122 On the Theogony. 



Hesiod first describes Prometheus as bound through the wrath of Jove, 

 by inextricable fetters to the midst of a column, wliile an eagle with out- 

 stretched wings perpetually preyed on his liver ; but from this state of 

 penal infliction he was at length delivered by Hercules, through the per- 

 mission of Jupiter, who preferred the glory of his son to his own vengeance. 

 Tlie causes of Jupiter's wrath are then explained. The first of these is 

 marked by all the hlzarrerle, which so often characterises the early my- 

 thology of half-civilized nations. In the division of a bull sacrificed at 

 Mecon^ (the ancient name of Sicyon) Prometheus distributed the produce 

 into two parcels ; the one containing all the flesli and entrails wrapped in 

 the skin, the other, which was much the largest, held nothing but the 

 bones shrouded in an envelope of suet ; he offered the choice of these to 

 Jupiter, who readily fell into the snare, chose the larger heap, and stripping 

 aside the fat with wrath observed the bare bones, which he had thus made 

 his portion. Can we conceive that this rude fable may be intended to 

 designate, that the wisdom Ilpo/xjj^eta of man sometimes may be perverted 

 even in attempting to deceive the deity ? Irritated by this fraud, Jupiter 

 withheld from the wretched race of man the gift of fire, but was again cir- 

 cumvented by the arts of Prometiieus, who surreptitiously concealed in 

 the hollow of a reed sparks of the indispensable element, and reconveyed it 

 to man ; thus by his signal benefit to the human race drawing upon him- 

 self the fearful vengeance of the majesty of heaven. This monstrous fable 

 seems in itself pregnant with views destructive of the very foundation of 

 religion, since it represents the chief of gods not as the bountiful bene- 

 factor but harsh oppressor of man ; and we find accordingly that in a later 

 age the genius of ^schylus, in embodying this fiction into the most re- 

 markable and powerful drama among the remains of the Greek theatre, 

 exhibited to the "fierce democracy" of Athens, the strongest ideal portrait 

 of stern oppression and arbitrary tyranny in the character of the supreme 

 majesty of heaven, while in the unhappy victim Prometheus he represents 

 the perfect image of a generous and determined patriot, bearing with un- 

 flinching constancy all the inflictions of his tyrant foe, above whom he 

 rises far superior in all the dignity of moral power. How such exhibitions 

 could possibly be reconciled to any profession of religious worship for the 

 being thus represented, it is indeed difi&cult to conceive. 



But not only was Prometheus himself thus punished, but for the whole 

 race of men a visitation of evil was prepared by the formation of Pandora, the 

 origin of the female sex, " a fair defect," welcomed by their deceived minds 

 as a blessing. This subject is also treated of by Hesiod, in the beginning 

 of his " Works and Days" and two or three lines are in both places the 

 same, but the general execution in that work is far more gracefully wrought. 

 In the Theogony the poet most ungallantly represents the sex, as much 

 such associates to laborious men as drones are to the industrious bees j and 

 he concludes with some lines which may be cited, certainly neither as an 



