As when astronomers call the lately discovered planet Neptune; or
the asteroid Astraea, that the Virgin who was driven from earth
to heaven at the end of the golden age, may have her local
habitation in the heavens more distinctly assigned her,--for the
slightest recognition of poetic worth is significant. By such
slow aggregation has mythology grown from the first. The very
nursery tales of this generation, were the nursery tales of
primeval races. They migrate from east to west, and again from
west to east; now expanded into the "tale divine" of bards, now
shrunk into a popular rhyme. This is an approach to that
universal language which men have sought in vain. This fond
reiteration of the oldest expressions of truth by the latest
posterity, content with slightly and religiously retouching the
old material, is the most impressive proof of a common humanity.
All nations love the same jests and tales, Jews, Christians, and
Mahometans, and the same translated suffice for all. All men are
children, and of one family. The same tale sends them all to
bed, and wakes them in the morning.
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