Heathen mythology, Illustrated by extracts from the most celebrated writers, both ancient and modern
present from above,
And such the will of cloud compelling Jove:
And now unnumbered woes o'er mortals reign
Alike infected is the land and main;
O'er human race distempers silent stray,
And multiply their strength by night and day!
'Twas Jove's decree they should in silence rove,
For who is able to contend with Jove?"
Hesiod.
When the box was opened, there issued from it a multitude of evils and distempers, which dispersed themselves over the world, and which from that fatal moment have never ceased to afflict the human race. Hope alone remained at the bottom, and that only has the power of easing the labours of man, and rendering his troubles less painful.
"But thou, oh! Hope, with eyes so fair,
What was thy delighted measure?
Still it whispered promised pleasure,
And bade the lovely scenes at distance hail!
Still would her touch the strain prolong,
And from the rocks, the woods, the vale,
She called on Echo still throughout the song;
And where her sweetest theme she chose
A soft responsive voice was heard at every close,
And Hope, enchanted, smiled and waved her golden hair!"
Collins.
———
"Hope sets the stamp of vanity on all,
That men have deemed substantial since the fall,
Yet has the wondrous virtue to educe,
From emptiness itself, a real use;
And while she takes, as at a father's hand,
What health and sober appetite demand,
From fading good derives with chemic art
That lasting happiness, a thankful heart.
Hope with uplifted foot set free from earth
Pants for the place of her ethereal birth;
Hope, as an anchor firm and sure, holds fast
The Christian vessel, and defies the blast.
Hope! nothing else can nourish and secure
His new born virtue, and preserve him pure.
Hope! let the wretch once conscious of the joy,
Whom now despairing agonies destroy,
Speak, for he can, and none so well as he,
What treasures centre, what delights in thee.
Had he the gems, the spices, and the land
That boasts the treasure, all at his command,
The fragrant grove, th' inestimable mine,
Were light when weighed against one smile of thine."
Cowper.
After this commenced the age of steel, when even Jupiter abandoned himself to the fiery passions of love, jealousy, and vengeance.
—————"Hard steel succeeded then:
And stubborn as the metal were the men.
Truth, modesty, and shame the world forsook;
Fraud, avarice, and force, their places took.
Then sails were spread to every wind that blew,
Raw were the sailors, and the depths were new;
Trees, rudely hollowed, did the waves sustain,
Ere ships in triumph, ploughed the watery plain.
Then landmarks limited to each his right;
For all before was common as the light:
Nor was the ground alone required to bear
Her annual income to the crooked share,
But greedy mortals rummaging her store,
Dug from her entrails first the precious ore,
Which next to hell the prudent Gods had laid,
And that alluring ill to sight displayed.
Thus cursed steel, and more accursed gold,
Gave mischief birth, and made the mischief bold,
And double did wretched man invade,
By steel assaulted, and by gold betrayed.
Now (brandished weapons glittering in their hands)
Mankind is broken loose from moral bands:
No right of hospitality remain;
The guest, by him who harboured him, is slain.
The son-in-law pursues the father's life,
The wife her husband murders, he the wife;
The step-dame poison for the son prepares;
The son inquires into his father's years.
Faith flies, and piety in exile mourns;
And justice, here opprest, to heaven returns."
Ovid.
He was enamoured of Antiope, Alcmena, Danae, Leda, Semele, Europa, Calista, and a crowd of other goddesses and mortals.
The principal names given to Jupiter are the Thunderer, the Avenger, the God of Day, the God of the Worlds, and lastly of Olympus, in which he dwelt, and on which poets and painters have exercised their imaginations.
The figures of Jupiter have varied according to the circumstances and the times in which they have appeared. He has been represented as a swan, a bull, a shower of gold, and as a cuckoo: but Homer appears to have inspired ideas of the most noble kinds to the sculptors of antiquity. The divine poet represents the King of Gods seated on a golden throne, at the feet of which are two cups, containing the principle of good and evil. His brow laden with dark clouds; his eyes darting lightning from beneath their lids; and his chin covered with a majestic beard. In one hand the sceptre, in the other a thunderbolt. The virtues are at his side: at his feet the eagle who bears the thunderbolt. One frown from his eyes makes the whole earth tremble.
The Olympian games in Greece were instituted in honour of this God, from those celebrated at Olympus. The following, perhaps the finest description we have of Jupiter, while granting the prayer of Achilles, is from Homer's Iliad.
"Twelve days were passed, and now the dawning light,
The Gods had summoned to the Olympian height.
Jove first ascending from the watery bowers,
Leads the long order of ethereal powers.
When like the morning mist in early days,
Rose from the flood the daughter of the seas;
And to the seats divine her flight addressed.
There far apart, and high above the rest
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