[38-2] Martius, _Von dem Rechtzustande unter den Ureinwohnern
Brasiliens_, p. 77.
CHAPTER II.
THE IDEA OF GOD.
An intuition common to the species.--Words expressing it in
American languages derived either from ideas of above in space, or
of life manifested by breath.--Examples.--No conscious monotheism,
and but little idea of immateriality discoverable.--Still less any
moral dualism of deities, the Great Good Spirit and the Great Bad
Spirit being alike terms and notions of foreign importation.
If we accept the definition that mythology is the idea of God expressed
in symbol, figure, and narrative, and always struggling toward a clearer
utterance, it is well not only to trace this idea in its very earliest
embodiment in language, but also, for the sake of comparison, to ask
what is its latest and most approved expression. The reply to this is
given us by Immanuel Kant. He has shown that our reason, dwelling on the
facts of experience, constantly seeks the principles which connect them
together, and only rests satisfied in the conviction that there is a
highest and first principle which reconciles all their discrepancies and
binds them into one.
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