Pan (mythology)

“ Brand observes [185] that "ephialtes, or nightmare, is called by common people witch-riding." He traces the superstition to the Gothic or Scandinavian Mara, "a spectre of the night."
In classical mythology Pan was regarded as the author of sudden frights or groundless alarms. Dr. Adam, in his "Roman Antiquities," says that Faunus and Sylvanus were "supposed to be the same with Pan." He further adds,—"There were several rural deities called Fauni, who were believed to occasion the nightmare."
It is not improbable that the modern equine form of the hag may have resulted from ordinary punning. ”

“ Half of the flesh and half of the spirit is Pan. There are some who have never come into contact with him, who know him only as the emblem of Paganism, a cruel thing, more beast than man, trampling, with goat's feet, on the gentlest flowers of spring. They know not the meaning of "the Green Fire of Life," nor have they ever known Pan's moods of tender sadness. ”

“ The gladness of living, the terror of living—the exquisite joy and the infinite pain—that has been the possession of Pan—for we have not yet found a more fitting title—since ever time began. And because Pan is as he is, from him has evolved a higher Pantheism. We have done away with his goat's feet and his horns, although these were handed on from him to Satan when Christianity broke down the altars of Paganism.
"Nature, which is the Time-vesture of God and reveals Him to the wise, hides Him from the foolish," writes Carlyle. ”

“ Omphale. The worship of Pan was well established, particularly in Arcadia, where he gave oracles on mount Lycæus. His festivals, called by the Greeks Lycæa, were brought to Italy by Evander, and they were well known at Rome by the name of the Lupercalia. See: Lupercalia. The worship, and the different functions of Pan, are derived from the mythology of the ancient Egyptians. This god was one of the eight great gods of the Egyptians, who ranked before the other 12 gods, whom the Romans called Consentes. He was worshipped with the greatest solemnity over all Egypt. ”

“ So King Midas acquired a farm and took his court there, becoming a worshipper of Pan, the goat-footed god of the fields.
The god Pan was the merriest and almost the best beloved of all the gods, for his domain was the whole of the beautiful, wide outdoors. He was a wanderer of the mountains and valleys through all the seasons, peering into the grottos where the shepherds lived, amusing himself by chasing the nymphs, and bringing laughter and merriment wherever he went. The stump of a tree with its shaggy roots was Pan's pillow and the dusky leaves his only shelter. ”

“ When he rises, run before him,
Heralding the path of Pan !
New York, 1896.
1 2 Pan is a god of nature in Greek mythology.↑ Arcadia is a wooded region of ancient Greece, and is often used as a name for a utopian vision of pastoralism and harmony with nature.↑ A hamadryad is a tree-dwelling spirit in Greek mythology.↑ A nymph is a minor female nature deity in Greek mythology.↑ A nereid is a sea nymph in Greek mythology. ”

“ In my Pantheon, Pan still reigns in his pristine glory, with his ruddy face, his flowing beard, and his shaggy body, his pipe and his crook, his nymph Echo, and his chosen daughter Iambe; for the great God Pan is not dead, as was rumored. Perhaps of all the gods of New England and of ancient Greece, I am most constant at his shrine.
It seems to me that the god that is commonly worshipped in civilized countries is not at all divine, though he bears a divine name, but is the overwhelming authority and respectability of mankind combined. Men reverence one another, not yet God. ”

“ Frivolity is a most unfit tribute to Pan, who ought to be represented in the mythology as the most continent of gods. I would not be frivolous before the admirable reserve and prudence of time, yet I cannot renounce the right of returning often to this old topic. The multitude of false churches accredits the true religion. Literature, poetry, science are the homage of man to this unfathomed secret, concerning which no sane man can affect an indifference or incuriosity. Nature is loved by what is best in us. ”

“ Pan was gifted with the power of prophecy, which he is said to have imparted to Apollo, and he possessed a well-known and very ancient oracle in Arcadia, in which state he was more especially worshipped.
The artists of later times have somewhat toned down the original very unattractive conception of Pan, as above described, and merely represent him as a young man, hardened by the exposure to all weathers which a rural life involves, and bearing in his hand the shepherd's crook and syrinx—these being his usual attributes—whilst small horns project from his forehead. ”

“ He is always near when people dare to be simple. There are many who call him a God still, but they do not use their eyes. You who see so directly must never forget that bad curve of him below the shoulders. Forever, the artists lying to themselves have tried to cover that bad curve of Pan as it sweeps down into the haunches of a goat. Pan is the first devil you meet when you reach that rectitude of heart which dares to be naked and unashamed. ”

“ Pan gazed upon her, and crept a little nearer through the brushwood.
"Sure I am that thou art as wise as thou art kind, fair stranger," said the innocent maiden. "There has ever been within me a secret thought that Pan, the lord of all the wild things of the wood, could not be fierce and cruel as men said, and ever have I been assured that could I meet and speak with him I should love him well."
"Love, love, love, love," said the deep soft voice of the [10] great god Pan. "Every tree, every flower, every bird, every beast lives for nothing else. ”

“ And all the beauty of the world grew more beautiful, and all its terror grew yet more grim, and still Pan piped on, and laughed to see the nymphs and the fauns first dance in joyousness and then tremble in fear, and the buds to blossom, and the stags to bellow in their lordship of the hills. When he ceased, it was as though a tensely-drawn string had broken, and all the earth lay breathless and mute. And Pan turned proudly to the golden-haired god who had listened as he had spoken through the hearts of reeds to the hearts of men.
"Canst, then, make music like unto my music, Apollo?" ”

“ There is a story that one night a ship’s crew, passing near a lonely island in the Ægean Sea, sacred to the gods, heard a great wailing and crying aloud of spirit voices, exclaiming, “Great Pan is dead.”
Pan was the heathen god of nature, to whom sacred places were dedicated, and this strange crying was at the very night after a day when, far away in Judæa, the sun had been darkened at noon, and the rocks were rent, and One who was dying on a cross had said, “It is finished.” For the victory over Satan and all his spirits was won by death. ”

“ Before inventing this new instrument, Pan had played upon the flute, and it was his skill in this direction that made King Midas dare to affront Apollo by declaring Pan to be the better musician. The god of woods and fields was not, however, a frequenter of palaces, but made his home in grottoes and piped to the murmuring trees. He loved to prowl by night in lonesome places, and lurk among the shadows where some belated traveler, startled by the weird hoot of an owl, would see his grotesque form and rush away, filled with that unreasoning terror called a "panic." ”

“ Pan has come to you because you dare.... You have murdered the old shames, you have torn down the ancient and mouldering churches. You do not require the blood, the thorn, the spikes, but I wonder if even you of a glorious generation, do not still require the Cross?... It is because you see so surely and are level-eyed that Pan is back in the world for you; and it is very strange but true that you must first meet Pan and pass him by, before you can enter into the woodlands with that valid God of Nature, whose back is a challenge to aspiration, and whose feet are of the purity of the saints. ”

“ Many more gods and goddesses were there in the wonder days of long ago, but of only one more may I stay to tell you now.
The great god Pan, protector of the shepherds and their flocks, was half man, half goat. Every one loved this strange god, who yet ofttimes startled mortals by his wild and wilful ways. When to-day a sudden, needless fear overtakes a crowd, and we say a panic has fallen upon it, we are using a word which we learned from the name of this old pagan god. ”

“ Whole races of artists have lied about Pan because they listened to the haunting music of his pipes. It calls sweetly, but does not satisfy. How many Pan has called—and left them sitting among the rocks with mindless eyes and hands that fiddle with emptiness!... Pan is so sad and level-eyed. He does not explain. He does not promise—too wise for that. He lures and enchants. He makes you pity him with a pity that is red as the lusts of flesh. ”

“ Pan it was who taught Apollo how to make music. It was Pan who spoke what he deemed to be comfort to the distraught Psyche; Pan who gave Diana her hounds. The other gods had their own special parts in the great play that at one time would have Olympus for stage, at another the earth. Pan was Nature incarnate. He was the Earth itself. ”

“ Behind these tales of the Devil there was the pagan tradition of Pan, whose upper part was that of a man and his lower part that of a goat. The devils of one religion are generally the gods of its predecessor; and the great Pan, whose myth is so beautifully expounded by Bacon, was degraded by Christianity into a fiend. ”

“ Although with the Greeks the great god Pan is a mild and gentle deity enough, and though of the earth earthy, in a sense, yet as symbolical of spontaneous nature, and simple animal existence, piping on his reeds by the riverside, he always remains a favourite with the poet and the artist. ”

“ Pan meant the richness of the sap in the trees, the lushness of grass and of the green stems of the blue hyacinths and the [Pg 213] golden daffodils; the throbbing of growth in the woodland and in the meadows; the trilling of birds that seek for their mates and find them; the coo of the doves on their nests of young; the arrogant virility of bulls and of stags whose lowing and belling wake the silence of the hills; the lightness of heart that made the nymphs dance and sing, the fauns leap high, and shout aloud for very joy of living. All of these things was Pan to those of his own kingdom. ”

“ Not a grave to show thereby,
‘Here these grey old gods do lie,’
Pan, Pan is dead.”
E. B. Browning.
Pan is dead. In the old Hellenistic sense Pan is gone forever. Yet until Nature has ceased to be, the thing we call Pan must remain a living entity. Some there be who call his music, when he makes all humanity dance to his piping, “Joie de vivre,” and De Musset speaks of “Le vin de la jeunesse” which ferments “dans les veines de Dieu.” ”

“ And methinks my interpretation is not improper; for he may lawfully be said in the Greek tongue to be Pan, since he is our all. For all that we are, all that we live, all that we have, all that we hope, is him, by him, from him, and in him. He is the good Pan, the great shepherd, who, as the loving shepherd Corydon affirms, hath not only a tender love and affection for his sheep, but also for their shepherds. ”

“ The moral purpose ascribed to the deity seems to indicate a loftier conception of him than that which is commonly found in ancient art and literature. But the popular tradition embodied in the legend is not therefore necessarily at fault; indeed it may be more true to the conception of Pan which prevailed among the common-folk in old days than were the portraits drawn and handed down by the more educated of their contemporaries. ”

“ When the ancient gods were turned out of Olympus, and the groan of dying Pan shook the world like an earthquake, none of the fallen deities was so disconsolate as Proserpine. She wandered across the world, assuming now this shape and now that, but nowhere could she find a resting-place or a home. In the Southern country which she regarded as her own, whatever shape or disguise she assumed, whether that of a gleaner or of an old woman begging for alms, the country people would scent something uncanny about her and chase her from the place. ”

“ The Fauns and Satyrs lived among the woods and hills, like the Dryads and Oreads.
The king of all these Nymphs, Fauns, and Satyrs was a god named Pan, who was himself a very hideous satyr. He had nothing to do with the gods of Olympus, but lived on the earth, chiefly in a part of Greece called Arcadia. “Pan” is the Greek for “all”—you may remember the same word in the name of “Pan-dora.” He was called “Pan” because he was the god of “all” nature—all the hills and mountains, all the woods and forests, all the fields, rivers, and streams. ”

“ For M. Clemenceau, Pan is the symbol of life in its harmonious and composite action, and science is the intelligent worship of Pan. This despised and fallen god, who seemed for one dark moment to be dead, survives and will return to his faithful adorers, has indeed returned already, and turns the tables on his priestly persecutors. The apparent death of Pan was but a sleep and a forgetting; the spirit of humanity, dominated for a moment by superstition and ignorance, seemed to be lying bound and mute, but it is vocal again, and its powers prove to be unshackled. ”