Agamemnon vowed to Diana, if he might be blessed with a child, that he would sacrifice to her the dearest of all his possessions. Iphigenīa, his infant daughter, was, of course, his “dearest possession;” but he refused to sacrifice her, and thus incurred the wrath of the goddess, which resulted in the detention of the Trojan fleet at Aulis. Iphigenia being offered in sacrifice, the offended deity was satisfied, and interposed at the critical moment, by carrying the princess to Tauris and substituting a stag in her stead.
The latter part of this tale cannot fail to call to mind the offering of Abraham. As he was about to take the life of Isaac, Jehovah interposed, and a ram was substituted for the human victim.—Gen. xxii.
[Be] not bent as Jephthah once,
Blindly to execute a rash resolve;
Whom better it had suited to exclaim,
“I have done ill!” than to redeem his pledge
By doing worse. Not unlike to him
In folly that great leader of the Greeks—
Whence, on the altar, Iphigenia mourned
Her virgin beauty.