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The prophetic influence was at first variously attributed to the goddess Earth, to Neptune, Themis, and others, but it was at length assigned to Apollo, and to him alone. A priestess was appointed whose office it was to inhale the hallowed air, and who was named the Pythia.
Here their allusion, however, only concerns the celebrated divinations of the Pythia. We must therefore, probe somewhat deeper, in order to illustrate that species of divination which was the result of dreams, and a source of divination on the nature of diseases and their remedies.
Upon which spirited rejoinder, the Pythia saw the policy of revising her truly brutal rescript as it had stood originally. The necessity, indeed, was strong for not acquiescing in the Oracle, until it had become clearer by revision or by casual illustrations, as will be seen even under our next head.
Convinced that the oracle was subsidized by Philip of Macedon, and instructed to speak in his favor, he boldly declared that the Pythia philippized, and bade the Athenians and Thebans remember that "Pericles and Epaminondas, instead of listening to the frivolous answers of the oracle, the resort of the ignorant and cowardly, consulted only reason in the choice of their measures."
They listened probably to the Pythia with a superstitious reverence for the incoherent sentences she uttered. She, like them, spent her life in being trained for the office to which she was devoted. All that was rambling and inapplicable in her wild declamation they consigned to oblivion. Whatever seemed to bear on the question proposed they preserved.
I never think that a woman can be anything but pretty or hideous. There is no middle, and no suspicion about them. Baroness B. is pretty. And if she likes to talk like a Pythia, that's her way of making people interested in her. Maroossia complained of a headache, so we left early. Baroness is in the Hotel d'Europe she is so sorry that "her Astoria" became such a hole. Well not only her Astoria.
"At any rate, come back here in a year, and if your cackling Pythia and this little leaf tell the truth, and I am permitted to bring it to you without support or crutch, I'll give you a stout piece of cloth for a new cloak; yet nay, better try your luck in six months, for your chiton looks sicker than I, and will hardly last a whole year." "Not half a one," replied the conjurer, with a sly smile.
When he saw her growing up to be tall and slender and wise, he wondered if, after all, he would have to die some time and leave his lands and his gold and his kingdom to her. So he sent to Delphi and asked the Pythia about it. The Pythia told him that he would not only have to die some time, but that the son of his daughter would cause his death.
It is said that whenever he set sail from Sikyon to Kirrha on the opposite coast, the Pythia would recite the verse, "Now goes our dear Hippolytus to sea," as if the god knew that he was coming and rejoiced at it.
She didn't quite like Dick's championship of this unknown girl, nor did she trust to his judgment; but, like a wise woman, she wanted to know what was the thing that had attracted him, and was big enough in heart to be willing to do a good turn wherever she could. "This is the oracle of the Pythia," she said at last. "We will not commit ourselves to anything at the behest of Richard Percival.
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