serve  as  his  escort.  We  shall  hereafter  recognise  the  same  pro-
cess, ill  the  succession  of  monotheism  to  polytheism.
The  particular  issue  by  which  the  transition  was  effected  is  easily
found,  when  we  consider  that  it  must  be  through  the  phenomenon
which  appears  the  most  general  and  abstract,  and  the  most  univer-
sal in  its  influence.  The  stars  answer  to  this  description,  when
once  their  isolated  and  inaccessible  position  had  fixed  men's  atten-
tion, in  preference  to  the  nearer  objects  which  had  at  first  engrossed
it.  The  difference  in  conception  between  a  fetich  and  a  god  must
be  smaller  in  the  case  of  a  star  than  of  any  other  body ;  and  it  was
this  which  made  astrolatry,  as  I  observed  before,  the  natural  inter-
mediary state  between  the  two  first  theological  phases.  Each  si-
dereal fetich,  powerful  and  remote,  was  scarcely  distinguishable
from  a  god;  and  especially  in  an  age  when  men  did  not  trouble
themselves  with  nice  distinctions.  The  only  thing  necessary  to  get
rid  of  the  individual  and  concrete  character  altogether,  was  to  lib-
erate the  divinity  from  his  imprisonment  in  one  place  and  function,
and  to  connect  him  by  some  real  or  apparent  analogy  with  more
general  functions  ;  thus  making  him  a  god,  with  a  star  for  his  pre-
ferred abode.  This  last  transformation  was  so  little  necessary  that,
throughout  nearly  the  whole  polytheistic  period,  it  was  only  the
planets  that,  on  account  of  tlieir  special  variations,  were  subjected
to  it.  The  fixed  stars  remained  true  fetiches  till  they  were  inclu-
ded, with  everything  in  the  universal  monotheism.
