors.h.i.+ped (propitiated) only that which he could see, or feel, or hear, or touch; his undeveloped psychical being could grasp nothing higher; his limited understanding could not frame an idea involving a spiritual element such as animism undoubtedly presents. Apropos of the dream birth of the soul, all terrestrial mammals dream, and in some of them, notably the dog and monkey, an observer can almost predicate the subject of their dreams by watching their actions while they are under dream influence; yet no animal save man, as far as we know, has ever evolved any idea of ghost or soul.[B] It may be said, on the other hand, that since animals show, unmistakably, that they are, in a measure, fully conscious of certain phenomena in the economy of nature, and while I am not prepared to state that any element of wors.h.i.+p enters into their regard, I yet believe that an infinitesimal increase in the development of their psychical beings would, undoubtedly, lead some of them to a natural religion such as our pithecoid ancestors practiced.

[2] t.i.to Vignoli: _Myth and Science_, p. 85.

[B] Clarke in his interesting book gives us some very readable stories anent the ability of animals seeing imaginary objects. I myself have seen a parrot with a marked case of _delirium tremens_, due to excessive use of alcoholic stimulants (Vid. Author: _The Dawn of Reason_). Romanes also gives valuable data in his _Mental Evolution_ (in Animal, and in Man) concerning this subject. The fox terrier (Vid. Author: _Dawn of Reason_) which carried his dreams into his awakened state is apropos.

The Egyptians noticed, over four thousand years ago, that cynocephali, the dog-headed apes of the Nile Valley, were in the habit of welcoming the rising sun with dancing and with howls of joy! "The habit of certain monkeys (cynocephali) a.s.sembling, as it were, in full court, and chattering noisily at sunrise and sunset, would almost justify the, as yet, uncivilized Egyptians in intrusting them with the charge of hailing the G.o.d morning and evening as he appeared in the east or pa.s.sed away in the west."[3] An English fox-terrier of my acquaintance is very much afraid of thunder or any noise simulating thunder. A load of coal rus.h.i.+ng through a chute into the coal cellar will send him, trembling and alarmed, to his hiding-place beneath a bed. This dog has never been shot over, nor has he, as far as I know, ever heard the sound of a gun.

I am confident that he considers the thunder as being supernatural, and that he would propitiate it, if he only knew how.

[3] Maspero (Sayce): _The Dawn of Civilization_, p. 103, and Maspero: _Etudes de Mythologie et d'Archiologie Egyptiennes_, vol.

ii, pp. 34, 35.

It is not probable that, at the present time, there exists a race of people which has not formulated an idea of ghost or soul; yet in ancient times, and up to a century or so ago, there existed many peoples who had not conceived any idea of ghosts or doubles.

According to Maspero, Sayce, Champollion, and other Egyptologists, the ancient Egyptians probably had a natural theogony long before they arrived at any idea of a double. In the beginning they treated the double or ghost with scant ceremony; it was only after many years that an element of wors.h.i.+p entered into their treatment of the ghosts of their dead ancestors. They believed, at first, that the double dwelt forever in the tomb along with the dead body; afterward, they evolved the idea that the double of the dead man journeyed to the "Islands of the Blessed," where it was judged by Osiris according to its merits.[4]

We have no reason for believing that the ancient Hebrews at the time of the Exodus had any knowledge of, or belief in, the existence of the soul or double, yet, that they did believe in the supernatural can not be questioned.[C] When Cook touched at Tierra del Fuego, he found a people in whom there existed mental habitudes but little above those to be found in the anthropoid apes. They had no knowledge whatever of the soul or double and but a dim concept of the powers of nature; they had not yet advanced far enough in psychical development to evolve any consistent form of natural theogony. They had only a shadowy concept of evil beings, powers of the air that inhabited the dense brakes of the forest, whom it would be dangerous to molest. Father Junipero Serra declares that when he first established the Mission Dolores, the Ahwashtees, Ohlones, Romanos, Altahmos, Tuolomos, and other Californian tribes had no word in their language for G.o.d, ghost, or devil.[5] The Inca Yupangui informed Balboa that there were many tribes in the interior which had no idea of ghost or soul.[6] Another writer says, that the Chirihuanas did not wors.h.i.+p anything either in heaven or on earth, and that they had no belief whatever in a future state.[7] Modern travelers have, however, found distinct evidences of phallic wors.h.i.+p in certain observances and customs of this tribe.[8]

[4] Maspero (Sayce): _The Dawn of Civilization_, p. 183 _et seq._

[C] That the patriarchs had their household G.o.ds, we have every reason for believing; these household G.o.ds were, however, tutelary divinities, such as were kept in the house of every Chaldean, and were not the images of ancestors. Rachel, the wife of Jacob, stole the household G.o.ds of Laban, her father, who is called a Syrian.

Abraham himself was a Chaldean. Gen. 11:31; also Gen. 31:19-20.

[5] Bancroft: _The Native Races of the Pacific States of North America_, vol. i, p. 400.

[6] Balboa: _History of Peru_.

[7] Garcila.s.so: _The Royal Commentaries of the Incas_.

[8] Browlow: _Travels_, p. 136.

Certain autochthons of India, when first discovered, were exceedingly immature in religious beliefs; they had neither G.o.d nor devil; they wandered through the woods subsisting on berries and fruits, and such small animals as their undeveloped and feeble sagacity allowed them to capture and slay. They did not even provide themselves with shelter, but, in pristine nakedness, roamed the forests of the Ghauts, animals but slightly above the anthropoid apes in point of intelligence. "In Central California we find," says Bancroft, "whole tribes subsisting on roots, herbs, and insects; having no boats, no clothing, no laws, no G.o.d."[9]

[9] Bancroft: _The Native Races of the Pacific States of North America_, vol. i, p. 400.

In the northwestern corner of the American continent there dwells a primitive race, which, for the sake of unification, I will style the Aleutians. When these people were first discovered they were in that state of social economics which they had reached after thousands of years of psychical and social evolution; a primitive people, such as our own ancestors were in the very beginning of civilization. The word civilization is used advisedly; civilization is comparative, and its degrees begin with the inception of man himself.

In their theogony, the Aleutians had arrived at an idea of the double or soul, thus showing that their religion had progressed several steps toward abstraction, that triumph of civilized religiosity; yet there remained enough veneration of natural objects to show that the origin of the religious feeling began, with them, in nature-propitiation. The bladder of the bear, which viscus, in the estimation of the Aleutians, is the seat of life, is at once suspended above the entrance of the _kachim_ or communal dwelling and wors.h.i.+ped by the hunter who has slain the beast from which it was taken. Moreover, when the bear falls beneath the weapons of an Aleutian, the man begs pardon of the beast and prays the latter to forgive him and to do him no harm. "A hunter who has struck a mortal blow generally remains within his hut for one or several days, according to the importance of the slain animal."[10] The first herring that is caught is showered with compliments and blessings; pompous t.i.tles are lavished upon it, and it is handled with the greatest respect and reverence; it is the herring-G.o.d![11]

[10] Reclus: _Primitive Folk_, p. 18.

[11] Dall: _Alaska and its Resources_, p. 96.

Sidne, chief G.o.d of the Aleutian theogony, on final a.n.a.lysis, is found to be the Earth, mother of all things. The _angakouts_, or priests, of this people individualize and deify, however, all the phenomena of nature; there are cloud-G.o.ds, sea-G.o.ds, river-G.o.ds, fire-G.o.ds, rain-G.o.ds, storm-G.o.ds, etc., etc., etc. Everywhere, throughout all nature, the Inoit, or Aleutian system of theology, penetrates, stripped, it is true, of much of its original materialism, yet retaining enough to show its undoubted origin in the sensual percepts, recepts, and concepts of its primal founders.

As I have observed above, the religion of these people has gained a certain degree of abstraction, and this abstraction is further shown by the presence of certain phallic rites and ceremonies in their religious observances; but of this, more anon.[D]

[D] In a letter to me, a naval officer of high rank states that, beyond question of doubt, the Aleutian priests keep male concubines whom they use in their religious observances. He, also, gives other evidences of phallic wors.h.i.+p among these people.

In most of the tribes of Equatorial Africa, nature-wors.h.i.+p has been superseded by ghost-wors.h.i.+p, devil-wors.h.i.+p, or witch-wors.h.i.+p, or, rather, by ghost, devil, or witch propitiation; yet, in the sanct.i.ty of the fetich, which is everywhere present, we see a relic of nature-wors.h.i.+p. Moreover, many of these tribes deify natural phenomena, such as the sun, the moon, the stars, thunder, lightning, etc., etc., etc., showing that here, too, in all probability, religious feeling had its origin in nature propitiation.

Abstraction also enters, to a certain extent, into the religious beliefs of most of these negroes, in whom primal materialism has given place to the unbridled superst.i.tion of crude spiritism. The curious habit these people have of sc.r.a.ping a little bone dust from the skull of a dead ancestor and then eating it with their food, thus, as they think, transmitting from the dead to the living the qualities of the former, is close kin to, and, in my opinion, is probably derived from, a wors.h.i.+p of the generative principle. When we take into consideration the fact that circ.u.mcision, _extensio c.l.i.toridis_, and other phallic rites are exceedingly common and prevalent among these negroes, this opinion has strong evidence in its support.[12]