These spirits of the living lead to the subject of spirits of the dying
- Date of account
- Published 1897
- Source
- The Book of Dreams and Ghosts
- Reference
- The Book of Dreams and Ghosts · selected passage 80
- Rights
- public_domain
- Language
- English
- Record updated
- 2026-08-24
Record summary
These spirits of the living lead to the subject of spirits of the dying
Published source text
Read the available text below. Archive transcriptions may contain OCR errors; later context is labelled separately. A recorded claim is not a finding that it happened.
Source passage
Source text · mention onlyThese spirits of the living lead to the subject of spirits of the dying. No kind of tale is so common as that of dying people appearing at a distance. Hundreds have been conscientiously published. {91b} The belief is prevalent among the Maoris of New Zealand, where the apparition is regarded as a proof of death. {91c} Now there is nothing in savage philosophy to account for this opinion of the Maoris. A man's "spirit" leaves his body in dreams, savages think, and as dreaming is infinitely more common than death, the Maoris should argue that the appearance is that of a man's spirit wandering in his sleep. However, they, like many Europeans, associate a man's apparition with his death.
Historical context
Contextual commentary · mention onlyThis material belongs to a folklore tradition. Story type, collector, community, transmission and literary editing matter when comparing it with other sources.
Modern context
Contextual commentary · mention onlyLattice compares motifs and reported features without assuming that a traditional being is a biological species or that similar stories document one external cause.
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