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838 Physical astronomy was both new and accounted impious in the time of the Peloponnesian war: see Plutarch, in his reference to that eclipse which proved so fatal to the Athenian army at Syracuse, in consequence of the religious feelings of Nikias: οὐ γὰρ ἠνείχοντο τοὺς φυσικοὺς καὶ μετεωρολέσχας τότε καλουμένους ὡς, εἰς αἰτίας ἀλόγους καὶ δυνάμεις ἀπρονοήτους καὶ κατηναγκασμένα πάθη διατρίβοντας τὸ θεῖον (Plutarch, Nikias, c. 23, and Periklês, c. 32; Diodôr. xii. 39; Dêmêtr. Phaler. ap. Diogen. Laërt, ix. 9, 1).

“You strange man, Melêtus,” said Socratês, on his trial, to his accuser, “are you seriously affirming that I do not think Hêlios and Selênê to be gods, as the rest of mankind think?” “Certainly not, gentlemen of the Dikastery (this is the reply of Melêtus), Socratês says that the sun is a stone, and the moon earth.” “Why, my dear Melêtus, you think you are preferring an accusation against Anaxagoras! You account these Dikasts so contemptibly ignorant, as not to know that the books of Anaxagoras are full of such doctrines! Is it from me that the youth acquire such teaching, when they may buy the books for a drachma in the theatre, and may thus laugh me to scorn if I pretended to announce such views as my own—not to mention their extreme absurdity?” (ἄλλως τε καὶ οὕτως ἄτοπα ὄντα, Plato, Apolog. Socrat. c. 14. p. 26).

The divinity of Hêlios and Selênê is emphatically set forth by Plato, Legg. x. p. 886-889. He permits physical astronomy only under great restrictions and to a limited extent. Compare Xenoph. Memor. iv. 7, 7; Diogen. Laërt. ii. 8; Plutarch, De Stoicor. Repugnant. c. 40. p. 1053; and Schaubach ad Anaxagoræ Fragmenta, p. 6.

839 Hesiod, Catalog. Fragm. 76. p. 48, ed. Düntzer:—

Ξυναὶ γὰρ τότε δαῖτες ἔσαν ξυνοί τε θόωκει,

Ἀθανάτοις τε θοῖσι καταθνήτοις τ᾽ ἀνθρώποις.

Both the Theogonia and the Works and Days bear testimony to the same general feeling. Even the heroes of Homer suppose a preceding age, the inmates of which were in nearer contact with the gods than they themselves (Odyss. viii. 223; Iliad, v. 304; xii. 382). Compare Catullus, Carm. 64; Epithalam. Peleôs et Thetidos, v. 382-408.

Menander the Rhetor (following generally the steps of Dionys. Hal. Art Rhetor. cap. 1-8) suggests to his fellow-citizens at Alexandria Trôas, proper and complimentary forms to invite a great man to visit their festival of the Sminthia:—ὥσπερ γὰρ Ἀπόλλωνα πολλάκις ἐδέχετο ἡ πόλις τοῖς Σμινθίοις, ἥνικα ἐξῆν θεοὺς προφανῶς ἐπιδημεῖν τοῖς ἀνθρώποις, οὕτω καὶ σὲ ἡ πόλις νῦν προσδέχεται (περὶ Ἐπιδεικτικ. s. iv. c. 14. ap. Walz. Coll. Rhetor, t. ix. p. 304). Menander seems to have been a native of Alexandria Trôas, though Suidas calls him a Laodicean (see Walz. Præf. ad t. ix. p. xv.-xx.; and περὶ Σμινθιακῶν, sect. iv. c. 17). The festival of the Sminthia lasted down to his time, embracing the whole duration of paganism from Homer downwards.

840 P. A. Müller observes justly, in his Saga-Bibliothek, in reference to the Icelandic mythes, “In dem Mythischen wird das Leben der Vorzeit dargestellt, wie es wirklich dem kindlichen Verstande, der jugendlichen Einbildungskraft, und dem vollen Herzen, erscheint.”

(Lange’s Untersuchungen über die Nordische und Deutsche Heldensage, translated from P. A. Müller, Introd. p. 1.)

841 Titus visited the temple of the Paphian Venus in Cyprus, “spectatâ opulentiâ donisque regum, quæque alia lætum antiquitatibus Græcorum genus incertæ vetustati adfingit, de navigatione primum consuluit” (Tacit. Hist. ii. 4-5).

842 Aristotel. Problem. xix. 48. Οἱ δὲ ἡγεμόνες τῶν ἀρχαίων μόνοι ἦσαν ἥρωες· οἱ δὲ λαοὶ ἄνθρωποι. Istros followed this opinion also: but the more common view seems to have considered all who combated at Troy as heroes (see Schol. Iliad, ii. 110; xv. 231), and so Hesiod treats them (Opp. Di. 158).

In reference to the Trojan war, Aristotle says—καθάπερ ἐν τοῖς Ἡρωϊκοῖς περὶ Πριάμου μυθεύεται (Ethic. Nicom. i. 9; compare vii. 1).

843 Generation by a god is treated in the old poems as an act entirely human and physical (ἐμιγη—παρελέξατο); and this was the common opinion in the days of Plato (Plato, Apolog. Socrat. c. 15. p. 15); the hero Astrabakus is father of the Lacedæmonian king Demaratus (Herod. vi. 66). [Herodotus does not believe the story told him at Babylon respecting Belus (i. 182).] Euripidês sometimes expresses disapprobation of the idea (Ion. 350), but Plato passed among a large portion of his admirers for the actual son of Apollo, and his reputed father Aristo on marrying was admonished in a dream to respect the person of his wife Periktionê, then pregnant by Apollo, until after the birth of the child Plato (Plutarch, Quæst. Sympos. p. 717. viii. 1; Diogen. Laërt. iii. 2; Origen, cont. Cels. i. p. 29). Plutarch (in Life of Numa, c. 4; compare Life of Thêseus, 2) discusses the subject, and is inclined to disallow everything beyond mental sympathy and tenderness in a god: Pausanias deals timidly with it, and is not always consistent with himself; while the later rhetors spiritualize it altogether. Meander, περὶ Ἐπιδεικτικῶν, (towards the end of the third century B. C.) prescribes rules for praising a king: you are to praise him for the gens to which he belongs: perhaps you may be able to make out that he really is the son of some god; for many who seem to be from men, are really sent down by God and are emanations from the Supreme Potency—πολλοὶ τὸ μὲν δοκεῖν ἐξ ἀνθρώπων εἰσὶ, τῇ δ᾽ ἀληθείᾳ παρὰ τοῦ θεοῦ καταπέμπονται καὶ εἰσιν ἀπόῤῥοιαι ὄντως τοῦ κρείττονος· καὶ γὰρ Ἡρακλῆς ἐνομίζετο μὲν Ἀμφιτρύωνος, τῇ δὲ ἀληθείᾳ ἦν Διός. Οὕτω καὶ βασιλεὺς ὁ ἡμέτερος το μὲν δοκεῖν ἐξ ἀνθρώπων, τῇ δὲ ἀληθείᾳ τὴν καταβολὴν οὐράνοθεν ἔχει, etc. (Menander ap. Walz. Collect. Rhetor. t. ix. c. i. p. 218). Again—περὶ Σμινθιακῶν—Ζεὺς γένεσιν παιδῶν δημιουργεῖν ἐνενόησε—Ἀπόλλων τὴν Ἀσκληπιοῦ γένεσιν ἐδημιούργησε, p. 322-327; compare Hermogenês, about the story of Apollo and Daphnê, Progymnasm. c. 4; and Julian. Orat. vii. p. 220.

The contrast of the pagan phraseology of this age (Menander had himself composed a hymn of invocation to Apollo—περὶ Ἐγκωμίων, c. 3. t. ix. p. 136, Walz.) with that of Homer is very worthy of notice. In the Hesiodic Catalogue of Women much was said respecting the marriages and amours of the gods, so as to furnish many suggestions, like the love-songs of Sapphô, to the composers of Epithalamic Odes (Menand. ib. sect. iv. c. 6. p. 268).

Menander gives a specimen of a prose hymn fit to be addressed to the Sminthian Apollo (p. 320); the spiritual character of which hymn forms the most pointed contrast with the Homeric hymn to the same god.

We may remark an analogous case in which the Homeric hymn to Apollo is modified by Plutarch. To provide for the establishment of his temple at Delphi, Apollo was described as having himself, in the shape of a dolphin, swam before a Krêtan vessel and guided it to Krissa, where he directed the terrified crew to open the Delphian temple. But Plutarch says that this old statement was not correct: the god had not himself appeared in the shape of a dolphin—he had sent a dolphin expressly to guide the vessel (Plutarch. de Solertiâ Animal. p. 983). See also a contrast between the Homeric Zeus, and the genuine Zeus, (ἀληθινὸς) brought out in Plutarch, Defect. Oracul. c 30. p. 426.

Illicit amours seem in these later times to be ascribed to the δαίμονες: see the singular controversy started among the fictitious pleadings of the ancient rhetors—Νόμου ὄντος, παρθένους καὶ καθαρὰς εἶναι τὰς ἱερείας, ἱερεία τις εὑρέθη ἀτόκιον φέρουσα, καὶ κρίνεται.... Ἀλλ᾽ ἐρεῖ, φασὶ, διὰ τὰς τῶν δαιμόνων ἐπιφοιτήσεις καὶ ἐπιβουλὰς περιτεθεῖσθαι. Καὶ πῶς οὐκ ἀνόητον κομιδῆ τὸ τοιοῦτον; ἔδει γὰρ πρὸς τὸ μὴ ἀφαιρεθῆναι τὴν παρθενίαν φορεῖν τι ἀποτρόπαιον, οὐ μὴν πρὸς τὸ τεκεῖν (Anonymi Scholia ad Hermogen. Στάσεις, ap. Walz. Coll. Rh. t. vii. p. 162).

Apsinês of Gadara, a sophist of the time of Diocletian, pretended to be a son of Pan (see Suidas, v. Ἀψίνης). The anecdote respecting the rivers Skamander and Mæander, in the tenth epistle ascribed to the orator Æschines (p. 737), is curious, but we do not know the date of that epistle.

844 The mental analogy between the early stages of human civilization and the childhood of the individual is forcibly and frequently set forth in the works of Vico. That eminently original thinker dwells upon the poetical and religious susceptibilities as the first to develop themselves in the human mind, and as furnishing not merely connecting threads for the explanation of sensible phænomena, but also aliment for the hopes and fears, and means of socializing influence to men of genius, at a time when reason was yet asleep. He points out the personifying instinct (“istinto d’ animazione”) as the spontaneous philosophy of man, “to make himself the rule of the universe,” and to suppose everywhere a quasi-human agency as the determining cause. He remarks that in an age of fancy and feeling, the conceptions and language of poetry coincide with those of reality and common life, instead of standing apart as a separate vein. These views are repeated frequently (and with some variations of opinion as he grew older) in his Latin work De Uno Universi Juris Principio, as well as in the two successive rédactions of his great Italian work, Scienza Nuova (it must be added that Vico as an expositor is prolix, and does not do justice to his own powers of original thought): I select the following from the second edition of the latter treatise, published by himself in 1744, Della Metafisica Poetica (see vol. v. p. 189 of Ferrari’s edition of his Works, Milan, 1836): “Adunque la sapienza poetica, che fu la prima sapienza della Gentilità, dovette incominciare da una Metafisica, non ragionata ed astratta, qual è questa or degli addottrinati, ma sentita ed immaginata, quale dovett’ essere di tai primi uomini, siccome quelli ch’ erano di niun raziocinio, e tutti robusti sensi e vigorosissime fantasie, come è stato nelle degnità (the Axioms) stabilito. Questa fu la loro propria poesia, la qual in essi fu una facultà loro connaturale, perchè erano di tali sensi e di si fatte fantasie naturalmente forniti, nata da ignoranza di cagioni—la qual fu loro madre di maraviglia di tutte le cose, che quelli ignoranti di tutte le cose fortemente ammiravano. Tal poesia incominciò in essi divina: perchè nello stesso tempo ch’essi immaginavano le cagioni delle cose, che sentivano ed ammiravano, essere Dei, come ora il confermiamo con gli Americani, i quali tutte le cose che superano la loro picciol capacità, dicono esser Dei ... nello stesso tempo, diciamo, alle cose ammirate davano l’essere di sostanze dalla propria lor idea: ch’è appunto la natura dei fanciulli, che osserviamo prendere tra mani cose inanimate, e transtullarsi e favellarvi, come fussero quelle persone vive. In cotal guisa i primi uomini delle nazioni gentili, come fanciulli del nascente gener umano, dalla lor idea creavan essi le cose ... per la loro robusta ignoranza, il facevano in forza d’una corpolentissima fantasia, e perch’ era corpolentissima, il facevano con una maravigliosa sublimità, tal e tanta, che perturbava all’eccesso essi medesimi, che fingendo le si creavano.... Di questa natura di cose umane restò eterna proprietà spiegata con nobil espressione da Tacito, che vanamente gli uomini spaventati fingunt simul creduntque.”

After describing the condition of rude men, terrified with thunder and other vast atmospheric phænomena, Vico proceeds (ib. p. 172)—“In tal caso la natura della mente umana porta ch’ella attribuisca all’effetto la sua natura: e la natura loro era in tale stato d’uomini tutti robuste forze di corpo, che urlando, brontolando, spiegavano le loro violentissime passioni, si finsero il cielo esser un gran corpo animato, che per tal aspetto chiamavano Giove, che col fischio dei fulmini e col fragore dei tuoni volesse lor dire qualche cosa.... E si fanno di tutta la natura un vasto corpo animato, che senta passioni ed affetti.”

Now the contrast with modern habits of thought:—

“Ma siccome ora per la natura delle nostre umane menti troppo ritirata dai sensi nel medesimo volgo—con le tante astrazioni, di quante sono piene le lingue—con tanti vocaboli astratti—e di troppo assottigliata con l’arti dello scrivere, e quasi spiritualezzata con la practica dei numeri—ci e naturalmente niegato di poter formare la vasta imagine di cotal donna che dicono Natura simpatetica, che mentre con la bocca dicono, non hanno nulla in lor mente, perocchè la lor mente è dentro il falso, che è nulla; nè sono soccorsi dalla fantasia a poterne formare una falsa vastissima imagine. Così ora ci è naturalmente niegato di poter entrare nella vasta immaginativa di quei primi uomini, le menti dei quali di nulla erano assottigliate, di nulla astratte, di nulla spiritualezzate.... Onde dicemmo sopra ch’ora appena intender si può, affatto immaginar non sì può, come pensassero i primi uomini che fondarono la umanità gentilesca.”

n this citation (already almost too long for a note) I have omitted several sentences not essential to the general meaning. It places these early divine fables and theological poets (so Vico calls them) in their true point of view, and assigns to them their proper place in the ascending movement of human society: it refers the mythes to an early religious and poetical age, in which feeling and fancy composed the whole fund of the human mind, over and above the powers of sense: the great mental change which has since taken place has robbed us of the power, not merely of believing them as they were originally believed, but even of conceiving completely that which their first inventors intended to express.

The views here given from this distinguished Italian (the precursor of F. A. Wolf in regard to the Homeric poems, as well as of Niebuhr in regard to the Roman history) appear to me no less correct than profound; and the obvious inference from them is, that attempts to explain (as it is commonly called) the mythes (i. e. to translate them into some physical, moral or historical statements, suitable to our order of thought) are, even as guesses, essentially unpromising. Nevertheless Vico, inconsistently with his own general view, bestows great labor and ingenuity in attempting to discover internal meaning symbolized under many of the mythes; and even lays down the position, “che i primi uomini della Gentilità essendo stati semplicissimi, quanto i fanciulli, i quali per natura son veritieri: le prime favole non poterono finger nulla di falso: per lo che dovettero necessariamente essere vere narrazioni.” (See vol. v. p. 194; compare also p. 99, Axiom xvi.) If this position be meant simply to exclude the idea of designed imposture, it may for the most part be admitted; but Vico evidently intends something more. He thinks that there lies hid under the fables a basis of matter of fact—not literal but symbolized—which he draws out and exhibits under the form of a civil history of the divine and heroic times: a confusion of doctrine the more remarkable, since he distinctly tells us (in perfect conformity with the long passage above transcribed from him) that the special matter of these early mythes is “impossibility accredited as truth,”—“che la di lei propria materia è l’impossibile credibile” (p. 176, and still more fully in the first rédaction of the Scienza Nuova, b. iii. c. 4; vol. iv. p. 187 of his Works).

When we read the Canones Mythologici of Vico (De Constantia Philologiæ, Pars Posterior, c. xxx.; vol. iii. p. 363), and his explanation of the legends of the Olympic gods, Hercules, Thêseus, Kadmus, etc., we see clearly that the meaning which he professes to bring out is one previously put in by himself.

There are some just remarks to the same purpose in Karl Ritter’s Vorhalle Europäischer Volkergeschichten, Abschn. ii. p. 150 seq. (Berlin, 1820). He too points out how much the faith of the old world (der Glaube der Vorwelt) has become foreign to our minds, since the recent advances of “Politik und Kritik,” and how impossible it is for us to elicit history from their conceptions by our analysis, in cases where they have not distinctly laid it out for us. The great length of this note prevents me from citing the passage: and he seems to me also (like Vico) to pursue his own particular investigations in forgetfulness of the principle laid down by himself.

845 O. Müller, in his Prolegomena zu einer wissenschaftlichen Mythologie (cap. iv. p. 108), has pointed out the mistake of supposing that there existed originally some nucleus of pure reality as the starting-point of the mythes, and that upon this nucleus fiction was superinduced afterwards: he maintains that the real and the ideal were blended together in the primitive conception of the mythes. Respecting the general state of mind out of which the mythes grew, see especially pages 78 and 110 of that work, which is everywhere full of instruction on the subject of the Grecian mythes, and is eminently suggestive, even where the positions of the author are not completely made out.

The short Heldensage der Griechen by Nitzsch (Kiel, 1842, t. v.) contains more of just and original thought on the subject of the Grecian mythes than any work with which I am acquainted. I embrace completely the subjective point of view in which he regards them; and although I have profited much from reading his short tract, I may mention that before I ever saw it, I had enforced the same reasonings on the subject in an article in the Westminster Review, May 1843, on the Heroen-Geschichten of Niebuhr.

Jacob Grimm, in the preface to his Deutsche Mythologie (p. 1, 1st edit. Gött. 1835), pointedly insists on the distinction between “Sage” and history, as well as upon the fact that the former has its chief root in religious belief “Legend and history (he says) are powers each by itself, adjoining indeed on the confines, but having each its own separate and exclusive ground;” also p. xxvii. of the same introduction.

A view substantially similar is adopted by William Grimm, the other of the two distinguished brothers whose labors have so much elucidated Teutonic philology and antiquities. He examines the extent to which either historical matter of fact or historical names can be traced in the Deutsche Heldensage; and he comes to the conclusion that the former is next to nothing, the latter not considerable. He draws particular attention to the fact, that the audience for whom these poems were intended had not learned to distinguish history from poetry (W. Grimm, Deutsche Heldensage, pp. 8, 337, 342, 345, 399, Gött. 1829).

846 Hesiod, Theogon. 32.—

... ἐνέπνευσαν δέ (the Muses) μοι αὐδὴν

Θείην, ὡς κλείοιμι τά τ᾽ ἐσσόμενα, πρό τ᾽ ἐόντα,

Καί με κέλονθ᾽ ὑμνεῖν μακάρων γένος αἰὲν ἐόντων, etc.

Odyss. xxii. 347; viii. 63, 73, 481, 489. Δημόδοκ᾽ ... ἢ σέ γε Μοῦσ᾽ ἐδίδαξε, Διὸς παῖς, ἢ σέγ᾽ Ἀπόλλων: that is, Demodocus has either been inspired as a poet by the Muse, or as a prophet by Apollo: for the Homeric Apollo is not the god of song. Kalchas the prophet receives his inspiration from Apollo, who confers upon him the same knowledge both of past and future as the Muses give to Hesiod (Iliad, i. 69):—

Κάλχας Θεστορίδης, οἰωνοπόλων ὄχ᾽ ἄριστος

Ὃς ᾔδη τά τ᾽ ἐόντα, τά τ᾽ ἐσσόμενα, πρό τ᾽ ἐόντα

Ἣν διὰ μαντοσύνην, τὴν οἱ πόρε Φοῖβος Ἀπόλλων.

Also Iliad, ii. 485.

Both the μάντις and the ἀοιδὸς are standing, recognized professions (Odyss. xvii. 383), like the physician and the carpenter, δημιόεργοι.

847 Iliad, ii. 599.

848 In this later sense it stands pointedly opposed to ἱστορία, history, which seems originally to have designated matter of fact, present and seen by the describer, or the result of his personal inquiries (see Herodot. i. 1; Verrius Flacc. ap. Aul. Gell. v. 18; Eusebius, Hist. Eccles. iii. 12; and the observations of Dr. Jortin, Remarks on Ecclesiastical History, vol. i. p. 59).

The original use of the word λόγος was the same as that of μῦθος—a current tale, true or false, as the case might be; and the term designating a person much conversant with the old legends (λόγιος) is derived from it (Herod. i. 1; ii. 3). Hekatæus and Herodotus both use λόγος in this sense. Herodotus calls both Æsop and Hekatæus λογοποιοί (ii. 134-143).

Aristotle (Metaphys. i. p. 8, ed. Brandis) seems to use μῦθος in this sense, where he says—διὸ καὶ φιλόμυθος ὁ φιλόσοφος πώς ἐστιν· ὁ γὰρ μῦθος συγκεῖται ἐκ θαυμασίων, etc. In the same treatise (xi. p. 254), he uses it to signify fabulous amplification and transformation of a doctrine true in the main.

849 M. Ampère, in his Histoire Littéraire de la France (ch. viii. v. i. p. 310) distinguishes the Saga (which corresponds as nearly as possible with the Greek μῦθος, λόγος, ἐπιχώριος λόγος), as a special product of the intellect, not capable of being correctly designated either as history, or as fiction, or as philosophy:—

“Il est un pays, la Scandinavie, où la tradition racontée s’est développée plus complètement qu’ailleurs, où ses produits ont été plus soigneusement recueillis et mieux conservés: dans ce pays, ils ont reçu un nom particulier, dont l’équivalent exact ne se trouve pas hors des langues Germaniques: c’est le mot Saga, Sage, ce qu’on dit, ce qu’on raconte,—la tradition orale. Si l’on prend ce mot non dans une acception restreinte, mais dans le sens général où le prenait Niebuhr quand il l’appliquoit, par exemple, aux traditions populaires qui ont pu fournir à Tite Live une portion de son histoire, la Saga doit être comptée parmi les produits spontanés de l’imagination humaine. La Saga a son existence propre comme la poësie, comme l’histoire, comme le roman. Elle n’est pas la poësie, parcequ’elle n’est pas chantée, mais parlée; elle n’est pas l’histoire, parcequ’elle est denuée de critique; elle n’est pas le roman, parcequ’elle est sincère, parcequ’elle a foi à ce qu’elle raconte. Elle n’invente pas, mais répète: elle peut se tromper, mais elle ne ment jamais. Ce récit souvent merveilleux, que personne ne fabrique sciemment, et que tout le monde altère et falsifie sans le vouloir, qui se perpétue à la manière des chants primitifs et populaires,—ce récit, quand il se rapporte non à un héros, mais à un saint, s’appelle une légende.”

850 Herodot. ii. 53.

851 See Plutarch, Perikl. capp. 5, 32, 38; Cicero, De Republ. i. 15-16, ed. Maii.

The phytologist Theophrastus, in his valuable collection of facts respecting vegetable organization, is often under the necessity of opposing his scientific interpretation of curious incidents in the vegetable world to the religious interpretation of them which he found current. Anomalous phænomena in the growth or decay of trees were construed as signs from the gods, and submitted to a prophet for explanation (see Histor. Plantar. ii. 3, iv. 16; v. 3).

We may remark, however, that the old faith had still a certain hold over his mind. In commenting on the story of the willow-tree at Philippi, and the venerable old plane-tree at Antandros (more than sixty feet high, and requiring four men to grasp it round in the girth), having been blown down by a high wind, and afterwards spontaneously resuming their erect posture, he offers some explanations how such a phænomenon might have happened, but he admits, at the end, that there may be something extra-natural in the case, Ἀλλὰ ταῦτα μὲν ἴσως ἔξω φυσικῆς αἰτίας ἔστιν, etc. (De Caus. Plant. v. 4): see a similar miracle in reference to the cedar-tree of Vespasian (Tacit. Hist. ii. 78).

Euripidês, in his lost tragedy called Μελανίππη Σοφὴ, placed in the month of Melanippê a formal discussion and confutation of the whole doctrine of τέρατα, or supernatural indications (Dionys. Halicar. Ars Rhetoric. p. 300-356, Reisk). Compare the Fables of Phædrus, iii. 3; Plutarch, Sept. Sap. Conviv. ch. 3. p. 149; and the curious philosophical explanation by which the learned men of Alexandria tranquillized the alarms of the vulgar, on occasion of the serpent said to have been seen entwined round the head of the crucified Kleomenês (Plutarch, Kleomen. c. 39).

It is one part of the duty of an able physician, according to the Hippocratic treatise called Prognosticon (c. 1. t. ii. p. 112, ed. Littré), when he visits his patient, to examine whether there is anything divine in the malady, ἅμα δὲ καὶ εἴ τι θεῖον ἔνεστιν ἐν τῇσι νούσοισι: this, however, does not agree with the memorable doctrine laid down in the treatise, De Aëre, Locis et Aquis (c. 22. p. 78, ed. Littré), and cited hereafter, in this chapter. Nor does Galen seem to have regarded it as harmonizing with the general views of Hippocratês. In the excellent Prolegomena of M. Littré to his edition of Hippocratês (t. i. p. 76) will be found an inedited scholium, wherein the opinion of Baccheius and other physicians is given, that the affections of the plague were to be looked upon as divine, inasmuch as the disease came from God; and also the opinion of Xenophôn, the friend of Praxagoras, that the “genus of days of crisis” in fever was divine; “For (said Xenophôn) just as the Dioskuri, being gods, appear to the mariner in the storm and bring him salvation, so also do the days of crisis, when they arrive, in fever.” Galen, in commenting upon this doctrine of Xenophôn, says that the author “has expressed his own individual feeling, but has no way set forth the opinion of Hippocratês:” Ὁ δὲ τῶν κρισίμων γένος ἡμερῶν εἰπὼν εἶναι θεῖον, ἑαυτοῦ τι πάθος ὡμολόγησεν· οὐ μὴν Ἱπποκράτους γε τὴν γνώμην ἔδειξεν (Galen, Opp. t. v. p. 120, ed. Basil).

The comparison of the Dioskuri appealed to by Xenophôn is a precise reproduction of their function as described in the Homeric Hymn (Hymn xxxiii. 10): his personification of the “days of crisis” introduces the old religious agency to fill up a gap in his medical science.

I annex an illustration from the Hindoo vein of thought:—“It is a rule with the Hindoos to bury, and not to burn, the bodies of those who die of the small pox: for (say they) the small pox is not only caused by the goddess Davey, but is, in fact, Davey herself; and to burn the body of a person affected with this disease, is, in reality, neither more nor less than to burn the goddess.” (Sleeman, Rambles and Recollections, etc., vol. i. ch. xxv. p. 221.)

852 Horat. de Art. Poet. 79:—

“Archilochum proprio rabies armavit Iambo,” etc.

Compare Epist. i. 19, 23, and Epod. vi. 12; Aristot. Rhetor. iii. 8, 7, and Poetic. c. 4—also Synesius de Somniis—ὥσπερ Ἀλκαῖος καὶ Ἀρχίλοχος, οἳ δεδαπανήκασι τὴν εὐστομίαν εἰς τὸν οἰκεῖον βίον ἑκάτερος (Alcæi Fragment. Halle, 1810, p. 205). Quintilian speaks in striking language of the power of expression manifested by Archilochus (x. 1, 60).

853 Simonidês of Amorgus touches briefly, but in a tone of contempt upon the Trojan war—γυναικὸς οὕνεκ᾽ ἀμφιδηριωμένους (Simonid. Fragm. 8. p. 36. v. 118); he seems to think it absurd that so destructive a struggle should have taken place “pro unâ mulierculâ,” to use the phrase of Mr. Payne Knight.

854 See Quintilian, x. 1, 63. Horat. Od. i. 32; ii. 13. Aristot. Polit. iii. 10, 4. Dionys. Halic. observes (Vett. Scriptt. Censur. v. p. 421) respecting Alkæus—πολλαχοῦ γοῦν τὸ μέτρον εἴ τις περιέλοι, ῥητορικὴν ἂν εὕροι πολιτείαν; and Strabo (xiii. p. 617), τὰ στασιωτικὰ καλούμενα τοῦ Ἀλκαίου ποιήματα.

There was a large dash of sarcasm and homely banter aimed at neighbors and contemporaries in the poetry of Sapphô, apart from her impassioned love-songs—ἄλλως σκώπτει τὸν ἄγροικον νύμφιον καὶ τὸν θυρωρὸν τὸν ἐν τοῖς γάμοις, εὐτελέστατα καὶ ἐν πέζοις ὀνόμασι μᾶλλον ἢ ἐν ποιητικοῖς. Ὥστε αὐτῆς μᾶλλόν ἐστι τὰ ποιήματα ταῦτα διαλέγεσθαι ἢ ἄδειν· οὐδ᾽ ἂν ἅρμοσαι πρὸς τὸν χόρον ἢ πρὸς τὴν λύραν, εἰ μή τις εἴη χόρος διαλεκτικός (Dêmêtr. Phaler, De Interpret. c. 167).

Compare also Herodot. ii. 135, who mentions the satirical talent of Sapphô, employed against her brother for an extravagance about the courtezan Rhodôpis.

855 Solôn, Fragm. iv. 1, ed. Schneidewin:—

Αὐτὸς κήρυξ ἦλθον ἀφ᾽ ἱμερτῆς Σαλαμῖνος

Κόσμον ἐπέων ᾠδὴν ἀντ᾽ ἀγορῆς θέμενος, etc.

See Brandis, Handbuch der Griechischen Philosophie, sect. xxiv.-xxv. Plato states that Solôn, in his old age, engaged in the composition of an epic poem, which he left unfinished, on the subject of the supposed island of Atlantis and Attica (Plato, Timæus, p. 21, and Kritias, p. 113). Plutarch, Solôn, c. 31.

856 Homer, Hymn. ad Apollin. 155; Thucydid. iii. 104.

857 Herodot. i. 163.

858 Herodot. iv. 36. γελῶ δὲ ὁρέων Γῆς περιόδους γράψαντας πολλοὺς ἤδη, καὶ οὐδένα νόον ἔχοντας ἐξηγησάμενον· οἳ Ὠκέανόν τε ῥέοντα γράφουσι πέριξ τὴν γῆν, ἐοῦσαν κυκλοτερέα ὡς ἀπὸ τόρνου, etc., a remark probably directed against Hekatæus.

Respecting the map of Anaximander, Strabo, i. p. 7; Diogen. Laërt. ii. 1; Agathemer ap. Geograph. Minor. i. 1. πρῶτος ἐτόλμησε τὴν οἰκουμένην ἐν πίνακι γράψαι.

Aristagoras of Milêtus, who visited Sparta to solicit aid for the revolted Ionians against Darius, brought with him a brazen tablet or map, by means of which he exhibited the relative position of places in the Persian empire (Herodot. v. 49).

859 Xanthus ap. Strabo. i. p. 50; xii. p. 579. Compare Creuzer, Fragmenta Xanthi, p. 162.

860 Xenophan. ap. Sext. Empiric. adv. Mathemat. ix. 193. Fragm. 1. Poet. Græc. ed. Schneidewin. Diogen. Laërt. ix. 18.

861 Hesiod, Opp. Di. 122; Homer, Hymn. ad Vener. 260.

862 A defence of the primitive faith, on this ground, is found in Plutarch, Quæstion. Sympos. vii. 4, 4, p. 703.

863 Aristotel. Metaphys. i. 3.

864 Plutarch, Placit. Philos. ii. 1; also Stobæus, Eclog. Physic. i. 22, where the difference between the Homeric expressions and those of the subsequent philosophers is seen. Damm, Lexic. Homeric. v. Φύσις; Alexander von Humboldt, Kosmos, p. 76, the note 9 on page 62 of that admirable work.

The title of the treatises of the early philosophers (Melissus, Dêmokritus, Parmenidês, Empedoclês, Alkmæôn, etc.) was frequently Περὶ Φύσεως (Galen. Opp. tom. i. p. 56, ed. Basil).

865 Xenophan. ap. Sext. Empiric. vii. 50; viii. 326.—

Καὶ τὸ μὲν οὖν σαφὲς οὔτις ἀνὴρ ἴδεν, οὔτε τίς ἐστιν

Εἰδὼς ἀμφὶ θεῶν τε καὶ ἅσσα λέγω περὶ πάντων·

Εἰ γὰρ καὶ τὰ μάλιστα τύχοι τετελεσμένον εἰπῶν,

Αὐτος ὅμως οὐκ οἶδε, δόκος δ᾽ ἐπὶ πᾶσι τέτυκται.

Compare Aristotel. De Xenophane, Zenone, et Georgiâ, capp. 1-2.

866 See the treatise of M. Auguste Comte (Cours de Philosophie Positive), and his doctrine of the three successive stages of the human mind in reference to scientific study—the theological, the metaphysical, and the positive;—a doctrine laid down generally in his first lecture (vol. i. p. 4-12), and largely applied and illustrated throughout his instructive work. It is also re-stated and elucidated by Mr. John Stuart Mill, in his System of Logic, Ratiocinative and Inductive, vol. ii. p. 610.

867 “Human wisdom (ἀνθρωπίνη σοφία), as contrasted with the primitive theology (οἱ ἀρχαῖοι καὶ διατρίβοντες περὶ τὰς θεολογίας),” to take the words of Aristotle (Meteorolog. ii. 1. pp. 41-42, ed. Tauchnitz).

868 Xenoph. Memor. i. 1, 6-9. Τὰ μὲν ἀναγκαῖα (Σωκράτης) συνεβούλευε καὶ πράττειν, ὡς ἐνόμιζεν ἄριστ᾽ ἂν πραχθῆναι· περὶ δὲ τῶν ἀδήλων ὅπως ἀποβήσοιτο, μαντευσομένους ἔπεμπεν, εἰ ποιητέα. Καὶ τοὺς μέλλοντας οἴκους τε καὶ πόλεις καλῶς οἰκήσειν μαντικῆς ἔφη προσδεῖσθαι· τεκτονικὸν μὲν γὰρ ἢ χαλκευτικὸν ἢ γεωργικὸν ἢ ἀνθρώπων ἀρχικὸν, ἢ τῶν τοιούτων ἔργων ἐξεταστικὸν, ἢ λογιστικὸν, ἢ οἰκονομικὸν, ἢ στρατηγικὸν γενέσθαι, πάντα τὰ τοιαῦτα, μαθήματα καὶ ἀνθρώπου γνώμῃ αἱρετέα, ἐνόμιζεν εἶναι· τὰ δὲ μέγιστα τῶν ἐν τούτοις ἔφη τοὺς θεοὺς ἑαυτοῖς καταλείπεσθαι, ὧν οὐδὲν δῆλον εἶναι τοῖς ἀνθρώποις.... Τοὺς δὲ μηδὲν τῶν τοιούτων οἰομένους εἶναι δαιμόνιον, ἀλλὰ πάντα τῆς ἀνθρωπίνης γνώμης, δαιμονᾷν ἔφη· δαιμονᾷν δὲ καὶ τοὺς μαντευομένους ἃ τοῖς ἀνθρώποις ἔδωκαν οἱ θεοὶ μαθοῦσι διακρίνειν.... Ἔφη δὲ δεῖν, ἃ μὲν μαθόντας ποιεῖν ἔδωκαν οἱ θεοὶ, μανθάνειν· ἃ δὲ μὴ δῆλα τοῖς ἀνθρώποις ἔστι, πειρᾶσθαι διὰ μαντικῆς παρὰ τῶν θεῶν πυνθάνεσθαι· τοὺς θεοὺς γὰρ, οἷς ἂν ὦσιν ἵλεῳ, σημαίνειν. Compare also Memorab. iv. 7. 7; and Cyropæd. i. 6, 3, 23-46.

Physical and astronomical phænomena are classified by Socratês among the divine class, interdicted to human study (Memor. i. 1,13): τὰ θεῖα or δαιμόνια as supposed to τἀνθρώπεια. Plato (Phileb. c. 16; Legg. x. p. 886-889; xii. p. 967) held the sun and stars to be gods, each animated with its special soul: he allowed astronomical investigation to the extent necessary for avoiding blasphemy respecting these beings—μέχρι τοῦ μὴ βλασφημεῖν περὶ αὐτά (vii. 821).

869 Hippocratês, De Aëre, Locis et Aquis, c. 22 (p. 78, ed. Littré, sect. 106 ed. Petersen): Ἔτι τε πρὸς τουτέοισι εὐνούχιαι γίγνονται οἱ πλεῖστοι ἐν Σκύθῃσι, καὶ γυναικηΐα ἐργάζονται καὶ ὡς αἱ γυναῖκες διαλέγονταί τε ὁμοίως· καλεῦνταί τε οἱ τοιοῦτοι ἀνανδριεῖς. Οἱ μὲν οὖν ἐπιχώριοι τὴν αἰτίην προστιθέασι θεῷ καὶ σέβονται τουτέους τοὺς ἀνθρώπους καὶ προσκυνέουσι, δεδοικότες περὶ ἑωϋτέων ἕκαστοι. Ἐμοὶ δὲ καὶ αὐτέῳ δοκέει ταῦτα τὰ πάθεα θεῖα εἶναι, καὶ τἄλλα πάντα, καὶ οὐδὲν ἕτερον ἑτέρου θειότερον οὐδὲ ἀνθρωπινώτερον, ἀλλὰ πάντα θεῖα· ἕκαστον δὲ ἔχει φύσιν τῶν τοιουτέων, καὶ οὐδὲν ἄνευ φύσιος γίγνεται. Καὶ τοῦτο τὸ πάθος, ὥς μοι δοκέει γίγνεσθαι, φράσω, etc.

Again, sect. 112. Ἀλλὰ γὰρ, ὥσπερ καὶ πρότερον ἔλεξα, θεῖα μὲν καὶ ταῦτά ἐστι ὁμοίως τοῖσι ἄλλοισι, γίγνεται δὲ κατὰ φύσιν ἕκαστα.

Compare the remarkable treatise of Hippocratês, De Morbo Sacro, capp. 1 and 18, vol. vi. p. 352-394, ed. Littré. See this opinion of Hippocratês illustrated by the doctrines of some physical philosophers stated in Aristotle, Physic. ii. 8. ὥσπερ ὕει ὁ Ζεὺς, οὐχ ὅπως τὸν σῖτον αὐξήσῃ, ἀλλ᾽ ἐξ ἀνάγκης, etc. Some valuable observations on the method of Hippocratês are also found in Plato, Phædr. p. 270.

870 See the graphic picture in Plato, Phædon. p. 97-98 (cap. 46-47): compare Plato, Legg. xii. p. 967; Aristotel. Metaphysic. i. p. 13-14 (ed. Brandis); Plutarch, Defect. Oracul. p. 435.

Simplicius, Commentar. in Aristotel. Physic. p. 38. καὶ ὅπερ δὲ ὁ ἐν Φαίδωνι Σωκράτης ἐγκαλεῖ τῷ Ἀναξαγόρᾳ, τὸ ἐν ταῖς τῶν κατὰ μέρος αἰτιολογίαις μὴ τῷ νῷ κεχρῆσθαι, ἀλλὰ ταῖς ὑλικαῖς ἀποδόσεσιν, οἰκεῖον ἦν τῇ φυσιολογίᾳ. Anaxagoras thought that the superior intelligence of men, as compared with other animals, arose from his possession of hands (Aristot. de Part. Animal. iv. 10. p. 687, ed. Bekk.).

871 Xenophôn, Memorab. iv. 7. Socratês said, καὶ παραφρονῆσαι τὸν ταῦτα μεριμνῶντα οὐδὲν ἧττον ἢ Ἀναξαγόρας παρεφρόνησεν, ὁ μέγιστον φρονήσας ἐπὶ τῷ τὰς τῶν θεῶν μηχανὰς ἐξηγεῖσθαι, etc. Compare Schaubach, Anaxagoræ Fragment. p. 50-141; Plutarch, Nikias, 23, and Periklês, 6-32; Diogen. Laërt. ii. 10-14.

The Ionic philosophy, from which Anaxagoras receded more in language than in spirit, seems to have been the least popular of all the schools, though some of the commentators treat it as conformable to vulgar opinion, because it confined itself for the most part to phænomenal explanations, and did not recognize the noumena of Plato, or the τὸ ἓν νοητὸν of Parmenidês,—“qualis fuit Ionicorum, quæ tum dominabatur, ratio, vulgari opinione et communi sensu comprobata” (Karsten, Parmenidis Fragment, De Parmenidis Philosophiâ, p. 154). This is a mistake: the Ionic philosophers, who constantly searched for and insisted upon physical laws, came more directly into conflict with the sentiment of the multitude than the Eleatic school.

The larger atmospheric phænomena were connected in the most intimate manner with Grecian religious feeling and uneasiness (see Demokritus ap. Sect. Empiric. ix. sect. 19-24. p. 552-554, Fabric.): the attempts of Anaxagoras and Demokritus to explain them were more displeasing to the public than the Platonic speculations (Demokritus ap. Aristot. Meteorol. ii. 7; Stobæus, Eclog. Physic. p. 594: compare Mullach, Democriti Fragmenta, lib. iv. p. 394).