similar process is to be observed elsewhere.[276]

APOTROPAIC CEREMONIES

+138+. The savage and half-civilized belief (a belief that has survived
to some extent in civilized communities) is that the ills that afflict
or threaten a community (such as epidemics and shortage of crops) are
due not to natural causes but to supernatural agencies. But man, it is
held, may control the hostile supernatural agents--they are subject to
fear and other emotions, and though powerful are not omnipotent; they
may be expelled or otherwise got rid of--violence may be used against
them, or the aid of stronger supernatural Powers may be called in. In
pursuance of these ends ceremonies have been devised in many parts of
the world; though differing in details they are alike in principle; the
question is how man may become the master of the demons. The ceremonies
are sometimes performed on the occasion of particular afflictions,
sometimes are massed at stated seasons, as at the beginning of the year
or in connection with some agricultural festival.

+139+. Man's defensive attitude toward the supernatural world appears in
many usages connected with ordinary life. Fear of the hostility of
ghosts has led surviving friends to take precautions against their
return--their own houses are closed to them and they are driven away
with blows.[277] They are too near akin to be trusted, and they are
believed to be able and willing to do harm.[278] At the other extreme of
life, when the child comes into the world, mother and child must be
guarded against hostile demonic influences.[279] When a demon is known
to have entered into a human being, producing sickness or madness,
exorcism must be resorted to; magicians, prophets, and saints are able
by ceremonies or by prayer to expel the intruder and restore the
afflicted to health. Ritual taint (which is supernatural), incurred, for
example, by touching a dead body, is removed by sprinkling with sacred
water.[280]

+140+. But the term "apotropaic" is generally used of expulsive
ceremonies in which a whole community takes part. In the simplest forms
of procedure the hostile spirits are driven out of the village by shouts
and blows; crowds of men rush through the streets, searching houses,
expelling spirits at every possible point of ingress, and finally
forcing them outside the limits of the community. Examples of such a
custom are found in the Pacific Islands, Australia, Japan, Indonesia,
West Africa, Ca