Bedtime Story For Adults - Greek Mythology: Hercules |Part 2

Welcome to this guided meditation for sleep and storytelling.

Focus on the sound of my voice and feel free to fall asleep at any time.

Greek mythology,

Herakles and Eurystheus,

And now it will be necessary to retrace our steps.

Just before the birth of Herakles,

Zeus,

In an assembly of the gods,

Exultingly declared that the child,

Who should be born on that day to the house of Perseus,

Should rule over all his race.

When Hera heard her lord's boastful announcement,

She knew well that it was for the child of the hated Alcmene,

That this brilliant destiny was designed,

And in order to rob the son of her rival of his rights,

She called to her aid the goddess Elythia,

Who slowed down the birth of Herakles and caused his cousin Eurystheus,

Another grandson of Perseus,

To precede him into the world.

And thus,

As the word of the mighty Zeus was irrevocable,

Herakles became the subject and servant of his cousin,

Eurystheus.

When after his splendid victory over Erginus,

The fame of Herakles spread throughout Greece.

But Eurystheus,

Who had become king of Mycenae,

Jealous of the reputation of the young hero,

Asserted his rights and commanded him to undertake for him various difficult tasks.

But the proud spirit of the hero rebelled against this humiliation,

And he was about to refuse compliance,

When Zeus appeared to him and desired him not to rebel against the fates.

Herakles now repaired to Delphi in order to consult the oracle and received the answer that after performing ten tasks for his cousin Eurystheus,

His servitude would be at an end.

Soon afterwards,

Herakles fell into a state of the deepest melancholy,

And through the influence of his inveterate enemy,

The goddess Hera,

This despondency developed into raving madness in which condition he killed his own children.

When he at length regained his reason,

He was so horrified and grieved at what he had done,

That he shut himself in his chamber and avoided all intercourse with men.

But in his loneliness and seclusion,

The conviction that work would be the best means of procuring oblivion of the past,

Decided him to enter,

Without delay,

Upon the tasks appointed him by Eurystheus.

1.

The Nemean Lion.

His first task was to bring to Eurystheus the skin of the much dreaded Nemean Lion,

Which ravaged the territory between Cleon and Nemea,

And whose hide was invulnerable against any mortal weapon.

Herakles proceeded to the forest of Nemea,

Where,

Having discovered the lion's lair,

He attempted to pierce him with his arrows,

But finding these of no avail,

He felled him to the ground with his club,

And before the mighty animal had time to recover from the terrible blow,

Herakles seized him by the neck and,

With a mighty effort,

Succeeded in strangling him.

He then made himself a coat of mail of the skin and a new helmet of the head of the animal.

Thus attired,

He so alarmed Eurystheus by appearing suddenly before him,

That the king concealed himself in his palace,

And henceforth forbade Herakles to enter his presence,

But commanded him to receive his behests for the future through his messenger,

Capreous.

2.

The Hydra.

His second task was to slay the Hydra,

A monster serpent,

And the offspring of Typhoon and Echidna,

Bristling with nine heads,

One of which was immortal.

This monster infested the neighborhood of Lerna,

Where she committed great depredations among the herds.

Herakles,

Accompanied by his nephew Eulaus,

Set out in a chariot for the marsh of Lerna in the slimy waters of which he found her.

He commenced the attack by assailing her with his fierce arrows in order to force her to leave her lair,

From which she at length emerged and sought refuge in a wood on a neighboring hill.

Herakles now rushed forward and endeavored to crush her heads by means of well-directed blows from his tremendous club,

But no sooner was one head destroyed than it was immediately replaced by two others.

He next seized the monster in his powerful grasp,

But at this juncture a giant crab came to the assistance of the Hydra and commenced biting the feet of her assailant.

At his command,

Eulaus set fire to the neighboring trees and,

With a burning branch,

Seared the necks of the monster as Herakles cut them off,

Thus eventually preventing the growth of more.

Herakles next struck off the immortal head,

Which he buried by the roadside and placed over it a heavy stone.

Into the poisonous blood of the monster he then dipped his arrows,

Which ever afterwards rendered wounds afflicted by them incurable.

3.

The Horned Hind The third labor of Herakles was to bring the horned hind Serenitis alive to Mycenae.

This animal,

Which was sacred to Artemis,

Had golden antlers and hoofs of brass.

Not wishing to wound the hind,

Herakles patiently pursued her through many countries for a whole year and overtook her at last on the banks of the river Ladon,

But even there he was compelled,

In order to secure her,

To wound her with one of his arrows,

After which he lifted her on his shoulders and carried her through Arcadia.

On his way he met Artemis with her brother Phoebus Apollo,

When the goddess angrily reproved him for wounding her favorite hind,

But Herakles succeeded in appeasing her displeasure,

Whereupon she permitted him to take the animal alive to Mycenae.

4.

The Arimantean Boar The fourth task imposed upon Herakles by Eurystheus was to bring alive to Mycenae the Arimantean Boar,

Which had laid waste the region of Arimantea and was the scourge of the surrounding neighborhood.

On his way thither he craved food and shelter of a centaur named Pholus,

Who received him with generous hospitality,

Setting before him a good and plentiful repast.

When Herakles expressed his surprise that at such a well-furnished board wine should be wanting,

His host explained that the wine cellar was the common property of all the centaurs and that it was against the rules for a cask to be broached,

Except all were present to take part of it.

By dint of persuasion,

However,

Herakles prevailed on his kind host to make an exception in his favor.

But the powerful luscious odor of the good old wine soon spread over the mountains and brought large numbers of centaurs to the spot all armed with huge rocks and fir trees.

Herakles drove them back with firebrands and then,

Following up his victory,

Pursued them with his arrows as far as Melia,

Where they took refuge in the cave of the kind old centaur Chiron.

Unfortunately,

However,

As Herakles was shooting at them with his poisoned darts,

One of these pierced the knee of Chiron.

When Herakles discovered that it was the friend of his early days that he had wounded,

He was overcome with sorrow and regret.

He at once extracted the arrow and anointed the wound with a salve,

The virtue of which had been taught him by Chiron himself.

But all his efforts were unavailing.

The wound imbued with the deadly poison of the hydra was incurable and so great was the agony of Chiron that the intercession of Herakles' death was sent him by the gods,

For otherwise being immortal,

He would have been doomed to endless suffering.

Pholus,

Who had so kindly entertained Herakles,

Also perished by means of one of these arrows,

Which he had extracted from the body of a dead centaur.

While he was quietly examining it,

Astonished that so small and insignificant an object should be productive of such serious results,

The arrow fell upon his foot and fatally wounded him.

Full of grief at this untoward event,

Herakles buried him with due honors and then set out to chase the boar.

With loud shouts and terrible cries he first drove him out of the thickets into the deep snowdrifts which covered the summit of the mountain,

And then having at length wearied him with his incessant pursuit,

He captured the exhausted animal,

Bound him with a rope,

And brought him alive to Mycenae.

Thank you for listening and enjoy the rest of your sleep.

Good night.