CONFUSION OF METAPHOR WITH FACT. 43 



suggestion of any such possibility. But by the inheritance 

 of nicknames that are eventually mistaken for the names 

 of the objects from which they were derived, the belief 

 readily arises is sure to arise. That the names of heav 

 enly bodies will furnish metaphorical names to the un 

 civilized, is manifest. Do we not ourselves call a distin 

 guished singer or actor a star ? And have we not in poems 

 numerous comparisons of men and women to the sun and 

 moon ; as in &quot; Love s Labour s Lost,&quot; where the princess 

 is called &quot; a gracious moon,&quot; and as in &quot; Henry VIII.,&quot; 

 where we read &quot; Those suns of glory, those two lights 

 of men ? &quot; Clearly, primitive men will be not unlikely 

 thus to speak of the chief hero of a successful battle. 

 When we remember how the arrival of a triumphant war 

 rior must affect the feelings of his tribe, dissipating clouds 

 of anxiety and irradiating all faces with joy, we shall see 

 that the comparison of him to the sun is extremely natural ; 

 and in early speech this comparison can be made only by 

 calling him the sun. As before, then, it will happen that, 

 through a confounding of the metaphorical name with the 

 actual name, his progeny, after a few generations, will be 

 regarded by themselves and others as descendants of the 

 sun. And, as a consequence, partly of actual inheritance 

 of the ancestral character, and partly of maintenance of 

 the traditions respecting the ancestor s achievements, it 

 will also naturally happen that the solar race will be con 

 sidered a superior race, as we find it habitually is. 



The origin of other totems, equally strange if not even 

 stranger, is similarly accounted for, though otherwise un 

 accountable. One of the New-Zealand chiefs claimed as 

 his progenitor the neighboring great mountain, Tongariro. 

 This seemingly -whimsical belief becomes intelligible when 

 we observe how easily it may have arisen from a nick 

 name. Do we not ourselves sometimes speak figuratively 



