another name for the sun, slain, as they thought, by the winter cold
and rain: and then, when spring-time came, with its sunshine,
flowers, and birds, rejoiced that the sun had come to life again.

So thought the old Greeks, and told how Persephone, the fair maiden
who was the spring-time, was stolen away by the king of darkness who
lived beneath the earth; and how her mother earth would not be
comforted for her loss, but sent barrenness on all the world till her
daughter, the spring, was given back to her, to dwell for six months
in the upper world of light, and six months in the darkness under
ground.

So thought our old forefathers; and told how Baldur (the Baal of the
Bible), the god of light and heat, who was likewise the sun, was
slain by treachery, and imprisoned for ever below in hell, the
kingdom of darkness and of cold; and how all things on earth, even
the very trees and stones, wept for his death: yet all their tears
could not bring back from death the god of life: nor any of the gods
unlock the gates which held him in.

And because our forefathers were a sad and earnest folk: because
they lived in a sad and dreary climate, where winter was far longer
and more bitter than it is, thank God, now; therefore all their
thoughts about winter and spring were sad; and they grew to despair,
at last, of life ever conquering death, or light conquering darkness.
An age would come, they said, in which snow should fall from the four
corners of the world, and the winters be three winters long; an evil
age, of murder and adultery, and hatred between brethren, when all
the ties of kin would be rent asunder, and wickedness should triumph
on the earth.