ng from the head of Zeus, the austere virgin, who was to
become the personification of prudence, self-restraint, and
culture, the celestial representative of the loftiest intellectual
and spiritual ideals of the Greek world at its best. Hence, too,
the group of conceptions which make the lightning and
thunderbolts the weapons of the sky, putting them into the
hands of the supreme ruler, and making them at last the symbols
of law and order. "Out of the fire" (says Ezekiel) "went forth
lightning." "Out of the throne" (says the seer of the Apocalypse)
"went forth lightnings."

In strong contrast is the beneficent aspect of fire, which, once
known and "tamed," becomes almost a necessity for human life.
It affords new protection against the cold, makes man peculiarly
the cooking animal, and above all establishes the family hearth
with all that is meant by "home." Of more distinctly utilitarian
import are the uses of fire in fashioning tools and instruments,
and the smelting of metals. And it is significant to note that
man's use of fire almost certainly owed its origin to his
emotional attitude towards it, culminating in worship. As many
anthropologists have pointed out, the fire on the hearth had its
unmistakable religious aspect, the result of the feeling of
veneration for the "element" of fire before its production or use
had been understood. And the kindling of the fire on the hearth
was as much a sacrifice to the gods as a means to the cooking of
food. Each house became a veritable temple of fire.

Wonderfully instructive, as well as fascinating it is to trace the
development of the home idea as based on the emotional
experiences stimulated by the mystic influences of fire. Each
house, as was just stated, was regarded as a temple of the divine
element; but the common house, the tribe house, was specially
singled out for this honour, and became a temple properly
so-called. When bands of citizens set out to found colonies in
strange lands, they took with them glowing embers from the
tribal or national hearth, as AEneas brought with him to Italy
the sacred fire of Troy. Until lately, we are told, the German
peasant just married would take to his new home a burning log
from the family hearth.

The classical instance of the development of this idea is found
in the cult of the Greek Hestia, the Latin Vesta, a goddess who
was the personification of fire, the guardian of the household
altar and of the welfare of cities an