n, speaking to his brother men, must always have stated what seemed
to him a _fact_, a real Appearance of Nature. But the way in which
such Appearance or fact shaped itself,--what sort of _fact_ it became
for him,--was and is modified by his own laws of thinking; deep,
subtle, but universal, ever-operating laws. The world of Nature, for
every man, is the Phantasy of Himself; this world is the multiplex
'Image of his own Dream.' Who knows to what unnameable subtleties of
spiritual law all these Pagan Fables owe their shape! The number
_Twelve_, divisiblest of all, which could be halved, quartered, parted
into three, into six, the most remarkable number,--this was enough to
determine the _Signs of the Zodiac_, the number of Odin's _Sons_, and
innumerable other Twelves. Any vague rumour of number had a tendency
to settle itself into Twelve. So with regard to every other matter.
And quite unconsciously too,--with no notion of building-up
'Allegories'! But the fresh clear glance of those First Ages would be
prompt in discerning the secret relations of things, and wholly open
to obey these. Schiller finds in the _Cestus of Venus_ an everlasting
aesthetic truth as to the nature of all Beauty; curious:--but he is
careful not to insinuate that the old Greek Mythists had any notion of
lecturing about the 'Philosophy of Criticism'!----On the whole we must
leave those boundless regions. Cannot we conceive that Odin was a
reality? Error indeed, error enough: but sheer falsehood, idle fables,
allegory aforethought,--we will not believe that our Fathers believed
in these.

* * * * *

Odin's _Runes_ are a significant feature of him. Runes, and the
miracles of 'magic' he worked by them, make a great feature in
tradition. Runes are the Scandinavian Alphabet; suppose Odin to have
been the inventor of Letters, as well as 'magic,' among that people!
It is the greatest invention man has ever made, this of marking down
the unseen thought that is in him by written characters. It is a kind
of second speech, almost as miraculous as the first. You remember the
astonishment and incredulity of Atahualpa the Peruvian King; how he
made the Spanish Soldier who was guarding him scratch _Dios_ on his
thumb-nail, that he might try the next soldier with it, to ascertain
whether such a miracle was possible. If Odin brought Letters among his
people, he might work magic enough!

Writing by Runes has some air of being origina