INTRODUCTION
dead?" In that case, though there is no visible human avenger, the Law nevertheless acts. The doer must suffer. That is Dikê, Justice. It is the law of Themis, of Moira, of the Erînyes, and ultimately of Mother Earth. Let us consider each of these conceptions separately.
Themis, as Dr. Jane Harrison has shown, is the correct tribal custom, the thing that is always done—always, that is, by the people who really know. When prodigies occur, or bewildering emergencies, and you do not know what to do, you consult the elders or other authorities on ritual and precedent. If they fail you, you go to an oracle and consult the great ancestors, the "Earthy" or "Underworld" people, called Chthonioi, lying in the bosom of the earth. They tell you what is Themis; and that is why Themis presides at Delphi.
Moira is commonly translated "Fate," but more strictly it is the "portion" allotted to every man, god, or city. Each of us must fulfil his portion; he cannot escape it: he must not exceed it nor trespass on the Moira of another. And the Moirai, when personified, are the Assigners or Apportioners of man's lot in life. One is reminded of the conception of Righteousness in Plato's Republic, where every man fulfils his "portion" of service to the community.
And the Erînyes. They are the wrath of the dead or the injured acting as a curse and pursuing the transgressor. Orestes, in the Choëphoroe, sees them as "his mother’s wrathful hounds." In this play we see Clytemnestra waken them when they have fallen asleep, They are obedient to her wrath, for they are her wrath in personal form. And such wrath, though
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