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that the two bodies, which, as the result of the earliest observa-tions, were believed to exist, and periodically to appear uponopposite sides of the Sun , never showed themselves together,and were really one and the same. To this earlier suppositionwe may attribute the traditions which have come down tous of the double appellations Set and Horus amongst theEgyptians, Rouhineya and Boudha amongst the Hindoos,Hermes and Apollo amongst the Greeks, which are said tohave been used for Mercury ; the name of Apollo (as the God of the Day) having been probably given to it when seen asa morning star before the same name was in later timesappropriated to the Sun . So, in like manner, Venus, as amorning star, was called eaxrcjtopos, i.e., the bringer of thedawn, or <£coo-(/>6po?, the bringer of light (in Latin “Lucifer”) ;and eo-7repo?(in Latin “Hesperus”), as an evening star.*
It was, however, much more easy in the case of Venus, thanin that of Mercury, to recognize the oscillation from one side ofthe Sun to the other, because it was possible to watch the planetthrough so much longer a proportion of its path. Indeed, wecannot but think that, if the ancients had not been hamperedby an intense belief in the immobility of the Earth , as thecentre about which the Sun and all the other heavenly bodiesrevolved (a doctrine, the denial of which, even in the time ofGalileo,t was thought to be the part of a heretic, owing to a
* See Homer, “ Iliad, ” xxiii. 226 :—
’Hpos S’ 'Eaaepopos elcn, <po<os epeaiv eirl yutav,
"Ov T6 pera KpoKoneukos p aka KibvaTai fjas.
(“ When the Dawn-bringer arrives, proclaiming light o’er the Earth ,after whom the saffron-vested morn is diffused o’er the sea.”)
"E anepos bs Kakkiaros iv ovpavto lOTarai aorrjp.
(“ Hesperus, which is placed the brightest star in heaven.”)
Compare also Milton, “ Paradise Lost, ” Book Y. :—
“ Fairest of stars, last in the train of night,
If better thou belong not to the dawn.”
t In his recantation, when seventy years of age, Galileo was forced to■say that he abjured, cursed, and detested, the absurdity, error, and heresy ofthe motion of the Barth.