Page:The Ancient City- A Study on the Religion, Laws, and Institutions of Greece and Rome.djvu/24

 18 ANCIENT BELIEFS. BOOK t serve him in the tomb, as they had done during his life. Aftei' the taking of Troy, the Greeks are about to return to their country ; each takes with him his beauti- ful captive ; but Achilles, who is under the earth, claims his captive also, and they give him Polyxena.' A verse of Pindar has preserved to us a curious vestige of the thoughts of those ancient generations. Phrixus had been compelled to quit Greece, and had fled as far as Colchis. He had died in that country; but, dead though he was, he wished to return to Gx'eece. He appeared, therefore, to Pelias, and directed him to go to Colchis and bring away his soul. Doubtless this soul regretted the soil of its native country, and the tomb of its family ; but being attached to its corporeal remains, it could not quit Colchis without them.* From this primitive belief came the necessity of burial. In order that the soul might be confined to this subterranean abode, which was suited to its second lite, it was necessary that the body to which it remained attached should be covered with earth. The soul that had no tomb had no dwelling-place. It was a wander- ing spirit. In vain it sought the repose which it would natui'ajly desire after the agitations and labor of this life ; it must wander forever under the form of a larva, or phantom, without ever stopping, without ever receiv- ing the offerings and the food which it had need of. Unfortunately, it soon became a malevolent spirit; it tormented the living ; it brought diseases upon them, ravaged their harvests, and frightened them by gloomy apparitions, to warn them to give sepulture to its body ' Eurip., Jffec, passim; Ale, Iphig., 162. Iliad, XXIII. 166. Virg., ^n., V. 77; VI. 221; XI. 81. Pliny, N. H., VIII. 40 8uet., CcBsar, 84. Lucian, De Luctu, 14. • Pind., Pythic, IV. 284, ed. Heyne; see the Scholiast.