The Golden Bough: A Study in Magic and Religion (Third Edition, Vol. 01 of 12)

If we analyse the principles of thought on which magic is based, they will probably be found to resolve themselves into two: first, that like produces like, or that an effect re...

The patient reader may remember that we were led to plunge into the labyrinth of magic, in which we have wandered for so many pages, by a consideration of two different types of...

The instances which in the preceding chapters I have drawn from the beliefs and practices of rude peoples all over the world, may suffice to prove that the savage fails to recog...

The foregoing evidence may satisfy us that in many lands and many races magic has claimed to control the great forces of nature for the good of man. If that has been so, the pra...

Who does not know Turner’s picture of the Golden Bough? The scene, suffused with the golden glow of imagination in which the divine mind of Turner steeped and transfigured even...

[Sidenote: Magic like science postulates the order and uniformity of nature; hence the attraction both of magic and of science, which open up a boundless vista to those who can...

[1] Strictly speaking, _nemus_ is a natural opening or glade in a forest. Thus Lucan says (_Pharsal._ i. 453 _sq._) that the Druids inhabited “deep glades in sacred groves far f...

“_Nec indigeste tamquam in acervum congessimus digna memoratu: sed variarum rerum disparilitas, auctoribus diversa confusa temporibus, ita in quoddam digesta corpus est, ut quae...

[454] A. L. van Hasselt, _Volksbeschrijving van Midden-Sumatra_ (Leyden, 1882), p. 323; J. L. van der Toorn, “Het animisme bij den Minangkabauer der Padangsche Bovenlanden,” _Bi...

[1315] A reminiscence of this evolution is preserved in the Brahman theology, according to which the gods were at first mortal and dwelt on earth with men, but afterwards attain...

[285] M. Bloomfield, _Hymns of the Atharva-Veda_, pp. 31, 536 _sq._; W. Caland, _Altindisches Zauberritual_, p. 103. In ancient Indian magic it is often prescribed that charms t...

[988] Fr. A. Jaussen, “Coutumes arabes,” _Revue Biblique_, April 1903, p. 248. Elsewhere the same writer describes this ceremony as a mode of putting a stop to cholera. See his...

[848] W. Mannhardt, _Antike Wald- und Feldkulte_, p. 342, note. The heathen Swedes appear to have mimicked thunder, perhaps as a rain-charm, by means of large bronze hammers, wh...

[189] The expression Homoeopathic Magic was first used, so far as I am aware, by Mr. Y. Hirn (_Origins of Art_ (London, 1900), p. 282). The expression Mimetic Magic was suggeste...

[1193] The government of the western islanders of Torres Straits is similar. See A. C. Haddon, in _Reports of the Cambridge Anthropological Expedition to Torres Straits_, v. 263...

The questions which we have set ourselves to answer are mainly two: first, why had Diana’s priest at Nemi, the King of the Wood, to slay his predecessor? second, why before doin...

[808] Malay magic in particular is deeply tinctured with a belief in spirits, to whom the magician appeals by kindly words and small gifts of food, drink, and even money. See R....

_TIMES._—“The verdict of posterity will probably be that _The Golden Bough_ has influenced the attitude of the human mind towards supernatural beliefs and symbolical rituals mor...

[157] J. Marquardt, _Römische Staatsverwaltung_, iii.² 321 _sqq._ Kings of the Sacred Rites are known from inscriptions to have existed at Lanuvium, Bovillae, and Tusculum. See...

serve, then I wish I were in Lapland, to buy a good wind of one of the honest witches, that sell so many winds there and so cheap” (Izaac Walton, _Compleat Angler_, ch. v.).

§ 1. _The Principles of Magic_, pp. 52–54.—The Law of Similarity and the Law of Contact or Contagion, 52 _sq._; the two principles misapplications of the association of ideas, 5...

§ 1. _The Public Magician_, pp. 244–247.—Two types of man-god, the religious and the magical, 244 _sq._; rise of a class of public magicians a step in social and intellectual pr...

Conception of gods slowly evolved, 373 _sq._; decline of magic, 374; conception of incarnate human gods an early stage of religious history, 374–376; {xxxii} incarnation either...

Magic not the only road to a throne, 332 _sq._; danger of too simple and comprehensive theories, 332 _sq._; discredit which such theories have brought on mythology, 333 _sq._; m...

Affinity of magic to science, 220 _sq._; its fatal flaw, 221 _sq._; relation of magic to religion, definition of religion, 222–224; opposition of principle between magic and sci...

§ 1. _Diana and Virbius_, pp. 1–24.—The lake and sanctuary of Diana at Nemi, 1–6; the character of Diana at Nemi, 6–8; rule of succession to the priesthood, 8–10; legends of its...