Animism is a fascinating concept often studied even into modernity- this particular text sees it as part of a natural spiritual evolution leading, as then-modern westerners held it, to the Christian world.This booklet explores the worship of trees, water, stones, and other inanimate things as well as ancestors and various unseen forces, as part of its cross-cultural review of practice and belief. Various superstitions and folk tales are described from Africa, Asia, and other places- takes which illustrate the point of the work. It should be noted that some anthropological lore here has been displaced by additional and more contemporary evidence.