o sure that in this aspect
the theory is not based on actual experiences, not of a normal and
ordinary kind. If so, the savage philosophy and its supposed survivals in
belief will appear in a new light. And we are inclined to hold that an
examination of the mass of evidence to which Mr. Tylor offers here so
slight an allusion will at least make it wise to suspend our judgment,
not only as to the origins of the savage theory of spirits, but as to the
materialistic hypothesis of the absence of a psychical element in man.

I may seem to have outrun already the limits of permissible hypothesis. It
may appear absurd to surmise that there can exist in man, savage or
civilised, a faculty for acquiring information not accessible by the known
channels of sense, a faculty attributed by savage philosophers to the
wandering soul. But one may be permitted to quote the opinion of
M. Charles Richet, Professor of Physiology in the Faculty of Medicine
in Paris. It is not cited because M. Richet is a professor of physiology,
but because he reached his conclusion after six years of minute
experiment. He says: 'There exists in certain persons, at certain moments,
a faculty of acquiring knowledge which has no _rapport_ with our normal
faculties of that kind.'[30]

Instances tending to raise a presumption in favour of M. Richet's idea may
now be sought in savage and civilised life.

[Footnote 1: _Primitive Culture,_ i. 9, 10.]

[Footnote 2: _Origin of Ranks._]

[Footnote 3: I may be permitted to refer to 'Reply to Objections' in the
appendix to my _Myth, Ritual, and Religion,_ vol. ii.]

[Footnote 4: Spencer, _Ecclesiastical Institutions_, pp. 672, 673.]

[Footnote 5: _Primitive Culture_, i. 417-425. Cf. however _Princip. Of
Sociol._, p. 304.]

[Footnote 6: Op. cit. i. 423, 424.]

[Footnote 7: Published for the Berlin Society of Experimental Psychology,
Guenther, Leipzig, 1890.]

[Footnote 8: _Ecclesiastical Institutions_, 837-839.]

[Footnote 9: _Primitive Culture_, i. 421, chapter xi.]

[Footnote 10: This theory is what Mr. Spencer calls 'Animism,' and does
not believe in. What Mr. Tylor calls 'Animism' Mr. Spencer believes in,
but he calls it the 'Ghost Theory.']

[Footnote 11: _Primitive Culture_, i. 428.]

[Footnote 12: Howitt, _Journal of Anthropological Institute_, xiii.
191-195.]

[Footnote 13: The curious may consult, for savage words for 'dreams,' Mr.
Scott's _Dictionary of the Mang'anja Language_, s.v. 'Lots,' or