a whirlwind. Prometheus, the wisest of all their race, long tried to
persuade them that good counsel would avail more than violence; but
they refused to listen. Then, seeing that such rulers would soon turn
heaven and earth into chaos again, Prometheus left them to their own
devices, and went over to Zeus, whom he aided so well that the Titans
were utterly overthrown. Down into Tartarus they went, to live among
the hidden fires of the earth; and there they spent a long term of
bondage, muttering like storm, and shaking the roots of mountains. One
of them was Enceladus, who lay bound under Aetna; and one, Atlas, was
made to stand and bear up the weight of the sky on his giant shoulders.

Zeus was left King of gods and men. Like any young ruler, he was eager
to work great changes with his new power. Among other plans, he
proposed to destroy the race of men then living, and to replace it with
some new order of creatures. Prometheus alone heard this scheme with
indignation. Not only did he plead for the life of man and save it, but
ever after he spent his giant efforts to civilize the race, and to
endow it with a wit near to that of gods.

In the Golden Age, men had lived free of care. They took no heed of
daily wants, since Zeus gave them all things needful, and the earth
brought forth fruitage and harvest without asking the toil of
husbandmen. If mortals were light of heart, however, their minds were
empty of great enterprise. They did not know how to build or plant or
weave; their thoughts never flew far, and they had no wish to cross the
sea.

But Prometheus loved earthly folk, and thought that they had been
children long enough. He was a mighty workman, with the whole world for
a workshop; and little by little he taught men knowledge that is