became, in the bas-reliefs of the story of
Bellerophon a mere singular mixture between a lion, a dog, and a bird--a
cross-breed which happens not to be possible, but which an ancient might
well have conceived as adorning some distant zoological collection. How
much more rationalised were not the divinities in whom only a peculiar
shape of the eye, a certain structure of the leg, or a definite fashion
of wearing the hair remained of their former nature. Learned men,
indeed, tell us that we need only glance at Hera to see that she is at
bottom a cow; at Apollo, to recognise that he is but a stag in human
shape: or at Zeus, to recognise that he is, in point of fact, a lion.
Yet it remains true that we need only walk down the nearest street to
meet ten ordinary men and women who look more like various animals than
do any antique divinities, and who can yet never be said to be in
reality cows, stags, or lions. The same applies to the violent efforts
which are constantly being made to show in the Greek and Latin poets a
distinct recollection of the cosmic nature of the gods, construing the
very human movements, looks, and dress of divinities into meteorological
phenomena, as has been done even by Mr. Ruskin, in his _Queen of the
Air_, despite his artist's sense, which should have warned him that no
artistic figure, like Homer's divinities, can possibly be at the same
time a woman and a whirlwind. The gods did originally partake of the
character of cosmic phenomena, as they partook of the characters of
beasts and birds, and of every other species of transformation, such as
we may watch in dreams; but as soon as they were artistically embodied,
this transformation ceased, the nature had to be specified in proportion
as the form became distinct; and the drapery of Pallas, although it had
inherited its purple tint from the storm-cloud, was none the less, when
it clad the shoulders of the goddess, not a storm-cloud, but a piece
of purple linen. "What do you want of me?" asks the artist. "A god,"
answers the believer. "What is your god to be like?" asks the artist.
"My god is to be a very handsome warrior, a serene heaven, which
is occasionally overcast with clouds, which clouds are sometimes
very beneficial, and become (and so does the god at those moments)
heavy-uddered cows; at others, they are dark, and cause annoyance, and
then they capture the god, who is the light (but he is also the clouds,
remember), and lock him up in a to