ABSTRACT
The transition in individual development from the prelogical to the logical, from the emotional to the theoretical interpretation. The rise of myths and of mythical interpretations of nature in terms of religion: mythical cosmic events celebrating religious or national heroes, mythical accounts of supernatural situations by which the natural are explained. The imaginative interpretation continues to serve the ends of social tradition and religious dogma. The myth is apologetic of faith, even when explanatory of nature. The interpretation due to poetic vision is reconstituted after every new discovery by which scientific truth is at once dislocated and re-articulated. The outcome on the side of theoretical interpretation is the dualism of mind and body, stated consciously as an opposition between the immaterial or spiritual and the material or physical. The doctrine of the soul in primitive thought did not realise this distinction fully.
