HISTORICAL EVOLUTION OF MYTH AND SCIENCE. 191 



modified and transformed the truth of the Semitic 

 idea, to suit their own genius and imagination, and 

 in this way they produced the wonderful fabric of 

 Christian civilization and of Catholicism. They alone 

 accepted a teaching which infused new spirit into 

 social life and produced the rule of religion over the 

 world, and the race still stands alone in the main- 

 tenance of its beliefs, to which science has added 

 the powerful simplicity of the Semitic idea, and their 

 vigorous influence has perpetuated and perfected 

 human progress upon earth.* The Aryan race at- 

 tained to the Semitic conception in its purity and 

 cosmic reality by the process of reason, and only 

 because it was endowed with all the civilizing and 

 moral qualities which were acquired in so many ages 

 of moral and intellectual energy, has the old concep- 

 tion been so vigorous and productive. 



" The Semitic race, on the other hand, adhered to 

 their old faith, rejected Christianity, as it had been 

 formulated by the Aryans, and had little influence on 

 the world. The Israelites, indeed, dispersed among 

 other nations, retained the idea of the one spiritual 

 God in all its purity, and civilization would have 



* The illustrious Du Bois Reymond delivered a lecture a few years 

 a^o, in which he made it clear that the Semitic idea of one Almighty 

 God led to the later and modern conception of the unity of forces 

 and the rational interpretation of the system of the universe. This 

 important testimony of so able a man confirms the theory set forth 

 some years ago in the work of which I have reproduced a part in the 

 text. 



