ence._

The italics in the above passages are mine, and they serve to illustrate
how certain writers manage to introduce quite misleading conceptions to
their readers. It almost causes one to cease wondering at the
persistence of religion when one finds a writer accepting the results of
anthropological research, and at the same time claiming that savage
"intuitions" are confirmed by modern science. If that be true, then all
that Mr. Clodd has previously written must be dismissed as untrue. The
statement is, however, quite inaccurate. The inference drawn by the
savage is not supported by modern science. Neither on the existence of a
soul nor on the existence of a god, nor on the nature of disease, nor on
the causes of physical or psychical states has science confirmed the
"intuitions" (whatever that conveniently cloudy word may mean) of the
primitive savage. The acquisition of correct views would indeed be an
easy thing if they could be gained by the "intuitions" of an untaught
savage.

The assertion that "in some sense" natural forces must be alive (as
though there can be any real sense in a term except the right sense),
and that this inference is "supported by modern physics," is an
illustration of that playing with words which is fatal to exact thought.
The only sense in which the expression is used in physics is that of
"active," and both "active" and "alive" owe their vogue to the necessity
for controverting the older view that natural forces are "inert" or
"dead" and need some external force to produce anything. It is a mere
figure of speech; the evil is when it is taken and used as an exact
expression of scientific fact. Let a reader of Mr. Clodd ask himself
whether the life he thinks of when he speaks of forces being alive is
animal life, and he will at once see the absurdity of the statement. And
if he does not mean animal life, what life does he mean?

Putting on one side all such attempts at accommodation, we may safely
say that given the origin of religion in the manner indicated, one may
trace--at least in outline--the development of religion from the
primitive ghost worship up to the rituals and beliefs of current creeds.
I do not mean by this that _all_ religious beliefs and practices spring
directly from ghost worship. Once religion is established, and the
myth-making capacity let loose, additions are made that are due to all
sorts of causes. The Romans and Greeks, for example, seem to have
created a