The origin and development of the moral ideas

Hence the souls of bad people are supposed to reappear in the shape of obnoxious animals184 or become evil spirits,185 and this may lead to the notion that they have to do so as a punishment for their wickedness.186 And as the revengeful feelings of men likewise are believed to last beyond death, offenders may in the other world have to suffer from the hands of those whom they injured in this.187 Some of the Nagas of Central India maintain that “a murdered man’s soul receives that of his murderer in the spirit world and makes him his slave.”188 The Chippewas think that in the land of the dead “the souls of bad men are haunted by the phantoms of the persons or things they have injured.”189 In Aurora, in the New Hebrides, the belief prevails that the ghosts of those whom a man has wronged in this world take a full revenge upon him after death.190 According to the Banks Islanders, if a person has killed a good man without cause, the good man’s ghost withstands his murderer, when the latter after death wants to enter into Panoi, the good place; but if one man has killed another in fair fight he will not be withstood by the person whom he slew.191 And not only the offended party but the other dead as well may, from dislike or fear, be anxious to refuse the souls of bad people admittance to their company.

In the belief of the Pentecost Islanders, when the soul of a murdered man comes to the land of ghosts with the instrument of death upon him, he tells who killed him, and when the murderer arrives the ghostly people will not receive him, but he has to stay apart with other murderers.192 The Iroquois allot separate villages even to the souls of those who have died in war and of those who have committed suicide, because the other dead are afraid of their presence.193 Among the Negroes of Northern Guinea, according to Mr. Wilson, “the only idea of a future state of retribution is implied in the use of a separate burial-place for those who have died ‘by the red-water ordeal’ or who have been guilty of grossly wicked deeds”;194 and if a person’s body is buried apart, his soul will naturally remain equally isolated.195 That the frequent idea of the bad being separated from the good after death is largely due to the assumed unwillingness of the latter to associate with dangerous or disreputable souls, seems probable from the fact that, in the beliefs of the lower races, paradise generally plays a much more prominent part than hell, the lot of the wicked being to suffer want rather than to be subjected to torments.196 But, finally, it must also be remembered that the other world is a creation of men’s fancy, and may therefore be formed in accordance with their hopes and wishes.

Beyond the gloom of death they imagine a paradise where life is much happier than here on earth.197 Why, then, might not their moral feelings, only too often ungratified in the reality of the present, occasionally seek satisfaction in the dreams of the future?

The belief in a moral retribution after death may thus originate in various ways, quite independently of any notion of a god who acts as a judge of human conduct. When such a belief is said to prevail among a savage people it is by no means the rule that the rewards or punishments are associated with the activity of a divine being. And when, as is sometimes the case, the fate of the dead is supposed to depend upon the will of a high god, the notions held about the other world, and especially about the place reserved for the wicked, in several instances suggest influence from a more advanced religion. But on the other hand it is not an idea which seems incompatible with genuine savage thought that, in cases where the souls of men are believed to go to live with gods, the latter select their companions and, like the human inhabitants of the other world, refuse admittance to undesirable individuals.

Religious ideas have no doubt already at the savage stage begun to influence the moral consciousness even in points which have no direct bearing upon the personal interests of gods; but this influence is not known to have been so great as it has often been represented to be. I can find no solid foundation for the statements made by recent writers, that “the historical beginning of all morality is to be found in religion”;198 that even in the earliest period of human history “religion and morality are necessary correlates of each other”;199 that “all moral commandments originally have the character of religious commandments”;200 that in ancient society “all morality—as morality was then understood—was consecrated and enforced by religious motives and sanctions”;201 that the clan-god was the guardian of the tribal morality.202 From various facts stated in this and earlier chapters I have 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 by the belief in the free activity of gods.