Untitled - Centrostudirpinia.it

DESTINY. 859
daughter, but be the last of his race. OSinn said : I shape him,
that he live three men s lifetimes (conf. Saxo Gram. p. 103).
Thorr : in each lifetime he shall do a nrSings-verk/ Oftinn :
I shape him, that he have the best of weapons and raiment.
Thorr : he shall have neither land nor soil. Oftinn : I give him,
that he have store of money and chattels. Thorr : I lay unto
him, that he take in every battle grievous wounds. Oftinn : I
give him the gift of poetry. Thorr : what he composes he shall
not be able to remember. OSinn : this I shape him, that he be
prized by the best and noblest men. Thorr : by the people he
shall be hated. Then the demsters awarded to Starkaftr all the
doom that was deemed, the council broke up, and Hrossharsgrani
and his pupil went to their boat.
Thorr plays here exactly the part of the ungracious fay (pp.
411-2), he tries to lessen each gift by a noxious ingredient.
And it is not for an infant, but a well-grown boy, and in his
presence, that the destiny is shaped.
According to Greek legend, Zeus did not always decide
directly, but made use of two scales, in which he weighed the
fates of men, e.g. of the Trojans and Achseans, of Achilles and
Hector :
Kal Tore Srj ^pva-eia Trarrjp eTriraive rd\avra
v 8 eTiOei Svo /cijpe TavTyXeyeos davdroio,
TpWOJV ITTTToSdfjLCOV
e\fce Se fjbecrcra Xa/3&)V
KOI ^
II. 8, 69. 22, 209; conf. 16, t>58. 19,
Aeneas and Turnus, Aen. 12, 723 :
Jupiter ipse, duas aequato
examine lances
223. The same of
sustinet, et fata iinponit diversa duorum,
quern damnet labor, et quo vergat pondere letum.
I am the more particular in quoting these, as the Christian legend
also provides the archangel Michael, the conductor of souls, with
scales, in which the good and evil deeds of them that die are
weighed against one another, and the destinies of souls determined
the 1 outcome (see Suppl.). The application
of a balance to
by
actions, to sins, is very natural; the (apocryphal) 2 Esdras 3, 34
i Conf. Deut. S. no. 479; a coll. of authorities in Zappert s Vita Acotauti
(Vienna 1839), pp. 79, 88.