238 MYTH AND SCIENCE. 



weight, numerical proportion, in short the experi- 

 mental method, took possession of the facts, acts, and 

 processes of the mind, as of every other ohject and 

 subject of nature. In addition to the great names of 

 modern psychologists in England, we may mention 

 among other experimental psychologists in Germany, 

 Fechner, Wundt, Lotze, Helmholtz, Weher, Kammler, 

 etc. ; illustrious men in France and elsewhere might 

 also be cited to show what progress has been made 

 and is about to be made in this field. The destruction 

 of myth and of the subjective myths of psychology is 

 always going on, and a positive science of mental 

 phenomena has arisen, like that of natural pheno- 

 mena. The ultimate phase of myth is so near its 

 end that it has been possible to create a psychology 

 implying the absence of a soul. The scientific faculty 

 has now indeed a complete ascendency over the 

 mythical representation with which it was originally 

 coeval. 



Yet we do not mean to say that myth is extinct. 

 In the case of the great majority of the human race, 

 a small and elect portion excepted, myth and all 

 the superstitions which proceed from it persist in an 

 ideal, cosmic, spiritual, or religious form, and these are 

 only slowly disappearing among the common people, 

 and even among the educated classes. Owing to the 

 primordial and innate necessity which it is so difficult 

 to overcome, science itself still nourishes myths within 

 its pale, although unconsciously and in their most 



