The Solar Theory of Myths. 



69 



who, following with uneven pace, is now obscured by his 

 glare at midday, as Remus yields to Romulus ; now in 

 his nightly absence is his vicegerent, as when pale Dian 

 illy fills the place of her brother, the regal sun. It is now 

 plain why in the West, where the sun sank, was placed 

 the fabled wealth of the universe;^ why Perseus should 

 there find the golden apples of the Hesperides ; why Arthur 

 must die in the "great battle of the West;" why from the 

 West of the Greek world should be lost the golden fleece 

 which the solar heroes find again in the far Eastern realm 

 of Colchis ; why from Sparta in the Wfest should be stolen 

 the queen that another band of sun warriors should win 

 in Eastern Troas ; why in the paradise of the West, whose 

 angel guarded the eastern gate, should be lost the purity, 

 restored by the " Sun of righteousness," whose star was 

 seen in the East. By the somewhat similar course of the 

 sun in the zodiac are explained still other particulars. We 

 can now see why Castor and Pollux are alternately in 

 Hades, in other words, the gloomy realm of winter ; why 

 Adonis remains six months in the underworld, and six in 

 the bright aether the companion of Aphrodite; why 

 Proserpine was one-half of the year the queen of Pluto, 

 and one-half with her mother in the upper air, and why 

 the Scandinavian Baldur is six months with Odin and the 

 bright ^sir, and other six in the cold embrace of the blue 

 lipped goddess of the dead. 



The above stated theory is now generally accepted, and, 

 although individual thinkers may except to certain conclu- 

 sions, the foremost investigators agree that the key to the 

 strange -parallels we have mentioned is found in their common 

 derivation from the solar myth. The point next in question is 

 as to the extent of the conclusions, based upon it, that may 

 be legitimately drawn. In this case the zeal of its friends 

 has been far more harmful than the attacks of its enemies. 

 Germany being foremost in historical and philological re- 



^ De Gubematis — Mitologia Vedica, pp. 57, 58, 85. 



