These are at the bottom of the scale. One degree higher, and we find the priesthood a separate class, usually of both sexes, but chosen by natural selection from those members of the community who by temperament or cultivation possess in the highest degree this tendency to mystical power. This is generally indicated by the clearness and character of the dreams and visions which appear at the time he or she enters adult life. These are considered to be direct inspirations from the spirit world, either from the souls of the dead, or the powers other than those which control the destiny of man.
These inspired seers represent the priesthood of every primitive religion. They cultivate and preserve it, and in them the missionaries of higher faiths have ever found their most resolute foes and successful opponents. The reason is, as I have said, that the shaman has himself been face to face with God, has heard His voice, and felt His presence. His faith therefore is real, and cannot be shaken by any argument. He may indeed, and he generally does, assist his public performances with some trickery, some thaumaturgy; but that this is merely superadded for effect is proved by the general custom that when one such adept is ill or in straits he will solicit the aid of another.[47]
Among his associates he is looked upon as set apart from other men by the divinity which chooses him for its agent, or dwells within him. In the Polynesian islands this is forcibly expressed in the terms applied to the native priests, _pia atua_, “god boxes,” receptacles of divinity; and _amama_, “open mouths,” for through them the god speaks, not their own selves.[48]
The presence of divinity is recognised and felt only in unusual mental states, in moments of ecstasy or trance, in periods of rapture, intoxication, or frenzy. Hence in all early and many late religions abnormal and pathological mental seizures are regarded as cases of inspiration, or else of demoniac possession. In the Quichua language of Peru the word _huaca_ is their most general term for the divine, but _huaca runa_, “divine man,” means one who is crazy[49]; and in Greek, the word _mania_ was used for both madness and prophetic inspiration.
