The Golden Bough: A Study in Magic and Religion (Third Edition, Vol. 08 of 12)

The doctrine of the transmigration of souls taught in ancient Greece by Pythagoras and Empedocles

In ancient Greece also the theory of the transmigration of souls found favour with the early philosophers Pythagoras and Empedocles, both of whom, if we may trust tradition, appealed to their own personal experience in support of the doctrine. According to ancient writers, Pythagoras affirmed that he had been Euphorbus the Trojan in one of his former lives, and in proof of the assertion he identified the shield of Euphorbus among the Trojan spoils at Mycenae.901 He would seem to have held that human souls can transmigrate into animals or even into plants;902 and we may suppose that the possibility of such transmigrations was at least one of the reasons he alleged for enjoining the strictest of his disciples neither to kill nor to eat animals and to abstain from certain vegetables, such as beans and mallows.903 Certainly at a later time these principles were maintained and these precepts inculcated by Empedocles, who outdid the reminiscences of his predecessor by asserting that he himself in former lives had been a boy, a girl, a bush, a bird, and a fish.904 Hence he denounced as a crime the practice of killing and eating animals, since according to him a man could never know but that in slaughtering and eating an animal he might be murdering and devouring one of his dead kinsfolk, it might be his father or mother, his son or daughter.905 Thus from the doctrine of transmigration Empedocles logically drew the same practical conclusion as the savage, who abstains, for example, from killing and eating crocodiles or pigs because he believes the souls of his departed relations to be embodied in crocodiles or pigs: the only important difference between the savage and the [pg 301] philosopher in this respect is that, whereas the savage venerates and spares only animals of one particular species on the ground of their possible affinity to himself, the philosopher on his own shewing was bound to abstain from all animals whatever, since according to him the spirits of his deceased relatives might be lurking in creatures of any species. Hence while a faith in transmigration imposes but few restrictions on the diet of a savage, since it leaves him free to partake of the flesh of every sort of animals but one, the creed of Empedocles logically cut him off from a flesh diet altogether and compelled him to live on vegetables alone; indeed, if he had been rigidly logical, he must have denied himself the use of vegetables also and perished of hunger, since on his theory vegetables as well as animals may house the souls of the dead.906 However, like a wise man he sacrificed logic to life, and contented himself with forbidding his disciples the use of a few vegetables, such as beans and laurels,907 while he suffered them to browse freely on all the rest.

The doctrine of transmigration used by Pythagoras and Empedocles mainly to inculcate certain ethical precepts. The pessimism of Empedocles unlike the ordinary Greek view of life; its similarity to Buddhism

So far as we can gather the real opinions of Pythagoras and Empedocles from the traditional history of the one and the miserably mutilated writings of the other, they seem both, like Buddha, with whom they had much in common, to have used the old savage doctrine of the transmigration of souls mainly as a handle by which to impress on the minds of their followers the necessity of leading an innocent, pure, and even ascetic life in this world as the only means of ensuring a blissful or at all events an untroubled eternity in a world to come.908 At least this is fairly certain for Empedocles, whose views are comparatively well known to us through the fragments of his philosophical writings. From these utterances of his, the genuineness of which seems to be beyond suspicion, we gather that the psychology of Empedocles was a curious blend of savagery and mysticism. He regarded the incarnation of the human soul in a body of any sort as a punishment for sin, a degradation, a fall from heaven, an [pg 302] exile from God, a banishment from a world of bliss to a world of woe.909 He describes the earth as a cavern,910 a joyless land, where men wander in darkness, a prey to murder and revenge, to swarms of foul fiends, to wasting sickness and decay.911 He speaks with pity and contempt of the life of mortals as a wretched and miserable existence, begotten of strife and sighs and prolonged as a punishment for their sins through a series of transmigrations, until, by the exercise of virtue, they have been born again as prophets, poets, physicians, and princes, and so return at last to communion with the gods to live thenceforth free from pain and sorrow, immortal, incorruptible, divine.912 This view of human destiny, this passionate scorn poured on the present world, this ecstatic aspiration after a blissful eternity, the reward of virtue in a world to come, are very alien from the cheerful serenity, the calm rationalism of the ordinary Greek attitude towards existence on earth.913 In his profound conviction of the manifold sufferings inseparable from mortality, in his longing to put off the burden of the body or what he calls “the garment of flesh,”914 in his tenderness for the lower animals and his strong sense of kinship with them, Empedocles resembled Buddha, whose whole cast of thought, however, was tinged with a still deeper shade of melancholy, a more hopeless outlook on the future. Yet so close in some respects is the similarity between the two that we might incline to suppose a direct influence of Buddhism on Empedocles, were it not that the dates of the two great thinkers, so far as they can be ascertained, appear to exclude the supposition.915[pg 303]

Analogy of the physical speculations of Empedocles to those of Herbert Spencer

But if on its ethical side the teaching of Empedocles may almost be described as Buddhism relieved of its deepest shadows, on its scientific side it curiously anticipated some speculations which have deeply stirred the European mind in our own and our fathers' days. For to his savage psychology and religious mysticism Empedocles superadded a comprehensive and grandiose theory of the material universe, which presents a close analogy to that of Herbert Spencer. The scientific doctrine of the conservation of energy or, as he preferred to call it, the persistence of force, which Spencer made the corner-stone of his system, has its counterpart in the Empedoclean doctrine of the conservation or indestructibility of matter, the sum of which, according to him, remains always constant, never undergoing either increase or diminution.916 Hence all the changes that take place in the physical world, according to Empedocles, resolve themselves into the integration and disintegration of matter, the composition and decomposition of bodies, brought about by the two antagonistic forces of attraction and repulsion, which in mythical language he called love and hate. And just as all particular things are evolved by the force of attraction and dissolved by the force of repulsion, a state of concentration or aggregation in the individual perpetually alternating with a state of diffusion or segregation, so it is also with the material universe as a whole. It, too, alternately contracts and expands according as the forces of attraction and repulsion alternately prevail. For it was the opinion of Empedocles that a long, perhaps immeasurable, period of time, during which the force of attraction prevails over the force of repulsion, is succeeded by an equally long period in which the force of repulsion prevails over the force of attraction, each period lasting till, the predominant force being spent, its action is first arrested and then reversed by the opposite force; so that the material universe performs a [pg 304] periodic and rhythmic movement of alternate contraction and expansion, which never ceases except at the moments when, the two opposite forces exactly balancing each other, all things come to rest and equilibrium for a time, only however to return, with the backward sweep of the cosmic pendulum, to their former state either of consolidation or of dispersion. Thus under the influence of attraction and repulsion matter is constantly oscillating to and fro: at the end of a period of contraction it is gathered up in a solid globe: at the end of a period of expansion it is diffused throughout space in a state of tenuity which nowadays we might describe as gaseous. And this gigantic see-saw motion of the universe as a whole has gone on and will go on for ever and ever.917

Herbert Spencer's theory of alternate periods of concentration and dissipation of matter

The imposing generalisation thus formulated by Empedocles in the fifth century before our era was enunciated independently in the nineteenth century of our era by Herbert Spencer. Like his Greek predecessor, the modern English philosopher held that the material universe passes through alternate periods of concentration and dissipation, of evolution and dissolution, according as the forces of attraction and repulsion alternately prevail. The terms in which he sums up his general conclusions might be used with hardly any change to describe the conclusions of Empedocles. For the sake of comparison it may be well to subjoin the passage. It runs as follows: —

“Thus we are led to the conclusion that the entire process of things, as displayed in the aggregate of the visible Universe, is analogous to the entire process of things as displayed in the smallest aggregates.

“Motion as well as matter being fixed in quantity, it would seem that the change in the distribution of Matter which Motion effects, coming to a limit in whichever direction it is carried, the indestructible Motion thereupon necessitates a reverse distribution. Apparently, the universally [pg 305] coexistent forces of attraction and repulsion, which, as we have seen, necessitate rhythm in all minor changes throughout the Universe, also necessitate rhythm in the totality of its changes – produce now an immeasurable period during which the attractive forces predominating, cause universal concentration, and then an immeasurable period during which the repulsive forces predominating, cause universal diffusion – alternate eras of Evolution and Dissolution. And thus there is suggested the conception of a past during which there have been successive Evolutions analogous to that which is now going on; and a future during which successive other such Evolutions may go on – ever the same in principle but never the same in concrete result.”918

Evolution or dissolution

The most recent researches in physical science tend apparently rather to confirm than to invalidate these general views of the nature of the universe; for if modern physicists are right in regarding the constitution of matter as essentially electrical, the antagonistic forces of attraction and repulsion postulated by Empedocles and Spencer would resolve themselves into positive and negative electricity. On the other hand the atomic disintegration which is now known to be proceeding in certain of the chemical elements, particularly in uranium and radium, and which is probably proceeding in all, suggests a doubt whether the universe is really, as Spencer supposed, in process of integration and evolution and not rather in process of disintegration and dissolution; or whether perhaps the apparent evolution of the organic world is not attended by a simultaneous dissolution of the inorganic, so that the fabric of the universe would be a sort of Penelope's web, which the great artificer weaves and unweaves at the same time.919 With such a grave doubt to [pg 306] trouble the outlook on the future, we may perhaps say that Empedocles was wiser than Herbert Spencer in leaving, as he apparently did, the question undecided, whether during the epoch open to human observation the force of attraction or that of repulsion has been and is predominant, and consequently whether matter as a whole is integrating or disintegrating, whether all things are gradually evolving into more complex and concentrated forms, or are gradually dissolving and wasting away, through simpler and simpler forms, into the diffused tenuity of their primordial constituents.

Empedocles as a forerunner of Darwin

Just as in his view of the constitution and history of the physical universe Empedocles anticipated to some extent the theories of Spencer, so in his view of the development of living beings he anticipated to some extent the theories of Darwin; for he held that the existing species of animals have been evolved out of inorganic matter through intermediate sorts of monstrous creatures, which, being ill fitted to survive, gradually succumbed and were exterminated in the struggle for existence.920 Whether Empedocles himself clearly enunciated the principle of the survival of the fittest as well as the doctrine of evolution, we cannot say with certainty; but at all events it is significant that Aristotle, after stating for the first time the principle of the survival of the fittest, illustrates it by a reference to Empedocles's theory of the extinction of monstrous forms in the past, as if he understood the theory to imply the principle.921[pg 307]

Empedocles as a pretender to divinity

It is a remarkable instance of the strange complexities and seeming inconsistencies of human nature, that a man whose capacious mind revolved ideas so far-reaching and fruitful, should have posed among his contemporaries as a prophet or even as a god, parading the streets of his native city bedecked with garlands and ribbons and followed by obsequious crowds of men and women, who worshipped him and prayed to him that he would reveal to them the better way, that he would give them oracles and heal their infirmities.922 In the character of Empedocles, as in that of another forerunner of science, Paracelsus, the sterling qualities of the genuine student would seem to have been alloyed with a vein of ostentation and braggadocio; but the dash of the mountebank which we may detect in his composition probably helped rather than hindered him to win for a time the favour and catch the ear of the multitude, ever ready as they are to troop at the heels of any quack who advertises his wares by a loud blast on a brazen trumpet. With so many claims on the admiration of the wise and the adulation of the foolish, we may almost wonder that Empedocles did not become the founder, if not the god, of a new religion. Certainly other human deities have set up in business and prospered with an intellectual stock-in-trade much inferior to that of the Sicilian philosopher. Perhaps Empedocles lacked that perfect sincerity of belief in his own pretensions without which it seems difficult or impossible permanently to impose on the credulity of mankind. To delude others successfully it is desirable, if not absolutely necessary, to begin by being one's self deluded, and the Sicilian sage was probably too shrewd a man to feel perfectly at ease in the character of a god.

The doctrine of the transmigration of souls in Plato

The old savage doctrine of the transmigration of souls, which Empedocles furbished up and passed off on his disciples [pg 308] as a philosophical tenet, was afterwards countenanced, if not expressly affirmed, by another Greek philosopher of a very different stamp, who united, as no one else has ever done in the same degree, the highest capacity for abstract thought with the most exquisite literary genius. But if he borrowed the doctrine from savagery, Plato, like his two predecessors, detached it from its rude original setting and fitted it into an edifying moral scheme of retributive justice. For he held that the transmigration of human souls after death into the bodies of animals is a punishment or degradation entailed on the souls by the weaknesses to which they had been subject or the vices to which they had been addicted in life, and that the kind of animal into which a peccant soul transmigrates is appropriate to the degree and nature of its weakness or guilt. Thus, for example, the souls of gluttons, sots, and rakes pass into the bodies of asses; the souls of robbers and tyrants are born again in wolves and hawks; the souls of sober quiet people, untinctured by philosophy, come to life as bees and ants; a bad poet may turn at death into a swan or a nightingale; and a bad jester into an ape. Nothing but a rigid practice of the highest virtue and a single-minded devotion to abstract truth will avail to restore such degraded souls to their human dignity and finally raise them to communion with the gods.923 Though the passages in which these views are set forth have a mythical colouring and are, like all Plato's writings, couched in dramatic form and put into the mouths of others, we need not seriously doubt that they represent the real opinion of the philosopher himself.924 It is interesting and instructive to meet with the old savage theory of the transmigration of souls thus masquerading under a flowing drapery of morality and sparkling with the gems of Attic eloquence in the philosophic system of a great Greek thinker. So curiously alike may be the solutions which the highest and the lowest intellects offer of [pg 309] those profound problems which in all ages have engaged the curiosity and baffled the ingenuity of mankind.925[pg 310]

Chapter XVII. Types of Animal Sacrament

§ 1. The Egyptian and the Aino Types of Sacrament

The ambiguous behaviour of the Aino and the Gilyaks towards bears explained

We are now perhaps in a position to understand the ambiguous behaviour of the Aino and Gilyaks towards the bear. It has been shewn that the sharp line of demarcation which we draw between mankind and the lower animals does not exist for the savage. To him many of the other animals appear as his equals or even his superiors, not merely in brute force but in intelligence; and if choice or necessity leads him to take their lives, he feels bound, out of regard to his own safety, to do it in a way which will be as inoffensive as possible not merely to the living animal, but to its departed spirit and to all the other animals of the same species, which would resent an affront put upon one of their kind much as a tribe of savages would revenge an injury or insult offered to a tribesman. We have seen that among the many devices by which the savage seeks to atone for the wrong done by him to his animal victims one is to shew marked deference to a few chosen individuals of the species, for such behaviour is apparently regarded as entitling him to exterminate with impunity all the rest of the species upon which he can lay hands. This principle perhaps explains the attitude, at first sight puzzling and contradictory, of the Aino towards the bear. The flesh and skin of the bear regularly afford them food and clothing; but since the bear is an intelligent and powerful animal, it is necessary to offer some satisfaction or atonement to the bear species for the loss which it sustains in the death of so many of its members. This satisfaction or atonement is [pg 311] made by rearing young bears, treating them, so long as they live, with respect, and killing them with extraordinary marks of sorrow and devotion. So the other bears are appeased, and do not resent the slaughter of their kind by attacking the slayers or deserting the country, which would deprive the Aino of one of their means of subsistence.

Two forms of the worship of animals

Thus the primitive worship of animals assumes two forms, which are in some respects the converse of each other. On the one hand, animals are worshipped, and are therefore neither killed nor eaten. On the other hand, animals are worshipped because they are habitually killed and eaten. In both forms of worship the animal is revered on account of some benefit, positive or negative, which the savage hopes to receive from it. In the former worship the benefit comes either in the positive form of protection, advice, and help which the animal affords the man, or in the negative one of abstinence from injuries which it is in the power of the animal to inflict. In the latter worship the benefit takes the material form of the animal's flesh and skin. The two forms of worship are in some measure antithetical: in the one, the animal is not eaten because it is revered; in the other, it is revered because it is eaten. But both may be practised by the same people, as we see in the case of the North American Indians, who, while they apparently revere and spare their totem animals,926 also revere the animals and fish upon which they subsist. The aborigines of Australia have totemism in the most primitive form known to us; but, so far as I am aware, there is no clear evidence that they attempt, like the North American Indians, to conciliate the animals which they kill and eat. The means which the Australians adopt to secure a plentiful supply of game appear to be primarily based, not on conciliation, but on sympathetic magic,927 a principle to which the North American [pg 312] Indians also resort for the same purpose.928 Hence, as the Australians undoubtedly represent a ruder and earlier stage of human progress than the American Indians, it would seem that before hunters think of worshipping the game as a means of ensuring an abundant supply of it, they seek to attain the same end by sympathetic magic. This, again, would shew – what there is good reason for believing – that sympathetic magic is one of the earliest means by which man endeavours to adapt the agencies of nature to his needs.

Two types of animal sacrament, the Egyptian and the Aino type

Corresponding to the two distinct types of animal worship, there are two distinct types of the custom of killing the animal god. On the one hand, when the revered animal is habitually spared, it is nevertheless killed – and sometimes eaten – on rare and solemn occasions. Examples of this custom have been already given and an explanation of them offered. On the other hand, when the revered animal is habitually killed, the slaughter of any one of the species involves the killing of the god, and is atoned for on the spot by apologies and sacrifices, especially when the animal is a powerful and dangerous one; and, in addition to this ordinary and everyday atonement, there is a special annual atonement, at which a select individual of the species is slain with extraordinary marks of respect and devotion. Clearly the two types of sacramental killing – the Egyptian and the Aino types, as we may call them for distinction – are liable to be confounded by an observer; and, before we can say to which type any particular example belongs, it is necessary to ascertain whether the animal sacramentally slain belongs [pg 313] to a species which is habitually spared, or to one which is habitually killed by the tribe. In the former case the example belongs to the Egyptian type of sacrament, in the latter to the Aino type.

Examples of animal sacraments among pastoral tribes. Aino or expiatory type of animal sacrament among the Abchases and Kalmucks

The practice of pastoral tribes appears to furnish examples of both types of sacrament. “Pastoral tribes,” says a learned ethnologist, “being sometimes obliged to sell their herds to strangers who may handle the bones disrespectfully, seek to avert the danger which such a sacrilege would entail by consecrating one of the herd as an object of worship, eating it sacramentally in the family circle with closed doors, and afterwards treating the bones with all the ceremonious respect which, strictly speaking, should be accorded to every head of cattle, but which, being punctually paid to the representative animal, is deemed to be paid to all. Such family meals are found among various peoples, especially those of the Caucasus. When amongst the Abchases the shepherds in spring eat their common meal with their loins girt and their staves in their hands, this may be looked upon both as a sacrament and as an oath of mutual help and support. For the strongest of all oaths is that which is accompanied with the eating of a sacred substance, since the perjured person cannot possibly escape the avenging god whom he has taken into his body and assimilated.”929 This kind of sacrament is of the Aino or expiatory type, since it is meant to atone to the species for the possible ill-usage of individuals. An expiation, similar in principle but different in details, is offered by the Kalmucks to the sheep, whose flesh is one of their staple foods. Rich Kalmucks are in the habit of consecrating a white ram under the title of “the ram of heaven” or “the ram of the spirit.” The animal is never shorn and never sold; but when it [pg 314] grows old and its owner wishes to consecrate a new one, the old ram must be killed and eaten at a feast to which the neighbours are invited. On a lucky day, generally in autumn when the sheep are fat, a sorcerer kills the old ram, after sprinkling it with milk. Its flesh is eaten; the skeleton, with a portion of the fat, is burned on a turf altar; and the skin, with the head and feet, is hung up.930