hildren whom such
women bear belong to the god. The institution "is essentially religious
in its origin and is intimately connected with phallic worship."

+587. Sacral harlotry and child sacrifice.+ These observations may serve
to introduce a study of the phenomena, so incomprehensible to us, of
sacral prostitution and child sacrifice. That study is calculated to
show us that the mores define right and wrong. It would be a great
mistake to regard the above cases as mere aberrations of sex appetite.
The usages had their origin in interests. Sacral harlotry was a
substitute for the child sacrifice of females. The other incidental
interests found advantage in it. It was an attempt to solve problems of
life. It was regarded as conducive to welfare, and was connected with
religion. It was kept up by the conservatism and pertinacity of
religious usage until a later time and another set of conditions, when
it became vicious.

+588. Reproduction and food supply.+ The operations of nature by which
plants and animals reproduce are of great interest and importance to
man, because on them depends the abundance of his food supply. It is
impossible to tell when this interest would "begin," but it would become
intense whenever the number of men was great in proportion to the food
supply. Hence the rainfall, the course of the seasons, the prevalence of
winds, the conjunction of astronomical phenomena with spawning or fruit
seasons, and the habits of plants and animals caught the feeble
attention of savage man and taught him facts of nature, through his
eagerness to get signs of coming plenty or suggestions as to his own
plans and efforts. Attention has been called to a very interesting fact
about the fructification of the domesticated date palm wherever oasis
cultivation prevailed in western Asia.[1887] The fructification must be
artificial. Men carry the pollen to the female plant and adopt devices
to distribute it on the wind or by artificial contact. At the present
time this is done by attaching a bunch of the male seed on a branch to
windward.[1888] Tylor first suggested that certain ancient pictorial
representations are meant to depict the work of artificial
fructification as carried on by mythological persons,--cherubim, who
represent the winds.[1889] The function of the wind distributing the
seed is divine work. The tree is of such supreme value[1890] that the
well living of men depends on this operation. The sex conjunction