fit.

Now the trouble with anthropologists is to find a working definition
of religion on which they can agree. Christianity is religion, all
would have to admit. Again, Mahomedanism is religion, for all
anthropological purposes. But, when a naked savage "dances" his
god--when the spoken part of the rite simply consists, as amongst the
south-eastern Australians, in shouting "Daramulun! Daramulun!" (the
god's name), so that we cannot be sure whether the dancers are indulging
in a prayer or in an incantation--is that religion? Or, worse still,
suppose that no sort of personal god can be discovered at the back
of the performance--which consists, let us say, as amongst the central
Australians, in solemnly rubbing a bull-roarer on the stomach, so that
its mystic virtues may cause the man to become "good" and "glad" and
"strong" (for that is his own way of describing the spiritual
effects)--is that religion, in any sense that can link it historically
with, say, the Christian type of religion?

No, say some, these low-class dealings with the unseen are magic, not
religion. The rude folk in question do not go the right way about
putting themselves into touch with the unseen. They try to put pressure
on the unseen, to control it. They ought to conciliate it, by bowing
to its will. Their methods may be earnest, but they are not propitiatory.
There is too much "My will be done" about it all.

Unfortunately, two can play at this game of _ex-parte_ definition.
The more unsympathetic type of historian, relentlessly pursuing the
clue afforded by this distinction between control and conciliation,
professes himself able to discover plenty of magic even in the higher
forms of religion. The rite as such--say, churchgoing as such--appears
to be reckoned by some of the devout as not without a certain intrinsic
efficacy. "Very well," says this school, "then a good deal of average
Christianity is magic."

My own view, then, is that this distinction will only lead us into
trouble. And, to my mind, it adds to the confusion if it be further
laid down, as some would do, that this sort of dealing with the unseen
which, on the face of it, and according to our notions, seems rather
mechanical (being, as it were, an effort to get a hold on some hidden
force) is so far from being akin to religion that its true affinity
is with natural science. The natural science of to-day, I quite admit,
has in part evolved out of experiments with the occult; jus