Margaret and Her Friends / or, Ten conversations with Margaret Fuller upon the mythology of the Greeks and its expression in art, held at the house of the Rev. George Ripley, Bedford Place, Boston, beginning March 1, 1841

by Caroline Wells Healey Dall; Margaret Fuller

Wheeler said there certainly was a well authenticated marriage between Venus and Mercury.

I could not help thinking it might be an astral connection that was indicated. On that remarkable day of his birth, Mercury was not content with stealing the divining-rod from Apollo; he took also the cestus from Venus, the voice from Neptune, the sword from Mars, the will from Zeus, and his tools from Vulcan! Sagacity compassed all the deeps of divinity to reach its end.

Ida Russell asked if Venus and Astarte were not the same.

Margaret said Astarte belonged to the stars.

Did not Venus, I wonder? But of course they are creations far asunder as the poles.

Charles Wheeler thought Astarte and Venus Urania were the same.

Ida said that could not be. The first statues of Astarte were rough blocks of wood, with veiled heads.

So, I said, were all first statues of Deities; so that was no argument.

When James Clarke asked Margaret to compare Venus with the Madonna, a curious talk arose between Alcott, Margaret, Charles Wheeler, and Emerson.

Alcott wanted to know why Christ was not as much an impersonation of a human faculty as either of the Greek Deities!