fallacious reasonings about misunderstood experiences.

It may seem almost wanton to suggest the desirableness of revising a
system at once so simple, so logical, and apparently so well bottomed on
facts. But there can never be any real harm in studying masses of evidence
from fresh points of view. At worst, the failure of adverse criticism must
help to establish the doctrines assailed. Now, as we shall show, there are
two points of view from which the evidence as to religion in its early
stages has not been steadily contemplated. Therefore we intend to ask,
first, what, if anything, can be ascertained as to the nature of the
'visions' and hallucinations which, according to Mr. Tylor in his
celebrated work 'Primitive Culture,' lent their aid to the formation of
the idea of 'spirit.' Secondly, we shall collect and compare the accounts
which we possess of the High Gods and creative beings worshipped or
believed in, by the most backward races. We shall then ask whether these
relatively Supreme Beings, so conceived of by men in very rudimentary
social conditions, can be, as anthropology declares, mere developments
from the belief in ghosts of the dead.

We shall end by venturing to suggest that the savage theory of the soul
may be based, at least in part, on experiences which cannot, at present,
be made to fit into any purely materialistic system of the universe. We
shall also bring evidence tending to prove that the idea of God, in its
earliest known shape, need not logically be derived from the idea of
spirit, however that idea itself may have been attained or evolved. The
conception of God, then, need not be evolved out of reflections on dreams
and 'ghosts.'

If these two positions can be defended with any success, it is obvious
that the whole theory of the Science of Religion will need to be