Cox, George - Aryan Mythology Vol 2.pdf

44 MYTHOLOGY OF THE ARYAN NATIONS.
BOOK labours, they related that Zeus made a compact by which
s_ ,' -, Herakles should become immortal when he had brought his
twelve tasks to a successful issue. The story of his birth
tells us not only of the child in his cradle strangling the
horrid snakes of darkness which seek to destroy their enemy,
but of an infancy as troubled as that of Telephos or Oidipous.
Like them, Alkmene, favouring the jealousy of Here, exposed
the babe on the plain which thence received the name of
Herakles ; and it is picked up, of course, by the dawn-goddess
Athene, who beseeches Here, the queen of the blue heaven, to
nourish it. The child bites hard, and Here flings it back to
Athene, who carries it to her mother. 1 The boy grows up
the model of human strength and power ; and his teachers
point to the cloudland to which he himself belongs. Auto-
lykos and Eurytos, by whom he is taught to wrestle and to
shoot with the bow, denote the light and splendour of
morning ; Kastor, who shows him how to fight in heavy
armour, is the twin brother of Polydeukes, these twins answering
to the Yedic Asvins or horsemen ; and Linos, who
teaches him music, is akin to Hermes, Pan, Orpheus, and
Amphion. The harper is slain by his pupil, and Amphitryon,
fearing that his son might use his strength in a like way
again, sends him to tend cattle, and in this task, which
in other myths is performed by Sarama or the daughters of
JSTeiara, he lives until he has reached the full strength of
youth. Thus far we have a time answering to the bright
period in which Phoibos is tended by the nymphs in his
infancy, when his face is unsoiled, and his raiment all white,
and his terrible sword is not yet belted to his side. It is the
picture of the unclouded sun rising in pure splendour, seeing
the heavens which he must climb, and ready for the conflicts
which may await him— gloomy mists and angry stormclouds.
The moral aspect which this myth may be made to assume
must be that of self-denial. The smooth road of indulgence
is the easiest on which to travel ; he who takes the rugged
path of duty must do so from deliberate choice ;
and thus
the brave Herakles, going forth to his long series of labours,
suggests to the sophist Prodikos the beautiful apologue in
' Diod. iv. 9.