The hesitations of the critics on this head are noteworthy. Karl Ottfried Müller, who is least himself in dealing with fundamental issues of creed, evades the problem (Lit. of Anc. Greece, 1847, p. 329) with the bald suggestion that "Æschylus, in his own mind, must have felt how this severity [of Zeus], a necessary accompaniment of the transition from the Titanic period to the government of the Gods of Olympus, was to be reconciled with the mild wisdom which he makes an attribute of Zeus in the subsequent ages of the world. Consequently, the deviation from right ... would all lie on the side of Prometheus." This nugatory plea--which is rightly rejected by Burckhardt (Griech. Culturgesch. ii, 25)--is ineffectually backed by the argument that the friendly Oceanides recur to the thought, "Those only are wise who humbly reverence Adrasteia (Fate)"--as if the positing of a supreme Fate were not a further belittlement of Zeus. Other critics are similarly evasive. Patin (Eschyle, éd. 1877, p. 250 sq.), noting the vagaries of past criticism, hostile and other, avowedly leaves the play an unsolved enigma, affirming only the commonly asserted "piety" of Æschylus. Girard (Le sentiment religieux en Grèce, pp. 425-29) does no better, while dogmatically asserting that the poet is "the Greek faithful to the faith of his fathers, which he interprets with an intelligent and emotional (émue) veneration." Meyer (iii, §§ 257-58) draws an elaborate parallel between Æschylus and Pindar, affirming in turn the "tiefe Frömmigkeit" of the former--and in turn leaves the enigma of the Prometheus unsolved. Professor Decharme, rightly rejecting the fanciful interpretations of Quinet and others who allegorize Prometheus into humanity revolting against superstition, offers a very unsatisfying explanation of his own (p. 107), which practically denies that there is any problem to solve.