The information which the cuneiform texts have yielded concerning the moral life of the Babylonian and Assyrian peoples, though scanty, is of the greatest value to the student of comparative morals, not only because it casts light upon a moral development in some important respects like the moral evolution of the kindred Semitic people of Israel, but also because that later evolution was probably deeply influenced by it. Therefore, though nothing like a connected account of the moral evolution in the Euphratean lands can be attempted till the thousands of cuneiform tablets recovered from the ancient libraries of the Babylonian-Assyrian cities have been deciphered, and the ethical character and value of their contents determined, we shall devote a few pages to the portrayal of such manifestations of conscience as are disclosed in the religious, literary, historical, and law tablets whose contents are already known to us. [Sidenote: The general nonethical character of the Babylonian-Assyrian religion] Religion filled a large place in the life of the ancient Babylonians and Assyrians, especially in that of the former; but religion with them had at first little or nothing to do with morality. Like the religion of savage and barbarian folk, it lacked wholly or almost wholly the ethical spirit. Throughout the early period it was in the main simply a system of incantations and magical rites. Scarcely any moral element entered into the system until the later centuries of Babylonian-Assyrian history. This religion was in truth simply a survival from primitive savage times when religion was merely a belief in the existence of evil spirits, and in their disposition and power to do harm to men.[101] In this stage of the religious evolution sickness, death, misadventure of every kind are believed to be caused by some malignant demon or by some offended and revengeful god. The evil spirits are supposed to act from pure malignancy, while the great gods are conceived to be angered especially by the nonobservance of some religious rite, by the violation of some taboo forbidding the use of certain kinds of food, or by some other like act. To ward off the attacks of the evil demons, or to appease the offended gods, recourse was had to the recital of magical formulas and incantations. This was Shamanism in its lowest and crudest form, in which there was at work as a motive on the part of the suppliant only cringing fear or a desire to get rid of some present pain, without the least trace of moral emotions, such as remorse and repentance. [Sidenote: Ethical tendencies in the religion]