ut still yields
it the stock of reincarnated soul-force that enables it to survive.
If, then, these rites are part and parcel of mere magic, most, or all,
of what the world knows as religion must be mere magic. But it is better
for anthropology to call things by the names that they are known by
in the world of men--that is, in the wider world, not in some corner
or coterie of it.

* * * * *

In order to bring out more fully the second point that I have been
trying to make, namely, the close interdependence between religion
and custom in primitive society, let me be allowed to quote one more
example of the ritual of a rude people. And again let us resort to
native Australia, though this time to the south-eastern corner of it;
since in Australia we have a cultural development on the whole very
low, having been as it were arrested through isolation, yet one that
turns out to be not incompatible with high religion in the making.

Initiation in native Australia is the equivalent of what is known
amongst ourselves as the higher education. The only difference is that,
with them, every one who is not judged utterly unfit is duly initiated;
whereas, with us, the higher education is offered to some who are unfit,
whilst many who are fit never have the luck to get it. The
initiation-custom is intended to tide the boys over the difficult time
of puberty, and turn them into responsible men. The whole of the adult
males assist in the ceremonies. Special men, however, are told off
to tutor the youth--a lengthy business, since it entails a retirement,
perhaps for six months, into the bush with their charges; who are there
taught the tribal traditions, and are generally admonished, sometimes
forcibly, for their good. Further, this is rather like a retirement
into a monastery for the young men, seeing that during all the time
they are strictly taboo, or in other words in a holy state that involves
much fasting and mortification of the flesh. At last comes the time
when their actual passage across the threshold of manhood has to be
celebrated. The rites may be described in one word as impressive.
Society wishes to set a stamp on their characters, and believes in
stamping hard. Physically, then, the lads feel the force of society.
A tooth is knocked out, they are tossed in the air to make them grow
tall, and so on--rites that, whilst they may have separate occult ends
in view, are completely at one in bein