Page:The Dramas of Aeschylus (Swanwick).djvu/37

Rh These legends probably symbolize convulsions of the elements, which threaten to blot out the sky, of which Zeus is the impersonation. In this character, as an elemental god, he is not only the father of rivers, he also presides over all meteorological phenomena.

Thus with his Ægis, the dark storm-cloud, he veils the summit of Mount Ida (xvii. 593), and even ocean shudders at his dreadful bolt. He rains (xii. 5). He snows (xii. 280). He deviseth hail and piercing sleet, and rainy flood (x. 5). He uproots the sturdy oak (xiv. 415), and he snaps the bow-string of Teucer (xv. 469). Occasionally the moral and physical elements are most curiously blended, as in the elaborate description of the rain deluge with which he punishes the crooked verdict of the unjust judge (xvi. 385). Many other passages of a similar character might be cited.

But it is in his relation with Hera, and the various heroines who are represented as the objects of his love, that the human element in the conception of the Homeric Zeus appears under its most revolting aspect.

His character has accordingly been described as the most repulsive in the whole circle of Olympian life, exhibiting the very temper of the most advanced depravity. "It is the Jupiter of Homer in whom we see first the most complete surrender of personal morality and self-government to mere appetite, and the most thoroughly selfish groundwork of character.