to be looked for not from the swiftness or ability of any one inquirer, but from a succession. For the strongest and swiftest runners are perhaps not the best fitted to keep their torch alight; since it may be put out by going too fast as well as too slow. It seems however that these races and games of the torch have long been intermitted; since it is still in their first authors, Aristotle, Galen, Euclid, Ptolemy, that we find the several sciences in highest perfection; and no great matter has been done, nor hardly attempted, by their successors. And well were it to be wished that these games in honour of Prometheus, that is of Human Nature, were again revived; that the victory may no longer depend upon the unsteady and wavering torch of each single man; but competition, emulation, and good fortune be brought to aid. Therefore men should be advised to rouse themselves, and try each his own strength and the chance of his own turn, and not to stake the whole venture upon the spirits and brains of a few persons.

Such are the views which I conceive to be shadowed out in this so common and hacknied fable. It is true that there are not a few things beneath which have a wonderful correspondency with the mysteries of the Christian faith. The voyage of Hercules especially, sailing in a pitcher to set Prometheus free, seems to present an image of God the Word hastening in the frail vessel of the flesh to redeem the human But I purposely refrain myself from all licence of speculation in this kind, lest peradventure I bring strange fire to the altar of the Lord.

XXVII.

THE FLIGHT OF ICARUS; ALSO SCYLLA AND
CHARYBDIS;

OR THE MIDDLE WAY.

MODERATION, or the Middle Way, is in Morals much commended; in Intellectuals less spoken of, though not less useful and good; in Politics only, questionable and to be used with caution and judg

ment.

The principle of moderation in Morals is represented by the ancients in the path which Icarus was directed to take through the air; the same principle in relation to the intellect, by the passage between Scylla and Charybdis, so famous for its difficulty and danger.

Icarus was instructed by his father to beware, when he came to fly over the sea, of taking either too high or too low a course. For his wings being fixed on with wax, the fear was that if he rose too high the wax would be melted by the sun's heat; if he kept down too near the vapour of the sea, it would lose its tenacity by the moisture. Icarus, in the adventurous spirit of youth, made for the heights, and so fell headlong down.

It is an easy and a familiar parable. The path of virtue goes directly midway between excess on the one hand and defect on the other. Icarus, being in the pride of youthful alacrity, naturally fell a victim to excess. For it is on the side of excess that the young commonly sin, as the old on the side of defect. And yet if he was to perish one way, it must be admitted

that of two paths, both bad and mischievous, he chose the better. For sins of defeet are justly accounted worse than sins of excess; because in excess there is something of magnanimity, something, like the flight of a bird, that holds kindred with heaven: whereas defect creeps on the ground Eke a reptile. Excellently was it said by Heraclitus. I light is the best soul. For when the moisture and humours of earth get into the soul, it becomes altogether Jow and degenerat And yet bore toe a measure must be kept: the dryness, so y peised, must be such as to make the Kiệt more sick, but na such as to make it och fm. But this is what everybody knows

Now for the passage Jerwoor. Serli, und Chandis puodostaad of the ennånen of the unasading 309 53 it nook hach sil and goal forume u

For the shuur m. Sela is dustFL

he macks, it at Churchis is

SPHINX, says the story, was a monster combining many shapes in one. She had the face and voice of a virgin, the wings of a bird, the claws of a griffin. She dwelt on the ridge of a mountain near Thebes and infested the roads, lying in ambush for travellers, whom she would suddenly attack and lay hold of; and when she had mastered them, she propounded to them certain dark and perplexed riddles, which she was thought to have obtained from the Muses. And if the wretched captives could not at once solve and interpret the same, as they stood hesitating and confused she cruelly tore them to pieces. Time bringing no abatement of the calamity, the Thebans offered to any man who should expound the Sphinx's riddles (for this was the only way to subdue her) the sovereignty of Thebes as his reward. The greatness of the prize induced Edipus, a man of wisdom and penetration, but lame from wounds in his feet, to accept the condition and make the trial who presenting himself full of confidence and alacrity before the Sphinx, and being asked what kind of animal it was which was born four-footed, afterwards became two-footed, then three-footed, and at last four-footed again, answered readily that it was man ; who at his birth and during his infancy sprawls on all four, hardly attempting to creep; in a little while walks upright on two feet; in later years leans on a walkingstick and so goes as it were on three; and at last in extreme age and decrepitude, his sinews all failing,

sinks into a quadruped again, and keeps his bed. This was the right answer and gave him the victory; whereupon he slew the Sphinx; whose body was put on the back of an ass and carried about in triumph; while himself was made according to compact King of Thebes,

The fable is an elegant and a wise one, invented apparently in allusion to Science; especially in its application to practical life. Science, being the wonder of the ignorant and unskilful, may be not absurdly called a monster. In figure and aspect it is repreanted as many shaped, in allusion to the immense Variety v mezfer with which it deals. It is said to and voke at`s woman, in respect of its Wing are added