When Helios saw what terrible mischief was being done, he begged Zeus for aid. To save the world from being destroyed, Zeus hurled a mighty thunderbolt at Phaethon, which struck him, and knocked him headlong from the sky. Then he sent a great rain, which lasted many days. Finally, when the flames were out, the gods saw how great the damage was. Whole countries were left bare and blackened; and though the plants soon began to grow again almost everywhere, some places are still barren to this day. And some races of men were so scorched by the great heat that the color of their skins has remained black or brown ever since.
The Elder Gods
The Greeks did not believe that Zeus and the other gods of Mount Olympus were the only ones that had ever ruled over the world. They thought that there had been other great gods long before Zeus, or Poseidon, or Hades, had even been born.
Uranus was the first ruler of the gods, while the earth was still young, and there were yet no men on it to be governed. He had many children, who were called Titans. These were huge, fierce gods, and even their father sometimes found it difficult to control them. Indeed, some of them were so strong and terrible that Uranus did not dare to allow them the freedom of the earth and sky, but kept them shut up tight and fast in the very deepest and darkest places inside the earth. Three of these prisoners were giants, each with a hundred hands; and others of them had only one great eye in the middle of the forehead.
Uranus may have been quite right in dreading these strange gods, and putting them away where they could do no harm; but their mother was angry when she discovered that they had been fastened in the depths of the earth. She was not strong enough herself to set them free, so she could only try to punish Uranus for his cruelty. She gave her youngest son Cronus a sharp sickle for weapon, and told him to drive his father Uranus from the throne of the gods.
Cronus succeeded in wounding Uranus, and took the throne himself; and he and the other Titans ruled together for a long time. But Cronus never felt secure upon his throne; for he was always fearing that one of his own children would overthrow him, as he had overthrown his father. At last this really came to pass. Zeus and Hades and Poseidon were the children of Cronus; and after many years they rose against him, and drove him from the throne.
But although their king was conquered, the other Titans did not give up without a struggle. There were many of them, and they were still very strong and powerful; so they tried to regain what had been conquered by the younger gods. The battle between them lasted for ten long years, and the Titans seemed almost victorious. But at last Zeus set free the hundred-handed and one-eyed giants from their prison in the earth, and asked them to help him. Then they came rushing to his aid, bringing thunder and lightning and earthquakes as weapons. With their help the Titans were conquered, and buried deep under the islands of the sea, so that they might never make further trouble.
Zeus kept the thunder and lightning, which the giants had brought, as his especial weapons, and ruled as king of the younger gods. But he felt as unsafe upon his throne as his father Cronus had felt before him. He was always fearing lest some one of the gods should become stronger than he and conquer him, as he had conquered Cronus, and Cronus had conquered Uranus.
Sometimes the gods were afraid of those who were not gods at all, and who were much less powerful than the Titans whom they had conquered. Perhaps you will remember Otus and Ephialtes, the two young giants who put Ares in a vase, and kept him shut up fro so many months. After they had succeeded so well with Ares they seemed to think that it would be a good plan to treat all the gods in the same way, so that men might be left to themselves upon the earth, with no one to rule over them, or tell them what they should or should not do. So they set about making war upon the gods. As they were mortals, like the other men upon the earth, Otus and Ephialtes could not follow the gods high up in heaven; so to get at them they began to pile one mountain on top of another. When the gods saw the two young giants moving the great mountains of the earth, they were afraid for a while that they might be driven from their homes in the sky. But Apollo, the archer, came down from heaven in a cloud, and soon the two giants were shot dead by the arrows from his golden bow.
Prometheus, the Fire-Giver
In the great war between the elder and the younger gods, two of the Titans took sides with Zeus against their brother Titans. The chief of these two was Prometheus; and it was because Zeus followed the wise advice which he gave, that the friends of Cronus were defeated, and Zeus became king of the gods in his place.
We should suppose that after this Zeus would have honored Prometheus always, and treated him as kindly as possible. But instead of that, in a little while Zeus became very angry with him, and punished him more severely, almost, than any one else was ever punished. This is the way it happened.
When Zeus became king of the gods, the men upon the earth were nothing more than savages They lived in caves, and wore skins of wild animals, and ate all their food raw because they did not know how to make fires to cook it. Prometheus felt sorry for them, and wanted to teach them many things; but Zeus would not allow him. At last Prometheus decided that he would help them nevertheless. So he stole some of the fire that the gods kept in heave, and brought it down to men hidden in the hollow stalk of a plant. From that time on, men began to make all kinds of things, which they could not have made without the help of fire; and they improved greatly in their manner of living. As Prometheus had also shut up all sicknesses and sorrows in a great chest in his home, so that men might not be troubled by them, it seemed as if they would soon become as happy as the gods themselves.
When Zeus saw what Prometheus had done he was very angry. To prevent men from becoming too proud and powerful, the gods made a beautiful maiden out of clay, and sent her to the brother of Prometheus, to be his wife. She was very curious about everything around her, and one of the first things that she did was to open the great chest which she found in the house. Then all the troubles, which Prometheus had so carefully shut up, at once flew out; and from that day to this, men have had to suffer for the curiosity of this girl, Pandora.
In order to punish Prometheus, Zeus had him chained fast by his hands and feet to a great lonely mountain, where the hot sun shone down on him day after day, and the rains and the storms beat upon him. But Prometheus was as brave and proud as Zeus was cruel. In spite of all that he suffered, he foretold that by and by there would come another god who would conquer Zeus just as Zeus had conquered his father Cronus When Zeus heard this, he sent Hermes to ask who this new god would be. But Prometheus refused to tell, unless Zeus would set him free. Then Zeus hurled great mountains upon Prometheus, and buried him in the earth far down below the world of the dead After many, many years, he brought him up, and fastened him to his mountain again; and then he sent an eagle to pick and tear at his liver every day, while every night the wound healed afresh. But still Prometheus refused to tell the secret that would save Zeus from losing his throne. So for ten thousand years he suffered in this way.