The Eternal Belief in Immortality & Worship of the Dead. James George Frazer

to be of use. … John Hunter, supported by his experiments on anabiosis, hoped to prolong the life of man indefinitely by alternate freezing and thawing; and the Veronese Colonel Aless. Guaguino made his contemporaries believe that a race of men existed in Russia, of which the individuals died regularly every year on the 27th of November, and returned to life on the 24th of the following April. There cannot however be the least doubt, that the higher organisms, as they are now constructed, contain within themselves the germs of death. The question however arises as to how this has come to pass; and I reply that death is to be looked upon as an occurrence which is advantageous to the species as a concession to the outer conditions of life, and not as an absolute necessity, essentially inherent in life itself. Death, that is the end of life, is by no means, as is usually assumed, an attribute of all organisms. An immense number of low organisms do not die, although they are easily destroyed, being killed by heat, poisons, etc. As long, however, as those conditions which are necessary for their life are fulfilled, they continue to live, and they thus carry the potentiality of unending life in themselves. I am speaking not only of the Amoebae and the low unicellular Algae, but also of far more highly organized unicellular animals, such as the Infusoria."¹⁰⁶

      Similar view expressed by Alfred Russel Wallace.

A similar suggestion that death is not a natural necessity but an innovation introduced for the good of the breed, has been made by our eminent English biologist, Mr. Alfred Russel Wallace. He says: "If individuals did not die they would soon multiply inordinately and would interfere with each other's healthy existence. Food would become scarce, and hence the larger individuals would probably decompose or diminish in size. The deficiency of nourishment would lead to parts of the organism not being renewed; they would become fixed, and liable to more or less slow decomposition as dead parts within a living body. The smaller organisms would have a better chance of finding food, the larger ones less chance. That one which gave off several small portions to form each a new organism would have a better chance of leaving descendants like itself than one which divided equally or gave off a large part of itself. Hence it would happen that those which gave off very small portions would probably soon after cease to maintain their own existence while they would leave a numerous offspring. This state of things would be in any case for the advantage of the race, and would therefore, by natural selection, soon become established as the regular course of things, and thus we have the origin of old age, decay, and death; for it is evident that when one or more individuals have provided a sufficient number of successors they themselves, as consumers of nourishment in a constantly increasing degree, are an injury to their successors. Natural selection therefore weeds them out, and in many cases favours such races as die almost immediately after they have left successors. Many moths and other insects are in this condition, living only to propagate their kind and then immediately dying, some not even taking any food in the perfect and reproductive state."¹⁰⁷

      Savages and some men of science agree that death is not a natural necessity.

      Thus it appears that two of the most eminent biologists of our time agree with savages in thinking that death is by no means a natural necessity for all living beings. They only differ from savages in this, that whereas savages look upon death as the result of a deplorable accident, our men of science regard it as a beneficent reform instituted by nature as a means of adjusting the numbers of living beings to the quantity of the food supply, and so tending to the improvement and therefore on the whole to the happiness of the species.

Footnote 57: (return)

      H. Callaway, The Religious System of the Amazulu, Part i. pp. 1, 3 sq., Part ii. p. 138; Rev. L. Grout, Zululand, or Life among the Zulu-Kafirs (Philadelphia, N.D.), pp. 148 sq.; Dudley Kidd, The Essential Kafir (London, 1904), pp. 76 sq. Compare A. F. Gardiner, Narrative of a Journey to the Zoolu Country (London, 1836), pp. 178 sq., T. Arbousset et F. Daumas, Relation d'un voyage d'Exploration au Nord-Est de la Colonie du Cap de Bonne-Espérance (Paris, 1842), p. 472; Rev. J. Shooter, The Kafirs of Natal and the Zulu Country (London, 1857), p. 159; W. H. I. Bleek, Reynard the Fox in South Africa (London, 1864), p. 74; D. Leslie, Among the Zulus and Amatongas, Second Edition (Edinburgh, 1875), p. 209; F. Speckmann, Die Hermannsburger Mission in Afrika (Hermannsburg, 1876), p. 164.

Footnote 58: (return)

      J. Chapman, Travels in the Interior of South Africa (London, 1868), i. 47.

Footnote 59: (return)

      E. Casalis, The Basutos (London, 1861), p. 242; E. Jacottet, The Treasury of Ba-suto Lore, i. (Morija, Basutoland, 1908), pp. 46 sqq.

Footnote 60: (return)

      H. A. Junod, Les Ba-Ronga Neuchâtel (1898), pp. 401 sq.

Footnote 61: (return)

      W. A. Elmslie, Among the Wild Ngoni (Edinburgh and London, 1899), p. 70.

Footnote 62: (return)

      H. A. Junod and W. A. Elmslie, ll.cc.

Footnote 63: (return)

      C. W. Hobley, Ethnology of A-Kamba and other East African Tribes (Cambridge, 1910), pp. 107–109.

Footnote 64: (return)

      Fr. Müller, "Die Religionen Togos in Einzeldarstellungen," Anthropos, ii. (1907) p. 203. In a version of the story reported from Calabar a sheep appears as the messenger of mortality, while a dog is the messenger of immortality or rather of resurrection. See "Calabar Stories," Journal of the African Society, No. 18 (January 1906), p. 194.

Footnote 65: (return)

      E. Perregaux, Chez les Achanti (Neuchâtel, 1906), pp. 198 sq.

Footnote 66: (return)

      E. Perregaux, op. cit. p. 199.

Footnote 67: (return)

      Sir J. E. Alexander, Expedition of Discovery into the Interior of Africa (London, 1838), i. 169; C. J. Andersson, Lake Ngami, Second Edition (London, 1856), pp. 328 sq.; W. H. I. Bleek, Reynard the Fox in South Africa (London, 1864), pp. 71–73; Th. Hahn, Tsuni-Goam, the Supreme Being of the Khoi-Khoi (London, 1881), p. 52.

Footnote 68: (return)

      W. H. I. Bleek, A Brief Account of Bushman Folk-lore (London, 1875), pp. 9 sq.

Footnote 69: (return)

      W. H. I. Bleek, Reynard the Fox in South Africa, pp. 69 sq.

Footnote 70: (return)