96 MYTH AND SCIENCE. 



In this second stage to which myth spontaneously 

 attained, it must be observed that all fetishes could 

 not be reduced to a specific or typical image, since 

 in nature, and in ages and conditions when the in- 

 telligence was still rude and uncultured, all pheno- 

 mena or objects could not assume a specific form, 

 but were still regarded as individuals. In this class 

 are the sun, the moon, certain stars and constella- 

 tions, as well as some other natural phenomena, 

 volcanoes, hot springs, and the like ; since these were 







unique within the range of country inhabited by the 

 savage hordes, they could not become specific. Hence, 

 while all other objects and their respective fetishes fol- 

 lowed the natural evolution into a specific type, and 

 through these into the simplest form of polytheism, 

 the special fetish which referred to unique things or 

 phenomena remained special, although it was modi- 

 fied, as we shall see, so as to harmonize with the 

 aspect commonly assumed by other typical images. 



It must be observed that we have gradually as- 

 cended from the special to the specific fetish, and to 

 types which are resolved by the intelligence into more 

 ideal and less concrete images ; precisely because 

 they are ideal and less bound to the form they had 

 before, they are incarnated in an anthropomorphic 

 and anthropopathic form. Released from the ne- 

 cessity of regarding them in a vague form, or one 

 different from that of man, the image becomes more 

 human, and that not only as before in consciousness 

 and purpose, but also in aspect and structure. 



