MAORI LORE.

Gisborne Times, Volume LIII, Issue 5539, 22 July 1920, Page 2

MAORI LORE.

LECTURE BY MR ELS DON BEST. The poetic imagination of the Maori people, their keen observation cf nature, the subtility of their thought, and their extraordinary mental capacity were strongly illustrated in the verv interesting: lecture that was given by Mr Elsdou Best at Wellington. In mythology and folk lore. Mr Best told his hearers, was to be seen the effect of nature upon the untutored mind of men, and their mentality was shown in the way in which they sought to •learn the origin of Nature's phenomena and the laws that governed them, their j concepts having had important effects upon human development. Man’s first gods were Nature gods, which were gradually resolved into tutelary beings, and so into deities of a -still lrglier character, placated bv offerings and ceremonials. The genius of the Maoris for personification, especially the personification of Nature in her varying aspects, the dawn, the trees, the clouds, the sky, the earth, and the ocean were illustrated by the beauLful myths which Mr Best related, showing how keen was their reasoning and their understanding of Nature, and how close their observation of her varying moods. To them the earth was the earth mother, and she was endowed with love, with many human attributes . and so brought nearer to mankind. Though they personified death, sickness knowledge, etc., they had. net risen to the personification of such qualities as mercy, hope, and others of a like character. Maori lore taught that all things on earth and ocean were the offspring of the sky and the earth, and all things possessed a spirit, also they possessed something of tlie female element which was necessary to their well-being. Mr Best spoke of the effect upon the mentality of the Maoris, of their closeness to Nature, how they strove to solve the problems of the pheiupnena around them, and of the remarkable power of abstract thought that they possessed. They did not. regard the powers of Nature as concrete things, but they personified them in obedience to the noetic instinct that in a greater or lesser degree controls uncultivated man. For instance,'to fell a tree was to meddle with a man’s own ancestor Tane. To see a mountain, mist-covered the first time one entered that part of the country, was to realise that it was covering its face in greeting to the stranger. Mr Best expressed the opinion that the allegorical powers of the Maoris were equal to. if not exceeding, those of any of the races of antiquity. Some extraordinary analogies between Maori myths and beliefs and those of the Egyptians and the Indians were given. Mqst poetics? was the myth ho related of the creation by Tano of the first woman, and it was interesting to learn that because ber first action was a sneeze, ever after special importance was attached to sneezing. In tho course of his address Mr Best made reference to the belief of the Maoris of a purification of the spirit after death, a belief Which lias been held by many races. The sacerdotal nature among tho Maoris of the number twelve was touched upon, an interesting fact in this relation being that it also figures in several of tlxe Aryan myths, and twelve gods besides Ra. figured in the Babylonian beliefs. Mr Best also spoke of the folk lore of the Maoris, their beliefs in fairies or forest folk, and the ways in which they were placated. In conclusion Mr Best quoted an authority upon anthropology, who had stated that the Polynesians had preserved for our own time the jire-liistoric ages of the world.