There is no distinction between these opinions and that of the Christian church, so beautifully expressed by St. Ephrem the Syrian: “At the nod of His will, noiseless and gentle, out of nothing He created all.” (_Select Works_, Translated by Rev. J. B. Morris, p. 185.) [146] Fornander, _The Polynesian Race_, vol. i., p. 67; _Rel. de la Nouv. France_, 1634, p. 13. [147] In _Myths of the New World_, ch. vii. (first ed., 1868). Numerous writers, Klee, Andree, Lucas, etc., have treated the deluge myth with fulness. It is found even among the Mincopies of the Andaman Islands (Man, _u. s._) and is quite common throughout Polynesia (Fornander, _u. s._, vol. i., pp. 88, _sq._). Various Australian tribes record it in detail, Smyth, _The Aborigines of Victoria_, vol. i., p. 430. [148] Fornander (_u. s._, vol. i., p. 79, _sq._) discusses it in Polynesia. Their “tree of life” was a sacred “tabooed” bread-fruit tree. For America, see _Myths of the New World_, pp. 103-106. [149] For this reason the works of Delitsch, Haupt, etc., on the question, _Wo lag das Paradies?_, are much less to the point than if their writers had studied the comparative mythology of the subject. [150] This mythical cycle, as it arose among the native tribes of America, was made by me the special subject of a volume, _American Hero-Myths_ (pp. 251, Philadelphia, 1882). [151] See my _Essays of an Americanist_, pp. 135-147; J. Grimm, _Teutonic Mythology_, vol. ii., p. 832; Schrader and Jevons, _Prehistoric Antiquities of the Aryan Peoples_, p. 424. [152] Codrington in _Jour. Anthrop. Soc._, vol. x., p. 285. [153] Waitz, _Anthropologie der Naturvölker_, Bd. ii., p. 188. [154] Von Hasselt, in _Zeitschrift für Ethnologie_, Bd. viii., p. 196. [155] J. G. Pfleiderer, _Die Genesis des Mythus der Indogermanischen Völker_, p. 48. [156] References in Pietschmann, _Zeitschrift für Ethnologie_, Bd. x., p. 159, who points out that fetishism should be, as a term, confined to the cult and not applied to the content of a religion. [157] Rialle, _La Mythologie Comparée_, ch. i. [158] Prof. Granger remarks that “the influence of the fetish is interpreted as a kind of life of which the fetish is the seat.”—_Worship of the Romans_, p. 201. Bastian defines it as “an incorporation of a subjective emotional state,” and his disciple Achelis recognises that it is not a stadium of religious development. See his _Moderne Völkerkunde_, p. 366. [159] The insufficiency of animism as a theory of primitive religions has been previously urged by Van Ende, _Histoire Naturelle de la Croyance_, p. 21. Like fetishism and shamanism, animism should be regarded, not as a form or stadium of religion, but, to use Castren’s excellent expression, “nur ein Moment in der Götterlehre.” _Finnische Mythologie_, Einleitung. [160] Dorsey, _Siouan Cults_, p. 433; the _Popol Vuh_, _passim_. [161] Hale, _Ethnog. and Philol. of the U. S. Exploring Expd._, p. 55. [162] E. T. Dalton, _Ethnology of Bengal_, p. 258.