§ 20. And herein was conquest. So defied, the betraying and accusing shadows shrank back; the mysterious horror subdued itself to majestic sorrow. Death was swallowed up in victory. Their blood, which seemed to be poured out upon the ground, rose into hyacinthine flowers. All the beauty of earth opened to them; they had ploughed into its darkness, and they reaped its gold; the gods, in whom they had trusted through all semblance of oppression, came down to love them and be their helpmates. All nature round them became divine,--one harmony of power and peace. The sun hurt them not by day, nor the moon by night; the earth opened no more her jaws into the pit; the sea whitened no more against them the teeth of his devouring waves. Sun, and moon, and earth, and sea,--all melted into grace and love; the fatal arrows rang not now at the shoulders of Apollo the healer; lord of life and of the three great spirits of life--Care, Memory, and Melody. Great Artemis guarded their flocks by night; Selene kissed in love the eyes of those who slept. And from all came the help of heaven to body and soul; a strange spirit lifting the lovely limbs; strange light glowing on the golden hair; and strangest comfort filling the trustful heart, so that they could put off their armor, and lie down to sleep,--their work well done, whether at the gates of their temples[5] or of their mountains;[6] accepting the death they once thought terrible, as the gift of Him who knew and granted what was best. FOOTNOTES: [1] Matt. v. 14. [2] The speech of Achilles to Priam expresses this idea of fatality and submission clearly, there being two vessels--one full of sorrow, the other of great and noble gifts (a sense of disgrace mixing with that of sorrow, and of honor with that of joy), from which Jupiter pours forth the destinies of men; the idea partly corresponding to the scriptural--" In the hand of the Lord there is a cup, and the wine is red; it is full mixed, and He poureth out of the same." But the title of the gods, nevertheless, both with Homer and Hesiod, is given not from the cup of sorrow, but of good; "givers of good" ([Greek: dotêres heaon]).--_Hes. Theog._ 664: _Odyss._ viii. 325. [3] The Alcestis is perhaps the central example of the _idea_ of all Greek drama. [4] [Greek: tô kai tethneiôti noon pore Persephoneia, oiô pepnusthai; toi de skiai aissousin]. Od. x. 495. [5] [Greek: ouketi anestesan, all' en telei toutô eschonto.] Herod, i. 31. [6] [Greek: ho de apopempomenos, autos men ouk apelipeto ton de paida sustrateuomenon, eonta oi mounogenea, apepempse.] Herod, vii. 221. CHAPTER III. THE WINGS OF THE LION. § 1. Such being the heroic spirit of Greek religion and art, we may now with ease trace the relations between it and that which animated the Italian, and chiefly the Venetian, schools.