nts become manifest; of this principle ideas respecting the
weather constitute good illustrations.

Students of this collection will be surprised by the number and vitality
of formulas and beliefs relative to the moon. It is probable that the
majority of the readers of the male sex will have no other associations
with the newly born moon than that poetic sentiment which delights in the
vision of the faint sickle silver through the twilight; if they possess
any further association with the planet, it is likely to be no more than
a vague dread of the effect of its radiance falling on a sleeper. Women,
on the contrary, will remember that the moon should be first seen not
"full face," but "over the the[TN-1] right shoulder;" they will be aware
that with such vision may be united a wish, to which jesting fancy
assigns a probability of accomplishment. But these, also, will be
surprised by the discovery that lunar divination is maintained with
profound seriousness, and that the honor paid to the orb is nothing else
than a continued worship, still connected with material blessings
expected from its bounty.

This record reveals the central principle and natural cause of moon
worship, by making clear the effect still ascribed to the variation of
the luminary. It is the night which is especially the season of primitive
worship; from times long antecedent to written history, as well among the
lowest savages as among tribes possessing the beginnings of civilization,
changes of the starry heavens have been the object of devout
contemplation and of reverent study. To the watcher it is the rapid
growth of the lunar crescent that is the most distinctive feature of
differences between the nights, an alteration which could not but be
supposed to exercise control over human and animal life. According to
natural processes of thought, it was inevitable that during the time when
it so rapidly increases, and becomes dominant in the sky, the principle
of growth should appear to prevail; and on the other hand, that the time
of lunar diminution should be the season of decay. Hence the conclusion,
probably prevalent in all times and countries, that designs and
undertakings which expect increase should belong to the new moon, and
that only operations which aim at the annihilation of existence should be
carried on during the waning quarter. In Hellenic antiquity, the dark of
the moon is mentioned as the suitable time for magical operations; for
suc