The Domestic affections.
The point in which the ethical tone of the heroic age stands highest of all is, perhaps, the strength of the domestic affections.
A marked indication of the power of this principle among mankind is to be found in its prevalence even among the Olympian deities. For its appearance there has no relation to divine attributes properly so called; it is strictly a part of the mythology; a sentiment copied from the human heart and life, and transferred to these inventive or idealized formations. Indeed we always find it in connection with that in which they are most human, namely, the indulgence of their sensual passions, and the results of that indulgence in their human progeny. It is not, therefore, among the higher or traditive deities that we find the sentiment; it does not exist in Apollo or Minerva, whose love is always of a different kind, and is grounded in the gifts or character of the person who is the object of it, as for instance, the great Ulysses[868], or, in a smaller sphere, the skilful Phereclus, who built the ships of Paris[869]. It is in Jupiter over Sarpedon, in Neptune for the blindness of his brutal son Polyphemus, in Mars over Ascalaphus, in Venus about Æneas; and these two last are the two deities whose ethical and intellectual standard is the lowest of all[870].
When we come down to earth, we find the sentiment strong everywhere. Among the Trojan royal family, where there is but little sense of the higher parts of morality, this feeling is intense alike with Priam and with Hecuba. The latter is not passionate, she is ἠπιόδωρος[871]. Yet on the death of Hector we see her become a tigress, and wish she could devour the conqueror[872]. Ulysses chooses for the title by which he would be known that of the Father of Telemachus[873]. It is true indeed that, then as now, the imperiousness of bodily wants made itself felt; and it was then more ingenuously acknowledged. Hence Telemachus, attached to his father, when he explained the double cause of his grief and care to the Ithacan assembly, first named the death or absence of his father, but then proclaimed as the chief matter, the continuing waste and threatened destruction of his property[874]:
νῦν δ’ αὖ καὶ πολὺ μεῖζον ὃ δὴ τάχα οἶκον ἅπαντα
πάγχυ διαρραίσει, βίοτον δ’ ἀπὸ πάμπαν ὀλέσσει.
And the gist of his complaint against the Suitors was, not their urging Penelope to marry, but their living upon him while prosecuting the suit[875]. But then this is a father, whom he has never known or consciously seen. The Shade of Achilles in the nether world is anxious upon one subject: it is that he may know if old Peleus is still held in honour. In another he is also deeply interested; it is the valour of his son: and the gloom of his chill existence is brightened into an exulting joy, when he learns that Neoptolemus is great in fight[876]. The mother of Ulysses died neither of disease nor of old age, but of a broken heart for the absence of her son[877]. But the most signal proof of the power of the instinct is in its hold upon the self-centred character of Agamemnon, which, as a general rule, leaves no room in his thoughts for anything, except policy alone, that lies beyond the range of his personal propensities and especially his appetite for wealth. But when the gallant Menelaus, ashamed of the silence of his countrymen, accepts the challenge of Hector[878], Agamemnon seizes him by the hand, and beseeches him not to run so terrible a hazard. And again, in the Δολώνεια, when Diomed has to select a companion, Agamemnon, in dread lest his choice should fall on Menelaus, desires him to take not the man of highest rank, but the most valiant and effective companion for an enterprise of so critical a kind. His motive was apprehension for the safety of his brother[879]:
ὣς ἔφατ’, ἔδδεισεν δὲ περὶ ξανθῷ Μενελάῳ.
The war too is full of the most pleasing instances of attachment between brothers; Ajax and Teucer, Glaucus and Sarpedon, and many other instances less illustrious, might be quoted. It is the sad end of Polydorus which at the last works up Hector into the most daring heroism; and again in the Odyssey, the advantage is set forth of having brothers, who defend a man while he is living, and avenge him when he is dead[880].
And hence it is that, even though Greeks were hot of head and ready of hand, we find no instance where, in consequence of a broil, one member of a family inflicts violence or death upon another of the same household. The horrible idea of parricide, and the execration with which public opinion would brand such a crime, restrain Phœnix at the very height of his passion from laying hands upon his father[881]: