“In better times the religion of the tribe or state has nothing in common with the private and foreign superstitions or magical rites that savage terror may dictate to the individual.”
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But, strictly speaking, this mythology was no essential part of ancient religion, for it had no sacred sanction and no binding force on the worshippers.
Even the highest forms of sacrificial worship present much that is repulsive to modern ideas, and in particular it requires an effort to reconcile our imagination to the bloody ritual which is prominent in almost every religion which has a strong sense of sin.
Thus a man was born into a fixed relation to certain gods as surely as he was born into a relation to his fellow-men and his religion... was simply one side of the general scheme of conduct prescribed for him by his position as a member of society.
In all the antique religions, mythology takes the place of dogma that is, the sacred lore of priests and people... and these stories afford the only explanation that is offered of the precepts of religion and the prescribed rules of ritual.
