There was also in Hades the sacred river Styx, by whose waters the gods swore their most irrevocable oaths; and the blessed Lethe, whose waters had the power to make one forget all unpleasant things, thus preparing the good for a state of endless bliss in the Elysian Fields.
THE FURIES.—A Study for the Masque of Cupid.—Burne-Jones.
“Lethe, the river of oblivion, rolls
Her wat’ry labrinth, whereof who drinks,
Forthwith his former state and being forgets,
Forgets both joy and grief, pleasure and pain.”
Milton.
The judges.
Near Pluto’s throne were seated the three judges of Hades, Minos, Rhadamanthus, and Æacus, whose duty it was to question all newly arrived souls, to sort out the confused mass of good and bad thoughts and actions, and place them in the scales of Themis, the blindfolded, impartial goddess of justice, who bore a trenchant sword to indicate that her decrees would be mercilessly enforced. If the good outweighed the evil, the spirit was led to the Elysian Fields; but if, on the contrary, the evil prevailed, the spirit was condemned to suffer in the fires of Tartarus.
“Where his decrees
The guilty soul within the burning gates
Of Tartarus compel, or send the good
To inhabit, with eternal health and peace,
The valley of Elysium.”
Akenside.
The Furies.