even when the delusion, as such, is exploded, the temper of mind induced by it persists.
Various other methods are employed to induce a feeling of religious exaltation. Prominent among these are dancing and singing. Dancing in connection with religious ceremonies is now generally outgrown in the civilised world, but singing is still the vogue. That is, singing is not, it must be remembered, practised from any desire to cultivate a love of music, although it may appeal to music-lovers. Still, its avowed purpose is to induce a feeling of devoutness in the congregation. The hypnotic consequences of a body of people singing in unison, or the soothing, mystical effect of certain airs from a choir upon a congregation, are recognised in practice if not in theory. This is a phenomenon that is not, of course, exclusively associated with religion. In this as in other instances religion only utilises the ordinary qualities of human nature. But in all cases the purpose and the result are the same. That is, the subject is placed for the time being in a supernormal condition, and the mild state of passivity or enthusiasm created makes him more susceptible to the influence brought to bear upon him. This is true of religious singing and chanting, from the forest gatherings of the primitive savage down to the more sedate and elaborate assemblages in church or chapel.
Primitive dancing had both a sexual and religious significance, although, as will be seen later, in the primitive mind the sexual functions themselves are very closely associated with supernatural agency. Tylor is of opinion that originally men and women dance in order to express their feelings and wishes,[27]
but it is certain it very early and universally became associated with religious ceremonies, and that because of the ecstasy induced. In some cases drug-taking and dancing go together. In others, reliance is placed on dancing alone. This latter is the case with the 'devil dancers' of Ceylon. In Africa the witch doctor discovers who has been guilty of sorcery by the aid of inspiration furnished during a dance. The whirling dance of the Eastern dervish is well known. Dancing also figures in the Bible. The Jews danced around the golden calf (Ex. xxxii. 19) in a state of nudity. David, too, danced naked before the Lord. Dancing was also part of the religious ceremonies attendant on the worship of Dionysos or Bacchus.[28] Along with the drinking of certain vegetable decoctions, dancing formed an important part of the witches' saturnalia during the medieval period. When in a state of frenzy, partly drug induced and partly the product of exhilaration caused by wild dancing, visions of Satan followed. In the dancing mania of the fourteenth century, the sufferers saw visions of heaven opened, with Jesus and the Virgin enthroned. Dancing was one of the prominent characteristics of the French Convulsionnaires in the eighteenth century. In more recent times we have the dancing and singing connected with the Methodist revival. In modern instances the dancing seems to have been consequent on religious excitement rather than precedent to it, but in earlier times there is no doubt that it was deliberately practised as a means of producing a state of exaltation.
Among the commonest methods of inducing a sense
of religious exaltation is the practice of fasting. In various guises, this is the most persistent form of religious self-torture. Amongst more civilised people the reason given for fasting is that it is a form of repentance, the genuineness of which is attested by voluntary punishment. But originally there seems little reason to doubt that it was adopted for a different purpose. It was valued not because the fasting person felt that he had done anything for which it was necessary to repent, but because it was believed to bring people into closer touch with the spiritual world. There is, of course, a very obvious reason for this belief. A lowered vitality is favourable to hallucinations of every description. A shipwrecked sailor is placed, by no act of his own, in precisely the same condition as is the primitive medicine man or the medieval saint by his own volition. It has always been recognised, and by none more readily than by the great religious teachers of the world, that a well-nourished body is inimical to what they chose to term "spiritual development." The historic Christian outcry against fleshly indulgence has much more in it than a revolt against mere sensualism. A well-fed body has been deprecated because it closed the avenue to spiritual illumination. Hence it is that fasting has found such favour in all religious systems. The ascetic saw more because, by reducing the body to an abnormal state, he provided the conditions for seeing more. The Zulu maxim, "A stuffed body cannot see secret things," really expresses in a sentence the philosophy of the matter.
Among the Blackfoot Indians of North America, when a boy reaches puberty he is sent away from
his father's lodge in search of a spiritual protector or totem. Seeking a secluded spot, he abstains from food until he is favoured in a dream with a vision of some animal or bird, which is at once adopted by him.[29] This custom obtains with most of the North American tribes. Among these tribes, also, the soothsayer prepares himself by fasting for the ecstatic state in which the spirits give their messages through him. The ordinary member of the tribe who wants anything will fast until he is assured in a dream that it will be granted him. Similarly, the Malay, to procure supernatural intercourse, retires to the jungle and abstains from food. The Zulu doctor prepares for intercourse with the tribal spirits by spare diet or solitary fasts. Fasting is part of the ordinary regimen of the Hindu yogi. Of certain Indian tribes we are told that before proceeding on an expedition they "observe a rigorous fast, or rather abstain from every kind of food for four days. In this interval their imagination is exalted to delirium; whether it be through bodily weakness or the natural effect of delirium, they pretend to have strange visions. The elders and sages of the tribe, being called upon to interpret these dreams, draw from them omens more or less favourable to the success of the enterprise; and their explanations are received as oracles, by which the expedition will be faithfully regulated."[30] Amongst the Samoans, when rain was required, the priests blackened themselves all over, exhumed a dead body, took the skeleton to a cave and poured water over it. They had to fast and remain in the cave until it rained. Sometimes they
died under the experiment, but they generally chose the showery months for their rain-making.[31]
In both the Old and New Testaments fasting figures largely. The encounter of Jesus with Satan is preceded by a forty days' fast. St. Catherine of Sienna began regular fasts at a very early age. Santa Teresa kept lengthy fasts every year. The fasting of the monks and nuns during the epidemic period of monasticism is too well known to call for more than a mere reference. Perhaps the most curious religious reason given for fasting is that cited by a writer from a monkish chronicler:—