What has been said throws great light on the fundamental ideas of totemism, but it does not account for the notion of protection, which forms the real practical feature of that system. This notion can, however, be found in certain doctrines of the ancient Persian religion. Dr. M’Lennan refers,[353] in support of his hypothesis, that animal gods were prolongations of the totems, to the opinion said to have been entertained by the Peruvians, that “there was not any beast or bird upon the earth whose shape or image did not shine in the heavens, by whose influence its similitude was generated on the earth, and its species increased.” From this he assumes “that the celestial beings were conceived to be in _the shape_ of the animals, and to have special relations to their breed on the earth.” The Peruvian notion is, however, rather a phase of the ancient belief, expressed in the cosmogony of Zoroaster, that all things on earth had celestial prototypes which emanated from the Deity. As Lenormant remarks,[354] “stars, animals, men, angels themselves—in one word, every created being had his Fravishi, who was invoked in prayers and sacrifices, and was the invisible protector who watched untiringly over the being to whom he was attached.” The Mazdian _fravishis_ answer to the personal spirits of nature-worship, and, according to the Accadian Magical Table, every man had “from the hour of his birth a special god attached to him, who lived as his protector and his spiritual type.”[355] We have here the idea of guardianship by a mysterious being which is so important in connection with the totem, but there is no suggestion that the _fravishi_ itself ever became embodied in a terrestrial form, although there does not appear to be any reason why it should not do so.