Chap. XII.198 - The Original Deities Were Human - With Some Very Questionable Characteristics. Saturn or Time Was Human. Inconsistencies of Opinion About Him.
Now, how much further need I go in recounting your gods - because I want to descant on the character of such as you have adopted? It is quite uncertain whether I shall laugh at your absurdity, or upbraid you for your blindness. For how many, and indeed what, gods shall I bring forward? Shall it be the greater ones, or the lesser? The old ones, or the novel? The male, or the female? The unmarried, or such as are joined in wedlock? The clever, or the unskilful? The rustic or the town ones? The national or the foreign? For the truth is,199 there are so many families, so many nations, which require a catalogue200 (of gods), that they cannot possibly be examined, or distinguished, or described. But the more diffuse the subject is, the more restriction must we impose on it. As, therefore, in this review we keep before us but one object - that of proving that all these gods were once human beings (not, indeed, to instruct you in the fact,201 for your conduct shows that you have forgotten it) - let us adopt our compendious summary from the most natural method202 of conducting the examination, even by considering the origin of their race. For the origin characterizes all that comes after it. Now this origin of your gods dates,203 I suppose, from Saturn. And when Varro mentions Jupiter, Juno, and Minerva, as the most ancient of the gods, it ought not to have escaped our notice, that every father is more ancient than his sons, and that Saturn therefore must precede Jupiter, even as Coelus does Saturn, for Saturn was sprung from Coelus and Terra. I pass by, however, the origin of Coelus and Terra. They led in some unaccountable way204 single lives, and had no children. Of course they required a long time for vigorous growth to attain to such a stature.205 By and by, as soon as the voice of Coelus began to break,206 and the breasts of Terra to become firm,207 they contract marriage with one another. I suppose either Heaven208 came down to his spouse, or Earth went up to meet her lord. Be that as it may, Earth conceived seed of Heaven, and when her year was fulfilled brought forth Saturn in a wonderful manner. Which of his parents did he resemble? Well, then, even after parentage began,209 it is certain210 that they had no child previous to Saturn, and only one daughter afterwards - Ops; thenceforth they ceased to procreate. The truth is, Saturn castrated Coelus as he was sleeping. We read this name Coelus as of the masculine gender. And for the matter of that, how could he be a father unless he were a male? But with what instrument was the castration effected? He had a scythe. What, so early as that? For Vulcan was not yet an artificer in iron. The widowed Tetra, however, although still quite young, was in no hurry211 to marry another. Indeed, there was no second Coeus for her. What but Ocean offers her an embrace? But he savours of brackishness, and she has been accustomed to fresh water.212 And so Saturn is the sole male child of Coelus and Tetra. When grown to puberty, he marries his own sister. No laws as yet prohibited incest, nor punished parricide. Then, when male children were born to him, he would devour them; better himself (should take them) than the wolves, (for to these would they become a prey) if he exposed them. He was, no doubt, afraid that one of them might learn the lesson of his father’s scythe. When Jupiter was born in course of time, he was removed out of the way:213 (the father) swallowed a stone instead of the son, as was pretended. This artifice secured his safety for a time; but at length the son, whom 141 he had not devoured, and who had grown up in secret, fell upon him, and deprived him of his kingdom. Such, then, is the patriarch of the gods whom Heaven214 and Earth produced for you, with the poets officiating as midwives. Now some persons with a refined215 imagination are of opinion that, by this allegorical fable of Saturn, there is a physiological representation of Time: (they think) that it is because all things are destroyed by Time, that Cœlus and Tetra were themselves parents without having any of their own, and that the (fatal) scythe was used, and that (Saturn) devoured his own offspring, because he,216 in fact, absorbs within himself all things which have issued from him. They call in also the witness of his name; for they say that he is called Κρόνος in Greek, meaning the same thing as χρόνος.217 His Latin name also they derive from seed-sowing;218 for they suppose him to have been the actual procreator - that the seed, in fact, was dropt down from heaven to earth by his means. They unite him with Ops, because seeds produce the affluent treasure (Opem) of actual life, and because they develope with labour (Opus). Now I wish that you would explain this metaphorical219 statement. It was either Saturn or Time. If it was Time, how could it be Saturn? If he, how could it be Time? For you cannot possibly reckon both these corporeal subjects220 as co-existing in one person. What, however, was there to prevent your worshipping Time under its proper quality? Why not make a human person, or even a mythic man, an object of your adoration, but each in its proper nature not in the character of Time? What is the meaning of that conceit of your mental ingenuity, if it be not to colour the foulest matters with the feigned appearance of reasonable proofs?221 Neither, on the one hand, do you mean Saturn to be Time, because you say he is a human being; nor, on the other hand, whilst portraying him as Time, do you on that account mean that he was ever human. No doubt, in the accounts of remote antiquity your god Saturn is plainly described as living on earth in human guise. Anything whatever may obviously be pictured as incorporeal which never had an existence; there is simply no room for such fiction, where there is reality. Since, therefore, there is clear evidence that Saturn once existed, it is in vain that you change his character. He whom you will not deny to have once been man, is not at your disposal to be treated anyhow, nor can it be maintained that he is either divine or Time. In every page of your literature the origin222 of Saturn is conspicuous. We read of him in Cassius Severus and in the Corneliuses, Nepes and Tacitus,223 and, amongst the Greeks also, in Diodorus, and all other compilers of ancient annals.224 No more faithful records of him are to be traced than in Italy itself. For, after (traversing) many countries, and (enjoying) the hospitality of Athens, he settled in Italy, or, as it was called, Oenotria, having met with a kind welcome from Janus, or Janes,225 as the Salii call him. The hill on which he settled had the name Saturnius, whilst the city which he rounded226 still bears the name Saturnia; in short, the whole of Italy once had the same designation. Such is the testimony derived from that country which is now the mistress of the world: whatever doubt prevails about the origin of Saturn, his actions tell us plainly that he was a human being. Since, therefore, Saturn was human, he came undoubtedly from a human stock; and more, because he was a man, he, of course, came not of Coelus and Terra. Some people, however, found it easy enough to call him, whose parents were unknown, the son of those gods from whom all may in a sense seem to be derived. For who is there that does not speak under a feeling of reverence of the heaven and the earth as his own father and mother? Or, in accordance with a custom amongst men, which induces them to say of any who are unknown or suddenly apparent, that “they came from the sky?” Hence it happened that, because a stranger appeared suddenly everywhere, it became the custom to call him a heaven-born man,227 - just as we also commonly call earth-born all those whose descent is unknown. I say nothing of the fact that such was the state of antiquity, when men’s eyes and minds were so habitually rude, that they were excited by the appearance of every newcomer as if it were that of a god: much more would this be the case with a king, and that the primeval one. I will linger some time longer over the case of Saturn, because by fully discussing his primordial history I shall beforehand furnish a compendious answer for all other cases; and I do not wish to omit the more convincing testimony of your sacred literature, the credit of which ought to be the greater in proportion to its antiquity. Now earlier than all literature 142 was the Sibyl; that Sibyl, I mean, who was the true prophetess of truth, from whom you borrow their title for the priests of your demons. She in senarian verse expounds the descent of Saturn and his exploits in words to this effect: “In the tenth generation of men, after the flood had overwhelmed the former race, reigned Saturn, and Titan, and Japetus, the bravest of the sons of Tetra and Coelus.” Whatever credit, therefore, is attached to your older writers and literature, and much more to those who were the simplest as belonging to that age,228 it becomes sufficiently certain that Saturn and his family229 were human beings. We have in our possession, then, a brief principle which amounts to a prescriptive rule about their origin serving for all other cases, to prevent our going wrong in individual instances. The particular character230 of a posterity is shown by the original founders of the race - mortal beings (come) from mortals, earthly ones from earthly; step after step comes in due relation231 - marriage, conception, birth - country, settlements, kingdoms, all give the clearest proofs.232 They, therefore who cannot deny the birth of men, must also admit their death; they who allow their mortality must not suppose them to be gods.
Chap. XIII.233 - The Gods Human at First. Who Had the Authority to Make Them Divine? Jupiter Not Only Human, but Immoral.
Manifest cases, indeed, like these have a force peculiarly their own. Men like Varro and his fellow-dreamers admit into the ranks of the divinity those whom they cannot assert to have been in their primitive condition anything but men; (and this they do) by affirming that they became gods after their death. Here, then, I take my stand. If your gods were elected234 to this dignity and deity,235 just as you recruit the ranks of your senate, you cannot help conceding, in your wisdom, that there must be some one supreme sovereign who has the power of selecting, and is a kind of Caesar; and nobody is able to confer236 on others a thing over which he has not absolute control. Besides, if they were able to make gods of themselves after their death, pray tell me why they chose to be in an inferior condition at first? Or, again, if there is no one who made them gods, how can they be said to have been made such, if they could only have been made by some one else? There is therefore no ground afforded you for denying that there is a certain wholesale distributor237 of divinity. Let us accordingly examine the reasons for despatching mortal beings to heaven. I suppose you will produce a pair of them. Whoever, then, is the awarder (of the divine honours), exercises his function, either that he may have some supports, or defences, or it may be even ornaments to his own dignity; or from the pressing claims of the meritorious, that he may reward all the deserving. No other cause is it permitted us to conjecture. Now there is no one who, when bestowing a gift on another, does not act with a view to his own interest or the other’s. This conduct, however, cannot be worthy of the Divine Being, inasmuch as His power is so great that He can make gods outright; whilst His bringing man into such request, on the pretence that he requires the aid and support of certain, even dead persons, is a strange conceit, since He was able from the very first to create for Himself immortal beings. He who has compared human things with divine will require no further arguments on these points. And yet the latter opinion ought to be discussed, that God conferred divine honours in consideration of meritorious claims. Well, then, if the award was made on such grounds, if heaven was opened to men of the primitive age because of their deserts, we must reflect that after that time no one was worthy of such honour; except it be, that there is now no longer such a place for any one to attain to. Let us grant that anciently men may have deserved heaven by reason of their great merits. Then let us consider whether there really was such merit. Let the man who alleges that it did exist declare his own view of merit. Since the actions of men done in the very infancy of time238 are a valid claim for their deification, you consistently admitted to the honour the brother and sister who were stained with the sin of incest - Ops and Saturn. Your Jupiter too, stolen in his infancy, was unworthy of both the home and the nutriment accorded to human beings; and, as he deserved for so bad a child, he had to live in Crete.239 Afterwards, when full-grown, he dethrones his own father, who, whatever his parental character may have been, was most prosperous in his reign, king as he was of the golden age. Under him, a stranger to toil and want, 143 peace maintained its joyous and gentle sway; under him -
“Nulli subigebant arva coloni”240
“No swains would bring the fields beneath their sway;”241
and without the importunity of any one the earth would bear all crops spontaneously.242 But he hated a father who had been guilty of incest, and had once mutilated his243 grandfather. And yet, behold, he himself marries his own sister; so that I should suppose the old adage was made for him: Τοῦ πατρὸς τὸ παιδίον - “Father’s own child.” There was “not a pin to choose” between the father’s piety and the son’s. If the laws had been just even at that early time,244 Jupiter ought to have been “sewed up in both sacks.”245 After this corroboration of his lust with incestuous gratification, why should he hesitate to indulge himself lavishly in the lighter excesses of adultery and debauchery? Ever since246 poetry sported thus with his character, in some such way as is usual when a runaway slave247 is posted up in public, we have been in the habit of gossiping without restraint248 of his tricks249 in our chat with passers-by;250 sometimes sketching him out in the form of the very money which was the fee of his debauchery - as when (he personated) a bull, or rather paid the money’s worth of one,251 and showered gold into the maiden’s chamber, or rather forced his way in with a bribe;252 sometimes (figuring him) in the very likenesses of the parts which were acted253 - as the eagle which ravished (the beautiful youth),254 and the swan which sang (the enchanting song).255 Well now, are not such fables as these made up of the most disgusting intrigues and the worst of scandals? or would not the morals and tempers of men be likely to become wanton from such examples? In what manner demons, the offspring of evil angels who have been long engaged in their mission, have laboured to turn men256 aside from the faith to unbelief and to such fables, we must not in this place speak of to any extent. As indeed the general body257 (of your gods), which took their cue258 from their kings, and princes, and instructors,259 was not of the self-same nature, it was in some other way260 that similarity of character was exacted by their authority. But how much the worst of them was he who (ought to have been, but) was not, the best of them? By a title peculiar to him, you are indeed in the habit of calling Jupiter “the Best,”261 whilst in Virgil he is “Æquus Jupiter.”262 All therefore were like him - incestuous towards their own kith and kin, unchaste to strangers, impious, unjust! Now he whom mythic story left untainted with no conspicuous infamy, was not worthy to be made a god.
Chap. XIV. - Gods, Those Which Were Confessedly Elevated to the Divine Condition, what Pre-Eminent Right Had They to Such Honour? Hercules an Inferior Character.
But since they will have it that those who have been admitted from the human state to the honours of deification should be kept separate from others, and that the distinction which Dionysius the Stoic drew should be made between the native and the factitious263 gods, I will add a few words concerning this last class also. I will take Hercules himself for raising the gist of a reply264 (to the question) whether he deserved heaven and divine honours? For, as men choose to have it, these honours are awarded to him for his merits. If it was for his valour in destroying wild beasts with intrepidity, what was there in that so very memorable? Do not criminals condemned to the games, though they are even consigned to the contest of the vile arena, despatch several of these animals at one time, and that with more earnest zeal? If it was for his world-wide travels, how often has the same thing been accomplished by the rich at their pleasant leisure, or by philosophers in their slave-like poverty?265 Is it forgotten that the cynic Asclepiades on a single sorry cow,266 riding on her back, and sometimes nourished at her udder, surveyed267 the whole world with a personal inspection? Even if Hercules visited the infernal regions, who does not know that the way to Hades is open to all? If you have deified him on account of his much carnage and many battles, a much greater number of victories was gained by the 144 illustrious Pompey, the conqueror of the pirates who had not spared Ostia itself in their ravages; and (as to carnage), how many thousands, let me ask, were cooped up in one corner of the citadel268 of Carthage, and slain by Scipio? Wherefore Scipio has a better claim to be considered a fit candidate for deification269 than Hercules. You must be still more careful to add to the claims of (our) Hercules his debaucheries with concubines and wives, and the swathes270 of Omphale, and his base desertion of the Argonauts because he had lost his beautiful boy.271 To this mark of baseness add for his glorification likewise his attacks of madness, adore the arrows which slew his sons and wife. This was the man who, after deeming himself worthy of a funeral pile in the anguish of his remorse for his parricides,272 deserved rather to die the unhonoured death which awaited him, arrayed in the poisoned robe which his wife sent him on account of his lascivious attachment (to another). You, however, raised him from the pyre to the sky, with the same facility with which (you have distinguished in like manner) another hero273 also, who was destroyed by the violence of a fire from the gods. He having devised some few experiments, was said to have restored the dead to life by his cures. He was the son of Apollo, half human, although the grandson of Jupiter, and great-grandson of Saturn (or rather of spurious origin, because his parentage was uncertain, as Socrates of Argon has related; he was exposed also, and found in a worse tutelage than even Jove’s, suckled even at the dugs of a dog); nobody can deny that he deserved the end which befell him when he perished by a stroke of lightning. In this transaction, however, your most excellent Jupiter is once more found in the wrong - impious to his grandson, envious of his artistic skill. Pindar, indeed, has not concealed his true desert; according to him, he was punished for his avarice and love of gain, influenced by which he would bring the living to their death, rather than the dead to life, by the perverted use of his medical art which he put up for sale.274 It is said that his mother was killed by the same stroke, and it was only right that she, who had bestowed so dangerous a beast on the world,275 should escape to heaven by the same ladder. And yet the Athenians will not be at a loss how to sacrifice to gods of such a fashion, for they pay divine honours to Aesculapius and his mother amongst their dead (worthies). As if, too, they had not ready to hand276 their own Theseus to worship, so highly deserving a god’s distinction! Well, why not? Did he not on a foreign shore abandon the preserver of his life,277 with the same indifference, nay heartlessness,278 with which he became the cause of his father’s death?
Chap. XV. - The Constellations and the Genii Very Indifferent Gods. The Roman Monopoly of Gods Unsatisfactory. Other Nations Require Deities Quite as Much.
It would be tedious to take a survey of all those, too, whom you have buried amongst the constellations, and audaciously minister to as gods.279 I suppose your Castors, and Perseus, and Erigona,280 have just the same claims for the honours of the sky as Jupiter’s own big boy281 had. But why should we wonder? You have transferred to heaven even dogs, and scorpions, and crabs. I postpone all remarks282 concerning those whom you worship in your oracles. That this worship exists, is attested by him who pronounces the oracle.283 Why; you will have your gods to be spectators even of sadness,284 as is Viduus, who makes a widow of the soul, by parting it from the body, and whom you have condemned, by not permitting him to be enclosed within your city-walls; there is Caeculus also, to deprive the eyes of their perception; and Orbana, to bereave seed of its vital power; moreover, there is the goddess of death herself. To pass hastily by all others,285 you account as gods the sites of places or of the city; such are Father Janus (there being, moreover, the archer-goddess286 Jana287), and Septimontius of the seven hills.
Men sacrifice288 to the same Genii, whilst 145 they have altars or temples in the same places; but to others besides, when they dwell in a strange place, or live in rented houses.289 I say nothing about Ascensus, who gets his name for his climbing propensity, and Clivicola, from her sloping (haunts); I pass silently by the deities called Forculus from doors, and Cardea from hinges, and Limentinus the god of thresholds, and whatever others are worshipped by your neighbours as tutelar deities of their street doors.290 There is nothing strange in this, since men have their respective gods in their brothels, their kitchens, and even in their prison. Heaven, therefore, is crowded with innumerable gods of its own, both these and others belonging to the Romans, which have distributed amongst them the functions of one’s whole life, in such a way that there is no want of the other291 gods. Although, it is true,292 the gods which we have enumerated are reckoned as Roman peculiarly, and as not easily recognised abroad; yet how do all those functions and circumstances, over which men have willed their gods to preside, come about,293 in every part of the human race, and in every nation, where their guarantees294 are not only without an official recognition, but even any recognition at all?
Chap. XVI. - Inventors of Useful Arts Unworthy of Deification. They Would Be the First to Acknowledge a Creator. The Arts Changeable from Time to Time, and Some Become Obsolete.
Well, but295 certain men have discovered fruits and sundry necessaries of life, (and hence are worthy of deification).296 Now let me ask, when you call these persons “discoverers,” do you not confess that what they discovered was already in existence? Why then do you not prefer to honour the Author, from whom the gifts really come, instead of converting the Author into mere discoverers? Previously he who made the discover, the inventor himself no doubt expressed his gratitude to the Author; no doubt, too, he felt that He was God, to whom really belonged the religious service,297 as the Creator (of the gift), by whom also both he who discovered and that which was discovered were alike created. The green fig of Africa nobody at Rome had heard of when Cato introduced it to the Senate, in order that he might show how near was that province of the enemy298 whose subjugation he was constantly urging. The cherry was first made common in Italy by Cn. Pompey, who imported it from Pontus. I might possibly have thought the earliest introducers of apples amongst the Romans deserving of the public honour299 of deification. This, however, would be as foolish a ground for making gods as even the invention of the useful arts. And yet if the skilful men300 of our own time be compared with these, how much more suitable would deification be to the later generation than to the former! For, tell me, have not all the extant inventions superseded antiquity,301 whilst daily experience goes on adding to the new stock? Those, therefore, whom you regard as divine because of their arts, you are really injuring by your very arts, and challenging (their divinity) by means of rival attainments, which cannot be surpassed.302
Chap. XVII.303 - Conclusion, the Romans Owe Not Their Imperial Power to Their Gods. The Great God Alone Dispenses Kingdoms, He Is the God of the Christians.
In conclusion, without denying all those whom antiquity willed and posterity has believed to be gods, to be the guardians of your religion, there yet remains for our consideration that very large assumption of the Roman superstitions which we have to meet in opposition to you, O heathen, viz. that the Romans have become the lords and masters of the whole world, because by their religious offices they have merited this dominion to such an extent that they are within a very little of excelling even their own gods in power. One cannot wonder that Sterculus, and Mutunus, and Larentina, have severally304 advanced this empire to its height! The Roman people has been by its gods alone ordained to such dominion. For I could not imagine that any foreign gods would have preferred doing more for a strange nation than for their own people, and so by such conduct become the deserters and neglecters, nay, the betrayers of the native land wherein they were born and bred, and ennobled and buried. Thus not even Jupiter 146 could suffer his own Crete to be subdued by the Roman fasces, forgetting that cave of Ida, and the brazen cymbals of the Corybantes, and the most pleasant odour of the goat which nursed him on that dear spot. Would he not have made that tomb of his superior to the whole Capitol, so that that land should most widely rule which covered the ashes of Jupiter? Would Juno, too, be willing that the Punic city, for the love of which she even neglected Samos, should be destroyed, and that, too, by the fires of the sons of Aeneas? Although I am well aware that
“Hic illius arma,
Hic currus fuit, hoc regnum des gentibus ease,
Si qua fata sinant, jam tunc tenditque fovetque.”305
Here were her arms, her chariot here,
Here goddess-like, to fix one day
The seat of universal sway,
Might fate be wrung to yield assent,
E’en then her schemes, her cares were bent.”306
Still the unhappy (queen of gods) had no power against the fates! And yet the Romans did not accord as much honour to the fates, although they gave them Carthage, as they did to Larentina. But surely those gods of yours have not the power of conferring empire. For when Jupiter reigned in Crete, and Saturn in Italy, and Isis in Egypt, it was even as men that they reigned, to whom also were assigned many to assist them.307 Thus he who serves also makes masters, and the bond-slave308 of Admetus309 aggrandizes with empire the citizens of Rome, although he destroyed his own liberal votary Croesus by deceiving him with ambiguous oracles.310 Being a god, why was he afraid boldly to foretell to him the truth that he must lose his kingdom. Surely those who were aggrandized with the power of wielding empire might always have been able to keep an eye, as it were,311 on their own cities. If they were strong enough to confer empire on the Romans, why did not Minerva defend Athens from Xerxes? Or why did not Apollo rescue Delphi out of the hand of Pyrrhus? They who lost their own cities preserve the city of Rome, since (forsooth) the religiousness312 of Rome has merited the protection! But is it not rather the fact that this excessive devotion313 has been devised since the empire has attained its glory by the increase of its power? No doubt sacred rites were introduced by Numa, but then your proceedings were not marred by a religion of idols and temples. Piety was simple,314 and worship humble; altars were artlessly reared,315 and the vessels (thereof) plain, and the incense from them scant, and the god himself nowhere. Men therefore were not religious before they achieved greatness, (nor great) because they were religious. But how can the Romans possibly seem to have acquired their empire by an excessive religiousness and very profound respect for the gods, when that empire was rather increased after the gods had been slighted?316 Now, if I am not mistaken, every kingdom or empire is acquired and enlarged by wars, whilst they and their gods also are injured by conquerors. For the same ruin affects both city-walls and temples; similar is the carnage both of civilians and of priests; identical the plunder of profane things and of sacred. To the Romans belong as many sacrileges as trophies; and then as many triumphs over gods as over nations. Still remaining are their captive idols amongst them; and certainly, if they can only see their conquerors, they do not give them their love. Since, however, they have no perception, they are injured with impunity; and since they are injured with impunity, they are worshipped to no purpose. The nation, therefore, which has grown to its powerful height by victory after victory, cannot seem to have developed owing to the merits of its religion - whether they have injured the religion by augmenting their power, or augmented their power by injuring the religion. All nations have possessed empire, each in its proper time, as the Assyrians, the Medes, the Persians, the Egyptians; empire is even now also in the possession of some, and yet they that have lost their power used not to behave317 without attention to religious services and the worship of the gods, even after these had become unpropitious to them,318 until at last almost universal dominion has accrued to the Romans. It is the fortune of the times that has thus constantly shaken kingdoms with revolution.319 Inquire who has ordained these changes in the times. It is the same (great Being) who dispenses kingdoms, (compare The Apology, c. xxvi.) and has now put the supremacy of them into the hands of the Romans, 147 very much as if320 the tribute of many nations were after its exaction amassed in one (vast) coffer. What He has determined concerning it, they know who are the nearest to Him.321
FOOTNOTES
198 Agrees with The Apology, c. x.
109 Bona fide.
200 Censum.
201 There is here an omitted clause, supplied in The Apology, “but rather to recall it to your memory.”
202 Ab ipsa ratione.
203 Signatur.
204 Undeunde.
205 Tantam proceritatem.
206 Insolescere, i.e., at the commencement of puberty.
207 Lapilliscere, i.e., to indicate maturity.
208 The nominative “cœlum” is used.
209 It is not very clear what is the force of “sed et pepererit,” as read by Oehler; we have given the clause an impersonal turn.
210 “Certe” is sometimes “certo” in our author.
211 Distulit.
212 That is, to rain and cloud.
213 Abalienato.
214 The word is “cœlum” here.
215 Eleganter.
216 i.e., as representing Time.
217 So Augustine. de Civ. Dei, iv. 10; Arnobius, adv. Nationes, iii. 29; Cicero, de Nat. Deor. ii. 25.
218 As if from “sero,” satum.
219 Translatio.
220 Utrumque corporale.
221 Mentitis argumentationibus.
222 Census.
223 See his Histories, Act_17:2, Act_17:4.
224 Antiquitatem canos, “hoary antiquity.”
225 Jano sive Jane.
226 Depalaverat, “marked out with stakes.”
227 Cœlitem.
228 Magis proximis quoniam illius ætatis.
229 Prosapia.
230 Qualitas. [n.b. Our author’s use of Prœscriptio.]
231 Comparantur.
232 Monumenta liquent.
233 Compare The Apology, c. xi.
234 Allecti.
235 This is not so terse as Tertullian’s “nomen et numen.”
236 Præstare.
237 Mancipem.
238 In cunabulis temporalitatis.
239 The ill-fame of the Cretans is noted by St. Paul, Tit_1:12.
240 Virgil, Georg. i. 125.
241 Sewell.
242 Ipsa.
243 Jupiter’s, of course.
244 The law which prescribed the penalty of the paracide, that he be sewed up in a sack with an ape, a serpent, and a cock, and be thrown into the sea.
245 In dous culleos dividi.
246 De quo.
247 De fugitivo.
248 Abusui nundinare.
249 The “operam ejus” = ingenia et artificia (Oehler).
250 Percontationi alienæ.
251 In the case of Europa.
252 In the case of Danäe.
253 Similitudines actuum ipsas.
254 In the case of Ganymede.
255 In the case of Leda.
256 Quos.
257 Plebs.
258 Morata.
259 Proseminatoribus.
260 Alibi.
261 Optimum.
262 There would seem to be a jest here; “æquus” is not only just but equal, i.e., “on a par with” others - in evil, of course, as well as good.
263 Inter nativos et factos. See above, c. ii., p. 131.
264 Summa responsionis.
265 Famulatoria mendicitas.
266 Vaccula.
267 Subegisse oculis, “reduced to his own eyesight.”
268 Byrsæ.
269 Magis obtinendus divinitati deputatur.
270 Fascias.
271 Hylas.
272 Rather murders of children and other kindred.
273 Æsculapius.
274 Tertullian does not correctly quote Pindar (Pyth. iii. 54-59), who notices the skilful hero’s love of reward, but certainly ascribes to him the merit of curing rather than killing: Αλλὰ κέρδει καὶ σοπία δέδεται ἒτραπεν καὶ κἀκεῖνον ἁγάνορι μισθῷ χρυσὸς ἐν χερσὶν φανεὶς ἂνδῤ ἐκ θανάτου κομίσαι ἤδη ἀλωκότα· χερσὶ δ ̓ ἄρα Κρονίων ῥίψαις δἰ ἀμποῖν ἀμπνοὰν στέρνων καθέλεν ὠκέως, αἴθων δὲ κεραυνὸς ἐνέσκιμψεν μόρον - “Even wisdom has been bound by love of gain, and gold shining in the hand by a magnificent reward induced even to him to restore from death a man already seized by it; and then the son of Saturn, hurling with his hands a bolt through both, speedily took away the breath of their breasts, and the flashing bolt inflicted death” (Dawson Turner).
275 Tertullian does not follow the legend which is usually received. He wishes to see no good in the object of his hatred, and so takes the worst view, and certainly improves upon it. The “bestia” is out of reason. [He doubtless followed some copy now lost.]
