It is particularly suitable in this place to notice the events which
took place at Delphi upon occasion of the memorable invasion of Xerxes
into Greece. This was indeed a critical moment for the heathen
mythology. The Persians were pointed and express in their hostility
against the altars and the temples of the Greeks. It was no sooner
known that the straits of Thermopylae had been forced, than the priests
consulted the God, as to whether they should bury the treasures of the
temple, so to secure them against the sacrilege of the invader. The
answer of the oracle was: "Let nothing be moved; the God is sufficient
for the protection of his rights." The inhabitants therefore of the
neighbourhood withdrew: only sixty men and the priest remained. The
Persians in the mean time approached. Previously to this however, the
sacred arms which were placed in the temple, were seen to be moved by
invisible hands, and deposited on the declivity which was on the
outside of the building. The invaders no sooner shewed themselves,
than a miraculous storm of thunder and lightning rebounded and flashed
among the multiplied hills which surrounded the sacred area, and
struck terror into all hearts. Two vast fragments were detached from
the top of mount Parnassus, and crushed hundreds in their fall. A
voice of warlike acclamation issued from within the walls. Dismay
seized the Persian troops. The Delphians then, rushing from their
caverns, and descending from the summits, attacked them with great
slaughter. Two persons, exceeding all human stature, and that were
said to be the demigods whose fanes were erected near the temple of
Apollo, joined in the pursuit, and extended the slaughter. [94] It has
been said that the situation of the place was particularly adapted to
this mode of defence. Surrounded and almost overhung with lofty
mountain-summits, the area of the city was inclosed within crags and
precipices. No way led to it but through defiles, narrow and steep,
shadowed with wood, and commanded at every step by fastnesses from
above. In such a position artificial fires and explosion might imitate
a thunder storm. Great pains had been taken, to represent the place as
altogether abandoned; and therefore the detachment of rocks from the
top of mount Parnassus, though effected by human hands, might appear
altogether supernatural.
Nothing can more forcibly illustrate the strength of the religious
feeling among the Greeks, than the language of the Athenian government
at the time of the second descent of the Persian armament upon their
territory, when they were again compelled to abandon their houses and
land to the invader. Mardonius said to them: "I am thus commissioned
by the king of Persia, he will release and give back to you your
country; he invites you to choose a further territory, whatever you
may think desirable, which he will guarantee to you to govern as you
shall judge fit. He will rebuild for you, without its costing you
either money or labour, the temples which in his former incursion he
destroyed with fire. It is in vain for you to oppose him by force, for
his armies are innumerable." To which the Athenians replied, "As long
as the sun pursues his course in the heavens, so long will we resist
the Persian invader." Then turning to the Spartan ambassadors who were
sent to encourage and animate them to persist, they added, "It is but
natural that your employers should apprehend that we might give way
and be discouraged. But there is no sum of money so vast, and no
region so inviting and fertile, that could buy us to concur in the
enslaving of Greece. Many and resistless are the causes which induce
us to this resolve. First and chiefest, the temples and images of the
Gods, which Xerxes has burned and laid in ruins, and which we are
called upon to avenge to the utmost, instead of forming a league with
him who made this devastation. Secondly, the consideration of the
Grecian race, the same with us in blood and in speech, the same in
religion and manners, and whose cause we will never betray. Know
therefore now, if you knew not before, that, as long as a single
Athenian survives, we will never swerve from the hostility to Persia
to which we have devoted ourselves."
Contemplating this magnanimous resolution, it is in vain for us to
reflect on the absurdity, incongruity and frivolousness, as we
apprehend it, of the pagan worship, inasmuch as we find, whatever we
may think of its demerits, that the most heroic people that ever
existed on earth, in the hour of their direst calamity, regarded a
zealous and fervent adherence to that religion as the most sacred of
all duties. [95]