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I

O

N.

PRELIMINARY ESSA Y.

HE moft fuperficial reader of the romantick fables

TH

of Pagan antiquity must have been often fhocked with thofe terreftial crimes, which credulous men have imputed to their vifionary gods. As most of these, if not all of them, were originally mortals, whom human adulation had exalted and deified, they translated not only their virtues, which alone gave them pretenfions to this elevation, but also their vices into heaven. These were fuppofed to adhere to them even in this new state, and were fabulously reprefented to have been often repeated. It is no wonder if in the number of thefe gallantry became a favourite amufement with enamoured Deities, who were the abject slaves of human paffions: hence every Heathen God in the Pantheon was metamorphofed into a celestial knight-errant, who defcended from the palace of Pagan Heaven to vifit his humble miftrefs on earth. When

this polite tenet had been once established in the antient code of fuperftition, the women would naturally fupport an error which paid fo flattering a compliment to their own vanity: every Græcian virgin of fuperior rank and transcen dent charms could attribute her pregnancy from the voluntary embrace of a mortal lover to the irrefiftible influence of an enraptured God:

'Hail, happy nymph! no vulgar births are ow'd To the prolifick raptures of a God.

POPE, Od. b. XI. v. 298.

Hence, in the fashionable calendar of antiquity, the number of harlots thus diftinguished was by no means inconfiderable. The heroine of this play, Creufa, was honoured with the addreffes of Apollo in the cave of Macrai near the citadel of Athens. She was a princefs of the most illuftrious descent; whofe pedigree we must trace to understand several allufions in the drama. Her grandfire Erichthonius (if we reckon from Cecrops) was the fourth king of Athens; and he was distinguished with the honourable appellation of earthborn ; the cause of which epithet was founded on the monstrous extravagance of Pagan Mythology; for in the language of Ovid he was fabled,

2

"The fon of Vulcan, without mother born."

MET. 1. II. v. 576.

Yet

* Επει ἐκ αποφώλιοι εὐκαὶ

̓Αθανάτων (Hom. Odyff. 1. XI. v. 249.

2 This ridiculous ftory, too indelicate to be here inferted, may be seen in Apollodorus (Bibl. 1. III. c. xiii. fect. 6.) in Hyginus (Fab. 166.) and in Lucian (Deor. Dial. 8. vol. I.) But I entirely aflent to the remark of Euftathius on Honer in the paflage cited in my next note, that the whole

ftory

Yet Homer feems to have applied this circumftance, related of Erichthonius, to his grandfon Erechtheus,

That ow'd his nurture to the blue-ey'd maid;
But from the teeming furrow took his birth,
The mighty offspring of the foodful earth.

4

POPE. II. B. II3. v. 660.

Immediately after his birth, the infant was configned by Minerva to the virgin daughters of Cecrops and his wife Agraulos, with a strict prohibition not to open the casket in which he was contained: but thefe virgins violated this divine injunction', and afflicted with madness, as a punishment for their criminal curiofity, they dashed themselves against a rock. At the time when Minerva committed to them the cuftody of Erichthonius, the delivered two ferpents,

story should be configned to filence, and buried in oblivion; gizledy się arany, nai doléor xalacañiai tỷ yã. According to Tzetzes, in his Commentary upon Lycophron, Minerva, or Belonica, daughter of Bronteus, was a queen, and married to Vulcan, father of Erichthonius, by her. (See Meurfius de Attic. I. I. c. 14. and 1. II. c. 1.)

Re Euftathius, in his Comment on this paffage, remarks, that fome af

ferted this identity of perfons in Erechtheus and Erichthonius 7ès de Tòv autòw nai 'Egixférior Pariv. (Il. II. v. 548. ed. Bafil. 1560) and other coreponding inftances may be feen in Meurfius (De Reg. Athen. 1. II. c. 1.) Sir Ifaac Newton alfo, in his Chronology, unites thefe different characters, (p. 143. ed. 1728.) but, according to the moft acknowledged teftimony, and the antient records of Græcian history, they were distinct monarchis as mentioned in this play of Euripides.

4 V. 21. Thus Ovid,

Nam tempore quodam
Pallas Erichonium, prolem fine matie creatam,
Clauferat Actæo textâ de vimine ciftâ ;
Virginibufque tribus gemino de Cecrope natis
Hanc legem dederat, fua ne fecreta viderent.

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(Met. 1. II. v. 552.) V. 274. See alfo Paufanias Att. 1. I. c. 18. and

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