The
Beginning of Earth and the Great Flood
The creation of the world is a
problem naturally fitted to excite the liveliest interest of man, its
inhabitant. The ancient pagans, not having the information on the subject which
we derive from the pages of Scripture, had their own way of telling the story,
which is as follows:
Before earth and sea and heaven were
created, all things wore one aspect, to which we give the name of Chaos - a
confused and shapeless mass, nothing but dead weight, in which, however,
slumbered the seeds of things. Earth, sea, and air were all mixed up together;
so the earth was not solid, the sea was not fluid, and the air was not
transparent. God and Nature at last interposed, and put an end to this discord,
separating earth from sea, and heaven from both. The fiery part, being the
lightest, sprang up, and formed the skies; the air was next in weight and
place. The earth, being heavier, sank below; and the water took the lowest
place, and buoyed up the earth.
Here some god- it is not known
which- gave his good offices in arranging and disposing the earth. He appointed
rivers and bays their places, raised mountains, scooped out valleys,
distributed woods, fountains, fertile fields, and stony plains. The air being
cleared, the stars began to appear, fishes took possession of the sea, birds of
the air, and four-footed beasts of the land.
When the world was furnished with
human inhabitants, there was a first age of innocence and happiness, called the
Golden Age. Truth and right prevailed, though not enforced by law, nor was
there any magistrate to threaten or punish. The forest had not yet been robbed
of its trees to furnish timbers for vessels, nor had men built fortifications
round their towns. There were no such things as swords, spears, or helmets. The
earth brought forth all things necessary for man, without his labour in
ploughing or sowing. Perpetual spring reigned, flowers sprang up without seed,
the rivers flowed with milk and wine, and yellow honey distilled from the oaks.
Then succeeded the Silver Age,
inferior to the golden, but better than that of brass. Jupiter shortened the
spring, and divided the year into seasons. Then, first, men had to endure the
extremes of heat and cold, and houses became necessary. Caves were the first
dwellings, and leafy coverts of the woods, and huts woven of twigs. Crops would
no longer grow without planting. The farmer was obliged to sow the seed, and
the toiling ox to draw the plough.
Next came the Brazen Age, more
savage of temper, and readier to the strife of arms, yet not altogether wicked.
The hardest and worst was the Iron Age. Crime burst in like a flood; modesty,
truth, and honour fled. In their places came fraud and cunning, violence, and
the wicked love of gain. Then seamen spread sails to the wind, and the trees
were torn from the mountains to serve for keels to ships, and vex the face of
the ocean. The earth, which till now had been cultivated in common, began to be
divided off into possessions. Men were not satisfied with what the surface
produced, but must dig into its bowels, and draw forth from thence the ores of
metals. Mischievous iron, and more mischievous gold, were produced. War sprang
up, using both as weapons; the guest was not safe in his friend's house; and
sons-in-law and fathers-in-law, brothers and sisters, husbands and wives, could
not trust one another. Sons wished their fathers dead, that they might come to
the inheritance; family love lay prostrate. The earth was wet with slaughter,
and the gods abandoned it, one by one, till Astraea* alone was left, and
finally she also took her departure.
It was a favourite idea of the old
poets that these goddesses would one day return, and bring back the Golden Age.
Even in a Christian hymn, the "Messiah" of Pope, this idea occurs:
All
crimes shall cease, and ancient fraud shall fail,
Returning
Justice lift aloft her scale,
Peace
o'er the world her olive wand extend,
And
white-robed Innocence from heaven descend.
Jupiter, seeing this state of
things, burned with anger. He summoned the gods to council. They obeyed the
call, and took the road to the palace of heaven. The road, which anyone may see
in a clear night, stretches across the face of the sky, and is called the Milky
Way. Along the road stand the palaces of the illustrious gods; the common
people of the skies live apart, on either side. Jupiter addressed the assembly.
He set forth the frightful condition of things on the earth, and closed by
announcing his intention to destroy the whole of its inhabitants, and provide a
new race, unlike the first, who would be more worthy of life, and much better
worshippers of the gods. So saying he took a thunderbolt, and was about to
launch it at the world, and destroy it by burning; but recollecting the danger
that such a conflagration might set heaven itself on fire, he changed his plan,
and resolved to drown it. The north wind, which scatters the clouds, was
chained up; the south was sent out, and soon covered all the face of heaven
with a cloak of pitchy darkness. The clouds, driven together, resound with a
crash; torrents of rain fall; the crops are laid low; the year's labour of the
husbandman perishes in an hour. Jupiter, not satisfied with his own waters,
calls on his brother Neptune to aid him with his. He lets loose the rivers, and
pours them over the land. At the same time, he heaves the land with an
earthquake, and brings in the reflux of the ocean over the shores. Flocks,
herds, men, and houses are swept away, and temples, with their sacred
enclosures, profaned. If any edifice remained standing, it was overwhelmed, and
its turrets lay hid beneath the waves. Now all was sea, sea without shore. Here
and there an individual remained on a projecting hilltop, and a few, in boats,
pulled the oar where they had lately driven the plough. The fishes swim among
the tree-tops; the anchor is let down into a garden. Where the graceful lambs
played now unwieldy sea calves gambol. The wolf swims among the sheep, the
yellow lions and tigers struggle in the water. The strength of the wild boar
serves him not, nor his swiftness the stag. The birds fall with weary win, into
the water, having found no land for a resting-place. Those living beings whom
the water spared fell a prey to hunger.
Parnassus alone, of all the
mountains, overtopped the waves; and there Deucalion, and his wife Pyrrha, of
the race of Prometheus, found refuge- he a just man, and she a faithful
worshipper of the gods. Jupiter, when he saw none left alive but this pair, and
remembered their harmless lives and pious demeanour, ordered the north winds to
drive away the clouds, and disclose the skies to earth, and earth to the skies.
Neptune also directed Triton to blow on his shell, and sound a retreat to the
waters. The waters obeyed, and the sea returned to its shores, and the rivers
to their channels. Then Deucalion thus addressed Pyrrha: "O wife, only
surviving woman, joined to me first by the ties of kindred and marriage, and
now by a common danger, would that we possessed the power of our ancestor
Prometheus, and could renew the race as he at first made it! But as we cannot,
let us seek yonder temple, and inquire of the gods what remains for us to
do." They entered the temple, deformed as it was with slime, and
approached the altar, where no fire burned. There they fell prostrate on the
earth, and prayed the goddess to inform them how they might retrieve their
miserable affairs. The oracle answered, "Depart from the temple with head
veiled and garments unbound, and cast behind you the bones of your
mother." They heard the words with astonishment. Pyrrha first broke silence:
"We cannot obey; we dare not profane the remains of our parents."
They sought the thickest shades of the wood, and revolved the oracle in their
minds. At length Deucalion spoke: "Either my sagacity deceives me, or the
command is one we may obey without impiety. The earth is the great parent of
all; the stones are her bones; these we may cast behind us; and I think this is
what the oracle means. At least, it will do no harm to try." They veiled
their faces, unbound their garments, and picked up stones, and cast them behind
them. The stones (wonderful to relate) began to grow soft, and assume shape. By
degrees, they put on a rude resemblance to the human form, like a block half
finished in the hands of the sculptor. The moisture and slime that were about
them became flesh; the stony part became bones; the veins remained veins,
retaining their name, only changing their use. Those thrown by the hand of the
man became men, and those by the woman became women. It was a hard race, and
well adapted to labour, as we find ourselves to be at this day, giving plain
indications of our origin.
*
The
goddess of innocence and purity. After leaving earth, she was placed among the
stars, where she became the constellation Virgo- the Virgin. Themis (Justice)
was the mother of Astraea. She is represented as holding aloft a pair of
scales, in which she weighs the claims of opposing parties.
