ground of relationship—of the relationship, that is, of mythology to folk-lore—we feel that there is the old error cropping up, and that, too, in such a form as to allow of it being laid hold of by the comparative mythologists and worked into their preconceived theories.[1] Folk-lore can never properly be confused with mythology, because it consists of elements which belong not only to the region of myths and fancies but to the region of actual facts, customs and events; and it never contains a complete system of mythology but only fragmentary survivals of it.
The errors in the definition and conception of folk-lore which we have pointed out have for the most part permeated very deeply among those who take up the study. Mr. Lang has on more than one occasion taken pains to bring back the aims and objects of the students of folk-lore to their legitimate basis and function. In the second volume of the Folk-Lore Record he has given a sort of summary of his views; but by far the best contribution to this subject is the chapter on "The Methods of Folk-Lore" in his recently published Custom and Myth, where, although he does not distinctly tell us what his definition of folk-lore really is, and he hesitates to call it a science, he explains and amplifies many of his previous studies.
But admirable as these explanations of Mr. Lang's really are, it does not appear to me that they go quite far enough. If it is true that "folk-lore is the study of survivals," and "that possibly there is no stage of human experience, however early and incomplete, from which something in our institutions does not still survive," it must follow that the study of folk-lore becomes, not the mere amusement of the antiquary, not the craze of an observer of all that is curious and extraordinary, but a science. And then again, if folk-lore is a science, and the science of survivals withal, there is something to be said about its place in the list of sciences, about its relation to other sciences; and, above all, about the chapter it should contribute to the great book of human knowledge. For this to be properly understood we must first give a rapid survey of what is now actually included under the title of folk-lore; and then, if possible, ascertain the scientific reason why folk-lore may properly be said to deal with all these subjects.
- ↑ Sir George Cox uses it curiously, Introduction to Mythology and Folk-Lore, p. 7.
