III.--Logical priority of impersonal force over the different mythical personalities--Recent theories which tend to admit this priority 198
IV.--The notion of religious force is the prototype of that of force in general 203
_Origin of the Idea of the Totemic Principle or Mana_
I.--The totemic principle is the clan, but thought of under a more empirical form 205
II.--General reasons for which society is apt to awaken the sensation of the sacred and the divine--Society as an imperative moral force; the notion of moral authority--Society as a force which raises the individual outside of himself-- Facts which prove that society creates the sacred 206
III.--Reasons peculiar to Australian societies--The two phases through which the life of these societies alternatively passes: dispersion, concentration--Great collective effervescence during the periods of concentration--Examples--How the religious idea is born out of this effervescence 214
Why collective force has been thought of under totemic forms: it is the totem that is the emblem of the clan--Explanation of the principal totemic beliefs 219
IV.--Religion is not the product of fear--It expresses something real--Its essential idealism--This idealism is a general characteristic of collective mentality--Explanation of the external character of religious forces in relation to their subjects--The principle that _the part is equal to the whole_ 223
V.--Origin of the notion of emblem: emblems a necessary condition of collective representations--Why the clan has taken its emblems from the animal and vegetable kingdoms 230
VI.--The proneness of the primitive to confound the kingdoms and classes which we distinguish--Origins of these confusions--How they have blazed the way for scientific explanations--They do not exclude the tendency towards distinction and opposition 234
I.--Analysis of the idea of the soul in the Australian societies 240
II.--Genesis of this idea--The doctrine of reincarnation according to Spencer and Gillen: it implies that the soul is a part of the totemic principle--Examination of the facts collected by Strehlow; they confirm the totemic nature of the soul 246
III.--Generality of the doctrine of reincarnation--Diverse facts in support of the proposed genesis 256