Note 61:1 — II
Reading edition
The spirit appears very simply in Eur. Iph. Taur. 386 ff., where Iphigenia rejects the gods who demand human sacrifice:
These tales be false, false as those feastings wild Of Tantalus, and gods that tare a child. This land of murderers to its gods hath given Its own lust. Evil dwelleth not in heaven.
Yet just before she has accepted the loves of Zeus and Leto without objection. 'Leto, whom Zeus loved, could never have given birth to such a monster!' Cf. Plutarch, Vit. Pelop. xxi, where Pelopidas, in rejecting the idea of a human sacrifice, says: 'No high and more than human beings could be pleased with so barbarous and unlawful a sacrifice. It was not the fabled Titans and Giants who ruled the world, but one who was a Father of all gods and men.' Of course, criticism and expurgation of the legends is too common to need illustration. See especially Kaibel, Daktyloi Idaioi, 1902, p. 512.