(Daniel), of the Hague, was an admired painter in the reigns of king James and king Charles. He had certainly (Mr Walpole says) studied the works of Rubens before his coming over. His landscape in the backgrounds of his portraits is evidently in the style of that school; and some of his works have been taken for Vandyck's. The date of his arrival is not certain. At Hampton-court are several whole lengths of princes and princesses of the house of Brunswick-Lunenburg, and the portrait of Charles Howard earl of Nottingham; at Kennington is Mytens's own head. At Knowle, Lionel Cranfield earl of Middlesex, lord treasurer, with his white staff, whole length. At Lady Elizabeth Germain's at Drayton is a very fine whole length of Henry Rich earl of Holland, in a striped habit, with a walking stick. At St James's is Jeffery Hudson the dwarf, holding a dog by a string, in a landscape, coloured warmly and freely like Snyder or Rubens. Mytens drew the same figure in a very large picture of Charles I. and his Queen. Mytens, Queen, which was in the possession of the late earl of Dunmore. The picture of the Queen of Scots at St James's is a copy by Mytens. Mytens remained in great reputation till the arrival of Vandyck, who being appointed the king's principal painter, the former in disgust asked his Majesty's leave to retire to his own country; but the king learning the cause of his dissatisfaction treated him with much kindness, and told him that he could find sufficient employment both for him and Vandyck. Mytens consented to stay, and even grew intimate, it is probable, with his rival, for the head of Mytens is one of those painted among the professors by that great master. Whether the same jealousy operated again, or real decline of business influenced him, or any other cause, Mytens did not stay much longer in England. We find none of his works here after the year 1630. Yet he lived many years afterwards. Houbraken quotes a register at the Hague dated in 1656, at which time it says Mytens painted part of the ceiling of the town hall there; the subject is, Truth writing history on the back of Fame.

(Martin), painter of portraits and history, was born at Stockholm in 1695, and at 11 years of age showed an extraordinary genius. When he had practised for some years, he determined to seek for improvement at Rome, and in his progress to examine everything curious in other cities of Europe. His first excursion was to Holland, and from thence he proceeded to London, where he practised miniature and enamel painting, to which he had always a strong tendency, and by his performances in that way gained a sufficiency to maintain himself, without being any incumbrance to his parents. In 1717 he visited Paris, and proved so fortunate as to obtain the favour of the duke of Orleans, and to have the honour to paint the portrait of that prince, and also the portraits of Louis XV. and the Czar Peter. In 1721 he arrived at Vienna, where he was graciously received; and having with great applause painted the portraits of the emperor, the empress, and the most illustrious persons at that court, during a residence of above two years, he proceeded on his intended journey to Italy. Having visited Venice, and spent two years at Rome, he went to Florence, where the grand duke Gafon I. showed him all possible marks of esteem; and having engaged him for some time in his service, he made him considerable presents, and placed the portrait of Mytens among the heads of the illustrious artists in his gallery. He also received public testimonies of favour from the king and queen of Sweden, each of them having presented him with a chain of gold and a medal, when he visited that court, after his return from Italy. At last he settled at Vienna, where he obtained large appointments from the court; and lived universally esteemed for his uncommon merit, and equally valued for his personal accomplishments. He died in 1755.

There were some other painters of the name of Mytens, but of inferior note.

MYTHOLOGY

Definition. IS a term compounded of two Greek words, and in its original import it signifies any kind of fabulous doctrine: In its more appropriated sense, it means those fabulous details concerning the objects of worship which were invented and propagated by men who lived in the early ages of the world, and by them transmitted to succeeding generations, either by written records or by oral tradition.

As the theology and mythology of the ancients are almost inseparably connected, it will be impossible for us to develop the latter, without often introducing some observations relating to the former. We must therefore intreat the indulgence of our readers, if upon many occasions we should hazard a few strictures on the names, characters, adventures, and functions of such pagan divinities as may have furnished materials for those fabulous narrations which the nature of the subject may lead us to discuss.

With respect to fable, it may be observed in general, that it is a creature of the human imagination, and derives its birth from that love of the marvellous which is in a manner congenial to the soul of man.—The appearances of nature which every day occur, objects, actions, and events, which succeed each other, by a kind of routine, are too familiar, too obvious, and uninteresting, either to gratify curiosity or to excite admiration. On the other hand, when the most common phenomena in nature or life are new-modelled by the plastic power of a warm imagination; when they are diversified, compounded, embellished, or even arranged and moulded into forms which seldom or perhaps never occur in the ordinary course of things;—novelty generates admiration, a passion always attended with delightful sensations. Here then we imagine we have discovered the very source of fiction and fable.—They originated from that powerful propensity in our nature towards the new and surprising, animated by the delight with which the contemplation of them is generally attended.

Many circumstances contributed to extend and establish the empire of fable. The legislator laid hold on this bias of human nature, and of course employed fable and fiction as the most effectual means to civilize a rude, unpolished world. The philosopher, the theologian, the poet, the musician, each in his turn, made use of this vehicle to convey his maxims and instructions to the savage tribes. They knew that truth, simple and unadorned, is not possessed of charms powerful enough to captivate the heart of man in his present corrupt and degenerate state. This consideration, which did indeed result from the character of their audience, naturally led them to employ fiction and allegory. From this was derived the allegorical taste of the ancients, and especially of the primary sages of the east.

Though almost every nation on the face of the globe, however remote from the centre of population, however savage and adverse from cultivation, has fabricated... and adopted its own system of mythology; the Orientals, however, have distinguished themselves in a peculiar manner, by the boldness, the inconsistency, and the extravagance of their mythology. The genial warmth of those happy climes, the fertility of the soil, which afforded every necessity, every convenience, and often every luxury of life, without depressing their spirits by laborious exertions; the face of nature perpetually blooming around them, the skies smiling with uninterrupted serenity; all contributed to inspire the Orientals with a glow of fancy and a vigour of imagination rarely to be met with in less happy regions. Hence every object was swelled beyond its natural dimensions. Nothing was great or little in moderation, but every sentiment was heightened with incredible hyperbole. The magnificent, the sublime, the vast, the marvellous, first sprung up, and were brought to maturity, in those native regions of fable and fairyland. As nature, in the ordinary course of her operations, exhibited neither objects nor effects adequate to the extent of their romantic imaginations, they naturally deviated into the fields of fiction and fable. Of consequence, the custom of detailing fabulous adventures originated in the east, and was from thence transplanted into the western countries.

As the allegorical taste of the eastern nations had sprung from their propensity to fable, and as that propensity had in its turn originated from the love of the marvellous; so did allegory in process of time contribute its influence towards multiplying fables and fiction almost in infinitum. The latent import of the allegorical doctrines being in a few ages lost and obliterated, what was originally a moral or theological tenet, assumed the air and habit of a personal adventure.

The propensity towards personification, almost universal among the Orientals, was another fruitful source of fable and allegory. That the people of the east were strongly inclined to personify inanimate objects and abstract ideas, we imagine will be readily granted, when it is considered, that in the formation of language they have generally annexed the affection of sex to those objects. Hence the distinction of grammatical genders, which is known to have originated in the eastern parts of the world. The practice of personifying virtues, vices, religious and moral affections, was necessary to support that allegorical style which universally prevailed in those countries. This mode of writing was in high reputation even in Europe some centuries ago; and to it we are indebted for some of the most noble poetical compositions now extant in our own language. Those productions, however, are but faint imitations of the original mode of writing still current among the eastern nations. The Europeans derived this species of composition from the Moorish inhabitants of Spain, who imported it from Arabia, their original country.

The general use of hieroglyphics in the east, must have contributed largely towards extending the empire of mythology. As the import of the figures employed in this method of delineating the signs of ideas was in a great measure arbitrary, mistakes must have been frequently committed in ascertaining the notions which they were at the first intended to represent. When the development of these arbitrary signs happened to be attended with uncommon difficulty, the expounders were obliged to have recourse to conjecture. Those conjectural expositions were for the most part tinctured with that bias towards the marvellous which universally prevailed among the primitive men. This we find is the case even at this day, when moderns attempt to develop the purport of emblematical figures, preserved on ancient medals, entaglions, &c.

The wise men of the east delighted in obscure enigmatical sentences. They seem to have disdained every sentiment obvious to vulgar apprehension. The words of the wife, and their dark sayings, often occur in the most ancient records both sacred and profane. The sages of antiquity used to vie with each other for the prize of superior wisdom, by propounding riddles, and dark and mysterious questions, as subjects of investigation. The contest between Solomon and Hiram, and that between Amasis king of Egypt and Polycrates tyrant of Samos, are universally known.—As the import of those enigmatical propositions was often absolutely lost, in ages when the art of writing was little known, and till less practised, nothing remained but fancy and conjecture, which always verged towards the regions of fable. This then, we think, was another source of mythology.

The Pagan priests, especially in Egypt, were probably the first who reduced mythology to a kind of system. The sacerdotal tribe, among that people, were the grand depositories of learning as well as of religion. That order of men monopolised all the arts and sciences. They seem to have formed a conspiracy among themselves, to preclude the laity from all the avenues of intellectual improvement. This plan was adopted with a view to keep the laity in subjection, and to enhance their own importance. To accomplish this end, they contrived to perform all the ministrations of their religion in an unknown tongue, and to cover them with a thick veil of fable and allegory. The language of Ethiopia became their sacred dialect, and hieroglyphics their sacred character.—Egypt, of course, became a kind of fairyland, where all was jugglery, magic, and enchantment. The initiated alone were admitted to the knowledge of the occult mystical exhibitions, which, in their hands, constituted the essence of their religion. From these the vulgar and profane were prohibited by the most rigorous penalties (see Mysteries.). The Egyptians, and indeed all the ancients without exception, deemed the mysteries of religion too sacred and solemn to be communicated to the herd of mankind, naked and unrefined; a mode by which they imagined those sacred and sublime oracles would have been defiled and degraded. "Procul, o procul eite profani—Odi profanum vulgus et arceo." Egypt was the land of graven images; allegory and mythology were the veil which concealed religion from the eyes of the vulgar; fable was the groundwork of that impenetrable covering.

In the earliest and most unpolished stage of society in the east, we cannot suppose fable to have existed among men. In the ages of Fables are always tales of other times, but at this period mythology other times did not reach far enough backward to afford those fruits of the imagination sufficient time to mature. Fable requires a considerable space of time to acquire credibility, and to rise into reputation. Accordingly, we find that both the Chinese and... and Egyptians, the two most ancient nations whose annals have reached our times, were altogether unacquainted with fabulous details in the most early and least improved periods of their respective monarchies. It has been shown almost to a demonstration, by a variety of learned men, that both the one and the other people, during some centuries after the general deluge, retained and practised the primitive Noachic religion, in which fable and fancy could find no place; all was genuine unsophisticated truth.

As soon as the authentic tradition concerning the origin of the universe was either in a good measure lost, or at least adulterated by the inventions of men, false and fiction began to prevail. The Egyptian Thoth or Thothot, or Mercury Trismegistus, and Mochus the Phoenician, undertook to account for the formation and arrangement of the universe, upon principles purely mechanical. Here fable began to usurp the place of genuine historical truth. Accordingly, we find that all the historians of antiquity, who have undertaken to give a general detail of the affairs of the world, have suffered in their narration with a fabulous cosmogony. Here imagination ranged unconfined over the boundless extent of the primary chaos. To be convinced of the truth of this assertion, we need only look into Sanchoniathon's Cosmogony, Euseb. Prep. Evang. I. i. sub init. and Diodorus Sic. I. i. From this we suppose it will follow, that the first race of fables owed their birth to the erroneous opinions of the formation of the universe.

Having now endeavoured to point out the origin of mythology, or fabulous traditions, we shall proceed to lay before our readers a brief detail of the mythology of the most respectable nations of antiquity, following the natural order of their situation.

The Chinese, if any credit be due to their own annals, or to the missionaries of the church of Rome, who pretend to have copied from them, were the first of the nations. Their fabulous records reach upwards many myriads of years before the Mosaic era of the creation. The events during that period of time, if any had been recorded, must have been fabulous as the period itself. These, however, are buried in eternal oblivion. The missionaries, who are the only sources of our information with relation to the earliest periods of the Chinese history, represent those people as having retained the religion of Noah many centuries after the foundation of their empire. Upon this supposition, their cosmogony must have been sound and genuine, without the least tincture of those fabulous ingredients which have both disguised and disgraced the cosmogonies of most other nations.

According to the most authentic accounts, Fo-hi or Fohi laid the foundation of that empire about 4000 years ago. This emperor, according to the Chinese, was conceived in a miraculous manner. His mother, say they, one day as she was walking in a desert place, was surrounded by a rainbow; and, being impregnated by this meteor, was in due time delivered of that celebrated legislator. This personage, like the Athenian Cecrops, was half a man and half a serpent. His intellectual powers were truly hyperbolical. In one day he discovered so different species of poisonous herbs. He taught his countrymen the whole art of agriculture in the space of a very few years. He instructed them how to sow five different sorts of grain. He invented boats and nets for fishing, the art of fabricating porcelain, the management of silk-worms, the manufacturing of silk, &c. In a word, that wonderful personage was inspired by Heaven with knowledge, which qualified him for composing that incomparable body of laws which are even at this day the wonder of the world. Our readers will admit, that this whole detail is fabulous and chimerical. The most learned part of them will readily observe, that the Chinese, in ascribing the invention of all the useful arts to their Fohi, are perfectly agreed with almost all the other nations of antiquity. The Indians ascribe every invention to Budha, or Vithou, or Foe; the Persians to Zerdusht or Zoroaster; the Chaldeans to their man of the sea, whom they call Oannes; the Egyptians to Thoth or Thothot; the Phoenicians to Melicertes; the Greeks to the family of the Titans; and the Scandinavians to Odin, &c.

About 551 years before the Christian era, appeared the famous Chinese philosopher Confucius, or Confucius Concerning the birth of this prince of philosophers, the Chinese have propagated the following legendary tale. His mother walking in a solitary place was impregnated by the vivifying influence of the heavens. The babe, thus produced, spoke and reasoned as soon as it was born. Confucius, however, wrought no miracles, performed no romantic exploits, but lived an austere ascetic life, taught and inculcated the doctrines of pure morality, and died, remarkable only for superior wisdom, religious, moral, and political.

About the year of Christ 601, flourished the Secularist Laokoon. His mother carried him 30 years in her womb, and was at last delivered of him under a plum-tree. This philosopher was the Epicurus of the Chinese. His disciples, who were denominated Faosse, i.e., heavenly doctors, were the first who corrupted the religion of the Chinese. They were addicted to magic, and introduced the worship of good and bad demons. Their doctrine was embraced by a long succession of emperors. One of these princes, called Tou-ti, had been deprived by death of a favourite mistress, whom he loved with the most extravagant passion. The emperor, by the magical skill of one of these doctors, obtained an interview with his deceased mistress, a circumstance which riveted the whole order in the affection and esteem of the deluded prince. Here our readers will observe the exact counterpart of the fable of Eurydice, so famous in the mythology of the Greeks and Romans. That such a system of religious principles must have abounded with mythological adventures is highly probable; but as the missionaries, to whom we are chiefly indebted for our information relating to the religion of the Chinese, have not taken the pains to record them, we find it impossible to gratify the curiosity of our readers on that head.

The worship of the idol Fo, or Foe, was transplanted from India into China about the 56th year of the Christian era, upon the following occasion. One worship of the doctors of the Fao-sse had promised a prince of Fo, and of the family of Tchou, and brother of the emperor Ming-ti, to make him enter into communion with the spirits. At his solicitation an ambassador was dispatched into India, in order to inquire where the true reli- There had been a tradition, say the missionaries, ever since the age of Confucius, that the true religion was to be found in the west.—The ambassador stopt short in India; and finding that the god Foe was in high reputation in that country, he collected several images of that deity painted on chintz, and with it 42 chapters of the canonical books of the Hindoos, which, together with the images, he laid on a white elephant, and transported into his native country. At the same time he imported from the same quarter the doctrine of the transmigration of souls, which is firmly believed in China to this day. The doctrine and worship of Foe, thus introduced, made a most rapid progress all over China, Japan, Siam, &c. The priests of Foe are called among the Siamese, Talopains; by the Tartars, Lamas; by the Chinese, Ho-chang; and by the people of Japan, Bonzes. By this last appellation they are generally known in Europe.

An infinitude of fable was invented and propagated by the disciples of Foe, concerning the life and adventures of their master. If the earlier ages of the Chinese history are barren of mythological incidents, the later periods, after the introduction of the worship of Foe, furnish an inexhaustible store of miracles, monsters, fables, intrigues, exploits, and adventures, of the most villainous complexion. Indeed, most of them are so absurd, so ridiculous, and at the same time so impious and profane, that we are convinced our readers will easily dispense with a detail from which they could reap neither entertainment nor instruction. Such as may find themselves disposed to rake into this abominable puddle, we must refer to the reverend fathers du Halde, Couplet, Amiot, Kircher, and other members of the propaganda, in whose writings they will find wherewithal to satisfy, and even to forfeit, their appetite.

The Hindoos, like the other nations of the east, for a long time retained the worship of the true God. At length, however, idolatry broke in, and, like an impetuous torrent, overwhelmed the country. First of all, the genuine history of the origin of the universe was either utterly lost, or disguised under a variety of fictions and allegories. We are told that Brimha, the supreme divinity of the Hindoos, after three several efforts, at last succeeded in creating four persons, whom he appointed to rule over all the inferior creatures.—Afterwards Brimha joined his efficient power with Bishon and Rudler; and by their united exertions they produced ten men, whose general appellation is Munier, that is, the inspired. The same being, according to another mythology, produced four other persons, as imaginary as the former; one from his breast, one from his back, one from his lip, and one from his heart. These children were denominated Bangs; the import of which word we cannot pretend to determine. According to another tradition, Brimha produced the Bramins from his mouth, to pray, to read, to instruct; the Chiltern from his arms, to draw the bow, to fight, to govern; the Bice from his belly or thighs, to nourish, to provide the necessaries of life by agriculture and commerce; the Soder from his feet, for subjection to serve, to labour, to travel. The reader will see at once, in these allegorical persons, the four castes or sects into which the Hindoo nations has, time immemorial, been divided. These are some of their most celebrated mythological traditions with relation to the origin of the universe.

The Hindoos have likewise some mythological opinions which seem to relate to the general deluge. They traditions tell us, that desiring the preservation of herds and of the Brahmins, of genii and of virtuous men, of vedas of &c. law, and of precious things, the Lord of the universe afflumed many bodily shapes; but though he pervades, like the air, a variety of beings, yet he is himself unvaried, since he has no quality in him subject to change. At the close of the last calpa, there was a general destruction, occasioned by the sleep of Brahma, whence his creatures in different worlds were drowned in a vast ocean. Brahma being inclined to slumber after a lapse of so many ages, the strong demon Hayagriva came near him, and stole the vedas which had flowed from his lips. When Heri, the preserver of the universe, discovered this deed of the prince of Dainavas, he took the shape of a minute fish called Sap-hari. After various transformations, and an enormous increase of size in each of them, the Lord of the universe loving the righteous man (A) who had still adhered to him under all these various shapes, and intending to preserve him from the sea of destruction caused by the depravity of the age, thus told him how he was to act: "In seven days from the present time, O thou Tamer of enemies! the three worlds will be plunged in an ocean of death; but in the midst of the destroying waves a large vessel sent by me for thy life shall stand before thee." The remaining part of the mythology so nearly resembles the Mosaic history of Noah and the general deluge, that the former may be a strong confirmation of the truth of the latter. To dry up the waters of the deluge, the power of the Deity descends in the form of a boar, the symbol of strength, to draw up and support on his tusks the whole earth, which had been sunk beneath the ocean. Again, the same power is represented as a tortoise sustaining the globe, which had been convulsed by the violent assaults of demons, while the gods charmed the sea with the mountain Mandar, and forced it to disgorge the sacred things and animals, together with the water of life which it had swallowed. All these stories, we think, relate to the same event, shadowed by a moral, a metaphysical, and an astronomical allegory; and all three seem connected with the hieroglyphical sculptures of the old Egyptians.

The Hindoos divide the duration of the world into four Yugs or Jugs, or Joguts, each consisting of a prodigious number of years. In each of those periods, the age and stature of the human race have been gradually diminished; and in each of them mankind has gradually declined in virtue and piety, as well as in age and stature. The present period they call the Colle, i.e. the corrupt Jogue, which they say is to last 400,000

(A) He was Sovereign of the world. His name was Mana, or Statgavirata; his patronymic name was Valvala, or Child of the Sun.