discover them. The one of these is in the person of Acteon, and the other in that of Pentheus. Acteon, undesignedly chancing to see Diana naked, was turned into a stag, and torn to pieces by his own hounds. And Pentheus, desiring to pry into the hidden mysteries of Bacchus’s sacrifice, and climbing a tree for that purpose, was struck with a frenzy. This frenzy of Pentheus caused him to see things double, particularly the sun, and his own city, Thebes, so that running homewards, and immediately espying another Thebes, he runs towards that; and thus continues incessantly, tending first to the one, and then to the other, without coming at either.
Explanation.—The first of these fables may relate to the secrets of princes, and the second to divine mysteries. For they who are not intimate with a prince, yet, against his will, have a knowledge of his secrets, inevitably incur his displeasure; and therefore, being aware that they are singled out, and all opportunities watched against them, they lead the life of a stag, full of fears and suspicions. It likewise frequently happens that their servants and domestics accuse them, and plot their overthrow, in order to procure favor with the prince; for whenever the king manifests his displeasure, the person it falls upon must expect his servants to betray him, and worry him down, as Acteon was worried by his own dogs.
The punishment of Pentheus is of another kind; for they who, unmindful of their mortal state, rashly aspire to divine mysteries, by climbing the heights of nature and philosophy, here represented by climbing a tree,—their fate is perpetual inconstancy, perplexity, and instability of judgment. For as there is one light of nature, and another light that is divine, they see, as it were, two suns. And as the actions of life, and the determinations of the will, depend upon the understanding, they are distracted as much in