Essays: First Series by Ralph Waldo Emerson Essay 3 Page 24

The human soul is true to these facts in the painting of fable, of history, of law, of proverbs, of conversation. It finds a tongue in literature unawares. Thus the Greeks called Jupiter, Supreme Mind; but having traditionally ascribed to him many base actions, they involuntarily made amends to reason by tying up the hands of so bad a god. He is made as helpless as a king of England. Prometheus knows one secret which Jove must bargain for; Minerva, another. He cannot get his own thunders; Minerva keeps the key of them: —

“Of all the gods, I only know the keys

That ope the solid doors within whose vaults

His thunders sleep.”

A plain confession of the in-working of the All and of its moral aim.