A certain Cardinal seemed contented therewith, and, as the historian
remarks, 'was clearly a man not difficult to please.' Mr. Max Muller
reminds me of the good Cardinal. I do not feel so satisfied as he does
of Mannhardt's re-conversion.



Mannhardt's Attitude to Philology


We have heard Mannhardt, in a letter partly cited by Mr. Max Muller,
describe his own method. He begins with what is certain and
intelligible, a mass of popular customs. These he explains by analogies.
He passes from the known to the obscure. Philological mythologists begin
with the unknown, the name of a god. This they analyse, extract a
meaning, and (proceeding to the known) fit the facts of the god's legend
into the sense of his name. The methods are each other's opposites, yet
the letter in which Mannhardt illustrates this fact is cited as a proof
of his return to his old colours.



Irritating Conduct of Mannhardt


Nothing irritates philological mythologists so much, nothing has injured
them so much in the esteem of the public which 'goes into these things a
little,' as the statement that their competing etymologies and discrepant
interpretations of mythical names are mutually destructive. I have been