THE IDEAS AND SOURCES OF MYTH. 31 



indeed be difficult to attain to a clear and adequate 

 conception of the universal evolution of myth and 

 science, but for the existence of a privileged race 

 distinguished for its psychical and organic power, 

 which from its beginning until now, although subject 

 to many partial eclipses, has on the whole maintained 

 its position in the world so as to present to us the 

 long historical drama of its evolutions. Other races, 

 peoples, or tribes have disappeared in the struggle 

 for existence, or have remained essentially incapable 

 of further progress even in a relatively inferior de- 

 gree, so as to afford no aid in following the successive 

 development of myth and science; while the Aryan 

 family, a race to which I believe that the Semitic 

 originally belonged,* furnishes the unbroken sequence 

 of events and the stages of such complex evolution. 

 Nor certainly is there any signs of the disappearance 

 of this race, since every day its intellectual and 

 territorial achievements, added to the instruments of 

 a powerful material civilization, invigorate its strength 

 and presage its indefinite duration in forms we are 

 not able to foresee, unless indeed fatal astral or 

 telluric catastrophes should hinder its progress or 

 bring it to an end. 



If we compare this race with itself at different 

 epochs, and in the many different peoples into which 



* See, with respect to the primitive unity of the Aryan and 

 Semitic races, the works of the great philologist, T. G. Ascoli, and 

 others. 



