One of the early stages of religious progress is to attempt to form a meeting-place with the spirit. This desire is seen in the lowest tribes and in the highest civilization of to-day. When Cabrillo came to the coast of southern California he found natives that had never before come in contact with civilized people. He describes a rude temple made by driving stakes in the ground in a circular form, and partitioning the enclosure by similar rows of stakes. At the centre was a rude platform, on which were placed the feathers of certain birds pleasing to the spirit. The natives came to this temple occasionally, and, circling around it, went through many antics of worship. This represents the primitive idea of location in worship. Not different in its fundamental conception from the rude altar of stones built by Abraham at Bethel, the Greek altar, or the mighty columns of St. Peter's, it was the simple meeting-place of man and the spirit. For all of these represent location in worship, and just as the modern worshipper enters the church or cathedral to meet God, so did the primitive savage fix locations for the meeting of the spirit. Man finally attempted to control the spirit for his own advantage. A rude form of religion was reached, found in {117} certain stages of the development of all religions, in which man sought to manipulate or exorcise the spirits who existed in the air or were located in trees, stones, and other material forms. Out of this came a genuine worship of the powerful, and supplication for help and support. Seeking aid and favor became the fundamental ideas in religious worship. Simple in the beginning, it sought to appease the wrath of the evil spirit and gain the favor of the good. But finally it sought to worship on account of the sublimity and power possessed by the object of worship. With the advancement of religious practice, religious beliefs and religious ceremonies became more complex. Great systems of mythology sprang up among nations about to enter the precincts of civilization, and polytheism predominated. Purely ethical religions were of a later development, for the notion of the will of the gods concerning the treatment of man by his fellows belongs to an advanced stage of religious belief. The ethical importance of religion reaches its culmination in the religion of Jesus Christ.