the interest of one
individual member and perhaps to the injury of another, is a personal
power, which in itself--that is to say, apart from the intention with
which it is used and apart from the consequences which ensue--is
neither commendable nor condemnable from the community's point of
view; and which consequently can neither be condemned nor commended by
the common consciousness, until the difference between self and the
community has become manifest, and the possibility of a divergence
between the interests of self or _alter_ and those of the community
has been realised. Further, this power, in whichever way it comes to
be exercised, marks a strong individuality; and may be the first, as
it is certainly a most striking, manifestation of the fact of
individuality: it marks off, at once, the individual possessing such
power from the rest of the community. And the common consciousness is
puzzled by the apparition. Just as it tolerates fetishes though it
disapproves of them and is afraid of them, so it tolerates the
magician, though it is afraid of him and does not cordially approve of
him, even when he benefits an individual client without injuring the
community. But though the man of power may use, and apparently most
often does use, his power, in the interest of some individual and to
the detriment of the community; and though it is this condemnable use
which is everywhere most conspicuous, and probably earliest developed;
still there is no reason why he should not use, and as a matter of
fact he sometimes does use, his power on behalf of the community to
promote the food-supply of the community or to produce the rain which
is desired. In this case, then, the individual, having a power which
others have not, is not at variance with the community but in harmony
with the common consciousness, and becomes an organ by which it acts.
When, then, the belief in gods, having the interests of the community
at heart, presents itself or develops within the common consciousness,
the individual who has the power on behalf of the community to make
rain or increase the food supply is marked out by the belief of the
community--or it may be by the communings of his own heart--as
specially related to the gods. Hence we find, in the low stages of the
evolution of religion, the proceedings, by which the man of power had
made rain for the community or increased the food-supply, either
incorporated into the ritual of the gods, or survivi