BOOK. II.
cerity, were to her things utterly hateful. Her purity could brook no uncleanness; her youth could know no decay, and thus her sacred dwelling became the centre of influences which breathed some life into a society prone to become more and more heartless and selfish. From the horrible devil-worship of Artemis Orthia, or Tauropola, we may turn to the redeeming cuhus of Hestia and Asklêpios,— the shrines of the one being the stronghold of generosity and sympathy, the temples of the other being devoted to those works of mercy, which we are disposed to regard as the exclusive products of Christianity.[1]
The sacred fire. Hestia in the common legend is the eldest daughter of Kronos and Rheia, and is wooed both by Phoibos and Poseidón ; but their suit is vain. Hestia makes a solemn vow that she will never be a bride, and as her reward she receives honour and glory both among gods and among men. As the pure maiden, she is to have her home in the inmost part of every dwelling, and at every sacrifice offered to Zeus and the other deities she is to preside and to receive the first invocation and the first share. As apart from her there can be no surety for truth, peace, and justice, each town, city, and state must have its own Prytaneion, with its central hearth, uniting the citizens in a common faith and in common interests. Here the suppliant should obtain at the least the boon of a fair trial, here should all compacts, whether between states or private men, receive their most solemn sanction; and when it became necessary to lighten the pressure of population at home by sending forth some of the citizens into new countries, from this hearth should the sacred fire be taken as the link which was to bind together the new home with the old. This fire should never be extinguished ; but if by chance such calamity should befall, it was to be lit again, not from common flame but as Hermes kindled fire, by friction, or drawn by burning glasses from the sun itself. Hands unclean might not touch her altar, and the guardians of her sacred fire should be pure and chaste as herself. All this is so transparent that we cannot be said to have entered here on the domain of mythology; and even the great hearth of the Universe is but an extension to the whole Kosmos of the idea which regarded Hestia as the very foundation of human society.
- ↑ The temples of Asklêpios were practically large hospitals, where something like the aid of Christian charity was extended to the sick and afflicted by physicians whose knowledge raised them far above the empires and spell-mutterers of the Middle Ages.
