Page:History of Greece Vol I.djvu/380

 348 HISTORY OF GREECE. give suitable utterance to this general sentiment, to furni< body and movement and detail to these divine and heroic prr- existences, which were conceived only in shadowy outline, U lighten up the dreams of what the past must have been, 1 in the minds of those who knew not what it really had been such was the spontaneous aim and inspiration of productive genius in the community, and such were the purposes which the Grecian mythes preeminently accomplished. The love of antiquities, which Tacitus notices as so prevalent among the Greeks of his day, 2 was one of the earliest, the most durable, and the most widely diffused of the national propensi- ties. But the antiquities of every state were divine and heroic, reproducing the lineaments, but disregarding the measure and limits, of ordinary humanity. The gods formed the starting-point, beyond which no man thought of looking, though some gods were more ancient than others : their progeny, the heroes, many of them sprung from human mothers, constitute an intermediate link between god and man. The ancient epic usually recognizes the presence of a multitude of nameless men, but they are intro- duced chiefly for the purpose of filling the scene, and of executing the orders, celebrating the valor, and bringing out the personality, of a few divine or heroic characters. 3 It was the glory of bards and storytellers to be able to satisfy those religious and patriotic predispositions of the public, which caused the primary demand 1 P. A. Miiller observes justly, in his Saga-Bibtiathek, in reference to the Icelandic mythes, " In dem Mythischen wird das Leben der Vorzeit darges- tellt, wie es wirklich dem kindlichen Verstande, der jugcndlichen Einbildung- skraft, und dem vollen Herzen, erscheint." (Xange's Untcrsuchungen iiber die Nordische und Deutsche Heldensage, translated from P. A. Mtiller, Introd. p. 1.) opulentia donisque regum, quteque alia Icetitm antiquitatibus Graecorum genus incertce vetustati adfingit. de navigatione primum consuluit" (Tacit Hist. ii. 4-5). 3 Aristotel. Problem, xix. 48. Ot <5e #ye//6vec TUV up%aiuv fiovot fyrrav fjpusf oi (5e Aaoi av&puiroi,. Istros followed this opinion also: but tho more common view seems to have considered all who combated at Troy as heroes (see Schol. Iliad, ii. 110; xv. 231), and so Hcsiod treats them (Opp. Di. 158). In rcfci ;nc* to the Trojan war, Aristotle says Kadairep h> rocf ' H p u J> otr nep: Hptufiov uvQeverat (Ethic. Nicom. i. 9; compare vii. I).
 * Titus visited the temple of the Paphian Venus in Cyprus, " spcctatd