CONTENTS
Dedication
Preface
Table of Contents
[Lecture I.]—Introduction
Natural theology, three modes of handling it, the dogmatic, the philosophical, and the historical, pp. 1 sq.; the historical method followed in these lectures, 2 sq.; questions of the truth and moral value of religious beliefs irrelevant in an historical enquiry, 3 sq.; need of studying the religion of primitive man and possibility of doing so by means of the comparative method, 5 sq.; urgent need of investigating the native religion of savages before it disappears, 6 sq.; a portion of savage religion the theme of these lectures, 7 sq.; the question of a supernatural revelation dismissed, 8 sq.; theology and religion, their relations, 9; the term God defined, 9 sqq.; monotheism and polytheism, 11; a natural knowledge of God, if it exists, only possible through experience, 11 sq.; the nature of experience, 12 sq.; two kinds of experience, an inward and an outward, 13 sq.; the conception of God reached historically through both kinds of experience, 14; inward experience or inspiration, 14 sq.; deification of living men, 16 sq.; outward experience as a source of the idea of God, 17; the tendency to seek for causes, 17 sq.; the meaning of cause, 18 sq.; the savage explains natural processes by the hypothesis of spirits or gods, 19 sq.; natural processes afterwards explained by hypothetical forces and atoms instead of by hypothetical spirits and gods, 20 sq.; nature in general still commonly explained by the hypothesis of a deity, 21 sq.; God an inferential or hypothetical cause, 22 sq.; the deification of dead men, 23-25; such a deification presupposes the immortality of the human soul or rather its survival for a longer or shorter time after death, 25 sq.; the conception of human immortality suggested both by inward experience, such as dreams, and by outward experience, such as the resemblances of the living to the dead, 26-29; the lectures intended to collect evidence as to the belief in immortality among certain savage races, 29 sq.; the method to be descriptive rather than comparative or philosophical, 30.
[Lecture II.]—The Savage Conception of Death
The subject of the lectures the belief in immortality and the worship of the dead among certain of the lower races, p. 31; question of the nature and origin of death, 31 sq.; universal interest of the question, 32 sq.; the belief in immortality general among mankind, 33; belief of many savages that death is not natural and that they would never die if their lives were not cut prematurely short by sorcery, 33 sq.; examples of this belief among the South American Indians, 34 sqq.; death sometimes attributed to sorcery and sometimes to demons, practical consequence of this distinction, 37; belief in sorcery as the cause of death among the Indians of Guiana, 38 sq., among the Tinneh Indians of North America, 39 sq., among the aborigines of Australia, 40-47, among the natives of the Torres Straits Islands and New Guinea, 47, among the Melanesians, 48, among the Malagasy, 48 sq., and among African tribes, 49-51; effect of such beliefs in thinning the population by causing multitudes to die for the imaginary crime of sorcery, 51-53; some savages attribute certain deaths to other causes than sorcery, 53; corpse dissected to ascertain cause of death, 53 sq.; the possibility of natural death admitted by the Melanesians and the Caffres of South Africa, 54-56; the admission marks an intellectual advance, 56 sq.; the recognition of ghosts or spirits, apart from sorcery, as a cause of disease and death also marks a step in moral and social progress, 57 sq.
[Lecture III.]—Myths of the Origin of Death
Belief of savages in man's natural immortality, p. 59; savage stories of the origin of death, 59 sq.; four types of such stories:—
(1) The Story of the Two Messengers.—Zulu story of the chameleon and the lizard, 60 sq.; Akamba story of the chameleon and the thrush, 61 sq.; Togo story of the dog and the frog, 62 sq.; Ashantee story of the goat and the sheep, 63 sq.
(2) The Story of the Waxing and Waning Moon.—Hottentot story of the moon, the hare, and death, 65; Masai story of the moon and death, 65 sq.; Nandi story of the moon, the dog, and death, 66; Fijian story of the moon, the rat, and death, 67; Caroline, Wotjobaluk, and Cham stories of the moon, death, and resurrection, 67; death and resurrection after three days suggested by the reappearance of the new moon after three days, 67 sq.
(3) The Story of the Serpent and his Cast Skin.—New Britain and Annamite story of immortality, the serpent, and death, 69 sq.; Vuatom story of immortality, the lizard, the serpent, and death, 70; Nias story of immortality, the crab, and death, 70; Arawak and Tamanchier stories of immortality, the serpent, the lizard, the beetle, and death, 70 sq.; Melanesian story of the old woman and her cast skin, 71 sq.; Samoan story of the shellfish, two torches, and death, 72.
(4) The Story of the Banana.—Poso story of immortality, the stone, the banana, and death, 72 sq.; Mentra story of immortality, the banana, and death, 73.
Primitive philosophy in the stories of the origin of death, 73 sq.; Bahnar story of immortality, the tree, and death, 74; rivalry for the boon of immortality between men and animals that cast their skins, such as serpents and lizards, 74 sq.; stories of the origin of death told by Chingpaws, Australians, Fijians, and Admiralty Islanders, 75-77; African and American stories of the fatal bundle or the fatal box, 77 sq.; Baganda story how death originated through the imprudence of a woman, 78-81; West African story of Death and the spider, 81-83; Melanesian story of Death and the Fool, 83 sq.
Thus according to savages death is not a natural necessity, 84; similar view held by some modern biologists, as A. Weismann and A. R. Wallace, 84-86.
[Lecture IV.]—The Belief in Immortality among the Aborigines of Central Australia
In tracing the evolution of religious beliefs we must begin with those of the lowest savages, p. 87; the aborigines of Australia the lowest savages about whom we possess accurate information, 88; savagery a case of retarded development, 88 sq.; causes which have retarded progress in Australia, 89 sq.; the natives of Central Australia on the whole more primitive than those of the coasts, 90 sq.; little that can be called religion among them, 91 sq.; their theory that the souls of the dead survive and are reborn in their descendants, 92 sq.; places where the souls of the dead await rebirth, and the mode in which they enter into women, 93 sq.; local totem centres, 94 sq.; totemism defined, 95; traditionary origin of the local totem centres (oknanikilla) where the souls of the dead assemble, 96; sacred birth-stones or birth-sticks (churinga) which the souls of ancestors are thought to have dropped at these places, 96-102; elements of a worship of the dead, 102 sq.; marvellous powers attributed to the remote ancestors of the alcheringa or dream times, 103 sq.; the Wollunqua, a mythical water-snake, ancestor of a totemic clan of the Warramunga tribe, 104-106; religious character of the belief in the Wollunqua, 106.
[Lecture V.]—The Belief in Immortality among the Aborigines of Central Australia (continued)
Beliefs of the Central Australian aborigines concerning the reincarnation of the dead, p. 107; possibility of the development of ancestor worship, 107 sq.; ceremonies performed by the Warramunga in honour of the Wollunqua, the mythical ancestor of one of their totem clans, 108 sqq.; union of magic and religion in these ceremonies, 111 sq.; ground drawings of the Wollunqua, 112 sq.; importance of the Wollunqua in the evolution of religion and art, 113 sq.; how totemism might develop into polytheism through an intermediate stage of ancestor worship, 114 sq.; all the conspicuous features of the country associated by the Central Australians with the spirits of their ancestors, 115-118; dramatic ceremonies performed by them to commemorate the deeds of their ancestors, 118 sq.; examples of these ceremonies, 119-122; these ceremonies were probably in origin not merely commemorative or historical but magical, being intended to procure a supply of food and other necessaries, 122 sq.; magical virtue actually attributed to these dramatic ceremonies by the Warramunga, who think that by performing them they increase the food supply of the tribe, 123 sq.; hence the great importance ascribed by these savages to the due performance of the ancestral dramas, 124; general attitude of the Central Australian aborigines to their dead, and the lines on which, if left to themselves, they might have developed a regular worship of the dead, 124-126.
[Lecture VI.]—The Belief in Immortality among the other Aborigines of Australia
Evidence for the belief in reincarnation among the natives of other parts of Australia than the centre, p. 127; beliefs of the Queensland aborigines concerning the nature of the soul and the state of the dead, 127-131; belief of the Australian aborigines that their dead are sometimes reborn in white people, 131-133; belief of the natives of South-Eastern Australia that their dead are not born again but go away to the sky or some distant country, 133 sq.; beliefs and customs of the Narrinyeri concerning the dead, 134 sqq.; motives for the excessive grief which they display at the death of their relatives, 135 sq.; their pretence of avenging the death of their friends on the guilty sorcerer, 136 sq.; magical virtue ascribed to the hair of the dead, 137 sq.; belief that the dead go to the sky, 138 sq.; appearance of the dead to the living in dreams, 139; savage faith in dreams, 139 sq.; association of the stars with the souls of the dead, 140; creed of the South-Eastern Australians touching the dead, 141; difference of this creed from that of the Central Australians, 141; this difference probably due in the main to a general advance of culture brought about by more favourable natural conditions in South-Eastern Australia, 141 sq.; possible influence of European teaching on native beliefs, 142 sq.; vagueness and inconsistency of native beliefs as to the state of the dead, 143; custom a good test of belief, 143 sq.; burial customs of the Australian aborigines as evidence of their beliefs concerning the state of the dead, 144; their practice of supplying the dead with food, water, fire, weapons, and implements, 144-147; motives for the destruction of the property of the dead, 147 sq.; great economic loss entailed by developed systems of sacrificing to the dead, 149.
[Lecture VII.]—The Belief in Immortality among the Aborigines of Australia (concluded)
Huts erected on graves for the use of the ghosts, pp. 150-152; the attentions paid by the Australian aborigines to their dead probably spring from fear rather than affection, 152; precautions taken by the living against the dangerous ghosts of the dead, 152 sq.; cuttings and brandings of the flesh of the living in honour of the dead, 154-158; the custom of allowing the blood of mourners to drip on the corpse or into the grave may be intended to strengthen the dead for a new birth, 158-162; different ways of disposing of the dead according to the age, rank, manner of death, etc., of the deceased, 162 sq.; some modes of burial are intended to prevent the return of the spirit, others are designed to facilitate it, 163-165; final departure of the ghost supposed to coincide with the disappearance of the flesh from his bones, 165 sq.; hence a custom has arisen in many tribes of giving the bones a second burial or otherwise disposing of them when the flesh is quite decayed, 166; tree-burial followed by earth-burial in some Australian tribes, 166-168; general conclusion as to the belief in immortality and the worship of the dead among the Australian aborigines, 168 sq.
[Lecture VIII.]—The Belief in Immortality among the Natives of the Torres Straits Islands
Racial affinities of the Torres Straits Islanders, pp. 170 sq.; their material and social culture, 171 sq.; no developed worship of the dead among them, 172 sq.; their fear of ghosts, 173-175; home of the dead a mythical island in the west, 175 sq.; elaborate funeral ceremonies of the Torres Straits Islanders characterised by dramatic representations of the dead and by the preservation of their skulls, which were consulted as oracles, 176.
Funeral ceremonies of the Western Islanders, 177-180; part played by the brothers-in-law of the deceased at these ceremonies, 177 sq.; removal of the head and preparation of the skull for use in divination, 178 sq.; great death-dance performed by masked men who personated the deceased, 179 sq.
Funeral ceremonies of the Eastern Islanders, 180-188; soul of the dead carried away by a masked actor, 181 sq.; dramatic performance by disguised men representing ghosts, 182 sq.; blood and hair of relatives offered to the dead, 183 sq.; mummification of the corpse, 184; costume of mourners, 184; cuttings for the dead, 184 sq.; death-dance by men personating ghosts, 185-188; preservation of the mummy and afterwards of the head or a wax model of it to be used in divination, 188.
Images of the gods perhaps developed out of mummies of the dead, and a sacred or even secular drama developed out of funeral dances, 189.
[Lecture IX.]—The Belief in Immortality Among the Natives Of British New Guinea
The two races of New Guinea, the Papuan and the Melanesian, pp. 190 sq.; beliefs and customs of the Motu concerning the dead, 192; the Koita and their beliefs as to the human soul and the state of the dead, 193-195; alleged communications with the dead by means of mediums, 195 sq.; fear of the dead, especially of a dead wife, 196 sq.; beliefs of the Mafulu concerning the dead, 198; their burial customs, 198 sq.; their use of the skulls and bones of the dead at a great festival, 199-201; worship of the dead among the natives of the Aroma district, 201 sq.; the Hood Peninsula, 202 sq.; beliefs and customs concerning the dead among the natives of the Hood Peninsula, 203-206; seclusion of widows and widowers, 203 sq.; the ghost-seer, 204 sq.; application of the juices of the dead to the persons of the living, 205; precautions taken by manslayers against the ghosts of their victims, 205 sq.; purification for homicide originally a mode of averting the angry ghost of the slain, 206; beliefs and customs concerning the dead among the Massim of south-eastern New Guinea, 206-210; Hiyoyoa, the land of the dead, 207; purification of mourners by bathing and shaving, 207 sq.; foods forbidden to mourners, 208 sq.; fires on the grave, 209; the land of the dead, 209 sq.; names of the dead not mentioned, 210; beliefs and customs concerning the dead among the Papuans of Kiwai, 211-214; Adiri, the land of the dead, 211-213; appearance of the dead to the living in dreams, 213 sq.; offerings to the dead, 214; dreams as a source of the belief in immortality, 214.
[Lecture X.]—The Belief in Immortality among the Natives of German New Guinea
Andrew Lang, pp. 216 sq.; review of preceding lectures, 217 sq.
The Papuans of Tumleo, their material culture, 218-220; their temples, 220 sq.; their bachelors' houses containing the skulls of the dead, 221; spirits of the dead as the causes of sickness and disease, 222 sq.; burial and mourning customs, 223 sq.; fate of the human soul after death, 224; monuments to the dead, 225; disinterment of the bones, 225; propitiation of ghosts and spirits, 226; guardian-spirits in the temples, 226 sq.
The Monumbo of Potsdam Harbour, 227 sq.; their beliefs concerning the spirits of the dead, 228 sq.; their fear of ghosts, 229; their treatment of manslayers, 229 sq.
The Tamos of Astrolabe Bay, 230; their ideas as to the souls of the dead, 231 sq.; their fear of ghosts, 232 sqq.; their Secret Society and rites of initiation, 233; their preservation of the jawbones of the dead, 234 sq.; their sham fights after a death, 235 sq.; these fights perhaps intended to throw dust in the eyes of the ghost, 236 sq.
[Lecture XI.]—The Belief in Immortality among the Natives of German New Guinea (continued)
The Papuans of Cape King William, pp. 238 sq.; their ideas as to spirits and the souls of the dead, 239 sq.; their belief in sorcery as a cause of death, 240 sq.; their funeral and mourning customs, 241 sq.; the fate of the soul after death, 242.
The Yabim of Finsch Harbour, their material and artistic culture, 242 sq.; their clubhouses for men, 243; their beliefs as to the state of the dead, 244 sq.; the ghostly ferry, 244 sq.; transmigration of human souls into animals, 245; the return of the ghosts, 246; offerings to ghosts, 246; ghosts provided with fire, 246 sq.; ghosts help in the cultivation of land, 247 sq.; burial and mourning customs, 248 sq.; divination to discover the sorcerer who has caused a death, 249 sq.; bull-roarers, 250; initiation of young men, 250 sqq.; the rite of circumcision, the novices supposed to be swallowed by a monster, 251 sq.; the return of the novices, 253; the essence of the initiatory rites seems to be a simulation of death and resurrection, 253 sqq.; the new birth among the Akikuyu of British East Africa, 254.
[Lecture XII.]—The Belief in Immortality among the Natives of German New Guinea (continued)
The Bukaua of Huon Gulf, their means of subsistence and men's clubhouses, pp. 256 sq.; their ideas as to the souls of the dead, 257; sickness and death caused by ghosts and sorcerers, 257 sq.; fear of the ghosts of the slain, 258; prayers to ancestral spirits on behalf of the crops, 259; first-fruits offered to the spirits of the dead, 259; burial and mourning customs, 259 sq.; initiation of young men, novices at circumcision supposed to be swallowed and afterwards disgorged by a monster, 260 sq.
The Kai, a Papuan tribe of mountaineers inland from Finsch Harbour, 262; their country, mode of agriculture, and villages, 262 sq.; observations of a German missionary on their animism, 263 sq.; the essential rationality of the savage, 264-266; the Kai theory of the two sorts of human souls, 267 sq.; death commonly thought to be caused by sorcery, 268 sq.; danger incurred by the sorcerer, 269; many hurts and maladies attributed to the action of ghosts, 269 sq.; capturing lost souls, 270 sq.; ghosts extracted from the body of a sick man or scraped from his person, 271; extravagant demonstrations of grief at the death of a sick man, 271-273; hypocritical character of these demonstrations, which are intended to deceive the ghost, 273; burial and mourning customs, preservation of the lower jawbone and one of the lower arm bones, 274; mourning costume, seclusion of widow or widower, 274 sq.; widows sometimes strangled to accompany their dead husbands, 275; house or village deserted after a death, 275.
[Lecture XIII.]—The Belief in Immortality among the Natives of German New Guinea (continued)
The Kai (continued), their offerings to the dead, p. 276; divination by means of ghosts to detect the sorcerer who has caused a death, 276-278; avenging the death on the sorcerer and his people, 278 sq.; precautions against the ghosts of the slain, 279 sq.; attempts to deceive the ghosts of the murdered, 280-282; pretence of avenging the ghost of a murdered man, 282; fear of ghosts by night, 282 sq.; services rendered by the spirits of the dead to farmers and hunters, 283-285; the journey of the soul to the spirit land, 285 sq.; life of the dead in the other world, 286 sq.; ghosts die the second death and turn into animals, 287; ghosts of famous people invoked long after their death, 287-289; possible development of ghosts into gods, 289 sq.; lads at circumcision supposed to be swallowed and disgorged by a monster, 290 sq.
The Tami Islanders of Huon Gulf, 291; their theory of a double human soul, a long one and a short one, 291 sq.; departure of the short soul for Lamboam, the nether world of the dead, 292; offerings to the dead, 292; appeasing the ghost, 292 sq.; funeral and mourning customs, dances in honour of the dead, offerings thrown into the fire, 293 sq.; bones of the dead dug up and kept in the house for a time, 294 sq.
[Lecture XIV.]—The Belief in Immortality among the Natives of German and Dutch New Guinea
The Tami Islanders of Huon Gulf (continued), their doctrine of souls and gods, pp. 296 sq.; dances of masked men representing spirits, 297; worship of ancestral spirits and offerings to them, 297 sq.; life of the souls in Lamboam, the nether world, 299 sq.; evocation of ghosts by the ghost-seer, 300; sickness caused by ghosts, 300 sq.; novices at circumcision supposed to be swallowed and disgorged by a monster, 301 sq.; meaning of the bodily mutilations inflicted on young men at puberty obscure, 302 sq. The natives of Dutch New Guinea, 303-323; the Noofoors of Geelvink Bay, their material culture and arts of life, 303-305; their fear and worship of the dead, 305-307; wooden images (korwar) of the dead kept in the houses and carried in canoes to be used as oracles, 307 sq.; the images consulted in sickness and taken with the people to war, 308-310; offerings to the images, 310 sq.; souls of those who have died away from home recalled to animate the images, 311; skulls of the dead, especially of firstborn children and of parents, inserted in the images, 312 sq.; bodies of young children hung on trees, 312 sq.; mummies of dead relatives kept in the houses, 313; seclusion of mourners and restrictions on their diet, 313 sq.; tattooing in honour of the dead, 314; teeth and hair of the dead worn by relatives, 314 sq.; rebirth of parents in their children, 315.
The natives of islands off the west coast of New Guinea, their wooden images of dead ancestors and shrines for the residence of the ancestral spirits, 315 sq.; their festivals in honour of the dead, 316; souls of ancestors supposed to reside in the images and to protect the house and household, 317.
The natives of the Macluer Gulf, their images and bowls in honour of the dead, 317 sq.
The natives of the Mimika district, their burial and mourning customs, their preservation of the skulls of the dead, and their belief in ghosts, 318.
The natives of Windessi, their burial customs, 318 sq.; divination after a death, 319; mourning customs, 319 sq.; festival of the dead, 320 sq.; wooden images of the dead, 321; doctrine of souls and of their fate after death, 321 sq.; medicine-men inspired by the souls of the dead, 322 sq.; ghosts of slain enemies driven away, 323.
[Lecture XV.]—The Belief in Immortality among the Natives of Southern Melanesia (New Caledonia)
The Melanesians in general, their material culture, p. 324; Southern Melanesia, the New Caledonians, and Father Lambert's account of them, 325; their ideas as to the spirit land and the way thither, 325 sq.; burial customs, 326; cuttings and brandings for the dead, 326 sq.; property of the dead destroyed, 327; seclusion of gravediggers and restrictions imposed on them, 327; sham fight in honour of the dead, 327 sq.; skulls of the dead preserved and worshipped on various occasions, such as sickness, fishing, and famine, 328-330; caves used as charnel-houses and sanctuaries of the dead in the Isle of Pines, 330-332; prayers and sacrifices to the ancestral spirits, 332 sq.; prayer-posts, 333 sq.; sacred stones associated with the dead and used to cause dearth or plenty, madness, a good crop of bread-fruit or yams, drought, rain, a good catch of fish, and so on, 334-338; the religion of the New Caledonians mainly a worship of the dead tinctured with magic, 338.
Evidence as to the natives of New Caledonia collected by Dr. George Turner, 339-342; material culture of the New Caledonians, 339; their burial customs, the skulls and nails of the dead preserved and used to fertilise the yam plantations, 339 sq.; worship of ancestors and prayers to the dead, 340; festivals in honour of the dead, 340 sq.; making rain by means of the skeletons of the dead, 341; execution of sorcerers, 341 sq.; white men identified with the spirits of the dead, 342.
[Lecture XVI.]—The Belief in Immortality among the Natives of Central Melanesia
Central Melanesia divided into two archipelagoes, the religion of the Western Islands (Solomon Islands) characterised by a worship of the dead, the religion of the Eastern Islands (New Hebrides, Banks' Islands, Torres Islands, Santa Cruz Islands) characterised by a worship of non-human spirits, pp. 343 sq.; Central Melanesian theory of the soul, 344 sq.; the land of the dead either in certain islands or in a subterranean region called Panoi, 345; ghosts of power and ghosts of no account, 345 sq.; supernatural power (mana) acquired through ghosts, 346 sq.
Burial customs in the Western Islands (Solomon Islands), 347 sqq.; land-burial and sea-burial, land-ghosts and sea-ghosts, 347 sq.; funeral feasts and burnt-offerings to the dead, 348 sq.; the land of the dead and the ghostly ferry, 350 sq.; ghosts die the second death and turn into the nests of white ants, 350 sq.; preservation of the skull and jawbone in order to ensure the protection of the ghost, 351 sq.; human heads sought in order to add fresh spiritual power (mana) to the ghost of a dead chief, 352.
Beliefs and customs concerning the dead in the Eastern Islands (New Hebrides, Banks' Islands, Torres Islands), 352 sqq.; Panoi, the subterranean abode of the dead, 353 sq.; ghosts die the second death, 354; different fates of the souls of the good and bad, 354 sq.; descent of the living into the world of the dead, 355; burial customs of the Banks' Islanders, 355 sqq.; dead sometimes temporarily buried in the house, 355; display of property beside the corpse and funeral oration, 355 sq.; sham burial of eminent men, 356; ghosts driven away from the village, 356-358; deceiving the ghosts of women who have died in child-bed, 358; funeral feasts, 358 sq.; funeral customs in the New Hebrides, 359 sqq.; the aged buried alive, 359 sq.; seclusion of mourners and restrictions on their diet, 360; sacrifice of pigs, 360 sq.; the journey of the ghost to the spirit land, 361 sq.; provisions made by the living for the welfare of the dead, 362.
Only ghosts of powerful men worshipped, 362 sq.; institution of the worship of a martial ghost, 363 sq.; offerings of food and drink to the dead, 364 sq.; sacrifice of pigs to ghosts in the Solomon Islands, 365 sq.
[Lecture XVII.]—The Belief in Immortality among the Natives of Central Melanesia (concluded)
Public sacrifices to ghosts in the Solomon Islands, pp. 367 sq.; offering of first-fruits to ghosts, 368 sq.; private ghosts as distinguished from public ghosts, 369 sq.; fighting ghosts kept as spiritual auxiliaries, 370; ghosts employed to make the gardens grow, 370 sq.; human sacrifices to ghosts, 371 sq.; vicarious and other sacrifices to ghosts at Saa in Malanta, 372 sq.; offerings of first-fruits to ghosts at Saa, 373 sq.; vicarious sacrifices offered for the sick to ghosts in Santa Cruz, 374; the dead represented by stocks in the houses, 374; native account of sacrifices in Santa Cruz, 374 sq.; prayers to the dead, 376 sq.; sanctuaries of ghosts in the Solomon Islands, 377-379; ghosts lodged in animals, birds, and fish, especially in sharks, 379 sq.
The belief in ghosts underlies the Melanesian conception of magic, 380 sq.; sickness commonly caused by ghosts and cured by ghost-seers, 381-384; contrast between Melanesian and European systems of medicine, 384; weather regulated by ghosts and spirits and by weather-doctors who have the ear of ghosts and spirits, 384-386; witchcraft or black magic wrought by means of ghosts, 386-388; prophets inspired by ghosts, 388 sq.; divination operating through ghosts, 389 sq.; taboos enforced by ghosts, 390 sq.; general influence which a belief in the survival of the soul after death has exercised on Melanesian life, 391 sq.
[Lecture XVIII.]—The Belief in Immortality among the Natives of Northern and Eastern Melanesia
The natives of Northern Melanesia or the Bismarck Archipelago (New Britain, New Ireland, etc.), their material culture, commercial habits, and want of regular government, pp. 393-395; their theory of the soul, 395 sq.; their fear of ghosts, 396; offerings to the dead, 396 sq.; burial customs, 397 sq.; preservation of the skulls, 398; customs and beliefs concerning the dead among the Sulka of New Britain, 398-400, among the Moanus of the Admiralty Islands, 400 sq. and among the natives of the Kaniet Islands, 401 sq.; natural deaths commonly attributed to sorcery, 402; divination to discover the sorcerer who caused the death, 402; death customs in the Duke of York Island, cursing the sorcerer, skulls preserved, feasts and dances, 403; prayers to the dead, 403 sq.; the land of the dead and the fate of the departed souls, hard lot of impecunious ghosts, 404-406.
The natives of Eastern Melanesia (Fiji), their material culture and political constitution, 406-408; means of subsistence, 408; moral character, 408 sq.; scenery of the Fijian islands, 409 sq.; the Fijian doctrine of souls, 410-412; souls of rascals caught in scarves, 412 sq.; fear of sorcery and precautions against it, 413 sq.; beneficial effect of the fear in enforcing habits of personal cleanliness, 414; fear of ghosts and custom of driving them away, 414 sq.; killing a ghost, 415 sq.; outwitting grandfather's ghost, 416; special relation of grandfather to grandchild, 416; grandfather's soul reborn in his grandchild, 417 sq.
[Lecture XIX.]—The Belief in Immortality among the Natives of Eastern Melanesia (Fiji) (continued)
Indifference of the Fijians to death, p. 419; their custom of killing the sick and aged with the consent of the victims, 419-424; their readiness to die partly an effect of their belief in immortality, 422 sq.; wives strangled or buried alive to accompany their husbands to the spirit land, 424-426; servants and dependants killed to attend their dead lords, 426; sacrifices of foreskins and fingers in honour of dead chiefs, 426 sq.; boys circumcised in order to save the lives of their fathers or fathers' brothers, 427; saturnalia attending such rites of circumcision, 427 sq.; the Nanga, or sacred enclosure of stones, dedicated to the worship of ancestors, 428 sq.; first-fruits of the yams offered to the ancestors in the Nanga, 429; initiation of young men in the Nanga, drama of death and resurrection, sacrament of food and water, 429-432; the initiation followed by a period of sexual licence, 433; the initiatory rites apparently intended to introduce the novices to the ancestral spirits and endow them with the powers of the dead, 434 sq.; the rites seem to have been imported into Fiji by immigrants from the west, 435 sq.; the licence attending these rites perhaps a reversion to primitive communism for the purpose of propitiating the ancestral spirits, 436 sq.; description of the Nanga or sacred enclosure of stones, 437 sq.; comparison with the cromlechs and other megalithic monuments of Europe, 438.
[Lecture XX.]—The Belief in Immortality among the Natives of Eastern Melanesia (Fiji) (concluded)
Worship of parents and other dead relations in Fiji, pp. 439 sq.; Fijian notion of divinity (kalou), 440; two classes of gods, namely, divine gods and human gods or deified men, 440 sq.; temples (bures) 441 sq.; worship at the temples, 443; priests (betes), their oracular inspiration by the gods, 443-446; human sacrifices on various occasions, such as building a house or launching a new canoe, 446 sq.; high estimation in which manslaughter was held by the Fijians, 447 sq.; consecration of manslayers and restrictions laid on them, probably from fear of the ghosts of their victims, 448 sq.; certain funeral customs based apparently on the fear of ghosts, 450 sqq.; persons who have handled a corpse forbidden to touch food with their hands, 450 sq.; seclusion of gravediggers, 451; mutilations, brandings, and fasts in honour of the dead, 451 sq.; the dead carried out of the house by a special opening to prevent the return of the ghost, 452-461; the other world and the way thither, 462 sqq.; the ghostly ferry, 462 sq.; the ghost and the pandanus tree, 463 sq.; hard fate of the unmarried dead, 464; the Killer of Souls, 464 sq.; ghosts precipitated into a lake, 465 sq.; Murimuria, an inferior sort of heaven, 466; the Fijian Elysium, 466 sq.; transmigration and annihilation, the few that are saved, 467.
Concluding observations, 467-471; strength and universality of the belief in immortality among savages, 468; the state of war among savage and civilised peoples often a direct consequence of the belief in immortality, 468 sq.; economic loss involved in sacrifices to the dead, 469; how does the savage belief in immortality bear on the truth or falsehood of that belief in general? 469; the answer depends to some extent on the view we take of human nature, 469-471; the conclusion left open, 471.
[Note.]—Myth of the Continuance of Death