And Frensch sche spak ful faire and fetysly, Aftur the scole of Stratford atte Bowe, For Frensch of Parys was to hire unknowe.'
The President de Brosses, a most original thinker of the 18th century, struck by the descriptions of the African worship of material and terrestrial objects, introduced the word Fétichisme as a general descriptive term,[1] and since then it has obtained great currency by Comte's use of it to denote a general theory of primitive religion, in which external objects are regarded as animated by a life analogous to man's. It seems to me, however, more convenient to use the word Animism for the doctrine of spirits in general, and to confine the word Fetishism to that subordinate department which it properly belongs to, namely, the doctrine of spirits embodied in, or attached to, or conveying influence through, certain material objects. Fetishism will be taken as including the worship of 'stocks and stones,' and thence it passes by an imperceptible gradation into Idolatry.
Any object whatsoever may be a fetish. Of course, among the endless multitude of objects, not as we should say physically active, but to which ignorant men ascribe mysterious power, we are not to apply indiscriminately the idea of their being considered vessels or vehicles or instruments of spiritual beings. They may be mere signs or tokens set up to represent ideal notions or ideal beings, as fingers or sticks are set up to represent numbers. Or they may be symbolic charms working by imagined conveyance of their special properties, as an iron ring to give firmness, or a kite's foot to give swift flight. Or they may be merely regarded in some undefined way as wondrous ornaments or curiosities. The tendency runs through all human nature to collect and admire objects remarkable in beauty, form, quality, or scarceness. The shelves of ethnological museums show heaps of the objects which the lower races treasure up
1 (C. de Brosses.) 'Du culte des dieux fétiches ou Parallèle de l'ancienne Religion de l'Egypte avec la religion actuelle de Nigritie.' 1760. [De Brosses supposed the word fétiche connected with chose fee, fatum.]
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