! JUPITER.

Jupiter, monarch of Heaven, and king of gods and men, was the son of Saturn and Cybele, saved by his mother's artifice from the devouring jaws of his father. He is said to have been brought up during his infancy in a cavern on Mount Ida, and nourished by the goat Amalthea, the Corybantes perpetually sounding their cymbals to prevent Saturn hearing his cries. At the division of the universe among the sons of Saturn, the empire of heaven fell by lot to Jupiter, who became, in consequence, the most powerful of the gods; he was at first disturbed

by the insurrection of the giants, who attempted to scale heaven by placing mountains on each other, and caused such dismay in the regions of Olympus, that the gods fled into Egypt, and sheltered themselves under the forms of various animals; Hercules at length freed them from this painful situation, and Jupiter, from that time, was not annoyed by any but domestic dissensions. He was the father of the Seasons, the Muses, and the Graces, and of several of the gods and heroes :Apollo, Minerva, Diana, Mars, Mercury, Hercules, Bacchus, Perseus, &c.

Jupiter was worshipped in every nation, but under various appellations; by the Greeks, he was called Jove, or Jupiter Olympus; by the Babylonians, Belus; by the Libyans, Ammon; he is also frequently designated Feretrius, Capitolinus, Herseus, Elicius, Maximus, the Thunderer and the Cloudcompeller, by the ancient poets. The principal offerings at his shrine, were white bulls, goats, and sheep; the oak was peculiarly sacred to him; he had a temple and oracle at Dodona, supposed to be the most ancient in the world.

The King of Heaven is represented in many different ways; sometimes as presiding in the assembly of the gods, at others as a majestic person seated on a throne, grasping a wand in one hand, thunder-bolts in the other, and with an eagle (emphatically styled the bird of Jove) by his side. Jupiter

was united to his sister Juno, but their marriage was not productive of happiness; he had several other wives.

Homer gives a beautiful description of Jupiter, as monarch of the skies, granting the prayer of Thetis in behalf of Achilles.

Twelve days were past, and now the dawning light
The gods had summoned to th' Olympian height;
Jove first ascending from the watery bowers,
Leads the long order of ethereal powers.
When like the morning mist in early day,
Rose from the flood the daughter of the sea;
And to the seats divine her flight addrest.
There, far apart, and high above the rest,
The Thund'rer sat; where old Olympus shrouds
His hundred heads in heaven, and props the clouds.
Suppliant the goddess stood; one hand she placed
Beneath his beard, and one his knees embraced.
If e'er, O father of the gods! (she said,)
My words could please thee, or my actions aid;
Some marks of honour on my son bestow,
And pay in glory what in life you owe.
Fame is at least by heavenly promise due
To life so short, and now dishonoured too.
Avenge this wrong, oh ever just and wise!
Let Greece be humbled, and the Trojans rise;
Till the proud king, and all th' Achaian race,
Shall heap with honours him they now disgrace.

She said, and sighing thus the god replies,

Who rolls the thunder o'er the vaulted skies:

What hast thou asked? Ah why should Jove engage
In foreign contests, and domestic rage,

The gods' complaints, and Juno's fierce alarms,
While I, too partial, aid the Trojan arms?
Go, lest the haughty partner of my sway
With jealous eyes thy close access survey;
But part in peace, secure thy prayer is sped:
Witness the sacred honours of our head,
The nod that ratifies the will divine,
The faithful, fixed, irrevocable sign;

This seals thy suit, and this fulfils thy vows-
He spoke, and awful bends his sable brows;
Shakes his ambrosial curls, and gives the nod,
The stamp of fate, and sanction of the god :
High heaven with trembling the dread signal took,
And all Olympus to the centre shook.

POPE'S HOMER's Iliad, book 1.

Hesiod, in his Theogony, thus relates the anger of Jove against the giant Typhæus, or Typhon, and its consequences—

Then had a dread event that fatal day
Inevitable fallen, and he had ruled
O'er mortals and immortals; but the sire
Of gods and men the peril instant knew
Intuitive; and vehement and strong

He thundered: instantaneous, all around

Earth reeled with horrible crash: the firmament

Of high heaven roared: the streams of Nile, the sea, And uttermost caverns. While the king in wrath

Uprose, beneath his everlasting feet

The great Olympus trembled, and earth groaned.
From either god, a burning radiance caught
The darkly azured ocean: from the flash
Of lightnings, and that monster's darted flame,
Hot thunder-bolts, and blasts of fiery winds.
Earth, air, sea, glowed: the billows heaved on high,
Foamed round the shores, and dashed on every side
Beneath the rush of gods. Concussion wild
And unappeasable uprose: aghast

The gloomy monarch of the infernal dead
Shuddered: the sub-tartarian Titans heard

E'en where they stood, with Saturn in the midst :
They heard, appalled, the unextinguished rage
Of tumult, and the din of dreadful war.

But now when Jove had gathered all his strength,
And grasped his weapons, bolts, and bickering flames,
He from the mount Olympus' topmost ridge
Leaped at a bound, and smote him: hissed at once
The horrible monster's heads enormous, scorched
In one conflagrant blaze. When thus the god
Had quelled him, thunder-smitten, mangled, prone,
He fell earth groaned and shook beneath his weight.