THE SOLAR THEORY OF MYTHS.^ 



By Prof. John DeWitt Warner. 



[Read before the Institute, Dec. 7, 1875.] 



Tn the old Roman capital were guarded the rolls which 

 Tarquin the proud, awe-struck at least once in his hfe, 

 had bought from the sibyl. The most venerable council 

 in the state was the conclave of augurs that pored over the 

 weird symbols, and from their confusion tortured dubious 

 prophecy. At Delphi, the Hellenic soothsayers caught 

 from the frenzied Pythia the words which decided the fate 

 of empires, while in the midst of the Lybian desert the 

 Egyptian priests gave to inquirers the portentous utterances 

 of their ram-headed divinity. To learn of the future from 

 the divine powers was the most serious business of the old 

 world. 



^ The following volumes are mentioned as being among the most import- 

 ant as well as most accessible publications upon the theme treated in the 

 present essay. 



Banier, Antoine.— La Mythologie et les Fables, ExpUquees par I'His- 

 toire. Paris, 1738, 3 vols., 4to. 



Court de Gebelin.— Monde Primitif Analyse et Compare avec le 

 Monde Moderne. Paris, 1773-83, 9 vols., 4to. 



Baring-Gould, J. — Curious Myths of the Middle Ages. Philadelphia, 

 1865, 12mo. 



Brinton, D. G. — Myths of the New World. New York, 1869, 12mo. 

 Fiske, John. — Myths and Myth Makers. Boston, 1874, 12mo. 

 Cox, Rev. G. W. — Mythology of the Aryan Nations, London, 1870, 2 

 vols. , 8vo. 



De Gubernatis, Angelo, — Zoological Mythology. London, 1872, 2 vols 

 8vo, Also Letture sopra la Mitologia Vedica. Firenze, 1874, 12mo. 



Miiller, Max. — Chips from a Oerriian Workshop. Vols, i and ii. London, 

 1867, 1869, 8vo. 



Lange, J. P, — Theological and Homiletical Commentary' on the Old and 

 New Testament. New York, 1866-75, 17 vols., 8vo. 



Tylor, Edward B. — Primitive Culture. London, 1874, 2 vols., 8vo. 



Gladstone, Wm. E. — Juventus Mundi, or Gods and Men of the Heroic 

 Age. London, 1870, 8vo. 



Trans, ix.'] 8 



