450 HISTORY OF GREECE. of faith over their eyes neither knowing the value, nor desiring the attainment, of an unclouded vision. The intimate companion- ship, and the occasional mistake of identity between gods and men, were in full harmony with their reverential restrospect. And we, accordingly, see the poet Ovid in his Fasti, when he un- dertakes the task of unfolding the legendary antiquities of early Rome, reacquiring, by the inspiration of Juno, the power of seeing gods and men in immediate vicinity and conjunct action, such as it existed before the development of the critical and his- torical sense. 1 To resume, in brief, what has been laid down in this and the preceding chapters respecting the Grecian mythes : 1. They are a special product of the imagination and feelings, radically distinct both from history and philosophy : they cannot be broken down and decomposed into the one, nor allegorized into the other. There are indeed some particular and even assignable mythes, which raise intrinsic presumption of an allegorizing ten- dency ; and there are doubtless some others, though not specially assignable, which contain portions of matter of fact, or names of real persons, embodied in them. But such matter of fact cannot be verified by any intrinsic mark, nor we are entitled to presume its existence in any given case unless some collateral evidence can be produced. 2. We are not warranted in applying to the mythical world the rules either of historical credibility or chronological sequence. Its personages are gods, heroes, and men, in constant juxtaposition and reciprocal sympathy ; men, too, of whom we know a large proportion to be fictitious, and of whom we can never ascertain how many may have been real. No series of such personages can serve as materials for chronological calculation. 1 Ovil, Fasti, vi. G-20 : "Fas mihi prsecipue vultus vidisse Deorura, Vcl quia sum vates, vel quia sacra cano . . . Ecce Deas vidi Horrueram, tacitoque animum pallore fatebar: Cum Dea, quos fecit, sustulit ipsa metus. Namque ait O vates, Romani conditor anni, Ausc per exiguos magna referre modos ; Jns tibi fecisti numcn cceleste videndi, Cam placuit numeris condcre fcsta tais."
