ocate of human
immortality.]

[Footnote 5: For instance, the Kagoro of Northern Nigeria believe that
"a spirit may transmigrate into the body of a descendant born
afterwards, male or female; in fact, this is common, as is proved by the
likeness of children to their parents or grand-parents, and it is lucky,
for the ghost has returned, and has no longer any power to frighten the
relatives until the new body dies, and it is free again" (Major A. J. N.
Tremearne, "Notes on some Nigerian Head-hunters," _Journal of the R.
Anthropological Institute_, xlii. (1912) p. 159). Compare _Taboo and the
Perils of the Soul_, pp. 88 _sq._; _The Dying God_, p. 287 (p. 288,
Second Impression).]

LECTURE II

THE SAVAGE CONCEPTION OF DEATH

[Sidenote: The subject of these lectures is the belief in immortality
and the worship of the dead.]

Last day I explained the subject of which I propose to treat and the
method which I intend to follow in these lectures. I shall describe the
belief in immortality, or rather in the continued existence of the human
soul after death, as that belief is found among certain of the lower
races, and I shall give some account of the religion which has been
based upon it. That religion is in brief a propitiation or worship of
the human dead, who according to the degree of power ascribed to them by
the living are supposed to vary in dignity from the humble rank of a
mere common ghost up to the proud position of deity. The elements of
such a worship appear to exist among all races of men, though in some
they have been much more highly developed than in others.

[Sidenote: Preliminary account of savage beliefs concerning the nature
and origin of death.]

But before I address myself to the description of particular races, I
wish in this and the following lecture to give you some general account
of the beliefs of savages concerning the nature and origin of death. The
problem of death has very naturally exercised the minds of men in all
ages. Unlike so many problems which interest only a few solitary
thinkers this one concerns us all alike, since simpletons as well as
sages must die, and even the most heedless and feather-brained can
hardly help sometimes asking themselves what comes after death. The
question is therefore thrust in a practical, indeed importunate form on
our attention; and we need not wonder that in the long history of human
speculation some of the highest intellects should have occupie