But on this subject we have more than conjecture, or even reason; we have facts. There are in the Eddas, and still more in the Scaldic interpretations, principles too repugnant to each other ever completely to harmonise. We know that Thor was more esteemed in Norway than Odin; and that in Denmark, no less than in Sweden, Odin was more highly venerated than Thor. The reason is, that the Goths, or, we should rather say, the last swarm of them that arrived with Odin, had more influence in these latter kingdoms than in the former. Thor, indeed, was almost exclusively worshipped by the Norwegians, who invoked Odin only on the eve of a battle. They held the former to be immeasurably the superior of the other; and, in contradiction to the Swedes and Danes, contended that Odin was the son of Thor. The elder Edda calls him the most powerful of the gods; and in the Sagas, by the most ancient Scalds, he is represented as frequently hostile to the other deity. Considering these facts, and the universal homage still paid to Thor by the Finns and Lapps—people of the same race with the Norwegians—we are of opinion that Thor was the native, Odin the foreign, divinity. The giants, too, appear to have been of native, perhaps of Celtic, origin, and to have been adopted by the Scythian Goths, after their arrival; while the _black_ dwarfs, whose habitation was in the bowels of the earth, were introduced by the latter, and soon made a portion of the native creed. The white, or benevolent elves, were universally received by the Goths; but the dark, the malignant elves, seem to have been brought from an eastern region. It is in the highest degree absurd to suppose that if there had been no foreign admixture with that creed, and a very large admixture, we should have nine different worlds, with their complicated, often dissonant relation to one another. Where this complexity, and, still more, this evident dissonance between the elements, are found to exist, we may safely conclude that they have been introduced at different periods; that the mighty and irregular edifice has been reared by different hands. But if there were no other argument to establish the dissonance for which we contend, and the forcible union of opinions never intended to harmonise, it would be sufficiently obvious from the distinction between the two great systems of creation to which we have already alluded—the Ymerian or animal, and Yggdrasil or vegetable.[43] Beyond all doubt, they were as distinct in their origin as in their nature; and were long held by the people essentially different. We are strongly disposed to regard the Ymerian as the native, the Yggdrasil as the foreign, system. Giants were more kindred with the Celtic than with the Gothic creed. By the latter, indeed, they were hated even more than feared. Whoever will peruse with attention those passages of the two Eddas where giants are mentioned, will probably arrive at the same