Uschold and other modern German authors seem to have adopted in its full extent the principle of interpretation proposed by Metrodorus—treating Odysseus and Penelopê as personifications of the Sun and Moon, etc. See Helbig, Die Sittlichen Zustände des Griechischen Helden Alters, Einleitung, p. xxix. (Leipzig, 1839.)
Corrections of the Homeric text were also resorted to, in order to escape the necessity of imputing falsehood to Zeus (Aristotel. De Sophist. Elench. c. 4).
[967] Sextus Empiric. ix. 18; Diogen. viii. 76; Plutarch, De Placit. Philosoph. i. 3-6; De Poesi Homericâ, 92-126; De Stoicor. Repugn. p. 1050, Menander, De Encomiis, c. 5.
Cicero, De Nat. Deor. i. 14, 15, 16, 41; ii. 24-25. “Physica ratio non inelegans inclusa in impias fabulas.”
In the Bacchæ of Euripidês, Pentheus is made to deride the tale of the motherless infant Dionysus having been sewn into the thigh of Zeus. Teiresias, while reproving him for his impiety, explains the story away in a sort of allegory: the μηρὸς Διὸς (he says) was a mistaken statement in place of the αἰθὴρ χθόνα ἐγκυλούμενος (Bacch. 235-290).
Lucretius (iii. 995-1036) allegorizes the conspicuous sufferers in Hadês,—Tantalus, Sisyphus, Tityus, and the Danaïds, as well as the ministers of penal infliction, Cerberus and the Furies. The first four are emblematic descriptions of various defective or vicious characters in human nature,—the deisidæmonic, the ambitious, the amorous, or the insatiate and querulous man; the last two represent the mental terrors of the wicked.
[968] Οἱ νῦν περὶ Ὅμηρον δεινοί—so Plato calls these interpreters (Kratylus, p. 407); see also Xenoph. Sympos. iii. 6; Plato, Ion. p. 530; Plutarch, De Audiend. Poet. p. 19. ὑπόνοια was the original word, afterwards succeeded by ἀλληγορία.
Ἥρας δὲ δεσμοὺς καὶ Ἡφαίστου ῥίψεις ὑπὸ πατρὸς, μέλλοντος τῇ μητρὶ τυπτομένῃ ἀμυνεῖν, καὶ θεομαχίας ὅσας Ὅμηρος πεποίηκεν, οὐ παραδεκτέον εἰς τὴν πόλιν, οὔτ᾽ ἐν ὑπονοίαις πεποιημένας, οὔτ᾽ ἄνευ ὑπονοιῶν. Ὁ γὰρ νέος οὐχ οἷός τε κρίνειν ὅ,τι τε ὑπόνοια καὶ ὃ μὴ, ἀλλ᾽ ἃ ἂν τηλικοῦτος ὢν λάβῃ ἐν ταῖς δόξαις, δυσέκνιπτά τε καὶ ἀμετάστατα φιλεῖ γίγνεσθαι (Plato, Republ. ii. 17. p. 378).
The idea of an interior sense and concealed purpose in the ancient poets occurs several times in Plato (Theætet. c. 93. p. 180): παρὰ μὲν τῶν ἀρχαίων, μετὰ ποιήσεως ἐπικρυπτομένων τοὺς πολλοὺς, etc.; also Protagor. c. 20. p. 316.
“Modo Stoicum Homerum faciunt,—modo Epicureum,—modo Peripateticum,—modo Academicum. Apparet nihil horum esse in illo, quia omnia sunt.” (Seneca, Ep. 88.) Compare Plutarch, De Defectu Oracul. c. 11-12. t. ii. p. 702, Wytt., and Julian, Orat. vii. p. 216.