In

will deserve the best thanks of men of letters. such a field of usefulness, I think I may say that the hearty sympathy of the Royal Society of Literature would be given to the work of the International Literary Association. We shall, in any case, watch its progress with interest, in so far as that progress may be identified with the advance of Literature. For, as Victor Hugo said, in his magnificent address to the Paris Congress at the Châtelet Theatre, "Literature and Civilisation are identical. Literature is the mind of man setting forth on its travels. Civilisation is the sequence of discoveries which the mind of man makes at every step on its journey, i.e., Progress. We all, you and I, are fellow-citizens of the State Universal. We are assembled together for no personal or selfish interest, but for the interest of all. The Nations are measured by their Literature, not by their numbers. Armies perish: the Iliad remains. Greece, small in point of territory, is great through Æschylus. Rome is but a town: yet through Tacitus, Lucretius, Virgil, Juvenal, that town fills the world with her fame. We want light, always, everywhere! give heed if you will, to the lighting of your streets; but give heed also, give heed above all, to the lighting of your minds !" Thus spoke Victor Hugo, recalling to mind at various points that lament of Otto, the wonder of the world, which sings of the world-capital, "O Rom! du bist so klein," and those last words of Goethe, in which he cried for "Light! more light!" If Literature be in truth identical with Civilisation, then the more we can do for Letters the more shall we be advancing the interests of the Civilised World. All who would work for this high

end must work for it in the spirit which the Nestor of French Literature so well laid down in one of the passages which I have cited, namely, as "citizens of the State Universal "-that "great state of the Universe" of the Stoic Philosophy, whereof "all the isolated states on earth are but houses and streets," and wherein is "no distinction between Greek and barbarian, bond and free, except virtue."5 Such was the vision of the sages of old. The walls of the city they dreamed of have not yet risen before us. Many workers are doubtless needed for the building. Let us offer ourselves, to do what we can, and, waiting for the dawn of the day when our eyes may see that vision in its beauty, let us at "Fiat Lux."

least say,

"North British Review," No. LXXXVIII, June, 1866; Art. I. "The Roman Element in Civilisation."

SOME ASPECTS OF ZEUS AND APOLLO

WORSHIP.

BY C. F. KEARY, ESQ.

[Read November 26th, 1879.]

IN the Greek images of the gods there is often so little individuality that, if we took away some external attributes or symbols which accompany the figures, and which are no more than a kind of labels to them, we might be in danger of confounding one divinity with another; of mistaking Athênê for Hêra, Hermês for Apollo, Poseidon or Hadês for Zeus. In the case of the Panathenaic Frieze, for instance, that sculptured procession which once adorned the second wall of the Parthenon, we do really find ourselves in such a dilemma. In the centre of the composition is a group of persons, whom, by their superior size above the mortal stature, we know to be intended for gods, but for what particular ones among the Olympians, it is still a matter of dispute. In the case of one or two we are able to fall back upon the helping symbol-as the shoes and petasos of Hermes; the ægis of Athênê; the wings of Erôs-but we shall never get beyond a probable conjecture for the greater number. The difficulty does not arise solely nor even chiefly from the disfigurement of the faces in this case. Some of them, at all events, are well preserved; yet we cannot say that these are distinguishable by the

countenance alone. Poseidon for all the character which he displays might as well be Zeus.1

I do not say that in general the antiquarian is left quite at a loss. His skill is to interpret small signs which would be unnoticed by common observers; to read, as it were, the mind of the artist, and not look from the position of those for whose sake the artist wrought. But the existence of such means of discrimination does not affect the general truth of the proposition, that to the ordinary glance, to any one not initiated into the secrets of the worker, there would be such a class likeness among certain orders of the divine beings that no single individuality would seem to step out from among them. And if we take this art to reflect-as art always seems to reflect the best-the popular religion of the day, we must confess that no very strong individuality would have been felt to attach to any one among the gods.

But art itself comes late in the history of Greece, and no condition of thought which existed then is any proof of like thoughts in the heroic age, centuries before, when as yet Greek sculpture was scarcely born. The religion which finds such an expression as in the sculpture of the days of Pheidias is very different from the creed of primitive times. Polytheism is come near to its latter days when the gods have grown so much alike, and when all seem to express the same ideal. So far as the Greek gods are now not men, so far as they contain some divine

1 See" Guide to the Elgin Room, British Museum," by C. T. Newton. Michaelis' "Parthenon," and Flasch's "Zum Parthenon." Some of the points in dispute are very curious; that for example between the maiden Artemis and the sad matron Dêmêtêr as the bearer of the torch.

nature in them, this nature is the same for all. And the god-like idea, or, to put it more in the language of philosophy, the abstract conception of a god, will soon attach specially to some particular member of the pantheon, who, like the later Zeus of the Greeks, will thus become the god par excellence, o Ocós; then the monotheistic goal will have been reached. For when in character the gods have become much the same, the difference between one and another of them must depend altogether on external surroundings. Some have a greater majesty in the eyes of their worshippers, and receive more reverence; but it is because their rule is wider, not because they are in themselves different from their brothers. But for the limit of their various domains all the gods are alike; they are many kings, whose empires are not the same, yet still all kings. And the most powerful anon becomes in heaven, as he would become on earth, an over-king to all the others, the bretwalda, as it were, until at last he brings the rest under him, and reigns alone. He is the single god; the other divine powers sink to positions like those which occupy the saints of the mediæval calendar.

In truth, when we look closer at the Greek pantheon, the pantheon of sculpture and of all art, we find that the process of absorption has already gone far, and that the almost complete uniformity among the divine faces has arisen from the constant tendency to assimilate to one or two leading types. Among the gods, for instance (and we will speak in this place only of the male divinities), amid the general likeness we discern two types, which are