The Religion of the Northmen #261576

In presenting the dogmas of the heathen Faith I have been as brief as possible. I have kept to the more important myths in their natural connection, in order to give a clear conception of the nature and principles of the Religious System. I have thought it the more necessary to be brief in this part of the work, since our literature already possesses a detail ed exposition of the heathen myths of the Northmen in Prof. P. A. Munch's excellent work — Tile My thologic and Heroic Legends of the North — which may serve as a guide to those who wish to study them in detail and have not an opportunity to search them out in the original manuscripts, to which I have merely referred. The Interpretation of these myths is natiu'ally adapted to the preced ing Exposition of them, and is, accordingly, brief. But in the Delineation of the Religious Institutions, such as they appeared in the public and private life of the Northmen, I have deemed it important to be more detailed, partly because a clear and thorough understanding of them is very important to every one who would gain a correct knowledge of the popular life of the old-northmen, and partly'be cause this subject has hitherto been less explicitly and carefully treated of.'