CHAPTER I.

SOME SAVAGE MYTHS AND BELIEFS.

The universality of religion—Nature and tests of the evidence relating to the subject—Savage ideas of creation: ideas of a first man confused with ideas of a first cause—Illustrative examples of primitive cosmogony—Origin of the myth of the Two Contending Brothers—Prevalence of the belief in a Golden Age—Deluge-myths—Their possible origin in recollections of local floods, in the changes of the land-level, or in fancies about the skies—Absence in most of them of any connection with human crime—Vivid belief in futurity among the lower races—Gradual growth of the idea of the future life as affected by the present one—Difficulties in the attainment of future happiness—The great difference between savage and civilised beliefs regarding the Unknown illustrated by the savage belief in a future life for animals or things as well as for men—Compensations in the savage’s creed: no terror of death nor of the future pages 1-40