Note 3 — MANNERS AND FASHION.

In this paragraph, which I have purposely left standing word for word as it did when republished with other essays in Dec. 1857, will be seen the outline of the ghost-theory. Though there are references to fetishism as a primitive form of belief, and though at that time I had passively accepted the current theory (though never with satisfaction, for the origin of fetishism as then conceived seemed in­comp­re­hen­si­ble) yet the belief that inanimate objects may possess supernatural powers (which is what was then understood as fetishism) is not dwelt upon as a primitive belief. The one thing which is dwelt upon is the belief in the double of the dead man as continuing to exist, and as becoming an object of propitiation and eventually of worship. There are clearly marked out the rudiments which, when supplied with the mass of facts collected in the Descriptive Sociology developed into the doctrine elaborated in Part I. of The Principles of Sociology.