has formed no small part of the ethical history of the race, its echoes
remaining to the present day. In all religions it has been hard to bring
about an intelligent harmony between the moral and the ritual. Taboo was
not originally irrational--it sprang from the belief (rational for the
early time) in the presence of the supernatural in certain objects, and
this belief was held to be supported by early experience, according to
which it seemed that violations of taboo were followed by sickness or
death or other misfortunes. It came to be thought irrational with the
progress of knowledge and reflection.

+633+. Taboo, being a religious conception, has been adopted and
fostered by all popular systems of religion. It has been set aside not
by religion as such but by all the influences that have tended to
rationalize religion. Religious leaders have modified it so far as
modification has been demanded by public opinion. So enlightened and
spiritual minded a man as the apostle Paul declared that an unworthy
participation in the eucharistic celebration produced sickness and
death.[1050] Innumerable are the taboos that have passed silently into
oblivion.

+634+. Taboo, then, is a concomitant of man's moral life that has
sometimes opposed, sometimes coalesced with natural morality. Like all
widely extending institutions it has tended in part to weld men
together; like all irrational restrictions it has tended also to hold
men apart. Like all positive law it has fostered the sense of moral
obligation, but like all arbitrary law it has weakened the power of
intelligent and moral obedience. It has been not the guardian of
morality, but a temporary form (useful in a primitive stage of society)
in which a part of the moral law expressed itself. The real moral force
of society has been sympathetic social intercourse, which, under the
guidance of an implicit moral ideal, has been constantly employed in
trying to spiritualize or to reject those enactments of taboo that have
been proved by experience, observation, and reflection to be
injurious.[1051]

CHAPTER VI

GODS

+635+. The climax of the organization of external religion appears in
the conception of gods proper; this conception is always associated with
more or less well-developed institutions. Early religious life expresses
itself in ceremonies; the god is the embodiment of man's ideal of the
extrahuman power that rules the world. It is not always easy to
distingu