was the whole of
the religion of the negroes (p. 61). Mr. Mueller then goes on to prove
that 'no religion consists of fetichism only,' choosing his examples
of higher elements in negro religion from the collections of Waitz. It
is difficult to see what bearing this has on his argument. De Brosses
(p. 20) shows that _he_, at least, was well aware that many negro
tribes have higher conceptions of the Deity than any which are
implied in fetich-worship. Even if no tribe in the world is
exclusively devoted to fetiches, the argument makes no progress.
Perhaps no extant tribe is in the way of using unpolished stone
weapons and no others, but it does not follow that unpolished stone
weapons are not primitive. It is just as easy to maintain that the
purer ideas have, by this time, been reached by aid of the
stepping-stones of the grosser, as that the grosser are the corruption
of the purer. Mr. Max Mueller constantly asserts that the 'human mind
advanced by small and timid steps from what is intelligible, to what
is at first sight almost beyond comprehension' (p. 126). Among the
objects which aided man to take these small and timid steps, he
reckons rivers and trees, which excited, he says, religious awe. What
he will not suppose is that the earliest small and timid steps were
not unaided by such objects as the fetichist treasures--stones,
shells, and so forth, which suggest no idea of infinity. Stocks he
will admit, but not, if he can help it, stones, of the sort that
negroes and Kanekas and other tribes use as fetiches. His reason is,
that he does not see how the scraps of the fetichist can appeal to the
feeling of the Infinite, which feeling is, in his theory, the basis of
religion.

After maintaining (what is readily granted) that negroes have a
religion composed of many elements, Mr. Mueller tries to discredit the
evidence about the creeds of savages, and discourses on the many
minute shades of progress which exist among tribes too often lumped
together as if they were all in the same condition. Here he will have
all scientific students of savage life on his side. It remains true,
however, that certain elements of savage practice, fetichism being one
of them, are practically ubiquitous. Thus, when Mr. Mueller speaks of
'the influence of public opinion' in biassing the narrative of
travellers, we must not forget that the strongest evidence about
savage practice is derived from the 'undesigned coincidence' of the
testimoni