on or
repugnance towards other lines of conduct that have become established
or interdicted, because they are beneficial or injurious to the tribe;
though neither the young nor the adults know why they have become
established or interdicted. Instance the praiseworthiness of
wife-stealing, and the viciousness of marrying within the tribe.

We may now ascend a stage to an order of incentives and restraints
derived from these. The primitive belief is that every dead man becomes
a demon, who is often somewhere at hand, may at any moment return, may
give aid or do mischief, and has to be continually propitiated. Hence
among other agents whose approbation or reprobation are contemplated by
the savage as consequences of his conduct, are the spirits of his
ancestors. When a child he is told of their deeds, now in triumphant
tones, now in whispers of horror; and the instilled belief that they may
inflict some vaguely-imagined but fearful evil, or give some great help,
becomes a powerful incentive or deterrent. Especially does this happen
when the story is of a chief, distinguished for his strength, his
ferocity, his persistence in that revenge on enemies which the
experiences of the savage make him regard as beneficial and virtuous.
The consciousness that such a chief, dreaded by neighbouring tribes, and
dreaded, too, by members of his own tribe, may reappear and punish those
who have disregarded his injunctions, becomes a powerful motive. But it
is clear, in the first place, that the imagined anger and the imagined
satisfaction of this deified chief, are simply transfigured forms of the
anger and satisfaction displayed by those around; and that the feelings
accompanying such imaginations have the same original root in the
experiences which have associated an average of painful results with the
manifestation of another's anger, and an average of pleasurable results
with the manifestation of another's satisfaction. And it is clear, in
the second place, that the actions thus forbidden and encouraged must be
mostly actions that are respectively detrimental and beneficial to the
tribe; since the successful chief is usually a better judge than the
rest, and has the preservation of the tribe at heart. Hence experiences
of utility, consciously or unconsciously organized, underlie his
injunctions; and the sentiments which prompt obedience are, though very
indirectly and without the knowledge of those who feel them, referable
to experien