Chapter XVI (5)

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).

It was from the same strong necessity, of accommodating the old mythes to a new standard both of belief and of appreciation, that both the historical and the allegorical schemes of transforming them arose; the literal narrative being decomposed for the purpose of arriving at a base either of particular matter of fact, or of general physical or moral truth. Instructed men were commonly disposed to historicize only the heroic legends, and to allegorize more or less of the divine legends: the attempt of Euêmerus to historicize the latter was for the most part denounced as irreligious, while that of Metrodôrus to allegorize the former met with no success. In allegorizing, moreover, even the divine legends, it was usual to apply the scheme of allegory only to the inferior gods, though some of the great Stoic philosophers carried it farther, and allegorized all the separate personal gods, leaving only an all-pervading cosmic Mind,[972] essential as a co-efficient along with Matter, yet not separable from Matter. But many pious pagans seem to have perceived that allegory pushed to this extent was fatal to all living religious faith,[973] inasmuch as it divested the gods of their character of Persons, sympathizing with mankind and modifiable in their dispositions according to the conduct and prayers of the believer: and hence they permitted themselves to employ allegorical interpretation only to some of the obnoxious legends connected with the superior gods, leaving the personality of the latter unimpeached.

[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.

One novelty, however, introduced seemingly by the philosopher Empedoklês and afterwards expanded by others, deserves notice, inasmuch as it modified considerably the old religious creed by drawing a pointed contrast between gods and dæmons,—a distinction hardly at all manifested in Homer, but recognized in the Works and Days of Hesiod.[974] Empedoklês widened the gap between the two, and founded upon it important consequences. The gods were good, immortal, and powerful agents, having free-will and intelligence, but without appetite, passion, or infirmity: the dæmons were of a mixed nature between gods and men, ministers and interpreters from the former to the latter, but invested also with an agency and dispositions of their own. They were very long-lived, but not immortal, and subject to the passions and propensities of men, so that there were among them beneficent and maleficent dæmons with every shade of intermediate difference.[975] It had been the mistake (according to these philosophers) of the old mythes to ascribe to the gods proceedings really belonging to the dæmons, who were always the immediate communicants with mortal nature, inspiring prophetic power to the priestesses of the oracles, sending dreams and omens, and perpetually interfering either for good or for evil. The wicked and violent dæmons, having committed many enormities, had thus sometimes incurred punishment from the gods: besides which, their bad dispositions had imposed upon men the necessity of appeasing them by religious ceremonies of a kind acceptable to such beings: hence, the human sacrifices, the violent, cruel, and obscene exhibitions, the wailings and fastings, the tearing and eating of raw flesh, which it had become customary to practise on various consecrated occasions, and especially in the Dionysiac solemnities. Moreover, the discreditable actions imputed to the gods,—the terrific combats, the Typhonic and Titanic convulsions, the rapes, abductions, flight, servitude, and concealment,—all these were really the doings and sufferings of bad dæmons, placed far below the sovereign agency—equable, undisturbed, and unpolluted—of the immortal gods. The action of such dæmons upon mankind was fitful and intermittent: they sometimes perished or changed their local abode, so that oracles which had once been inspired became after a time forsaken and disfranchized.[976]

[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.

This distinction between gods and dæmons appeared to save in a great degree both the truth of the old legends and the dignity of the gods: it obviated the necessity of pronouncing either that the gods were unworthy, or the legends untrue. Yet although devised for the purpose of satisfying a more scrupulous religious sensibility, it was found inconvenient afterwards, when assailants arose against paganism generally. For while it abandoned as indefensible a large portion of what had once been genuine faith, it still retained the same word _dæmons_ with an entirely altered signification. The Christian writers in their controversies found ample warrant among the _earlier_ pagan authors[977] for treating all the gods as dæmons—and not less ample warrant among the _later_ pagans for denouncing the dæmons generally as evil beings.[978]

[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.

[978] See above, Chapter II. p. 70, the remarks on the Hesiodic
Theogony.

Such were the different modes in which the ancient mythes were treated, during the literary life of Greece, by the four classes above named—poets, logographers, historians, and philosophers.

Literal acceptance, and unconscious, uninquiring faith, such as they had obtained from the original auditors to whom they were addressed, they now found only among the multitude—alike retentive of traditional feeling[979] and fearful of criticizing the proceedings of the gods.[980] But with instructed men they became rather subjects of respectful and curious analysis—all agreeing that the Word as tendered to them was inadmissible, yet all equally convinced that it contained important meaning, though hidden yet not undiscoverable. A very large proportion of the force of Grecian intellect was engaged in searching after this unknown base, by guesses, in which sometimes the principle of semi-historical interpretation was assumed, sometimes that of allegorical, without any collateral evidence in either case, and without possibility of verification. Out of the one assumption grew a string of allegorized phænomenal truths, out of the other a long series of seeming historical events and chronological persons,—both elicited from the transformed mythes and from nothing else.[981]

[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).

[981] There is here a change as compared with my first edition;
I had inserted here some remarks on the allegorical theory of
interpretation, as compared with the semi-historical. An able
article on my work (in the Edinburgh Review, October 1846),
pointed out that those remarks required modification, and that
the idea of allegory in reference to the construction of the
mythes was altogether inadmissible.

The utmost which we accomplish by means of the semi-historical theory, even in its most successful applications, is, that after leaving out from the mythical narrative all that is miraculous or high-colored or extravagant, we arrive at a series of credible incidents—incidents which _may, perhaps_, have really occurred, and against which no intrinsic presumption can be raised. This is exactly the character of a well-written modern novel (as, for example, several among the compositions of Defoe), the whole story of which is such as may well have occurred in real life: it is plausible fiction, and nothing beyond. To raise plausible fiction up to the superior dignity of truth, some positive testimony or positive ground of inference must be shown; even the highest measure of intrinsic probability is not alone sufficient. A man who tells us that, on the day of the battle of Platæa, rain fell on the spot of ground where the city of New York now stands, will neither deserve nor obtain credit, because he can have had no means of positive knowledge; though the statement is not in the slightest degree improbable. On the other hand, statements in themselves very improbable may well deserve belief, provided they be supported by sufficient positive evidence; thus the canal dug by order of Xerxês across the promontory of Mount Athos, and the sailing of the Persian fleet through it, is a fact which I believe, because it is well-attested—notwithstanding its remarkable improbability, which so far misled Juvenal as to induce him to single out the narrative as a glaring example of Grecian mendacity.[982] Again, many critics have observed that the general tale of the Trojan war (apart from the superhuman agencies) is not more improbable than that of the Crusades, which every one admits to be an historical fact. But (even if we grant this position, which is only true to a small extent), it is not sufficient to show an analogy between the two cases in respect to negative presumptions alone; the analogy ought to be shown to hold between them in respect to positive certificate also. The Crusades are a curious phænomenon in history, but we accept them, nevertheless, as an unquestionable fact, because the antecedent improbability is surmounted by adequate contemporary testimony. When the like testimony, both in amount and kind, is produced to establish the historical reality of a Trojan war, we shall not hesitate to deal with the two events on the same footing.

[982] Juvenal, Sat. x. 174:—

“Creditur olim
Velificatus Athos, et quantum Græcia mendax
Audet in historiâ,” etc.

In applying the semi-historical theory to Grecian mythical narrative, it has been often forgotten that a certain strength of testimony, or positive ground of belief, must first be tendered, before we can be called upon to discuss the antecedent probability or improbability of the incidents alleged. The belief of the Greeks themselves, without the smallest aid of special or contemporary witnesses, has been tacitly assumed as sufficient to support the case, provided only sufficient deduction be made from the mythical narratives to remove all antecedent improbabilities. It has been taken for granted that the faith of the people must have rested originally upon some particular historical event, involving the identical persons, things, and places which the original mythes exhibit, or at least the most prominent among them. But when we examine the pyschagogic influences predominant in the society among whom this belief originally grew up, we shall see that their belief is of little or no evidentiary value, and that the growth and diffusion of it may be satisfactorily explained without supposing any special basis of matters of fact. The popular faith, so far as it counts for anything, testifies in favor of the entire and literal mythes, which are now universally rejected as incredible.[983] We have thus the very minimum of positive proof, and the maximum of negative presumption: we may diminish the latter by conjectural omissions and interpolations, but we cannot by any artifice increase the former: the narrative ceases to be incredible, but it still remains uncertified,—a mere commonplace possibility. Nor is fiction always, or essentially, extravagant and incredible. It is often not only plausible and coherent, but even more like truth (if a paradoxical phrase may be allowed) than truth itself. Nor can we, in the absence of any extrinsic test, reckon upon any intrinsic mark to discriminate the one from the other.[984]

[983] Colonel Sleeman observes, respecting the Hindoo historical
mind—“History to this people is all a fairy tale.” (Rambles and
Recollections of an Indian Official, vol. i. ch. ix. p. 70.) And
again, “The popular poem of the Ramaen describes the abduction
of the heroine by the monster king of Ceylon, Rawun; and her
recovery by means of the monkey general, Hunnooman. Every word of
this poem, the people assured me was written, if not by the hand
of the Deity himself, at least by his inspiration, which was the
same thing—and it must consequently be true. Ninety-nine out of
a hundred, among the Hindoos, implicitly believe, not only every
word of the poem, but every word of every poem that has ever been
written in Sanscrit. If you ask a man whether he really believes
any very egregious absurdity quoted from these books, he replies,
with the greatest _naïveté_ in the world, Is it not written in
the book; and how should it be there written, if not true? The
Hindoo religion reposes upon an entire prostration of mind,—that
continual and habitual surrender of the reasoning faculties,
which we are accustomed to make occasionally, while engaged at
the theatre, or in the perusal of works of fiction. We allow the
scenes, characters, and incidents, to pass before our mind’s
eye, and move our feelings—without stopping a moment to ask
whether they are real or true. There is only this difference—that
with people of education among us, even in such short intervals
of illusion or _abandon_, any extravagance in the acting, or
flagrant improbability in the fiction, destroys the charm, breaks
the spell by which we have been so mysteriously bound, and
restores us to reason and the realities of ordinary life. With
the Hindoos, on the contrary, the greater the improbability, the
more monstrous and preposterous the fiction—the greater is the
charm it has over their minds; and the greater their learning
in the Sanscrit, the more are they under the influence of this
charm. Believing all to be written by the Deity, or under his
inspirations, and the men and things of former days to have
been very different from men and things of the present day, and
the heroes of these fables to have been demigods, or people
endowed with powers far superior to those of the ordinary men
of their own day—the analogies of nature are never for a moment
considered; nor do questions of probability, or possibility,
according to those analogies, ever obtrude to dispel the charm
with which they are so pleasingly bound. They go on through
life reading and talking of these monstrous fictions, which
shock the taste and understanding of other nations, without
ever questioning the truth of one single incident, or hearing
it questioned. There was a time, and that not far distant, when
it was the same in England, and in every other European nation;
and there are, I am afraid, some parts of Europe where it is
so still. But the Hindoo faith, so far as religious questions
are concerned, is not more capacious or absurd than that of the
Greeks or Romans in the days of Socrates or Cicero: the only
difference is, that among the Hindoos a greater number of the
questions which interest mankind are brought under the head of
religion.” (Sleeman, Rambles, etc., vol. i. ch. xxvi. p. 227:
compare vol. ii. ch. v. p. 51; viii. p. 97.)

[984] Lord Lyttleton, in commenting on the tales of the Irish
bards, in his History of Henry II., has the following just
remarks (book iv. vol. iii. p. 13, quarto): “One may reasonably
suppose that in MSS. written since the Irish received the Roman
letters from St. Patrick, _some_ traditional truths recorded
before by the bards in their unwritten poems may have been
preserved to our times. Yet these cannot be so separated from
many fabulous stories derived from the same sources, as to obtain
a firm credit; it not being sufficient to establish the authority
of suspected traditions, that they can be shown not to be so
improbable or absurd as others with which they are mixed—_since
there may be specious as well as senseless fictions_. Nor can a
poet or bard, who lived in the sixth or seventh century after
Christ, if his poem is still extant, be any voucher for facts
supposed to have happened before the incarnation; though his
evidence (allowing for poetical license) may be received on such
matters as come within his own time, or the remembrance of old
men with whom he conversed. The most judicious historians pay no
regard to the Welsh or British traditions delivered by Geoffrey
of Monmouth, though it is not impossible but that some of these
may be true.”

One definition of a mythe given by Plutarch coincides exactly
with a _specious fiction_: Ὁ μῦθος εἶναι βούλεται λόγος ψευδὴς
ἐοικὼς ἀληθινῷ (Plutarch, Bellone an pace clariores fuerunt
Athenienses, p. 348).

“Der Grund-Trieb des Mythus (Creuzer justly expresses it) das
Gedachte in ein Geschehenes umzusetzen.” (Symbolik der Alten
Welt, sect. 43. p. 99.)

In the semi-historical theory respecting Grecian mythical narrative, the critic unconsciously transports into the Homeric age those habits of classification and distinction, and that standard of acceptance or rejection, which he finds current in his own. Amongst us, the distinction between historical fact and fiction is highly valued as well as familiarly understood: we have a long history of the past, deduced from a study of contemporary evidences; and we have a body of fictitious literature, stamped with its own mark and interesting in its own way. Speaking generally, no man could now hope to succeed permanently in transferring any striking incident from the latter category into the former, nor could any man deliberately attempt it without incurring well-merited obloquy. But this _historical sense_, now so deeply rooted in the modern mind that we find a difficulty in conceiving any people to be without it, is the fruit of records and inquiries, first applied to the present, and then preserved and studied by subsequent generations; while in a society which has not yet formed the habit of recording its present, the real facts of the past can never be known; the difference between attested matter of fact and plausible fiction—between truth and that which is like truth—can neither be discerned nor sought for. Yet it is precisely upon the supposition that this distinction is present to men’s habitual thoughts, that the semi-historical theory of the mythes is grounded.

It is perfectly true, as has often been stated, that the Grecian epic contains what are called traditions respecting the past—the larger portion of it, indeed, consists of nothing else. But what are these traditions? They are the matter of those songs and stories which have acquired hold on the public mind; they are the creations of the poets and storytellers themselves, each of whom finds some preëxisting, and adds others of his own, new and previously untold, under the impulse and authority of the inspiring Muse. Homer doubtless found many songs and stories current with respect to the siege of Troy; he received and transmitted some of these traditions, recast and transformed others, and enlarged the whole mass by new creations of his own. To the subsequent poets, such as Arktinus and Leschês, these Homeric creations formed portions of preëxisting tradition, with which they dealt in the same manner; so that the whole mass of traditions constituting the tale of Troy became larger and larger with each successive contributor. To assume a generic difference between the older and the newer strata of tradition—to treat the former as morsels of history, and the latter as appendages of fiction—is an hypothesis gratuitous at the least, not to say inadmissible. For the further we travel back into the past, the more do we recede from the clear day of positive history, and the deeper do we plunge into the unsteady twilight and gorgeous clouds of fancy and feeling. It was one of the agreeable dreams of the Grecian epic, that the man who travelled far enough northward beyond the Rhipæan mountains, would in time reach the delicious country and genial climate of the virtuous Hyperboreans—the votaries and favorites of Apollo, who dwelt in the extreme north beyond the chilling blasts of Boreas. Now the hope that we may, by carrying our researches up the stream of time, exhaust the limits of fiction, and land ultimately upon some points of solid truth, appears to me no less illusory than this northward journey in quest of the Hyperborean elysium.

The general disposition to adopt the semi-historical theory as to the genesis of Grecian mythes, arises in part from reluctance in critics to impute to the mythopœic ages extreme credulity or fraud; together with the usual presumption, that where much is believed some portion of it must be true. There would be some weight in these grounds of reasoning, if the ages under discussion had been supplied with records and accustomed to critical inquiry. But amongst a people unprovided with the former and strangers to the latter, credulity is naturally at its maximum, as well in the narrator himself as in his hearers: the idea of deliberate fraud is moreover inapplicable,[985] for if the hearers are disposed to accept what is related to them as a revelation from the Muse, the _œstrus_ of composition is quite sufficient to impart a similar persuasion to the poet whose mind is penetrated with it. The belief of that day can hardly be said to stand apart by itself as an act of reason. It becomes confounded with vivacious imagination and earnest emotion; and in every case where these mental excitabilities are powerfully acted upon, faith ensues unconsciously and as a matter of course. How active and prominent such tendencies were among the early Greeks, the extraordinary beauty and originality of their epic poetry may teach us.

[985] In reference to the loose statements of the Highlanders,
Dr. Johnson observes, “He that goes into the Highlands with a
mind naturally acquiescent, and a credulity eager for wonders,
may perhaps come back with an opinion very different from mine;
for the inhabitants, knowing the ignorance of all strangers in
their language and antiquities, are perhaps not very scrupulous
adherents to truth; yet I do not say that they deliberately speak
studied falsehood, or have a settled purpose to deceive. They
have acquired and considered little, and do not always feel their
own ignorance. They are not much accustomed to be interrogated
by others, and seem never to have thought of interrogating
themselves; _so that if they do not know what they tell to be
true, they likewise do not distinctly perceive it to be false_.
Mr. Boswell was very diligent in his inquiries, and the result of
his investigations was, that the answer to the second question
was commonly such as nullified the answer to the first.” (Journey
to the Western Islands, p. 272, 1st edit., 1775).

It is, besides, a presumption far too largely and indiscriminately applied, even in our own advanced age, that where much is believed, something must necessarily be true—that accredited fiction is always traceable to some basis of historical truth.[986] The influence of imagination and feeling is not confined simply to the process of retouching, transforming, or magnifying narratives originally founded on fact; it will often create new narratives of its own, without any such preliminary basis. Where there is any general body of sentiment pervading men living in society, whether it be religious or political—love, admiration, or antipathy—all incidents tending to illustrate that sentiment are eagerly welcomed, rapidly circulated and (as a general rule) easily accredited. If real incidents are not at hand, impressive fictions will be provided to satisfy the demand. The perfect harmony of such fictions with the prevalent feeling stands in the place of certifying testimony, and causes men to hear them not merely with credence, but even with delight: to call them in question and require proof, is a task which cannot be undertaken without incurring obloquy. Of such tendencies in the human mind, abundant evidence is furnished by the innumerable religious legends which have acquired currency in various parts of the world, and of which no country was more fertile than Greece—legends which derived their origin, not from special facts misreported and exaggerated, but from pious feelings pervading the society, and translated into narrative by forward and imaginative minds—legends, in which not merely the incidents, but often even the personages are unreal, yet in which the generating sentiment is conspicuously discernible, providing its own matter as well as its own form. Other sentiments also, as well as the religious, provided they be fervent and widely diffused, will find expression in current narrative, and become portions of the general public belief—every celebrated and notorious character is the source of a thousand fictions exemplifying his peculiarities. And if it be true, as I think present observation may show us, that such creative agencies are even now visible and effective, when the materials of genuine history are copious and critically studied—much more are we warranted in concluding that, in ages destitute of records, strangers to historical testimony, and full of belief in divine inspiration both as to the future and as to the past, narratives purely fictitious will acquire ready and uninquiring credence, provided only they be plausible and in harmony with the preconceptions of the auditors.

[986] I considered this position more at large in an article
in the “Westminster Review” for May, 1843, on Niebuhr’s Greek
Legends, with which article much in the present chapter will be
found to coincide.

The allegorical interpretation of the mythes has been by several learned investigators, especially by Creuzer, connected with the hypothesis of an ancient and highly instructed body of priests, having their origin either in Egypt or in the East, and communicating to the rude and barbarous Greeks religious, physical, and historical knowledge under the veil of symbols. At a time (we are told) when language was yet in its infancy, visible symbols were the most vivid means of acting upon the minds of ignorant hearers: the next step was to pass to symbolical language and expressions—for a plain and literal exposition, even if understood at all, would at least have been listened to with indifference, as not corresponding with any mental demand. In such allegorizing way, then, the early priests set forth their doctrines respecting God, nature, and humanity—a refined monotheism and a theological philosophy—and to this purpose the earliest mythes were turned. But another class of mythes, more popular and more captivating, grew up under the hands of the poets—mythes purely epical, and descriptive of real or supposed past events. The allegorical mythes, being taken up by the poets, insensibly became confounded in the same category with the purely narrative mythes—the matter symbolized was no longer thought of, while the symbolizing words came to be construed in their own literal meaning—and the basis of the early allegory, thus lost among the general public, was only preserved as a secret among various religious fraternities, composed of members allied together by initiation in certain mystical ceremonies, and administered by hereditary families of presiding priests. In the Orphic and Bacchic sects, in the Eleusinian and Samothracian mysteries, was thus treasured up the secret doctrine of the old theological and philosophical mythes, which had once constituted the primitive legendary stock of Greece, in the hands of the original priesthood and in ages anterior to Homer. Persons who had gone through the preliminary ceremonies of initiation, were permitted at length to hear, though under strict obligation of secrecy, this ancient religious and cosmogonic doctrine, revealing the destination of man and the certainty of posthumous rewards and punishments—all disengaged from the corruptions of poets, as well as from the symbols and allegories under which they still remained buried in the eyes of the vulgar. The mysteries of Greece were thus traced up to the earliest ages, and represented as the only faithful depository channels of that purer theology and physics which had originally been communicated, though under the unavoidable inconvenience of a symbolical expression, by an enlightened priesthood coming from abroad to the then rude barbarians of the country.[987]

[987] For this general character of the Grecian mysteries, with
their concealed treasure of doctrine, see _Warburton_, Divine
Legation of Moses, book ii. sect. 4.

_Payne Knight_, On the Symbolical Language of ancient Art and
Mythology, sect. 6, 10, 11, 40, etc.

_Saint Croix_, Recherches sur les Mystères du Paganisme, sect. 3,
p. 106; sect. 4, p. 404, etc.

_Creuzer_, Symbolik und Mythologie der Alten Völker, sect. 2,
3, 23, 39, 42, etc. Meiners and Heeren adopt generally the same
view, though there are many divergences of opinion between these
different authors, on a subject essentially obscure. Warburton
maintained that the interior doctrine communicated in the
mysteries was the existence of one Supreme Divinity, combined
with the Euemeristic creed, that the pagan gods had been mere men.

See Clemens Alex. Strom. v. p. 582, Sylb.

The view taken by Hermann of the ancient Greek mythology is
in many points similar to that of Creuzer, though with some
considerable difference. He thinks that it is an aggregate
of doctrine—philosophical, theological, physical, and
moral—expressed under a scheme of systematic personifications,
each person being called by a name significant of the function
personified: this doctrine was imported from the East into
Greece, where the poets, retaining or translating the names, but
forgetting their meaning and connection, distorted the primitive
stories, the sense of which came to be retained only in the
ancient mysteries. That true sense, however, (he thinks,) may be
recovered by a careful analysis of the significant names: and
his two dissertations (De Mythologiâ Græcorum Antiquissimâ, in
the Opuscula, vol. ii.) exhibit a specimen of this systematic
expansion of etymology into narrative. The dissent from Creuzer
is set forth in their published correspondence, especially in his
concluding “Brief an Creuzer über das Wesen und die Behandlung
der Mythologie,” Leipzig, 1819. The following citation from his
Latin dissertation sets forth his general doctrine:—

Hermann, De Mythologiâ Græcorum Antiquissimâ, p. 4 (Opuscula,
vol. ii. p. 171): “Videmus rerum divinarum humanarumque scientiam
ex Asiâ per Lyciam migrantem in Europam: videmus fabulosos
poëtas peregrinam doctrinam, monstruoso tumore orientis sive
exutam, sive nondum indutam, quasi de integro Græcâ specie
procreantes; videmus poëtas, illos, quorum omnium vera nomina
nominibus—ab arte, quâ clarebant, petitis—obliterata sunt,
diu in Thraciâ hærentes, raroque tandem etiam cum aliis
Græciæ partibus commercio junctos: qualis Pamphus, non ipse
Atheniensis, Atheniensibus hymnos Deorum fecit. Videmus denique
retrusam paulatim in mysteriorum secretam illam sapientum
doctrinam, vitiatam religionum perturbatione, corruptam inscitiâ
interpretum, obscuratam levitate amœniora sectantium—adeo ut eam
ne illi quidem intelligerent, qui hæreditariam a prioribus poësin
colentes, quum ingenii præstantiâ omnes præstinguerent, tantâ
illos oblivione merserunt, ut ipsi sint primi auctores omnis
eruditionis habiti.”

Hermann thinks, however, that by pursuing the suggestions of
etymology, vestiges may still be discovered, and something like a
history compiled, of Grecian belief as it stood anterior to Homer
and Hesiod: “Est autem in hac omni ratione judicio maxime opus,
quia non testibus res agitur, sed ad interpretandi solertiam
omnia revocanda sunt” (p. 172). To the same general purpose
the French work of M. Emérie David, Recherches sur le Dieu
Jupiter—reviewed by O. Müller: see the Kleine Schriften of the
latter, vol. ii. p. 82.

Mr. Bryant has also employed a profusion of learning, and
numerous etymological conjectures, to resolve the Greek mythes
into mistakes, perversions, and mutilations, of the exploits and
doctrines of oriental tribes long-lost and by-gone,—Amonians,
Cuthites, Arkites, etc. “It was Noah (he thinks) who was
represented under the different names of Thoth, Hermês, Menês,
Osiris, Zeuth, Atlas, Phorôneus, Promêtheus, to which list a
farther number of great extent might be added: the Νοῦς of
Anaxagoras was in reality the patriarch Noah” (Ant. Mythol. vol.
ii. pp. 253, 272). “The Cuthites or Amonians, descendants of
Noah, settled in Greece from the east, celebrated for their skill
in building and the arts” (_ib._ i. p. 502; ii. p. 187). “The
greatest part of the Grecian theology arose from misconception
and blunders, the stories concerning their gods and heroes were
founded on terms misinterpreted or abused” (_ib._ i. p. 452).
“The number of different actions ascribed to the various Grecian
gods or heroes all relate to one people or family, and are at
bottom one and the same history” (_ib._ ii. p. 57). “The fables
of Promêtheus and Tityus were taken from ancient Amonian temples,
from hieroglyphics misunderstood and badly explained” (i. p.
426): see especially vol. ii. p. 160.

But this theory, though advocated by several learned men, has been shown to be unsupported and erroneous. It implies a mistaken view both of the antiquity and the purport of the mysteries, which cannot be safely carried up even to the age of Hesiod, and which, though imposing and venerable as religious ceremonies, included no recondite or esoteric teaching.[988]

[988] The Anti-Symbolik of Voss, and still more the Aglaophamus
of Lobeck, are full of instruction on the subject of this
supposed interior doctrine, and on the ancient mysteries
in general: the latter treatise, especially, is not less
distinguished for its judicious and circumspect criticism than
for its copious learning.

Mr. Halhed (Preface to the Gentoo Code of Laws, pp. xiii.-xiv.)
has good observations on the vanity of all attempts to allegorize
the Hindu mythology: he observes, with perfect truth, “The
vulgar and illiterate have always understood the mythology of
their country in its literal sense; and there was a time to
every nation, when the highest rank in it was equally vulgar and
illiterate with the lowest.... A Hindu esteems the astonishing
miracles attributed to a Brima, or a Kishen, as facts of the
most indubitable authenticity, and the relation of them as most
strictly historical.”

Compare also Gibbon’s remarks on the allegorizing tendencies of
the later Platonists (Hist. Decl. and Fall, vol. iv. p. 71).

The doctrine, supposed to have been originally symbolized and subsequently overclouded, in the Greek mythes, was in reality first intruded into them by the unconscious fancies of later interpreters. It was one of the various roads which instructed men took to escape from the literal admission of the ancient mythes, and to arrive at some new form of belief, more consonant with their ideas of what the attributes and character of the gods ought to be. It was one of the ways of constituting, by help of the mysteries, a philosophical religion apart from the general public, and of connecting that distinction with the earliest periods of Grecian society. Such a distinction was both avowed and justified among the superior men of the later pagan world. Varro and Scævola distributed theology into three distinct departments,—the mythical or fabulous, the civil, and the physical. The first had its place in the theatre, and was left without any interference to the poets; the second belonged to the city of political community as such,—it comprised the regulation of all the public worship and religious rites, and was consigned altogether to the direction of the magistrate; the third was the privilege of philosophers, but was reserved altogether for private discussion in the schools, apart from the general public.[989] As a member of the city, the philosopher sympathized with the audience in the theatre, and took a devout share in the established ceremonies, nor was he justified in trying what he heard in the one or saw in the other by his own ethical standard. But in the private assemblies of instructed or inquisitive men, he enjoyed the fullest liberty of canvassing every received tenet, and of broaching his own theories unreservedly, respecting the existence and nature of the gods. By these discussions, the activity of the philosophical mind was maintained and truth elicited; but it was such truth as the body of the people ought not to hear, lest their faith in their own established religious worship should be overthrown. In thus distinguishing the civil theology from the fabulous, Varro was enabled to cast upon the poets all the blame of the objectionable points in the popular theology, and to avoid the necessity of pronouncing censure on the magistrates, who (he contended) had made as good a compromise with the settled prejudices of the public as the case permitted.

[989] Varro, ap. Augustin. De Civ. Dei, iv. 27; vi. 5-6. “Dicis
fabulosos Deos accommodatos esse ad theatrum, naturales ad
mundum, civiles ad urbem.” “Varro, de religionibus loquens, multa
esse vera dixit, quæ non modo vulgo scire non sit utile, sed
etiam tametsi falsa sint, aliter existimare populum expediat:
et ideo Græcos teletas et mysteria taciturnitate parietibusque
clausisse” (_ibid._ iv. 31). See Villoison, De Triplici Theologiâ
Commentatio, p. 8; and Lactantius, De Origin. Error. ii. 3. The
doctrine of the Stoic Chrysippus, ap. Etymologicon Magn. v.
Τελεταί—Χρύσιππος δέ φησι, τοὺς περὶ τῶν θείων λόγους εἰκότως
καλεῖσθαι τελετὰς, χρῆναι γὰρ τούτους τελευταίους καὶ ἐπὶ πᾶσι
διδάσκεσθαι, τῆς ψυχῆς ἐχούσης ἕρμα καὶ κεκρατημένης, καὶ πρὸς
τοὺς ἀμυήτους σιωπᾷν δυναμένης· μέγα γὰρ εἶναι τὸ ἆθλον ὑπὲρ θεῶν
ἀκοῦσαί τε ὀρθὰ, καὶ ἐγκρατεῖς γενέσθαι αὐτῶν.

The triple division of Varro is reproduced in Plutarch,
Amatorius, p. 763. τὰ μὲν μύθῳ, τὰ δὲ νόμῳ, τὰ δὲ λόγῳ, πίστιν ἐξ
ἀρχῆς ἔσχηκε· τῆς δ᾽ οὖν περὶ θεῶν δόξης καὶ παντάπασιν ἡγεμόνες
καὶ διδάσκαλοι γεγόνασιν ἡμῖν οἵ τε ποιηταὶ, καὶ οἱ νομοθέται,
καὶ τρίτον, οἱ φιλόσοφοι.

The same conflicting sentiments which led the philosophers to decompose the divine mythes into allegory, impelled the historians to melt down the heroic mythes into something like continuous political history, with a long series of chronology calculated upon the heroic pedigrees. The one process as well as the other was interpretative guesswork, proceeding upon unauthorized assumptions, and without any verifying test or evidence: while it frittered away the characteristic beauty of the mythe into something essentially anti-mythical, it sought to arrive both at history and philosophy by impracticable roads. That the superior men of antiquity should have striven hard to save the dignity of legends which constituted the charm of their literature as well as the substance of the popular religion, we cannot be at all surprised; but it is gratifying to find Plato discussing the subject in a more philosophical spirit. The Platonic Socratês, being asked whether he believed the current Attic fable respecting the abduction of Oreithyia (daughter of Erechtheus) by Boreas, replies, in substance,—“It would not be strange if I disbelieved it, as the clever men do; I might then show my cleverness by saying that a gust of Boreas blew her down from the rocks above while she was at play, and that, having been killed in this manner, she was reported to have been carried off by Boreas. Such speculations are amusing enough, but they belong to men ingenious and busy-minded overmuch, and not greatly to be envied, if it be only for this reason, _that, after having set right one fable, they are under the necessity of applying the same process to a host of others_—Hippocentaurs, Chimæras, Gorgons, Pegasus, and numberless other monsters and incredibilities. A man, who, disbelieving these stories, shall try to find a probable basis for each of them, will display an ill-placed acuteness and take upon himself an endless burden, for which I at least have no leisure: accordingly, I forego such researches, and believe in the current version of the stories.”[990]

[990] Plato, Phædr. c. 7. p. 229:—

PHÆDRUS. Εἶπέ μοι, ὦ Σώκρατες, σὺ τοῦτο τὸ μυθολόγημα πείθει
ἀληθὲς εἶναι;

SOCRATES. Ἀλλ᾽ εἰ ἀπιστοίην, ὥσπερ οἱ σοφοὶ, οὐκ ἂν ἄτοπος εἴην,
εἶτα σοφιζόμενος φαίην αὐτὴν πνεῦμα Βορέου κατὰ τῶν πλησίον
πετρῶν σὺν φαρμακείᾳ παίζουσαν ὦσαι, καὶ οὕτω δὴ τελευτήσασαν
λεχθῆναι ὑπὸ τοῦ Βορέου ἀναρπαστὸν γεγονέναι.... Ἐγὼ δὲ, ὦ
Φαῖδρε, ἄλλως μὲν τὰ τοιαῦτα χαρίεντα ἡγοῦμαι, λίαν δὲ δεινοῦ καὶ
ἐπιπόνου καὶ οὐ πάνυ εὐτυχοῦς ἀνδρὸς, κατ᾽ ἄλλο μὲν οὐδὲν, ὅτι δ᾽
αὐτῷ ἀνάγκη μετὰ τοῦτο τὸ τῶν Ἱπποκενταύρων εἶδος ἐπανορθοῦσθαι,
καὶ αὖθις τὸ τῆς Χιμαίρας. Καὶ ἐπιῤῥεῖ δὲ ὄχλος τοιούτων Γοργόνων
καὶ Πηγάσων, καὶ ἄλλων ἀμηχάνων πλήθη τε καὶ ἀτοπίαι τερατολόγων
τινῶν φύσεων· αἷς εἴ τις ἀπιστῶν προσβιβᾷ κατὰ τὸ εἰκὸς ἕκαστον,
ἅτε ἀγροίκῳ τινὶ σοφίᾳ χρώμενος, πολλῆς αὐτῷ σχολῆς δεήσει. Ἐμοὶ
δὲ πρὸς ταῦτα οὐδαμῶς ἐστι σχολή.... Ὅθεν δὴ χαίρειν ἐάσας ταῦτα,
πειθόμενος δὲ τῷ νομιζομένῳ περὶ αὐτῶν, ὃ νῦν δὴ ἔλεγον, σκοπῶ οὐ
ταῦτα ἀλλ᾽ ἐμαυτὸν, etc.

These remarks of Plato are valuable, not simply because they point out the uselessness of digging for a supposed basis of truth in the mythes, but because they at the same time suggest the true reason for mistrusting all such tentatives. The mythes form a class apart, abundant as well as peculiar: to remove any individual mythe from its own class into that of history or philosophy, by simple conjecture, and without any collateral evidence, is of no advantage, unless you can perform a similar process on the remainder. If the process be trustworthy, it ought to be applied to all; and _e converso_, if it be not applicable to all, it is not trustworthy as applied to any one specially; always assuming no special evidence to be accessible. To detach any individual mythe from the class to which it belongs, is to present it in an erroneous point of view; we have no choice except to admit them as they stand, by putting ourselves approximatively into the frame of mind of those for whom they were destined and to whom they appeared worthy of credit.

If Plato thus discountenances all attempts to transform the mythes by interpretation into history or philosophy, indirectly recognizing the generic difference between them—we find substantially the same view pervading the elaborate precepts in his treatise on the Republic. He there regards the mythes, not as embodying either matter-of-fact or philosophical principle, but as portions of religious and patriotic faith, and instruments of ethical tuition. Instead of allowing the poets to frame them according to the impulses of their own genius, and with a view to immediate popularity, he directs the legislator to provide types of his own for the characters of the gods and heroes, and to suppress all such divine and heroic legends as are not in harmony with these preëstablished canons. In the Platonic system, the mythes are not to be matters of history, nor yet of spontaneous or casual fiction, but of prescribed faith: he supposes that the people will believe, as a thing of course, what the poets circulate, and he therefore directs that the latter shall circulate nothing which does not tend to ennoble and improve the feelings. He conceives the mythes as stories composed to illustrate the general sentiments of the poets and the community, respecting the character and attributes of the gods and heroes, or respecting the social relations, and ethical duties as well as motives of mankind: hence the obligation upon the legislator to prescribe beforehand the types of character which shall be illustrated, and to restrain the poets from following out any opposing fancies. “Let us neither believe ourselves (he exclaims), nor permit any one to circulate, that Thêseus son of Poseidôn and Peirithöus son of Zeus, or any other hero or son of a god, could ever have brought themselves to commit abductions or other enormities such as are now falsely ascribed to them. We must compel the poets to say, either that such persons were not the sons of gods, or that they were not the perpetrators of such misdeeds.”[991]

[991] Plato, Repub. iii. 5. p. 391. The perfect ignorance of
all men respecting the gods, rendered the task of fiction easy
(Plato, Kritias, p. 107).

Most of the mythes which the youth hear and repeat (according to Plato) are false, but some of them are true: the great and prominent mythes which appear in Homer and Hesiod are no less fictions than the rest. But fiction constitutes one of the indispensable instruments of mental training as well as truth; only the legislator must take care that the fiction so employed shall be beneficent and not mischievous.[992] As the mischievous fictions (he says) take their rise from wrong preconceptions respecting the character of the gods and heroes, so the way to correct them is to enforce, by authorized compositions, the adoption of a more correct standard.[993]

[992] Plato, Repub. ii. 16. p. 377. Λόγων δὲ διττὸν εἶδος, τὸ
μὲν ἀληθὲς, ψεῦδος δ᾽ ἕτερον; Ναί. Παιδευτέον δ᾽ ἐν ἀμφοτέροις,
πρότερον δ᾽ ἐν τοῖς ψεύδεσιν· ... Οὐ μανθάνεις, ὅτι πρῶτον τοῖς
παιδίοις μύθους λέγομεν· τοῦτο δέ που ὡς τὸ ὅλον εἰπεῖν ψεῦδος,
ἔνι δὲ καὶ ἀληθῆ.... Πρῶτον ἡμῖν ἐπιστατητέον τοῖς μυθοποιοῖς,
καὶ ὃν μὲν ἂν καλὸν μῦθον ποιήσωσιν, ἐγκριτέον, ὃν δ᾽ ἂν μὴ,
ἀποκριτέον ... ὧν δὲ νῦν λέγουσι, τοὺς πολλοὺς ἐκβλητέον ... οὓς
Ἡσίοδος καὶ Ὅμηρος ἡμῖν ἐλεγέτην, καὶ οἱ ἄλλοι ποιηταί. Οὗτοι
γάρ που μύθους τοῖς ἀνθρώποις ψευδεῖς συντιθέντες ἔλεγόν τε καὶ
λέγουσι. Ποίους δὴ, ἦ δ᾽ ὅς, καὶ τί αὐτῶν μεμφόμενος λέγεις;
Ὅπερ, ἦν δ᾽ ἐγὼ, χρὴ καὶ πρῶτον καὶ μάλιστα μέμφεσθαι, ἄλλως τε
καὶ ἐάν τις μὴ καλῶς ψεύδηται. Τί τοῦτο; Ὅταν τις εἰκάζῃ κακῶς
τῷ λόγῳ περὶ θεῶν τε καὶ ἡρώων, οἷοί εἰσιν, ὥσπερ γραφεὺς μηδὲν
ἐοικότα γράφων οἷς ἂν ὅμοια βουληθῇ γράψαι.

The same train of thought, and the precepts founded upon it, are
followed up through chaps. 17, 18, and 19; compare De Legg. xii.
p. 941.

Instead of recognizing the popular or dramatic theology as
something distinct from the civil (as Varro did), Plato
suppresses the former as a separate department and merges it in
the latter.

[993] Plato, Repub. ii. c. 21. p. 382. Τὸ ἐν τοῖς λόγοις ψεῦδος
πότε καὶ τί χρήσιμον, ὥστε μὴ ἄξιον εἶναι μίσους; Ἆρ᾽ οὐ πρός
τε τοὺς πολεμίους καὶ τῶν καλουμένων φίλων, ὅταν διὰ μανίαν ἤ
τινα ἄνοιαν κακόν τι ἐπιχειρῶσι πράττειν, τότε ἀποτροπῆς ἕνεκα
ὡς φάρμακον χρήσιμον γίγνεται; ~Καὶ ἐν αἷς νῦν δὴ ἐλέγομεν ταῖς
μυθολογίαις, διὰ τὸ μὴ εἰδέναι ὅπῃ τἀληθὲς ἔχει περὶ τῶν παλαιῶν,
ἀφομοιοῦντες τῷ ἀληθεῖ τὸ ψεῦδος~, ὅτι μάλιστα, οὕτω χρήσιμον
ποιοῦμεν;

The comments which Plato has delivered with so much force in his Republic, and the enactments which he deduces from them, are in the main an expansion of that sentiment of condemnation, which he shared with so many other philosophers, towards a large portion of the Homeric and Hesiodic stories.[994] But the manner in which he has set forth this opinion, unfolds to us more clearly the real character of the mythical narratives. They are creations of the productive minds in the community, deduced from the supposed attributes of the gods and heroes: so Plato views them, and in such character he proposes to amend them. The legislator would cause to be prepared a better and truer picture of the foretime, because he would start from truer (that is to say, more creditable) conceptions of the gods and heroes. For Plato rejects the mythes respecting Zeus and Hêrê, or Thêseus and Peirithöus, not from any want of evidence, but because they are unworthy of gods and heroes: he proposes to call forth new mythes, which, though he admits them at the outset to be fiction, he knows will soon be received as true, and supply more valuable lessons of conduct.

[994] The censure which Xenophanês pronounced upon the Homeric
legends has already been noticed: Herakleitus (Diogen. Laërt. ix.
1) and Metrodôrus, the companion and follower of Epicurus, were
not less profuse in their invectives, ἐν γράμμασι τοσούτοις τῷ
ποιητῇ λελοιδόρηται (Plutarch, Non posse suaviter vivi secundum
Epicurum, p. 1086). He even advised persons not to be ashamed
to confess their utter ignorance of Homer, to the extent of not
knowing whether Hectôr was a Greek or a Trojan (Plut. _ib._ p.
1094).