sprung from the blood of Ouranos.  In Myth, Ritual, and Religion (i. 299-315) I give the competing explanations of Mr. Max Muller, of Schwartz (Cronos=storm god), Preller (Cronos=harvest god), of others who see the sun, or time, in Cronos; while, with Professor Tiele, Cronos is the god of the upper air, and also of the underworld and harvest; he ’doubles the part.’  ’Il est l’un et l’autre’—­that is, ’le dieu qui fait murir le ble’ and also ‘un dieu des lieux souterrains.’  ’Il habite les profondeurs sous la terre,’ he is also le dieu du ciel nocturne.

It may have been remarked that I declined to add to this interesting collection of plausible explanations of Cronos.  A selection of such explanations I offer in tabular form:—­

Cronos was God of

Time (?)—­Max Muller
Sun—­Sayce
Midnight sky—­Kuhn

Under-world }
Midnight sky}—­Tiele
Harvest }

Harvest—­Preller
Storm—­Schwartz
Star-swallowing sky—­Canon Taylor
Sun scorching spring—­Hartung

Cronos was by Race

Late Greek (?)—­Max Muller
Semitic—­Bottiger
Accadian (?)—­Sayce

Etymology of Cronos

[Greek]=Time (?)—­Max Muller
Krana (Sanskrit)—­Kuhn
Karnos (Horned)—­Brown
[Greek]—­Preller

The pleased reader will also observe that the phallus of Ouranos is the sun (Tiele), that Cronos is the sun (Sayce), that Cronos mutilating Ouranos is the sun (Hartung), just as the sun is the mutilated part of Ouranos (Tiele); Or is, according to others, the stone which Cronos swallowed, and which acted as an emetic.

My Lack of Explanation of Cronos

Now, I have offered no explanation at all of who Cronos was, what he was god of, from what race he was borrowed, from what language his name was derived.  The fact is that I do not know the truth about these important debated questions.  Therefore, after speaking so kindly of our method, and rejecting the method of Mr. Max Muller, Professor Tiele now writes thus (and this Mr. Max Muller does cite, as we have seen):—­

’Mr. Lang and M. Gaidoz are not entirely wrong in claiming me as an ally.  But I must protest, in the name of mythological science, and of the exactness as necessary to her as to any of the other sciences, against a method which only glides over questions of the first importance’ (name, origin, province, race of Cronos), ’and which to most questions can only reply, with a smile, C’est chercher raison ou il n’y en a pas.’

My Crime