Page:Norse mythology or, the religion of our forefathers, containing all the myths of the Eddas, systematized and interpreted with an introduction, vocabulary and index.djvu/120

 we may liken unto that which operates between the soul and the body; and thus it may be said that the mythology and the popular life combined produced their nude art. To say that the popular character of the Greeks, taken individually or collectively, was stimulated into life by their mythology; that the virtues and the vices of the people originated in it alone; would certainly be an incorrect and one-sided view of the subject. The Greeks brought with them, from their original home into Greece, the germs of that faith which afterwards became developed in a certain direction under the influence of the popular life and the action of external circumstances upon that life, but which in turn reacted upon the popular life with a power which increased in proportion as the system of mythology acquired by development a more decided character. The same is true of the Norsemen and of the Goths in general. When it is found, for instance, that the mythological representation of Odin as father of the slain (Val-father), and that Valhal (the hall of the slain), the valkyries and einherjes, contain a strong incentive to warlike deeds, then it must not be imagined that this martial spirit, that displayed itself so powerfully among the Goths generally, and among the Norsemen particularly, was the offspring of the mythology of our ancestors; but we may rather conceive that the Norsemen were from the beginning a race of remarkable physical power, that accidental external causes, such as severe climate, mountainous country, conflicts with neighboring peoples, etc., brought this inherent physical force into activity and thus awakened the warlike spirit; and then it may be said that this martial spirit stamped itself upon their religious ideas, upon their mythology, and finally that the mythology, when it had received