sympathy and moral perception as to see no harm in adultery, revenge,
murder and cannibalism, and in attributing them to their gods, are
altogether too coarse and callous to be able to experience the higher
religious emotions. This inference is borne out by what a most careful
observer (Ellis, _P.R._, I., 291) says:

"Instead of exercising those affections of gratitude,
complacency, and love toward the objects of their
worship which the living God supremely requires, they
regarded their deities with horrific dread, and
worshipped only with enslaving fear."

This "enslaving fear" is the principal ingredient of primitive
religious emotion everywhere. To the savage and barbarian, religion is
not a consolation and a blessing, but a terror. Du Chaillu says of the
equatorial Africans (103) that "their whole lives are saddened by the
fears of evil spirits, witchcraft, and other kindred superstitions
under which they labor." Benevolent deities, even if believed in,
receive little or no attention, because, being good, they are supposed
to do no harm anyway, whereas the malevolent gods must be propitiated
by sacrifices. The African Dahomans, for instance, ignore their Mahu
because his intentions are naturally friendly, whereas their Satan,
the wicked Legba, has hundreds of statues before which offerings are
made. "Early religions," as Mr. Andrew Lang tersely puts it, "are
selfish, not disinterested. The worshipper is not contemplative, so
much as eager to gain something to his advantage." If the gods fail to
respond to the offerings made to them, the sacrificers naturally feel
aggrieved, and show their displeasure in a way which to a person who
knows refined religion seems shocking and sacrilegious. In Japan,
China, and Corea, if the gods fail to do what is expected of them,