Show THE IN DWELLING SPIRITS OF MEN the navajo believes that there are three entities in man 1 the corporeal man 2 his soul the vehicle of independent personal existence which at the death of the body survives and continues its career in the land of spirits a 3 his spiritual body which dr matthews terms his third element 1 the ithe speaking negroes of the gold coast that is the As hantis fantis Was saws gamans and several other tribes believe similarly in three entities 1 the corporeal man 2 his soul or ghost 3 the indwelling dwelling in spirit of the living man which they term his kra now though the kra has frequently been confounded with the soul or ghost it is essentially liy distinct the soul or ghost only comes into being when the corporeal man ceases to exist and so may be considered to be the latter deprived of his material body butth but the ekra kra the speaking negro believes beli evea existed independently before the birth of the man and after his bis death will continue to exist equally independently of the soul or ghost A kra may have and almost always has been a kra in the bodies of other men since deceased and at the death of the individual whose body he is now tenanting ten will seek to enter the body of some newborn new born human being failing in this it enters the body of an ani animal uial and if unable to enter the body either or of a human being or of an it becomes a oka a kra without a tenement and wanders about the earth causing sickness to malkind the ghost or soul which at the death of the corporeal man proceeds to dead land and there continues the former vocations of the man and for whose service in dead land slaves and wives are F sacrificed and arms implements and clothing buried with the corpse is the vehicle of individual personal existence the true soul and the kra whose connection connect iob with the man commences with the birth and terminates at his death is something quite different the difference between the kra and the soul is also well shown by the different results which ensue when they quit the body the kra can and does quit the boy boey atwill usually it does so only during the sleet of the man who is 18 unconscious u D bons eons cious of its 1 to departure and its adventures are the occurrence of which the man dreams if it should leave while the man is awake the latter is only made conscious of it it at all by a dawna sneezed zea shudder or some such slight convulsion which Indi indicates cales to him that his kra is going out in any case whether sleeping or waking he suffers no DO pain feels no inconvenience and is 18 subject to no do apparent change consequent on the departure of his bis kra the absence of the kra is however dangerous as it affords an opportunity for azaz arriea or kra without a tenement to enter the vacant body for which the anska are believed to be always on the lookout the man is n not ot conscious of the entry of the sim and nothing happens until the kra returns and attempts to eject the intruder when the effect of the I 1 internal struggle is to throw the man into convulsions in this manner the west african negroes seek to account for epileptic and similar seizures they are what used to be termed cases of possession but b t they are not directly dire etly attributable lo to the departure of the kra per se 86 when however the soul quits the body the latter falls at once into a motionless and lifeless condition sometimes though but rarely the soul returns and then the man has been in a swoon br or trance more frequently it does not return and then the man is dead it is in the hope that the soul may that appeals to the dead to come back are always made and that the corpse is kept until the signs of corruption show that the soul is gone forever the difference then between the results of departure is clear when the kra departs there is no direct and immediate result though the departure may lead to possession but when the soul departs the direct and immediate result is suspended animation or death the ewi speaking peoples of the slave coast the alunas krepis Da Dah omia homis dahis etc hold exactly similar views the third element or in dwelling spirit of man boing being by them termed a laivo the ga speaking peoples of the eastern districts of the gold coast have modified the more original conception and believe that each individual has two ala the ga term for kra a male and a female the former being of a bad disposition aad the latter of a goo good the rho negroes of the gold and slave coasts like every other people low in the stage of civilization believe that inanimate as well as ais animate objects have souls or ghosts a belief which is proved by the practice of burying arms implements utensils etc for the use of the dead in dead land the soul or ghost of the dead hunter goes to dead land and there continues the former pursuit of the man using the souls or ghosts of the weapons buried with him but the negroes have gone gond beyond this and just as they believe man to possess a third element or in dwelling spirit so do they believe that every natural object everything not made by human hands has in addition to tes its soul or ghost a third element or spiritual individuality they ey hold that just as when w hen the man dies the kra of the ruan man enters a newborn new born child and the soul or ghost man goes oes to Dead headland adland De Jand so when the tree dies les the kra so to speak of the tree enters a seedling and the ghost tree twe goes to join the ranks of the shadowy forest in i n dead land and it is these animating 0 spiritual tenants of natural objects and natural features that the negro fears and consequently worships maj N A B in in the popular science monthly for april apoll |