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Show LXXXVI BUREAU OF AMERICAN ETHNOLOGY and the stories told are tales of wars and wiles, and the heroes are kings, wamors, wizards, dwarfs, giants, and demons. They often wander about the world for the purpose of adventure or because they are engaged in wonderful enterprises. Thau-maturgy- not natural wonders, but invented wonders- now constitutes the principal theme of romance. Myth is transmuted into romance. The three worlds remain as earth, hell, and heaven. We can not stop to catalog these medieval romances, but they constitute an extensive literature in themselves and there is an extensive body of literature about them. Often in the next stage they become the themes of poetry The Victorian bard has used some of these medieval themes in the Idylls of the King. Novels- It must constantly be bome in mind that romance in its various stages may have themes to a greater or less extent the same throughout, but that they differ in the method of treatment. Beast fables may yet be told, but merely as fables to teach a lesson. The nature myths may yet be used as illustrations and embellishments, and romances may yet be written with all the thaumaturgy of the Middle Ages to give literary amusement to people who are not supposed to believe in necromancy. With this warning we may go on to describe the romance of the last stage. To the world's store of romance new tales are added- fictitious histories in a series of events where causes conspire to produce effects that have an intellectual and emotional interest, In an especial manner modern tales are designed to teach a lesson of good and evil, and there are many romances that are doctrinaire in motive. This is the transmutation brought by science upon the characteristics of romance. Tales are no longer told to be believed, but are told to teach lessons. Romance is fundamentally designed to give pleasure, but at the same time is made to teach wisdom in conduct. If the medicine is but a coated >: pill, it is refused; but if a dram of moral truth is deftly mixed^ with a pound of delightful representation of men and things, the moral becomes a luxury. |