s
identical with the custom and belief of early or primitive man. Such
identification is in the main correct; but it is correct not because
it has been proved by the best methods to be so, but because, of all
possible explanations, this is the only one that meets the general
position in a satisfactory manner. In many cases, however, it is
monstrously incorrect, and it is the incorrect conclusion which weighs
far more against the acceptance of the results of folklore than do the
correct conclusions in its favour.

The work which has to be accomplished by the comparative method of
research is of such magnitude that it needs to be considered. The
labour and research might in point of volume be out of proportion to
the results, and it may be questioned, as it has already been
questioned by inference, whether it is worth the while. The first
answer to this objection is that all historical investigation is
justified, however much the labour, however extensive the research.
Secondly, considering the very few results which the study of folklore
has hitherto produced upon the investigations into prehistoric Europe,
it must be worth while for the student of custom and belief to conduct
his experiments upon a recognised plan in order to get at the secret
of man's place in the struggle for existence, which is determined more
by psychological than by physical phenomena. Thirdly, if the psychical
anthropology of prehistoric times is to be sought for in the customs
and beliefs of modern savages, it is of vital importance to
anthropological science that this should be established by methods
exactly defined. Whatever of traditional custom and belief is capable
of bearing the test and of being definitely labelled as belonging to
prehistoric man, becomes thereafter the data for the psychical
anthropology of civilised man. Edmund Spenser understood this when his
official duties took him among the "wild" Irish. "All the customs of
the Irish," he says, "which I have often noted and compared with that
I have read, would minister occasion of a most ample discourse of the
original of them, and the antiquity of that people, which in truth I
think to be more ancient than most that I know in this end of the
world; so as if it were in the handling of some man of sound judgment
and plentiful reading, it would be most pleasant and profitable."[236]

Comparative folklore, then, to be of value must be based upon
scientific principles. The unmeaning c