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Only the day before yesterday he made a poem in which he described the entertainment of Heracles, who was a connexion of the family, setting forth how in virtue of this relationship he was hospitably received by an ancestor of Lysis; this ancestor was himself begotten of Zeus by the daughter of the founder of the deme.
To others, who do not need him, he is a boisterous and eccentric person, a Heracles in the house of mourning. Let us remember his main belief, the value of the individual. The needs of society constantly require that the individual be suppressed. They hold him down and punish him at every point. The tyranny of order and organization of monarch or public opinion weights him and presses him down.
Their divination is ordered thus: the art is assigned not to any man but to certain of the gods, for there are in their land Oracles of Heracles, of Apollo, of Athene, of Artemis, or Ares, and of Zeus, and moreover that which they hold most in honour of all, namely the Oracle of Leto which is in the city of Buto.
It is not therefore a contradiction when interpreters of myths sometimes connect a myth with one spiritual fact and sometimes with another. From this standpoint, we are able to find a thread to conduct us through the labyrinth of Greek myths. Let us consider the legend of Heracles.
From an Andromache or a Hecuba, one can endure recitative: but when Heracles himself comes upon the stage, and so far forgets himself, and the respect due to the lion-skin and club that he carries, as to deliver a solo, no reasonable person can deny that such a performance is in execrable taste.
For Cypris stirred in them a sweet desire, for the sake of Hephaestus of many counsels, in order that Lemnos might be again inhabited by men and not be ruined. Thereupon Aeson's son started to go to the royal home of Hypsipyle; and the rest went each his way as chance took them, all but Heracles; for he of his own will was left behind by the ship and a few chosen comrades with him.
The waters flowed through the stables, and in a day all the uncleanness was washed away. Then Heracles turned the rivers back into their own courses. He was not given the reward he had bargained for, however. He went back to Mycenæ with the tale of how he had cleaned the stables. "Ten labors remain for me to do now," he said. "Eleven," said Eurystheus.
"I would not have you enter into strife with the Amazons," said Queen Hippolyte. And so saying she drew off the girdle of bronze and iridescent glass, and she gave it into his hands. Heracles took the beautiful girdle into his hands. Fearful he was that some piece of guile was being played upon him, but then he looked into the open eyes of the queen and he saw that she meant no guile.
He saw, too, the phantom of Heracles, who lives with honor among the gods, and has for his wife Hebe, the daughter of Zeus and Juno. But though he would have talked with the heroes for a year and more, he sought out Tiresias. "The anger of Poseidon follows thee," said the sage. "Wherefore, Odysseus, thy return is yet far off.
They were all slain with the unerring arrows. Then Heracles took up the body of his companion and he buried it with proper rights, and over it he raised a column. Afterward, around that column a city that bore the name of Heracles's friend was built. Then toward the Euxine Sea he went. There, where the River Themiscyra flows into the sea he saw the abodes of the Amazons.
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