hearth was a god; the walls and
doors and threshold of his house were gods; the boundaries of his field
were also gods. [100] It is precisely the same with the modern Hindu;
he also venerates the threshold of his house, the cooking-hearth, the
grinding-mill, and the boundaries of his field. The Jains still think
that all animals, plants and inanimate objects have souls or spirits
like human beings. The belief in a soul or spirit is naturally not
primitive, as man could not at first conceive of anything he did not
see or hear, but plants and inanimate objects could not subsequently
have been credited with the possession of souls or spirits unless they
had previously been thought to be alive. "The Fijians consider that
if an animal or a plant dies its soul immediately goes to Bolotoo;
if a stone or any other substance is broken, immortality is equally
its reward; nay, artificial bodies have equal good luck with men
and hogs and yams. If an axe or a chisel is worn out or broken up,
away flies its soul for the service of the gods. If a house is taken
down or any way destroyed, its immortal part will find a situation on
the plains of Bolotoo. The Finns believed that all inanimate objects
had their _haltia_ or soul." [101] The Malays think that animals,
vegetables and minerals, as well as human beings, have souls. [102]
The Kawar tribe are reported to believe that all articles of furniture
and property have souls or spirits, and if any such is stolen the
spirit will punish the thief. Theft is consequently almost unknown
among them. All the fables about animals and plants speaking and
exercising volition; the practice of ordeals, resting on the belief
that the sacred living elements, fire and water, will of themselves
discriminate between the innocent and guilty; the propitiatory
offerings to the sea and to rivers, such incidents as Xerxes binding
the sea with fetters, Ajax defying the lightning, Aaron's rod that
budded, the superstitions of sailors about ships: all result from
the same primitive belief. Many other instances of self-conscious
life and volition being attributed to animals, plants and natural
objects are given by Lord Avebury in _Origin of Civilisation_, by
Dr. Westermarck in _The Origin and Development of the Moral Ideas_,
[103] and by Sir J.G. Frazer in _The Golden Bough_ [104]

Thus primitive man had no conception of inanimate matter, and it seems
probable that he did not either realise the idea of death. Th