BULL. 30] 



MYTHOLOGY 



967 



belief in spiritual beings," and as "the 

 deep-lying doctrine of spiritual beings, 

 which embodies the very essence of 

 spiritualistic as opposed to materialistic 

 philosophy"; and, finally, he says, 

 "animism is, in fact, the groundwork of 

 the philosophy of religion, from that of 

 savages up to that of civilized men." 

 He further makes the belief in spiritual 

 beings "the minimum definition of 

 religion." Hence, with Tylor, animism 

 is broadly synonymous with religifm. 



But, strit-t definition shows that a belief 

 in spiritual beings, as such, did not, dots 

 not, and can not form the sole material 

 out of which primitive thought has 

 developed its gods and deities. To this 

 extent, therefore, animism does not fur- 

 nish the key to an accurate and valid 

 explanation of mythology and religion. 



Brinton (1896) denies that there is any 

 special religious activity taking the form 

 of what Tylor calls "animism," and 

 declares that the belief tliat inanimate 

 objects possess souls or spirits is common 

 to all religions and many philosophies, 

 and that it is not a trait characteristic of 

 primitive faiths, but merely a secondary 

 phenomenon of the religious sentiment. 

 Further, he insists that "the acceptance 

 of the doctrine of ' animism ' as a sufficient 

 explanation of early cults has led to the 

 neglect, in English-speaking lands, of 

 their profounder analysis." 



So far as is definitely known, no sup- 

 port is found in the mythologies of North 

 America for the doctrine of ancestor- 

 worship. This doctrine seeks to show 

 that savage men had evolved real gods 

 from the shades of their own dead chiefs 

 and great men. It is more than doubt- 

 ful that such a thing has ever been done 

 by man. Competent data and trained 

 experience with the Indians of North 

 America show that the dominant ideas 

 of early savage thought precluded such a 

 thing. One of the most fundamental and 

 characteristic beliefs of savage thought is 

 the utter helplessness of man unaided by 

 the magic power of some favoring being 

 against the bodies and elements of his 

 environment. The deities, the masters 

 and controllers — the gods of later times — 

 differed greatly in strength of body and 

 in the potency of the magic ]wwer exer- 

 cised by them, in knowledge and in 

 astuteness of mind; but each in liis own 

 sphere and jurisdiction was generally 

 supreme and incomprehensible. Human 

 shades, or ghosts, did not or could not 

 attain to these godlike gifts. To change, 

 transform, create by metamorphosis, or 

 to govern, some body or element in 

 nature, is at once the prerogative and 

 the function of a master — a controller — 

 humanly speaking, a god. 



The attribution of power to do things 

 magically, that is, to perform a func- 

 tion in a mysterious ami incomprehen- 

 sible manner, was the fundamental pos- 

 tulate of savage mind to account for the 

 ability of the gods, the fictitious person- 

 ages of its mythology, to perform the 

 acts which are in fact the operations of 

 the forces of nature. To define one such 

 man-being or personage, the explanation, 

 to be satisfactory, must be more than the 

 mere statement of the imputation of life, 

 mind, and the human form and attri- 

 butes to an objective thing. There must 

 also be stated the fact of the concomitant 

 possession along with these of orciula, 

 or magic power, differing from individual 

 to individual in efficacy, function, and 

 scope of action. 



While linguistics may greatly aid in 

 comprehending myths, it is nevertheless 

 not always safe for determining the sub- 

 .stance of the thought, the concept; and 

 the student mu.st eschew the habit of giv- 

 ing only an etymology rather than a defi- 

 nition of the things having the names of 

 the mythic persons, which may be 

 the subject of investigation. Etymology 

 may aid, but w'ithout corroborative testi- 

 mony it niay mislead. 



Many are the causes which bring about 

 the decline and disintegration of a myth 

 or a cycle of myths of a definite people. 

 The migration or violent disruption of the 

 peo{)le, the attrition or the superposition 

 of diverse alien cultures, or the change or 

 reformation of the religion of the people 

 based on a recasting of opinions and like 

 causes, all tend to the decline and dis- 

 memberment and the final loss of a myth 

 or a niytholog}'. 



All tribes of common blood and speech 

 are bound together by a common my- 

 thology and by a religion founded on 

 the teachings of that mythology. These 

 ddctrines deal with a vast body of all 

 kinds of knowledge, arts, institutions, 

 and customs. It is the creed of such a 

 people that all their knowledge and wis- 

 dom, all their rites and ceremonies, and 

 all that they possess and all that they 

 are socially and politically, have come to 

 them through direct revelation from their 

 gods, through the l)eneficence of the rul- 

 ers of the bodies and elements of their 

 environment. 



The social and political bonds of every 

 known tribe are founded essentially on 

 real or fictitious blood kinship, and the 

 religious bonds that hold a people to its 

 gods are founded on faith in the truth of 

 the teachings of their myths. No stronger 

 bonds than these are known to savage 

 men. The disruption of these, by what- 

 ever cause, results in the destruction of 

 the people. 



