t be altered or modified
by the offerings which are made to him. Where, however, the being or
power worshipped is, as with the jungle-dwellers of Chota Nagpur,
still nameless, his personality and individuality must be of the
vaguest; and, in that case, there is the probability that the plant or
animal offered to him may become sacred to him; and, having become
sacred, may become divine. The animal or plant may become that in
which the nameless being manifests himself. The corn or maize is
offered to the nameless deity; the deity is the being to whom the corn
or maize is habitually offered; and then becomes the corn-deity or
maize-deity, the mother of the maize or the corn-goddess.

Like the _di indigites_ of Italy, these vegetation-goddesses are
addressed by names which, though performing the function of personal
names and enabling the worshippers to make appeals to the deities
personally, are still of perfectly transparent meaning. Both present
to us that stage in the evolution of a deity, in which as yet the
meaning of his name still survives; in which his name has not yet
become a fully personal name; and in which he has not yet attained to
full personality and complete individuality. This want of complete
individuality can hardly be dissociated from another fact which goes
with it. That fact is that the deity is to be found in any plant of
the species sacred to him, or in any animal of the species sacred to
him, but is not supposed to be found only in the particular plant or
animal which is offered on one particular occasion. If the
corn-goddess is present, or manifests herself, in one particular sheaf
of corn, at her harvest festival this year, still she did manifest
herself last year, and will manifest herself next year, in another.
The deity, that is to say, is the species; and the species, and no
individual specimen thereof, is the deity. That is the reason which
prevents, or tends to prevent, deities of this kind from attaining
complete individuality.

This want of complete individuality and of full personality it is
which characterises totems. The totem, also, is a being who, if he
manifests himself in this particular animal, which is slain, has also
manifested himself and will manifest himself in other animals of the
same species: but he is not identical with any particular individual
specimen. Not only is the individuality of the totem thus incomplete,
but in many instances the name of the species has not