The Classification of Gods and Goddesses--Primeval
Parent Chaos--Creation--Influence of Ether--The Human
Race in danger of Perishing--Celestial Fire--Birth of
Cupid--Banishment of Cupid from the Blest
Abodes--Cupid's Armour--Fate--Eternal Decrees--Throne
of Jove--Fortune and Happiness--Misfortune and
Misery--Twofold Nature--Rewards and Punishments--First
Man and Woman--Pan the Emblem of all Things--Power of
Heathen Gods--Descriptions of Juno--Venus the Goddess
of Love and Beauty--Rustics turned into
Frogs--Vulcan--AEolus--Momus the Jester--The Carping
God's Fault-finding--Improper Position of the Bull's
Horns--Minerva as a House--Window in Man's Breast.
We do not intend to notice at great length the ancient opinions and
writings concerning the deities which heathen nations thought presided
over the world and the heavens, and influenced the affairs of the
spheres above and below; but as much of comparatively modern
superstition has been traced to mythology, generally so called, we
cannot pass without observation the history of the gods, nor avoid
giving such extracts therefrom as bear particularly on our subject,
"The Collected Mysteries of all Nations."
The gods and goddesses of heathen nations were classified as
follows:--1st, the celestial gods and goddesses; 2nd, the terrestrial
deities; 3rd, the marine and river gods and goddesses; 4th, the
infernal gods; 5th, the subordinate and miscellaneous deities; 6th,
the ascriptious gods, demigods, and heroes; and 7th, the modal
deities. Ancient writers speak thus:
"When the primeval parent Chaos, hoary with unnumbered ages, was first
moved by the breath of Erebus, she brought forth her enormous
first-born Hyle, and at the same portentous birth the amiable almighty
Eros, chief of the immortals. They had no sooner come to light than
they produced the terrible Titans."
Again we are informed that--"Ere the universe appeared; ere the sun
mounted on high, or the moon gave her pale light; ere the vales were
stretched out below, or the mountains reared their towering heads; ere
the winds began to blow, or the rivers to flow, or plants or trees had
sprung from the earth; while the heavens lay hid in the mighty mass,
and the stars were unknown, the various parts of which the wondrous
creation consists lay jumbled without form in the Abyss of Being."
There, it is said, they had lain for ever and ever if the breath of
the terrible Erebus, the spirit that dwelt in eternal darkness, had
not gone forth and put the mass into vital agitation.
From another source we learn that, first of all, Chaos existed; next
in order the broad Earth; and then Love appeared, the most beautiful
of all things. Of Chaos sprang Erebus and dusty Night, and of Erebus
and Night came Ether and smiling Day.
The Earth conceived by the influence of Ether, and brought forth man
and every description of animal. The human race was in danger of
perishing from the face of earth. Naked, needy, and ignorant, they
passed their dreary days, living in caves and lurking in woods like
wild beasts. They were alike destitute of laws and arts. Their food
consisted of herbs. Often were they compelled to fly before the
mountain tigers and bears of the forest, while they were nearly frozen
to death. Thus they lived in wretchedness until Prometheus came to
their relief. He called Pallas, the goddess of wisdom, to his aid. By
her assistance he mounted to heaven, where he secretly held the reed
he carried in his hand to the wheel of the sun's chariot. In this way
he obtained the celestial fire, and conveyed it to Earth, where he
presented it to man. Prometheus did not stop here: he instructed man
in arts and industry of almost every description.
There is an interesting account of Cupid. The goddess of beauty, we
are informed, brought forth a delicate infant, whom she gave to the
Graces to nurse. Unhappily, the child neither throve in person, nor
put forth feathers to cover the wings which he had. Under this
affliction, Cupid's mother and nurses had recourse to the most ancient
and infallible Themis, who gave this answer: That love came, for the
most part, single into the world, but that the child would not thrive
until his mother brought forth another son. Then the one would thrive
in virtue of the other; but if the one died, the other could not long
survive. Venus brought forth another son, Anteros. He no sooner came
into being, than his elder brother Cupid grew, and his wings were soon
fledged. So strong did the little urchin become, that he flew to
heaven. There he associated with the Muses, became intimate with
Mercury, kept company with Hymen, and grew in favour with every one
except the implacable Momus. Unfortunately, Cupid became insolent and
vain, behaving with arrogance to the superior powers. He made enmity
reign where peace and concord should have been found. Feuds raged
among the gods and goddesses on his account. To rid themselves of a
pest, the rulers of heaven called an assembly of the gods, to consider
how peace could be restored. Cupid was accused of being a public
incendiary, a disturber of good order; and the fomenter of discord
being found guilty, he was banished from the blest abodes; ordered to
be a retainer of Ceres and Bacchus on earth; and doomed to have his
wings stripped of their feathers, that he might not again infest the
confines of heaven.
Cupid is now armed with two bows, one of which he bends with the aid
of the Graces, to secure a happy smiling lot, and he with the other,
blind-folded, lets fly his arrows, to the confusion and misery of many
in life. Like his mother, he is constantly in want. He is eager,
ravenous, and wandering about bare-footed, without home or habitation,
sleeping before doors or by the wayside, under the open sky. But at
the same time he is ever forming designs upon all that is beautiful,
is forward, cunning, and fond of new tricks.
Fate mysteriously clings round this earth, the heavens, and the
creatures in the regions above and below. When Jupiter heard of the
death of his son Sarpedon, in great grief he called on Mercury to go
instantly to the Fates, and bring from them the strong box in which
the eternal decrees are laid up. Mercury went to the Fatal Sisters,
and delivered his message. The Sisters smiled, and told him that the
other end of the golden chain which secured the box with the
unalterable decrees was so fixed to the throne of Jove, that were it
to be unfastened, the master's seat itself might be shaken.
Jupiter holds in his hands the unerring balance of fate. Close to his
throne stand the two inexhaustible urns--the one filled with good
fortune and happiness, the other with misfortune and misery. Out of
these is mixed a dose of life to every mortal man; and as the draught
is, so are one's days embittered with disasters, or made pleasant with
serenity, ease, and prosperity. To every star is allotted a mind, and
all things have their fixed irrevocable laws. The human nature is
twofold; and man, who lives well on earth, returns after death to the
habitations of his congenial star, and there leads a blessed life;
but, failing in his duties, he is doomed to live a thousand years in
a degraded state. Sometimes a human soul is destined to animate a
wild beast, never to be relieved until it reattain the purest of its
first and best existence.
The Goths and Vandals entertained the opinion that the first man and
woman were made of an ash-tree. Odin, it is said, gave them breath,
Hener endowed them with reason, and Lodur injected blood into their
veins, and provided them with beautiful faces.
Pan has been represented as the emblem of all things, and among the
learned of early times he passed for the first and oldest of the
divinities. His person is composed of various and opposite parts--a
man and a goat. According to the most ancient Egyptians and Greeks, he
had neither father nor mother, but sprang of Demogorgon at the same
instant with the Fatal Sisters, the Parcae.
The power of the heathen gods and goddesses is reported as truly
wonderful. Apollo turned Daphne, whom he loved, into a laurel, and his
boy Hyacinth into a violet. Mars was the son of Jupiter and Juno, or,
according to Ovid, of Juno alone, who conceived him at the smell of a
flower shown her by the goddess Flora.
Juno is esteemed the goddess of kingdoms and riches. She is
represented as a majestic beautiful woman, riding in a golden chariot
drawn by peacocks, waving a sceptre in her hand, and wearing a crown
set about with roses and lilies, and encircled with fair Iris, or the
rainbow. She is also supposed to preside over matrimony and births,
and is the guardian angel of woman.
Venus is the goddess of love and beauty; she sprang from the foam of
the sea. As soon as she was born she was cast upon the island of
Cyprus, where she was educated, and afterwards being carried to
heaven, was married to Vulcan. Her image is fair and beautiful; she is
clothed with purple, glittering with diamonds. There are two Cupids on
her side, while around her are the Graces. Her chariot is of ivory,
drawn by swans, doves, or swallows.
Whilst Latona was wandering through the fields of Lycia, she desired
to drink from a spring at the bottom of a valley, but the country
rustics drove her away. In spite of her entreaties, they refused to
allow her to slake her thirst, whereupon, in wrath, she, cursing them,
said, "May ye always live in this water!" Immediately they were turned
into frogs, and leaped into the streams and pools, where they
continued to exist.
Vulcan, notwithstanding his noble descent, is obliged to follow the
trade of a blacksmith. On account of his deformity, he was cast down
from heaven into the isle of Lemnos. His leg was broken by the fall.
He erected a forge, where he makes thunderbolts for his father Jupiter
and armour for the other gods. His servants are called Cyclops,
because they have but one eye. Though Vulcan is unpleasant in the
sight of others, Venus thinks him the most beautiful of all the
divinities.
AEolus keeps the winds under his power in a cave in the AEolian Islands,
where he dwells. He can raise storms and hurricanes, and restrain
their rage at pleasure.
Momus is a jester, mocker, or mimic. His life is spent in idleness,
merely observing the sayings and doings of the gods, and then
censuring and deriding them. For instance, when Neptune was made a
bull, Minerva a house, and Vulcan a man, Momus was appointed to judge
as to whom the greatest skill was manifested in creation. The carping
god disapproved of all. He found fault with the bull for not having
his horns before his eyes in his forehead, that he might be enabled to
push the surer. He condemned the house, because it was fixed and could
not be carried away in case it was placed in a bad neighbourhood. But
the god, he said, who made man, was most imprudent because he did not
make a window in the human breast, that the thoughts might be seen.