A second group of figures embodying the same idea of the connection of morality with religion is found in the various impersonations {213} of the Order of Nature and its correlate in Law in the world without and the heart within. The speculations of the early Greek philosophers in their attempts to reach an ultimate Unity behind all the diversities of appearance familiarised the higher minds with the idea of the harmony of the cosmos. "Law," sang Pindar, "is king of all, both mortals and immortals." And this sovereign order is represented mythologically by Themis, whom Hesiod exalts to be the daughter of Heaven and Earth, and bride of Zeus. Pindar pictured her as borne in a golden car from the primeval Ocean, the source of all, up to the sacred height of Olympus, to be the consort of Zeus the Preserver. But though she is thus the spouse of the sovereign of the sky, she is in another aspect identified with Earth, scene of fixed rules both in nature and social life, for with the cultus of the earth were associated not only the operations of agriculture, but the rites and duties of marriage, and the maintenance of the family. So Themis is the mother of the seasons in the annual round, and the sequences of blossom and fruit are her work; but among her daughters are also Fair Order, Justice, and Peace, and the world and the State thus reflect obedience to a universal Law. Behind Greece lay Egypt, where tradition said that Thales, first of Greeks to philosophise, had studied. When the soul of the dead man was brought to the test of the balance (p. 8), {214} he was supported by the goddesses of Maāt or Truth. Derived from the root _mā_, "to stretch out," this name covered the ideas of rectitude or right, and Maāt was the splendid impersonation of order, law, justice, truth, in both the physical and moral spheres. She is the daughter--or even the eye--of the Sun-god Rê. But she is conceived in still more exalted fashion as the sovereign of all realms, and is elevated above all relationships. She is Lady of heaven, and Queen of earth, and even Lady of the Land of the West, the mysterious dwellings of the dead. In one aspect she serves each of the great gods as her lord and master; in another she knows no lord or master. So it is by her that the gods live; she is, as it were, the law of their being; alike for sun and moon, for days and hours, in the visible world, and for the divine king at the head of his people. She is solemnly offered by the sovereign to his god, and the deity responds by laying her in the heart of his worshipper, to manifest her everlastingly before the gods. Through the court-phrases gleams the solemn idea that sovereignty on earth is no law to itself; it must follow the ordinances of heaven.