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they have a basis in reality. Domestic arrangements, political institutions, and professional customs last, in the long run, because of their usefulness. Is it likely that feasts and cults should prove an exception to this rule ?*
The true meaning of public worship has been well stated by Tarde : "What is a fete ? It is that sovereign process by which the social logic of the sentiments overrules and resolves all par- tial discords, private enmities, envies, contempts, jealousies, moral oppositions of all sorts into an immense unison formed by the periodical convergence of all these secondary sentiments into a greater and stronger sentiment of collective hate or love for some great object which gives the tone to all hearts and transfigures their dissonances into a higher harmony." 2
This interpretation accounts for certain peculiar features of worship. Why else should worship be so universally public? "The sacrificial meal had preeminently the character of the public feast." 3 "The ordinary type of Hebrew worship was essen- tially social, for in antiquity all religion was an affair of the community rather than of the individual." 4 "Every complete act of worship for a mere vow was not complete till it was ful- filled by presenting a sacrifice had a public or quasi-public character. Most sacrifices were offered on fixed occasions, at the great communal or national feasts, but even a private offer- ing was not complete without guests." 5 Private worship, far from being the prototype, is the parody of public worship. "All over the world these private cults are modeled on, derived from, and later than the established worship of the gods of the community. " ( "Ancestor worship is steadily assimilated in form, in its rites and ceremonies, to the public worship of the gods. "7
Why, if worship be mere propitiation, should emotional stress
1 For a striking instance of hovr apparently meaningless observances disclose to the sage observer the hidden utility that keeps them alive, see " Bhowani, the Cholera Goddess" in the Nineteenth Century for October 1896.
2 La logique sociale, p. 325. * Ibid., p. 236.
3 Religion of the Semites, p. 234. $ Ibid., p. 247. 6 jEVONS, Introduction to the History of Religion, p. 175. 1 Ibid., p. 195.
