70 MYTH AND SCIENCE. 



If in this psj'chical and organic fact of perception, 

 man is at first absolutely in the conditions of animals, 

 identical effects must be produced; and this was 

 originally the case, as far as man himself and ex- 

 ternal things were concerned. The powerful self- 

 consciousness which actuates man and animals alike 

 is projected on the objects or phenomena perceived, 

 and they see them transformed into living, deliberat- 

 ing subjects. In this way the world and all which 

 it contains appears to be a congeries of beings, 

 actuated by will and consciousness, and powerful for 

 good or evil, and in practice they seek to modify, to 

 encourage, or to avoid such influence. The ultimate 

 effect of this action, assumed to be intentional in all 

 and each of these subjects, will be their personification, 

 either vaguely or definitely, but always as a power 

 active for good or ill. 



If we trace back the memories of historic and 

 civilized peoples into the twilight of their origin, at 

 a time when they were still barbarous, and little 

 removed from their primitive savage conditions, we 

 shall find, the further we go back, the more vivid, 

 general, and multiform will the mythological inter- 

 pretation and conception of the w r orld and its various 

 phenomena appear to be ; everything was personified 

 by these primitive peoples in a way common to the 

 animal and human consciousness alike. 



Of this the testimony remaining in the most 

 ancient verses of the first Veda is a sufficient proof. 



