Page:Norse mythology or, the religion of our forefathers, containing all the myths of the Eddas, systematized and interpreted with an introduction, vocabulary and index.djvu/69

 which can be born must die. The Greeks did not release the titans from their prisons in Tartaros and bring them up to enter the last struggle with the gods. Signs of such a contest flitted about like clouds in the deep-blue southern sky, but they did not gather into a deluging thunder-storm. The ideas were too broken and scattered to be united into one grand picture. The Greek was so much allured by the pleasures of life, that he could find no time to fathom its depths or rise above it. And hence, when the glories of this life had vanished, there remained nothing but a vain shadow, a lower world, where the pale ghosts of the dead knew no greater happiness than to receive tidings from this busy world.

The Norseman willingly yields the prize to the Greek when the question is of precision in details and external adornment of the figures; but when we speak of deep significance and intrinsic power, the Norseman points quietly at Ragnarok, the Twilight of the gods, and the Greek is silent.

The Goth, as has before been indicated, concentrated life; the Greek divided it into parcels. Thus the Greek mythology is frivolous, the Norse is profound. The frivolous mind lives but to enjoy the passing moment; the profound mind reflects, considers the past and the future. The Greek abandoned himself wholly to the pleasures of this life, regardless of the past or future. The Norseman accepted life as a good gift, but he knew that he was merely its transient possessor. Over every moment of life hangs a threatening sword, which may in the next moment prove fatal. Life possesses no hour of the future. And this is the peculiar characteristic of the heroic life in the North, that our ancestors were powerfully impressed with the