Conclusive evidence of this is offered by language. From the abundant material at hand let us choose three examples, widely separated, one from the Dakotan stock of North American Indians, one from the ancient Peruvians, and one from the South Sea Islanders.
The hidden and mysterious power of the universe is expressed in the Dakotan dialects by the word wakan. This term expresses infinite will; it is, as Miss Fletcher tells us, “the deification of that peculiar quality or power of which man is conscious within himself as directing his own acts or willing a course to bring about certain results.” From the word wacin, will, are derived the terms for what we call “telepathy,” a belief in which is nigh universal in primitive cults; for intelligence or mentality; and for the sacred dance.[50]
While the meaning of wakan in Dakota is well defined, its derivation is uncertain. It is singular that precisely the same word with the same meaning reappears in the Quichua and Aymara languages of the interior of Peru. It is there applied to everything which is extraordinary or immense, out of the course of nature, and especially to everything sacred or divine. It was not a deity, but expressed the deific power believed to be present in men, animals, or things.[51]
The identity of the two words is probably no mere coincidence, nor is the one borrowed from the other. In Quichua wakan expresses the sound characteristic of any animal, as allco wakan, the dog howls, huallpa wakan the cock crows, and this in turn is derived from the interjection of surprise or astonishment or admiration, hua. It was that which was employed in the sacred invocations.
Strange as it may seem, the English word “God” is traced by Aryan scholars through the Gothic guth to the Sanscrit verb hua to call upon, to invoke (past participle, hutha), the same primitive interjection in verbal form; and the holy name of the Hebrews, Yahve, is now believed to be that of the Chaldean god of the earth, waters, and fertility, in whose name Eā, Ya, or Yah, we recognize a cognate interjection or refrain, the same which, shouted in the orgiastic rites, gave the name, Bacchus or Iachus.[52]
Turning to the island world of the Pacific we find through its countless groups of sunny isles the impersonal Divine expressed by one general term, mana. The natives believed in the agency of departed souls and also of spirits of independent origin (vui); but the supernatural power through which both acted on nature or events was this mana. If a man prospered in his affairs and gained influence in the tribe, it was not by his own efforts, but because he had mana; precisely as pious persons among ourselves attribute their prosperity and that of their worthy neighbors to the favour of the Lord. The original meaning of mana appears to be “that which is within one,” and, later, the intelligence on mind, whence power or might, as the expressions of Will applied to the concept of universal life and motion.[53]
These words, I repeat, do not convey any idea of personality. They are not evidences of a primitive monotheism, as has often been claimed. They, and all like them, are vague, indefinite terms for the supernatural, that which was inexplicable by the limited knowledge of the most ignorant of our species.[54]
The media of suggestion act primarily through the emotions, and in the religious suggestion those emotions especially are concerned which give rise to thoughts concerning the super-sensuous and the manifestation of power.
But none of these emotions in itself, neither fear, hope, awe, wonder, nor any other, has the power to evoke the notion of the supernatural. It arises from those deeper intellectual traits which are peculiarly human.
Yet it is true that such emotions are potent stimuli to those forms of suggestion which lead up to the religious feelings; they are part of them, and what arouses and incites those, develops and strengthens these; and they thus have their place as suggestive accessories.