Page:Folk-lore - A Quarterly Review. Volume 4, 1893.djvu/183

 Rh Such is the view that we have been able to take of English Folk-Drama so far as is possible within the compass of a short paper. It is a diminished heritage: much had to be lost before the value of that which we are losing could make itself felt. It is for us to make the best and the most of what remains to us, and, by analysis and careful study, make good, as far as we can, what is now irrecoverable; science, I am sure, can do much to strengthen the links which have become worn and thin in the chain of our traditions; and truly it is a glorious thing to feel that we inherit a right to the mythology of the North, of which that chain is the evidence. Thanks to the peasantry of England, who have preserved the traditions which testify to our birthright! It has come to us to see and to know and to understand, and knowledge is sublime; but, in the presence of that unconscious perpetuation by generation upon generation of men and women of our race, in obedience to the instincts of their blood, I feel myself in the presence of something more than human knowledge—something mighty and organic, in which consciousness and unconsciousness are simply phases of the same thing. Let us not paralyse ourselves with doubt, but hastily snatch up all the fragments and scraps that have fallen from the table of the gods. Let us believe all to be of value rather than cast aside one morsel. We shall have ages of civilisation in which to sort out and arrange the items and squabble about interpretation. But we shall not get another Norse mythology, nor another body of English custom and tradition. It is all vanishing—quietly dying out without giving sign. I urge upon the Society to undertake immediately the thorough and systematic collection of English Folk-Dramas.