arge number of examples, because I am
not concerned with their variety nor with their essentials. I am only
anxious to point out their existence as evidence of the scientific
character of primitive myth.[186] It is not to the point to say that
the science was all wrong. What is to the point is to say that the
attempt was made to get at the origin of man and his destiny. Mr. Lang
thinks that "the origin of the world and of man is naturally a problem
which has excited the curiosity of the least developed minds," but in
the use of the term "naturally," I think the stupendous nature of the
effort made by the least developed minds is entirely neglected, and we
miss the opportunity of measuring what this effort might mean.

When savages ask themselves, as they certainly _do_ ask themselves,
whence the sky, whence the winds, the sun, moon, stars, sea, rivers,
mountains and other natural objects, they reply in terms of good logic
applied to deficient knowledge. All the knowledge they possess is that
based upon their own material senses. And therefore, when they apply
that knowledge to subjects outside their own personality, they deal
with them in terms of their own personality. How did the sky get up
there, above their heads--the sky evidently so lovingly fond of the
earth, so intimately connected with the earth?

The New Zealand answer to these questions is a great one, by whatever
standard it is measured. Heaven and earth, they say, were husband and
wife, so locked in close embrace that darkness everywhere prevailed.
Their children were ever thinking amongst themselves what might be the
difference between darkness and light. At last, worn out by the
continued darkness, they consulted amongst themselves whether they
should slay their parents, Rangi and Papa, _i.e._ heaven and earth, or
whether they should rend them apart. The fiercest of their children
exclaimed, "Let us slay them!" but the forest, another of the sons,
said, "Nay, not so. It is better to rend them apart, and to let
heaven stand far above us and the earth to lie under our feet. Let the
sky become as a stranger to us, but the earth remain close to us as
our nursing-mother." The brothers consented to this proposal with the
exception of Tawhiri-ma-tea, the father of winds and storms; thus five
of the brothers consented and one would not agree. Then each of the
brothers tries to rend his parents, heaven and earth, asunder. First
the father of cultivated food tries