heir feast. In some cases of
totem-clans the totem animal is sacrificed, and all the members of
the clan eat their animal ancestor (only on such a solemn occasion
could the totem be eaten), and so renew their bond of membership and
brotherhood. A covenant is made by sacrifice, to which the deity and
all the members of his people are parties.

[Footnote 2: I. 457 _sqq._]

To these primitive conceptions others no doubt should be added. The
mood was not always the same which prevailed when the tribe renewed
its union with its god; that depended on circumstances. In general
the sacrifice of early days is a joyous thing, but to a fierce god
cruel rites belonged. When cannibalism was practised it also was such
a primitive sacrifice, and the most powerful means, no doubt, of
cementing the union of the god with the members of the tribe. When
the god was noted for suffering, a tragic tone prevailed, and the
sacrifice might have a dramatic character and represent the leading
incident in the history of the god.

If we trace the history of sacrifice in any particular people we find
two opposite tendencies at work in connection with it. On the one
hand there is a disposition to smooth matters, to drop the harsher
practices, to let an animal victim suffice where a man used to be
sacrificed, to let the man off with some slight mutilation, such as
circumcision; or to allow poor people to offer a less costly victim
than the former custom claimed--the rite, in fact, becomes civilised,
and adapts itself to the feelings of a humaner period. On the other
hand there is a tendency to add to the value of the offerings, and to
reckon the efficacy of sacrifice by its cost and painfulness. In
periods of outward distress sacrifice attains a deeper earnestness,
nothing is to be left undone, and no cost to be spared to bring the
deity back to his people; darker customs which had become obsolete
are revived again,[3] the ceremonial is made more elaborate, new
kinds of sacrifice are introduced. The old social aspect of sacrifice
grows faint; it becomes a propitiation or a trespass-offering; the
notion is entertained that sacrifice is the more efficacious the more
it has cost, or the more magnificent and awful its mode of
presentation.

[Footnote 3: An instance of human sacrifice has just taken place in a
remote part of Russia.]

Prayer is the ordinary concomitant of sacrifice; the worshipper
explains the reason of the gift, and urges the deity