Page:History of Greece Vol I.djvu/50

18 of Kronos was a period of tranquillity and happiness, as well as of extraordinary longevity and vigor.

Kronos and Rhea gave birth to Zeus and his brothers and sisters. The concealment and escape of the infant Zeus, and the swallowing of the stone by Kronos, are given in the Orphic Theogony substantially in the same manner as by Hesiod, only in a style less simple and more mysticized. Zeus is concealed in the cave of Nyx, the seat of Phanês himself, along with Eidê and Adrasteia, who nurse and preserve him, while the armed dance and sonorous instruments of the Kurêtes prevent his infant cries from reaching the ears of Kronos. When grown up, he lays a snare for his father, intoxicates him with honey, and having surprised him in the depth of sleep, enchains and castrates him. Thus exalted to the supreme mastery, he swallowed and absorbed into himself Mêtis, or Phanês, with all the preëxisting elements of things, and then generated all things anew out of his own being and conformably to his own divine ideas. So scanty are the remains of this system, that we find it difficult to trace individually the gods and goddesses sprung from Zeus