[945] We may here notice some particulars respecting Isokratês. He manifests entire confidence in the authenticity of the mythical genealogies and chronology; but while he treats the mythical personages as historically real, he regards them at the same time not as human, but as half-gods, superior to humanity. About Helena, Thêseus, Sarpêdôn, Cycnus, Memnôn, Achilles, etc., see Encom. Helen. Or. x. pp. 282, 292, 295. Bek. Helena was worshipped in his time as a goddess at Therapnæ (ib. p. 295). He recites the settlements of Danaus, Kadmus, and Pelops in Greece, as undoubted historical facts (p. 297). In his discourse called Busiris, he accuses Polykratês, the sophist, of a gross anachronism, in having placed Busiris subsequent in point of date to Orpheus and Æolus (Or. xi. p. 301, Bek.), and he adds that the tale of Busiris having been slain by Hêraklês was chronologically impossible (p. 309). Of the long Athenian genealogy from Kekrops to Thêseus, he speaks with perfect historical confidence (Panathenaic. p. 349, Bek.); not less so of the adventures of Hêraklês and his mythical contemporaries, which he places in the mouth of Archidamus as a justification of the Spartan title to Messenia (Or. vi. Archidamus, p. 156, Bek.; compare Or. v. Philippus, pp. 114, 138), φάσιν, οἷς περὶ τῶν παλαιῶν πιστεύομεν, etc. He condemns the poets in strong language for the wicked and dissolute tales which they circulated respecting the gods: many of them (he says) had been punished for such blasphemies by blindness, poverty, exile, and other misfortunes (Or. xi. p. 309, Bek.).
In general, it may be said that Isokratês applies no principles of historical criticism to the mythes; he rejects such as appear to him discreditable or unworthy, and believes the rest.
[946] Thucyd. i. 21-22.
The first two volumes of this history have been noticed in an able article of the Quarterly Review, for October, 1846; as well as in the Heidelberger Jahrbücher der Literatur (1846. No. 41. pp. 641-655), by Professor Kortüm.
While expressing, on several points, approbation of my work, by which I feel much flattered—both my English and my German critic take partial objection to the views respecting Grecian legend. While the Quarterly Reviewer contends that the mythopœic faculty of the human mind, though essentially loose and untrustworthy, is never creative, but requires some basis of fact to work upon—Kortüm thinks that I have not done justice to Thucydidês, as regards his way of dealing with legend; that I do not allow sufficient weight to the authority of an historian so circumspect and so cold-blooded (den kalt-blüthigsten und besonnensten Historiker des Alterthums, p. 653) as a satisfactory voucher for the early facts of Grecian history in his preface (Herr G. fehlt also, wenn er das anerkannt kritische Proœmium als Gewährsmann verschmäht, p. 654).
No man feels more powerfully than I do the merits of Thucydidês as an historian, or the value of the example which he set in multiplying critical inquiries respecting matters recent and verifiable. But the ablest judge or advocate, in investigating specific facts, can proceed no further than he finds witnesses having the means of knowledge, and willing more or less to tell truth. In reference to facts prior to 776 B. C., Thucydidês had nothing before him except the legendary poets, whose credibility is not at all enhanced by the circumstance that he accepted them as witnesses, applying himself only to cut down and modify their allegations. His credibility in regard to the specific facts of these early times depends altogether upon theirs. Now we in our day are in a better position for appreciating their credibility than he was in his, since the foundations of historical evidence are so much more fully understood, and good or bad materials for history are open to comparison in such large extent and variety. Instead of wondering that he shared the general faith in such delusive guides—we ought rather to give him credit for the reserve with which he qualified that faith, and for the sound idea of historical possibility to which he held fast as the limit of his confidence. But it is impossible to consider Thucydidês as a satisfactory guarantee (Gewährsmann) for matters of fact which he derives only from such sources.
Professor Kortüm considers that I am inconsistent with myself in refusing to discriminate particular matters of historical fact among the legends—and yet in accepting these legends (in my chap. xx.) as giving a faithful mirror of the general state of early Grecian society (p. 653). It appears to me that this is no inconsistency, but a real and important distinction. Whether Hêraklês, Agamemnôn, Odysseus, etc. were real persons, and performed all, or a part, of the possible actions ascribed to them—I profess myself unable to determine. But even assuming both the persons and their exploits to be fictions, these very fictions will have been conceived and put together in conformity to the general social phænomena among which the describer and his hearers lived—and will thus serve as illustrations of the manners then prevalent. In fact, the real value of the Preface of Thucydidês, upon which Professor Kortüm bestows such just praise, consists, not in the particular facts which he brings out by altering the legends, but in the rational general views which he sets forth respecting early Grecian society, and respecting the steps as well as the causes whereby it attained its actual position as he saw it.
Professor Kortüm also affirms that the mythes contain “real matter of fact along with mere conceptions:” which affirmation is the same as that of the Quarterly Reviewer, when he says that the mythopœic faculty is not creative. Taking the mythes in the mass, I doubt not that this is true, nor have I anywhere denied it. Taking them one by one, I neither affirm nor deny it. My position is, that, whether there be matter of fact or not, we have no test whereby it can be singled out, identified, and severed from the accompanying fiction. And it lies upon those, who proclaim the practicability of such severance, to exhibit some means of verification better than any which has been yet pointed out. If Thucydidês has failed in doing this, it is certain that none of the many authors who have made the same attempt after him have been more successful.
It cannot surely be denied that the mythopœic faculty is creative, when we have before us so many divine legends, not merely in Greece, but in other countries also. To suppose that these religious legends are mere exaggerations, etc. of some basis of actual fact—that the gods of polytheism were merely divinized men, with qualities distorted or feigned—would be to embrace in substance the theory of Euêmerus.
[947] Diodôr. xv. 89. He was a contemporary of Alexander the Great.
[948] Diodôr. iv. 1. Strabo, ix. p. 422, ἐπιτιμήσας τοῖς φιλομυθοῦσιν ἐν τῇ τῆς ἱστωρίας γραφῇ.
[949] Ephorus recounted the principal adventures of Hêraklês (Fragm. 8, 9, ed. Marx.), the tales of Kadmus and Harmonia (Fragm. 12), the banishment of Ætôlus from Elis (Fragm. 15; Strabo, viii. p. 357); he drew inferences from the chronology of the Trojan and Theban wars (Fragm. 28); he related the coming of Dædalus to the Sikan king Kokalus, and the expedition of the Amazons (Fragm. 99-103).
He was particularly copious in his information about κτίσεις, ἀποικίαι and συγγενείαι (Polyb. ix. 1).
[950] Strabo, i. p. 74.
[951] Dionys. Halic. De Vett. Scriptt. Judic. p. 428, Reisk; Ælian, V. H. iii. 18, Θεόπομπος ... δεινὸς μυθόλογος.
Theopompus affirmed, that the bodies of those who went into the forbidden precinct (τὸ ἄβατον) of Zeus, in Arcadia, gave no shadow (Polyb. xvi. 12). He recounted the story of Midas and Silênus (Fragm. 74, 75, 76, ed. Wichers); he said a good deal about the heroes of Troy; and he seems to have assigned the misfortunes of the Νόστοι to an historical cause—the rottenness of the Grecian ships, from the length of the siege, while the genuine epic ascribes it to the anger of Athênê (Fragm. 112, 113, 114; Schol. Homer. Iliad, ii. 135); he narrated an alleged expulsion of Kinyras from Cyprus by Agamemnôn (Fragm. 111); he gave the genealogy of the Macedonian queen Olympias up to Achilles and Æakus (Fragm. 232).
[952] Cicero, Epist. ad Familiar. v. 12; Xenophôn de Venation. c. 1.
[953] Philistus, Fragm. 1 (Göller), Dædalus, and Kokalus; about Liber and Juno (Fragm. 57); about the migration of the Sikels into Sicily, eighty years after the Trojan war (ap. Dionys. Hal. i. 3).
Timæus (Fragm. 50, 51, 52, 53, Göller) related many fables respecting Jasôn, Mêdea, and the Argonauts generally. The miscarriage of the Athenian armament under Nikias, before Syracuse, is imputed to the anger of Hêraklês against the Athenians because they came to assist the Egestans, descendants of Troy (Plutarch, Nikias, 1),—a naked reproduction of genuine epical agencies by an historian; also about Diomêdês and the Daunians; Phaëthôn and the river Eridanus; the combats of the Gigantes in the Phlegræan plains (Fragm. 97, 99, 102).
[954] Strabo, ix. p. 422.
[955] Compare Diodôr. v. 44-46; and Lactantius, De Falsâ Relig. i. 11.
[956] Cicero, De Naturâ Deor. i. 42; Varro, De Re Rust. i. 48.
[957] Strabo, ii. p. 102. Οὐ πολὺ οὖν λείπεται ταῦτα τῶν Πύθεω καὶ Εὐημέρου καὶ Ἀντιφάνους ψευσμάτων; compare also i. p. 47, and ii. p. 104.
St. Augustin, on the contrary, tells us (Civitat. Dei, vi. 7), “Quid de ipse Jove senserunt, qui nutricem ejus in Capitolio posuerunt? Nonne attestati sunt omnes Euemero, qui non fabulosâ garrulitate, sed historicâ diligentiâ, homines fuisse mortalesque conscripsit?” And Minucius Felix (Octav. 20-21), “Euemerus exequitur Deorum natales: patrias, sepulcra dinumerat, et per provincias monstrat, Dictæi Jovis, et Apollinis Delphici, et Phariæ Isidis, et Cereris Eleusiniæ.” Compare Augustin, Civit. Dei, xviii. 8-14; and Clemens Alexand. Cohort. ad Gent. pp. 15-18, Sylb.
Lactantius (De Falsâ Relig. c. 13, 14, 16) gives copious citations from Ennius’s translation of the Historia Sacra of Euêmerus.
Εὐήμερος, ὁ ἐπικληθεὶς ἄθεος, Sextus Empiricus, adv. Physicos, ix. § 17-51. Compare Cicero, De Nat. Deor. i. 42; Plutarch, De Iside et Osiride, c. 23. tom. ii. p. 475, ed. Wytt.
Nitzsch assumes (Helden Sage der Griechen, sect. 7. p. 84) that the voyage of Euêmerus to Panchaia was intended only as an amusing romance, and that Strabo, Polybius, Eratosthenês and Plutarch were mistaken in construing it as a serious recital. Böttiger, in his Kunst-Mythologie der Griechen (Absch. ii. s. 6. p. 190), takes the same view. But not the least reason is given for adopting this opinion, and it seems to me far-fetched and improbable; Lobeck (Aglaopham. p. 989), though Nitzsch alludes to him as holding it, manifests no such tendency, as far as I can observe.
[958] Diodôr. iv. 1-8. Ἔνιοι γὰρ τῶν ἀναγινωσκόντων, οὐ δικαίᾳ χρώμενοι κρίσει, τἀκριβὲς ἐπιζητοῦσιν ἐν ταῖς ἀρχαίαις μυθολογίαις, ἐπίσης τοῖς πραττομένοις ἐν τῷ καθ᾽ ἡμᾶς χρόνῳ, καὶ τὰ δισταζόμενα τῶν ἔργων διὰ τὸ μέγεθος, ἐκ τοῦ καθ᾽ αὑτοὺς βίου τεκμαιρόμενοι, τὴν Ἡρακλέους δύναμιν ἐκ τῆς ἀσθενείας τῶν νῦν ἀνθρώπων θεωροῦσιν, ὥστε διὰ τὴν ὑπερβολὴν τοῦ μεγέθους τῶν ἔργων ἀπιστεῖσθαι τὴν γραφήν. Καθόλου γὰρ ἐν ταῖς ἀρχαίαις μυθολογίαις οὐκ ἐκ παντὸς τρόπου πικρῶς τὴν ἀλήθειαν ἐξεταστέον. Καὶ γὰρ ἐν τοῖς θεάτροις πεπεισμένοι μήτε Κενταύρους διφυεῖς ἐξ ἑτερογενῶν σωμάτων ὑπάρξαι, μήτε Γηρυόνην τρισώματον, ὅμως προσδεχόμεθα τὰς τοιαύτας μυθολογίας, καὶ ταῖς ἐπισημασίαις συναύξομεν τὴν τοῦ θεοῦ τιμήν. Καὶ γὰρ ἄτοπον, Ἡρακλέα μὲν ἔτι κατ᾽ ἀνθρώπους ὄντα τοῖς ἰδίοις πόνοις ἐξημερῶσαι τὴν οἰκουμένην, τοὺς δ᾽ ἀνθρώπους, ἐπιλαθομένους τῆς κοινῆς εὐεργεσίας, συκοφαντεῖν τὸν ἐπὶ τοῖς καλλίστοις ἔργοις ἔπαινον, etc.
This is a remarkable passage: first, inasmuch as it sets forth the total inapplicability of analogies drawn from the historical past as narratives about Hêraklês; next, inasmuch as it suspends the employment of critical and scientific tests, and invokes an acquiescence interwoven and identified with the feelings, as the proper mode of evincing pious reverence for the god Hêraklês. It aims at reproducing exactly that state of mind to which the mythes were addressed, and with which alone they could ever be in thorough harmony.
[959] Diodôr. iii. 45-60; v. 44-46.
[960] The work of Palæphatus, probably this original, is alluded to in the Ciris of Virgil (88):—
“Docta Palæphatiâ testatur voce papyrus.”
The date of Palæphatus is unknown—indeed this passage of the Ciris seems the only ground that there is for inference respecting it. That which we now possess is probably an extract from a larger work—made by another person at some later time: see Vossius de Historicis Græcis, p. 478, ed. Westermann.
[961] Palæphat. init. ap. Script. Mythogr. ed. Westermann, p. 268. Τῶν ἀνθρώπων οἱ μὲν πείθονται πᾶσι τοῖς λεγομένοις, ὡς ἀνομίλητοι σοφίας καὶ ἐπιστήμης—οἱ δὲ πυκνότεροι τὴν φύσιν καὶ πολυπράγμονες ἀπιστοῦσι τὸ παράπαν μηδὲν γενέσθαι τούτων. Ἐμοὶ δὲ δοκεῖ γενέσθαι πάντα τὰ λεγόμενα· ... γενόμενα δέ τινα οἱ ποιηταὶ καὶ λογογράφοι παρέτρεψαν εἰς τὸ ἀπιστότερον καὶ θαυμασιώτερον τοῦ θαυμάζειν ἕνεκα τοὺς ἀνθρώπους. Ἐγὼ δὲ γινώσκω, ὅτι οὐ δύναται τὰ τοιαῦτα εἶναι οἷα καὶ λέγεται· τοῦτο δὲ καὶ διείληφα, ὅτι εἰ μὴ ἐγένετο, οὐκ ἄν ἐλέγετο.
The main assumption of the semi-historical theory is here shortly and clearly stated.
One of the early Christian writers, Minucius Felix, is astonished at the easy belief of his pagan forefathers in miracles. If ever such things had been done in former times (he affirms), they would continue to be done now; as they cannot be done now, we may be sure that they never were really done formerly (Minucius Felix, Octav. c. 20): “Majoribus enim nostris tam facilis in mendaciis fides fuit, ut temerè crediderint etiam alia monstruosa mira miracula, Scyllam multiplicem, Chimæram multiformem, Hydram, et Centauros. Quid illas aniles fabulas—de hominibus aves, et feras homines, et de hominibus arbores atque flores? Quæ, si essent facta, fierent; quia fieri non possunt, ideo nec facta sunt.”
[962] Palæphat. Narrat. 1, 3, 6, 13, 20, 21, 29. Two short treatises on the same subject as this of Palæphatus, are printed along with it, both in the collection of Gale and of Westermann; the one, Heracliti de Incredibilibus, the other Anonymi de Incredibilibus. They both profess to interpret some of the extraordinary or miraculous mythes, and proceed in a track not unlike that of Palæphatus. Scylla was a beautiful courtezan, surrounded with abominable parasites: she ensnared and ruined the companions of Odysseus, though he himself was prudent enough to escape her (Heraclit. c. 2. p. 313, West.) Atlas was a great astronomer: Pasiphaê fell in love with a youth named Taurus; the monster called the Chimæra was in reality a ferocious queen, who had two brothers called Leo and Drako; the ram which carried Phryxus and Hellê across the Ægean was a boatman named Krias (Heraclit. c. 2, 6, 15, 24).
A great number of similar explanations are scattered throughout the Scholia on Homer and the Commentary of Eustathius, without specification of their authors.
Theôn considers such resolution of fable into plausible history as a proof of surpassing ingenuity (Progymnasmata, cap. 6, ap. Walz. Coll. Rhett. Græc. i. p. 219). Others among the Rhetors, too, exercised their talents sometimes in vindicating, sometimes in controverting, the probability of the ancient mythes. See the Progymnasmata of Nicolaus—Κατασκευὴ ὅτι εἰκότα τὰ κατὰ Νιόβην, Ἀνασκευὴ ὅτι οὐκ εἰκότα τὰ κατὰ Νιόβην (ap. Walz. Coll. Rhetor. i. p. 284-318), where there are many specimens of this fanciful mode of handling.
Plutarch, however, in one of his treatises, accepts Minotaurs, Sphinxes, Centaurs, etc. as realities; he treats them as products of the monstrous, incestuous, and ungovernable lusts of man, which he contrasts with the simple and moderate passions of animals (Plutarch, Gryllus, p. 990).
[963] The learned Mr. Jacob Bryant regards the explanations of Palæphatus as if they were founded upon real fact. He admits, for example, the city Nephelê alleged by that author in his exposition of the fable of the Centaurs. Moreover, he speaks with much commendation of Palæphatus generally: “He (Palæphatus) wrote early, and seems to have been a serious and sensible person; one who saw the absurdity of the fables upon which the theology of his country was founded.” (Ancient Mythology, vol. i. p. 411-435.)
So also Sir Thomas Brown (Enquiry into Vulgar Errors, Book I. chap. vi. p. 221, ed. 1835) alludes to Palæphatus as having incontestably pointed out the real basis of the fables. “And surely the fabulous inclination of those days was greater than any since; which swarmed so with fables, and from such slender grounds took hints for fictions, poisoning the world ever after: wherein how far they succeeded, may be exemplified from Palæphatus, in his Book of Fabulous Narrations.”
[964] Xenophan. ap. Sext. Empir. adv. Mathemat. ix. 193. He also disapproved of the rites, accompanied by mourning and wailing, with which the Eleatês worshipped Leukothea: he told them, εἰ μὲν θεὸν ὑπολαμβάνουσι, μὴ θρηνεῖν· εἰ δὲ ἄνθρωπον, μὴ θύειν (Aristotel. Rhet. ii. 23).
Xenophanês pronounced the battles of the Titans, Gigantes, and Centaurs to be “fictions of our predecessors,” πλάσματα τῶν προτέρων (Xenophan. Fragm. 1. p. 42, ed. Schneidewin).
See a curious comparison of the Grecian and Roman theology in Dionys. Halicarn. Ant. Rom. ii. 20.
[965] Schol. Iliad. xx. 67: Tatian. adv. Græc. c. 48. Hêrakleitus indignantly repelled the impudent atheists who found fault with the divine mythes of the Iliad, ignorant of their true allegorical meaning: ἡ τῶν ἐπιφυομένων τῷ Ὁμήρῳ τόλμα τοὺς Ἥρας δεσμοὺς αἰτιᾶται, καὶ νομίζουσιν ὕλην τινα δαψιλῆ τῆς ἀθέου πρὸς Ὅμηρον ἔχειν μανίας ταῦτα—Ἦ οὐ μέμνῃ ὅτι τ᾽ ἐκρέμω ὑψόθεν, etc. λέληθε δ᾽ αὐτοὺς ὅτι τούτοις τοῖς ἔπεσιν ἐκτεθεολόγηται ἡ τοῦ παντὸς γένεσις, καὶ τὰ συνεχῶς ᾀδόμενα τέσσαρα στοιχεῖα τούτων τῶν στίχων ἐστὶ τάξις (Schol. ad Hom. Iliad. xv. 18).
[966] Diogen. Laërt. ii. 11; Tatian. adv. Græc. c. 37; Hesychius, v. Ἀγαμέμνονα. See the ethical turn given to the stories of Circê, the Sirens, and Scylla, in Xenoph. Memorab. i. 3, 7; ii. 6, 11-31. Syncellus, Chronic. p. 149. Ἑρμηνεύουσι δὲ οἱ Ἀναξαγόρειοι τοὺς μυθώδεις θεοὺς, νοῦν μὲν τὸν Δία, τὴν δὲ Ἀθηνᾶν τέχνην, etc.
Uschold and other modern German authors seem to have adopted in its full extent the principle of interpretation proposed by Metrodorus—treating Odysseus and Penelopê as personifications of the Sun and Moon, etc. See Helbig, Die Sittlichen Zustände des Griechischen Helden Alters, Einleitung, p. xxix. (Leipzig, 1839.)
Corrections of the Homeric text were also resorted to, in order to escape the necessity of imputing falsehood to Zeus (Aristotel. De Sophist. Elench. c. 4).
[967] Sextus Empiric. ix. 18; Diogen. viii. 76; Plutarch, De Placit. Philosoph. i. 3-6; De Poesi Homericâ, 92-126; De Stoicor. Repugn. p. 1050, Menander, De Encomiis, c. 5.
Cicero, De Nat. Deor. i. 14, 15, 16, 41; ii. 24-25. “Physica ratio non inelegans inclusa in impias fabulas.”
In the Bacchæ of Euripidês, Pentheus is made to deride the tale of the motherless infant Dionysus having been sewn into the thigh of Zeus. Teiresias, while reproving him for his impiety, explains the story away in a sort of allegory: the μηρὸς Διὸς (he says) was a mistaken statement in place of the αἰθὴρ χθόνα ἐγκυλούμενος (Bacch. 235-290).
Lucretius (iii. 995-1036) allegorizes the conspicuous sufferers in Hadês,—Tantalus, Sisyphus, Tityus, and the Danaïds, as well as the ministers of penal infliction, Cerberus and the Furies. The first four are emblematic descriptions of various defective or vicious characters in human nature,—the deisidæmonic, the ambitious, the amorous, or the insatiate and querulous man; the last two represent the mental terrors of the wicked.
[968] Οἱ νῦν περὶ Ὅμηρον δεινοί—so Plato calls these interpreters (Kratylus, p. 407); see also Xenoph. Sympos. iii. 6; Plato, Ion. p. 530; Plutarch, De Audiend. Poet. p. 19. ὑπόνοια was the original word, afterwards succeeded by ἀλληγορία.
Ἥρας δὲ δεσμοὺς καὶ Ἡφαίστου ῥίψεις ὑπὸ πατρὸς, μέλλοντος τῇ μητρὶ τυπτομένῃ ἀμυνεῖν, καὶ θεομαχίας ὅσας Ὅμηρος πεποίηκεν, οὐ παραδεκτέον εἰς τὴν πόλιν, οὔτ᾽ ἐν ὑπονοίαις πεποιημένας, οὔτ᾽ ἄνευ ὑπονοιῶν. Ὁ γὰρ νέος οὐχ οἷός τε κρίνειν ὅ,τι τε ὑπόνοια καὶ ὃ μὴ, ἀλλ᾽ ἃ ἂν τηλικοῦτος ὢν λάβῃ ἐν ταῖς δόξαις, δυσέκνιπτά τε καὶ ἀμετάστατα φιλεῖ γίγνεσθαι (Plato, Republ. ii. 17. p. 378).
The idea of an interior sense and concealed purpose in the ancient poets occurs several times in Plato (Theætet. c. 93. p. 180): παρὰ μὲν τῶν ἀρχαίων, μετὰ ποιήσεως ἐπικρυπτομένων τοὺς πολλοὺς, etc.; also Protagor. c. 20. p. 316.
“Modo Stoicum Homerum faciunt,—modo Epicureum,—modo Peripateticum,—modo Academicum. Apparet nihil horum esse in illo, quia omnia sunt.” (Seneca, Ep. 88.) Compare Plutarch, De Defectu Oracul. c. 11-12. t. ii. p. 702, Wytt., and Julian, Orat. vii. p. 216.
[969] Pausan. viii. 8, 2. To the same purpose (Strabo, x. p. 474), allegory is admitted to a certain extent in the fables by Dionys. Halic. Ant. Rom. ii. 20. The fragment of the lost treatise of Plutarch, on the Platæan festival of the Dædala, is very instructive respecting Grecian allegory (Fragm. ix. t. 5. p. 754-763, ed. Wyt.; ap. Euseb. Præpar. Evang. iii. 1).
[970] This doctrine is set forth in Macrobius (i. 2). He distinguishes between fabula and fabulosa narratio: the former is fiction pure, intended either to amuse or to instruct—the latter is founded upon truth, either respecting human or respecting divine agency. The gods did not like to be publicly talked of (according to his view) except under the respectful veil of a fable (the same feeling as that of Herodotus, which led him to refrain from inserting the ἱεροὶ λόγοι in his history). The supreme god, the τἀγαθὸν, the πρῶτον αἴτιον, could not be talked of in fables: but the other gods, the aërial or æthereal powers and the soul, might be, and ought to be, talked of in that manner alone. Only superior intellects ought to be admitted to a knowledge of the secret reality. “De Diis cæteris, et de animâ, non frustra se, nec ut oblectent, ad fabulosa convertunt; sed quia sciunt inimicam esse naturæ apertam nudamque expositionem sui: quæ sicut vulgaribus sensibus hominum intellectum sui, vario rerum tegmine operimentoque, subtraxit; ita à prudentibus arcana sua voluit per fabulosa tractari.... Adeo semper ita se et sciri et coli numina maluerunt, qualiter in vulgus antiquitus fabulata est.... Secundum hæc Pythagoras ipse atque Empedocles, Parmenides quoque et Heraclides, de Diis fabulati sunt: nec secus Timæus.” Compare also Maximus Tyrius, Dissert. x. and xxxii. Arnobius exposes the allegorical interpretation as mere evasion, and holds the Pagans to literal historical fact (Adv. Gentes, v. p. 185, ed. Elm.).
Respecting the allegorical interpretation applied to the Greek fables, Böttiger (Die Kunst—Mythologie der Griechen, Abschn. ii. p. 176); Nitzsch (Heldensage der Griech. sect. 6. p. 78); Lobeck (Aglaopham. p. 133-155).
[971] According to the anonymous writer ap. Westermann (Script. Myth. p. 328), every personal or denominated god may be construed in three different ways: either πραγματικῶς (historically, as having been a king or a man)—or ψυχικῶς, in which theory Hêrê signifies the soul; Athênê, prudence; Aphroditê, desire; Zeus, mind, etc.—or στοιχειακῶς, in which system Apollo signifies the sun; Poseidôn, the sea; Hêrê, the upper stratum of the air, or æther; Athênê, the lower or denser stratum; Zeus, the upper hemisphere; Kronus, the lower, etc. This writer thinks that all the three principles of construction may be resorted to, each on its proper occasion, and that neither of them excludes the others. It will be seen that the first is pure Euêmerism; the two latter are modes of allegory.
The allegorical construction of the gods and of the divine mythes is copiously applied in the treatises, both of Phurnutus and Sallustius, in Gale’s collection of mythological writers. Sallustius treats the mythes as of divine origin, and the chief poets as inspired (θεόληπτοι): the gods were propitious to those who recounted worthy and creditable mythes respecting them, and Sallustius prays that they will accept with favor his own remarks (cap. 3 and 4. pp. 245-251, Gale). He distributes mythes into five classes; theological, physical, spiritual, material, and mixed. He defends the practice of speaking of the gods under the veil of allegory, much in the same way as Macrobius (in the preceding note): he finds, moreover, a good excuse even for those mythes which imputed to the gods theft, adultery, outrages towards a father, and other enormities: such tales (he says) were eminently suitable, since the mind must at once see that the facts as told are not to be taken as being themselves the real truth, but simply as a veil, disguising some interior truth (p. 247).
Besides the Life of Homer ascribed to Plutarch (see Gale, p. 325-332), Hêraclidês (not Hêraclidês of Pontus) carries out the process of allegorizing the Homeric mythes most earnestly and most systematically. The application of the allegorizing theory is, in his view, the only way of rescuing Homer from the charge of scandalous impiety—πάντῃ γὰρ ἠσέβησεν, εἰ μηδὲν ἠλληγόρησεν (Hêrac. in init. p. 407, Gale). He proves at length, that the destructive arrows of Apollo, in the first book of the Iliad, mean nothing at the bottom except a contagious plague, caused by the heat of the summer sun in marshy ground (pp. 416-424). Athênê, who darts down from Olympus at the moment when Achilles is about to draw his sword on Agamemnôn, and seizes him by the hair, is a personification of repentant prudence (p. 435). The conspiracy against Zeus, which Homer (Iliad, i. 400) relates to have been formed by the Olympic gods, and defeated by the timely aid of Thetis and Briareus—the chains and suspension imposed upon Hêrê—the casting of Hêphæstos by Zeus out of Olympus, and his fall in Lêmnus—the destruction of the Grecian wall by Poseidôn, after the departure of the Greeks—the amorous scene between Zeus and Hêrê on Mount Gargarus—the distribution of the universe between Zeus, Poseidôn, and Hadês—all these he resolves into peculiar manifestations and conflicts of the elemental substances in nature. To the much-decried battle of the gods, he gives a turn partly physical, partly ethical (p. 481). In like manner, he transforms and vindicates the adventures of the gods in the Odyssey: the wanderings of Odysseus, together with the Lotophagi, the Cyclôps, Circê, the Sirens, Æolus, Scylla, etc., he resolves into a series of temptations, imposed as a trial upon a man of wisdom and virtue, and emblematic of human life (p. 496). The story of Arês, Aphroditê, and Hêphæstos, in the eighth book of the Odyssey, seems to perplex him more than any other: he offers two explanations, neither of which seems satisfactory even to himself (p. 494).
An anonymous writer in the collection of Westermann (pp. 329-344) has discussed the wanderings of Odysseus upon the same ethical scheme of interpretation as Hêraclidês: he entitles his treatise “A short essay on the Wanderings of Odysseus in Homer, worked out in conjunction with ethical reflections, and rectifying what is rotten in the story, as well as may be, for the benefit of readers.” (τὸ μύθου σαθρὸν θεραπεύουσα.) The author resolves the adventures of Odysseus into narratives emblematic of different situations and trials of human life. Scylla and Charybdis, for example (c. 8. p. 338), represent, the one, the infirmities and temptations arising out of the body, the other, those springing from the mind, between which man is called upon to steer. The adventure of Odysseus with Æolus, shows how little good a virtuous man does himself by seeking, in case of distress, aid from conjurors and evil enchanters; the assistance of such allies, however it may at first promise well, ultimately deceives the person who accepts it, and renders him worse off than he was before (c. 3. p. 332). By such illustrations does the author sustain his general position, that there is a great body of valuable ethical teaching wrapped up in the poetry of Homer.
Proclus is full of similar allegorization, both of Homer and Hesiod: the third Excursus of Heyne ad Iliad. xxiii. (vol. viii. p. 563), De Allegoriâ Homericâ, contains a valuable summary of the general subject.
The treatise De Astrologiâ, printed among the works of Lucian, contains specimens of astrological explanations applied to many of the Grecian μῦθοι, which the author as a pious man cannot accept in their literal meaning. “How does it consist with holiness (he asks) to believe that Æneas was son of Aphroditê, Minôs of Zeus, or Askalaphus of Mars? No; these were men born under the favorable influences of the planets Venus, Jupiter, and Mars.” He considers the principle of astrological explanation peculiarly fit to be applied to the mythes of Homer and Hesiod (Lucian, De Astrologiâ, c. 21-22).
[972] See Ritter, Geschichte der Philosophie, 2nd edit. part 3. book 11. chap. 4. p. 592; Varro ap. Augustin. Civitat. Dei, vi. 5, ix. 6; Cicero, Nat. Deor. ii. 24-28.
Chrysippus admitted the most important distinction between Zeus and the other gods (Plutarch. de Stoicor. Repugnant. p. 1052.)
[973] Plutarch. de Isid. et Osirid. c. 66. p. 377; c. 70. p. 379. Compare on this subject O. Müller, Prolegom. Mythol. p. 59 seq., and Eckermann, Lehrbuch der Religionsgeschichte, vol. i. sect. ii. p. 46.
[974] Hesiod, Opp. et Di. 122: to the same effect Pythagoras and Thalês (Diogen. Laër. viii. 32; and Plutarch, Placit. Philos. i. 8).
The Hesiodic dæmons are all good: Athenagoras (Legat. Chr. p. 8) says that Thalês admitted a distinction between good and bad dæmons, which seems very doubtful.
[975] The distinction between Θεοὶ and Δαίμονες is especially set forth in the treatise of Plutarch, De Defectu Oraculorum, capp. 10, 12, 13, 15, etc. He seems to suppose it traceable to the doctrine of Zoroaster or the Orphic mysteries, and he represents it as relieving the philosopher from great perplexities: for it was difficult to know where to draw the line in admitting or rejecting divine Providence: errors were committed sometimes in affirming God to be the cause of everything, at other times in supposing him to be the cause of nothing. Ἐπεὶ τὸ διορίσαι πῶς χρηστέον καὶ μέχρι τίνων τῇ προνοίᾳ, χαλεπὸν, οἱ μὲν οὐδενὸς ἁπλῶς τὸν θεὸν, οἱ δὲ ὁμοῦ τι πάντων αἴτιον ποιοῦντες, ἀστοχοῦσι τοῦ μετρίου καὶ πρέποντος. Εὖ μὲν οὖν λέγουσιν καὶ οἱ λέγοντες, ὅτι Πλάτων τὸ ταῖς γεννωμέναις ποιότησιν ὑποκείμενον στοιχεῖον ἐξευρὼν, ὃ νῦν ὕλην καὶ φύσιν καλοῦσιν, πολλῶν ἀπήλλαξε καὶ μεγάλων ἀποριῶν τοὺς φιλοσόφους· ἐμοὶ δὲ δοκοῦσι πλείονας λῦσαι καὶ μείζονας ἀπορίας οἱ τὸ τῶν δαιμόνων γένος ἐν μέσῳ θεῶν καὶ ἀνθρώπων, καὶ τρόπον τινὰ τὴν κοινωνίαν ἡμῶν σύναγον εἰς ταὐτὸ καὶ σύναπτον, ἐξευρόντες (c. 10). Ἡ δαιμόνων φύσις ἔχουσα καὶ πάθος θνητοῦ καὶ θεοῦ δύναμιν (c. 13).
Εἰσὶ γὰρ, ὡς ἐν ἀνθρώποις, καὶ δαίμοσιν ἀρετῆς διάφοραὶ, καὶ τοῦ παθητικοῦ καὶ ἀλόγου τοῖς μὲν ἀσθενὲς καὶ ἀμαυρὸν ἔτι λείψανον, ὥσπερ περίττωμα, τοῖς δὲ πολὺ καὶ δυσκατάσβεστον ἔνεστιν, ὧν ἴχνη καὶ σύμβολα πολλαχοῦ θύσιαι καὶ τελεταὶ καὶ μυθολογίαι σώζουσι καὶ διαφυλάττουσιν ἐνδιεσπαρμένα (ib.): compare Plutarch. de Isid. et Osir. 25. p. 360.
Καὶ μὴν ὅσας ἔν τε μύθοις καὶ ὕμνοις λέγουσι καὶ ᾅδουσι, τοῦτο μὲν ἁρπαγὰς, τοῦτο δὲ πλάνας θεῶν, κρύψεις τε καὶ φυγὰς καὶ λατρείας, οὐ θεῶν εἰσίν ἀλλὰ δαιμόνων παθήματα, etc. (c. 15): also c. 23; also De Isid. et Osir. c. 25. p. 366.
Human sacrifices and other objectionable rites are excused, as necessary for the purpose of averting the anger of bad dæmons (c. 14-15).
Empedoklês is represented as the first author of the doctrine which imputed vicious and abominable dispositions to many of the dæmons (c. 15, 16, 17, 20), τοὺς εἰσαγομένους ὑπὸ Ἐμπεδοκλέους δαίμονας; expelled from heaven by the gods, θεήλατοι καὶ οὐρανοπετεὶς (Plutarch, De Vitand. Aër. Alien. p. 830); followed by Plato, Xenokratês, and Chrysippus, c. 17: compare Plato (Apolog. Socrat. p. 27; Politic. p. 271; Symposion, c. 28. p. 203), though he seems to treat the δαίμονες as defective and mutable beings, rather than actively maleficent. Xenokratês represents some of them both as wicked and powerful in a high degree:—Ξενοκράτης καὶ τῶν ἡμερῶν τὰς ἀποφράδας, καὶ τῶν ἑορτῶν ὅσαι πληγάς τινας ἢ κοπετοὺς, ἢ νηστείας, ἢ δυσφημίας, ἢ αἰσχρολογίαν ἔχουσιν, οὔτε θεῶν τιμαῖς οὔτε δαιμόνων οἴεται προσήκειν χρηστῶν, ἀλλ᾽ εἶναι φύσεις ἐν τῷ περιέχοντι μεγάλας μὲν καὶ ἰσχυρὰς, δυστρόπους δὲ καὶ σκυθρωπὰς, αἳ χαίρουσι τοῖς τοιούτοις, καὶ τυγχάνουσαι πρὸς οὐθὲν ἄλλο χεῖρον τρέπονται (Plutarch, De Isid. ut Osir. c. 26. p. 361; Quæstion. Rom. p. 283): compare Stobæus, Eclog. Phys. i. p. 62.
[976] Plutarch, De Defect. Orac. c. 15. p. 418. Chrysippus admitted, among the various conceivable causes to account for the existence of evil, the supposition of some negligent and reckless dæmons, δαιμόνια φαυλὰ ἐν οἷς τῷ ὄντι γίνονται καὶ ἐγκλητέαι ἀμέλειαι (Plutarch, De Stoicor. Repugnant. p. 1051). A distinction, which I do not fully understand, between θεοὶ and δαίμονες, was also adopted among the Locrians at Opus: δαίμων with them seems to have been equivalent to ἥρως (Plutarch, Quæstion. Græc. c. 6. p. 292): see the note above, pp. 350-351.
[977] Tatian. adv. Græcos, c. 20; Clemens Alexandrin. Admonit. ad Gentes, pp. 26-29, Sylb.; Minuc. Felix, Octav. c. 26. “Isti igitur impuri spiritus, ut ostensum a Magis, a philosophis, a Platone, sub statuis et imaginibus consecrati delitescunt, et afflatu suo quasi auctoritatem præsentis numinis consequuntur,” etc. This, like so many other of the aggressive arguments of the Christians against paganism, was taken from the pagan philosophers themselves.
Lactantius, De Verâ Philosophiâ, iv. 28. “Ergo iidem sunt Dæmones, quos fatentur execrandos esse: iidem Dii, quibus supplicant. Si nobis credendum esse non putant, credant Homero; qui summum illum Jovem Dæmonibus aggregavit,” etc.
[979] A destructive inundation took place at Pheneus in Arcadia, seemingly in the time of Plutarch: the subterranean outlet (βάραθρον) of the river had become blocked up, and the inhabitants ascribed the stoppage to the anger of Apollo, who had been provoked by the stealing of the Pythian tripod by Hêraklês: the latter had carried the tripod to Pheneus and deposited it there. Ἆρ᾽ οὖν οὐκ ἀτοπώτερος τούτων ὁ Ἀπόλλων, εἰ Φενεάτας ἀπόλλυσι τοὺς νῦν, ἐμφράξας τὸ βάραθρον, καὶ κατακλύσας τὴν χώραν ἅπασαν αὐτῶν, ὅτι πρὸ χιλίων ἐτῶν, ὥς φασιν, ὁ Ἡρακλῆς ἀνασπάσας τὸν τρίποδα τὸν μαντικὸν εἰς Φενεὸν ἀπήνεγκε; (Plutarch. de Serâ Numin. Vindictâ, p. 577; compare Pausan. viii. 14, 1.) The expression of Plutarch, that the abstraction of the tripod by Hêraklês had taken place 1000 years before, is that of the critic, who thinks it needful to historicize and chronologize the genuine legend; which, to an inhabitant of Pheneus, at the time of the inundation, was doubtless as little questioned as if the theft of Hêraklês had been laid in the preceding generation.
Agathoclês of Syracuse committed depredations on the coasts of Ithaca and Korkyra: the excuse which he offered was, that Odysseus had come to Sicily and blinded Polyphêmus, and that on his return he had been kindly received by the Phæakians (Plutarch, ib.).
This is doubtless a jest, either made by Agathoclês, or more probably invented for him; but it is founded upon a popular belief.
[980] “Sanctiusque et reverentius visum, de actis Deorum credere quam scire.” (Tacit. German. c. 34.)
Aristidês, however, represents the Homeric theology (whether he would have included the Hesiodic we do not know) as believed quite literally among the multitude in his time, the second century after Christianity (Aristid. Orat. iii. p. 25). Ἀπορῶ, ὅπη πότε χρή με διαθέσθαι μεθ᾽ ὑμῶν, πότερα ὡς τοῖς πολλοῖς δοκεῖ καὶ Ὁμήρῳ δὲ συνδοκεῖ, θεῶν παθήματα συμπεισθῆναι καὶ ἡμᾶς, οἷον Ἀρέος δέσμα καὶ Ἀπόλλωνος θητείας καὶ Ἡφαίστου ῥίψεις εἰς θάλασσαν, οὕτω δὲ καὶ Ἰνοῦς ἄχη καὶ φυγάς τινας. Compare Lucian, Ζεὺς Τραγῶδος, c. 20, and De Luctu, c. 2; Dionys. Halicar. A. R. ii. p. 90, Sylb.
Kallimachus (Hymn. ad Jov. 9) distinctly denied the statement of the Kretans that they possessed in Krête the tomb of Zeus, and treated it as an instance of Kretan mendacity; while Celsus did not deny it, but explained it in some figurative manner—αἰνιττόμενος τροπικὰς ὑπονοίας (Origen. cont. Celsum, iii. p. 137).