Description
Begins “Read 14 November 1934
Some scholars look upon a myth as an article of faith of pagan times. Others take it as an expression of the early religious mind in a symbolic form. However, neither dogmatism nor speculation belongs to the primitive properties of religion. Their influence, great though it may become in the course of evolution, is not in any degree underrated if precedence is given to an altogether different aspect of mythology, which is of a practical and, therefore, a more primitive character. Myths have an essential bearing upon the execution of the earliest religious functions, that is, upon the ritual intended for the obtaining of a gift or favour from a superior power. Where a god is worshipped, the myth is there to remind him of what he has done or allowed on a previous occasion. [...]”