means contemptible. The Seri of the Californian Gulf, perhaps on a still lower plane of civilization, and certainly leading their life in more miserable surroundings, are divided into clans and furnished with a social hierarchy built up on a reverence for women almost chivalrous in its type.[121.1] The existence everywhere of organized societies implies the paramount influence of the community over the individual. Nor is that influence only a matter of implication. Abundant evidence is found of the control wielded by society over the actions and the very thoughts of its members. The individual is nothing: the group is everything. As Professor Durkheim remarks, every society exercises power over its members, power physical and above all moral. It keeps them in a sensation of perpetual dependence. It is distinct from the individuals who compose it, and consequently its interests are distinct from theirs. But as it cannot attain its ends except through and by means of the individual, it makes an imperious claim on his assistance, exacting it even to the sacrifice of his inclinations and interests. Thus at every moment we are obliged to submit to rules of conduct and of thought which we have neither made nor wished to make, and which may even be contrary to our most fundamental instincts.[121.2] In these days and among civilized societies, when individualism is so strongly developed in thought and action, we are apt to forget to what an extent religion is an expression of the social organization. An eminent {122} Oxford professor, not long ago deceased, used to say that religion was a social secretion. That may be an excellent way to phrase the relations between society and religion in modern Europe. It is a very incomplete account of them as they exist on the Australian steppe or in the forests of Brazil. In the lower culture religion is much more than a social secretion: it is one aspect of the social organization, inseparable from the rest. The organization cannot be understood without it--nay, it cannot exist apart from it. In these societies every member has his position and takes his share in religious rites. Whatever his place in the social scale, he is on the same level of knowledge, he shares in the same beliefs, with his fellows. The mental atmosphere of each is charged with the same electric fluid, which communicates itself to all alike. Especially on the occasions of reunion its action is intensified, frequently resulting in excitement, in vehement exaltation, translated into the wildest and most extravagant actions. But these reunions are not merely social, they are religious festivals. For religion pervades every thought and deed both of the individual and of the community. It binds the members together as no other force could do. The power of society over the individual is the power of religion. For religion is not as yet distinguished from politics, from law, from medicine, or