nd west and south and north of Palestine with each other, but
never with those of Palestine itself; so it came that one of the regions
most fruitful in materials for reverent thought and healthful comparison
was held exempt from the unbiased search for truth; so it came that, in
the name of truth, truth was crippled for ages. While observation, and
thought upon observation, and the organized knowledge or science which
results from these, progressed as regarded the myths and legends of
other countries, and an atmosphere was thus produced giving purer
conceptions of the world and its government, myths of that little
geographical region at the eastern end of the Mediterranean retained
possession of the civilized world in their original crude form, and have
at times done much to thwart the noblest efforts of religion, morality,
and civilization.

II. MEDIAEVAL GROWTH OF THE DEAD SEA LEGENDS.

The history of myths, of their growth under the earlier phases of human
thought and of their decline under modern thinking, is one of the most
interesting and suggestive of human studies; but, since to treat it as
a whole would require volumes, I shall select only one small group, and
out of this mainly a single myth--one about which there can no longer be
any dispute--the group of myths and legends which grew upon the shore of
the Dead Sea, and especially that one which grew up to account for the
successive salt columns washed out by the rains at its southwestern
extremity.

The Dead Sea is about fifty miles in length and ten miles in width; it
lies in a very deep fissure extending north and south, and its surface
is about thirteen hundred feet below that of the Mediterranean. It has,
therefore, no outlet, and is the receptacle for the waters of the whole
system to which it belongs, including those collected by the Sea of
Galilee and brought down thence by the river Jordan.

It certainly--or at least the larger part of it--ranks geologically
among the oldest lakes on earth. In a broad sense the region is
volcanic: On its shore are evidences of volcanic action, which must from
the earliest period have aroused wonder and fear, and stimulated the
myth-making tendency to account for them. On the eastern side are
impressive mountain masses which have been thrown up from old volcanic
vents; mineral and hot springs abound, some of them spreading sulphurous
odours; earthquakes have been frequent, and from time to time these have
c