8. Unsatisfied Wishes and Sublimation - Square Circles Publishing
8. Unsatisfied Wishes and Sublimation - Square Circles Publishing
8. Unsatisfied Wishes and Sublimation - Square Circles Publishing
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SOURCE 8: THE MIND AT MISCHIEF<br />
[contd] It may well be the case that the<br />
departed was a character of mingled good<br />
<strong>and</strong> evil, as indeed we all are,<br />
but the thoughts that occur about him<br />
tend of their own accord to integrate<br />
themselves into systems <strong>and</strong> for a short<br />
time after his death the departed savage is<br />
regarded as a hostile spirit, who has to be<br />
appeased in every possible way<br />
so that he may not do harm to the<br />
survivors (L 171).<br />
[Compare L 169.]<br />
The savage knows that his compatriots<br />
are composed of both good <strong>and</strong> evil traits<br />
of character, of things which give him<br />
now pleasure, now pain,<br />
<strong>and</strong> so after the departure of his friend to<br />
another world he seeks in devious ways to<br />
appease him, <strong>and</strong> otherwise to show<br />
himself friendly,<br />
so as to prevent the newly departed spirit<br />
from wreaking vengeance on those who<br />
still live.<br />
His mental conception of the spirit of the<br />
departed member of the tribe he projects<br />
outward, seeming to recognize it as a real<br />
thing in the mist, in a hazy cloud, in the<br />
shadowy forest; <strong>and</strong> in many other ways<br />
he imagines he is able to detect the spirits<br />
of the departed.<br />
§11. Science <strong>and</strong> Projection (Lay 173)<br />
8:7.4 It cannot be said that modern<br />
spirit mediums have done much to refine<br />
this primitive concept.<br />
It is unquestionable that spiritism is<br />
an anthropomorphic tendency, while<br />
science might be called cosmomorphic.<br />
All the petty details of the nature of the<br />
clothes spirits wear, of their being sexed<br />
or sexless, of their diversions, even of the<br />
cigars they smoke <strong>and</strong> the food <strong>and</strong> drink<br />
they enjoy,<br />
are, on the face of them, projections as<br />
crass as the houris of the Mohammedan<br />
paradise, <strong>and</strong> the bows <strong>and</strong> arrows of the<br />
American Indian happy hunting ground;<br />
They tell us about the clothes that<br />
departed spirits wear, <strong>and</strong> other material<br />
things in their environment.<br />
The spirit l<strong>and</strong> of to-day seems just about<br />
as grossly crass as the Paradise of either<br />
Mohammedan or Jew, <strong>and</strong> just about as<br />
material <strong>and</strong> puerile as the Happy<br />
Hunting Ground of the North American<br />
Indian.<br />
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