THE CHILDHOOD OF RELIGIONS: EMBRACING A SIMPLE ACCOUNT OF THE BIRTH AND GROWTH OF MYTHS AND LEGENDS. BY EDWARD CLODD, F.R.A.S., AUTHOR OF "THE CHILDHOOD OF THE WORLD." "We were all brothers, because we had one work, and one hope, MAY 1878 SECOND THOUSAND. LONDON: C. KEGAN PAUL & CO., I PATERNOSTER SQUARE, PREFACE. IN a little book entitled 'The Childhood of the World,' which was received by the public with unlooked-for favour, an attempt was made to convey to young persons the knowledge concerning man's early condition which has been gathered during recent years, and it is to the Second Part of that work, which treats of his advance from lower to higher stages of religious belief, that the present volume, which deals mainly with the expression and embodiment of that belief in certain great religions of the East, is intended to be supplemental. The question which forces itself upon all who are interested in the education of the young, is what they shall be taught regarding the relation of the Bible to other sacred scriptures, and to the declarations of modern science where they fail to harmonise with its statements; and it is as a BY THE SAME AUTHOR. Third Thousand, crown 8vo, price 5s., THE CHILDHOOD OF RELIGIONS: EMBRACING A SIMPLE ACCOUNT OF THE BIRTH AND GROWTH OF MYTHS AND LEGENDS. 'His (Mr Clodd's) language is simple, clear, and impressive. His faculty of disentangling complicated masses of detail, and compressing much information into small space, with such felicitous arrangement and expression, as never to overtax the attention or abate the interest of the reader, is very remarkable.— Examiner. 'The style is very charming: there is something in the author's enthusiasm, something in the pellucid simplicity of his easy prose, which beguiles the reader along.-Academy. Third Edition, crown 8vo, price 3s., THE CHILDHOOD OF THE WORLD: A SIMPLE ACCOUNT OF MAN IN EARLY TIMES. 'The book is one which very young children could understand, and which grown-up persons may run through with pleasure and advantage.-Spectator. 'Its style is simply exquisite, and it is filled with most curious information.' -Christian World. 'Supplies just what is wanted with respect to what, for lack of a simpler name, we must call the child's cosmological questionings.'-Examiner. 'Nothing better could be put into the hands of children. -British Quarterly Review. 'This genial little volume is a child's book as to shortness. cheapness, and simplicity of style. Mr CLODD has thought out his philosophy of life, and used his best skill to bring it into the range of a child's view.'-E. B. Tylor, F.R.S., in' Nature. BY THE SAME AUTHOR, JESUS OF NAZARETH: A SIMPLE ACCOUNT OF HIS LIFE AND TIMES. PREFACE. IN a little book entitled 'The Childhood of the World,' which was received by the public with unlooked-for favour, an attempt was made to convey to young persons the knowledge concerning man's early condition which has been gathered during recent years, and it is to the Second Part of that work, which treats of his advance from lower to higher stages of religious belief, that the present volume, which deals mainly with the expression and embodiment of that belief in certain great religions of the East, is intended to be supplemental. The question which forces itself upon all who are interested in the education of the young, is what they shall be taught regarding the relation of the Bible to other sacred scriptures, and to the declarations of modern science where they fail to harmonise with its statements; and it is as a |