Brewer's: Pan

The personification of deity displayed in creation and pervading all things. As flocks and herds were the chief property of the pastoral age, Pan was called the god of flocks and herds. He is also called the god of hyle, not the “woods” only, but “all material substances.” The lower part was that of a goat, because of the asperity of the earth; the upper part was that of a man, because ether is the “hegemonic of the world;” the lustful nature of the god symbolised the spermatic principle of the world; the libbard's skin was to indicate the immense variety of created things; and the character of “blameless Pan” symbolised that wisdom which governs the world. (Greek, pan, everything.) (Phornutus: De Natura Deorum, xxvii. 203.)

Universal Pan, Knit with the Graces and the Hours in dance, Led on the eternal spring.

Milton: Paradise Lost, iv. 265.

In the National Museum of Naples is the celebrated marble of “Pan teaching Apollo to play on the panpipe.”

The Great Pan.
Francois Marie Arouet de Voltaire, also called the Dictator of Letters. (1694-1778.)
Source: Dictionary of Phrase and Fable, E. Cobham Brewer, 1894
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