it has often been represented to be,' Dr. Westermarck contrives to say, 'I can find no solid foundation for the statement that the clan-god was the guardian of the tribal morality.' Dr. Westermarck himself says, 'the belief in a god who acts as a guardian of morality undoubtedly gives emphasis to its rules.' If it be thought that this statement is meant to be understood of the gods of civilized races and not of the gods of uncivilized races, then we have also the statement that' instances are not wanting in which savage gods are supposed to punish the transgression of rules relating to worldly morality.'

The reason why Dr. Westermarck wishes to maintain that, though savage gods punish breaches of worldly morality, there is no solid foundation for the statement that they are the guardians of the tribal morality; the reason why he can find no sufficient ground for Robertson Smith's statement that in ancient society' all morality—as morality was then understood-was consecrated and enforced by religious motives and sanctions,' and yet can say himself that religious belief undoubtedly does give emphasis to, that is, does consecrate and enforce, tribal morality, is that he has been led to the conclusion that among uncivilised races the moral ideas relating to men's conduct towards one another have been much more influenced by the belief in magic forces which may be utilised by man' than they have been by religious beliefs. Thus, the efficacy ascribed to an oath is originally of a magical character'; 'it is due to the magic power inherent in the cursing words.' Eventually, however, it is made efficacious by bringing in the name of a supernatural being, to whom an appeal is made.' And two consequences appear to flow from bringing the god's name in first, when the oath 'contains an appeal to a god he is, according to primitive notions, a mere tool in the hand of the person invoking him'; next, Dr. Westermarck tells us elsewhere, ' If a god is frequently appealed to in oaths, a general hatred of lying and unfaithfulness may become one of his attributes': he comes to be looked upon as a guardian of veracity and good faith because he has been frequently appealed to in connexion with them. Not

only so, but justice itself thus 'readily becomes the attribute of a god who is habitually appealed to in curses or oaths'—and that, although the god of justice is, according to the notions of the person invoking him, a mere tool in his hands.

The efficacy of an oath, then, according to Dr. Westermarck, is originally of a magical and is not of a religious character. In course of time, to give it still greater efficacy, the name of a god is brought into the formula; and the result of bringing in his name is deleterious to religion, for it makes the god a mere tool in the hands of the person invoking him. And there Dr. Westermarck drops his investigation of the history of the oath. He does not go on to inquire whether religion, having been thus contaminated with magic, has ever reacted against the contamination and endeavoured to throw off and stamp out the magic which was the origin and essence of swearing and oaths. Yet it is strange that he should have overlooked the words, 'But I say unto you, swear not at all.' And if he had consulted St. Matthew v. 37 he would have found that anything more than ' Yea, yea; nay, nay,' is' of evil,' or' of the evil one': swearing and oaths are in their origin and essence not religious but magical. To make of a god ' a mere tool in the hands of the person invoking him' is to bring religion down to the level of magic: it does not, and did not, tend to the development but to the degradation alike of the moral idea of truth and the religious idea of God. The practice of proffering and taking oaths undoubtedly is prejudicial to the duty of truth-speaking, as implying that the duty is less incumbent on the man who avoids taking an oath than it is on him who swears. In this case, therefore, the influence of the belief in magic has indeed been great; but it has not been, as Dr. Westermarck supposes, an influence for good: it has not promoted but retarded the growth of morality.

According to Dr. Westermarck's theory, the gods came to be guardians of veracity, if not of morality in general, accidentally, or indirectly: they acquired a character, which they did not originally possess, of hating untruth, because they were frequently appealed to in oaths. And by the

same argument it might be maintained that the gods originally were indifferent to all morals, and only acquired a character for hating wrong because from some accident or other they were frequently appealed to when wrong was done. There is, however, another theory possible, and it is one which is held by Dr. Westermarck himself, viz. that man makes his gods in his own image. From this point of view it is quite natural that the gods should be a mirror, as it were, to the community whose notions of morality they reflect. In that case there is no need to resort to the theory that the gods got their morality by a series of accidents: moral qualities appeared in the mirror just for the same reason that they appeared in the community mirrored. The gods reflect the point of view of the community: if the community condemns lying or stealing the gods do the same. But there is this difference between the community and its gods, a difference of which, Dr. Westermarck tells us, man never lost sight: 'he always ascribed to them a superior power of action; otherwise they would have been no gods at all.' Now it was just this superior power of action which made the difference between the resentment felt by the community against wrong-doing and the condemnation which the god carried out by his superior power of action. It is this power of the gods, on whom man feels himself dependent, and to whose will he makes an appeal in worship,' that accounts for man's' regardful attitude' towards the god. The god not only reflected the community's condemnation of lying— if it did condemn it--but could express his and their condemnation with superior power of action. Hence the individual's heedful attitude towards the power on which he felt himself dependent, and towards the will to which he appealed in worship.

It is, however, clear that Dr. Westermarck, when he says that man made his gods in his own image and likeness, makes the statement with a considerable mental reservation; for elsewhere he states quite definitely that man did not go so far as to make his gods so like him as to share his opinions about right and wrong. It has been said that when men

ascribe to their gods a mental constitution similar to their own they also eo ipso consider them to approve of virtue and disapprove of vice. But this conclusion is certainly not true in general.' On the contrary, the truth, according to Dr. Westermarck, is that the gods got their morality quite accidentally, and very imperfectly: they got it because they could be used as mere tools for the purpose of giving efficacy to swearing and oaths. Thus it was that truth and justice and various other departments of social morality eventually came to be placed under the supervision of the gods. 'The gods have thus experienced a gradual change for the better; until at last they are described as ideals of moral perfection, even though, when more closely scrutinised, their goodness and notions of justice are found to differ materially from what is deemed good and just in the case of men.' What, then, did the gods do before they took over the supervision of the various departments of morality, and administered them in so inferior a manner? The answer is that 'most religions contain an element which constitutes a real peril to the morality of their votaries. They have introduced a new kind of duties-duties towards gods; and even where religion has entered into close union with worldly morality, much greater importance has been attached to ceremonies or worship or the niceties of belief than to good behaviour towards fellow-men. People think that they may make up for lack of the latter by orthodoxy or pious performances.' Indeed the sentence with which Dr. Westermarck concludes his book and sums up the whole matter of 'The Origin and Development of the Moral Ideas ' is ' that in its relation to morality religion will be increasingly restricted to emphasising ordinary moral rules, and less preoccupied with inculcating special duties to the deity.'

Special duties to the deity, then, are a survival from the time when man was a moral agent and the gods were imaginary beings, as yet non-moralized. In the course of their evolution the gods experienced a gradual change for the better and became partially moralized. But closer scrutiny reveals that this process of amelioration has never been thoroughly carried out, the reason being that orthodoxy

and pious performances-special duties to the deitycrowd out morality. Eventually, however, the process of amelioration will be carried through, and special duties to the deity will vanish before the emphasis given to ordinary moral rules. The highest stage of culture will then be reached, and religious influence, which ' reached its greatest extension' at an earlier stage, will have been left behind. As morality, then, stands independently of religion, and must always, in Dr. Westermarck's view, have stood upon an independent basis, we have to consider what, from his point of view, that basis is.

Dr. Westermarck's view is that moral concepts are essentially generalisations of tendencies in certain phenomena to call forth either indignation or approval.' Thus he tells us, moral approval and disapproval are at the bottom of the concepts, ought' and 'duty,' right and wrong. 'If these concepts were unanalysable, as they have often been represented to be, any attempt to explain the origin and development of the moral ideas would, in my opinion, be a hopeless failure.' But, it seems, if we recognize that moral approval or disapproval is at the bottom of the concepts, duty and ought, right and wrong, then eo ipso those concepts are, in Dr. Westermarck's opinion, analyzed, and we can go on to explain the origin and development of the moral ideas. What leads to moral disapproval or indignation is aversion: Aversion, as we have often noticed, leads to moral indignation, especially where the moral judgment is little influenced by reflection.' Indeed, 'the evolution of the moral consciousness partly consists in its development from the unreflecting to the reflecting stage, from the unenlightened to the enlightened.'

Certain phenomena then, we learn, call forth moral indignation or moral approval. From this fact man draws generalizations, which are made sometimes correctly and sometimes incorrectly. By thought and reflexion it is to some extent possible to correct the errors which may have been made in such generalizations. Progressive enlightenment consists in the advances made by means of generalizations which enlightened thought and reflexion shew to be