The Religion and Philosophy of the Veda and Upanishads v1.c11.s3.32

v1.c11.s3.32

A like one-sidedness mars the theories of Mannhardt and of Sir J. Frazer regarding the nature of sacrifice, which the latter in the most clear terms reduces to a magic device to prolong the life of the crops, men, and animals. From this position Sir J. Frazer³ has advanced to the definite assertion that all religion is derived from magic: that in the first instance the primitive savage conceives of himself as all powerful over the course of nature, and that he wields the means of magic to bring about the results he desires, but that in the long run, finding that his magic arts do not prevail to accomplish all his desires, he has instead recourse to the belief in unseen beings in whom abide the powers which he is denied, and of which he confesses himself barren, and seeks to win the favour of these beings by offerings and prayer, though continuing of course at the same time the practice of his old magic devices. Apart from objections to the attempt to reduce sacrifice to one primitive type alone, and to prove that the gift theory of sacrifice is late, the theory of the priority of magic rests upon the fundamental assumption that primitive man believes in his power to control by his arts the whole proceedings of the universe. It is difficult to conceive how such an idea can be deemed primitive, or how it could have developed in the mind of primitive man, whose experience from the first must have sternly checked any such high belief in the powers of mortal efforts. Magic and religion are to all appearance in essence distinct and irreconcilable things, as different in essence as science and religion as a philosophy, and the fact that they are inextricably conjoined in practically every religious system known to us does not in the slightest degree prove their identity, or render probable the derivation of one from the other.