The truly artistic production, on the other hand, though equally liable to be laid under contribution as a source of informa tion, may well outlast the inferior work into whose service it is thus pressed, as the diamond
survives
the glass which it engraves.
Universal Anthology - v01
362
John Keats Lord Byron
377
. . .
LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS. VOLUME L
RICHARD GARNETT
ADAM AND EVE 36 RUINS OF THE TEMPLE OF PHILjE 08 BUILDING OF THE PYRAMIDS 118 SADJT GEORGE AND THE DRAGON 350 THE GORGON'S HEAD 380
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THE USE AND VALUE OF ANTHOLOGIES
Written fob this Work bt Db. RICHARD GAKNETT. OB.
There have been periods in human history when the action of the Turk, who picks up and preserves every stray piece of inscribed paper, "because it may contain the name of Allah," has been highly reasonable. Such, in fact, is the present attitude of the archaeologist and explorer to the fragments of papyrus he en counters in the rubbish of buried Egyptian cities, precious because they are so scarce, because they are so old, and because nobody can tell what priceless syllables they may contain. But the demeanour which is right in the infancy of a young literature, or amid the vestiges of an antique one, is wholly uncalled for in an age where the
difficulty is to keep out of print. Even without the printing press, the scholars of the Alexandrian period found literature getting too much for them. What must it be now, when every daily news paper requires machinery capable of producing more literary matter in an hour than all the scribes of Alexandria could have turned out in a generation ? As the existence of a great river in a
civilised country involves that of dykes, and quays, and bridges, so the existence of a great literature implies the ministrations of literary officials engaged in winnowing the bad from the good, and helping the latter to permanence. In a rude, imperfect manner this function is discharged by the current criticism of the periodical press; but this criticism, produced in haste, and by persons of widely varying degrees of qualification, requires to be itself very
carefully winnowed.
xiv INTRODUCTION :
The appearance of a new book in ancient times must have elicited abundance of viva voce criticism, but the literary review can scarcely have existed Every intellectual condition favoured, but material conditions forbade. The circulation of our most esteemed journals would be limited indeed, if they were produced by transcribers working with reed pens ; nor, in fact, when the indis pensable exigencies of ordinary life had been satisfied, did enough papyrus remain for the books and the comments also. Readers no doubt spoke their minds freely, but authors did not fall into the hands of the grammarians, corresponding to our reviewers, until they had passed this preliminary ordeal, and had established more or less claim to a permanent place in literature. The grammarian, sometimes, no doubt, somewhat of a pedant, but almost always endowed with the culture entitling him to act as literary expert and appraiser, proceeded by one of three methods. If he did not reject the aspirant altogether, he admitted him into his canon, or drew upon him for his anthology, or made him the subject of an epitome —
Masked and fine,
And priced and saleable at last !
It can rarely be said now, as it often could of old, that a single book is the chief repertory of knowledge on any important subject. While, therefore, epitomes of information are more frequent than ever, epitomes of particular authors have become rare. The canon, also, is a classification difficult to maintain in presence of the extreme complexity of modern literature. In ancient times this beneficial system was comparatively easy to apply, when the world possessed but one literary language, and that one in which the standard of excellence was both lofty and well defined. It was not difficult for a Greek to decide, for instance, that but nine of the numerous lyric poets of Hellas deserved to be accounted canonical, and the conditions of literary composition had so greatly altered between the times of Simonides and those of Aristarchus, that there was but little prospect of the rekindling of a " Lost Pleiad," or of the intrusion of a tenth muse into the hallowed circle. The classification went farther ; three tragic poets and three of the old
THE USE AND VALUE OF ANTHOLOGIES xv
comedy were picked out from the rest as pre-eminently worthy to be read ; seven of the later Alexandrian dramatists were allowed to form a band of Epigoni, below the great but among the good; twenty-four of Menander's comedies were selected as eminently worthy of transcription, and hence survived for the perusal of Photius after a thousand years. Of the canon of Scripture, Old and New, and the weighty controversies connected with it, it is needless to speak. In the modern literature the principle of the canon is less easy of application, on account of the difficulty of establishing an absolute criterion of style, and also of its greater complexity and variety. The supreme perfection of prose style, the felicitous expression to which nothing can be added and from which nothing can be taken away, has, perhaps, hardly ever been attained but by those authors of the first rank with whom the modern world has least concern. Eousseau may be an exception, but to canonise Bossuet will not be to find him readers, and who is to discriminate the temporary from the permanent in the enormous production of Voltaire ? We should, moreover, be confronted by the want of any standard of excellence universally agreed upon. Athens or Alexandria could prescribe the laws of taste to obedient antiquity, but Pascal's writ does not run in Britain, or Carlyle's in France. The age of literary canons, in the sense of select authors prescribed for imitation, is gone by, and apart from individual examples and the admonitions which we occasionally receive from men of taste sensitive to the literary failings of their times, such as Matthew Arnold, the best way to maintain a high standard of authorship is the method of anthology, of a selection from those pieces which have actually striven and prevailed in the great literary struggle for existence, and thus practically demonstrated the qualities that keep a writer's name green.
Two systems nave been followed in the confection of anthologies, each of which has its advantages. The first, especially recommend- able for poetical anthologies, is the system of fastidious severity, which can only be carried out by a compiler of exquisite taste and consummate judgment. Such was the system on which Meleager,
INTRODUCTION :
the first Greek anthologist, framed his collection, which, so far as can be determined in the mutilated condition in which it has reached our times, did not contain a single piece unacceptable on poetical grounds. Such was also the case with the first series of the late Mr. Palgrave's " Golden Treasury," which we are able to judge with more exactness than Meleager's, knowing not only what Mr. Palgrave admitted, but what he excluded. The same high standard, however, is incapable of application to selections of mixed verse and prose, since modern prose rarely attains the flaw less perfection of much modern verse, nor, growing out of and leading up to other passages, can it usually possess the symmetrical unity of a complete poem. Another principle may here be invoked, and the selection may in a manner be entrusted to the public suffrage, those pieces being especially chosen which are known to have appealed with special force to the general heart and con science. Such is the case with the selections which these remarks accompany. The great majority are here by universal suffrage, and the great extent of the collection, unparalleled in any similar undertaking, allows the general estimate to be reflected with a precision unattainable in an attempt to present " infinite riches in little room. " The endeavour to indicate public feeling by a few favourite pieces would be like carrying a sample brick as a representative of a great city ; it is otherwise where there is room for hundreds of such objects of general approval. If this character of echo of vox populi, vox Dei does not seem equally merited by all departments of this colossal gathering, the objector may reflect that the favourite literature of educated persons is not, like a plane surface, spread out everywhere and equally visible in every part, but, like the soil itself, a succession of strata through which the explorer must drive his shaft, and that the occurrence of Plato, for
example, in the uppermost stratum, is a good reason for not expecting him lower down; that the lower strata have their indigenous products too ; and that the business of a collection formed on this principle is to exhibit not one stratum but all, so long as all deserve the name of literature. This is assuredly the case ; various as are the degrees of culture and the modifications of
THE USE AND VALUE OF ANTHOLOGIES xvii
taste here represented, not much will be found that does not incontestably belong to the world of literature, as distinguished from the world of bookmaking. While such a collection is especially profitable as a mirror of the nation's mental activity, and an echo of the general verdict, it might well have impressed an intelligent foreigner by the vigour, affluence, and variety of the Anglo-American intellect, and the splendour of the gifts bestowed upon the finer spirits of the mother country and her daughters, whether of Teutonic or of Celtic stock.
The large proportion allotted in this anthology to American literature is not without significance at the present crisis in the history of our race. We in Britain have learned to acknowledge a Greater Britain, greater actually in extent, potentially in world wide importance, than our own. So frankly has the admission been made that the phrase recording it has become a household word, as famous and universally accepted as John Bull. But we are now beginning to see that the phrase cannot be limited to our colonial dependencies. Let any one ask himself the question: Supposing that Australia, for instance, were to assert political independence of Great Britain, would she therefore be excluded from Greater Britain ? Assuredly not ; for one tie that would have been snapped, twenty would remain —kinship, language, literature, religion, institutions substantially identical, commercial and social intercourse —after a short interval at most, the same affection as of old. But if this is true of the new colony, it must be equally true of the old. The rupture of political connections and the change of political institutions have made no breach between England and America. In reading the specimens of American literature in this collection we are at once aware that we are reading our own. They do not differ from us as do the specimens of the literature of France or Germany. They are racy of the soil, of course, and that soil is not the soil of England, but neither is it the soil of Scotland or Ireland. It is not two great literatures regarding each other across the Atlantic, but one colossal literature bestriding that vast ocean. What hope and encouragement this fact affords it is need
xviii INTRODUCTION :
less to say, both as a revelation of the indefinite possibilities of the development of our literature in the future, and as an assurance of the mutual understanding of the two moieties of this great English- speaking nation which present circumstances do, and future circumstances will, so urgently require. A virtual identity of literary expression and literary sentiment which has grown up by the force of circumstances without encouragement, sometimes with discouragement, from statesmen and organs of public opinion, clearly points to affinities too deep to be unsettled by transitory circumstances, and which will, indeed, impress such circumstances into its service.
Apart from the great actual merits of American writers, the successful transplantation of English literature to the United States and " Greater Britain " is almost the most important event that has ever befallen indefinitely extending the chances of the one thing absolutely essential to its existence. There is, after all, no glory of British literature equal to that which all but unique with —its continuity. Shelley, who was not only a great poet but great intellect, notes this when he says—
Poesy's unfailing river
Which through Albion winds for ever.
This the simple fact, save for the dull period of the fifteenth century, when literature all over Europe was mainly restricted to commentary and compilation, England has never wanted successor to Chaucer, and the least superficially attractive ages of her literature have frequently produced the works of most sterling value. The same may be said of French literature as regards prose, not as regards poetry, which, unless versified logic and rhetoric be poetry, slept in France for two hundred and fifty years. Elsewhere, in Italy, Germany, Spain, Portugal, Greece, we every where behold the same phenomena of epochs of extreme brilliancy followed by long periods of silence or of the productiveness of perverted taste. England alone always active to good purpose,
and some eras of her literary history are less exemplary than others, there not one with which the nation or the world could
if is
is a
it
is
a
is
it,
THE USE AND VALUE OP ANTHOLOGIES xix
dispense. The prospect of her continued activity is obviously brightened by the new Englands she has created in the regions of the newly - discovered world, whether American, African, or Australian, most favourable to intellectual as well as to physical activity. Like the banyan tree, she has sent down shoots rooted in the earth, any of which may rival the massiveness and surpass the durability of the parent. Something like this has happened of old, when Eoman literature, effete at home, was long preserved and cultivated by Spaniards, Gauls, Africans, and Egyptians, who were either descended from Eoman colonists, or had imbibed the spirit of Latin letters. The barbarian deluge, however, overwhelmed the colonies and dependencies as well as the mother country — a catastrophe little likely to befall the widely-disseminated lands where English is the language of letters and of life. American and colonial literature, therefore, deserve profound attention from Britain, as the certain perpetuators of her own, as, even in their present undeveloped condition, redeeming this from the reproach of insularity, and as indefinitely enlarging its prospects both of permanence and of influence upon mankind. It would be rash to predict that the next English-speaking genius of the first rank will be born in America or Australia, but it would be equally rash to predict that he will not.
In one of the charming letters which Emerson wrote to Carlyle the philosopher is found telling his friend of his vain but strenuous endeavour to get through the whole of Goethe's work. " Thirty- five I have read," he writes blithely, " but compass the other thirty- five I cannot. " Seventy volumes in all from one man! Little wonder that the Concord sage could find time for perhaps only twice as many as the present day finds time to remember.
For a moment this thought may seem discouraging, and derogatory to modern literature, especially when we consider the care taken to preserve, and the pains spent in interpreting, every scrap that has come down to us from antiquity. But this is not really the case, for what is the larger part of antique literature itself but a co-operative alliance for the performance of tasks too
zz INTRODUCTION :
extensive for any single man ? Ancient authors, like moderns, fell to a certain extent into oblivion, but revived again in those whom they had influenced, and by whom the best part of their writings were preserved, though mainly as ingredients in the works of others, often in an altered form. The Bible and the Talmud, the Vedas, the Mahabarata, the Avesta, the Sagas, and the Eddas are not the work of one man but of many men. They are full of frag ments of older writings, frequently recognisable as such. Granting the personality of Homer and the unity of his epics, who can doubt that he must have worked upon abundant stores of material furnished by more primitive minstrels ? The dramatists prey upon him in their turn. ^EBchylus declared that his tragedies were but scraps stolen from the great Homeric banquet. Take even a com paratively recent, a highly finished, and a perfectly artistic production like the uSZneid, what would remain even of this national epic of Eome if Virgil were deprived of everything that he had borrowed from Greece ? He was a great anthologist, and his English rival Milton even a greater ; naturally so, for he had wider fields to gather in. Ancient history, with one or two remarkable exceptions to be noticed, is more than an anthology; it is a composite, a breccia. As historical facts became more numerous and less manageable throughout the lengthening ages, the standard histories of Ephorus, Theopompus, and the like, become a quarry for later compilers of the order of Diodorus and Tragus, who some times transcribe their predecessor, sometimes abridge him, but alway fuse his identity into their own. The exception is in the case of writers like Herodotus and Thucydides, rendered by perfect style or consummate political wisdom a possession for ever, as one of them said. If a man can write like Herodotus or Thucydides he need not fear the compiler or the anthologist, and many moderns, such as the very Goethe whom we have cited as an instance of the impermanence of great authors, have attained this standard in their best works. For their inferior writings and the general mass of authors there remains but the alternatives —to be absorbed, to be excerpted, or to be virtually forgotten.
Absorption may be defined as the process undergone by valuable
THE USE AND VALUE OF ANTHOLOGIES xxi
literary matter which has not received due artistic form and polish. It is not thrown away; it does not, properly speaking, cease to exist, but it exists only as an element in the compositions of later authors.
The truly artistic production, on the other hand, though equally liable to be laid under contribution as a source of informa tion, may well outlast the inferior work into whose service it is thus pressed, as the diamond survives the glass which it engraves. Almost every word, for example, which Arrian has written about Alexander, is very probably coloured by the authoritative biography of Ptolemy Lagus, Alexander's companion in arms, but of Ptolemy's work itself, deficient in style and arrangement, not a word is preserved except those which may be embedded in Arrian's narrative. Caesar's Commentaries, on the other hand, have been equally used as historical authorities, but the works of those who have thus employed them have mostly passed away, while the Commentaries remain as fresh as of old. Yet, though terse brevity is among their most conspicuous merits, the modern reader, unless a professional scholar or historian, cannot find time for them, not from their prolixity, but from the immensity of the mass of even more valuable literature. He must therefore make their acquaint ance through general Eoman histories like Mommsen's, or special biographies like Froude's, or else through the medium of excerpt or anthology. This is but another way of saying that only the best literature of its respective description, be that description elevated or familiar, is proper for anthology. Such a collection should take no cognisance of the literature destined to absorption, but only of that which is isolated from the mass by its superior symmetry and polish. It follows that it will be more concerned with poetry and fiction than with the graver departments of intellectual labour, since these can be profitably cultivated without the art which in poetry and fiction is absolutely indispensable, and also that in dealing with serious literature it will concern itself chiefly with what approximates most closely to art : in disquisition seeking for what is most cogent, in narrative for what is most dramatic. The very law of its existence, then, should keep it at a high leveL
xxii
INTRODUCTION :
Modern literature, yet more decisively nineteenth-century literature, possesses a richness, a range, and a variety to which the classics of the past can lay no claim ; and if something of the perfection of form which belongs to classical times is lacking to the present day, this loss is compensated in many ways. Nothing is more characteristic of the literary activity of the last hundred and fifty years than its amazing fertility. To such a point indeed has the production of books now attained, that the danger lies not in a paucity of genius, but in the fact that the works of genius may be lost in a surging and ever-increasing flood. Every nation contributes. In England and America alone upwards of 10,000 new books are printed every year. Were we to take twice Dr. Johnson's prescription of five hours a day and read as fast as could Scott or Macaulay, it would still be impossible to compass a tithe of this mass. Sifting and selection, once a slow and orderly process, has become an imperative necessity. The dilemma is clear. We shall either read aimlessly, catching up bits of what is good and great amid much chaff and trash, or else we shall neglect the greater literature altogether.
The time seems ripe for a reversion to the principle which gave to classical literature its glory and its life—the sentiment that the highest excellence should be aimed at, and hence for a revival of the Greek idea of an anthology —a " gathering of flowers," which is after all, translated into broader scientific language, but Darwin's formula of the survival of the fittest. It is out of this idea that the present work has sprung. If the execution corresponds to the idea, if it is a true gathering of flowers, it should aid in protecting our literature on both sides of the Atlantic from its chief actual danger — debasement to suit the taste of half-educated readers. The perils which it has already encountered and escaped —the Euphuistic affectation of the Elizabethan age, the Gallicism of the Restoration period, the frigidity of the eighteenth century —were maladies caught from the refined and intelligent society of those epochs. All these it has surmounted, but it is now confronted with an entirely novel danger in the dependence of the most popular, and therefore the most influential, authors upon a wide general public
THE USE AND VALUE OF ANTHOLOGIES xxiii
neither refined nor intelligent, who now, as dispensers of the substantial rewards of literature, occupy the place formerly held by the Court, the patron, and the university. Hence a serious apprehension of a general lowering of the standard of literature, far more pernicious than any temporary aberration of taste. The evil may be combated in many ways, and not least effectively by anthologies, which, if skilfully adapted to meet the needs of the general reader, and not themselves unduly tolerant of inferior work, may do much good by familiarising the reader with what is excellent in the present, and reminding the writer of the conditions
on which alone fame may be won in the future.
THE ASSYRIAN STORY OF THE CREATION. By Rjsv. A. H. SAYCE.
(From " Records of the Past. ")
[Archibald Henhy Satcb, the foremost living Assyriologist and authority on Hebrew origins, and a philologist of great attainments, was born near Bristol, England, September 25, 1846. Graduated at Oxford, and ordained 1871. His early repute was so great that at twenty -seven he was made one of the Old Testa ment Revision Committee. He has published among other works a comparative Assyrian Grammar (1872); "Principles of Comparative Philology" (1874); "Lectures on the Assyrian Language" (1877); "Babylonian Literature"
(1877) ; "Introduction to the Science of Language" (1880) ; "Monuments of the Hittites " (1881), revised 1888 ; " First Light from the Monuments " (1884) ; "Ancient Empires of the East" (1884) ; "Assyria" (1885) ; "Hibbert Lec tures on the Origin and Growth of Religion" (1887) ; "Records of the Past, New Series" (1889-1892) ; " Life and Times of Isaiah" (1889) ; "Races of the Old Testament " (1891) ; "Social Life among the Assyrians and Babylo nians" (1891) ; "Primer of Assyriology" (1894); "The Higher Criticism and the Verdict of the Monuments " (1894) ; " The Egypt of the Hebrews " (1895) ; " Early History of the Hebrews " (1897).
Fragments of a long epic poem, describing the creation of the world in a series of tablets or books, were discovered by Mr. George Smith among the cuneiform treasures of the British Museum which had come from the royal library of Kouyunjik or Nineveh. The tablets appear to be seven in number ; and since the creation was described as consisting of a series of successive acts, it presented a curious similarity to the account of the creation recorded in the first chapter of Genesis.
The first tablet or book opens before the beginning of time, the expression " at that time " answering to the expression " in the beginning" of Genesis. The heavens and earth had not yet been created ; and since the name was supposed to be the same as the thing named, their names had not as yet been pronounced. A watery chaos alone existed, Mummu Tiamat, "the chaos of the deep. " Out of the bosom of this chaos
26
26 ASSYRIAN STORY OF THE CREATION.
proceeded the gods as well as the created world. First came the primeval divinities Lakhmu and Lakhamu, words of un known meaning, and then An-sar [Uranus, Saturn] and Ki- sar, "the upper" and "lower firmament. " Last of all were born the three supreme gods of the Babylonian faith, Anu the sky god, Bel or Illil the lord of the ghost world, and Ea the god of the river and sea [Jupiter, Pluto, Neptune].
But before the younger gods could find a suitable habitation for themselves and their creation, it was necessary to destroy " the dragon " of chaos with all her monstrous offspring. The task was undertaken by the Babylonian sun god Merodach. Light was introduced into the world, and it only remained to destroy Tiamat herself. Tiamat was slain and her allies put in bondage, while the books of destiny which had hitherto been possessed by the older race of gods were now transferred to the younger deities of the new world. The visible heaven was formed out of the skin of Tiamat, and became the outward symbol of An-sar and the habitation of Anu, Bel, and Ea, while the chaotic waters of the dragon became the law-bound sea ruled over by Ea.
The heavens having been thus made, they were furnished with mansions for the sun and moon and stars, and the heavenly bodies were bound down by fixed laws that they might regulate the calendar and determine the year.
It will be seen from this that in its main outlines the Assyr ian epic of the creation bears a striking resemblance to the account of it given in the first chapter of Genesis. In each case the history of the creation is divided into seven successive acts ; in each case the present world has been preceded by a watery chaos. In fact, the selfsame word is used of this chaos in both the Biblical and Assyrian accounts — tehdm,
Tiamat; the only difference being that in the Assyrian story " the deep " has become a mythological personage, the mother of a chaotic brood. The order of the creation, moreover, agrees in the two accounts ; first the light, then the creation of the firmament of heaven, subsequently the appointment of the celes tial bodies " for signs and for seasons and for days and years," and next, the creation of beasts and "creeping things. "
But the two accounts also differ in some important particu lars. In the Assyrian epic the earth seems not to have been made until after the appointment of the heavenly bodies, instead of before it as in Genesis ; and the seventh day is a day of work
ASSYRIAN STORY OF THE CREATION.
27
instead of rest; while there is nothing corresponding to the statement of Genesis that " the Spirit of God moved upon the face of the waters. " But the most important difference con sists in the interpolation of the struggle between Merodach and the powers of evil, as a consequence of which light was introduced into the universe and the firmament of the heavens was formed.
It has long since been noted that the conception of this struggle stands in curious parallelism to the verses of the Apocalypse (Rev. xii. 7-9) : " And there was war in heaven : Michael and his angels fought against the dragon ; and the dragon fought and his angels, and prevailed not ; neither was their place found any more in heaven. And the great dragon was cast out, that old serpent, called the Devil, and Satan, which deceiveth the whole world. " "We are also reminded of the words of Isaiah xxiv. 21, 22 : The Lord shall visit the host of the high ones that are on high, and the kings of the earth upon the earth. And they shall be gathered together, as prisoners are gathered in the pit, and shall be shut up in prison. " It may be added that an Assyrian bas-relief now in the British Museum represents Tiamat with horns and claws,
tail and wings.
There is no need of drawing attention to the profound
difference of spiritual conception that exists between the Assyr ian epic and the first chapter of Genesis. The one is mytho logical and polytheistic, with an introduction savoring of the later materialism of the schools ; the other is sternly monothe istic. Between Bel-Merodach and the Hebrew God there is an impassable gulf.
It is unfortunate that the last lines of the epic, in which the creation of man would have been recorded, have not yet been recovered. A passage in one of the early magical texts of Babylonia, however, goes to show that the Babylonians believed that the woman was produced from the man, conformably to the statement in Gen. ii. 22, 23. We there read of the seven evil spirits, that "the woman from the man do they bring forth. "
First Tablet.
At that time the heaven above had not yet announced, or the earth beneath recorded, a name ;
the unopened deep was their generator,
28 ASSYRIAN STORY OF THE CREATION.
Mummu-Tiamat (the chaos of the sea) was the mother of them all. Their waters were embosomed as one, and
the cornfield was unharvested, the pasture was ungrown.
At that time the gods had not appeared, any of them ;
By no name were they recorded, no destiny (had they fixed). Then the (great) gods were created,
Lakhmu and Lakh amp issued forth (the first),
until they grew up (when)
An-sar and Ki-sar were created.
Long were the days, extended (was the time, until) the gods Anu (Bel and Ea were born),
An-sar and Ki-sar (gave them birth).
The rest of the tablet is lost.
Fourth Tablet. BEVEESE.
" (Against) the gods my fathers thou hast directed thy hostility. Thou harnesser of thy companions, may thy weapons reach their
bodie(s).
Stand up, and I and thou will fight together. "
When Tiamat heard this,
she uttered her former spells, she repeated her command.
Tiamat also cried out vehemently with a loud voice.
From its roots she strengthened (her) seat completely.
She recites an incantation, she casts a spell,
and the gods of battle demand for themselves their arms.
Then Tiamat attacked Merodach the chief prophet of the gods; in combat they joined ; they met in battle.
And the lord outspread his snare (and) inclosed her.
He sent before him the evil wind to seize (her) from behind.
And Tiamat opened her mouth to swallow it.
He made the evil wind enter so that she could not close her lips. The violence of the winds tortured her stomach, and
her heart was prostrated and her mouth was twisted.
He swung the club, he shattered her stomach ;
he cut out her entrails ; he overmastered (her) heart ;
he bound her and ended her life.
He threw down her corpse ; he stood upon it.
When Tiamat who marched before (them) was conquered,
he dispersed her forces, her host was overthrown,
and the gods her allies who marched beside her
trembled (and) feared (and) turned their backs.
They escaped and saved their lives.
ASSYKIAN STORY OF THE CREATION. 29
They clung to one another fleeing helplessly.
He followed them and shattered their weapons.
He cast his snare and they are caught in his net.
Knowing (? ) the regions they are filled with grief.
They bear their sin, they are kept in bondage,
and the elevenfold offspring are troubled through fear.
The spirits as they march perceived (? ) the glory (of Merodach). His hand lays blindness (on their eyes).
At the same time their opposition (is broken) from under them ;
and the god Kingu who had (marshaled) their (forces)
he bound him also along with the god of the tablets (of destiny in)
his right hand.
And he took from him the tablets of destiny (that were) upon him. With the string of the stylus he sealed (them) and held the . . . of
the tablet.
From the time when he had bound (and) laid the yoke on his foes he led the illustrious enemy captive like an ox,
he established fully the victory of An-sar over the foe ;
Merodach overcame the lamentation of (Ea) the lord of the world. Over the gods in bondage he strengthened his watch, and
Tiamat whom he had bound he turned head backwards ;
then the lord trampled on the underpart of Tiamat.
With his club unbound he smote (her) skull ;
he broke (it) and caused her blood to flow ;
the north wind bore (it) away to secret places.
Then his father (Ea) beheld (and) rejoiced at the savor ;
he caused the spirits (? ) to bring a peace offering to himself.
So the lord rested ; his body he feeds.
He strengthens (his) mind (? ), he forms a clever plan,
and he stripped her of (her) skin like a fish, according to his plan ; he described her likeness and (with it) overshadowed the heavens ; he stretched out the skin, he kept a watch,
he urged on her waters that were not issuing forth ;
he lit up the sky ; the sanctuary (of heaven) rejoiced, and
he presented himself before the deep, the seat of Ea.
Then the lord measured (Tiamat) the offspring of the deep ;
the chief prophet made of her image the house of the Firmament. E-Sarra which he had created (to be) the heavens
the chief prophet caused Anu, Bel, and Ea to inhabit as their
stronghold.
Fifth Tablet.
He prepared the twin mansions of the great gods.
He fixed the stars, even the twin stars to correspond with them. He ordained the year, appointing the signs of the Zodiac over (it).
80 ASSYRIAN STORY OF THE CREATION.
For each of the twelve months he fixed three stars,
from the day when the year issues forth to the close.
He founded the mansion of (the Sun-god) the god of the ferryboat,
that they might know their bonds,
that they might not err, that they might not go astray in any way. He established the mansion of Bel and Ea along with himself. Moreover he opened the great gates on either side,
he strengthened the bolts on the left hand and on the right,
and in the midst of it he made a staircase.
He illuminated the Moon-god that he might be porter of the night, and ordained for him the ending of the night that the day may be
known,
(saying :) " Month by month, without break, keep watch in thy disk. At the beginning of the month light up the night,
announcing thy horns that the heaven may know.
On the seventh day, (filling thy) disk
thou shalt open indeed (its) narrow contraction.
At that time the sun (will be) on the horizon of heaven at thy
(rising).
Thou shalt cut off its . . .
(Thereafter) towards the path of the sun thou shalt approach. (Then) the contracted size of the sun shall indeed change (? )
. . . seeking its path.
. . . descend and pronounce judgment.
The rest of the obverse and the first three lines of the reverse are destroyed.
Seventh Tablet.
At that time the gods in their assembly created (the beasts).
They made perfect the mighty (monsters).
They caused the living creatures (of the field) to come forth,
the cattle of the field, (the wild beasts) of the field, and the creeping
things (of the field).
(They fixed their habitations) for the living creatures (of the field).
They distributed (in their dwelling places) the cattle and the creep ing things of the city.
(They made strong) the multitude of creeping things, all the offspring
(of the earth).
. . . in the assembly of my family.
. . . Ea the god of the illustrious face.
. . . the multitude of creeping things did I make strong. . . . the seed of Lakhama did I destroy.
The rest is lost.
ISHTAR'S DESCENT TO THE UNDERWORLD. 31
ISHTAR'S DESCENT TO THE UNDERWORLD. Fbom BABYLONIAN TABLETS.
(Translated by H. Fox Talbot in " Records of the Past," First Series. )
Ishtar was the goddess of Love, answering to the Venus of the Latins and the Aphrodite of the Greeks. The object of her descent into the infernal regions was probably narrated in another tablet, which has not been preserved, for no motive is assigned for it here. I conjecture that she was in search of her beloved Thammuz (Adonis), who was detained in Hades by Persephone or Proserpine. We may compare the Greek legend, which was as follows, as given by Panyasis (quoted by Apollodorus) : —
" Aphrodite had intrusted Adonis, who was a very beauti ful child during his infancy, to the care of Persephone ; but she fell in love with him, and refused to restore him. Upon this Aphrodite appealed to Jupiter, who gave judgment in the cause. He decreed that Adonis should remain for one third of the year in the infernal regions with Persephone ; one third of the year in heaven with Aphrodite ; the remaining third of the year was to be left at his own disposal. Adonis chose to spend it in heaven with Aphrodite. "
The Assyrian legend differs much from this, but yet has some resemblance.
To the land of Hades, the region of (. . . )
Ishtar, daughter of the Moon-god San, turned her mind, and the daughter of San fixed her mind [to go there] :
to the House of Eternity : the dwelling of the god Irkalla : to the House men enter — but cannot depart from .
to the Road men go — but cannot return :
The abode of darkness and famine,
where Earth is their food : their nourishment clay :
Light is not seen : in darkness they dwell :
ghosts, like birds, flutter their wings there :
on the door and gate posts the dust lies undisturbed.
When Ishtar arrived at the gate of Hades
to the keeper of the gate a word she spoke :
" O keeper of the entrance ! open thy gate !
" Open thy gate ! again, that I may enter I
" H thou openest not thy gate, and I enter not,
32
ISHTAR'S DESCENT TO THE UNDERWORLD.
John Keats Lord Byron
377
. . .
LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS. VOLUME L
RICHARD GARNETT
ADAM AND EVE 36 RUINS OF THE TEMPLE OF PHILjE 08 BUILDING OF THE PYRAMIDS 118 SADJT GEORGE AND THE DRAGON 350 THE GORGON'S HEAD 380
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THE USE AND VALUE OF ANTHOLOGIES
Written fob this Work bt Db. RICHARD GAKNETT. OB.
There have been periods in human history when the action of the Turk, who picks up and preserves every stray piece of inscribed paper, "because it may contain the name of Allah," has been highly reasonable. Such, in fact, is the present attitude of the archaeologist and explorer to the fragments of papyrus he en counters in the rubbish of buried Egyptian cities, precious because they are so scarce, because they are so old, and because nobody can tell what priceless syllables they may contain. But the demeanour which is right in the infancy of a young literature, or amid the vestiges of an antique one, is wholly uncalled for in an age where the
difficulty is to keep out of print. Even without the printing press, the scholars of the Alexandrian period found literature getting too much for them. What must it be now, when every daily news paper requires machinery capable of producing more literary matter in an hour than all the scribes of Alexandria could have turned out in a generation ? As the existence of a great river in a
civilised country involves that of dykes, and quays, and bridges, so the existence of a great literature implies the ministrations of literary officials engaged in winnowing the bad from the good, and helping the latter to permanence. In a rude, imperfect manner this function is discharged by the current criticism of the periodical press; but this criticism, produced in haste, and by persons of widely varying degrees of qualification, requires to be itself very
carefully winnowed.
xiv INTRODUCTION :
The appearance of a new book in ancient times must have elicited abundance of viva voce criticism, but the literary review can scarcely have existed Every intellectual condition favoured, but material conditions forbade. The circulation of our most esteemed journals would be limited indeed, if they were produced by transcribers working with reed pens ; nor, in fact, when the indis pensable exigencies of ordinary life had been satisfied, did enough papyrus remain for the books and the comments also. Readers no doubt spoke their minds freely, but authors did not fall into the hands of the grammarians, corresponding to our reviewers, until they had passed this preliminary ordeal, and had established more or less claim to a permanent place in literature. The grammarian, sometimes, no doubt, somewhat of a pedant, but almost always endowed with the culture entitling him to act as literary expert and appraiser, proceeded by one of three methods. If he did not reject the aspirant altogether, he admitted him into his canon, or drew upon him for his anthology, or made him the subject of an epitome —
Masked and fine,
And priced and saleable at last !
It can rarely be said now, as it often could of old, that a single book is the chief repertory of knowledge on any important subject. While, therefore, epitomes of information are more frequent than ever, epitomes of particular authors have become rare. The canon, also, is a classification difficult to maintain in presence of the extreme complexity of modern literature. In ancient times this beneficial system was comparatively easy to apply, when the world possessed but one literary language, and that one in which the standard of excellence was both lofty and well defined. It was not difficult for a Greek to decide, for instance, that but nine of the numerous lyric poets of Hellas deserved to be accounted canonical, and the conditions of literary composition had so greatly altered between the times of Simonides and those of Aristarchus, that there was but little prospect of the rekindling of a " Lost Pleiad," or of the intrusion of a tenth muse into the hallowed circle. The classification went farther ; three tragic poets and three of the old
THE USE AND VALUE OF ANTHOLOGIES xv
comedy were picked out from the rest as pre-eminently worthy to be read ; seven of the later Alexandrian dramatists were allowed to form a band of Epigoni, below the great but among the good; twenty-four of Menander's comedies were selected as eminently worthy of transcription, and hence survived for the perusal of Photius after a thousand years. Of the canon of Scripture, Old and New, and the weighty controversies connected with it, it is needless to speak. In the modern literature the principle of the canon is less easy of application, on account of the difficulty of establishing an absolute criterion of style, and also of its greater complexity and variety. The supreme perfection of prose style, the felicitous expression to which nothing can be added and from which nothing can be taken away, has, perhaps, hardly ever been attained but by those authors of the first rank with whom the modern world has least concern. Eousseau may be an exception, but to canonise Bossuet will not be to find him readers, and who is to discriminate the temporary from the permanent in the enormous production of Voltaire ? We should, moreover, be confronted by the want of any standard of excellence universally agreed upon. Athens or Alexandria could prescribe the laws of taste to obedient antiquity, but Pascal's writ does not run in Britain, or Carlyle's in France. The age of literary canons, in the sense of select authors prescribed for imitation, is gone by, and apart from individual examples and the admonitions which we occasionally receive from men of taste sensitive to the literary failings of their times, such as Matthew Arnold, the best way to maintain a high standard of authorship is the method of anthology, of a selection from those pieces which have actually striven and prevailed in the great literary struggle for existence, and thus practically demonstrated the qualities that keep a writer's name green.
Two systems nave been followed in the confection of anthologies, each of which has its advantages. The first, especially recommend- able for poetical anthologies, is the system of fastidious severity, which can only be carried out by a compiler of exquisite taste and consummate judgment. Such was the system on which Meleager,
INTRODUCTION :
the first Greek anthologist, framed his collection, which, so far as can be determined in the mutilated condition in which it has reached our times, did not contain a single piece unacceptable on poetical grounds. Such was also the case with the first series of the late Mr. Palgrave's " Golden Treasury," which we are able to judge with more exactness than Meleager's, knowing not only what Mr. Palgrave admitted, but what he excluded. The same high standard, however, is incapable of application to selections of mixed verse and prose, since modern prose rarely attains the flaw less perfection of much modern verse, nor, growing out of and leading up to other passages, can it usually possess the symmetrical unity of a complete poem. Another principle may here be invoked, and the selection may in a manner be entrusted to the public suffrage, those pieces being especially chosen which are known to have appealed with special force to the general heart and con science. Such is the case with the selections which these remarks accompany. The great majority are here by universal suffrage, and the great extent of the collection, unparalleled in any similar undertaking, allows the general estimate to be reflected with a precision unattainable in an attempt to present " infinite riches in little room. " The endeavour to indicate public feeling by a few favourite pieces would be like carrying a sample brick as a representative of a great city ; it is otherwise where there is room for hundreds of such objects of general approval. If this character of echo of vox populi, vox Dei does not seem equally merited by all departments of this colossal gathering, the objector may reflect that the favourite literature of educated persons is not, like a plane surface, spread out everywhere and equally visible in every part, but, like the soil itself, a succession of strata through which the explorer must drive his shaft, and that the occurrence of Plato, for
example, in the uppermost stratum, is a good reason for not expecting him lower down; that the lower strata have their indigenous products too ; and that the business of a collection formed on this principle is to exhibit not one stratum but all, so long as all deserve the name of literature. This is assuredly the case ; various as are the degrees of culture and the modifications of
THE USE AND VALUE OF ANTHOLOGIES xvii
taste here represented, not much will be found that does not incontestably belong to the world of literature, as distinguished from the world of bookmaking. While such a collection is especially profitable as a mirror of the nation's mental activity, and an echo of the general verdict, it might well have impressed an intelligent foreigner by the vigour, affluence, and variety of the Anglo-American intellect, and the splendour of the gifts bestowed upon the finer spirits of the mother country and her daughters, whether of Teutonic or of Celtic stock.
The large proportion allotted in this anthology to American literature is not without significance at the present crisis in the history of our race. We in Britain have learned to acknowledge a Greater Britain, greater actually in extent, potentially in world wide importance, than our own. So frankly has the admission been made that the phrase recording it has become a household word, as famous and universally accepted as John Bull. But we are now beginning to see that the phrase cannot be limited to our colonial dependencies. Let any one ask himself the question: Supposing that Australia, for instance, were to assert political independence of Great Britain, would she therefore be excluded from Greater Britain ? Assuredly not ; for one tie that would have been snapped, twenty would remain —kinship, language, literature, religion, institutions substantially identical, commercial and social intercourse —after a short interval at most, the same affection as of old. But if this is true of the new colony, it must be equally true of the old. The rupture of political connections and the change of political institutions have made no breach between England and America. In reading the specimens of American literature in this collection we are at once aware that we are reading our own. They do not differ from us as do the specimens of the literature of France or Germany. They are racy of the soil, of course, and that soil is not the soil of England, but neither is it the soil of Scotland or Ireland. It is not two great literatures regarding each other across the Atlantic, but one colossal literature bestriding that vast ocean. What hope and encouragement this fact affords it is need
xviii INTRODUCTION :
less to say, both as a revelation of the indefinite possibilities of the development of our literature in the future, and as an assurance of the mutual understanding of the two moieties of this great English- speaking nation which present circumstances do, and future circumstances will, so urgently require. A virtual identity of literary expression and literary sentiment which has grown up by the force of circumstances without encouragement, sometimes with discouragement, from statesmen and organs of public opinion, clearly points to affinities too deep to be unsettled by transitory circumstances, and which will, indeed, impress such circumstances into its service.
Apart from the great actual merits of American writers, the successful transplantation of English literature to the United States and " Greater Britain " is almost the most important event that has ever befallen indefinitely extending the chances of the one thing absolutely essential to its existence. There is, after all, no glory of British literature equal to that which all but unique with —its continuity. Shelley, who was not only a great poet but great intellect, notes this when he says—
Poesy's unfailing river
Which through Albion winds for ever.
This the simple fact, save for the dull period of the fifteenth century, when literature all over Europe was mainly restricted to commentary and compilation, England has never wanted successor to Chaucer, and the least superficially attractive ages of her literature have frequently produced the works of most sterling value. The same may be said of French literature as regards prose, not as regards poetry, which, unless versified logic and rhetoric be poetry, slept in France for two hundred and fifty years. Elsewhere, in Italy, Germany, Spain, Portugal, Greece, we every where behold the same phenomena of epochs of extreme brilliancy followed by long periods of silence or of the productiveness of perverted taste. England alone always active to good purpose,
and some eras of her literary history are less exemplary than others, there not one with which the nation or the world could
if is
is a
it
is
a
is
it,
THE USE AND VALUE OP ANTHOLOGIES xix
dispense. The prospect of her continued activity is obviously brightened by the new Englands she has created in the regions of the newly - discovered world, whether American, African, or Australian, most favourable to intellectual as well as to physical activity. Like the banyan tree, she has sent down shoots rooted in the earth, any of which may rival the massiveness and surpass the durability of the parent. Something like this has happened of old, when Eoman literature, effete at home, was long preserved and cultivated by Spaniards, Gauls, Africans, and Egyptians, who were either descended from Eoman colonists, or had imbibed the spirit of Latin letters. The barbarian deluge, however, overwhelmed the colonies and dependencies as well as the mother country — a catastrophe little likely to befall the widely-disseminated lands where English is the language of letters and of life. American and colonial literature, therefore, deserve profound attention from Britain, as the certain perpetuators of her own, as, even in their present undeveloped condition, redeeming this from the reproach of insularity, and as indefinitely enlarging its prospects both of permanence and of influence upon mankind. It would be rash to predict that the next English-speaking genius of the first rank will be born in America or Australia, but it would be equally rash to predict that he will not.
In one of the charming letters which Emerson wrote to Carlyle the philosopher is found telling his friend of his vain but strenuous endeavour to get through the whole of Goethe's work. " Thirty- five I have read," he writes blithely, " but compass the other thirty- five I cannot. " Seventy volumes in all from one man! Little wonder that the Concord sage could find time for perhaps only twice as many as the present day finds time to remember.
For a moment this thought may seem discouraging, and derogatory to modern literature, especially when we consider the care taken to preserve, and the pains spent in interpreting, every scrap that has come down to us from antiquity. But this is not really the case, for what is the larger part of antique literature itself but a co-operative alliance for the performance of tasks too
zz INTRODUCTION :
extensive for any single man ? Ancient authors, like moderns, fell to a certain extent into oblivion, but revived again in those whom they had influenced, and by whom the best part of their writings were preserved, though mainly as ingredients in the works of others, often in an altered form. The Bible and the Talmud, the Vedas, the Mahabarata, the Avesta, the Sagas, and the Eddas are not the work of one man but of many men. They are full of frag ments of older writings, frequently recognisable as such. Granting the personality of Homer and the unity of his epics, who can doubt that he must have worked upon abundant stores of material furnished by more primitive minstrels ? The dramatists prey upon him in their turn. ^EBchylus declared that his tragedies were but scraps stolen from the great Homeric banquet. Take even a com paratively recent, a highly finished, and a perfectly artistic production like the uSZneid, what would remain even of this national epic of Eome if Virgil were deprived of everything that he had borrowed from Greece ? He was a great anthologist, and his English rival Milton even a greater ; naturally so, for he had wider fields to gather in. Ancient history, with one or two remarkable exceptions to be noticed, is more than an anthology; it is a composite, a breccia. As historical facts became more numerous and less manageable throughout the lengthening ages, the standard histories of Ephorus, Theopompus, and the like, become a quarry for later compilers of the order of Diodorus and Tragus, who some times transcribe their predecessor, sometimes abridge him, but alway fuse his identity into their own. The exception is in the case of writers like Herodotus and Thucydides, rendered by perfect style or consummate political wisdom a possession for ever, as one of them said. If a man can write like Herodotus or Thucydides he need not fear the compiler or the anthologist, and many moderns, such as the very Goethe whom we have cited as an instance of the impermanence of great authors, have attained this standard in their best works. For their inferior writings and the general mass of authors there remains but the alternatives —to be absorbed, to be excerpted, or to be virtually forgotten.
Absorption may be defined as the process undergone by valuable
THE USE AND VALUE OF ANTHOLOGIES xxi
literary matter which has not received due artistic form and polish. It is not thrown away; it does not, properly speaking, cease to exist, but it exists only as an element in the compositions of later authors.
The truly artistic production, on the other hand, though equally liable to be laid under contribution as a source of informa tion, may well outlast the inferior work into whose service it is thus pressed, as the diamond survives the glass which it engraves. Almost every word, for example, which Arrian has written about Alexander, is very probably coloured by the authoritative biography of Ptolemy Lagus, Alexander's companion in arms, but of Ptolemy's work itself, deficient in style and arrangement, not a word is preserved except those which may be embedded in Arrian's narrative. Caesar's Commentaries, on the other hand, have been equally used as historical authorities, but the works of those who have thus employed them have mostly passed away, while the Commentaries remain as fresh as of old. Yet, though terse brevity is among their most conspicuous merits, the modern reader, unless a professional scholar or historian, cannot find time for them, not from their prolixity, but from the immensity of the mass of even more valuable literature. He must therefore make their acquaint ance through general Eoman histories like Mommsen's, or special biographies like Froude's, or else through the medium of excerpt or anthology. This is but another way of saying that only the best literature of its respective description, be that description elevated or familiar, is proper for anthology. Such a collection should take no cognisance of the literature destined to absorption, but only of that which is isolated from the mass by its superior symmetry and polish. It follows that it will be more concerned with poetry and fiction than with the graver departments of intellectual labour, since these can be profitably cultivated without the art which in poetry and fiction is absolutely indispensable, and also that in dealing with serious literature it will concern itself chiefly with what approximates most closely to art : in disquisition seeking for what is most cogent, in narrative for what is most dramatic. The very law of its existence, then, should keep it at a high leveL
xxii
INTRODUCTION :
Modern literature, yet more decisively nineteenth-century literature, possesses a richness, a range, and a variety to which the classics of the past can lay no claim ; and if something of the perfection of form which belongs to classical times is lacking to the present day, this loss is compensated in many ways. Nothing is more characteristic of the literary activity of the last hundred and fifty years than its amazing fertility. To such a point indeed has the production of books now attained, that the danger lies not in a paucity of genius, but in the fact that the works of genius may be lost in a surging and ever-increasing flood. Every nation contributes. In England and America alone upwards of 10,000 new books are printed every year. Were we to take twice Dr. Johnson's prescription of five hours a day and read as fast as could Scott or Macaulay, it would still be impossible to compass a tithe of this mass. Sifting and selection, once a slow and orderly process, has become an imperative necessity. The dilemma is clear. We shall either read aimlessly, catching up bits of what is good and great amid much chaff and trash, or else we shall neglect the greater literature altogether.
The time seems ripe for a reversion to the principle which gave to classical literature its glory and its life—the sentiment that the highest excellence should be aimed at, and hence for a revival of the Greek idea of an anthology —a " gathering of flowers," which is after all, translated into broader scientific language, but Darwin's formula of the survival of the fittest. It is out of this idea that the present work has sprung. If the execution corresponds to the idea, if it is a true gathering of flowers, it should aid in protecting our literature on both sides of the Atlantic from its chief actual danger — debasement to suit the taste of half-educated readers. The perils which it has already encountered and escaped —the Euphuistic affectation of the Elizabethan age, the Gallicism of the Restoration period, the frigidity of the eighteenth century —were maladies caught from the refined and intelligent society of those epochs. All these it has surmounted, but it is now confronted with an entirely novel danger in the dependence of the most popular, and therefore the most influential, authors upon a wide general public
THE USE AND VALUE OF ANTHOLOGIES xxiii
neither refined nor intelligent, who now, as dispensers of the substantial rewards of literature, occupy the place formerly held by the Court, the patron, and the university. Hence a serious apprehension of a general lowering of the standard of literature, far more pernicious than any temporary aberration of taste. The evil may be combated in many ways, and not least effectively by anthologies, which, if skilfully adapted to meet the needs of the general reader, and not themselves unduly tolerant of inferior work, may do much good by familiarising the reader with what is excellent in the present, and reminding the writer of the conditions
on which alone fame may be won in the future.
THE ASSYRIAN STORY OF THE CREATION. By Rjsv. A. H. SAYCE.
(From " Records of the Past. ")
[Archibald Henhy Satcb, the foremost living Assyriologist and authority on Hebrew origins, and a philologist of great attainments, was born near Bristol, England, September 25, 1846. Graduated at Oxford, and ordained 1871. His early repute was so great that at twenty -seven he was made one of the Old Testa ment Revision Committee. He has published among other works a comparative Assyrian Grammar (1872); "Principles of Comparative Philology" (1874); "Lectures on the Assyrian Language" (1877); "Babylonian Literature"
(1877) ; "Introduction to the Science of Language" (1880) ; "Monuments of the Hittites " (1881), revised 1888 ; " First Light from the Monuments " (1884) ; "Ancient Empires of the East" (1884) ; "Assyria" (1885) ; "Hibbert Lec tures on the Origin and Growth of Religion" (1887) ; "Records of the Past, New Series" (1889-1892) ; " Life and Times of Isaiah" (1889) ; "Races of the Old Testament " (1891) ; "Social Life among the Assyrians and Babylo nians" (1891) ; "Primer of Assyriology" (1894); "The Higher Criticism and the Verdict of the Monuments " (1894) ; " The Egypt of the Hebrews " (1895) ; " Early History of the Hebrews " (1897).
Fragments of a long epic poem, describing the creation of the world in a series of tablets or books, were discovered by Mr. George Smith among the cuneiform treasures of the British Museum which had come from the royal library of Kouyunjik or Nineveh. The tablets appear to be seven in number ; and since the creation was described as consisting of a series of successive acts, it presented a curious similarity to the account of the creation recorded in the first chapter of Genesis.
The first tablet or book opens before the beginning of time, the expression " at that time " answering to the expression " in the beginning" of Genesis. The heavens and earth had not yet been created ; and since the name was supposed to be the same as the thing named, their names had not as yet been pronounced. A watery chaos alone existed, Mummu Tiamat, "the chaos of the deep. " Out of the bosom of this chaos
26
26 ASSYRIAN STORY OF THE CREATION.
proceeded the gods as well as the created world. First came the primeval divinities Lakhmu and Lakhamu, words of un known meaning, and then An-sar [Uranus, Saturn] and Ki- sar, "the upper" and "lower firmament. " Last of all were born the three supreme gods of the Babylonian faith, Anu the sky god, Bel or Illil the lord of the ghost world, and Ea the god of the river and sea [Jupiter, Pluto, Neptune].
But before the younger gods could find a suitable habitation for themselves and their creation, it was necessary to destroy " the dragon " of chaos with all her monstrous offspring. The task was undertaken by the Babylonian sun god Merodach. Light was introduced into the world, and it only remained to destroy Tiamat herself. Tiamat was slain and her allies put in bondage, while the books of destiny which had hitherto been possessed by the older race of gods were now transferred to the younger deities of the new world. The visible heaven was formed out of the skin of Tiamat, and became the outward symbol of An-sar and the habitation of Anu, Bel, and Ea, while the chaotic waters of the dragon became the law-bound sea ruled over by Ea.
The heavens having been thus made, they were furnished with mansions for the sun and moon and stars, and the heavenly bodies were bound down by fixed laws that they might regulate the calendar and determine the year.
It will be seen from this that in its main outlines the Assyr ian epic of the creation bears a striking resemblance to the account of it given in the first chapter of Genesis. In each case the history of the creation is divided into seven successive acts ; in each case the present world has been preceded by a watery chaos. In fact, the selfsame word is used of this chaos in both the Biblical and Assyrian accounts — tehdm,
Tiamat; the only difference being that in the Assyrian story " the deep " has become a mythological personage, the mother of a chaotic brood. The order of the creation, moreover, agrees in the two accounts ; first the light, then the creation of the firmament of heaven, subsequently the appointment of the celes tial bodies " for signs and for seasons and for days and years," and next, the creation of beasts and "creeping things. "
But the two accounts also differ in some important particu lars. In the Assyrian epic the earth seems not to have been made until after the appointment of the heavenly bodies, instead of before it as in Genesis ; and the seventh day is a day of work
ASSYRIAN STORY OF THE CREATION.
27
instead of rest; while there is nothing corresponding to the statement of Genesis that " the Spirit of God moved upon the face of the waters. " But the most important difference con sists in the interpolation of the struggle between Merodach and the powers of evil, as a consequence of which light was introduced into the universe and the firmament of the heavens was formed.
It has long since been noted that the conception of this struggle stands in curious parallelism to the verses of the Apocalypse (Rev. xii. 7-9) : " And there was war in heaven : Michael and his angels fought against the dragon ; and the dragon fought and his angels, and prevailed not ; neither was their place found any more in heaven. And the great dragon was cast out, that old serpent, called the Devil, and Satan, which deceiveth the whole world. " "We are also reminded of the words of Isaiah xxiv. 21, 22 : The Lord shall visit the host of the high ones that are on high, and the kings of the earth upon the earth. And they shall be gathered together, as prisoners are gathered in the pit, and shall be shut up in prison. " It may be added that an Assyrian bas-relief now in the British Museum represents Tiamat with horns and claws,
tail and wings.
There is no need of drawing attention to the profound
difference of spiritual conception that exists between the Assyr ian epic and the first chapter of Genesis. The one is mytho logical and polytheistic, with an introduction savoring of the later materialism of the schools ; the other is sternly monothe istic. Between Bel-Merodach and the Hebrew God there is an impassable gulf.
It is unfortunate that the last lines of the epic, in which the creation of man would have been recorded, have not yet been recovered. A passage in one of the early magical texts of Babylonia, however, goes to show that the Babylonians believed that the woman was produced from the man, conformably to the statement in Gen. ii. 22, 23. We there read of the seven evil spirits, that "the woman from the man do they bring forth. "
First Tablet.
At that time the heaven above had not yet announced, or the earth beneath recorded, a name ;
the unopened deep was their generator,
28 ASSYRIAN STORY OF THE CREATION.
Mummu-Tiamat (the chaos of the sea) was the mother of them all. Their waters were embosomed as one, and
the cornfield was unharvested, the pasture was ungrown.
At that time the gods had not appeared, any of them ;
By no name were they recorded, no destiny (had they fixed). Then the (great) gods were created,
Lakhmu and Lakh amp issued forth (the first),
until they grew up (when)
An-sar and Ki-sar were created.
Long were the days, extended (was the time, until) the gods Anu (Bel and Ea were born),
An-sar and Ki-sar (gave them birth).
The rest of the tablet is lost.
Fourth Tablet. BEVEESE.
" (Against) the gods my fathers thou hast directed thy hostility. Thou harnesser of thy companions, may thy weapons reach their
bodie(s).
Stand up, and I and thou will fight together. "
When Tiamat heard this,
she uttered her former spells, she repeated her command.
Tiamat also cried out vehemently with a loud voice.
From its roots she strengthened (her) seat completely.
She recites an incantation, she casts a spell,
and the gods of battle demand for themselves their arms.
Then Tiamat attacked Merodach the chief prophet of the gods; in combat they joined ; they met in battle.
And the lord outspread his snare (and) inclosed her.
He sent before him the evil wind to seize (her) from behind.
And Tiamat opened her mouth to swallow it.
He made the evil wind enter so that she could not close her lips. The violence of the winds tortured her stomach, and
her heart was prostrated and her mouth was twisted.
He swung the club, he shattered her stomach ;
he cut out her entrails ; he overmastered (her) heart ;
he bound her and ended her life.
He threw down her corpse ; he stood upon it.
When Tiamat who marched before (them) was conquered,
he dispersed her forces, her host was overthrown,
and the gods her allies who marched beside her
trembled (and) feared (and) turned their backs.
They escaped and saved their lives.
ASSYKIAN STORY OF THE CREATION. 29
They clung to one another fleeing helplessly.
He followed them and shattered their weapons.
He cast his snare and they are caught in his net.
Knowing (? ) the regions they are filled with grief.
They bear their sin, they are kept in bondage,
and the elevenfold offspring are troubled through fear.
The spirits as they march perceived (? ) the glory (of Merodach). His hand lays blindness (on their eyes).
At the same time their opposition (is broken) from under them ;
and the god Kingu who had (marshaled) their (forces)
he bound him also along with the god of the tablets (of destiny in)
his right hand.
And he took from him the tablets of destiny (that were) upon him. With the string of the stylus he sealed (them) and held the . . . of
the tablet.
From the time when he had bound (and) laid the yoke on his foes he led the illustrious enemy captive like an ox,
he established fully the victory of An-sar over the foe ;
Merodach overcame the lamentation of (Ea) the lord of the world. Over the gods in bondage he strengthened his watch, and
Tiamat whom he had bound he turned head backwards ;
then the lord trampled on the underpart of Tiamat.
With his club unbound he smote (her) skull ;
he broke (it) and caused her blood to flow ;
the north wind bore (it) away to secret places.
Then his father (Ea) beheld (and) rejoiced at the savor ;
he caused the spirits (? ) to bring a peace offering to himself.
So the lord rested ; his body he feeds.
He strengthens (his) mind (? ), he forms a clever plan,
and he stripped her of (her) skin like a fish, according to his plan ; he described her likeness and (with it) overshadowed the heavens ; he stretched out the skin, he kept a watch,
he urged on her waters that were not issuing forth ;
he lit up the sky ; the sanctuary (of heaven) rejoiced, and
he presented himself before the deep, the seat of Ea.
Then the lord measured (Tiamat) the offspring of the deep ;
the chief prophet made of her image the house of the Firmament. E-Sarra which he had created (to be) the heavens
the chief prophet caused Anu, Bel, and Ea to inhabit as their
stronghold.
Fifth Tablet.
He prepared the twin mansions of the great gods.
He fixed the stars, even the twin stars to correspond with them. He ordained the year, appointing the signs of the Zodiac over (it).
80 ASSYRIAN STORY OF THE CREATION.
For each of the twelve months he fixed three stars,
from the day when the year issues forth to the close.
He founded the mansion of (the Sun-god) the god of the ferryboat,
that they might know their bonds,
that they might not err, that they might not go astray in any way. He established the mansion of Bel and Ea along with himself. Moreover he opened the great gates on either side,
he strengthened the bolts on the left hand and on the right,
and in the midst of it he made a staircase.
He illuminated the Moon-god that he might be porter of the night, and ordained for him the ending of the night that the day may be
known,
(saying :) " Month by month, without break, keep watch in thy disk. At the beginning of the month light up the night,
announcing thy horns that the heaven may know.
On the seventh day, (filling thy) disk
thou shalt open indeed (its) narrow contraction.
At that time the sun (will be) on the horizon of heaven at thy
(rising).
Thou shalt cut off its . . .
(Thereafter) towards the path of the sun thou shalt approach. (Then) the contracted size of the sun shall indeed change (? )
. . . seeking its path.
. . . descend and pronounce judgment.
The rest of the obverse and the first three lines of the reverse are destroyed.
Seventh Tablet.
At that time the gods in their assembly created (the beasts).
They made perfect the mighty (monsters).
They caused the living creatures (of the field) to come forth,
the cattle of the field, (the wild beasts) of the field, and the creeping
things (of the field).
(They fixed their habitations) for the living creatures (of the field).
They distributed (in their dwelling places) the cattle and the creep ing things of the city.
(They made strong) the multitude of creeping things, all the offspring
(of the earth).
. . . in the assembly of my family.
. . . Ea the god of the illustrious face.
. . . the multitude of creeping things did I make strong. . . . the seed of Lakhama did I destroy.
The rest is lost.
ISHTAR'S DESCENT TO THE UNDERWORLD. 31
ISHTAR'S DESCENT TO THE UNDERWORLD. Fbom BABYLONIAN TABLETS.
(Translated by H. Fox Talbot in " Records of the Past," First Series. )
Ishtar was the goddess of Love, answering to the Venus of the Latins and the Aphrodite of the Greeks. The object of her descent into the infernal regions was probably narrated in another tablet, which has not been preserved, for no motive is assigned for it here. I conjecture that she was in search of her beloved Thammuz (Adonis), who was detained in Hades by Persephone or Proserpine. We may compare the Greek legend, which was as follows, as given by Panyasis (quoted by Apollodorus) : —
" Aphrodite had intrusted Adonis, who was a very beauti ful child during his infancy, to the care of Persephone ; but she fell in love with him, and refused to restore him. Upon this Aphrodite appealed to Jupiter, who gave judgment in the cause. He decreed that Adonis should remain for one third of the year in the infernal regions with Persephone ; one third of the year in heaven with Aphrodite ; the remaining third of the year was to be left at his own disposal. Adonis chose to spend it in heaven with Aphrodite. "
The Assyrian legend differs much from this, but yet has some resemblance.
To the land of Hades, the region of (. . . )
Ishtar, daughter of the Moon-god San, turned her mind, and the daughter of San fixed her mind [to go there] :
to the House of Eternity : the dwelling of the god Irkalla : to the House men enter — but cannot depart from .
to the Road men go — but cannot return :
The abode of darkness and famine,
where Earth is their food : their nourishment clay :
Light is not seen : in darkness they dwell :
ghosts, like birds, flutter their wings there :
on the door and gate posts the dust lies undisturbed.
When Ishtar arrived at the gate of Hades
to the keeper of the gate a word she spoke :
" O keeper of the entrance ! open thy gate !
" Open thy gate ! again, that I may enter I
" H thou openest not thy gate, and I enter not,
32
ISHTAR'S DESCENT TO THE UNDERWORLD.
