ation of Westermarck's during his residence among the country
people of Morocco. He was struck, he says, with the superstitious fear
the men had of women. They are supposed to be much better versed in
magic, and therefore one ran greater danger in offending them. The
curses of women are, generally, much more feared than those of men. To
this we have a parallel in Christianity which so often revived and
strengthened the lower religious beliefs. During the witch mania an
overwhelming proportion of those charged with and executed for sorcery
were women. As a matter of fact, women were more prone than men to
credit themselves with possessing supernatural power. But the
theological explanation was that the devil had more power over women
than men. This was, obviously, a heritage from the primitive belief
above described.[81]

Another way in which religion becomes closely associated with sexualism
is through the widely diffused phallic worship. The worship of the
generative power in the form of stones, pillars, and carved
representations of the male and female sexual organs plays an
unquestionably important part in the history of religion, however hardly
pressed it may have been by some enthusiastic theorisers. "The farther
back we go," says Mr. Hargrave Jennings, "in the history of every
country, the deeper we explore into all religions, ancient as well as
modern, we stumble the more frequently upon the incessantly intensifying
distinct traces of this supposedly indecent mystic worship."[82] On the
lower Congo, says Sir H. H. Johnston:--

"Phallic worship in various forms prevails. It is not associated with
any rites that might be called particularly obscene; and on the coast,
where manners and morals are particularly corrupt, the phallus cult is
no longer met with. In the forests between Manyanga and Stanley Pool it
is not rare to come upon a little rustic temple, made of palm fronds and
poles, within which male and female figures, nearly or quite life size,
may be seen, with disproportionate genital organs, the figures being
intended to represent the male and female principle. Around these carved
and painted statues are many offerings, plates, knives, and cloth, and
frequently also the phallic symbol may be seen dangling from the
rafters. There is not the slightest suspicion of obscenity in all this,
and anyone qualifying this worship of the generative power as obscene
does so hastily and ignorantly. It is a solemn myster