Again, as these great deities are anomalies in themselves, so are they likewise in the Olympian order.
If we were to remove Minerva and Apollo from Olympus, we should indeed take away the breadth and boldness of its sublimity, but we should add greatly to its mere symmetry: especially as some other minor figures would for the same reasons follow. There would then remain there the polygamous monarch of the skies, with his chief and secondary wives, the ranks of earth supplying him from time to time with further satisfaction for his passions; and in his various children or companions would be represented the various essential functions, as they were then estimated, of an organized community. Themis would represent policy, Mercury gain, the Muses song, and with it all knowledge; Vulcan, manual skill; Mars, the soldier; Paieon, the surgeon; Venus, that relaxed relation of the sexes to which mankind has ever leaned. For corn there would be Demeter or Ceres, and for wine, Dionysus or Bacchus. I grant that there is here inserted one single ingredient not known to the Homeric Olympus. His Muses are not stated to have any foreknowledge. But, after allowing for this trifling exception, I think it remains clear that though the ethics and the poetry of that region would be fatally damaged by the removal of Apollo and Minerva, its mere statistics might be visibly improved.
The discussions which have arisen upon the etymology of the name Apollo, are in themselves significant of the difficulty of accounting for his origin mythologically. Müller mentions the derivation from the sun (Ἠϝέλιος, ΑΠέλιος) in order to reject it; as he repudiates (and very justly) the whole theory, which treats this deity as an elemental power. Passing over others as unworthy of serious notice, he rejects ἀπόλλυμι[241], as ‘founded on a partial and occasional attribute of the god,’ and adopts ἀπέλλων the averter (sc. of evil) or defender, as most expressive of his general function: in other words, though he does not go on to say so, he is the darkened shadow of the Saviour. But the really characteristic name of Apollo he conceives to be Φοῖβος, the bright and clear[242]. Clemens Alexandrinus, in the Stromata, fancifully derives the name from ἀ privative, and πόλλων, and interprets the name as signifying the negation of plurality, and thus the unity of the Godhead[243].
The name of Athene would appear to be formed by transposition from the Egyptian Neith[244], to whom, according to ancient inscriptions, very high and comprehensive dignities were assigned. It does not follow that we are to regard the Athene of Homer as an Egyptian divinity; though an Egyptian name may have been the centre, around which gathered the remarkable and even august fragments of the Messianic traditions that we have found represented in her.
Summary of distinctive traits.
In quitting a subject of so much importance, I will now endeavour to sum up, in the most concise form of which it is susceptible, the evidence to be drawn from Homer of the different position held by Apollo and Minerva from that of the other Olympian deities.
I. Points of distinction in their relations to the Olympian Court and its members.
1. The dignity accorded to them is quite out of keeping with their rank, as belonging to the junior generation of the mythological family, which was, as such, inferior in rank and power to the senior one[245].
2. They bear visible marks, even in the mythological order, of an antiquity greater than that of the other deities in general.
3. The external administration, or subordinate parts of the functions assigned to them in the mythological system, are commonly devolved upon another set of deities, here called Secondaries.