The Solar Theory of Myths. 



63 



but the very words in which the wondrous old story is told, 

 are frequently so nearly the same, that they seem transla- 

 tions of a common text. The Hindoo mother quiets her 

 babe with the same fairy tale that stilled the Grecian in- 

 fant, and with which the sisters of 'New York or Boston 

 amuse their baby brothers. Achilles, Moses and Hector, 

 Sigurd, Romulus and good King Arthur, are born with 

 the same halo about their cradles; as the heads of their peo- 

 ples, and heroes of the same series of adventures, live par- 

 allel lives: then, with a convoy of celestials or by the 

 direct agency of deity, step at once from the groans of 

 earth to the thrones of heaven. With their attributes re- 

 peated in sublimer proportions, the bright warrior god 

 Indra, the silver-bowed Apollo and the Immanuel of 

 Christendom are the same as to the series of events in 

 their noble lives, and many of the peculiar features of their 

 supernatural nature. The more striking analogies are too 

 well known to need that I should point them out. The 

 fourth eclogue of Virgil and the glorious vision of Isaiah, 

 the story of Samson^ and the legend of Hercules are alike 

 in their most striking features f that the Leto of Homer 

 is of similar type as the virgin of the evangelists, was long 

 since noted, and has been recently argued by the learned 

 Gladstone, who has also shown that Zeus, Apollo and 

 Athene are respectively the Greek equivalents for the three 

 persons of the Trinity. 



But it may be well to introduce a few examples ; and so, 

 as a basis of comparison, the legend of King Arthur will 

 be correhited with that of Theseus, the Attic king. The 

 mother of Arthur was Igraine, wife of the Duke of Corn- 

 wall. She had been put into the fortress of Tintagil to 

 keep her from the British king. But her husband was 

 slain ; Pendragon gained admittance in disguise, and pos- 

 sessed the lady who became the mother of his heir. Aithra 



' De Gubernatis — Mitologia Vedica,\). 81. 

 " Lange's Commentary : Book of Judges. 



