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010 - Prometheus and Pandora - Greek · Myths and Legends Around the World - Collection 05

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  Speaker 1: Prometheus and Pandora from a Book of Myths by Gene Lang.
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  Speaker 1: This is a LibriVox recording. All LibriVox recordings are in
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  Speaker 1: the public domain. For more information or to volunteer, please
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  Speaker 1: visit LibriVox dot org. Prometheus and Pandora from a Book
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  Speaker 1: of Myths. Those who are interested in watching the mental
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  Speaker 1: development of a child must have noted that when the
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  Speaker 1: baby has learned to speak, even a little, it begins
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  Speaker 1: to show its growing intelligence by asking questions what is this?
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  Speaker 1: It would seem at first to ask with regard to
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  Speaker 1: simple things that to it are still mysteries. Soon it
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  Speaker 1: arrives at the more far reaching inquiries why is this so?
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  Speaker 1: How did this happen? And as the child's mental growth continues,
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  Speaker 1: the painstaking and conscientious parent or guardian is many times
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  Speaker 1: faced by questions which lack of knowledge or a sensitive
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  Speaker 1: honesty prevents him from answering, either with assurance or with ingenuity.
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  Speaker 1: As with the child, so it has ever been with
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  Speaker 1: the human race. Man has always come into the world
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  Speaker 1: asking how, why, what? And so the Hebrew, the Greek,
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  Speaker 1: the Maori, the Australian Blackfellow, the Norsemen. In a word,
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  Speaker 1: each race of mankind has formed for itself an explanation
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  Speaker 1: of existence, an answer to the questions of the groping
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  Speaker 1: child mind. Who made the world? What is God? What
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  Speaker 1: made a god think of fire and air and water?
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  Speaker 1: Why am I I? Into the explanation of creation and
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  Speaker 1: existence given by the Greeks come the stories of Prometheus
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  Speaker 1: and of Pandora. The world, as first it was to
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  Speaker 1: the Greeks, was such a world as the one of
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  Speaker 1: which we read in the Book of Genesis, without form
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  Speaker 1: and void. It was a sunless world in which land, air,
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  Speaker 1: and sea were mixed up together, and over which reigned
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  Speaker 1: a deity called Chaos. With him ruled the goddess of Night,
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  Speaker 1: and their son was Arabis, god of darkness. When the
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  Speaker 1: two beautiful children of Arabis, light and Day had flooded
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  Speaker 1: formless space with their radiance, Aros, the god of Love,
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  Speaker 1: was born, and Light and Day and Love, working together,
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  Speaker 1: turned discord into harmony and made the earth, the sea,
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  Speaker 1: and the sky into one perfect hole. A giant race,
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  Speaker 1: a race of Titans in time populated this newly made earth,
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  Speaker 1: and of these, one of the mightiest was Prometheus. To
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  Speaker 1: him and to his brother Epimetheus was entrusted by Aros,
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  Speaker 1: the distribution of the gifts of faculties and of instincts
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  Speaker 1: to all the living creatures in the world, and the
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  Speaker 1: task of making a creature lower than the gods, something
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  Speaker 1: less great than the Titans, yet in knowledge and in understanding,
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  Speaker 1: infinitely higher than the beasts and birds and fishes. At
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  Speaker 1: the hands of the Titan brothers, birds, beasts, and fishes
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  Speaker 1: had fared handsomely. They were Titanic in their generosity, and
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  Speaker 1: so prodigal had they been in their gifts, that when
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  Speaker 1: they would fain have carried out the commands of Aros,
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  Speaker 1: they found that nothing was left for the equipment of
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  Speaker 1: this being to be called man. Yet nothing daunted. Prometheus
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  Speaker 1: took some clay from the ground at his feet, moistened
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  Speaker 1: it with water, and fashioned it into an image in
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  Speaker 1: form like the gods. Into its nostrils. Aros breathed the
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  Speaker 1: spirit of life, Pallas Athena endowed it with a soul,
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  Speaker 1: and the first man looked wonderingly round on the earth
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  Speaker 1: that was to be his heritage. Prometheus, proud of the
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  Speaker 1: beautiful thing of his own creation, would fain have given
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  Speaker 1: man a worthy gift. But no gift remained for him.
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  Speaker 1: He was naked, unprotected, more helpless than any of the
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  Speaker 1: beasts of the field, more to be pitied than any
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  Speaker 1: of them, in that he had a soul to suffer.
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  Speaker 1: Surely Zeus, the all powerful ruler of Olympus, would have
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  Speaker 1: compassion on man. But Prometheus looked to Zeus in vain
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  Speaker 1: compassion he had none. Then, in infinite pity, Prometheus bethought
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  Speaker 1: himself of a power belonging to the gods alone and
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  Speaker 1: unshared by any living creature on the earth. We shall
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  Speaker 1: give fire to the man whom we have made, he
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  Speaker 1: said to Epimetheus. To Epimetheus, this seemed an impossibility, But
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  Speaker 1: to Prometheus nothing was impossible. He bided his time, and
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  Speaker 1: unseen by the gods, he made his way into Olympus,
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  Speaker 1: lighted a hollow torch with a spark from the chariot
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  Speaker 1: of the Sun, and hastened back to Earth. With this
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  Speaker 1: royal gift to man. Assuredly, no other gift could have
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  Speaker 1: brought him more completely the empire that has since been his.
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  Speaker 1: No longer did he tremble and cower in the darkness
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  Speaker 1: of caves when Zeus hurled his lightnings across the sky.
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  Speaker 1: No more did he dread the animals that hunted him
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  Speaker 1: and drove him in terror before them. Armed with fire,
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  Speaker 1: the beasts became his vassals. With fire, he forged weapons,
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  Speaker 1: defied the frost and cold, coined money, made implements for tillage,
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  Speaker 1: introduced to the arts, and was able to destroy as
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  Speaker 1: well as to create. From his throne on Olympus, Zeus
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  Speaker 1: looked down on the earth and saw with wonder airy
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  Speaker 1: columns of blue gray smoke that curled upwards to the sky.
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  Speaker 1: He watched more closely and realized with terrible wrath that
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  Speaker 1: the moving flowers of red and gold that he saw
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  Speaker 1: in that land that the Titans shared with men came
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  Speaker 1: from fire that had hitherto been the God's own sacred power. Speedily,
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  Speaker 1: he assembled a council of the gods to mete out
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  Speaker 1: to Prometheus a punishment fit for the blasphemous daring of
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  Speaker 1: his crime. This council decided at length to create a
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  Speaker 1: thing that should forevermore charm the souls and hearts of men,
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  Speaker 1: and yet for evermore be man's undoing. To Vulcan, god
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  Speaker 1: of Fire, whose province Prometheus had insulted, was given the
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  Speaker 1: work of fashioning out of clay and water, the creature
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  Speaker 1: by which the honor of the gods was to be avenged.
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  Speaker 1: The Lame Vulcan, says Hesiod, poet of Greek mythology, formed
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  Speaker 1: out of the earth an image resembling a chaste virgin
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  Speaker 1: Pallas Athena of the Blue Eyes, hastened to ornament her
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  Speaker 1: and to robe her in a white tunic. She dressed
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  Speaker 1: on the crown of her head a long veilskillfully fashioned
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  Speaker 1: and admirable to see. She crowned her forehead with graceful
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  Speaker 1: garlands of newly opened flowers, and a golden diadem that
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  Speaker 1: the lame Vulcan, the illustrious god, had made with his
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  Speaker 1: own hands to please the puissant Jove. On this crown,
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  Speaker 1: Vulcan had chiseled the innumerable animals that the continents and
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  Speaker 1: the sea nourish in their bosoms, all endowed with a
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  Speaker 1: marvelous grace, and apparently alive. When he only completed, instead
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  Speaker 1: of some useful work, this illustrious masterpiece, he brought into
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  Speaker 1: the assembly, this virgin, proud of the ornaments with which
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  Speaker 1: she had been decked by the Blue eyed goddess, daughter
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  Speaker 1: of a powerful sire, to this beautiful creature destined by
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  Speaker 1: the gods to be man's destroyer. Each of them gave
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  Speaker 1: a gift. From Aphrodite, she got beauty from Apollo, music
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  Speaker 1: from Hermes, the gift of a winning tongue. And when
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  Speaker 1: all that great company and Olympus had bestowed their gifts,
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  Speaker 1: they named the woman Pandora, gifted by all the gods,
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  Speaker 1: thus equipped for victory, Pandora was led by Hermes to
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  Speaker 1: the world that was thenceforward to be her home. As
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  Speaker 1: a gift from the gods, she was presented to Prometheus.
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  Speaker 1: But Prometheus, gazing in wonder at the violet blue eyes
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  Speaker 1: bestowed by Aphrodite, that looked wonderingly back into his own,
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  Speaker 1: as if they were indeed as innocent as two violets
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  Speaker 1: wet with the morning dews, hardened his great heart and
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  Speaker 1: would have none of her as a hero. A worthy
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  Speaker 1: descendant of Titans, said in later years TIMEO Danaeus at donaphorentis,
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  Speaker 1: I fear the Greeks even when they bring gifts. In Prometheus,
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  Speaker 1: the greatly daring, knowing that he merited the anger of
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  Speaker 1: the gods, saw treachery and a gift so outwardly perfect.
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  Speaker 1: Not only would he not accept this exquisite creature for
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  Speaker 1: his own, but he hastened to caution his brother also
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  Speaker 1: to refuse her. But well were they named Prometheus forethought
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  Speaker 1: and Epimetheus afterthought. For Epimetheus, it was enough to look
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  Speaker 1: at this peerless woman sent from the gods for him
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  Speaker 1: to love her and to believe in her utterly. She
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  Speaker 1: was the fairest thing on earth, worthy indeed of the
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  Speaker 1: deathless gods who had created her. Perfect too was the
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  Speaker 1: happiness that she brought with her to Epimetheus before her coming,
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  Speaker 1: As he well knew now, the fair world had been
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  Speaker 1: incomplete since she came. The fragrant flowers had grown more
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  Speaker 1: sweet for him, the song of the birds more full
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  Speaker 1: of melody. He found new life in Pandora and marveled
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  Speaker 1: how his brother could ever have fancied that she could
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  Speaker 1: bring to the world aught but peace and joyousness. Now,
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  Speaker 1: when the gods had entrusted to the Titan brothers the
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  Speaker 1: endowment of all living things upon the earth, they had
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  Speaker 1: been careful to withhold everything that might bring into the
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  Speaker 1: world pain, sickness, anxiety, bitterness of heart, remorse, or soul
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  Speaker 1: crushing sorrow. All these hurtful things were imprisoned in a coffer,
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  Speaker 1: which was given into the care of the trusty Epimetheus.
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  Speaker 1: To Pandora, the world into which she came was all fresh,
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  Speaker 1: all new, quite full of unexpected joys and delightful surprises.
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  Speaker 1: It was a world of mystery, but mystery of which
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  Speaker 1: her great adoring simple Titan held the golden key. When
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  Speaker 1: she saw the coffer, which never was opened, what then
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  Speaker 1: more natural than that she should ask Epimetheus what it contained?
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  Speaker 1: But the contents were known only to the gods. Epimetheus
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  Speaker 1: was unable to answer. Day by day, the curiosity of
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  Speaker 1: Pandora increased. To her the gods had never given anything
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  Speaker 1: but good, Surely there must be here gifts more precious. Still,
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  Speaker 1: What if the Olympians had destined her to be the
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  Speaker 1: one to open the casket, and had sent her to
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  Speaker 1: Earth in order that she might bestow on this dear world,
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  Speaker 1: on the men who lived on it, and on her
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  Speaker 1: own magnificent Titan, happiness and blessings which only the minds
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  Speaker 1: of the gods could have conceived. Thus did there come
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  Speaker 1: a day when Pandora, unconscious instrument in the hands of
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  Speaker 1: a vengeful Olympian in all faith and with the courage
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  Speaker 1: that is born of faith and of love opened the
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  Speaker 1: lid of the prison house of evil, And as from
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  Speaker 1: coffers in the old Egyptian tombs, the live plague can
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  Speaker 1: still rush forth and slay. The long imprisoned evils rushed
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  Speaker 1: forth upon the fair earth and on the human beings
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  Speaker 1: who lived on it, malignant, ruthless, fierce, treacherous, and cruel, poisoning, slaying, devouring,
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  Speaker 1: plague and pestilence and murder, envy and malice and revenge,
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  Speaker 1: and all viciousness. An ugly wolf pack, indeed, was that
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  Speaker 1: one let loose by pandora, Terror, doubt, misery had all
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  Speaker 1: rushed straightway to attack her heart, while the evils of
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  Speaker 1: which she had never dreamed, stung mind and soul into
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  Speaker 1: dismay and horror. When, by hastily shutting the lid of
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  Speaker 1: the coffer, she tried to undo the evil she had done,
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  Speaker 1: and lo she found that the gods had imprisoned one
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  Speaker 1: good gift only in this inferno of horrors and of ugliness.
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  Speaker 1: In the world there had never been any need of hope.
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  Speaker 1: What work was there for hope to do? Where all
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  Speaker 1: was perfect, and where each creature possessed the desire of
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  Speaker 1: body and of heart. Therefore hope was thrust into the
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  Speaker 1: chest that held the evils, a star and a black knight,
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  Speaker 1: a lily growing on a dung heap. And as Pandora,
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  Speaker 1: white lipped and trembling, looked into the otherwise empty box,
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  Speaker 1: courage came back to her heart. And Epimetheus let fall
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  Speaker 1: to his side the arm that would have slain the
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  Speaker 1: woman of his love, because there came to him like
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  Speaker 1: a draft of wine to a warrior spent in battle,
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  Speaker 1: an imperial vision of the sons of men through all
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  Speaker 1: the eons, to come, combating all evils of body and
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  Speaker 1: of soul, going on conquering and to conquer. Thus, saved
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  Speaker 1: by hope, the Titan and the woman faced the future,
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  Speaker 1: and for them the vengeance of the gods was stayed.
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  Speaker 1: Yet I argue not against Heaven's hand or will, nor
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  Speaker 1: bade a jot of heart or hope, but still bear
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  Speaker 1: up and steer right onward. So spoke Milton, the blind
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  Speaker 1: Titan of the seventeenth century. And Shakespeare says, true hope
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  Speaker 1: is swift and flies with swallows, wings kings. It makes
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  Speaker 1: gods and meaner creatures kings upon the earth, and on
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  Speaker 1: the children of men who were as gods in their
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  Speaker 1: knowledge and mastery of the force of fire. Jupiter had
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  Speaker 1: had his revenge for Prometheus, he reserved another punishment. He
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  Speaker 1: the greatly daring Once the dear friend and companion of Zeus,
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  Speaker 1: himself was chained to a rock on Mount Caucasus by
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  Speaker 1: the vindictive deity. There on a dizzying height, his body
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  Speaker 1: thrust against the sun baked rock, Prometheus had to endure
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  Speaker 1: the torment of having a foul beaked vulture tear out
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  Speaker 1: his liver as though he were a piece of carrion,
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  Speaker 1: lying on the mountain side all day, while the sun
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  Speaker 1: mercilessly smote him, and the blue sky turned from red
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  Speaker 1: to black before his pain racked eyes. The torture went
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  Speaker 1: on each night. When the filthy bird of prey that
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  Speaker 1: worked the will of the gods, spread its dark wings
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  Speaker 1: and flew back to its airy the titan endured the
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  Speaker 1: cruel mercy of having his body grow whole once more.
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  Speaker 1: But with daybreak there came again the silent shadow, the
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  Speaker 1: smell of the unclean thing, and again, with fierce beak
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  Speaker 1: and talents, the vulture greedily began its work. Thirty thousand
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  Speaker 1: years was the time of his sentence. And yet Prometheus
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  Speaker 1: knew that at any moment he could have brought his
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  Speaker 1: torment to an end. A secret was his, a mighty secret,
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  Speaker 1: the revelation of which would have brought him the mercy
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  Speaker 1: of Zeus and have reinstated him in the favor of
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  Speaker 1: the all powerful God. Yet did he prefer to endure
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  Speaker 1: his agonies rather than to free himself by bowing to
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  Speaker 1: the desires of a tyrant who had caused man to
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  Speaker 1: be made, yet denied to man those gifts that made
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  Speaker 1: him nobler than the beasts, and raised him almost to
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  Speaker 1: the heights of the Olympians. Thus, for him, the weary
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  Speaker 1: centuries dragged by in suffering that knew no respite in
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  Speaker 1: endurance that the gods might have ended. Prometheus had brought
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  Speaker 1: an imperial gift to the men that he had made,
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  Speaker 1: and imperially he paid the penalty three thousand years of sleep,
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  Speaker 1: unsheltered hours and moments I divided by keen pangs till
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  Speaker 1: they seemed years, torture and solitude, scorn and despair. These
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  Speaker 1: are mine, Empire, more glorious far than that which thou
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  Speaker 1: surveyest from thine unenvied throne, Almighty God, Almighty, had I
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  Speaker 1: deigned to share the shame of thine ill tyranny and
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  Speaker 1: hung not here, nailed to this wall of eagle, baffling mountain, black, wintry, dead,
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  Speaker 1: unmeasured without herb insect or beast, or shape or sound
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  Speaker 1: of life. Ah me alast, pain, pain ever forever, Shelley Titan,
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  Speaker 1: to whose immortal eyes the sufferings of mortality seen in
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  Speaker 1: and their sad reality were not as things that gods despise.
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  Speaker 1: What was thy pity's recompense? A silent suffering and intense
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  Speaker 1: The rock, the vulture, and the chain all that the
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  Speaker 1: proud can feel of pain, the agony. They do not
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  Speaker 1: show the suffocating sense of woe, which speaks but in
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  Speaker 1: its loneliness, and then is jealous lest the sky should
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  Speaker 1: have a listener, nor will sigh until its voice is echoless. Byron.
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  Speaker 1: Yet I am still Prometheus, wiser, grown by years of
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  Speaker 1: solitude that holds apart the past and future, giving the
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  Speaker 1: soul room to search into itself and long commune with
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  Speaker 1: this eternal silence. More a god, and my long suffering
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  Speaker 1: and strength to meet with equal front the diresh shafts
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  Speaker 1: of fate than thou in thy faint hearted despotism. Therefore
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  Speaker 1: great heart bear up thou art, But type of what
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  Speaker 1: all lofty spirits endure, that feign would win men back
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  Speaker 1: to strength and peace through love. Each hath his lonely pique.
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  Speaker 1: And on each heart envy or scorn or hatred tears
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  Speaker 1: life long with vulture beak. Yet the high soul is left,
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  Speaker 1: and faith, which is but hope grown wise, and love
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  Speaker 1: and patience which at last shall overcome Lowell and of
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  Speaker 1: Prometheus and Pandora, from a book of myths by Jane Lang,
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  Speaker 1: recorded by Matthew mc clellan,