Thus from the moment when, for the first time, the ancient philosophers questioned “why?” from the time of Socrates, Plato, and Aristotle, to our own practical and matter-of-fact century, mythology has not ceased to compel attention, and to furnish endless matter of conjecture. Learned writers have sought in physical sciences, history, and metaphysics, an explanation of this phenomenon; but in spite of this vast labour inspired by a love of science, and carried on for more than two thousand years, the secret of the sphinx of mythology remains undisclosed, and we still ask, “what is mythology?” Is it an invention of Homer and Hesiod? Or is it a phase in the development of the human mind, a deviation in the growth of reason? The school of philology has a solution of its own to offer; will it be as futile as the others? After hearing it shall we still say the Sphinx is mute? This school takes upon itself to assert that the explanation of the mystery can only be found in the Science of Language. It is a fact that the history of language--which is the history of the human mind--enables us to answer the preceding questions categorically. Yes. Mythology was inevitable, an inherent part of language itself, to be considered, not as a simple external symbol, but as the only incorporation of thought possible. Mythology, in the widest acceptation of the term, is the shadow which language casts on thought; and the whole history of philosophy from Thales to Hegel has been one uninterrupted struggle with mythology, a constant protest between thought and language. FOOTNOTES: [47] _Chips from a German Workshop_, vol. ii. p. 11. Max Müller. [48] Max Müller, _Science of Language_, vol. ii. p. 436. CHAPTER VII MYTHS In order to appreciate truly our neighbour’s impressions and points of view, we must constantly detach ourselves from our own special way of seeing and feeling; this habit of abstraction--which is most difficult to every one--is indispensable when we are endeavouring to understand the natures of persons who lived many thousands of years ago, and who thought and spoke in a totally different manner from ourselves. In seeking to grasp the phraseology of myths we perceive that its chief elements consist in a repetition of phrases in which the acts of nature are used as embodiments of the idea, under the figures of day and night, dawn and twilight, the sun and the moon, the heavens and the earth, as they stand in relation to man.