Essays: Scientific, Political, & Speculative; Vol. 1 of 3: Library Edition (1891), Containing Seven Essays not before Republished, and Various other Additions.Spencer, Herbert
Philosophy
Essays: Scientific, Political, & Speculative; Vol. 1 of 3: Library Edition (1891), Containing Seven Essays not before Republished, and Various other Additions.
Spencer, Herbert
Philosophy; Political science; Science
consciousness, that occasionally occur in members of his tribe. One who
has fainted, and cannot be immediately brought back to himself (note the
significance of our own phrases "returning to himself," etc.) as a
sleeper can, shows him a state in which the other self has been away for
a time beyond recall. Still more is this prolonged absence of the other
self shown him in cases of apoplexy, catalepsy, and other forms of
suspended animation. Here for hours the other self persists in remaining
away, and on returning refuses to say where he has been. Further
verification is afforded by every epileptic subject, into whose body,
during the absence of the other self, some enemy has entered; for how
else does it happen that the other self, on returning, denies all
knowledge of what his body has been doing? And this supposition that the
body has been "possessed" by some other being, is confirmed by the
phenomena of somnambulism and insanity. 6. What, then, is the
interpretation inevitably put upon death? The other self has habitually
returned after sleep, which simulates death. It has returned, too, after
fainting, which simulates death much more. It has even returned after
the rigid state of catalepsy, which simulates death very greatly. Will
it not return also after this still more prolonged quiescence and
rigidity? Clearly it is quite possible--quite probable even. The dead
man's other self is gone away for a long time, but it still exists
somewhere, far or near, and may at any moment come back to do all he
said he would do. Hence the various burial-rites--the placing of weapons
and valuables along with the body, the daily bringing of food to it,
etc. I hope hereafter to show that, with such knowledge of the facts as
he has, this interpretation is the most reasonable the savage can arrive
at. Let me here, however, by way of showing how clearly the facts bear
out this view, give one illustration out of many. "The ceremonies with
which they [the Veddahs] invoke them [the shades of the dead] are few as
they are simple. The most common is the following. An arrow is fixed
upright in the ground, and the Veddah dances slowly round it, chanting
this invocation, which is almost musical in its rhythm:"
"Mâ miya, mâ miy, mâ deyâ,
Topang koyihetti mittigan yandâh?"
"My departed one, my departed one, my God!
Where art thou wandering?"
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