If I were to consider myth as it has ultimately been developed in man, it would be a strange and absurd attempt to trace out any points of resemblance with animals, who are altogether devoid of the logical faculty which leads to such development.  But if, on the contrary, we endeavour to trace the earliest, spontaneous, and direct elements of myth as a product of animal emotions and implicit intelligence, such research becomes not only legitimate but necessary; since the instrument is the same, the effects ought also to be the same.

We have already said that the fact has been observed and generally admitted that the primary origin of myth in its essential elements consists in the personification or animation of all extrinsic phenomena, as well as of the dreams, illusions, and hallucinations which are intrinsic.  It is agreed that this animation is not the reflex and deliberate act of man, but that it is the spontaneous and immediate act of the human intelligence in its elementary consciousness and emotions.  It must therefore be evident that this vague and continual animation of things ought to be found also in animals, especially in those of the higher types, in whom consciousness, the emotions, and the intelligence are implicitly identical with those of man.  Consequently, that which is at first sight absurd becomes obvious and natural, and the fact is only strange and inexplicable to those who have not carefully considered it.

We must, however, declare that this primary fact is not irreducible, and that science ought not to be content to stop there, but should endeavour to explain and resolve it into its elements, so as to be able to say we have reached the point at which the genesis of myth really begins.  This aim can only be attained by the decomposition by analysis of the primitive fact.  Since intelligence in its essential elements, and in its innate and implicit exercise, appears to be the same in man and in animals, it is necessary to reduce the analysis of animal nature to a primary psychical fact, in order to see whether by this fact, which is identical also in man, the generating element of myth is really revealed.

I propose to show that this research will reveal truths hitherto unattained, and explain the general law, not merely of the extrinsic process of science and of myth, but also of civilization.

Starting from this wide basis, we must trace, step by step, the dawn, development, and gradual disappearance of myth.  Since it is our business to consider science as well as myth, and their respective relations in the evolution common to both, we must, as briefly as possible in the present work, pause to consider these two factors of the human mind, observing the beginnings, conditions, and modes in which the one arose and gradually disappeared, while the other advanced and triumphed.  We must not only regard the progress and transformation of religions, but also of science, as it is revealed in the philosophic systems of every