TRUE DREAMS AND FALSE DREAMS
Apollo, who is the leader of the Muses, once asked Zeus to give him the power
of foresight, so that he could be the best oracle. Zeus agreed, but when Apollo
was then able to provoke the wonder of all mankind, he began to think that he
was better than all the other gods and he treated them with even greater arrogance
than before. This angered Zeus (and he was Apollo's superior, after all). Since
Zeus didn't want Apollo to have so much power over people, he devised a true
kind of dream that would reveal to people in their sleep what was going to happen.
When Apollo realized that no one would need him for his prophecies any more,
he asked Zeus to be reconciled to him, imploring Zeus not to subvert his own
prophetic power. Zeus forgave Apollo and proceeded to devise yet more dreams
for mankind, so that there were now false dreams that came to them in their
sleep, in addition to the true dreams. Once the people realized that their dreams
were unreliable, they had to turn once again to Apollo, the original source
of prophetic divination. |