Million Book Collection - The Fishers of Men Ministries

42 THE GODS OF THE NATIONSand deeply sensualised ; but their glory was thisgreat Hellenic civilisation, with which polytheismmight be termed one and the same thing.*2. When we turn to the West, the seat of thesovereign city and of the empire itself, we findthat from the very beginning and through manycenturies the political constitution of the city hadbeen indissolubly blended with the worship of theRoman gods. The religion of Eome wasmore than national ; her polity seemed only anothcname for her worship. Her temples were as muca part of her political life as her forum. So far atleast she had embodied in her whole structure thelegend of her Etruscan teacher, wherein the dwarfTages sprung from the soil to communicate theworship claimed by the gods.39 Her soil and herworshi were indivisible. And even after sevencenturies, when the city was embracing the worldin its arms, this union practically existed. Romeindeed admitted, as we have said, the gods of theconquered nations into her pantheon, but it wason the same tenure as the nations themselvesshared her civic rights. Jupiter Capitolinus wasa sort of suzerain not only to the gods of theGrecian Olympus, but to the dark forms of theNile deities, to the Syrian, the Libyan, the Gallic,the Germanic, the Sarmatian Valhalla. Whenthe greatest of her poets would express unendingduration, he joins together the race of ./Eneas en-39 Merivale, Hi. 496.