emerging out of barbarism, the religious significance which had
once belonged to it was lost sight of, and it came to be regarded
as the subject of a purely artistic or poetical treatment. But it was
inevitable that from time to time minds should [31] arise, deeply
enough impressed by its beauty and power to ask themselves
whether the religion of Greece was indeed a rival of the religion
of Christ; for the older gods had rehabilitated themselves, and
men's allegiance was divided. And the fifteenth century was an
impassioned age, so ardent and serious in its pursuit of art that it
consecrated everything with which art had to do as a religious
object. The restored Greek literature had made it familiar, at
least in Plato, with a style of expression concerning the earlier
gods, which had about it something of the warmth and unction of
a Christian hymn. It was too familiar with such language to
regard mythology as a mere story; and it was too serious to play
with a religion.

"Let me briefly remind the reader"--says Heine, in the Gods in
Exile, an essay full of that strange blending of sentiment which is
characteristic of the traditions of the middle age concerning the
pagan religions--"how the gods of the older world, at the time of
the definite triumph of Christianity, that is, in the third century,
fell into painful embarrassments, which greatly resembled certain
tragical situations of their earlier life. They now found
themselves beset by the same troublesome necessities to which
they had once before been exposed during the primitive ages, in
that revolutionary epoch when the Titans broke out of the custody
of Orcus, and, piling Pelion on Ossa, scaled [32] Olympus.
Unfortunate gods! They had then to take flight ignominiously,
and hide themselves among us here on earth, under all sorts of