7. Legends

Both myths and legends belong to folk-lore literature and to the idealistic type of story. The difference between them is that the myth is a personification of nature, while the legend is an idealization of a person or place. “The myth is a creation of fancy from ideas. The legend is the perception of an idea from a basis in fact. The myth is a creation of pure and absolute imagination. The legend is a story based on historical fact, but enlarged, abridged, or modified at pleasure. Both myths and legends express the imagination, emotion, and spirit of early man, and, for this reason, make a strong appeal to the same qualities in the soul of those who are in the early years of life to-day.” As all races have their legends, the list of them is long. Not one-thousandth part of them can be told. Among legends that age after age has loved and treasured, are those of India, brought together in the “Jataka Tales,” those of Greece and Rome, of the Middle Ages, of the Northmen, of King Arthur and the Round Table, and of the American Indian. Some of the best collections are: “Juventus Mundi,” Gladstone; “Famous Legends,” Crommelin (legends of all countries); “Legends of Greece and Rome,” Kupper; “Book of Legends,” Scudder; “Child’s Book of Saints,” Canton.