OMENS
§ 1. THE PREVALENCE OF OMENS
“When great disasters are about to befall a state or nation it often
happens that there is some warning,” says Herodotus.[339] It happens,
indeed, not only to states and nations, but to eminent men, or even to
common men, children and old women. An old woman who in England sees
the new moon for the first time through glass, will not be surprised
when, next morning, the market-basket drops from her arm in the middle
of the street. In Fiji, if a woman putting bananas into a pot let one
fall on the outside, or if the bread-fruit burst in roasting, she wrung
her hands in dismay and cried aloud.[340] The whole world is full of
such portents, and has been many thousands of years; and there is no
clearer disproof of the vulgar error that age is the mother of wisdom
than this, that the older the race grows the less it attends to them:
or rather, whilst it attends to them more and more sedulously up to a
certain critical hour—reached by the Greeks (say) 400 B.C., and by
Western Europe (say) A.D. 1600—it then begins to disregard, rapidly
neglects them, till in a comparatively short time what is called the
“enlightened” part of mankind forgets to take account of them at all;
although it is well known that an eclipse of the moon a little before
sunrise in the sign of Leo was a token that Darius should be defeated
at Arbela; that on the first day that Julius Cæsar sat on the golden
throne and wore the purple robe, an ox, having been sacrificed, was
found to have no heart—at which Cæsar himself was surprised, and soon
after he was assassinated; and that many signs and wonders announced
quite recently the coming of the Spaniards into Mexico; Montezuma had
visions and grew melancholy; the idol of Quetzalchoatl declared that a
strange people approached to possess his kingdom, and so did witches
and sorcerers; a stone spoke and warned him; a lake overflowed its
banks; a pyramid of fire was seen in the sky; monsters were born with
two heads, and there were other portents, all to no purpose.[341]
Omens, enjoyed with fear and trembling by all men in all ages, have
sometimes been conceived of as due to magical power, but much more
generally as the sendings of demons or gods; although the fact that
they are rarely of any use to the recipient, or even intelligible to
him until after the event, makes it very improbable that they involve
the intervention of any intelligent cause. And what are we to think of
the intelligence of mankind, who in spite of their experience of omens
during so many ages, were still eager to observe them?
§ 2. OMENS AND NATURAL SIGNS
For the wild man seeking game or on the alert for enemies it is
necessary to read every sign of the presence of enemies or of game in
the neighbourhood: footprints, broken twigs and bent grass, droppings
of feathers, hair or dung, remnants of food or marks of habitation
instantly catch his eye; noises or odours arrest his other senses.
His world is full of these signs, and he must always be on the watch
for them: the birds being suddenly silent, on looking up he sees a
hawk; a change of wind, or the aspect of clouds, announces rain or
fair weather; the coming and departure of certain birds—as with us
the swallow and the cuckoo—portend the change of seasons. In all
these cases causation is active and sometimes obvious, but often very
obscure: the apparent may be the reverse of the real order: for the
coming of swallows is the antecedent of our enjoying the summer; but in
the order of nature the course of the seasons determines the migration
of birds. That the true relation may be misunderstood is shown by the
behaviour of certain Australian natives who, noticing that plovers cry
before the coming of rain, take their cry to be a cause of rain, and
therefore imitate it when performing their rain-rites.[342] We may
observe how obscure is the distinction between sign and cause even
amongst ourselves, in the general belief that “a change of the moon” is
connected somehow with a change of weather; for what the relation is no
one seems clearly to conceive.
The relation between natural signs and the events signified, being
obscure, may be mysterious; and accordingly its obscurity has been made
use of to defend the belief in Omens. In the _De Divinatione_[343]
Quintus, who is unkindly given by his brother the post of apologist for
all that nonsense, (following, I suppose, the sophistry of some Stoic)
quotes Aratus’ description of how certain movements of the sea presage
a coming storm; the gull, too, and the crow by their behaviour: and the
croaking of frogs and the snuffing of cattle foretell rain. I cannot
explain, he says, how animals have such knowledge any more than I can
explain the divinations of augurs; nor is it necessary to do so: in
both cases there are the facts.
No wonder, then, that the savage, depending for his life upon a
knowledge of signs, driven by eagerness and anxiety to observe
them, and unable to distinguish coincidence from causation and the
entanglements of causation, should imagine himself to have discovered
many more signs than are comprised in the order of nature. Thus in
Torres Straits, the biro-biro announces by its arrival that yams are
ready for eating (which seems needless), and the cry of the koko
predicts fine weather (which is credible); but, further, the sunbird
can foretell the coming of a boat,[344] and that must be imagination.
§ 3. SOME SIGNS CONCEIVED OF AS MAGICAL
Very gradually, we may suppose, a difference came to be felt between
two classes of signs: (1) those that are of a usual kind, such as the
tracks of game, the return of the swallows, the croaking of frogs,
which are almost constantly the antecedents of interesting events, such
as the getting of food, the coming of spring, or of rain; sequences
that recur again and again, some of them being, like the tracks of
game, easily intelligible; all which, accordingly, are accepted as a
matter of course and incorporated with common sense. (2) Less usual
events, such as strange animals, lightning, eclipses, shooting-stars;
which come to be considered as signs by being connected in imagination
with interesting events which happen soon after them, such as a failure
in hunting, an attack by enemies, a death in the tribe, the wreck of
a canoe; though the connexions are irregular and never intelligible,
and are accepted not as a matter of course, but as mysterious, magical
and portentous: they are Omens. They acquire the hold upon men that
belongs to the growing body of superstition. Although irregular, they
are classed with the connexions that are believed to be most regular,
and failures are overlooked. To these are added and accumulated in
tradition, by analogy or caprice, innumerable other signs and warnings.
That Omens obtain an inextricable hold in the tangle of superstitious
beliefs results from men’s strong desire to foresee the future,
especially in social conditions full of dangers and uncertainties,
without the settled organisation which, with us in ordinary times,
makes one year so much like another. Upon many people, indeed, this
desire has the same effect to this day, and becomes more active in
troubled times like the present. Anxious to know whether they are to
marry, or to hear of a death, or to come into money or some other
advancement, they hope to find out by visiting Mrs. Sludge in a stuffy
chamber, or (as you may see in London) by consulting a canary at
the street-corner. When a fixed idea of love or ambition or anxiety
possesses the mind and leaves it no peace, we are ready to try any
device that promises to relieve the strain, and we do things sillier
than could have been predicted even by those who knew us best.
Belief in Omens and the practice of observing them having been
established, the list of portentous events grows ever larger. (_a_) In
a depressed frame of mind the future looks gloomy; in exhilaration,
cheerful. A sensation, such as shivering, or sweating, that accompanies
fear is apt to excite fear. In fear or depression one acts feebly
and fails; in hope and confidence one acts vigorously and wins: the
expectations produced by such moods fulfil themselves, and therefore
the moods are ominous. This may be the reason why, when men are at
strife and some ambiguous Omen occurs, he who first claims its favour
or denounces its menace upon his enemy, gains an advantage;[345] for
the other may be daunted and unable to rally his forces. But that
depends on character.
This subjective value of an Omen, making its virtue a function of the
recipient’s disposition, sometimes became so prominent as to obscure
its truly magical character; according to which it must be indissolubly
connected in some way with the event and can have nothing to do with
the recipient’s attitude. Thus it might be held that an Omen, if it
deeply affected a man’s imagination, would be fulfilled; but, if
neglected, it might not be. Pliny says[346] that, according to the
augurs, auspices had no import for one who in any enterprise declared
that he would not regard them. Or, again, the bearing of an Omen may be
determined by the way in which it is accepted: Julius Cæsar, landing in
Africa, fell; and that must have seemed a very bad Omen; but he, having
the presence of mind (though not exempt from superstition) to exclaim:
“Africa, I lay hold of thee!” changed its significance;[347] and,
doubtless, greatly altered its effect upon the minds of his officers
and soldiers and of all who heard of it; and that was the important
matter. Hope and desire and anxiety created Omens, and they had also
the power to direct the incidence and corrupt the interpretation of
Omens. In fact, there were conventional formulæ for accepting good
Omens and rejecting bad ones: _Accipio omen, Absit omen, Tibi in caput
redeat;_ which were counteractive spells; and it is agreed that Magic
may be overcome by stronger Magic.
This attitude of mind that makes an Omen subject to its acceptance,
may explain the otherwise absurd practice of taking the Omens again
and again, when the earlier have been unfavourable, until one is
obtained that flatters the inquirer’s hopes. Not only amongst
sophisticated peoples, who might be supposed to treat Omens in a
formal and perfunctory way, but even in the lower barbarism Omens are
thus garbled. The Karens of Borneo, consulting the liver of a pig to
authorise an expedition, if with one pig the appearance is forbidding,
sacrifice a second, third, or fourth; though without a satisfactory
forecast they will not set out. Then, having set out, they try to avoid
hearing the cry of the woodpecker (which has two notes, the one of
good, the other of evil augury), lest it should be against their plans.
And the same simple-minded people believe in the magical efficacy of
the sign, no matter how obtained. Vaticinating by the flight of a hawk,
a man will try, by shouting and by waving to it, to turn its flight
toward the left, that being with them the prosperous direction.[348]
Imagination-beliefs are saturated with insincerity; their unconscious
maxim is, “Believe as you list.”
Although it may be a general principle that savages are more impressed
by external than by internal experiences, yet the suggestion of the
foregoing paragraphs, that the finding of Omens in one’s own sensations
is secondary to, and dependent on, the growth of a belief in Omens
presented by physical events, is not one upon which I much rely.
Possibly sensations and moods are a distinct and primitive source of
this superstition: for it has been noticed in Australia, where the lore
of Omens in general has made but little progress. Whilst performing
tribal ceremonies under strong emotion, the aborigines think that their
entrails sometimes acquire “sight”; so that they know whether their
wives have been unfaithful, or they feel the approach of danger.[349]
In the Western Isles of Torres Straits shivering and uneasy feelings
are presentiments; and in the Eastern Isles, a dryness of one’s skin
or sneezing:[350] in New Guinea, if the right shoulder ache, expect
good news; if the left, bad.[351] And these simplest of all whims are
the longest lived; for amongst ourselves many a woman suddenly has a
presentiment, “as if some one were walking over her grave.”
(_b_) As a mood of elation or depression is itself ominous, so is
whatever excites such a mood. Depressing objects are cripples, old
women, sick people, timid hares, loathsome toads, a snake coming to
meet a war-party, discouraging words, ugly dreams; whereas pleasant
dreams, encouraging words, a snake going before us as against the
enemy, hawks, wolves and blooming youth are all exhilarating: the list
varies from tribe to tribe. Many ominous things promise good or evil
according as they appear on the right hand or on the left: the left
being generally held inauspicious, because (it is said) the left hand
is the clumsier and weaker; and this may be true. But we have seen that
in Borneo the left is preferred; and whereas the Greeks followed the
general rule, assigning evil to the left hand, the Romans thought the
right hand was the direction of danger. And this contrariety has been
explained as due to a difference of orientation in the formal taking of
Omens; for the Greek then faced northward, and had the place of sunrise
upon his right hand; whilst the Roman faced southward and had on his
right hand the place of sunset: so that it was not anything to do with
his own body, but the direction whence the sun appeared and advanced
with growing power and splendour which each of them judged of good
hope, in contrast with that whither the sun declined and weakened to
his death. To illustrate these fancies would be an endless task, and a
superfluous labour, since nothing is better known.
(_c_) Coincidence, the occurrence near together of two interesting
events, is sure to make people think there must be some connexion
between them; and the earlier event will be classed, according to
circumstances, as either a cause or a sign of the later; and if the
connexion is mysterious, it must be either a magical power like that
of a talisman, or that special kind of Magic which is an Omen. What
circumstances determine this distinction, I will presently try to
show. Possibly all Omens that are not derived from subjective moods
and sensations, or from things or events that excite such moods,
were originally founded upon coincidence. Upon this, apparently, the
Egyptians relied in the records they kept (according to Herodotus) of
Omens and their fulfilment; and Quintus Cicero is represented[352] as
believing that the Babylonians kept such records for 470,000 years: so
that it was, in their view, an inductive science; but we never hear of
their having kept a record of failures and disappointments.
Some Omens having been established by subjective prognostication or
by coincidence, many more may be added by analogy, or by a sort of
reasoning. An analogy with the contrast of right and left hand may
be noticed in all opposites: the woodpecker in Borneo, for example,
having two cries, and one of them a warning, must not the other
be an encouragement? The belief in Omens having taken hold of the
public mind, everybody is on the look-out for signs and wonders; and
anything unusual seen, or heard, or rumoured, becomes a possible
Omen of anything else, and men ask one another what it portends. The
superstitious imagination is greedy of its accustomed food. Under
such conditions, too, Omens are discovered by retrospection: a public
calamity, such as the death of a king, the defeat of an army, or a
pestilence (or in private life some private misfortune), makes us
remember some foregoing event or events, which must have forewarned
us, had we had the skill to interpret the significance of Time’s
progression.
§ 4. DIFFERENTIATION OF OMENS FROM GENERAL MAGIC
The savage mind, sensitive to the resemblance of relations, cannot
overlook the analogy between signs and warning cries; many Omens are
cries; and with the spread of animistic explanation, they came to
be considered as the sendings of spirits or gods. But, at first, by
mere magical thinking, under the stress of anxiety to know the future,
and the helplessness of common sense to predict anything outside
the everyday routine, Omens are gradually separated from ordinary
probable signs (such as the tracks of game) as necessary infallible
signs (or tendencies) if cunning can find them out, connected by some
supernatural law with the unknown future that certainly awaits us, and
as a kind of Magic. The magical habit of mind may be supposed to have
resulted from the coalescence of beliefs concerning several imaginary
operations—by charms, spells, rites—each class of beliefs having its
own occasions, causes, or fallacious grounds. Those operations had in
common the marks of being connexions of events due to imagined forces
of a mysterious kind, and therefore grouped themselves together in
men’s minds as the Magic apperception-mass. Omens had these marks and,
therefore, were assimilated to Magic. An Omen is an event regarded as
a magical sign of the good or ill success of some undertaking, or of
the approach of good fortune, or of calamity. And on the principle that
ideas are differentiated from a confused matrix, it is probable that
Omens, having at first been confused with other magical antecedents
of events, were only gradually again distinguished from them. But
an important distinction existed and at last came to light: charms,
rites and spells are causes of events; whereas Omens are signs only,
not causes. The difference is that whereas charms, rites and spells
directly exert their powers upon the course of things, Omens themselves
exert no power, but show only that there is some power at work, which
will have such or such results.[353]
Comparing Omens with other modes of Magic, several peculiarities may be
noticed: (_a_) Omens themselves (apart from the preparation of victims,
etc.) imply no human intervention, whereas rites and spells must be
performed or recited by some one, and even charms are carried about
one, or used in rites, or solemnly affixed to doors, animals or other
possessions. (_b_) Partly as a consequence of this, Omens, considered
in themselves, generally (as I have said) convey no suggestion of
force. This cannot, indeed, be said of eclipses and thunderstorms;
but the note of a bird, the appearance of entrails, a mere shivering
or other change of feeling, though ominous, suggests no energetic
operation; whilst rites and spells are often carried out with much
expenditure of energy, and even charms, though not obviously active,
are necessarily believed to be powerful in some obscure way of their
own. (_c_) Omens are often so remote in time, as well as in place,
from the events indicated that any quasi-mechanical determination
of the issue by them can hardly be thought of; but with rites and
spells, though they may not operate openly in the hour of their setting
to work, yet the delay is not expected to be great, and (as said)
their impulsion or _nisus_ is often very impressive; and charms are
incessantly and immediately active. (_d_) Omens in general do not
foretell precisely what is to happen, but only the success or failure
of some enterprise (not the “how” of it), happiness or misfortune;
whereas rites and spells have some definite object, and most charms
inflict, or guard against, some one kind of evil, disease or shipwreck;
though others (it is true) bring luck or loss at large. Thus Omens are
very different from other magical conditions; and although it is not
likely that the ordinary savage or even the wizard ever consciously
draws these distinctions or sums them up, still they have an effect
upon his mind, and the observation of Omens and the reading of them
becomes at last a special branch of the Magic Art—Divination.
§ 5. OMENS INTERPRETED BY ANIMISM
Omens, then, being only signs and not causes of future events, having
no power in themselves, must be connected with some efficient power,
or else the events prognosticated could not happen. How is that
power to be understood? For a long time, probably, there is no clear
conception of it: the connexion is mysterious. But there are two ways
in which it may be interpreted: (_a_) Following the impersonal magical
way of thinking, we are led to the idea of currents of force in which
both Omen and event are borne along; and, at last, to the conception
of a fatal order of the world in which all events have their necessary
places. There A is always followed by B; so that, although A exerts no
power over B, yet (if we know the law of the sequence) when the former
appears it is an infallible portent of the latter. The power at work is
Fate; and to this idea I must return; for in its full development it
comes late in history.
(_b_) The other and much simpler way of explaining Omens is to
attribute them to the intervention of spirits who, whether they control
events or not, at least foresee them, and send messages of warning
to mankind. With the spread of Animism this is a matter of course.
A sophisticated age may ask how a spirit should be able to see the
future; and may answer that spirits, having greater knowledge than we
of the present state of the world and its laws of causation, are able
to calculate the outcome, just as an astronomer foretells an eclipse
of the sun. A precious rationalisation! To the untutored savage there
is no difficulty. To foresee the future is a very common performance:
whenever we form an expectation which is fulfilled (and that happens
many times a day) we accomplish this feat; and for the most part we are
unconscious of the grounds upon which we formed the expectation. The
savage is always in this position: he has not analysed the relation
of “ground and consequence” nor examined the mental conditions that
precede an inference. To him, therefore, foreknowledge, within a
certain range, is not even mysterious; and, of course, spirits have
the gift in a much higher degree. In Melanesia a _vui_ (spirit)
knows secret things without seeing;[354] and here begins the rôle of
intuition in Philosophy. Later, a high god may give warnings, not
merely of what he foresees in the course of the world, but of what he
of his own volition will bring to pass; or a lesser god may announce
what he knows to be the will of the higher; or, later still, all
spiritual warnings may sink back into helpless incidents in the course
of Fate.
Omens (as has been mentioned) resemble warnings: (_a_) Like warnings,
they precede events, but do not cause them. (_b_) They sometimes
precede an event by a considerable interval, as if to give time for
precaution. (_c_) They do not announce the details of any event (which
a friendly counsellor may not know), but only its character as good or
evil. Then, if they are warnings (implying foreknowledge), since they
are not the act of any man, they must be given by some spirit or other
intelligence. So that once a belief in the intervention of spirits in
mundane affairs has become prevalent in any tribe, nothing can be more
natural than to regard Omens as spiritual messages. Still, this way of
thinking may have been preceded by a disposition to attribute Omens
to the good will of animals, especially Totems; for animals are often
wiser than we are. In Australia the Turbal tribe held that the chirping
of insects foretold the coming of blacks; a Wakelbwa who dreamed of
a kangaroo would expect one of the Banbe subclass next day; to dream
of old-man kangaroos sitting round the fire presaged danger.[355]
Among the Yuin (Western Australia) a Black-Duck clansman thought that
black ducks warned him against enemies; and men of the Kurnai, who had
personal Totems, thought they gave protection by warnings.[356] Very
early, however, ghosts or spirits sometimes come themselves to instruct
us; as amongst the Kurnai, the Biraark (wizards) hold _séances_ at
night, when ghosts attend, and give news of enemies or of absent
friends.[357] In New Guinea, the ghosts of dead tribesmen send their
surviving relatives Omens by fishes or birds.[358]
By this animistic theory Omens are intimately connected with Oracles
and Dreams; for these, too, are messages from the spirit-world.
Dreams are the chief causes of belief in spirits, and with many people
have not yet lost the character of supernatural visitations. Probably
for ages past there have been in each generation a few rationalists,
who treated dreams in the manner of Artabanes (as reported by
Herodotus[359]—who, however, will show that the event refuted him),
holding that “whatever a man has been thinking of during the day
is wont to hover round him in the visions of his dreams at night.”
Incensed against the diviners, rationalists have, in fact, too much
despised and neglected dreams.
Oracles and Dreams are amongst the phenomena of “possession.” Spirits,
demons, gods, roaming the world and indwelling or haunting various
bodies or localities, sometimes take up their abode in stones or bags
of charms, which then become fetiches; or attain greater dignity in
images and temples; or enter into men and women, afflicting them with
diseases, or else with dreams, or drunkenness, or madness, or prophecy,
or poetry;[360] for these things are hard to distinguish. And sometimes
the people thus afflicted wander at large, sometimes are to be found
only by some tree, or spring, or cave, or temple, where the spirit that
makes them wise above others has chosen to reside, perhaps because his
body was buried there.
Omens, Oracles and Dreams have, besides their dependence on spirits,
another trait in common, namely, obscurity of meaning. When you have
been favoured with one of these communications, what does it promise or
threaten? To answer this question passes the wit of ordinary men; and,
therefore, certain superior minds assume the important function of
Diviners and, to guide their judgment, work out in course of ages with
infinite ingenuity the Art of Divination.
§ 6. NATURAL AND ARTIFICIAL OMENS
Before discussing Divination we had better remind ourselves of the
immense extension that the lore of Omens undergoes beyond the early
recognition of mysterious natural signs (thunder or the behaviour
of birds, etc.), by the preparation in various ways of conditions
under which Omens may be obtained at will (throwing dice, roasting
shoulder-blades, sacrificing pigs, etc.). Men are eager to know the
future, at least the general complexion of it as happy or unhappy;
and for this purpose they desire Omens. But natural Omens do not
always appear when wanted, though probably the mere desire of them
has multiplied them greatly; it is, therefore, very convenient to
discover devices by which Omens can always be obtained by any one for
any purpose. A common practice is to toss a halfpenny, and decide a
doubtful choice of action by head or tail: reinforcing imbecility
with superstition. It is impossible we should ever learn how such
conventions originated, but may assume that the earlier were suggested
by some accident, and many of the later by analogy. The Warramunga have
a very simple plan, when a man dies, for discovering who it was that
by evil magic slew him. They smooth the ground about the spot where
the death occurred, and next morning come to examine it; and if they
find there the trail of a snake, they know that the murderer was a
man of the Snake-totem.[361] It is reasonable to suppose that in the
first instance they found such a trail of snake or other animal upon
unprepared ground, and thereafter smoothed the ground to make such
signs plainer: thus they began the preparation of conditions for the
taking of Omens. A New Zealand wizard had a simple construction for
discovering beforehand who would have the better of a battle: he set
up two sticks near together, one for his own party, the other for the
enemy, and let them fall: whichever stick fell on the top of the other
the party it had stood for was to conquer in the fight.[362] As ages
go by and more and more intellect is concentrated upon the problem
of foreknowledge, more and more ways are discovered of preparing the
conditions of taking Omens, more and more expensive and complicated
ones; for the more difficult the preparation and interpretation, the
more necessary it is to employ a professional augur. The casting of
dice, the drawing of lots, the taking of one’s chance with verses of
Virgil or of the Bible, may seem easy, but even such devices may be
made difficult by accumulating rules of interpretation. The sacred
chicken, whose vagaries in feeding occasionally relieve with grateful
diversion the strenuous page of Roman History, cannot have required
highly skilled manipulation, but to watch them a professional eye
was necessary; and when sacrifices are employed as opportunities of
taking Omens from the behaviour of the victims, the manner of their
dying and the condition of their entrails, a technical specialist of
high training becomes indispensable. This led to the intensive study
of entrails, especially of livers (Hepatoscopy, Hepatomancy), with
some gain of knowledge in Anatomy. The study was widely diffused;
but still more widely, perhaps, the art of prophesying by the lines
to be observed in shoulder-blades cracked by roasting over a fire
(Scapulomancy).
Where nothing is or can be done to alter the physical conditions of
premonitory signs, yet a painstaking analysis has been made of those
conditions in order to interpret them in a methodical way; and this
study may demand far greater skill than augury. In Cheiromancy the
lines and eminences of the hand have been exactly mapped and defined,
and have had their several values and meanings assigned. It is really a
perplexing study, not to be entered upon with a light heart, yet simple
and obvious in comparison with Astrology. The Astrologer who would
undertake to forecast the future fate of men or nations, or to recover
forgotten facts of antiquity, such as the date of a hero’s birth (for
it was understood that a difference of forward or backward in time
should not hinder scientific calculations), had to take account of all
the visible furniture of heaven, the stars in their constellations,
especially the signs of the Zodiac; the seven planets, each with its
own qualities and powers assumed arbitrarily or by fanciful analogies,
all unquantified and all varying in the Twelve Houses of Heaven. What
learning, what stupendous abilities were demanded for such a task!
In fact, any one who now hears of it, immediately knows it to be
impossible. But until many problems had been solved and the method of
them appreciated, no one could understand what kind of problems are
insoluble. Meanwhile, in this study, for ages so honoured, a mixture
of genuine Astronomy and a parade of systematic procedure (of which
philosophers well know the force) made fatuity plausible.
§ 7. DIVINATION AND ORACLES
Omens and Oracles are, no doubt, infallible premonitions of something,
if one can find it out; but they are often so obscure or ambiguous that
one gets no guidance from them, and indeed it is sometimes impossible
to judge whether they are ever fulfilled, or not. It is, therefore,
most important that some one should be able to expound them; and here,
as in every department of human effort, we may be sure that, of the
many who attempt interpretation, one will be more successful than
others; and then to him all men flock for enlightenment, especially if
he make one good guess about some Omen or Oracle of general interest.
Such a man was thereby constituted a Diviner, and became the founder
of a profession, or (at least) of a branch or function of the great
wizardly profession. It happened long ago; for in savagery most wizards
are already Diviners.
In course of time the profession can no longer be satisfied with
interpretation by guesswork, but elaborates the principles of
the subject, the Art of Divination, upon which, perhaps, as much
painstaking and ingenuity have been expended as upon industry and
science put together. The _savants_ who carried out such work were
probably (many of them) as honest as fanatics can be; but the result
always was to raise the reputation of the profession for occult
knowledge and mysterious insight.
Diviners are either free and independent seers, soothsayers,
fortune-tellers, mostly poverty-stricken and disreputable, though
sometimes eminent and influential, like Tiresias and Epimenides; or
else officials (a much smaller party) attached to some temple or
government. Official soothsayers have often exercised immense power
in society and politics. They are not found, of course, at the bottom
of the scale of culture, where there is no government in Church
or State; but in the lower barbarism, among the Bantu tribes (for
example), Diviners have a highly influential station. The chief of
a tribe usually has a specially trusted Diviner, and also consults
others in discovering sorcerers and in forecasting the future.[363]
In the Mazwaya clan of the Thonga there is an official Diviner who
alone knows the exact composition of the royal “medicine,” on which
the welfare of the whole tribe depends. He is very much feared: no one
dares dispute with him; and he has the right of cursing even the chief
himself.[364] Such a powerful subject naturally excites the jealousy of
the chief, who sometimes endeavours to get into his own hands all the
medicines and occult virtues possessed by any of his tribesmen.[365]
The danger of opposition between Church and State was also felt in
Melanesia and Polynesia; and in Hawaii it was decisively overcome; for
when the oracle was to be consulted, the king, concealed in a frame of
wickerwork, gave the responses himself.[366]
In Greece (sixth and fifth centuries B.C.) oracles were still more
powerful: the record may be read in Herodotus. The most flourishing
States observed the Omens, and never ventured to go to war without
consulting the Oracles; and the Oracles undertook to advise on war and
peace and alliances, to settle disputed claims to sovereignty and the
constitution of States, to sanction new laws and the foundation of
colonies, to order the erection of new temples and even the worship of
new deities—some of them of very dubious reputation: to say nothing
of the infinite extent of their private practice. Their utterances
were often unintelligible; they were sometimes known to have accepted
bribes; yet the most enlightened people in the world continued to
consult them: whether in good faith, or for their effect upon the
vulgar both friends and enemies, or perhaps to share responsibility for
an action with the gods, or even because one then felt more comfortable
than in leaving them alone. But the diffusion of philosophy was too
much for them; and, as Cicero says,[367] even the Delphic Oracle
declined in reputation, not because with lapse of time the divine
virtue failed of those exhalations that inspired the priestess, but
when men became less credulous. Perhaps it was also because social
life had become, under Roman government, safer and more settled and
regular; so that a reasonable amount of foresight could be exercised
without supernatural aid. Still, after the Oracles seemed to have been
struck dumb, they revived from time to time for two or three centuries;
Plutarch was far from incredulous; and the equivalent of them will (I
suppose) continue to revive now and then, unless insane desire, and
anxiety, and pusillanimity, and wonder and confusion of mind shall one
day be extinguished.
In the great empires of the higher barbarism, the Magi amongst the
Medes and Persians, and in Egypt, Babylonia and India the priesthood
who practised soothsaying and vaticination with their other functions,
obtained still greater control over national life. The development of
Astrology has always been imputed to the Chaldeans; and the importance
of dreams and their interpretation in Egypt and Babylon is reflected in
the stories of Joseph and Daniel as well as in the profaner pages of
Herodotus.
The character of Omens and the way of obtaining Oracles and of being
inspired in Greece were merely modifications of those that have been
in vogue amongst savages. Imagination-beliefs, in spite of their
extravagance, have, in fact, a short tether and move in narrow circles,
perpetually renewing the same themes. The ravings of the Pythoness
possessed, which are said to have sometimes frightened the priests,
might have been studied in Fiji. This was what happened when a priest
was inspired: he “becomes absorbed in thought ... in a few minutes
he trembles; slight distortions are seen in his face, and twitching
movements in his limbs. These increase to a violent muscular action,
which spreads until the whole frame is violently convulsed, and the
man shivers as with a strong ague-fit. In some instances this is
accompanied by murmurs and sobs; the veins are greatly enlarged, and
the circulation of the blood quickened. The priest is now possessed by
his god, and all his words and actions are considered as no longer his
own, but those of the deity who has entered him. Shrill cries of Koi
au! Koi au! ‘It is I! It is I!’ fill the air, and the god is supposed
thus to notify his approach. While giving the answer the priest’s eyes
stand out and roll as in a frenzy; his voice is unnatural, his face
pale, his lips livid, his breathing depressed and his entire appearance
that of a furious madman. The sweat runs from every pore, the tears
start from his strained eyes; after which the symptoms gradually
disappear. The priest looks round with a vacant stare, and as the god
says ‘I depart,’ announces his actual departure by violently flinging
himself down on the mat, or by suddenly striking the ground with a
club.... The convulsive movements do not entirely disappear for some
time.”[368]
To become inspired by means of visions or dreams, or endowed with the
powers of a prophet or diviner, the obvious plan is to go to places
frequented by spirits, namely, tombs, caves and temples. The Oracle of
Trophonius in Bœotia was situated in a cave into which the consultant
descended, and there saw visions or heard strange noises, and lost his
senses: on returning to the upper air, he sat in the Chair of Memory
and reported to the priests what had happened; and they delivered him
to his friends “overpowered with fear, and quite unconscious of himself
and his surroundings.”[369] Afterwards he recovered his wits. At Oropus
was a sanctuary of Amphiaraus, who (against his better judgment) had
joined the expedition of Adrastus against Thebes and, amidst the
general defeat of the army, fled and was swallowed up in the earth. His
death ought to have occurred where his sanctuary stood; for it was a
famous Oracle, and to consult it you purified yourself and sacrificed
a ram and, spreading the skin under you, went asleep there, awaiting
a revelation in a dream.[370] In the temple of Pasiphæ, too, near
Sparta, one might hope for a divine message in a dream; and a shepherd,
sleeping by the grave of Orpheus at Libethra, was moved to sing the
verses of Orpheus.[371]
To lose one’s memory and afterwards recover one’s wits is incidental
to many initiation ceremonies, and the darkness and secrecy of
caves—which, moreover, are often burial-places—have always deeply
impressed our imagination. Amongst the Arunta there is a way of
obtaining powers of Magic and Divination by going to sleep at the
mouth of a cave; when the Iruntarinia (a kind of spirits), who live
there, pierce the sleeper’s head with lances, drag him into the
cave, disembowel him and give him new entrails. He awakes dazed and
silly; and the spirits lead him home, where gradually he recovers his
right mind.[372] Amongst the Kurnai, again, one may become a wizard
and diviner by sleeping at a grave; for in the night the dead man
disembowels one, and provides new visceral organs.[373] Elsewhere in
Australia a candidate for the wizardly profession is tied down at night
in the tribal burial-ground and visited by spirits who force a stone
into his head—apparently a kind of crystal, by gazing into which a
wizard is able to see the past, the distant and the future.[374]
The seeking of enlightenment where spirits dwell in caves or graves,
loss of wits by contact with them and subsequent recovery—all this may
remind us of stories in Pausanias; but what of the disembowelling and
renewing of the viscera? We are told by Spencer and Gillen that during
the performance of certain traditionary ceremonies, an Australian’s
emotion is very great, so that he says his inward parts get “tied
up in knots,” and sometimes acquire “sight” and give omens;[375] and
Howitt tells us that fat of the kidneys is believed to be the seat
of a man’s prowess and other virtues.[376] To extract and renew a
man’s entrails, therefore, is to renew his spirit, just as we speak
metaphorically of a “change of heart,” so that he has more vivid
emotions, firmer courage, clearer insight. In fact, it is the magical
equivalent of inspiration; the crystal, too, of the Euahlayi is a magic
source; and this is as far as the Australians have got:[377] gross
materialism, which the progress or (at least) the movement of animistic
thought has happily superseded by conceptions more refined, if not more
truthful.
§ 8. APPARENT FAILURE OF OMENS
Though in their nature infallible, Omens are not always fulfilled—at
least, their fulfilment is not always ascertainable. But this is easily
explained; for whatever an Omen may be in itself, our knowledge of
it depends on observation, which may be superficial and incomplete,
so that we may not know what it was. What kind of bird was it? Which
way did it fly? How many cries did it utter? These questions go to
the heart of the matter; yet each of them points out an opportunity
of error. But granting the observations perfect, we have still to
learn what the Omen portends; and although a simple mind, trusting to
simple rules, may be ready offhand with an answer, it becomes, with the
development of the art of Divination, more and more complicated and
difficult, demanding long experience and profound erudition—something
worth paying for. It is popularly known that dreams are perplexing as
the guide of life. Are they to be accepted at face value, or do they go
by contraries? What difference does it make whether they happen early
in the night, or in the morning, or whether we sleep in white or in
coloured night-clothes? There is an extensive casuistry of this matter.
Interpretations of Omens proceeded generally by analogy: the length
and direction of the cracks in a shoulder-blade indicate the length
and tenor of a man’s life. Oracles, again, were often distractingly
obscure; from Delphi much like riddles; but those of Zeus at Dodona are
said to have been sometimes taken to Apollo at Delphi to ask what they
meant. Clearly, then, besides possible errors of observation, there
were further pitfalls of interpretation; if a physician or a pilot is
sometimes out in his reckoning, why not also a diviner? So that an Omen
might very well be fulfilled without our knowing exactly what it was or
what it indicated.
But that is not all; for we have seen that any kind of magical force
is only infallible as a tendency; it may be counteracted, and this
is generally thought to be the case with Omens. Just as the rites of
one magician may be frustrated by the more powerful operations of
another, so an Omen indicates a course of events which may, perhaps,
be turned aside. That which is foreseen by one spirit may be prevented
by another, whose intervention was not foreseen; for spirits are by no
means infallible. Hence, however well observed and interpreted, the
tendency of an Omen, or of the force it manifests, may be diverted or
reversed by some unknown cause. Moreover, we ourselves are loth to
relinquish all control over affairs. We have seen that the efficacy of
Omens depended (not without reason) on the way they were received; and
that we may meet them with our own magical influence, accepting them,
or rejecting with a spell.
And further, we have seen that Magic often works by symbols, and that
a symbolic action will cause or incite a real event; and similarly it
is believed that the event foreshown by an Omen may be symbolically
fulfilled; that some harmless semblance of the event may be substituted
for it, absorb (as it were) the poison of the menace and let the
threatened man go free. Astyages dreamed a dream which the Magi
interpreted to mean that the child of his daughter (married to a
Persian) should reign over Asia in his stead—implying that the kingdom
must pass from the Medes. He therefore took measures to have the child
destroyed; but by a series of happy chances Cyrus, the child, escaped
and grew up; and in his boyhood Astyages discovered who he was, and was
greatly alarmed. So he sent again for the Magi; but they, on learning
that the boys in the village where Cyrus had been reared had in games
appointed him their king, decided that this fulfilled the dream; for,
said they, “he will not reign a second time.”[378] So Cyrus lived, and
the lordship of Asia passed to the Persians; for the Magi in this case
overestimated the value of symbols. But all these ways of frustrating
an Omen are incompatible with the interpretation of them by the course
of Fate, and are only fit to be believed in by the weaker brethren.
§ 9. APOLOGY FOR OMENS
It may be some excuse for Omens that the interpretation of them was
a sort of gymnastic for ingenuity, and was a means by which the
quick-witted maintained themselves in a world of violence. It is,
moreover, the business of those who undertake such work to study social
and political conditions, just as rain-doctors study the weather. Their
judgment, therefore, may often be better than that of men immersed
in affairs and biassed by particular interests. Even in the lower
savagery diviners manage to know more than others. In Queensland,
when a big mob has assembled at a camp, diviners are believed to keep
their eyes and ears open, sleepless—to learn who have death-bones,
who has operated with one, who has been pointed at, etc.;[379] and
in South Africa (two or three steps higher in culture) diviners take
pains to obtain information as a means of “opening the gates of
distance.”[380] At Delphi, also, news was welcome from all parts, and
men of capacity kept a steady eye upon the affairs of Greece and Asia.
Of course, Divination, like every other superstition, was exploited
by politicians. The Roman Government, according to Cicero, maintained
the College of Augurs for the advantage of the State in civil affairs,
although in his time the leaders of armies had ceased to consult the
Omens:[381] and Polybius thought that religion was Rome’s most useful
institution.[382] A law that the comitia should not be held when
Jupiter thundered and lightened was especially convenient when that
assembly was inconvenient; for the official whose function it was had
only to declare that he saw lightning, and thereupon the comitia broke
up. Probably even those who thus abused a superstition, yet believed
(at least in times of danger) “there was something in it.” Omens and
Oracles were sought after to allay fear and to gain confidence, and
often they gave confidence and the strength that goes with confidence;
or perhaps the rashness and folly that go with confidence, and so
betrayed the devotee; or, again, they dashed the courage of brave men,
and spread dismay, distrust and weakness.
No superiority of mere intellect seems to ensure men against
participating in these delusions. Many Stoics, though highly
disciplined in Logic, upheld the practices of Divination and Astrology.
Panætius, indeed, rejected them; and Epictetus on moral grounds
discouraged Divination. “For,” said he, “what the diviner foresees is
not what really concerns us. We have within us a diviner who tells
us what good and evil are, and what are the signs of them. Does the
diviner understand that—after all his studies of the viscera? Not what
is to happen in the future, but to do as we ought whatever happens is
our true concern.”[383] But this genuine expression of Stoic thought
was abandoned by most of the sect in their desire to defend as much as
possible the popular religion. They even staked the existence of the
gods upon the genuineness of Divination: arguing that if Divination
exists there must be gods who send Omens; and that if Divination does
not exist there can be no gods—since if there are gods who know the
future, and have a regard for mankind, and are able to give warnings,
they will certainly do so. Therefore, no Divination, no gods.[384]
There is, indeed, a widespread pitiful persuasion that some provision
must have been made whereby a man may foresee his future; and so, in
a sense, there is; for the existence of order in nature implies the
possibility of foresight; and a fanciful mind might regard Divination
as the anticipatory manifestation of an instinct in play before the
faculties became capable of serious exercise. But the play was taken
too seriously; and the worst of it was that its inane methods diverted
attention from the only possible method—if not always on the part of
the diviner, at least on the part of the great multitude, his dupes.
M. H. A. Jounod says of the Bantu tribes, “Divination kills any attempt
to use reason or experience in practical life.”[385] And, clearly, this
is everywhere its tendency, be it a question of consulting a canary at
the street-corner, whether or not we should marry, or an augur rather
than an experienced general whether or not now to engage the enemy.
Seneca[386] treated Omens as a necessary consequence of universal Fate:
for if all events are factors of one predetermined order, everything
in the present is a sign or omen of everything to occur in the future;
and some events, such as the flight of birds, have been selected as
Omens, merely because the meaning or consequents of these happen to
have been observed; and whether Omens are respected or despised, Fate
determines the whole course of events. By this way of thinking, as it
was fated that the Romans should be defeated at Lake Trasimenus, it
was also fated that the Omens should be declared unfavourable and that
the warning should not be taken; and if it was fated that the Romans
should be defeated at Cannæ, it was also fated that the Omens should be
declared favourable and that they should be accepted. A belief in Fate
makes Omens useless.
If, however, instead of Fate (all-comprehensive Magic) or
predestination (by a supreme God), we regard the course of the world
as determined by natural causation, whether Omens or Oracles may be
useful or not (supposing them possible) depends on the nature of the
event foretold—on whether it involves ourselves conditionally only
or unconditionally. Omens that warn us against events conditionally
may be useful enough, and few will think it a serious fault that
they discourage the use of reason. King Deiotarus, having set out on
a journey, was warned by an eagle not to go forward with it, and he
turned back; and that same night the house at which he was to have
slept fell down; so he escaped.[387] The danger was conditional on his
continuing the journey; and, in the course of causation, a warning
of danger, whether announced by an augur or by our own sagacity, may
often enable us to avoid it. The causes of the future are present, and
(within certain limits) are in our power. If I have reason to believe
that there will be a fire at the Opera to-night, or have a presentiment
of some calamity there, I need not go; and, then, I shall not be burnt
alive. Whether the presage come to me by an Omen, or by a message from
a god, or in an anonymous letter from one of the incendiaries who
happens to be a friend of mine, cannot matter. No, if there were gods
with intuitions of futurity, or with better knowledge than we have
of present fact and greater power of calculating the consequences,
they might make themselves useful. On this hypothesis there is not _a
priori_ any absurdity in the doctrine of Omens.
But with Omens or Oracles of magical or divine authority, that
foreshadow our own fate unconditionally, the case is different. If,
for example, they tell a man that he will die by the fall of the roof
of his own house, that must be his end; and any one who examines his
career afterwards will find that all his efforts to escape, all his
pusillanimous crouchings and windings, were just so many steps of
causation upon the road to inevitable doom. To convey such a presage
serves no purpose but to fill the victim’s last days with anxiety and
dread: it is as bad as cruelty to animals.
The defence of Omens is mere rationalisation. They took possession
of men’s minds not in an age of reason, but when beliefs were freely
born of hope and fear, were entirely practical, were never thought
out and never verified. Whether the connection of Omen with event was
conceived of magically or animistically, it was always mysterious, and
on that account was the more impressive and acceptable. The uniformity
of such connexions was, indeed, assumed—otherwise they were useless;
the same bird’s call on this hand or on that had always the same
significance; but each case at first stood by itself; it was what
we call “a miracle.” Even such assumption of causation in ordinary
cases as common sense implies did not compel the reflection that each
cause must itself be an effect of other causes, and so again, and so
on for ever. Nor did the assumption that spirits could foresee the
future require that they should foresee the whole future, so as to
imply an inviolable order of the world. Such considerations were left
to amuse or perplex a later age. A great advance is marked by the
saying of the Bechuana prince to Casalis, that “one event is the son
of another, and we must never forget the genealogy.”[388] But quite
recently amongst ourselves causation was so feebly appreciated, even by
the most educated, that testimony concerning miracles could still be
appealed to as a ground for believing something further. One reviews
all these wonderful fossils of the soul which are dead and yet alive,
not without sympathy. For myself, I am free to confess, as they used to
say in Parliament, that Omens and presentiments still haunt the shadowy
precincts of imagination with vague shapes and mutterings of evils to
come; which when they approach will be (I suppose) as hard and definite
as daylight.
FOOTNOTES:
[339] VI. c. 27 (Rawlinson’s Translation).
[340] Williams, _Fiji and the Fijians_, p. 152.
[341] De Acosta, _History of the Indies_, VII. c. 23 (translated by
C. R. Markham).
[342] Spencer and Gillen, _Across Australia_, p. 220.
[343] Book I. cc. 7-10.
[344] _Reports of the Cambridge Expedition to Torres Straits_, VI. p.
260.
[345] W. R. Halliday, _Greek Divination_, p. 15.
[346] _Historia Naturalis_, XXVII. p. 4.
[347] Suetonius: _Julius_, c. 59.
[348] Hose and McDougall, _Pagan Tribes of Borneo_, II. pp. 56-64.
[349] _Northern Tribes of Central Australia_, p. 266.
[350] _Reports of the Cambridge Expedition to Torres Straits_, V. p.
361; VI. p. 259.
[351] Seligman, _Mel. of B. N. G._, p. 309.
[352] _De Divinatione_, I. c. 19.
[353] An infallible sign is, in Formal Logic, the same as a cause,
according to the scheme _If A, then B_; and it is conceivable that,
with strict thinking, a belief in an Omen may give rise to a magical
practice. “For,” says Lord Avebury, “granted that the fall of a stick
certainly preludes that of the person it represents, it follows that by
upsetting the stick his death can be caused” (_Origin of Civilisation_,
p. 166). I do not see why such an inference should not be drawn, but
can give no example of it. The possibility shows how much community
there is between Magic and the lore of Omens; but as to this particular
case, the magical cast of mind is already implied in the original
setting up of the stick whose fall should prelude that of a given
individual.
[354] Coddrington, _The Melanesians_, p. 123.
[355] A. W. Howitt, _Native Tribes of South-East Australia_, p. 401.
[356] Quoted by Frazer, _Totemism and Exogamy_, I. pp. 489 and 495.
[357] A. W. Howitt, _op. cit._, p. 389.
[358] C. G. Seligman, _op. cit._, p. 188.
[359] VII. c. 16.
[360] The poet is closely allied at first to the wizard; for (besides
that the greatest spells and oracles are versified) the poet is
inspired. In Australia poets are sometimes carried by ghosts into
skyland, where they learn songs and dances. Some compose awake;
but the belief prevails that they are inspired in dreams by dead
and kindred spirits. Their songs travel far amongst tribes that no
longer understand the language. (Howitt, _Native Tribes of South-East
Australia_, pp. 389 and 413.) Similarly in Fiji (_Fiji and the
Fijians_, p. 98). “The poem is too wonderful for me”—such is the
poet’s humility; “it was made by the gods”—such is his arrogance.
[361] Spencer and Gillen, _Native Tribes of Central Australia_, p. 526.
[362] Tylor, _Primitive Culture_, I. p. 125.
[363] Casalis, _Les Bassoutos_, pp. 299 and 340.
[364] Jounod, _Life of a South African Tribe_, I. 361. This “medicine”
is the chief’s great store of magical force: its principal ingredients
are the nails and hair of chiefs deceased, fixed together by a kind of
wax.
[365] Callaway, _Religion of the Amazulu_, p. 417.
[366] W. Ellis, _Polynesian Researches_, II. p. 235.
[367] _De Div._, II. c. 57.
[368] Thomas Williams, _Fiji and the Fijians_, p. 190.
[369] Pausanias, IX. c. 10 (Frazer’s Translation).
[370] Pausanias, I. p. 34.
[371] _Ibid._, IX. p. 30.
[372] Spencer and Gillen, _Native Tribes of Central Australia_, p. 523.
[373] A. W. Howitt, _op. cit._, p. 404.
[374] Langloh Parker, _The Euahlayi_, p. 25.
[375] _Northern Tribes of Central Australia_, p. 181.
[376] _Native Tribes of South-East Australia_, p. 367.
[377] This is unjust to the Australians. Amongst the Dieri (L. Eyre)
wizards with renewed entrails communicate with supernatural beings,
interpret dreams and discover murderers; but they also recognise
spiritual communication with ordinary men in visions; not ordinary
dreams, which are mere fancies, but those that are repeated; and these
come from Kutchi, an evil spirit (Howitt, _op. cit._, p. 358). We may
be sure the Greeks were mistaken in supposing that it was Amphiaraus
who instituted divination by dreams.
[378] Herodotus, I. cc. 107, 28.
[379] W. E. Roth, _Ethnological Studies_, p. 154.
[380] Kidd, _The Essential Kafir_, p. 193.
[381] _De Div._, II. cc. 33, 35.
[382] Polybius, VI. c. 2.
[383] _Discourses_, II. c. 7.
[384] _De Div._, II. c. 17; cf. c. 49.
[385] _Life of a South African Tribe_, p. 521.
[386] _Questiones Naturales_, II. c. 32.
[387] _De Div._, I. c. 15.
[388] _Les Bassoutos_, p. 248.