Macic 1x Names. By Edward Clodd.
Chapman & Hall. 12/6 net.
Mr. Clodd has collected, from works on folklore, many curious instances of '"mana''—as the South Sea islanders call the " vague, impersonal, ever-acting, universally diffused power" of which they are conscious—in tangible things like blood or hair, in names and in words. There is much more in a mame than Shakespeare thought. The fisherman of East Aberdeen-shire, who met anyone of the name of Whyte on his way to the shore, was unwilling to put to sea, in the Moray Firth "there are surnames which, if only breathed by the boy, would bring disaster on the crew." In Central Africa a youth on coming to manhood must forget his original name. In New Guinea "'the name of a dead man banished from the language." In old Egypt the real names of the gods were kept secret. The magic of words, too, forms a curious chapter. Mr. Clodd's real purpose is to suggest that the Christian religion, which retains many old forms, is just as much a superstition as the most primitive fetish-worship, and he presses this argument in a way that will distress some of his readers. He forgets, however, that the analogies between primitive ceremonies and Christian ritual prove nothing except that Christians are human, like other men. The essence of Christianity but in its spiritual creed.
Text read from the printed page and cleaned; old type leaves the occasional error.