POWEI.I.] SOPHIOLOOY TLXXXI 



of action. If the action proves unwise, the judgment is wrong; 

 but as judgments nuiltiply and are compounded in notions, a 

 new test of error is developed, which is the incongruitv of 

 notions. But the discovery of incongruitA' is not the discovery 

 of the specitic error. The incongruity is a rehxtion between 

 two or more notions; some one of tiiese notions must be erro- 

 neous, but which one is not i-evealed l)y the incongruity. The 

 error is discovered only by submitting' tlie judgments to trial 

 by verification. The incongruity does not reveal a jiarticular 

 error, but only the fact that some error exists; on the other 

 hand congruity does not prove validity. 



Mythologic notions mav well be congruous with one another. 

 There is no incongruitv between the notion of the thunder- 

 bird and the notion of the Avind bird. If there is a bird which 

 roars in the heavens, there may be a bird which breathes in 

 the hiu'ricane; the one notion serves to confirm the other. It 

 is strange how congruous mythic notions are with one another. 

 Stud}' the mythology of any people as a system, and you will 

 be surprised at the congruity of the notions which it reveals. 

 Compare one mythology with another, and often they will be 

 found strangely antagonistic. This congruity of mythic con- 

 cepts in one system is a fact so conspicuous as to challenge 

 the attention of thinking men, and it is early discovered iuul 

 widely used alike in savagery, barbarism, and civilization. 



This method of reasoning from the congruity of notions 

 was finally developed in early civilization into a body of doc- 

 trine called dialectic. By this doctrine any mythic notion 

 coidd be expounded as a starting point and other mythic no- 

 tions brought into judgment before the one selected and found 

 to be congruous, and by this logic proved correct. Proceed- 

 ing in this manner from notion to notion, many are verified, 

 and the assumed original notion is in this same manner found 

 valid. It is thus that a special system of reasoning in the 

 interest of mythology is gradually developed. 



If this system of logic were not already named, I should be 

 tempted to call it Kanosh logic. Kanosh was the chief of a 

 Shoshonean tribe in the i-entral part of Utah, where cinder- 

 cones and lava-beds are found. In vears of mv youth I was 



