When first the gods their fatal strife began,
And insurrection raged in heaven, some striving
To cast old Kronos from his heavy throne
That Jove might reign, and others to crush i' the bud
His swelling mastery--I wise counsel gave
To the Titans, sons of primal Heaven and Earth;
But gave in vain.
Thus baffled in my plans, I deemed it best,
As things then were, leagued with my mother Themis,
To accept Jove's proffered friendship. By my counsels.
From his primeval throne was Kronos hurled
Into the pit Tartarean, dark, profound,
With all his troop of friends.
Soon as he sat on his ancestral throne
He called the gods together, and assigned
To each his fair allotment and his sphere
Of sway; but, ah! for wretched man!
To him no portion fell: Jove vowed
To blot his memory from the Earth, and mould
The race anew. I only of the gods
Thwarted his will; and, but for my strong aid,
Hades had whelmed, and hopeless ruin swamped
All men that breathe. Such were my crimes:
* * * * *
And here I lie, in cunning torment stretched,
A spectacle inglorious to Jove.
Presently Ocean appears, and advises Prometheus to yield. Prometheus
scornfully refuses, and Ocean, fearful of being found in bad company,
prudently retires, whereupon, after a mournful hymn from the chorus,
reciting the sympathy of all nations and things with Prometheus, he
proceeds to relate in detail his ministry in behalf of mankind. The
account which he gives of the primal condition of the human race is
very instructive upon our present research, as embodying, or rather as
unconsciously revealing, the complete unconsciousness of
personality--of what we call personality--among Aeschylus and his
contemporaries.
Prometheus begins by calling the whole human race at that time a babe,
and goes on to declare that
... Having eyes to see, they saw not,
And hearing, heard not, but, like dreaming phantoms,
A random life they led from year to year,
All blindly floundering on. No craft they knew
--to build--
But in the dark earth burrowed....
Numbers too I taught them ... and how
To fix their shifting thoughts by marshalled signs.
He brings the ox, the ass, and the horse into service, launches the
first boat on the sea, teaches medicine, institutes divination, and
finally
... I probed the earth
To yield its hidden wealth ...
Iron, copper, silver, gold; ...
And thus, with one short word to sum the tale,
Prometheus taught all arts to mortal men.