Mythology.

Mythology. A myth is a story told about gods or heroes. Mythology is a term sometimes applied to the collected myths of a nation, sometimes to the scientific study of myths. Mythology in the latter sense of the term has for its object not to ascertain why men believe in gods—that is rather the business of the science of religion—but, granted the belief, why men tell these (sometimes extraordinary) stories about them. The first nation to busy itself with this enquiry was the nation whose mythology had the most luxuriant development, the Greeks. From very early times they started their enquiry with the assumption that there must be something behind the myths as known to them—that there was some meaning in a myth. Thus far, they were as regards most myths quite right. The mistake, however, which the Greek philosophers who undertook to recover the original meaning of various myths made was that they imagined the authors of these myths to be, like themselves, philosophers. In other words, they imagined that not only was there a meaning concealed behind myths, but that that meaning had been intentionally concealed, and that myths were the vehicles by which philosophical teaching had been originally conveyed, and in which it might still be detected. Myth was identified with allegory. The particular branch of philosophy supposed to be veiled by mythology depended on the taste of the particular mythologist. Anaxagoras discovered psychological teaching behind the veil; Empedocles found his own theory of the four elements capable of being stated in terms of mythology (see EMPEDOCLES), and he thus effected the first reconciliation between science and religion.

And speaking generally, we may say that from that day to this the magic mirror of mythology has never failed to show to every enquirer that which he wished to see in it. The next attempt at interpretation, which also proceeded from Greece, was to strip myth of all that was supernatural and affirm the residuum to be history (see EUHEMERISM, to which article it is only necessary here to add that in the opinion of Gruppe, in Die griechischen Culte und Mythen (vol. i. 1887), the work of Euhemerns was not intended as an explanation of mythology, though it was subsequently regarded as such, but was a romance of much the same character as some of Lucian's work or Gulliver's Travels). It is interesting to note that in India an independent attempt was made by the Aitihasika school to explain the mythology of the Vedas as history clothed in the garb of the supernatural. The two modes of interpretation already described—the allegorical and the Euhemeristic—continued to be the only methods applied throughout Roman and Christian times to the present century, nor can they be said to be wholly extinct even now. At Rome the Stoics, developing systematically what had been rather suggested than definitely formulated by Empedocles, endeavoured to explain all myths as but allegorical descriptions of physical facts. They failed, however, to explain just those myths which most required explanation, the immoral, brutal, and bestial myths, for examples of which we may refer to Vol. V. p. 385 of this work. Their failure was the more remarkable inasmuch as in India the same key had been applied by the native grammarians with considerable apparent success: but we must remember that the science of grammar had been already carried to great perfection in India, and that some of the mythological figures in the Vedas have names which are much more obviously names of nature-powers than is the case in Greek mythology. For instances of native Indian interpretations we may refer to Max-Müller's History of Ancient Sanskrit Literature, p. 529. Inadequate as was the allegorical interpretation of myth, it continued to enjoy an undisputed mastery of the field of investigation in Europe for many centuries. But, as it was sterile to the end, we need here only mention the fact that the latest and most learned form in which it appeared was the Symbolik und Mythologie der alten Völker of Creuzer (q.v.), published 1810–12. The effect of the publication of this work was to overthrow the mode of interpretation which it was designed to prove and illustrate. It led to a thorough investigation of the assumptions on which the allegory theory was based; and an era in the history of mythology as a science is marked by the demonstration given by Lobeck in his Aglaphamus (1829), of the utter untenability of these assumptions. What is implied in any theory which explains myths as truths conveyed in the form of allegories is the existence of a caste or class of priests or philosophers, possessing a recudite knowledge and teaching it by means of parables. Now the existence of such a class or caste is a matter which requires to be proved, and of which the proof must satisfy the canons of historical criticism. And it may safely be said that there is absolutely no evidence whatever to show that such a class ever existed amongst the Greeks or any other Indo-Germanie nation.

The establishment of this negative conclusion by Lobeck paved the way for the next step forward in the science of mythology. Scholars had hitherto assumed that the authors of myths were men of learning, philosophers. After the exposure of this error, the next step was to recognise the necessity not only of throwing aside our modern, civilised, artificial ideas, but also of endeavouring to see the myths in 'the light in which they presented themselves to the Homeric or Hesiodic audience.' The conviction of this necessity manifests itself, after the time of Lobeck, in Grote, from whom the quotation in the last sentence is made, Lehrs (Gott, Götter, und Dämonen), and Renan (Études de l'Histoire Religieuse). Now, if we try to see myths as primitive man saw them, we can hardly doubt that to the Greek of Homer's time or Hesiod's Aphrodite must have presented herself as the ideal of female beauty, Demeter as the perfect type of motherhood, and so on. Thus far it was thought, by Grote and others, possible to go in the way of interpretation: the Greek was at all times characteristically given to anthropomorphism. But to go further and try to explain not only the individual figures of the gods, but the relations in which those figures are represented by myth as standing to each other, was, by a natural reaction against the exploded system of allegorical interpretation, considered to be futile. Primitive man is but a child; he lives in a world of dreams and fancies which are to him as real as the waking world of facts. As for coherence or meaning in what he chose to dream about his gods, you may as well undertake to decide what shapes the clouds have or what words the bells say. The imagination knows no law, or at the most is subject only to the laws of poetical and æsthetic consistency. It is vain to endeavour to go beyond the myth, or behind it. It is like the curtain of Zeus, which was itself the picture. There is nothing behind it. This, as we have said, was a natural reaction, but the pendulum swung too far. No one at the present day would think of denying that in many cases there is something behind the veil—that most myths have a meaning of some kind. Nor would any one now admit that myths possess poetic or æsthetic consistency; on the contrary, one of the problems of scientific mythology is to explain the inconsistency of feeling which is to be found in myths relating to the same subject, to explain, for instance, the repulsive origin attributed by mythology to Aphrodite, the type of feminine beauty, or the amour carried on by Demeter, the ideal of motherhood, in the shape of a mare, with Poseidon.

A partial solution of this problem was afforded by the brothers Grimm (q.v.), whose labours mark a new era in mythology. While collecting their famous fairy tales from the mouths of the people, they were forced to the conclusion that many a tale which had hitherto only been known in a literary form had existed orally long before it had been put on paper or shaped into verse, and the further inference from this became the wide-reaching conclusion that mythology was not, as the allegory theory had falsely taught, the work of the superior few, but the production of the people. It was the way in which the many expressed their religious feeling. It was their only mode of expression, and it was theirs exclusively. The current of mythology, on this theory, flows from the lower strata of society to the upper. Here we have an explanation of the incongruity existing in the myths told of Aphrodite or Demeter, for instance; for myths could not be perpetually retold in one generation after another without being reshaped to suit the changing modes of thought of different generations. But it will be also noticed that, granting that the current of mythology is upwards from below, we are no nearer an answer to the question, Why do men tell the extraordinary stories they do tell about their gods? The quarter, however, in which an answer to this question might be looked for was indicated by Grimm.

One and the same myth may be found, in different forms, amongst different Aryan peoples (see

Vol. I. p. 471), and although some such myths may have been borrowed by one people from another, just as one language may borrow words from another, still the resemblances between the myths of different Aryan peoples could, like the resemblance between their languages, be only properly accounted for on the supposition that they had been handed down by each separate people from a time when the forefathers of all were united in one home, one tongue, one faith. In fine, the solution of the problem was to be sought in the application of the comparative method to the study of mythology, and in the creation of a comparative mythology of the Aryan peoples. The verification of this hypothesis was supposed to have been effected when it was discovered that the literature of Sanskrit threw the same light on the structure of myths as the language of Sanskrit had thrown on the structure of the Aryan tongues. Comparative mythology may fairly be said to be the creation of two scholars—in Germany Adalbert Kuhn (1812–81), and in England Max-Müller (q.v.). The object of the school founded by them is to trace myths back to Aryan times, to determine their original forms, and, having done this, to show what was their original meaning, and any changes that may have subsequently come over that meaning. Their guiding principle is that in the Vedas (q.v.) we see Aryan myths in their earliest form—indeed, that we see them in process of making. The conclusion to which they come is that, owing to the defects of language in its earliest stage, the primitive Aryan could only speak of natural objects as living things, and that in consequence he came to believe that all nature was possessed of life. Again, as in language we can only predicate of a subject something which the subject is not, so in myth, primitive man could only express a phenomenon of nature by comparing it with something which it was not—in fact, could only express it by a simile. When in course of time, and owing to the 'disease of language,' the meaning of the simile came to be forgotten, what had originally been a very innocent comparison might become a very repulsive myth. For instance, the sun's relation to the dawn may be likened to that of a husband to his wife, or of a son to his mother; and a myth of incest may be the result.

The reaction against the allegory theory, which was strongest in the time of Grote, has, we observe, ceased by the time of Max-Müller, and the pendulum once more approaches more nearly to the true mean. According to the comparative mythologists, there is, after all, something behind myth; not, however, an intentionally veiled meaning, but an unintentionally forgotten substratum, a simile originally descriptive of some natural phenomenon. But though this school is right in maintaining that myths have a meaning, and that in some cases the meaning is to be found in a metaphorical description of the sun, the dawn, the wind, &c., the extremes to which this mode of interpretation has been pushed have caused a revolt amongst recent mythologists. The earliest insurgent, Mannhardt (1831–89), was content to turn from the Vedas to popular beliefs and folk-tales as the earliest stratum accessible to the comparative mythologist; but the latest revolter, and we may say the greatest, that is Gruppe, rejects the comparative method altogether, and undertakes to demonstrate in his second and following volumes that myths have been borrowed by one nation from another, not handed down from the common ancestors of the separate peoples. It seems indeed impossible to deny that, with regard to the importance of Sanskrit, the same mistake has been made by comparative mythologists as was at first made by comparative philologists. The conviction is spreading that the myths of the Vedas form a literary mythology which is nothing like so near to the myth-making stage in the history of a people as are many of the popular traditions of the peasantry of Europe. On the other hand, although Max-Müller and his school have been guilty of many offences against the canons of comparative philology in their desire to identify the names of mythological figures, Gruppe undoubtedly has gone too far in asserting that comparative philology lends no support whatever to the belief that the Aryans possessed any gods at all. Zeus, Aurora, and Agni may safely be said to have been known to the Aryans, and to have been worshipped as deities.

Another series of attacks has been made upon the Kuhn and Müller school on the ground that, if the comparative method is to be applied, it should be applied to the whole of the facts, and not to one particular section of them. In other words, we must not confine ourselves to Aryan myths, but must open our eyes to the fact that nearly every Aryan myth can be paralleled by similar tales from the remotest quarters of the globe. No explanation which explains only a part of the phenomena and leaves other exactly similar phenomena unexplained can possibly be the right explanation. Obviously, therefore, it is impossible to find the key to all the mythologies in any peculiarity of language, for such peculiarity or 'disease' would only affect the mythology of the nations speaking that language or family of languages. The mythologist has not only to answer the question why men tell their extraordinary tales about the gods, but also the question why do they all tell the same sort of story, no matter what race or clime they belong to. The theory that all myths are derived from a common centre, from which they spread in all directions over the face of the earth by borrowing, would explain the similarity in the myths; but, until that theory is more fully elaborated than it is at present, the field is held by a theory of mythology of which the most distinguished champion in England is Mr Andrew Lang (q.v.). It is, briefly, that myths are survivals from a primitive stage of culture through which all races pass, and in which they much resemble each other. Ex eisdem eadem. Primitive man, whether of the stone age on this side of the world or on the other, clipped his flint implements in much the same way; and no one thinks of accounting for the resemblance between the implements thus manufactured by any theory of borrowing or of common descent. It is obvious that the same causes acting on the same organisms produce similar results, and this is as true of mental and moral culture as of material culture. Here, too, we have the explanation of the strange nature of many myths; what seems brutal to us does not seem brutal to the savage. There is therefore nothing surprising in the fact that the gods and heroes of the savage are, like himself, savages. Above all, the same problems presented themselves to primitive peoples in all parts of the world, and were solved by the aid of the same analogies. What was the origin of man? of the world? What causes rain? Why does the wind blow? Why does the sun behave as he does? Why are certain customs observed? The answers which commended themselves to primitive man constitute mythology. At the same time there is no reason to believe that primitive man was not as fond of hearing and telling stories as civilised man is of reading novels. And though most myths may be the explanations which were invented to explain what seemed to primitive man to need explanation, some myths probably were from the beginning designed solely for the gratification of the imagination.

In addition to the works of Creuzer, Lobeck, Grote, Lehrs, Renan, Grünm, and Gruppe already referred to, see Max-Müller's various works, and particularly his Biographies of Words; Mannhardt, Wald und Feldkulte; Schrader, Prehistoric Antiquities of the Aryan Peoples; E. B. Tylor, Early History of Mankind and Primitive Culture; A. Lang, Custom and Myth and La Mythologie (Paris, 1886); Canon Taylor, Origin of the Aryans; Chantepie de la Saussaye, Religions-geschichte; C. Petersen, article Mythologie in Ersch and Gruber; L. Preller, Griechische Mythologie; P. Decharme, Mythologie de la Grèce antique; and Roscher's Lexikon der Mythologie. See also the articles in this work on such mythologists as Euhemerus, Cox, Gubernatis, Lang, Max-Müller; those on the several gods; and the following: