The people of the Philippines, their religious progress and preparation for spiritual leadership in the Far East,

38 THE PEOPLE OF THE PHILIPPINES
communication with the dead through mediums was universal.
The spirit world was also supposed to be inhabited by untold
multitudes of other malign and benevolent spirits. The unseen
world was a more vivid and ever-present reality to these primitive people than it is to the average civilized man. That this
belief was a powerful restraining influence, holding individuals
up to the ethical standards of their tribes, is the outstanding
impression with which one turns away from the study of these
tribes. The drunkenness, vice, theft, and quarreling which
result when the Bagobos, for example, lose faith in their animistic gods, clearly indicate that the destruction of a religion
is a perilous thing unless it is replaced immediately by another
equally good or better.