Page:The Mythology of the Aryan Nations.djvu/481

Rh called forth its sweet music, and Hermes, taking courage, prayed that CIIAP. to him also might be granted the secret wisdom of Phoibos ; but • '^— ' Apollon said, " This alone may not be. None but myself may know the hidden counsels of Zeus ; but other things there are which mortal men may never learn, and these things the Thriai shall teach thee, who dwell far down in the clifts of Parnassos. Other honours too are in store for thee. Thou shalt be the guardian of all flocks and herds, the messenger of the gods, and the guide of the dead to the dark land of Hades." Thus was the compact between them made, and Phoibos became the lord of the sweet-voiced lyre, and Hermes for his part sware that no harm should come to the holy home of Apollon at Delphoi. But to men Hermes brings no great help, for he has a way of cheating them through the dusky hours of night.

It is obvious that the legend, as thus related in the hymn, cannot The mean- be understood until we have traced to their source the mythical facts covenant, that Hermes was born in the morning, that from him come the gifts of music and song, that he reached his full strength at midday, that although he could kindle flame he could not eat the food w-hich the fire devoured, and that he could at will lie like a child in his cradle or terrify gods and men with his sudden blasts.^ The mystery is certainly not solved if we hold that " the general types of Hermes and Apollon, coupled with the present fact that no thief ever approached the rich and seemingly accessible treasures of Delphi^ engender a string of expository incidents, cast into a quasi-historical form, and detailing how it happened that Hermes had bound himself by especial convention to respect the Delphian temple." ^ The immunity of the Pythian shrine from theft and plunder cannot have originated the general types of the two gods, and it is precisely with these types that we are now concerned. If a convention should be made at all, why should it be with Hermes rather than with any other god ? If it be answered that Hermes was the prince and patron of thieves, we have then to ask why this should be his character and whence the notion came. The mere pointing out of a contrast does not explain the origin of that contrast ; and it is a principle capable of universal application that " invention cannot absolutely create ; it

sight of his flocks in the water. "There ' Ilynin to H^rtncs, 296. This line happened to l)e a fine blue sky with contains, perhaps, the only really coarse plenty of fleecy clouds over it, which expression in the whole poem ; and the were mirrored in the water and looked reference to the action of wind in its like little lambs. The farmers called sudden outburst at once makes it both one to another, 'Look there, we can see innocent and graphic, the sheep already on the ground below * Grote, History of Greece, part i. the water. ' " ch. i.