Themis, a study of the social origins of Greek ... - Warburg Institute

xi] Moral Right and Natural Law 531
Dike then, the Way, rules in the underworld, she and her
subjects, the year and day daimones. She is there of necessity, as
the Living Way, the course of Nature, before Orphic theology
placed her there as the spirit of Vengeance. Regarding Dike as
the Way, the order of living, of Nature, we see at once that she,
eldest and chief of the Horai, might well be invoked by the
Kouretes to welcome the Year. But here we come straight up
against our final difficulty, a difficulty we have ignored in con-
sidering rta and asha and tao, but that has all the time been
dogging our steps. Why does man make this strange confusion
between moral right and natural law ? Why is Themis the mother
of Dike, and why must the Kouretes, if they want a good
harvest, 'leap' not only for Dike and the Horai but for 'goodly
Themis'?
Deep-rooted in man's heart is the pathetic conviction that moral
goodness and material prosperity go together, that, if man keep
the rta, he can magically affect for good nature's ordered going.
When the Olympians became fully humanized, and sacramentalism
was replaced by gift-sacrifice, the notion slightly altered its form.
The gods it was now felt were bound in honour to bestow on their
faithful worshippers a quid pro quo. The idea is no-wise confined
to the Greeks. The Psalmist, whose sheltered outlook on life was
traditional and religious rather than realistic, says confidently,
' I have been young, and now atn old,
And yet saw I never the righteous forsaken,
Nor his seed begging their bread 1 .'
Hesiod- mutatis mutandis cherishes the same conviction,
Whoso to stranger and to kinsmen deal
Straight judgments, ne'er o'erpassing Justice' bounds,
Their city flowers, and their folk blossometh,
And in their land is Peace the Nurse of children.
Never on them doth Zeus bring grievous war.
Famine and strife are far from men who deal
Straight judgments, feast and song are all their toil.
For them earth bears rich food ; the mountain oak
Rears high her acorns, midway holds her bees.
The fleecy sheep go heavy with thick wool,
And wives bear children like unto their sires.
All good things blossom ; never need they tempt
The barren sea, for them earth bears her grain.
1 Ps. xxxvii. 25. - Ov. 225.
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