Primitive Culture: Researches Into the Development of Mythology, Philosophy, Religion, Language, Art and Custom, Volume 1

Front Cover

From inside the book

Common terms and phrases

Popular passages

Page 1 - Civilization, taken in its wide ethnographic sense, is that" complex whole which includes knowledge, belief, art, morals, law, custom, and any other capabilities and habits acquired by man as a member of society.
Page 278 - Of the lands which the river of Time Had left ere he woke on its breast, Or shall reach when his eyes have been closed. Only the tract where he sails He wots of; only the thoughts, Raised by the objects he passes, are his.
Page 31 - The discoveries of ancient and modern navigators, and the domestic history or tradition of the most enlightened nations, represent the human savage naked both in mind and body, and destitute of laws, of arts, of ideas, and almost of language.
Page 435 - Among the Seminoles of Florida, when a woman died in childbirth, the infant was held over her face to receive her parting spirit, and thus acquire strength and knowledge for its future use.
Page 496 - Every night and alle ; The fire will burn thee to the bare bane ; And Christe receive thy saule.
Page 495 - Every nighte and alle, Sit thee down and put them on ; And Christe receive thy saule. If hosen and shoon thou ne'er...
Page 420 - have no ' idea of a Supreme Divinity, the creator and governor ' of the world, the witness of their actions, and their ' future judge. They have no object of worship, even ' of a subordinate and inferior rank.
Page 431 - It is a thin unsubstantial human image, in its nature a sort of vapour, film, or shadow ; the cause of life and thought in the individual it animates ; independently possessing thex personal consciousness and volition of its corporeal owner, past or present ; capable of leaving the body far behind, to flash swiftly from place to place ; mostly impalpable and invisible, yet also manifesting physical power, and especially appearing to men waking or asleep as a phantasm separate from the body of which...
Page 85 - I (saith Israel) know One : One is God, who is over heaven and earth. Who knoweth two ? I (saith Israel) know two : Two tables of the covenant ; but One is our God Who is over the heavens and the earth.' (And so forth, accumulating up to the last verse, which is — ) ' Who knoweth thirteen ? I (saith Israel) know thirteen : Thirteen divine attributes, twelve tribes, eleven stars, ten commandments, nine months preceding childbirth, eight days preceding circumcision, seven days of the week, six books...
Page 432 - The Basutos not only call the spirit remaining after death the seriti or "shadow," but they think that if a man walks on the river bank a crocodile may seize his shadow in the water and draw him in; while in Old Calabar there is found the same identification of the spirit with the ukpon or "shadow," for a man to lose which is fatal.

Bibliographic information