154 MASON" — EIPENING OF THOUGHTS IN COMMON. [April 



Learning and Lore. 



Lore is the learning of the folk, the philosophy of savages, the 

 survival of old beliefs and customs into enlightenment — old thoughts 

 in common gone to seed. In form, it is the traditions, songs, 

 proverbial philosophies, ceremonies, and real knowledge of peoples. 

 The lore-thoughts of a people are the most deep-rooted and persis- 

 tent, because indigenous to their minds. It is said that at the 

 battle of Sebastopol the critical charge was incited by the play- 

 ing of the Marseillaise, which the old soldiers heard for the first 

 time in years. Anyone who has tried to oppose an absurd popu- 

 lar belief, such as that in the hoop-snake, the retiring of the 

 ground-hog at Candlemas, the marvelous doings of the earwig, and 

 a thousand more, will appreciate what is here insisted on, namely, 

 that the holding of a thought in common intensifies its activity, as 

 in a battery of infinite number of cells. 



On the intellectual side, lore has become learning and science is 

 slowly permeating the communal mind and becoming the institu- 

 tional mind. The personal equation of conservatism still acts as a 

 balance-wheel there, as those who worked for uniform time and 

 better nomenclature, and are now laboring for a uniform alphabet 

 and a standard numeral system, will testify. 



The sciences began in the individual observation and were 

 perfected one by one in the institutional mind. Since anthro- 

 pology is a composite science, using and depending on all others, 

 it will be the last to rise to the dignity of a perfected science. The 

 same is true of all its component sciences. 



In the museum one sees the botanist returning with his plants 

 from the field. He has been collecting, he is a collector, these are 

 his collections : his work is in the collective stage. 



Next, on long tables, he lays them in heaps, according to certain 

 classific concepts in his mind, he is classifying, he is a systematist : 

 this is his classification. Finally he comes to conclusions, will tell 

 you beforehand what to look for in this or that class. He predicts, 

 he is a philosophic botanist : his work is in the predictive stage. 

 But this has been going on for centuries, with fresh returns to the 

 fields, again and again with brighter eyes and larger experience. 

 At last the organized mind takes up the task, so that the work of 

 each must pass the scrutiny of all. 



