observe that "in the matter of morality their code differs radically
from ours, but it cannot be denied that their conduct is governed by it,
and that any known breaches are dealt with both surely and severely. In
very many cases there takes place what the white man, not seeing beneath
the surface, not unnaturally describes as secret murder, but, in
reality, revolting though such slaughter may be to our minds at the
present day, it is simply exactly on a par with the treatment accorded
to witches not so very long ago in European countries. Every case of
such secret murder, when one or more men stealthily stalk their prey
with the object of killing him, is in reality the exacting of a life for
a life, the accused person being indicated by the so-called medicine-man
as one who has brought about the death of another man by magic, and
whose life must therefore be forfeited. It need hardly be pointed out
what a potent element this custom has been in keeping down the numbers
of the tribe; no such thing as natural death is realised by the native;
a man who dies has of necessity been killed by some other man, or
perhaps even by a woman, and sooner or later that man or woman will be
attacked. In the normal condition of the tribe every death meant the
killing of another individual."[30]
[Sidenote: Belief of the natives of the Torres Straits Islands and New
Guinea in sorcery as the cause of death.]
Passing from Australia to other savage lands we learn that according to
the belief of the Torres Straits Islanders all sickness and death were
due to sorcery.[31] The natives of Mowat or Mawatta in British New
Guinea "do not believe in a natural death, but attribute even the
decease of an old man to the agency of some enemy known or unknown."[32]
In the opinion of the tribes about Hood Peninsula in British New Guinea
no one dies a natural death. Every such death is caused by the evil
magic either of a living sorcerer or of a dead relation.[33] Of the
Roro-speaking tribes of British New Guinea Dr. Seligmann writes that
"except in the case of old folk, death is not admitted to occur without
some obvious cause such as a spear-thrust. Therefore when vigorous and
active members of the community die, it becomes necessary to explain
their fate, and such deaths are firmly believed to be produced by
sorcery. Indeed, as far as I have been able to ascertain, the Papuasian
of this district regards the existence of sorcery, not, as has been
alleged, as a particularly terrifying and horrible affair, but as a
necessary and inevitable condition of existence in the world as he knows
it."[34] Amongst the Yabim of German New Guinea "every case of death,
even though it should happen accidentally, as by the fall of a tree or
the bite of a shark, is laid at the door of the sorcerers. They are
blamed even for the death of a child. If it is said that a little child
never hurt anybody and therefore cannot have an enemy, the reply is that
the intention was to injure the mother, and that the malady had been
transferred to the infant through its mother's milk."[35]
[Sidenote: Belief of the Melanesians in sorcery as the cause of sickness
and death.]
Again, in the island of Malo, one of the New Hebrides, a Catholic
missionary reports that according to a belief deeply implanted in the
native mind every disease is the effect of witchcraft, and that nobody
dies a natural death but only as a consequence of violence, poison, or
sorcery.[36] Similarly in New Georgia, one of the Solomon Islands, when
a person is sick, the natives think that he must be bewitched by a man
or woman, for in their opinion nobody can be sick or die unless he is
bewitched; what we call natural sickness and death are impossible. In
case of illness suspicion falls on some one who is supposed to have
buried a charmed object with intent to injure the sufferer.[37] Of the
Melanesians who inhabit the coast of the Gazelle Peninsula in New
Britain it is said that all deaths by sickness or disease are attributed
by them to the witchcraft of a sorcerer, and a diviner is called in to
ascertain the culprit who by his evil magic has destroyed their
friends.[38] "Amongst the Melanesians few, if any, are believed to die
from natural causes only; if they are not killed in war, they are
supposed to die from the effects of witchcraft or magic. Whenever any
one was sick, his friends made anxious inquiries as to the person who
had bewitched (_agara'd_) him. Some one would generally be found to
admit that he had buried some portion of food or something belonging to
the sick man, which had caused his illness. The friends would pay him to
dig it up, and after that the patient would generally get well. If,
however, he did not recover, it was assumed that some other person had
also _agara'd_ him."[39]
[Sidenote: The belief of the Malagasy in sorcery as a cause of death.]
Speaking of the Malagasy a Catholic missionary tells us that in
Madagascar nobody dies a natural death. With the possible exception of
centenarians everybody is supposed to die the victim of the sorcerer's
diabolic art. If a relation of yours dies, the people comfort you by
saying, "Cursed be the sorcerer who caused his death!" If your horse
falls down a precipice and breaks its back, the accident has been caused
by the malicious look of a sorcerer. If your dog dies of hydrophobia or
your horse of a carbuncle, the cause is still the same. If you catch a
fever in a district where malaria abounds, the malady is still ascribed
to the art of the sorcerer, who has insinuated some deadly substances
into your body.[40] Again, speaking of the Sakalava, a tribe in
Madagascar, an eminent French authority on the island observes: "They
have such a faith in the power of talismans that they even ascribe to
them the power of killing their enemies. When they speak of poisoning,
they do not allude, as many Europeans wrongly suppose, to death by
vegetable or mineral poisons; the reference is to charms or spells. They
often throw under the bed of an enemy an _ahouli_ [talisman], praying it
to kill him, and they are persuaded that sooner or later their wish will
be accomplished. I have often been present at bloody vendettas which had
no other origin but this. The Sakalava think that a great part of the
population dies of poison in this way. In their opinion, only old people
who have attained the extreme limits of human longevity die a natural
death."[41]
[Sidenote: Belief of African tribes in sorcery as the cause of sickness
and death.]
In Africa similar beliefs are widely spread and lead, as elsewhere, to
fatal consequences. Thus the Kagoro of Northern Nigeria refuse to
believe in death from natural causes; all illnesses and deaths, in their
opinion, are brought about by black magic, however old and decrepit the
deceased may have been. They explain sickness by saying that a man's
soul wanders from his body in sleep and may then be caught, detained,
and even beaten with a stick by some evil-wisher; whenever that happens,
the man naturally falls ill. Sometimes an enemy will abstract the
patient's liver by magic and carry it away to a cave in a sacred grove,
where he will devour it in company with other wicked sorcerers. A
witch-doctor is called in to detect the culprit, and whomever he
denounces is shut up in a room, where a fire is kindled and pepper
thrown into it; and there he is kept in the fumes of the burning pepper
till he confesses his guilt and returns the stolen liver, upon which of
course the sick man recovers. But should the patient die, the miscreant
who did him to death by kidnapping his soul or his liver will be sold as
a slave or choked.[42] In like manner the Bakerewe, who inhabit the
largest island in the Victoria Nyanza lake, believe that all deaths and
all ailments, however trivial, are the effect of witchcraft; and the
person, generally an old woman, whom the witch-doctor accuses of having
cast the spell on the patient is tied up, severely beaten, or stabbed to
death on the spot.[43] Again, we are told that "the peoples of the Congo
do not believe in a natural death, not even when it happens through
drowning or any other accident. Whoever dies is the victim of witchcraft
or of a spell. His soul has been eaten. He must be avenged by the
punishment of the person who has committed the crime." Accordingly when
a death has taken place, the medicine-man is sent for to discover the
criminal. He pretends to be possessed by a spirit and in this state he
names the wretch who has caused the death by sorcery. The accused has to
submit to the poison ordeal by drinking a decoction of the red bark of
the _Erythrophloeum guiniense_. If he vomits up the poison, he is
innocent; but if he fails to do so, the infuriated crowd rushes on him
and despatches him with knives and clubs. The family of the supposed
culprit has moreover to pay an indemnity to the family of the supposed
victim.[44] "Death, in the opinion of the natives, is never due to a
natural cause. It is always the result either of a crime or of sorcery,
and is followed by the poison ordeal, which has to be undergone by an
innocent person whom the fetish-man accuses from selfish motives."[45]
[Sidenote: Effect of such beliefs in thinning the population by causing
multitudes to die for the imaginary crime of sorcery.]
Evidence of the same sort could be multiplied for West Africa, where the
fear of sorcery is rampant.[46] But without going into further details,
I wish to point out the disastrous effects which here, as elsewhere,
this theory of death has produced upon the population. For when a death
from natural causes takes place, the author of the death being of course
unknown, suspicion often falls on a number of people, all of whom are
obliged to submit to the poison ordeal in order to prove their
innocence, with the result that some or possibly all of them perish. A
very experienced American missionary in West Africa, the Rev. R. H.
Nassau, the friend of the late Miss Mary H. Kingsley, tells us that for
every person who dies a natural death at least one, and often ten or
more have been executed on an accusation of witchcraft.[47] Andrew
Battel, a native of Essex, who lived in Angola for many years at the end
of the sixteenth and beginning of the seventeenth century, informs us
that "in this country none on any account dieth, but they kill another
for him: for they believe they die not their own natural death, but that
some other has bewitched them to death. And all those are brought in by
the friends of the dead whom they suspect; so that there many times come
five hundred men and women to take the drink, made of the foresaid root
_imbando_. They are brought all to the high-street or market-place, and
there the master of the _imbando_ sits with his water, and gives every
one a cup of water by one measure; and they are commanded to walk in a
certain place till they make water, and then they are free. But he that
cannot urine presently falls down, and all the people, great and small,
fall upon him with their knives, and beat and cut him into pieces. But I
think the witch that gives the water is partial, and gives to him whose
death is desired the strongest water, but no man of the bye-standers can
perceive it. This is done in the town of Longo, almost every week
throughout the year."[48] A French official tells us that among the
Neyaux of the Ivory Coast similar beliefs and practices were visibly
depopulating the country, every single natural death causing the death
of four or five persons by the poison ordeal, which consisted in
drinking the decoction of a red bark called by the natives _boduru_. At
the death of a chief fifteen men and women perished in this way. The
French Government had great difficulty in suppressing the ordeal; for
the deluded natives firmly believed in the justice of the test and
therefore submitted to it willingly in the full consciousness of their
innocence.[49] In the neighbourhood of Calabar the poison ordeal, which
here consists in drinking a decoction of a certain bean, the
_Physostigma venenosum_ of botanists, has had similar disastrous
results, as we learn from the testimony of a missionary, the Rev. Hugh
Goldie. He tells us that the people have firm faith in the ordeal and
therefore not only accept it readily but appeal to it, convinced that it
will demonstrate their innocence. A small tribe named Uwet in the
hill-country of Calabar almost swept itself off the face of the earth by
its constant use of the ordeal. On one occasion the whole population
drank the poison to prove themselves pure, as they said; about half
perished, "and the remnant," says Mr. Goldie, "still continuing their
superstitious practice, must soon become extinct"[50] These words were
written a good many years ago, and it is probable that by this time
these poor fanatics have actually succeeded in exterminating themselves.
So fatal may be the practical consequences of a purely speculative
error; for it is to be remembered that these disasters flow directly
from a mistaken theory of death.
[Sidenote: General conclusion as to the belief in sorcery as the great
cause of death.]
Much more evidence of the same kind could be adduced, but without
pursuing the theme further I think we may lay it down as a general rule
that at a certain stage of social and intellectual evolution men have
believed themselves to be naturally immortal in this life and have
regarded death by disease or even by accident or violence as an
unnatural event which has been brought about by sorcery and which must
be avenged by the death of the sorcerer. If that has been so, we seem
bound to conclude that a belief in magic or sorcery has had a most
potent influence in keeping down the numbers of savage tribes; since as
a rule every natural death has entailed at least one, often several,
sometimes many deaths by violence. This may help us to understand what
an immense power for evil the world-wide faith in magic or sorcery has
been among men.
[Sidenote: But some savages have attributed death to other causes than
sorcery.]
But even savages come in time to perceive that deaths are sometimes
brought about by other causes than sorcery. We have seen that some of
them admit extreme old age, accidents, and violence as causes of death
which are independent of sorcery. The admission of these exceptions to
the general rule certainly marks a stage of intellectual progress. I
will give a few more instances of such admissions before concluding this
part of my subject.
[Sidenote: Some savages dissect the corpse to ascertain whether death
was due to natural causes or to sorcery.]
In the first place, certain savage tribes are reported to dissect the
bodies of their dead in order to ascertain from an examination of the
corpse whether the deceased died a natural death or perished by magic.
This is reported by Mr. E. R. Smith concerning the Araucanians of Chili,
who according to other writers, as we saw,[51] believe all deaths to be
due to sorcery. Mr. Smith tells us that after death the services of the
_machi_ or medicine-man "are again required, especially if the deceased
be a person of distinction. The body is dissected and examined. If the
liver be found in a healthy state, the death is attributed to natural
causes; but if the liver prove to be inflamed, it is supposed to
indicate the machinations of some evil-intentioned persons, and it rests
with the medicine-man to discover the conspirator. This is accomplished
by much the same means that were used to find out the nature of the
disease. The gall is extracted, put in the magic drum, and after various
incantations taken out and placed over the fire, in a pot carefully
covered; if, after subjecting the gall to a certain amount of roasting,
a stone is found in the bottom of the pot, it is declared to be the
means by which death was produced. These stones, as well as the frogs,
spiders, arrows, or whatever else may be extracted from the sick man,
are called _Huecuvu_--the 'Evil One.' By aid of the _Huecuvu_ the
_machi_ [medicine-man] throws himself into a trance, in which state he
discovers and announces the person guilty of the death, and describes
the manner in which it was produced."[52]
Again, speaking of the Pahouins, a tribe of the Gaboon region in French
Congo, a Catholic missionary writes thus: "It is so rare among the
Pahouins that a death is considered natural! Scarcely has the deceased
given up the ghost when the sorcerer appears on the scene. With three
cuts of the knife, one transverse and two lateral, he dissects the
breast of the corpse and turns down the skin on the face. Then he
grabbles in the breast, examines the bowels attentively, marks the last
muscular contractions, and thereupon pronounces whether the death was
natural or not." If he decides that the death was due to sorcery, the
suspected culprit has to submit to the poison ordeal in the usual manner
to determine his guilt or innocence.[53]
[Sidenote: The possibility of natural death admitted by the
Melanesians.]
Another savage people who have come to admit the possibility of merely
natural death are the Melanesians of the New Hebrides and other parts of
Central Melanesia. Amongst them "any sickness that is serious is
believed to be brought about by ghosts or spirits; common complaints
such as fever and ague are taken as coming in the course of nature. To
say that savages are never ill without supposing a supernatural cause is
not true of Melanesians; they make up their minds as the sickness comes
whether it is natural or not, and the more important the individual who
is sick, the more likely his sickness is to be ascribed to the anger of
a ghost whom he has offended, or to witchcraft. No great man would like
to be told that he was ill by natural weakness or decay. The sickness is
almost always believed to be caused by a ghost, not by a spirit....
Generally it is to the ghosts of the dead that sickness is ascribed in
the eastern islands as well as in the western; recourse is had to them
for aid in causing and removing sickness; and ghosts are believed to
inflict sickness not only because some offence, such as a trespass, has
been committed against them, or because one familiar with them has
sought their aid with sacrifice and spells, but because there is a
certain malignity in the feeling of all ghosts towards the living, who
offend them by being alive."[54] From this account we learn, first, that
the Melanesians admit some deaths by common diseases, such as fever and
ague, to be natural; and, second, that they recognise ghosts and spirits
as well as sorcerers and witches, among the causes of death; indeed they
hold that ghosts are the commonest of all causes of sickness and death.
[Sidenote: The possibility of natural death admitted by the Caffres of
South Africa.]
The same causes of death are recognised also by the Caffres of South
Africa, as we learn from Mr. Dudley Kidd, who tells us that according to
the beliefs of the natives, "to start with, there is sickness which is
supposed to be caused by the action of ancestral spirits or by fabulous
monsters. Secondly, there is sickness which is caused by the magical
practices of some evil person who is using witchcraft in secret.
Thirdly, there is sickness which comes from neither of these causes, and
remains unexplained. It is said to be 'only sickness, and nothing more.'
This third form of sickness is, I think, the commonest. Yet most writers
wholly ignore it, or deny its existence. It may happen that an attack of
indigestion is one day attributed to the action of witch or wizard;
another day the trouble is put down to the account of ancestral spirits;
on a third occasion the people may be at a loss to account for it, and
so may dismiss the problem by saying that it is merely sickness. It is
quite common to hear natives say that they are at a loss to account for
some special case of illness. At first they thought it was caused by an
angry ancestral spirit; but a great doctor has assured them that it is
not the result of such a spirit. They then suppose it to be due to the
magical practices of some enemy; but the doctor negatives that theory.
The people are, therefore, driven to the conclusion that the trouble has
no ascertainable cause. In some cases they do not even trouble to
consult a diviner; they speedily recognise the sickness as due to
natural causes. In such a case it needs no explanation. If they think
that some friend of theirs knows of a remedy, they will try it on their
own initiative, or may even go off to a white man to ask for some of his
medicine. They would never dream of doing this if they thought they were
being influenced by magic or by ancestral spirits. The Kafirs quite
recognise that there are types of disease which are inherited, and have
not been caused by magic or by ancestral spirits. They admit that some
accidents are due to nothing but the patient's carelessness or
stupidity. If a native gets his leg run over by a waggon, the people
will often say that it is all his own fault through being clumsy. In
other cases, with delightful inconsistency, they may say that some one
has been working magic to cause the accident. In short, it is impossible
to make out a theory of sickness which will satisfy our European
conception of consistency."[55]
[Sidenote: The admission that death may be due to natural causes, marks
an intellectual advance. The recognition of ghosts or spirits as a cause
of disease, apart from sorcery, also marks a step in intellectual,
moral, and social progress.]
From the foregoing accounts we see that the Melanesians and the Caffres,
two widely different and widely separated races, agree in recognising at
least three distinct causes of what we should call natural death. These
three causes are, first, sorcery or witchcraft; second, ghosts or
spirits; and third, disease.[56] That the recognition of disease in
itself as a cause of death, quite apart from sorcery, marks an
intellectual advance, will not be disputed. It is not so clear, though I
believe it is equally true, that the recognition of ghosts or spirits as
a cause of disease, quite apart from witchcraft, marks a real step in
intellectual, moral, and social progress. In the first place, it marks a
step in intellectual and moral progress; for it recognises that effects
which before had been ascribed to human agency spring from superhuman
causes; and this recognition of powers in the universe superior to man
is not only an intellectual gain but a moral discipline: it teaches the
important lesson of humility. In the second place it marks a step in
social progress because when the blame of a death is laid upon a ghost
or a spirit instead of on a sorcerer, the death has not to be avenged by
killing a human being, the supposed author of the calamity. Thus the
recognition of ghosts or spirits as the sources of sickness and death
has as its immediate effect the sparing of an immense number of lives of
men and women, who on the theory of death by sorcery would have perished
by violence to expiate their imaginary crime. That this is a great gain
to society is obvious: it adds immensely to the security of human life
by removing one of the most fruitful causes of its destruction.
It must be admitted, however, that the gain is not always as great as
might be expected; the social advantages of a belief in ghosts and
spirits are attended by many serious drawbacks. For while ghosts or
spirits are commonly, though not always, supposed to be beyond the reach
of human vengeance, they are generally thought to be well within the
reach of human persuasion, flattery, and bribery; in other words, men
think that they can appease and propitiate them by prayer and sacrifice;
and while prayer is always cheap, sacrifice may be very dear, since it
can, and often does, involve the destruction of an immense deal of
valuable property and of a vast number of human lives. Yet if we could
reckon up the myriads who have been slain in sacrifice to ghosts and
gods, it seems probable that they would fall far short of the untold
multitudes who have perished as sorcerers and witches. For while human
sacrifices in honour of deities or of the dead have been for the most
part exceptional rather than regular, only the great gods and the
illustrious dead being deemed worthy of such costly offerings, the
slaughter of witches and wizards, theoretically at least, followed
inevitably on every natural death among people who attributed all such
deaths to sorcery. Hence if natural religion be defined roughly as a
belief in superhuman spiritual beings and an attempt to propitiate them,
we may perhaps say that, while natural religion has slain its thousands,
magic has slain its ten thousands. But there are strong reasons for
inferring that in the history of society an Age of Magic preceded an Age
of Religion. If that was so, we may conclude that the advent of religion
marked a great social as well as intellectual advance upon the preceding
Age of Magic: it inaugurated an era of what might be described as mercy
by comparison with the relentless severity of its predecessor.
[Footnote 6: W. Martin, _An Account of the Natives of the Tonga
Islands_, Second Edition (London, 1818), ii. 99.]