34 MYTHOLOGY OF THE NORTH AMERICAN INDIANS, 
In the history of every individual the sports and joys of childhood are 
compared and contrasted with the toils and pains of old age. Greatly 
protracted life, in savagery and barbarism, is not a boon to be craved. 
In that stage of society where the days and the years go by with little 
or no provision for a time other than that which is passing, the old must 
go down to the grave through poverty and suffering. In that stage of 
culture to-morrow’s bread is not certain, and to-day’s bread is often 
searce. In civilization plenty and poverty live side by side; the palace 
and the hovel are on the same landscape; the rich and poor elbow 
each other on the same street; but in savagery plenty and poverty come 
with recurring days to the same man, and the tribe is rich to-day and poor 
to-morrow, and the days of want come in every man’s history; and when 
they come the old suffer most, and the burden of old age is oppressive. 
In youth activity is joy; in old age activity is pain. No wonder, then, 
that old age loves youth, or that to-day loves yesterday, for the instinct 
is born of the inherited experiences of mankind. 
But there is yet another and more potent reason for ancientism. That 
tale is the most wonderful that has been inost repeated, for the breath 
of speech is the fertilizer of story. Hence, the older the story the greater 
its thaumaturgics. Thus, yesterday is greater than to-day by natural 
processes of human exaggeration. Again, that is held to be most cer- 
tain, and hence most sacred, which has been most often affirmed. A 
Brahman was carrying a goat to the altar. Three thieves would steal 
it. So they placed themselves at intervals along the way by which the 
pious Brahman would travel. When the venerable man came to the 
first thief he was accosted: “Brahman, why do you carry adog?” Now, 
a dog is an unclean beast which no Brahman must touch. And the 
Brahman, after looking at his goat, said: ‘You do err; this is a goat.” 
And when the old man reached the second thief, again he was accosted : 
“Brahman, why do you carry a dog?” Sothe Brahman put his goat on 
the ground, and after narrowly scrutinizing it, he said: “Surely this is 
a goat,” and went on his way. When he came to the third thief he was 
once more accosted: ‘Brahman, why do you carry a dog?” Then the 
Brahman, having thrice heard that his goat was a dog, was convinced, 
and throwing it down, he fled to the temple for ablution, and the thieves 
had a feast. 
The child learns not for himself, but is taught, and accepts as true 
that which is told, and a propensity to believe the affirmed is implanted 
in his mind. In every society some are wise and some are foolish, and 
the wise are revered, and their affirmations are accepted. Thus, the few 
lead the multitude in knowledge, and the propensity to believe the 
affirmed started in childhood is increased in manhood in the great aver- 
age of persons constituting society, and these propensities are inherited 
from generation to generation, until we have a cumulation of effects. 
The propagation of opinions by affirmation, the cultivation of the pro- 
pensity to believe that which has been affirmed many times, let us call 
