folk-lore since Grimm, might, at
different periods of his career, have been reckoned an ally, now by
philologists, now by 'the new school.' He may be said, in fact, to have
combined what is best in the methods of both parties. Both are anxious
to secure such support as his works can lend.

Moral Character Impeached

Mr. Max Muller avers that his moral character seems to be 'aimed at' by
critics who say that he has no right to quote Mannhardt or Oldenberg as
his supporters (1. xvi.). Now, without making absurd imputations, I do
not reckon Mannhardt a thorough partisan of Mr. Max Muller. I could not
put _our_ theory so well as Mannhardt puts it. 'The study of the lower
races is an invaluable instrument for the interpretation of the survivals
from earlier stages, which we meet in the full civilisation of cultivated
peoples, but which arose in the remotest fetishism and savagery.'

Like Mr. Max Muller, I do not care for the vague word 'fetishism,'
otherwise Mannhardt's remark exactly represents my own position, the
anthropological position. {42a} Now, Mr. Max Muller does not like that
position. That position he assails. It was Mannhardt's, however, when
he wrote the book quoted, and, so far, Mannhardt was _not_ absolutely one
of Mr. Max Muller's 'supporters'--unless I am one. 'I have even been
accused,' says Mr. Max Muller, 'of intentionally ignoring or suppressing
Mannhardt's labours. How charitable!' (1. xvii.) I trust, from our
author's use of the word todtschweigen, that this uncharitable charge was
made in Germany.

Mannhardt

Mannhardt, for a time, says Mr. Max Muller, 'expressed his mistrust in
some of the results of comparative mythology' (1. xvii.). Indeed, I
myself quote him to that very effect. {42b} Not only '_some_ of the
results,' but the philological method itself was distrusted by Mannhardt,
as by Curtius. 'The failure of the method in its practical working lies
in a lack of the historical sense,' says Mannhardt. {42c} Mr. Max Muller
may have, probably has, referred to these sayings of Mannhardt; or, if he
has not, no author is obliged to mention everybody who disagrees with
him. Mannhardt's method was mainly that of folklore, not of philology.
He examined peasant customs and rites as 'survivals' of the oldest
paganism. Mr. Frazer applies Mannhardt's rich lore to the explanation of
Greek and other rites in The Golden Bough, that entrancing book. Such
was Mannhardt's positio