Ceres and Stellio.
Another anecdote illustrating Ceres’ power is told about a lad, Stellio, who made fun of the goddess when she was journeying, on account of the haste with which she disposed of a bowl of gruel offered by some charitable person. To punish the boy for his rudeness, Ceres flung the remainder of her gruel into his face, and changed him into a lizard.
CHAPTER XV.
VESTA.
Worship of Vesta.
Vesta, or Hestia, daughter of Cronus and Rhea, goddess of fire and of the family hearth, and guardian angel of mankind, was worshiped principally throughout Italy, although she also had shrines in Greece and Asia Minor.
The family hearth in ancient times possessed a far different signification from what it does now, and was considered the family altar, for there the father of the family was wont to offer up his daily prayers and sacrifices. “As, according to the old heathen custom, all men were regarded as enemies unless by a special compact they had been made friends, so Vesta presided especially over true and faithful dealing;” and she was therefore generally represented as pure and undefiled.
A beautiful circular temple in Rome was dedicated to Vesta’s service; and here the Palladium of Troy was supposed to be preserved, together with the goddess’s sacred fire, originally kindled by the rays of the sun.
This fire—an emblem of the flame of life, which the ancients fancied was kept burning within each human breast by Vesta, the life-giver—was kept constantly burning, and never allowed to go out for want of fuel or timely care. Its flames were also intended to represent the purity of the goddess, who, although wooed by many lovers,—among whom Apollo and Neptune can justly claim the precedence,—remained always a virgin.