Here was one of the
sad troop of soulless women who appear in the legends of all the races
of mankind. Medusa had herself been petrified before she turned others
to stone. The horror that had come upon her life had been too much to
bear, and it had killed her heart within her.
So far of passion and the price the woman's heart has paid for it. But
this story has to do also with Athene, on whose shield Medusa's head
must rest at last. For it is not passion only, but knowledge, that may
petrify the soul. Indeed, the story of passion can only do this when the
dazzling glamour of temptation has passed, and in place of it has come
the cold knowledge of remorse. Then the sight of one's own shame, and,
on a wider scale, the sight of the pain and the tragedy of the world,
present to the eyes of every generation the spectacle of victims
standing petrified like those who had seen too much at the cave's mouth
in the old legend.
It is peculiarly interesting to contrast the story of Medusa with its
Hebrew parallel in Lot's wife. Both are women presumably beautiful, and
both are turned to stone. But while the Greek petrifaction is the result
of too direct a gaze upon the horrible, the Hebrew is the result of too
loving and desirous a gaze upon the coveted beauty of the world.
Pages:
18
19
20
21
22
23
24
25
26
27
28
29
30
31
32
33
34
35
36
37
38
39
40
41
42