History of the World/History of the World (Bureau Development, Inc.)(1992).BIN/dp/0000/00006.txt

Text File | 1992-10-11 | 8KB | 148 lines

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$Title{Age Of Fable Or Beauties Of Mythology
Preface}
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$Author{Bulfinch, Thomas}
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$Subject{mythology
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Title:       Age Of Fable Or Beauties Of Mythology
Author:      Bulfinch, Thomas

Preface

     If no other knowledge deserves to be called useful but that which helps
to enlarge our possessions or to raise our station in society, then Mythology
has no claim to the appellation.  But if that which tends to make us happier
and better can be called useful, then we claim that epithet for our subject.
For Mythology is the handmaid of literature; and literature is one of the
best allies of virtue and promoters of happiness.

     Without a knowledge of mythology much of the elegant literature of our
own language cannot be understood and appreciated.  When Byron calls Rome
"the Niobe of nations," or says of Venice, "She looks a Sea-Cybele fresh from
ocean," he calls up to the mind of one familiar with our subject
illustrations more vivid and striking than the pencil could furnish, but
which are lost to the reader ignorant of mythology.  Milton abounds in
similar allusions.  The short poem "Comus" contains more than thirty such,
and the ode "On the Morning of the Nativity" half as many.  Through "Paradise
Lost" they are scattered profusely.  This is one reason why we often hear
persons by no means illiterate say that they cannot enjoy Milton.  But were
these persons to add to their more solid acquirements the easy learning of
this little volume, much of the poetry of Milton which has appeared to them
"harsh and crabbed" would be found "musical as is Apollo's lute." Our
citations, taken from more than twenty-five poets, from Spenser to
Longfellow, will show how general has been the practice of borrowing
illustrations from mythology.

     The prose writers also avail themselves of the same source of elegant
and suggestive illustration.  One can hardly take up a number of the
Edinburgh or Quarterly Review without meeting with instances.  In Macaulay's
article on Milton there are twenty such.

     But how is mythology to be taught to one who does not learn it through
the medium of the languages of Greece and Rome?  To devote study to a species
of learning which relates wholly to false marvels and obsolete faiths, is not
to be expected of the general reader in a practical age like this.  The time
even of the young is claimed by so many sciences of facts and things, that
little can be spared for set treatises on a science of mere fancy.

     But many not the requisite knowledge of the subject be acquired by
reading the ancient poets in translations?  We reply, the field is to
extensive for a preparatory course; and these very translations require some
previous knowledge of the subject to make them intelligible.  Let any one who
doubts it read the first page of the "Aeneid," and see what he can make of
"the hatred of Juno," the "decree of the Parcae," the "judgment of Paris,"
and the "honors of Ganymede," without this knowledge.

     Shall we be told that answers to such queries may be found in notes, or
by a reference to the Classical Dictionary?  We reply, the interruption of
one's reading by either process is so annoying that most readers prefer to
let an allusion pass unapprehended rather than submit to it.  Moreover, such
sources give us only the dry facts without any of the charm of the original
narrative; and what is a poetical myth when stripped of its poetry?  The
story of Ceyx and Halcyone, which fills a chapter in our book, occupies but
eight lines in the best (Smith's) Classical Dictionary; and so of others.

     Our book is an attempt to solve this problem, by telling the stories of
mythology in such a manner as to make them a source of amusement.  We have
endeavored to tell them correctly, according to the ancient authorities, so
that when the reader finds them referred to he may not be at a loss to
recognize the reference.  Thus we hope to teach mythology not as a study, but
as a relaxation from study; to give our work the charm of a story-book, yet
by means of it to impart a knowledge of an important branch of education.
The index at the end will adapt it to the purposes of reference, and make it
a Classical Dictionary for the parlor.

     Most of the classical legends in this book are derived from Ovid and
Virgil.  They are not literally translated, for, in the author's opinion,
poetry translated into literal prose is very unattractive reading.  Neither
are they in verse, as well for other reasons as from a conviction that to
translate faithfully under all the embarrassments of rhyme and measure is
impossible.  The attempt has been made to tell the stories in prose,
preserving so much of the poetry as resides in the thoughts and is separable
from the language itself, and omitting those amplifications which are not
suited to the altered form.

     The Northern mythological stories are copied with some abridgment from
Mallet's Northern Antiquities.  These chapters, with those on Oriental and
Egyptian mythology, seemed necessary to complete the subject, though it is
believed these topics have not usually been presented in the same volume with
the classical fables.

     The poetical citations so freely introduced are expected to answer
several valuable purposes.  They will tend to fix in memory the leading fact
of each story, they will help to the attainment of a correct pronunciation of
the proper names, and they will enrich the memory with many gems of poetry,
some of them such as are most frequently quoted or alluded to in reading and
conversation.

     Having chosen mythology as connected with literature for our province, we
have endeavored to omit nothing which the reader of elegant literature is
likely to find occasion for.  Such stories and parts of stories as are
offensive to pure taste and good morals are not given.  But such stories are
not often referred to, and if they occasionally should be, the English reader
need feel no mortification in confessing his ignorance of them.

     Our book is not for the learned, nor for the theologian, nor for the
philosopher, but for the reader of English literature, of either sex, who
wishes to comprehend the allusions so frequently made by public speakers,
lecturers, essayists, and poets, and those which occur in polite conversation.

     We trust our young readers will find it a source of entertainment; those
more advanced a useful companion in their reading those who travel, and visit
museums and galleries of art, an interpreter of paintings and sculptures;
those who mingle in cultivated society, a key to allusions which are
occasionally made; and last of all, those in advanced life, pleasure in
retracing a path of literature which leads them back to the days of their
childhood, and revives at every step the associations of the morning of life.

     The permanency of those associations is beautifully expressed in the
well-known lines of Coleridge, in "The Piccolomini," Act ii.  Scene 4.

     "The intelligible forms of ancient poets,
     The fair humanities of old religion,
     The Power, the Beauty, and the Majesty
     That had their haunts in dale or piny mountain,
     Or forest, by slow stream, or pebbly spring,
     Or chasms and watery depths; all these have vanished.
     They live no longer in the faith of reason;
     But still the heart doth need a language; still
     Doth the old instinct bring back the old names;
     Spirits or gods that used to share this earth
     With man as with their friend; and at this day
     "Tis Jupiter who brings whate'er is great,
     And Venus who brings every thing that's fair."