New Pantheon

Introduction

Mythology, as the word imports, from mythos, a fable, and logos, a discourse, signifies a fabulous account of things-, particularly of such things as regard false gods and their idolatrous worship.

Idolary, from the words eidolon, an image, and latreia, worship, signifies, literally, the worship of images as the representations of some god, which constitutes an essential part of the heathen mythology.

The practice of idolatry began to prevail at a very early period of the world, soon after the flood, if not before,

INTRODUCTION.

The father of Abraham, and probably Abraham himself, for a time, served other gods, as appears from that passage in Scripture where it is said, " Your fathers dwelt on the other side the flood in old time, even Terah, the father of Abraham, and the father of Nahor, and they served other gods and we are expressly informed that Laban had his strange gods.

The principal cause of idolatry was the depravity and pride of man, which, after the fall, naturally prompted him to worship every thing but the true God ; not only those things which are grand, and calculated to excite admiration, but also things that are mean and pitiful, and altogether unfit to be objects of worship. The Persians, Lybians, and Arabians, worshipped fire, water, the winds, the sun, moon, and stars ; the Thebans, whales ; the Thessalonians, storks ; the Syrophcenicians, doves; the Egyptians, dogs, cats, crocodiles, hawks, nay, even leeks, onions, garlick, and other objects, animate and inanimate.

The practice of exalting men to the rank of gods, and paying them divine honours, sprung from other subordinate causes ; as gratitude to benefactors, admiration of illustrious characters, national pride and vain glory, servile flattery of subjects to princes, and a fond desire of being immortalized.

The first example of this species of idolatry on record is the deification of Bel, or Belus, the Nimrod of Scripture, by his son Ninus, who erected a statue of his father, and commanded his subjects to pay the same reverence to it as they would have done to Belus if he had been alive.

The study of Mythology has hitherto been interesting principally to the scholar, the poet, and the artist ; but when taken in a religious point of view, it ought to be a matter of considerable interest to the Christian, as it furnishes him with the strongest corroborative evidence of the veracity of the sacred history, from the fabulous accounts of those who were the greatest enemies to divine truth. The most important events of the Bible, as the creation, the fall of man, deluge, tower of Babel, dispersion of mankind, and other incidents, though mutilated and disguised under absurd fables, are nevertheless to be traced, more or less clearly, in the mythology of most nations ; and there is every reason to believe that many of those gods, now so

GRECIAN AND ROMAN MYTHOLOGY.

familiarly known to us through the Greeks and Romans, were the patriarchs or other personages who are distinguished in Holy Writ.

Although in the order of time the mythology of the most ancient people, which forms the groundwork of later mythologies, might be entitled to the first notice, yet, for the purposes of this work, it will be equally convenient, and, for readers in general, far more agreeable, to begin with the mythology of the Greeks and Romans.

CHAPTER I. THE ACi-IIYr

GRECIAN AND ROMAN MYTHOLOGY.

The mythology of the Greeks was, as to the most important particulars, confessedly borrowed from the Egyptians* A 3

6 GRECIAN AND ROMAN MYTHOLOGY.

Their philosophers, Anaxagoras, Pythagoras, Thales, and others, travelled into Egypt, where they gathered all the notions there current concerning the gods, the transmigration of souls, a future state, and other points, which they modelled into a system that was afterwards enlarged and adorned by all the charms and embellishments that poetry and art could furnish.

The Greeks and Romans had many deities in common, particularly the superior gods, arising partly from adoption, on one side or the other, but more especially from the circumstance that the two countries were peopled by different branches of the same family, descended from one common ancestor, Japhet. At the same time it is evident, from the difference in the names of the Greek and Roman deities, and in their primary attributes, that they drew their mythology from different sources, which may be easily imagined, when it is considered that they were cut off from all intercourse with each other on their first settlement, and mingled with different tribes in the course of their migration. The Tuscans or Etrurians had, as is generally admitted, their mythology as well as their language, from their Pelasgian ancestors, long before the Grecians and Romans were known to each other ; but in after ages, when the intercourse between these two people became intimate, the Romans, without doubt, borrowed many of the fables of the Greeks, to which their poets and historians, who are very ample in their descriptions of the gods, added much of their own invention.

The Greek and Roman deities are distinguished into three classes; namely, the superior gods, the inferior gods, and the demigods.

The superior gods, otherwise called Dii Majorum Gentium , that is, gods of the superior houses or families, answering to the patricians or nobility of Rome, were so named because they were believed to be more eminently employed in the government of the world. They were also styled the select gods, of whom twelve were admitted into the council of Jupiter, and on that account denominated Consentes.

The images of these twelve gods were fixed in the Forum at Rome, six of them being males, and six females ; their

GRECIAN AND ROMAN MYTHOLOGY.

names are given in the following distich by the poet Ennius : —

Juno, Vesta, Minerva, Ceres, Diana, Mars, Mercurius, Jove, Neptunus, Vulcanus, Apollo.

These twelve gods were supposed to preside over the twelve months ; to each of them was allotted a month : January to Juno, February to Neptune, March to Minerva, April to Venus, May to Apollo, June to Mercury, July to Jupiter, August to Ceres, September to Vulcan, October to Mars, November to Diana, December to Vesta. They likewise presided over the twelve celestial signs. If to these twelve be added the eight following, namely, Janus, Saturnus, Genius, Sol, Pluto, Bacchus, Terra, and Luna, there will be twenty of the first class, or superior gods. These superior gods were likewise distinguished, from their usual place of residence, into celestial, terrestrial, marine, and infernal gods.

The inferior gods comprehended what Ovid called the Celestial Populace, answering to the plebeians among the Romans, who had no place in heaven, as the Penates, Lares, rural deities, &c.

The third class, or demigods, was composed of such as derived their origin from a god or goddess and a mortal, or such as by their valour and exploits had raised themselves to the rank of immortals. Of this class was Hercules, JEsculapius, Castor, Pollux, Achilles, &c.

To the list of the Roman gods might be added a fourth class, called novensiles, which the Sabines brought to Rome by the command of King Tatius. They were so named because, as some suppose, they were the last of all that were reckoned among the gods. Of this class also were the deities by whose help and means, as Cicero says, men are advanced to heaven and obtain a place among the gods, namely, the moral virtues, as mercy, chastity, piety, &c.

CHAOS AND THE CREATION.

CHAPTER IT.

CHAOS AND THE CREATION.

Chaos was the oldest of the gods, according to Hesiod, whose children were Tellus, TiTiEA, Terra, or Vesta (in the Greek Gcea, signifying the earth), Tartarus and Amor, Erebus and Nox,

Tellus had a son, named Ccelus (or Caelum, in Greek, Uranus, signifying heaven), whom she afterwards married. Erom them descended Pelagus, Pontus, Oceanus, &c. They were also the parents of Saturn, Cybele, the Titans, giants, &c, of whom more will be said hereafter.

Erebus and Nox were united, and from their union sprang jEther and Hemera ; that is, Air and Day. Between Hesiod' s and the Mosaic account of the creation there is a striking analogy, whether the Greeks took it immediately from the Bible, or indirectly from the Egyptians. Hesiod begins with Chaos, from which sprang the Earth ; Tartarus, that is, the inner abyss in or under the earth ; and Amor, or the lovely order and beauty of the world. Moses speaks of the chaotic state of the earth, the face of the deep or abyss on which the Spirit of God moved, and then of the beauty and order of the whole as it came out of the hands of the Almighty Creator.

Again, Hesiod tells us that Chaos brought forth Erebus (Gloominess), and Nox (Night), and from these two sprang Air and Day, that is, when light was divided from the darkness, and both together made one day ; which corresponds with what Moses says of the gloomy darkness that existed before the creation, and of the firmament, and the dividing the day from the night.

Hesiod, moreover, tells us that Chaos begat Ccelum or Ccelus, beset with stars that covered the whole earth, and was the residence of the blessed gods ; that is, in the words of Moses, God called the dry land, earth, and the firmament, wherein he .planted the stars, he called heaven.

Hesiod then says that Tellus begat high mountains, and delightful caves for the nymphs, as also Pelagus and Pontus,

SATURN.

that is, the seas, and Oceanus, the ocean ; and Moses says, "God gathered the waters into one place," and " the gathering together of the waters he called seas." Hesiod then relates the progeny of Tellus and Coelum, that is, the generative powers of earth and heaven, corresponding with the Mosaic account of the earth yielding grass, &c. ; and in this manner he fills the world with gods, goddesses, and nymphs, as, according to the Mosaic account, God filled the world with men, "beasts, fowls, and fishes.

The Romans appear to have borrowed their fictions respecting the creation of the world from the same source as the Greeks. Ovid expressly calls Chaos, rudis indigestaque moles, a rude indigested heap ; or, as Moses says, " the earth was without form and void after which the poet goes on in a strain very similar to what has already been set forth.

The Etruscans, who were among the original settlers in Italy, gave, according to Suidas, the following account of the creation. "God," says a philosopher of that nation, " created the universe in six thousand years, and appointed the same period of time to be the extent of its duration. In the first period of a thousand years, God created the heavens and the earth ; in the second, the visible firmament ; in the third, the sea and all the waters that are in the earth ; in the fourth, the sun, moon, and stars ; in the fifth, every living soul of birds, reptiles, and quadrupeds, which have their abode either on the land, in the air, or the water ; and in the sixth, man alone." Now when it is considered that in another part of Scripture it is said, that " one day is with the Lord as a thousand years, and a thousand years as one day," it is easy to explain the origin of this fiction.

Chapter III. Saturn

Saturn, the son of Terra or Vesta the Elder, and Ccelus, is styled the father of the gods. His brothers were, Titan, Oceanus, the Cyclops, and others ; his sisters, Ceres,Tethys, and Ops, Rhea, or Cybele, whom he afterwards married.

Titan, his eldest brother, was entitled by seniority to succeed to the kingdom of his father, Coelus ; but, at the request of his mother, he yielded his right to his brother Saturn, on condition that he should not bring up any male children.

Saturn, according to agreement, devoured his sons as fast as they were born, until his wife, having brought forth twins, Jupiter and Juno, gave her husband a stone to devour, instead of Jupiter, whom she sent to be nursed on Mount Ida by the priestesses of Cybele. They, by the noise of their drums, are said to have drowned the cries of the child.

By a similar trick she saved Neptune and Pluto.

The stone which she is said to have given was called Betylus, and is here introduced in allusion to the stones called Bethulia, which, according to Sanchthoniatho, were contrived by Uranus, and possessed the power of motion ; all which refers to the stone set up by Jacob, which, in the Hebrew, is called Bethel, that is, " the House of the Lord," whence arose the worship of stones, of which there is frequent mention in the Grecian, Roman, and other mythologies.

SATURN.

1!

Titan, having discovered the fraud, and finding the compact between him and his brother thus violated, had recourse to arms, defeated Saturn, and, having taken him and his wife prisoner, confined them in chains in Tartarus.

In the meantime, Jupiter, being grown up, raised an army of Cretans, released his father from confinement, and caused all the gods to swear fidelity to him.

Saturn, whom an oracle had foretold that his son would dethrone him, soon grew jealous of Jupiter, and sought to take away his life ; whereupon Jupiter rebelled against his father, and compelled him to flee into Italy.

Saturn was received kindly by Janus, king of Italy, and admitted by him as a partner of his throne. In return for this kindness, Saturn endued Janus with extraordinary wisdom ; so that he received divine honours after his death, and had a temple erected to him by Romulus and Tatius, which Numa Pompilius ordained should be opened in time of war, and shut in time of peace.

After the arrival of Saturn, money was coined, with a ship on one side, to denote his coming in a ship, and a head of Janus, with two faces, to denote either his knowledge of things past and to come, or his sharing the regal authority with Saturn.

Under the reign of Saturn, the people, who before wandered about like beasts, were reduced to civil society, and taught the art of husbandry, as well as the liberal arts, whence Italy was anciently called Saturnia, from him, and also Latium, from lateo, to hide, because there he lay hidden. For the same reason, the mountain, afterwards called the Capitoline Hill, was first named Saturnius ; and the festival instituted in honour of him was named Saturnalia, at which revelry of all kinds went forward.

By some writers a different account of Saturn is given, being represented as a tyrannical, covetous, and cruel prince, who reigned over Italy and Sicily, enlarged his dominions by conquest, oppressed his subjects by taxes, and kept them in awe by garrisons. Certain it is that human sacrifices were first offered to him, because he was thought to delight in human blood, and on that account the gladiators, who were under his protection, fought at his festival.

SATURN.

The Romans esteemed Saturn an infernal god, as Plutarch says, because the planet Saturn is malignant and hurtful ; yet he is commonly reckoned a terrestrial god.

Those who sacrificed to him had their heads bare, and his priests wore scarlet garments. On his altars were placed wax tapers lighted, because by Saturn men were reduced from the darkness of error to the light of truth.

Chapter IV

saturn (continued).

The Latin name, Saturnus, is derived from satus, sowing, because he was reckoned the god of husbandry ; but the Greeks gave him the name of Chronos, signifying time, because he was the god of Time ; whence the fable of his devouring his children is explained, by supposing time to devour days, months, and years, which are produced by him.

The ancient statues of Saturn wear chains, in remembrance of those with which he was loaded by his brother Titan. These were taken off at the feast of the Saturnalia, to show that his reign had been that of liberty.

He is usually represented as a decrepit old man, sometimes holding a scythe or sickle in one hand, and a key, or a circumfiexed serpent biting its tail, in the other. The scythe was either a symbol of husbandry, or it denoted that time destroys all things ; the key, to signify that time unlocks all things ; and the serpent, to denote the revolution of the year. Sometimes he has also an hour-glass standing by him, which is a fit emblem of the god of time ; sometimes he has wings, to denote the flight of time.

The story of Saturn evidently points to several persons and things in Scripture, although jumbled together in strange confusion.

The poets feign that the world was divided into four ages.

The first, called the Golden Age, was ascribed to th

SATURN.

reign of Saturn, when justice and innocence reigned throughout the earth, and the soil produced what was necessary for the subsistence and enjoyment of mankind.

The second, or Silver Age, was so called because men began to degenerate ; the third, or the Brazen Age, because they became more and more licentious; and the fourth, or Iron Age, because they had reached to the highest pitch of profligacy. In this account we read, in other words, the condition of man before and after the Fall, as described in the Bible.

From the circumstance of Saturn being coupled with the age of innocence, some have supposed him to be Adam.

Others, judging from his character for ambition and a love of conquest, have supposed him to represent Ximrod ; but the circumstances of the narrative, which agree in so many particulars with the account of Xoah, lead naturally to the conclusion that he was intended to represent that patriarch.

In the time of Xoah the whole earth spoke one language, and it is said that in Saturn's reign there was but one language.

Saturn had three sons, so had Xoah.

Ham, by the heathens called Jupiter Ammon, or Hammon, is said to have ascended to the possession of heaven because he entered upon the hot places of Egypt and Libya, which were thought to be in the confines of heaven.

Japhet had his lot in Europe and the islands, and therefore was afterwards styled Xeptune, or the god of the sea.

Shem had the name of Pluto, or the god of hell, because among his posterity remained the true belief that persons who departed this life should not die eternally, but, according to their actions here, would, in another life, receive their rewards or punishments.

Noah was the first planter of vineyards, and the art of cultivating vines is attributed to Saturn, whence drunkenness was practised to the utmost excess at his Saturnalia, i

Xoah saved himself in a ship, and Saturn is said to have done the same when he fled into Italy. To these might be added, if necessary, other points of agreement

B

CYBELE.

CHAPTER \.

CYBELE.

Cybele, or Vesta the Elder, was the daughter of Coelus and Terra, and wife of her brother Saturn. She was commonly called by the Greeks Hestia ; but she had a variety of names, either according to her attributes, or the places where she was worshipped.

This deity was called Cybele, from Cybelus, a mountain ot Phrygia, where sacrifices to her were first instituted, or from cybele, a cube, because the cube, or die, which is every way square, was dedicated to her.

She is named Ops, because she brings help to every thing contained in this world.

Rhea, from the abundance of benefits, which, without ceasing, flow from her.

Dyndymene, from Mount Dyndymus, in Phrygia.

Mater Berecynthia, Berecynthian Mother, from Berecynthus, a castle in Phrygia.

Bona Dea, Good Goddess, because all good things for the support of life proceed from her.

Fauna, because she is said to favour all creatures.

CYBELE.

Idaa Mater, from Mount Ida in Phrygia, or Crete, for she was highly honoured at both places.

And, lastly, Magna Mater, the Great Mother, because she was regarded as the mother, as Saturn was the father, of the gods.

The sacrifices to Cybele were performed in great privacy, whence they were called Opertanea, and the place where they were performed, Opertum, that is, hidden. They were celebrated, like those of Bacchus, with a confused noise of timbrels, pipes, and cymbals, and the sacrificants howled as if they were mad, throwing themselves about with many frantic and indecent gesticulations. Her temple was opened not by hands, but by prayers ; none entered who had tasted garlick ; priests sacrificed to her sitting and touching the earth, and offered the hearts of the victims.

Among the trees, the box and pine were sacred to her ; the box, because the pipes used in her sacrifices were made of it ; the pine, for the sake of Atys, a boy whom she loved, but whom, for his breaking his vow of chastity, she turned into a pine.

The priests of Cybele were called

Galli, from a river of Phrygia of that name ; also Curetes, from the island of Crete, where they nursed Jupiter.

Corybantes, from their butting with their foreheads like rams, when they danced at the sacrifices.

Cabiri, from mountains of Phrygia of that name, or from the Hebrew or Phoenician cabir, mighty ; a name given to their principal deities, of which more will be said hereafter ; or from the Phoenician cabar, strong, mighty.

Telchines, from famous magicians so called.

And Dactyli from dactylos, a finger, because they were ten in number, like the fingers.

Cybele is usually represented as seated in a lofty chariot, drawn by lions, crowned with towers, and bearing in her hand a key. Being the goddess not of cities only, but of all things which the earth sustains, she was crowned with turrets ; whilst the key implied her custody of cities, as also that in winter the earth locks those treasures which she brings forth and dispenses in summer. She rides in a chariot, because the earth was supposed to hang suspended

AURORA.

in the air, balanced and poised by its own weight ; and as the chariot is supported by wheels, so the earth is a voluble body and turns round ; the chariot is drawn by lions, because nothing is so fierce, so savage, or so ungovernable, but a motherly piety and tenderness is able to tame it and make it submit to the yoke. Her garments are painted with divers colours, particularly green, because such a dress was most suitable to the appearance of the earth. Sometimes she is represented sitting on a pedestal with a sphere behind her, to denote the earth, a lion by her side, and a branch in her hand, all attributes of her as the goddess of the earth.

The worship of Cybele, or the earth, is supposed to have commenced in Phrygia.

This deity was unknown in Italy till the time of Hannibal's invasion, when the Romans, consulting the Sibylline oracles, found that the enemy could not be expelled until they brought the Idaean Mother, or Cybele, to Rome. The senate accordingly despatched ambassadors to Attalus, king of Phrygia, to request the statue of this goddess, which was of stone, at the city of Pessinus, in Galatia. When brought to Rome, the ladies went to the Tyber to receive her, but the vessel which carried her being miraculously stopped, and remaining immovable in the Tyber, the vestal Claudia, who had fallen under the suspicion of levity, evinced her purity by drawing the vessel on shore with her girdle ; and the goddess was introduced into the city, according to the Sibylline oracle, by the best man of Rome, whom the senate adjudged to be young Publius Scipio. This image was reputed to have fallen from heaven, and was therefore esteemed as one of the pledges of stability for the Roman state.

From the name of Vesta which is given to this goddess, she is often confounded with Vesta the younger, her daughter.

Chapter VI. Aurora

Auroua, or the goddess of the morning, was, according to some, the daughter of Titan and Terra ; but Hesiod

AURORA.

makes her the daughter of Hyperion, andTHiA, the sister of the sun and moon, and the mother of the winds and stars. Orpheus calls her the harbinger of Titan or the sun, because she is the personification of that light which precedes the appearance of the sun.

The poets describe this goddess as rising out of the ocean in a saffron robe, seated in a chariot of gold, drawn by two or four horses, opening the gates of light and scattering the dew. Virgil represents her horses as of flame-colour, and varies their number from two to four, according as she rises slower or faster.

Aurora is said to have been the daughter of Titan and the Earth, because the light of the morning seems to rise out of the earth and to proceed from the sun, which immediately follows it. She is styled mother of the winds, because the winds are observed very frequently to fall towards evening, and rise again in the morning, as if attendant upon their mother.

By Astraeus, her husband, she had the stars and the four winds, Argestes, Boreas, Notus, and Zephyrus.

By Tithonus, the son of Laomedon, and brother of Priam, king of Troy, she had Memnon. She took this Tithonus, who was remarkable for his beauty, with her into heaven, and obtained from the Fates immortality for him, but forgot to ask that he should not grow old, whereupon he at length fell into dotage, and Aurora, in compassion to him, changed him into a grasshopper, which they say moults when it is old, and grows young again.

Memnon, their son, went to Troy to assist king Priam, where he was killed in a duel with Achilles, and the poets feign that in the place where he fell a fountain arose, which, every year, on the same day on which he died, sent forth blood instead of water. As his body lay on the funeral pile, it is said to have been changed into a bird by his mother Aurora's intercession, and that many other birds flew out of the pile with him, which were called after him Aves Memnoniee, who, dividing themselves into two troops, and furiously fighting with their claws and beaks, appeased by their blood the ghost of Memnon, from whom they sprung.

There was a memorable statue of this Memnon made of bS

JUPITER.

black marble, and set up in the temple of Serapis, at Thebes, in Egypt, of which it is related, that the mouth of the statue, when first touched by the rays of the sun, sent forth a sweet and harmonious sound, as though it rejoiced when its mother, Aurora, came ; but, at the setting of the sun, it sent forth a low melancholy tone, as though it lamented its mother's departure.

The Romans gave the name of Aurora to this deity, from aurum, gold, on account of her rosy colour ; the Greeks gave her the name of Eous or Heous, that is, the morning, because she is the goddess of the morning.

Chapter VII. Jupiter

There were several Jupiter? among the Greeks and Romans ; but the most famous Jupiter, to whom the attributes ascribed to the others properly belonged, was the son of

Saturn and Rhea who, as before observed, was saved by a trick of his mother.

Jupiter, after having waged a successful war against the Titans, and deposed his father, ascended the throne, and received the homage of the other gods ; but he had not reigned long before Juno, Neptune, and Pallas, thinking he affected too much the tyrant, conspired against him, and threw him into bonds, from which he was delivered by the giants Cottus, Gyges, and Briareus.

After this Jupiter was engaged in another war with the giants, who sought to revenge the defeat of the Titans ; but were themselves routed, and most of them killed.

Jupiter having thus restored peace to the universe, divided it by lot between himself and his brothers, Neptune and Pluto, The dominion of the Sea fell to Neptune, that of the Infernal regions, to Pluto ; and of the Celestial, to Jupiter.

In this dominion of Jupiter, Aidos, or Reverence paid to good men by their inferiors, and Dice, or Equity, were always attendant on his throne, intimating that justice in a prince will ever command respect and obedience. The LixcB Preces, or Supplications, his daughters by Juno, were likewise constantly near him.

The place of Jupiter's birth has been variously represented : in Crete, at Thebes in Bceotia, and among the Messenians ; the more general opinion is in favour of Crete, as his birth-place ; but Callimachus, in his hymn to Jupiter, declares himself unwilling to decide.

It was no less doubtful by whom he was nursed. Virgil tells us he was fed by the bees, which followed the musical sounds made by the Curetes, to whom he was entrusted ; and out of gratitude for which that insect was changed by him from an iron to a golden colour. Some affirm that he was nursed by Amalthjea and Melissa, daughters of Melissus, king of Crete, who fed him with goat's-milk and honey ; others, that Amaltheea was the name of a goat that nursed him. whose horn he presented to those princesses, with this privilege annexed, that whoever possessed it should have whatever they desired; whence it came to be called the Horn of plenty. After this, the goat dying, Jupiter

JUPITER.

placed her amongst the stars ; and, by the advice of Themis, to intimidate the giants, covered with her skin his shield, whence it obtained the name of jEgis, i. e« a goat.