MYTHOLOGIC PHILOSOPHY. 797 



their explanations rested. A philosophy will be higher in the scale, 

 nearer the truth, as the discernment is wider, the discrimination nicer, 

 and the classification better. 



The sense of the savage is dull compared with the sense of the 

 civilized man. There is a myth current in civilization to the effect 

 that the barbarian has highly developed perceptive faculties. It has 

 no more foundation than the myth of the wisdom of the owl. A sav- 

 age sees but few sights, hears but few sounds, tastes but few flavors, 

 smells but few odors ; his whole sensuous life is narrow and blunt, and 

 his facts that are made up of the combination of sensuous impressions 

 are few. In comparison the civilized man has his vision extended 

 away toward the infinitesimal and away toward the infinite ; his per- 

 ception of sound is multiplied to the comjirehension of rapturous 

 symphonies ; his perception of taste is increased to the enjoyment of 

 delicious viands ; his perception of smell is developed to the apprecia- 

 tion of most exquisite perfumes ; and his facts that are made up of the 

 combination of sensuous impressions are multiplied beyond enumera- 

 tion. The stages of discernment from the lowest savage to the high- 

 est civilized man constitute a series the end of which is far from the 

 beginning. 



If the discernment of the savage is little, his discrimination is less. 

 All his sensuous perceptions are confused ; but the confusion is that 

 universal habit of savagery the confusion of the objective with the 

 subjective, so that the savage sees, hears, tastes, smells, feels the 

 imaginings of his own mind. Subjectively determined sensuous pro- 

 cesses are diseases in civilization, but normal functional methods in 

 savagery. 



The savage philosopher classifies by obvious resemblances ana- 

 logic characters. The civilized philosopher classifies by essential affini- 

 ties homologic characteristics and the progress of philosophy is 

 marked by changes from analogic categories to homologic categories. 



II. Two Grand Stages of Philosophy. 



There are two grand stages of philosophy the mythologic and the 

 scientific. In the first, all phenomena are explained by analogies de- 

 rived from subjective human experiences ; in the latter, phenomena are 

 explained as orderly successions of events. 



In sublime egotism man first interprets the cosmos as an extension 

 of himself ; he classifies the phenomena of the outer world by their 

 analogies with subjective phenomena ; his measure of distance is his 

 own pace, his measure of time his own sleep, for he says, " It is a 

 thousand paces to the great rock," or, " It is a hundred sleeps to the 

 great feast." Noises are voices, powers are hands, movements .are 

 made afoot. By subjective examination discovering in himself will 

 and design, and by inductive reason discovering will and design in his 

 fellow men and in animals, he extends the induction to all the cosmos, 



