420 mSTORY OF GREECE. the same principle of treating the popular gods as allegorical per- sonages ; while the expositors of Homer (such as Stesimbrotus, Glaukon, and others, even down to the Alexandrine age), though none of them proceeded to the same extreme length as Metrodd- rus, employed allegory amongst other media of explanation for the purpose of solving difficulties, or eluding reproaches against the poet. In the days of Plato and Zenophon, this allegorizing interpre- tation was one of the received methods of softening down the ob- noxious mythes though Plato himself treated it as an insuffi- cient defence, seeing that the bulk of youthful hearers could not see through the allegory, but embraced the story literally as it was set forth. 1 Pausanias tells us, that when he first began to write his work, he treated many of the Greek legends as silly and undeserving of serious attention ; but as he proceeded, he gradu- ally arrived at the full conviction, that the ancient sages had de- signedly spoken in enigmatical language, and that there was val- uable truth wrapped up in their narratives : it was the duty of a pious man, therefore, to study and interpret, but not to reject, penal infliction, Cerberus and the Furies. The first four are emblematic descriptions of various defective or vicious characters in human nature, the deisidsDmoriic, the ambitious, the amorous, or the insatiate and querulous man ; the last two represent the mental terrors of the wicked. 1 Oi vvv irspl "Ofijjpov SeLvoi so Plato calls these interpreters (Kratylus, p. 407) ; see also Xenoph. Sympos. iii. 6 ; Plato, Ion. p. 530 ; Plutarch, De Audiend. Poet. p. 19. iirovoia was the original word, afterwards succeeded by ukhriyopia.
- Kpaf <5e deafj.oi>f Kal 'Htyaiorov piipeif virb irarpbf, fie^Xovrof Ty fj.r]Tpl TVTT-
TOfisvy u/jLvvelv, Kal -&cofj.ax'iaf oaac "Qftepof irEnoirjKev, ov TrapadeKTcov elf T7jv iroTitv, ovT 1 iv VTTOV oiaif jrefroiij/nevaf, OVT' uv ev i> TTOV o i- u> v. 'O yap VEOf ov%' oldf re Kpivetv 5,Tt re imovoia Kal o fi%, a/lA' a cb TTj^iKovTOf )v Au/Jj; ev ralf (Jofatf, 6vcreKvnrTa re Kal a/^Eraorara tiikel yiy- VEO&ai (Plato, Republ. ii. 17. p. 578). The idea of an interior sense and concealed purpose in the ancient poets occurs several times in Plato (Theaetet. c. 93. p. 180) : -rapti filv ruv apx a ' iuv > fiera TroiqaEUf ETUKpvTTTo/Lievuv rot)f 7ro/l/loi)f, etc. ; also Protagor. C. 20. p. 316. " Modo Stoicum Homerum faciunt, modo Epicurcum, modo Peripa- teticum, modo Academicum. Apparat nihil horum csse in illo, quig omnia sunt." (Seneca, Ep. 88.) Compare Plutarch, De Defectu Oracul. c 11-12. t. ii. p. 702, Wytt., and Julian, Orat. vii. p. 216.
