explanation. We must try to discover some actual and demonstrable
and widely prevalent condition of the human mind, in which tales
that even to remote and rudimentary civilisations appeared
irrational and unnatural would seem natural and rational. To
discover this intellectual condition has been the aim of all
mythologists who did not believe that myth is a divine tradition
depraved by human weakness, or a distorted version of historical
events.

Before going further, it is desirable to set forth what our aim is,
and to what extent we are seeking an interpretation of mythology.
It is not our purpose to explain every detail of every ancient
legend, either as a distorted historical fact or as the result of
this or that confusion of thought caused by forgetfulness of the
meanings of language, or in any other way; nay, we must constantly
protest against the excursions of too venturesome ingenuity. Myth
is so ancient, so complex, so full of elements, that it is vain
labour to seek a cause for every phenomenon. We are chiefly
occupied with the quest for an historical condition of the human
intellect to which the element in myths, regarded by us as
irrational, shall seem rational enough. If we can prove that such
a state of mind widely exists among men, and has existed, that
state of mind may be provisionally considered as the fount and
ORIGIN of the myths which have always perplexed men in a reasonable
modern mental condition. Again, if it can be shown that this
mental stage was one through which all civilised races have passed,
the universality of the mythopoeic mental condition will to some
extent explain the universal DIFFUSION of the stories.

Now, in all mythologies, whether savage or civilised, and in all