said, save that where we propound a scientific theorem, they
constructed a myth.[12] A thing is said to be explained when
it is classified with other things with which we are already
acquainted. That is the only kind of explanation of which the
highest science is capable. We explain the origin, progress,
and ending of a thunder-storm, when we classify the phenomena
presented by it along with other more familiar phenomena of
vaporization and condensation. But the primitive man explained
the same thing to his own satisfaction when he had classified
it along with the well-known phenomena of human volition, by
constructing a theory of a great black dragon pierced by the
unerring arrows of a heavenly archer. We consider the nature
of the stars to a certain extent explained when they are
classified as suns; but the Mohammedan compiler of the
"Mishkat-ul-Ma'sabih" was content to explain them as missiles
useful for stoning the Devil! Now, as soon as the old Greek,
forgetting the source of his conception, began to talk of a
human Oidipous slaying a leonine Sphinx, and as soon as the
Mussulman began, if he ever did, to tell his children how the
Devil once got a good pelting with golden bullets, then both
the one and the other were talking pure mythology.

[12] Les facultes qui engendrent la mythologie sont les memes
que celles qui engendront la philosophie, et ce n'est pas sans
raison que l'Inde et la Grece nous presentent le phenomene de
la plus riche mythologie a cote de la plus profonde
metaphysique. "La conception de la multiplicite dans
l'univers, c'est le polytheisme chez les peuples enfants;
c'est la science chez les peuples arrives a l'age mur.--Renan,
Hist. des Langues Semitiques, Tom. I. p. 9.