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courts of heaven. Finding that all good counsels were cast away on
the brutal partisans of Kronos, Prometheus throws in the weight of
his wisdom on the side of Zeus, and the result is that Kronos with his
adherents is hurled, like Satan with the revolted angels, into the abyss
of Tartaros or hell. Thus far Prometheus was a benefactor to Zeus
without awakening either his jealousy or his wrath. Henceforth he
might have remained for ever in the bright homes of Olympos had it
not been for the injustice of which Zeus became guilty as soon as he
found himself securely seated on the throne of heaven. To each of
the deathless gods he assigned a place and function ; of men alone he
took no count, his heart's desire being to sweep the whole race from
the earth and to create another. But it is clear that this resolution
was formed not because men were already becoming too wise and too
powerful, as the Hesiodic version would represent it, but because
man was too mean and wretched a thing to be suffered to cumber
the earth. Here Zeus expresses no fear, and Prometheus is opposed
to him not because he is too severe upon enemies whom he dreads,
but because he feels no pity for creatures whose WTetchedness calls
only for compassion. The mercy refused by Zeus is extended to
them by Prometheus, who determines to raise them from their abject
misery, and by stealing the fire converts the opposition of Zeus into a
fierce longing for vengeance against the mighty being who had dared
to thwart his will. The great heart whose pulses had beaten in
sympathy with the griefs and wants of men shall itself be torn with an
agony far surpassing their puny woes. In the sentence thus passed
upon him it seems difficult not to discern a phrase or a sentiment in
close analogy with those which are seen in the myths of Erinys or Ate.
The awful being, who with sleepless eye wanders through the air to
watch the deeds of men and exact a righteous penalty for the shed-
ding of innocent blood, had been, or was, in the land of the Five
Streams only the beautiful Saranyu or morning. But the natural
phrase, " the dawn will find out the evil-doer," changes Saranyu in
Hellas into the dread minister of divine vengeance ; and it was
necessary only to give a physical meaning to the phrase that the hearts
of the enemies of Zeus shall be racked with pain, to furnish a starting-
point for the myth which told how the vulture gnawed the heart of
Prometheus as he lay bound to the frozen crags of Caucasus. But
the visible vulture gnawing a bleeding heart would soon have
finished its horrid task ; the heart, therefore, must constantly grow,
and thus the story ran that the portion consumed during the day was
restored in the night, and the region of everlasting ice and storm was
chosen as the place of torture presenting the most awful contrast
