his exploded assertion about 'godless tribes.' He says:
'The thoughts and principles of modern Christianity are attached to
intellectual clues which run back through far pre-Christian ages to the
very origin of human civilisation, _perhaps even of human existence_.'[9]
So far we abound in Mr. Tylor's sense. 'As a minimum definition of
religion' he gives 'the belief in spiritual beings,' which appears
'among all low races with whom we have attained to thoroughly intimate
relations.' The existence of this belief at present does not prove that no
races were ever, at any time, destitute of all belief. But it prevents us
from positing the existence of such creedless races, in any age, as a
demonstrated fact. We have thus, in short, no opportunity of observing,
_historically_, man's development from blank unbelief into even the
minimum or most rudimentary form of belief. We can only theorise and make
more or less plausible conjectures as to the first rudiments of human
faith in God and in spiritual beings. We find no race whose mind, as to
faith, is a _tabula rasa_.

To the earliest faith Mr. Tylor gives the name of _Animism_, a term not
wholly free from objection, though 'Spiritualism' is still less desirable,
having been usurped by a form of modern superstitiousness. This Animism,
'in its full development, includes the belief in souls and in a future
state, in controlling deities and subordinate spirits.' In Mr. Tylor's
opinion, as in Mr. Huxley's, Animism, in its lower (and earlier) forms,
has scarcely any connection with ethics. Its 'spirits' do not 'make for
righteousness.' This is a side issue to be examined later, but we may
provisionally observe, in passing, that the ethical ideas, such as they
are, even of Australian blacks are reported to be inculcated at the
religious mysteries (_Bora_) of the tribes, which were instituted by and
are performed in honour of the gods of their native belief. But this topic
must be reserved for our closing chapters.

Mr. Tylor, however, is chiefly concerned with Animism as 'an ancient and
world-wide philosophy, of which belief is the theory, and worship is the
practice.' Given Animism, then, or the belief in spiritual beings, as the
earliest form and minimum of religious faith, what is the origin of
Animism? It will be seen that, by Animism, Mr. Tylor does not mean the
alleged early theory, implicitly if not explicitly and consciously held,
that all things whatsoever are animated and a