ABSTRACT
This chapter examines a number of myths in detail, but for the moment let us glances at the subjects of some typical myths. It focuses on the role of myth in life. The examination of a typical Melanesian culture and by a survey of the opinions, traditions, and behavior of these natives. It shows how deeply the sacred tradition, the myth, enters into their pursuits, and how strongly it controls their moral and social behavior. The close connection between religion and myth which has been overlooked by many students has been recognized by others. Psychologists like Wundt, sociologists like Durkheim, Hubert, and Mauss, anthropologists like Crawley, classical scholars like Miss Jane Harrison have all understood the intimate association between myth and ritual, between sacred tradition and the norms of social structure. Myth as it exists in a savage community, that is, in its living primitive form, is not merely a story told but a reality lived.
