How natural, then, that we should find in so many primitive faiths the belief in the triplicate nature of divinity, should find myths, idols, rites, so devised as to reflect and inculcate this! Such is the case, and it is easy to quote examples, whether we turn to the Indians of America or the Indians of Hindostan, whether we touch on the triads of ancient Egypt or those of the Druids, whether we recall the three Norns of Teutonic myth or the three Fates of the Hellenes. As a writer, who has made the subject his special branch, observes: “It is impossible to study any single system of worship throughout the world, without being struck with the peculiar persistence of the triple number in regard to Divinity.”[141]
The exception to this would naturally be where the concept of the number itself was too feeble to impress itself upon the myth. There are tribes who cannot count four, whose languages have no word for any number beyond two, and yet who are by no means deficient either in mythologies or practical arts.[142] Among these, we should look in vain for the sacredness of numbers.
3. The Drama of the Universe.—I have already quoted the saying of the wise men of ancient India, “There is no limit to the knowing of the Self that knows.” He who through meditation and prayer has become one with God, knows what God knows. Thus it is that in the rudest tribes we find the story of the beginning of things clearly told as coming from the inspired knowledge of the seers.
This story has many points of similarity, wherever we find it, not owing, I hasten again to say, to any unity of origin in place, but due to the higher unity of the mind of man, and the necessary results of its activity.
Look in what continent we please, we shall find the myth of a Creation or of a primeval construction, of a Deluge or a destruction, and of an expected Restoration. We shall find that man has ever looked on this present world as a passing scene in the shifting panorama of time, to be ended by some cataclysm and to be followed by some period of millennial glory.
Whenever we have a fairly complete body of the mythology of a primitive stock, we discover the same scenario of the vast drama of the universe, varying abundantly in detail and local colour, but true to the grandiose lines of its composition.
It is instructive to analyse its various elements and trace them to their psychic sources. Let us begin with the modes of action of the creative power itself.
This mysterious power is known to man under three forms.
The simplest is that of the moulder or manufacturer, as the potter makes his pots, the shoemaker his shoes. This is the conception which underlies many myths of the Creator, as is shown by the names he bears. Thus the Australians called him Baiame, “the cutter-out,” as one cuts out a sandal from a skin, or a figure from bark. The Maya Indians used the term Patol, from the verb pat, to mould, as a potter his clay, Bitol, which has the same meaning, and Tzacol, the builder, as of a house.[143] With the Dyaks of Borneo, the Creator is Tupa, the forger, as one forges a spear-blade[144]; and so on.