Chapter L: E. L (1)

We cannot better conclude our account of this important Deity, than by the following epigram, written under one of his statues.

"Whoe'er thou art, thy master see,
Who was, or is,--or is to be."

VOLTAIRE.

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MINERVA.

------

Minerva, the Goddess of wisdom, war, and all the liberal arts, came forth, armed and grown up, from her father's brain, and was immediately admitted into the association of the Gods, becoming one of the most faithful counsellors of her father. She was indeed the only one of all the divinities whose authority, and consequence, were equal to those of Jupiter.

"From Jove's awful head sprang forth to light,
In golden panoply superbly dight;
And while the glittering spear thy hands essayed,
Olympus trembled at the martial maid.
Affrighted earth sounds from her deepest caves,
And swell of Ocean tides the sable waves;
The turgid billows sink; in heaven's high plains
His steeds the son of Hyperion reins,
Till Pallas lays her arms divine aside,
While Jove his daughter views with conscious pride."

HORACE.

The strife of this Goddess with Neptune is worthy attention: each of them claimed the right of giving a name to the capital of Cecropia, and the assembly of the Gods decided the dispute by promising preference to whichever could produce the most useful and necessary present to the inhabitants of the earth.

Neptune, upon hearing this, struck the ground with his trident, and immediately a horse issued therefrom. Minerva produced the olive, and obtained the victory by the unanimous voice of the gods, who considered the olive, as the emblem of peace, to be far preferable to the horse, the symbol of war and bloodshed. The victorious deity called the capital Athenoe, and became the tutelar divinity of the place.

--------"The sandals of celestial mould,
Fledged with ambrosial plumes and rich with gold
Surround her feet: with these sublime she sails
Th' aerial space, and mounts the winged gales;
O'er earth and ocean wide, prepared to soar,
Her dreaded arm a beaming javelin bore,
Ponderous and vast: which, when her fury burns,
Proud tyrants humbles, and whole hosts o'erturns."

HOMER.

Arachne, a woman of Colophon, having acquired great perfection in working with her needle, became impressed with a belief that her powers were superior to those of Minerva, goddess of the art. {89} This wounded Minerva's jealous pride, which was increased by Arachnes challenging her to a trial of skill.

"From famed Pactolus' golden stream,
Drawn by her art the curious Naiads came
Nor would the work, when finished, please so much
As, while she wrought, to view each graceful touch:
Whether the shapeless wool in balls she wound,
Or with quick motion turned the spindle round,
Or with her pencil drew the neat design,
Pallas, her mistress, shone in every line.
This the proud maid, with scornful air denies,
And e'en the goddess at her work defies,
Disowns her heavenly mistress every hour,
Nor asks her aid, nor deprecates her power."

OVID.

Beautiful as the production of Arachne was, which recorded the intrigues of Jove, yet it could not compete with that of Minerva, who by her divine skill, surpassed all her rival's efforts.

"Pallas in figures wrought the heavenly powers,
And Mars's skill among the Athenean bowers,
Each god, by proper features was exprest;
Jove with majestic mien, excelled the rest,
His nine forked mace the dewy sea-god shook,
And, looking sternly, smote the ragged rock;
When, from the stone, leaped forth the sprightly steed
And Neptune claims the city for the deed.
Herself she blazons with a glittering spear,
And crested helm that veiled her braided hair,
With shield, and scaly breast-plate, implements of war.
Struck with her pointed lance, the teeming earth
Seemed to produce a new surprising birth,
When from the glebe, the pledge of conquest sprung,
A tree, pale green with fairest olives hung."

OVID.

Although her work was perfect and masterly, the Goddess was so vexed at the subjects Arachne had chosen, that she struck her two or three times on the forehead.

"The bright goddess, passionately moved,
With envy saw, yet inwardly approved,
The scene of heavenly guilt, with haste she tore,
Nor longer the affront with patience bore;
A boxen shuttle in her hand she took,
And more than once, Arachne's forehead struck."

The high spirited mortal, indignant at the blows, and in despair at her defeat, hung herself, and was changed into a spider by Minerva.

--------"She sprinkled her with juice,
Which leaves of baleful aconite produce.
Touched with the poisonous drug, her flowing hair
Fell to the ground, and left her temples bare.
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Her usual features vanished from their place,
Her body lessened--but the most, her face,
Her slender fingers, hanging on each side,
With many joints the use of legs supplied,
A spider's bag, the rest, from which she gives
A thread, and still, by constant spinning lives."

OVID.

Minerva when amusing herself by playing upon her favourite flute before Juno and Venus, was ridiculed by the goddesses for the distortion of her face while blowing the instrument; Minerva convinced of the truth of their remarks, by looking at herself in a fountain near Mount Ida, threw the flute away, and denounced a melancholy death to him who should find it. Marsyas was the unfortunate being, and in the history of Apollo may be found the fate he experienced through the veracity of her decree.

Minerva was called Athena Pallas, either from her killing the giant Pallas, or because the spear which she seems to brandish in her hands is called "_pallein_."

According to the different characters in which she has appeared, has the goddess been represented. Usually with a helmet on her head, and a large plume nodding in the air. In one hand she holds a spear, and in the other, a shield, with the dying head of Medusa upon it.

"With bright wreaths of serpent tresses crowned,
Severe in beauty, young Medusa frowned;
Erewhile subdued, round Wisdom's Aegis rolled,
Hissed the dread snakes, and flamed in burnished gold
Flashed on her brandished arm the immortal shield,
And terror lightened o'er the dazzled field."

DARWIN.

Sometimes the Gorgon's head was on her breast-plate, with living serpents writhing round it, as well as on her shield and helmet.

It was in one of her temples that the following occurrence took place, from which she adopted this device.

Medusa was the only one of the Gorgons who was subject to mortality, and was celebrated for her personal charms; particularly for the beauty of her hair. Neptune became enamoured of her

Medusa once had charms, to gain her love
A rival crowd of envious lovers strove.
They who have seen her, own they ne'er did trace,
More moving features, in a sweeter face:
Yet above all, her length of hair they own,
In golden ringlets waved, and graceful shone.
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Her, Neptune saw: and with such beauties fired,
Resolved to compass what his soul desired.
The bashful goddess turned her eyes away,
Nor durst such bold impurity survey."

This violation of the sanctity of her temple provoked Minerva, and she changed the beautiful locks of Medusa, which had inspired the love of Neptune, into ghastly and living serpents, as a punishment for the desecration of that sanctuary, where only worship and incense should have been offered.

"It lieth, gazing on the midnight sky,
Upon the cloudy mountain peak supine;
Below, the far lands are seen tremblingly:
Its horror and its beauty are divine.
Upon its lips and eyelids seems to lie,
Loveliness like a shadow, from which shine,
Fiery and lurid, struggling underneath,
The agonies of anguish and of death.

"Yet it is less the horror than the grace,
Which turns the gazer's spirit into stone:
Whereon the lineaments of that dead face
Are graven, till the characters be grown
Into itself, and thought no more can trace;
'Tis the melodious hue of beauty thrown
Athwart the darkness and the glare of pain,
Which humanize and harmonize the strain.

"And from its head as from one body grow,
As grass out of a watery rock,
Hairs which are vipers, and they curl and flow,
And their long tangles in each other lock:
And with unending involutions show,
Their mailed radiance as it were to mock,
The torture and the death within, and saw
The solid air with many a ragged jaw,

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"'Tis the tempestuous loveliness of terror;
For from the serpents gleam a brazen glare,
Kindled by that inextricable error,
Which makes a thrilling vapour of the air
Become a strange, and ever shifting mirror
Of all the beauty, and the terror there--
A woman's countenance, with serpent locks,
Gazing in death on heaven, from those evil rocks."

SHELLEY.

Some of the statues of Minerva represented her helmet with a sphinx in the middle, supported on either side by griffins. In some medals, a chariot drawn by four horses, appears at the top of her helmet.

But it was at the Panathenaea, instituted in her behalf, that she received the greatest honour. On the evening of the first day, there was a race with torches, in which men on foot, and afterwards on horseback, contended.

To celebrate these festivals, also, the maidens divided into troops, and armed with sticks and stones, attacked each other with fury. Those who were overcome in this combat, were devoted to infamy, while they who conquered, and had received no wounds, were honoured with triumphant rejoicings.

These fetes, established in Lybia, were transferred to Athens, the city to which Minerva had granted the olive tree, and which she had taken under her protection.

She was adored at Troy by the title of Pallas, and her statue guarded the city under the name of Palladium. Some authors maintain that this was made with the bones of Pelops--while Apollodorus asserts, it was no more than a piece of clock-work which moved of itself. To its possession, was attached the safety of the city; and during the Trojan war, Ulysses and Diomedes were commissioned to steal it away.

DESCRIPTION OF MINERVA IN THE FLORENCE GALLERY.

"The head is of the highest beauty. It has a close helmet from which
the hair, delicately parted on the forehead, half escapes. The attitude
gives entire effect to the perfect form of the neck, and to that full
and beautiful moulding of the lower part of the face and mouth, which
is in living beings the seat of the expression of a simplicity and
integrity of nature. Her face, upraised to heaven, is animated with a
profound, sweet, and impassioned melancholy, with an earnest, and
fervid and disinterested pleading against some vast and inevitable
wrong. It is the joy and poetry of sorrow making {93} grief beautiful,
and giving it that nameless feeling, which, from the imperfection of
language, we call pain, but which is not all pain, though a feeling
which makes not only its possessor, but the spectator of it, prefer it
to what is called pleasure, in which all is not pleasure. It is
difficult to think that this head, though of the highest ideal beauty
is the head of Minerva, although the attributes and attitude of the
lower part of the statue certainly suggest that idea.

"The Greeks rarely in their representations of the characters of their
Gods--unless we call the poetic enthusiasm of Apollo a mortal
passion--expressed the disturbance of human feeling; and here is deep
and impassioned grief animating a divine countenance. It is indeed
divine. The drapery of the statue, the gentle beauty of the feet, and
the grace of the attitude, are what may be seen in many other statues
belonging to that astonishing era which produced it: such a countenance
is seen in few."

SHELLEY.

We have already seen that Minerva, not satisfied with being goddess of Wisdom, claimed also pre-eminence in beauty, although Paris by his judgment, gave the palm of loveliness to Venus.

* * * * *

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MARS.

------

Mars, the God of War, was the son of Juno, who jealous of the birth of Minerva, consulted Flora, and on the plains near Olenus, was shown by her a flower, through the very touch of which she might become a mother. The goddess tried, and from her touch sprang Mars. His education was entrusted by Juno to the god Priapus, who instructed him in dancing, and in every manly exercise. His trial before the celebrated court of Areopagus, for the murder of Hallirhotius, who insulted a daughter of Mars because she slighted his addresses, forms an important epoch in his history. The fiery blood of Mars, which would submit to no insult, was immediately in arms at so tender a point, and he slew the insulter. Neptune, father of the slain, cited Mars to appear before the tribunal of justice, to answer for the murder of his son. The cause was tried at Athens, in a place which has been called from thence Areopagus, and Mars was acquitted.

"Mars! God of Armies! mid the ranks of war,
Known by thy golden helm, and rushing car,
Before whose lance, with sound terrific, fall
The massy fortress and embattled wall.

"Father of victory! whose mighty powers,
And brazen spears, protect Olympus' towers;
By whom the brave to high renown are led,
Whom justice honours, and whom tyrants dread.
Hail! friend to man! whose cares to youth, impart
The arm unwearied, and the undaunted heart!"

HORACE.

During the Trojan war, Mars interested himself on the side of the Trojans; but while he defended these favourites of Venus with great activity, he was wounded by Diomedes, and hastily retreated to Heaven, complaining to Jupiter that Minerva had directed the unerring weapon of his antagonist.

"Wild with his pain, he sought the bright abodes,
There, sullen, sate beneath the sire of gods,
Shewed the celestial blood, and with a groan,
Thus poured his plaints before the immortal throne.
Can Jove, supine, flagitious acts survey
And brook the furies of the daring day?
For mortal men, celestial powers engage,
And gods on gods exert eternal rage.
From thee, O father! all these ills we bear,
And thy fell daughter with the shield and spear.
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Thou gavest that fury to the realms of light,
Pernicious, wild, regardless of the right;
All Heaven besides, reveres thy sovereign sway,
Thy voice we hear, and thy behests obey:
'Tis hers to offend, and e'en offending, share
Thy breast, thy counsels, thy distinguished care:
So boundless she, and thou so partial grown,
Well may we deem, the wondrous birth thine own;
Now frantic Diomed, at her command,
Against the immortals lifts his raging hand;
The heavenly Venus first his fury found:
Me next encountering, me he dared to wound:
Vanquished I fled; e'en I, the god of fight,
From mortal madness, scarce was saved by flight,
Else hadst thou seen me sink on yonder plain,
Heaped round, and heaving under loads of slain,
Or pierced with Grecian darts, for ages lie
Condemned to pain, though fated not to die.'"

HOMER.

The Thunderer treated with disregard the complaint of Mars against his favourite daughter, and thus upbraided him:

"'To me, perfidious! this lamenting strain,
Of lawless force, shall lawless Mars complain?
Of all the gods who tread the spangled skies,
Thou most unjust, most odious in our eyes!
Inhuman discord is thy dire delight,
The waste of slaughter, and the rage of fight.
No bound, no law, thy fiery temper quells,
And all thy mother in thy soul rebels.
In vain our threats, in vain our power, we use,
She gives the example, and her son pursues.
Yet long the inflicted pangs thou shalt not mourn,
Sprung since thou art from Jove, and heavenly born:
Else singed with lightning, hadst thou hence been thrown,
Where, chained on burning rocks, the Titans groan.'"

HOMER.

Under the direction of Jupiter, the God of War soon recovered.

"Thus he, who shakes Olympus with his nod,
Then gave to Poeon's care the bleeding god.
With gentle hand, the balm he poured around,
And healed th' immortal flesh, and closed the wound.
Cleansed from the dust and gore, fair Hebe dressed
His mighty limbs in an immortal vest,
Glorious he sat, in majesty restored,
Fast by the throne of Heaven's superior lord."

HOMER.

The worship of Mars, was not very universal among the ancients, nor were his temples very numerous in Greece, but among the warlike Romans he received great homage, as they were proud of sacrificing to a deity, whom they considered the patron of their city, and the father of the first of their monarchs; a faith to which {96} they loved to give credit. Among this people, it was customary for the consul, before he went on an expedition, to visit the temple of Mars, where he offered his prayers, and shook in a solemn manner, the spear which was in the hand of the statue of the God, exclaiming "_Mars vigila!_ God of War, watch over the safety of this city."

The influence of Cupid, as God of love, was felt even by Mars, who was compelled to acknowledge his power, and the sharpness of his arrows.

"As in the Lemnian caves of fire,
The mate of her who nursed desire,
Moulded the glowing steel, to form
Arrows for Cupid, melting, warm;
Once to this Lemnian cave of flame,
The crested lord of battles came;
'Twas from the ranks of war he rushed,
His spear with many a life-drop blushed;
He saw the mystic darts, and smiled
Derision on the archer child.
'And dost thou smile?' said little Love;
'Take this dart, and thou mayest prove
That tho' they pass the breeze's flight,
My bolts are not so feathery light.'
He took the shaft--and oh! thy look,
Sweet Venus! when the shaft he took,
He sighed, and felt the urchin's art,
He sighed in agony of heart;
'It is not light, I die with pain!
Take, take thine arrow back again.'
'No,' said the child 'it must not be,
That little dart was made for thee.'"

MOORE.

The result of his amour with Venus has been related in another part of this work.

He is usually represented in a chariot of steel, conducted by Bellona, goddess of War: on his cuirass are painted several monsters; the figures of Fury and Anger ornament his helmet, while Renown precedes him.

His priests, named Salii, carried small bucklers, supposed to be sacred, and to have fallen from the skies. To him was consecrated the cock, because it was vigilant and courageous, but they preferred offering the wolf; they sacrificed however, to him, all kinds of animals, and even human victims.

The statues and portraits of Mars, as the God of War, and consequently the winner of victory, have been very numerous. {97}

His most celebrated temple at Rome, was built by Augustus, after the battle of Phillippi, and was dedicated to "Mars the avenger."

"_Rivers._ And this is he, the fabled God of War.

_Evadne._ Aye, Mars the conqueror, see how he stands;
The lordly port, the eye of fierce command,
The threatening brow, and look that seems to dare
A thousand foes to battle.
--It was a beautiful faith that gave these gods
A name and office! Is he not glorious?

_Rivers._ To my poor thought, there's that within his glance
So fierce, I scarce dare meet it.

_Evadne._ It is your studious nature, yet methinks
To gaze upon that proud and haughty form,
To think upon the glorious deeds of war,
The pomp and pride and circumstance of battle,
The neighing of the steed, the clash of arms,
The banner waving in the glowing breeze,
The trumpet sound, the shout.
Oh! there is nought so beautiful as this.

_Rivers._ Aye, but to see the living and the dead,
Lying in mortal agony, side by side,
Their bright hair dabbled in unrighteous blood,
Their vestures tinctured with its gory red,
The quivering limb, the eye that's glazed in death,
The groan--

_Evadne._ 'Tis lost boy, in the drum and trumpet's voice.
'Tis lost in shouts of glorious victory,
'Tis lost in high, triumphal tones of gladness.

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_Rivers._ But then to think upon the hearts that grieve.
For those who peril thus their lives in war,
The misery that sweeps along the brain,
The widows' moan, the orphans' tears of woe,
The love that watcheth at the midnight hour,
And hopeth on, but hopeth on in vain.

_Evadne._ And that is lost too in their country's shouts
The voice of gratitude for those that fell,
Drowns every thought in those who live to mourn;
The hand of charity for those who are left.
Fills every heart and dries up every fear;
The record of a nation's loud applause,
Writes on their tombs in characters of brass.
And graves within our very souls, the words,
'Here lies his country's saviour.'

_Rivers._ But these can never pay the wrung in heart:
Pride is a poor exchange for those adored:
And even a nation with its giant strength,
Cannot supply the vacant place of love!

_Evadne._ Shame on such craven thoughts,
The image of the God frowns on your words--
All glorious Mars! be thou my god and guide,
Be thou the image to fill up my heart,
Be thou the spirit leading me to glory,
And be my latest hour still cheered by thee,
While round me dwells the shout of victory!"

FLETCHER.

Mars was the presider over gladiators, and was the god of all exercises, which have in them a manly or spirited character.

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NEPTUNE,

------

--------"The God whose potent hand
Shakes the tumultuous sea, and solid land:
The Ocean Lord, o'er Helicon who reigns,
O'er spacious Aegae's wide extended plains;
To whom the gods, with equal skill concede,
To guide the bark and tame the fiery steed,"

HORACE.

was the son of Saturn, and brother to Jupiter, Pluto, and Juno; being restored to life by the draught administered to Saturn, the portion of the kingdom allotted to him was that of the sea. This, however, did not seem equivalent to the empire of heaven and earth, which Jupiter had claimed; he therefore conspired with the other gods to dethrone his brother. The conspiracy was discovered, and Jupiter condemned Neptune to assist in building the walls of Troy, and to be subservient to his sceptre for a year. When the work was completed, Laomedon refused to reward the labours of the god, and in retribution, his territories were soon afterwards laid waste by the god of the sea, and his subjects visited with a pestilence sent by Apollo.

Besides the dispute this deity had with Minerva, related in her history, he claimed the isthmus of Corinth from Apollo; and Briareus, the Cyclops, who was mutually chosen umpire, gave the isthmus to Neptune, and the promontory to Apollo.

Neptune, as god of the sea, was entitled to more power than any of the other deities, except Jupiter. Not only the oceans, rivers, and fountains, were subjected to him, but he could also cause earthquakes at pleasure, and raise islands from the sea by a blow of his trident.

----------------"King of the stormy sea!
Brother of Jove, and co-inheritor
Of elements Eternally before
Thee, the waves awful bow. Fast, stubborn rock;
At thy feared trident, shrinking, doth unlock
Its deep foundations, hissing into foam.
All mountain-rivers, lost, in the wide home
Of thy capacious bosom, ever flow.
Thou frownest, and old Aeolus, thy foe,
Skulks to his cavern, mid the gruff complaint
Of all his rebel tempests. Dark clouds faint
When, from thy diadem, a silver gleam
Slants over blue dominion. Thy bright team
Gulfs in the morning light, and scuds along
To bring thee nearer to that golden song
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Apollo singeth, while his chariot
Waits at the door of heaven. Thou art not
For scenes like this; an empire stern hast thou;
And it hath furrowed that large front: yet now,
As newly come of heaven, dost thou sit,
To blend and inter-knit
Subdued majesty with this glad time.
O shell born king sublime!
We lay our hearts before thee evermore--
We sing and we adore!"

KEATS.

He obtained Amphitrite, daughter of Ocean, in marriage, through the skill of a dolphin, although she had made to herself a vow of perpetual celibacy; and had by him, Triton, one of the sea deities. To the story of Neptune, may be attached the beautiful fable of Arion, the illustrious rival of Amphion and Orpheus.

This famous lyric poet and musician, having gone into Italy, with Periander, tyrant of Corinth, he obtained immense treasures through his profession. On his return to his native country with his riches, the sailors of the vessel in which he had embarked, resolved to murder him, that they might obtain possession of his wealth; when the poet discovered their intention, he endeavoured to outwit them. {101}

"Allow me," said Arion, with all the earnestness of an enthusiast. "Ere I leave this world, oh! allow me to touch once more, and for the last time, the strings of the lyre which has so often cheered me: let the last moments of my life, be soothed by its gentle influence."

The boon was granted, and the divine strains of the master, issued in solemn beauty over the deep. At the sound, the traitors were struck silent, and hesitated in their course, but they had gone too far: it was too late to recede, and the poet was thrown into the deep. When lo! the dolphins, attracted by the sweet tones which they had heard, gathered round him; and Arion, mounted on the back of one, and accompanied by the remainder arrived safely at the end of his voyage. It is added, as an instance of the ingratitude of mortals, that the dolphin, having proceeded too far upon the sand, was unable to get back to the water, and the ungrateful Arion allowed his liberator to perish.

The worship of Neptune was established in almost every part of the earth, and the Libyans in particular, venerated him above all other Gods.

------"Great Neptune! I would be
Advanced to the freedom of the main,
And stand before your vast creation's plain,
And roam your watery kingdom thro' and thro'
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And see your branching woods and palace blue,
Spar-built and domed with crystal: aye and view
The bedded wonders of the lonely deep;
And see on coral banks, the sea-maids sleep,
Children of ancient Nereus, and behold
Their streaming dance about their father old,
Beneath the blue Egean; where he sate,
Wedded to prophecy, and full of fate!
Or rather, as Arion harped, indeed,
Would I go floating on my billow-steed,
Over the billows, and triumphing there,
Call the white syren from her cave to share
My joy, and kiss her willing forehead fair."

KEATS.

To him was consecrated the horse, and in his honour were celebrated the Isthmian games. His throne was a chariot drawn by four fiery steeds; his stature is grand, and his appearance imposing; he wears the look of an old man, his long beard and hair, wet with the vapour of the water.

In his hand he holds the trident, which bids the waves of ocean to rise, and causes the thunder of its tempests. With this trident also, he shakes the world, and bids the earth to tremble.

During the _Consualia_ of the Romans, horses were led through the streets, finely equipped, and crowned with garlands, as the God in whose honour the festivals were instituted, had produced the horse, an animal so beneficial for the use of mankind.

As monarch of the sea, he is supposed to have had possession of the deep, and all the treasures which the stormy winds sent to his domain.

"What hid'st thou in thy treasure-caves and cells?
Thou hollow-sounding, and mysterious main!
Pale glistening pearls, and rainbow-coloured shells,
Bright things which gleam unrecked of, and in vain;
Keep, keep thy riches, melancholy sea.
We ask not such from thee!

"Yet more, the depths have more! what wealth untold,
Far down, and shining thro' their stillness lies;
Thou hast the starry gems, the burning gold,
Won from ten thousand royal argosies;
Sweep o'er thy spoils, thou wild and wrathful main;
Earth claims not these again!

"Yet more, the depths have more! thy waves have rolled,
Above the cities of a world gone by!
Sand hath filled up the palaces of old,
Sea-weed o'er-grown the halls of revelry.
Dash o'er them, ocean! in thy scornful play!
Man yields them to decay

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Yet more! the billows and the depths have more!
High hearts and brave are gathered to thy breast!
They hear not now the booming waters roar,
The battle thunders will not break their rest;
Keep thy red gold and gems, thou stormy grave,
Give back the true and brave!

"Give back the lost and lovely! those for whom
The place was kept at board and hearth so long;
The prayer went up thro' midnight's breathless gloom,
And the vain yearning woke midst festal song!
Hold fast thy buried isles, thy towers o'erthrown,
But all is not thine own!

"To thee the love of woman hath gone down,
Dark flow thy tides o'er manhood's noble head,
O'er youth's bright locks, and beauty's flowery crown,
Yet must thou hear a voice--restore the dead!
Earth shall reclaim her precious things from thee!
Restore the dead thou sea!"

HEMANS.

* * * * *

PLUTO.

------

The name of Pluto, as god of the kingdom of hell, and whatever is under the earth, where

"------------Cerberus, the cruel worm of death,
Keeps watchful guard, and with his iron throat,
Affrights the spirits in their pale sojourn,"

THURLOW.

is as well known to the readers of Mythology as that of his brother Jupiter.

The place of his residence being gloomy, and consequently unbearable to those goddesses whose hand he sought in marriage, and who looked for a gayer life than he could offer them, they all refused to become the sharer of his possessions. Pluto, however, was by no means willing to sit quietly down in single blessedness, thinking, perhaps, that the very reason which they assigned for their refusal, was an additional one in his favour for wishing a soother of his lot.

It was in his visit to the island of Sicily, that the God saw and became enamoured of Proserpine, as she gathered flowers in the plains of Enna. {104}

------"He comes to us
From the depths of Tartarus.
For what of evil doth he roam
From his red and gloomy home.
In the centre of the world
Where the sinful dead are hurled?
Mark him as he moves along,
Drawn by horses black and strong.
Such as may belong to night,
Ere she takes her morning flight,
Now the chariot stops: the God
On our grassy world hath trod,
Like a Titan steppeth he,
Yet full of his divinity.
On his mighty shoulders lie
Raven locks, and in his eye
A cruel beauty, such as none
Of us may wisely look upon."

BARRY CORNWALL.

In vain she called upon her attendants for help, the God bore her off to his dominions, and she became his bride.

"So in Sicilia's ever blooming shade,
The playful Proserpine from Ceres strayed.
Led with unwary step her virgin trains
O'er Etna's steeps, and Enna's golden plains;
Plucked with fair hand the silver blossomed bower,
And purpled mead,--herself a fairer flower;
{105}
Sudden, unseen amid the twilight glade,
Rushed gloomy Dis, and seized the trembling maid.
Her startling damsels sprung from mossy seats,
Dropped from their gauzy laps the gathered sweets,
Clung round the struggling nymph, with piercing cries
Pursued the chariot, and invoked the skies;--
Pleased as he grasps her in his iron arms,
Frights with soft sighs, with tender words alarms;
The wheels descending, rolled in smoky rings,
Infernal Cupids flapped their demon wings;
Earth with deep yawn received the fair amazed,
And far in night, celestial beauty blazed."

DARWIN.

At the entrance of the place of torments was an enormous vestibule, tenanted by black Anxieties, Regrets, Groans, Remorse, pale Malady, Decay, Fright, Hunger, Poverty, Death, Sleep, fierce Joy, Rage, and the Eumenides, or Furies, who were seated on a couch of iron, and crowned with blood-stained serpents. A deep and dark cavern led towards Tartarus, which was surrounded by the river Acheron; Charon conducted over this water the souls of those sent to him by Death, while any to whom the rites of sepulchre had not been granted, were for a hundred years allowed to solicit their passage in vain. If any living person presented himself to cross the lake, he could not be admitted before he showed Charon a golden bough; and Charon was once imprisoned for a year, because he had ferried Hercules over without this passport.

Cerberus, a dog with three heads, watched at the entrance to Tartarus.

"A horrid dog and grim, couched on the floor,
Guards, with malicious art, the sounding door;
On each, who in the entrance first appears,
He fawning wags his tail, and cocks his ears;
If any strive to measure back the way,
Their steps he watches, and devours his prey."

HESIOD.

Surrounded by an outer wall of iron, this terrible place was enclosed within a wall of adamant.

Pluto is generally represented as holding a trident with three prongs, and has a key in his hand, to intimate that whoever enters can never return. He is considered as a hard-hearted and inexorable deity, with a grim and dismal countenance, for which reason, temples were not raised to his honour, as to the remainder of the gods; though the story of Orpheus shews that he could be occasionally less severe. {106}

"When ill-fated Orpheus tuned to woe
His potent lyre, and sought the realms below;
Charmed into life unreal forms respired,
And list'ning shades the dulcet note admired.
Love led the sage through Death's tremendous porch,
Cheered with his smile, and lighted with his torch;
Hell's triple dog his playful jaws expands,
Fawns round the god, and licks his baby hands;
In wondering groups the shadowy nations throng,
And sigh or simper, as he steps along;
Sad swains, and nymphs forlorn, on Lethe's brink,
Hug their past sorrows, and refuse to drink;
Night's dazzled empress feels the golden flame
Play round her breast, and melt her frozen frame;
Charms with soft words, and sooths with amorous wiles,
Her iron-hearted lord, and Pluto smiles.
His trembling bride the bard triumphant led
From the pale mansions of the astonished dead;
Gave the fair phantom to admiring light,
Ah! soon again to tread irrevocable night!"

DARWIN.

Black victims, and particularly the bull, were the only sacrifices which were offered to him, and their blood was not sprinkled on the altars, but permitted to run down into the earth to penetrate the realms of the God.

The Syracusans paid yearly homage to him near the fountain of Cyane, into which one of the attendant maidens of Proserpine had been metamorphosed, and where he had, according to the received traditions, disappeared with the goddess.

--------"On the ground,
She sinks without a single sound,
And all her garments float around;
Again, again she rises light,
Her head is like a fountain bright,
And her glossy ringlets fall
With a murmur musical,
O'er her shoulders, like a river
That rushes and escapes for ever.
Is the fair Cyane gone?
Is this fountain left alone
For a sad remembrance, where
We may in after times repair,
With heavy heart and weeping eye,
To sing songs to her memory?"

BARRY CORNWALL.

From the functions, and the place he inhabited, he received different names, and became the god of the infernal regions, of death, and of funerals.

That he might govern with order and regularity, the spirits who {107} were inhabitants of his vast dominions, he committed part of his power to three judges of the infernal regions, of whom Minos and Rhadamanthus were the most important. He sate in the middle, holding a sceptre in his hand. The dead pleaded their different causes before him, and the impartial judge shakes the fatal urn which is filled with the destinies of mankind. Rhadamanthus was employed in compelling the dead to confess their crimes, and in punishing them for their offences.

"Awful Rhadamanthus rules the state.
He hears and judges each committed crime,
Inquires into the manner, place, and time:
The conscious wretch must all his acts reveal,
Loth to confess, unable to conceal,
From the first moment of his vital breath,
To his last year of unrepenting death."

Amongst the most notorious criminals plunged in Tartarus, were the Titans; Sisyphus, a celebrated robber, condemned to roll an enormous stone to the summit of a high mountain, from which it fell again without ceasing, that he might be eternally employed in this punishment; Ixion who had dared to offer impure vows to Juno, and was affixed to a wheel which went constantly round, rendering his punishment also eternal; with Tantalus, condemned to a burning thirst, and surrounded by the grateful liquid which always vanished before his touch. {108}

--------"Tantalus condemned to hear
The precious stream still purling in his ear;
Lip-deep in what he longs for, and yet curst
With prohibition and perpetual thirst."

COWPER.

The Danaides, daughters of Danaus, king of Argos, were also there, who, in obedience to the cruel advice of their parent, had caused their husbands to perish; with Tityus, who having had the audacity to attempt the honour of Latona, was doomed to feel a vulture constantly gnawing his entrails.

Ulysses sought the realm of Pluto, among his many adventures.

"When lo! appeared along the dusky coasts,
Thin, airy shoals of visionary ghosts:
Fair, pensive youths, and young enamoured maids;
And withered elders, pale and wrinkled shades;
Ghastly with wounds the forms of warriors slain,
Stalked with majestic port, a martial train;
These and a thousand more, swarmed o'er the ground,
And all the dire assembly shrieked around.
Astonished at the sight, aghast I stood,
And a cold fear ran shivering through my blood."

While here he saw the ghosts of all those famed in story, who had descended to the infernal regions for punishment.

"High on a throne, tremendous to behold,
Stern Minos waves a mace of burnished gold;
Around, ten thousand, thousand spectres stand,
Thro' the wide dome of Dis, a trembling band.
Still as they plead, the fatal lot he rolls,
Absolves the just, and dooms the guilty souls.
There huge Orion, of portentous size,
Swift thro' the gloom, a giant hunter flies;
A ponderous mace of brass with direful sway
Aloft he whirls to crush the savage prey!
Stern beasts in trains that by his truncheon fell,
Now grisly forms, shoot o'er the lawns of hell.
There Tityus, large and long, in fetters bound,
O'erspreads nine acres of infernal ground;
{109}
Two ravenous vultures, furious for their food,
Scream o'er the fiend, and riot in his blood,
Incessant gore the liver in his breast,
Th' immortal liver grows, and gives the immortal feast.
There Tantalus along the Stygian bounds
Pours out deep groans (with groans all hell resounds);
Ev'n in the circling floods refreshment craves,
And pines with thirst amidst a sea of waves;
When to the water he his lip applies,
Back from his lip the treacherous water flies,
Above, beneath, around his hapless head,
Trees of all kinds delicious fruitage spread;
There figs sky-dy'd, a purple hue disclose,
Green looks the olive, the pomegranate grows,
There dangling pears exalting scents unfold,
And yellow apples ripen into gold:
The fruit he strives to seize, but blasts arise,
Toss it on high, and whirl it to the skies.
I turned my eye, and, as I turned, surveyed
A mournful vision! the Sisyphian shade;
With many a weary step, and many a groan,
Up the high hill he heaves a huge round stone;
The huge round stone, resulting with a bound,
Thunders impetuous down and smokes along the ground,
Again the restless orb his toil renews,
Dust mounts in clouds, and sweat descends in dews."

* * * * *

{110}

MERCURY.

------

Though according to Cicero, there were no less than five gods of this name; yet to the son of Jupiter and Maia, the actions of all the others have been probably attributed, as he is the most famous and the best known.

Mercury was the messenger of the gods and the patron of travellers and shepherds; he conducted the souls of the dead into the infernal regions, and not only presided over orators and merchants, but was also the god of thieves, pickpockets, and all dishonest persons.

--------"A babe, all babes excelling,
A schemer subtle beyond all belief,
A shepherd of thin dreams, a cow stealing,
A night watching and door waylaying thief."

SHELLEY.

The day following his birth he offered an early proof of his dishonest propensities, by stealing away the oxen of Admetus which Apollo tended.

"The babe was born at the first peep of day,
He began playing on the lyre at noon,
And the same evening did he steal away
Apollo's herds."

SHELLEY.

He gave another proof of this propensity, by throwing himself upon the timid Cupid, and wrestling from him his quivers; and increased his notoriety by robbing Venus of her girdle, Mars of his sword, Jupiter of his sceptre, and Vulcan of his mechanical instruments.

"Hermes with gods and men, even from that day
Mingled and wrought the latter much annoy,
And little profit, going far astray,
Through the dun night."

SHELLEY.

{111}

As the messenger of Jupiter, he was entrusted with all his secrets and permitted to make himself invisible whenever he pleased, or to assume any shape he chose.

The invention of the lyre and seven strings is ascribed to him, which he gave to Apollo, and received in exchange the celebrated caduceus, with which the God of poetry used to drive the flocks of King Admetus. This celebrated instrument was a rod entwined at one end by two serpents.

------------------------"Come take
The lyre--be mine the glory of giving it--
Strike the sweet chords, and sing aloud and wake
The joyous pleasure out of many a fit
Of tranced sound--and with fleet fingers make
Thy liquid voiced comrade talk with thee;
It can talk measured music eloquently.
Then bear it boldly to the revel loud,
Love wakening dance, or feast of solemn state,
A joy by night or day, for those endowed
With art and wisdom, who interrogate!
It teaches, bubbling in delightful mood
All things which make the spirit most elate,
Soothing the mind with sweet familiar play,
Chasing the heavy shadows of dismay."

SHELLEY.

"O Hermes, thou who couldst of yore
Amphion's bosom warm,
And breathe into his strains the power,
The rugged rocks to charm;
Breathe, breathe into my lyre's soft string,
And bid its music sweet notes fling,
For what O lyre, can thee withstand?
Touched by an Orpheus' magic hand,
Thou calm'st the tiger's wrath:
The listening woods thou draw'st along,
The rivers stay to hear thy song,
And listen still as death.
Tityos with pleasure heard thy strain,
And Ixion smiled amid his pain."

HORACE.

Numerous were the modes of sacrifice to Mercury, and the places in which they were offered; among others, the Roman merchants yearly celebrated a festival in his honour. After the votaries had sprinkled themselves with water, they offered prayers to the divinity, and entreated him to be favourable to them, and to forgive any artful measures, perjuries, or falsehoods they had used in the pursuit of gain; and this may be considered to have been particularly necessary when it is remembered that the merchants, who had promised him all the incense in the world to obtain his {112} protection, proved that they had profited by his principles, by offering him only a hundredth part, when they had secured his good offices.

Jupiter soon missed the services of his intelligent messenger, and recalled him to Olympus. Here, Mercury rendering some kindness to Venus, the goddess fell in love with him, and bore to him Hermaphrodite, a child which united the talents of his father with the graces of his mother; at the age of fifteen, he began to travel, and bathing one day in a fountain in Cana, excited the passion of Salmaeis, the nymph who presided over it.

"From both the illustrious authors of his race
The child was named; nor was it hard to trace
Both the bright parents through the infant's face.
When fifteen years, in Ida's cool retreat,
The boy had told, he left his native seat,
And sought fresh fountains in a foreign soil:
The pleasure lessened the attending toil.
With eager steps the Lycian fields he crossed,
And fields that border on the Lycian coast;
A river here he viewed so lovely bright,
It showed the bottom in a fairer light,
Nor kept a sand concealed from human sight.
The fruitful banks with cheerful verdure crowned,
And kept the spring eternal on the ground.
A nymph presides, nor practised in the chase,
Nor skilful at the bow, nor at the race;
Of all the blue-eyed daughters of the main,
The only stranger to Diana's train;
Her sisters often, as 'tis said, would cry
'Fye, Salmaeis, what always idle! fye;
Or take the quiver, or the arrows seize
And mix the toils of hunting with thy ease.'
Nor quivers she, nor arrows e'er would seize,
Nor mix the toils of hunting with her ease;
But oft would bathe her in the crystal tide,
Oft with a comb her dewy locks divide;
Now in the limped streams she views her face,
And dressed her image in the floating glass:
On beds of leaves she now reposed her limbs,
Now gathered flowers that grew about her streams,
And there by chance was gathering as she stood
To view the boy--"

OVID.

Hermaphroditus continued deaf to all entreaties and offers; and Salmaeis, throwing her arms around him, entreated the Gods to render her inseparable from him whom she adored. The Gods heard her prayer, and formed of the two, a being of perfect beauty, preserving the characteristics of both sexes. {113}

Offerings were made to him of milk and honey, because he was the God of eloquence, whose powers were sweet and persuasive. Sometimes his statues represent him without arms, because the power of speech can prevail over everything.

The Greeks and Romans celebrated his festivals, principally in the month of May. They frequently placed on his back the statue of Minerva, and offered to him the tongues of the victims whom they immolated to the goddess.

"Who beareth the world on his shoulders so broad;
Hear me, thou power, who, of yore, by thy words
Couldst soften the hearts of the barbarous hordes,
And by the Palaestia taught him of the wild
To be gentle, and graceful, and meek as a child.
Thou messenger fleet of the cloud-throned sire,
'Twas thou who inventedst the golden-stringed lyre;
I hail thee the patron of craft and of guile,
To laugh while you grieve, to deceive while you smile,
When you chafed into wrath bright Apollo of old,
His dun-coloured steers having stol'n from the fold,
He laughed; for, while talking all fiercely he found
That his quiver, alack! from his back was unbound.
'Twas thou, who old Priam didst guide on his way,
When he passed unperceived thro' the hostile array,
Of the proud sons of Atreus, who sought to destroy
The towers of high Ilion, the city of Troy.
O Hermes, 'tis thou who conductest the blest
To the seats where their souls shall for ever exist,
Who governest their shades by the power of thy spell,
The favourite of Heaven, the favourite of Hell."

HORACE.

* * * * *

{114}

NEREIDS

------

These divinities were children of Nereus and Dorus. As the Dryads and Hamadryads presided over forests--as the Naiads watched over fountains and the sources of rivers--as the Oreads were the peculiar guardians of the hills, so the Nereids guided and commanded the waves of the ocean, and were implored as its deities. They had altars chiefly on the coast of the sea, where the piety of mankind made offerings of milk, oil, and honey, and often of the flesh of goats. When they were on the sea shore, they generally resided in grottos and caves, adorned with shells.

There were fifty of them, all children of Nereus, who is represented as an old man with a long flowing beard, and hair of an azure colour. The chief place of his residence was in the Egean Sea, where he was attended by his daughters, who often danced in chorus round him. He had the gift of prophecy, and informed those who consulted him, of the fate which awaited them, though such was the god's aversion to his task, that he often evaded the importunities of the inquirers, by assuming different shapes, and totally escaping from their grasp.

* * * * *

{115}

DIVINITIES OF THE SECOND CLASS.

------

The gods of the first order, were endowed by the writers of antiquity, with natures partly real, and partly imaginary. By their power, the government of the universe was carried on; but mortals in attributing to these gods their own passions and weaknesses, began to blend with them divinities of a secondary class, to preside over those less important affairs, which might be supposed unworthy the notice of the superior intelligences.

For the most part, therefore, these Immortals have no origin in history; but, as allusions are constantly made to them in the eloquent language of the orator, or in the beautiful metaphor of the poet, it is necessary to introduce those who are considered to be the most celebrated.

And for the future, the poetry offered will principally be that which relates rather to the attributes they were supposed to possess, than to the gods themselves. Thus, with such deities as Aeolus and Mors, we shall introduce poems addressed to the Wind and Death, over which they presided, as suited to the modern character of our Mythology, and more generally appreciated by the readers of the nineteenth century.

DIVINITIES OF THE EARTH.

PAN.

Pan was the god of shepherds, and of all inhabitants of the country; he was the son of Mercury by Driope, and is usually described as possessing two small horns on his head, his complexion ruddy, his nose flat, and his legs, thighs, tail and feet hairy, like those of a goat. When he was brought into the world, the nurse, terrified at sight of him, ran away in horror, and his father wrapping him up in the skins of beasts, carried him to Heaven, where Jupiter and the other Gods, entertained themselves with the oddity of his appearance; Bacchus was delighted with him, and gave him the name of Pan.

--------------"Sprung the rude God to light;
Of dreadful form, and horrible to sight;
Goat-footed, horned, yet full of sport and joy,
The nurse, astonished, fled the wondrous boy:
{116}
His shaggy limbs, the trembling matron feared,
His face distorted, and his rugged beard:
But Hermes from her hands received the child,
And on the infant god auspicious smiled.
In the thick fur wrapped of a mountain hare,
His arms the boy to steep Olympus bear;
Proudly he shows him to imperial Jove,
High seated 'mid the immortal powers above.
With friendly joy and love, the race divine,
But chiefly Bacchus, god of mirth and wine,
Received the dauntless god, whom Pan they call,
Pan, for his song delights the breast of all."

HORACE.

This god of the shepherds chiefly resided in Arcadia, where the woods and the mountains were his habitation.

------------"His mighty palace roof doth hang
From jagged trunks, and overshadoweth
Eternal whispers, glooms, the birth, life, death,
Of unseen flowers in heavy peacefulness.
Who loves to see the hamadryads dress
Their ruffled locks, where meeting hazels darken,
And through whole solemn hours, dost sit and harken
The dreary melody of bedded reeds."

KEATS.

The flute was invented by Pan, and formed of seven reeds, which he called Syrinx, in honour of a beautiful nymph of the same name, who, refusing his addresses, was changed into a reed.

----------------"A nymph of late there was,
Whose heavenly form her fellows did surpass,
The pride and joy of fair Arcadia's plains,
Beloved by deities, adored by swains.
Like Phoebe clad, e'en Phoebe's self she seems,
So tall, so straight, such well proportioned limbs,
The nicest eye did no distinction know
But that the goddess bore a golden bow,
Descending from Lycaeus, Pan admires
The matchless nymph, and burns with new desires.
A crown of pine upon his head he wore,
And then began her pity to implore.
But ere he thus began, she took her flight,
So swift she was already out of sight,
Nor staid to hear the courtship of the god:
But bent her course to Ladon's gentle flood:
There by the river stopped, and tired before
Relief from water-nymphs her prayers implore,
Now while the rural god with speedy pace,
Just thought to strain her in his strict embrace,
He filled his arms with reeds, new rising in the place:
And while he sighs his ill success to find,
The tender canes were shaken by the wind,
And breathed a mournful air unheard before,
That much surprizing Pan, yet pleased him more,
{117}
Admiring this new music, 'Thou' he said,
'Who cans't not be the partner of my bed,
At least shall be the consort of my mind,
And often, often to my lips be joined.'
He formed the reeds, proportioned as they are,
Unequal in their length and waxed with care,
They still retain the name of his ungrateful fair."

OVID.