Hymns are due mainly to the unique genius of the fully developed Hellenic
race. The combination of good and bad, of ancestral rites and ideas, of
native taste, of philosophical refinement on inherited theology, could
not last; the elements were too discordant. And yet it could not pass
naturally away. The Greece of A.D. 300

"Wandered between two worlds, one dead,
The other powerless to be born,"

without external assistance. That help was brought by the Christian
creed, and, officially, Gods, rites, and myths vanished, while,
unofficially, they partially endure, even to this day, in Romaic folk-
lore.




HOMERIC HYMNS


HYMN TO APOLLO


[Silver stater of Croton (about 400 B.C.). Obv. Hercules, the Founder.
Rev. Apollo shooting the Python by the Delphic Tripod: lang103.jpg]

Mindful, ever mindful, will I be of Apollo the Far-darter. Before him,
as he fares through the hall of Zeus, the Gods tremble, yea, rise up all
from their thrones as he draws near with his shining bended bow. But
Leto alone abides by Zeus, the Lord of Lightning, till Apollo hath