But on the whole it may be said of the Romans, as Dr. Farnell has said of our Teutonic ancestors (_Evolution of Religion_, p. 108), that cathartic ritual did not weigh heavily on their consciences. Assuredly it may be so said of the Romans of historical times, subjected to the quieting influences of priestly law and ritual, which found infallible remedies for the conscience of the individual, for his fear of evil powers material or spiritual--expedients to emancipate him from the bondage of taboo[117]--in the religious action of the State as a whole. It may perhaps be guessed that even in an age long before the State arose the conscience of the Latin was never ‘intensified’ as regards purification from bloodshed or other mischance or misdeed. The impurity or holiness of blood, as conceived by all primitive peoples, has left no obvious trace in Roman ideas, legends, or literature; it is to be found, but it does not attract our attention as it does in Greece. I believe that the explanation of this lies in the genius of the Roman for law, and in his early and very distinct conception of the State and of the authority of its officials. It may, indeed, be also due to the invasion of Latium by a people of advanced culture, who had but little to say to the grosser material ideas of an aboriginal population; but this is still merely speculation, into which I cannot enter now. Whatever the cause, the religion of the Romans as we know it shows no horror, no fear, so long as the worship of the gods is performed exactly and correctly according to the rules of the State priesthoods: there is no sense of sin or of pollution, of taboo irremediably broken, haunting the mind of the individual: all is cheerfully serious, regular, ordered, ritualistic; and nowhere can we see this better than in the public and private lustral processions of the Roman people.