Page:Psychology of the Unconscious (1916).djvu/83

 the explanation for the bewildering changes, the kaleidoscopic transformations and new syncretistic groupings, and the continued rejuvenation of the myths in the Grecian sphere of culture. Here, we move in a world of phantasies, which, little concerned with the outer course of things, flows from an inner source, and, constantly changing, creates now plastic, now shadowy shapes. This phantastical activity of the ancient mind created artistically par excellence. The object of the interest does not seem to have been to grasp hold of the "how" of the real world as objectively and exactly as possibly, but to æsthetically adapt subjective phantasies and expectations. There was very little place among ancient people for the coldness and disillusion which Giordano Bruno's thoughts on eternity and Kepler's discoveries brought to modern humanity. The naïve man of antiquity saw in the sun the great Father of the heaven and the earth, and in the moon the fruitful good Mother. Everything had its demons; they animated equally a human being and his brother, the animal. Everything was considered according to its anthropomorphic or theriomorphic attributes, as human being or animal. Even the disc of the sun was given wings or four feet, in order to illustrate its movement. Thus arose an idea of the universe which was not only very far from reality, but was one which corresponded wholly to subjective phantasies.

We know, from our own experience, this state of mind. It is an infantile stage. To a child the moon is a man or a face or a shepherd of the stars. The clouds in the sky