PROLOGUE CHAPTER 1 THE TYRANNY OF IGNORANCE CHAPTER 2 THE GREEKS CHAPTER 3 THE BEGINNING OF.RESTRAINT CHAPTER 4 THE TWILIGHT OF THE GODS CHAPTER 5 IMPRISONMENT CHAPTER 6 THE PURE OF LIFE CHAPTER 7 THE !NQUISITION CHAPTER 8 THE CURIOUS ONES CHAPTER 9 THE WAR UPON THE PRINTED WORD CHAPTER 10 CONCERNING THE WRITING OF HISTORY IN GENERAL AND THIS BOOK IN PARTICULAR CHAPTER 11 RENAISSANCE CHAPTER 12 THE REFORMATION CHAPTER 13 ERASMUS CHAPTER 14 RABELAIS CHAPTER 15 NEW SIGNBOARDS FOR OLD CHAPTER 16 THE ANABAPTISTS CHAPTER 17 THE SOZZINI FAMILY ……
摘要
If I hereby state that the savage was the most intolerant of human beings, I do not mean to insult him, for I hasten to add that given the circumstances under which he lived, it was his duty to be intolerant. Had he allowed any one to interfere with the thousand and one rules upon which his tribe depended for its continued safety and peace of mind, the life of the tribe would have been put in jeopardy and that would have been the greatest of all possible crimes. But (and the question is worth asking) how could a group of people, relatively limited in number, protect a most complex system of verbal regulations when we in our own day with millions of soldiers and thousands of policemen find it difficult to enforce a few plain laws? Again the answer is simple. The savage was a great deal cleverer than we are. He accomplished by shrewd calculation what he could not do by force. He invented the idea of "taboo." Perhaps the word "invented" is not the right expression. Such things are rarely the product of a sudden inspiration. They are the result of long years of growth and experiment. Let that be as it may, the wild men of Africa and Polynesia devised the taboo, and thereby saved themselves a great deal of trouble. The word taboo is of Australian origin. We all know more or less what it means. Our own world is full of taboos, things we simply must not do or say, like mentioning our latest operation at the dinner table, or leaving our spoon in our cup of coffee. But our taboos are never of a very serious nature. They are part ……
