Arnobius: ADVERSVS NATIONES LIBRI VII

1.1. Iamdudum quidem criminibus his omnibus, maledictionibus potius ut vera dicamus, ab excellentibus parte in hac viris et veritatem istam commeritis nosse satis plene accurateque responsum est neque apex ullus ullius praetermissus est quaestionis qui non sit modis mille et rationibus validissimis refutatus. Non est igitur necessarium parte in hac causae diutius | f. 64b | inmorari. 2. Neque enim res stare sine adsertoribus non potest, religio Christiana aut eo esse comprobabitur vera, si adstipulatores habuerit plurimos et auctoritatem ab hominibus sumpserit.

1.1. For a long while indeed a full and accurate answer has been given by the eminent men to all these charges—rather maledictions, to speak truly—concerning our persons and this truth, nor has any apex of any question been omitted which has not been refuted in a thousand ways and by most powerful reasons. It is therefore not necessary to linger longer on this part of the cause. | f. 64b | 2. For the matter cannot stand by its assertors alone; the Christian religion will not be proved true merely because it has very many adherents and has assumed authority from men.

Suis illa contenta est viribus et veritatis propriae fundaminibus nititur nec spoliatur vi sua, etiamsi nullum habeat vindicem, immo si linguae omnes contra facíant contraque nitantur et ad fidem illius abrogandam consensionis unitae animositate conspirent.

She is content with her own strengths and rests upon the foundations of her own truth, nor is she despoiled of her force, even if she have no defender; indeed, if all tongues should speak against her and strive contrary, and conspire with the united spirit of assent to abrogate her faith.

2.1. Nunc ad ordinem revertamur a quo sumus necessario paulo ante digressi, ne diutius interrupta defensio palmam criminis comprobati calumniatoribus concessisse dicatur. Subiciunt enim haec: "Si vobis divina res cordi est, cur alios nobiscum neque deos colitis neque adoratis nec cum vestris gentibus communia sacra, miscetis et religionum coniungitis ritus?". - 2. Possumus interim dicere: ad cultum divinitatis obeundum satis est nobis deus primus, deus, inquam, primus, pater rerum ac dominus, constitutor moderatorque cunctorum, in hoc omne quod colendum est colimus, quod adorari convenit adoramus, quod obsequium venerationis exposcit venerationibus promeremur. 3. Cum enim divinitatis ipsius teneamus caput, a quo ipsa divinitas divinorum omnium quaecumque sunt ducitur, supervacuum putamus personaliter per singulos, cum et ipsi qui sint et quae habeant nomina nesciamus et cuius sint praeterea numeri neque liquidum neque comprehensum neque exploratum habere possimus.

2.1. Now let us return to the order from which we were necessarily a little before departed, lest, the defence being interrupted any longer, it be said that the prize of the crime has been granted to the proven calumniators. For they set before us these things: "If the divine thing is dear to you, why do you not worship other gods with us nor adore them nor, with your peoples, share common sacred rites, why do you mingle and join the rites of religions?" - 2. Meanwhile we can say: for the performance of divine cult one god is enough for us, god, I say, first—god first, the father of things and lord, establisher and governor of all—this we worship in all that is to be worshipped, that which is fitting to be adored we adore, what the service of veneration demands we render by acts of veneration. 3. For since we hold the very head of the divinity, from whom that divinity of all divinities, whatever they are, is derived, we think it superfluous to go about personally through each one, when we neither know who they are nor what names they bear nor to what number they belong moreover, nor can we have anything clear, comprehended, or duly examined.

3.1. Atque ut in terrestribus regnis necessitate nulla compellimur, | f. 65 | regalibus in familiis constitutos nominatim cum principibus adorare, sed in regum ipsorum cultu quicquid illis adnexum est tacita ut se sentit honorificentia comprehendi, non alia ratione quicumque hi dii sunt quos esse nobis proponitis, si sunt progenies regia et principali oriuntur e capite, etiamsi nullos accipiant nominatim a nobis cultus, intellegunt se tamen honorari communiter cum suo rege atque in illius venerationibus contineri. 2. Et hoc quidem a nobis fuerit ita prolatum, si modo liquet et constat praeter ipsum regem et principem esse alia numinum capita, quae digesta et separata per numerum velut quendam populum plebeiae multitudinis faciant. Neque nobis in aedibus sacris effigies pro diis, illa et simulacra velitis ostendere, quae intellegitis vos quoque, et recusatis et rennuitis confiteri, vilissimi esse formas luti et fabrorum figmenta puerilia.

3.1. And just as in earthly kingdoms we are by no necessity compelled to worship those established in royal households by name together with their princes, so in the cult of the kings themselves whatever is annexed to them is tacitly, as it were, comprehended by honorific veneration; not otherwise, whoever these gods are whom you propose to us — if they are of royal progeny and spring chiefly from the head — even if they receive no named cults from us, yet understand themselves to be honoured commonly with their king and to be contained in his veneration. 2. And this indeed would have been thus uttered by us, if only it is clear and certain that besides the king and prince himself there are other heads of gods, which, arranged and separated by number, make up, as it were, a people of plebeian multitude. Nor do we set forth in sacred houses effigies for gods, those simulacra, if you will, which you yourselves, having refused and denied, confess to be the basest forms of clay and the childish devices of artisans.

3. Et cum de re loquimur divina vobiscum, hoc ut ostendatis exposcimus, esse deos alios natura vi nomine, non in simulacris propositos, quos videmus, sed in ea substantia in qua conveniat aestimari tanti nominis oportere virtutem.

3. And when we speak with you about the divine matter, we demand that you show this: that there are other gods by nature, by force, by name, not set forth in the simulacra which we see, but in that substance in which it is fitting that the virtue worthy of so great a name ought to be estimated.

4.1. Sed consilium non est parte in hac causae diutius inmorari, ne lites maximas concitare ac tumultuosa conserere videamur velle certamina. 2. Sit ista, ut praedicatis, plebs numinum, sint deorum innumerae gentilitates, adstipulamur adquiescimus conivemus nec in aliqua quaestione dubitabile istud ambiguumque configimus. 3. Illud tamen a vobis audire exposcimus | f. 65b | et rogamus: unde vobis compertum est | vel quibus rationibus conprehensum, hine di sint in caelo quos esse existimatis et colitis an nescio qui alii opinionis et nominis inauditi?

4.1. But the counsel is not that on one part of this cause we remain longer, lest we seem to wish to stir up the greatest lawsuits and to sow tumultuous contests. 2. Let these be, as you proclaim, a plebs of the numina; let there be innumerable gentilitates of gods — we assent, acquiesce, we wink, and in no question do we fix this doubtful and ambiguous matter. 3. Yet this we ask to hear from you and demand: whence have you discovered, or by what reasons have you apprehended, that there are gods in heaven whom you suppose to be and to worship, or are there, I know not, others unheard-of in opinion and name? | f. 65b |

4. Potest enim fieri, ut et hi sint quos esse non remini et quos esse confiditis in nulla inveniantur parti naturae. 5. Neque enim caeli aliquando subvolastis ad sidera, singulorum facies atque ora vidistis, et quos esse memineritis illic deos eosdem hic colere tamquam notos instituistis ac visos. Sed et illud rursus desideramus audire, a vobisne inposita habeant haec nomina quibus eos vocatis an ipsi haec sibi diebus imposuerint lustricis.

4. It may indeed be that those whom you confidently assert to exist and remember do not exist in any part of nature. 5. For you have never flown up into the heavens to the stars, nor seen the faces and visages of each, and those whom you recall to be gods there you have instituted to be worshipped here as if known and seen. But again we wish to hear this from you: are these names with which you call them imposed by you, or have they themselves imposed these lustral days upon themselves?

6. Si divina haec sunt et caelestia nomina, quis detulit ad vos ea? Sin autem a vobis appositas appellationes has habent, quemadmodum potuistis vocabula his dare quos neque videbatis aliquando neque quales aut qui essent in ulla cognitione noratis?

6. If these are divine and heavenly names, who conveyed them to you? But if these appellations are apposed by you, how in what manner could you give vocables to those whom you neither ever saw nor knew in any cognition what sort or who they were?

5.1. Sed ut vultis et creditis atque ut vobis persuasum est, hi dii sunt, nominibus appellentur his etiam quibus eospopulares censeri popularis vulgaritas ducit: unde tamen vobis, quot nominibus huius censum complent, an sint aliqui vobis incogniti neque in usum aliquando notitiamque perlati? Neque enim sciri est facile, definita et certa sit eorum numeri multitudo an sine ulla populositatis summa sit nec computationis alicuius rationibus terminata. 2. Fingamus enim vos deos mille percolere vel milia potius quinque: at in rerum natura potest forsitan fieri, ut deorum milia centum sint, potest, ut hoc amplius, immo, quod diximus paulo ante, potest deorum summa esse nulla | f. 66 | nec numerabili circumscriptione finita.

5.1. But as you wish and believe and as it is persuaded to you, these are gods, let them be called by those names even by which thepopular multitude is wont to reckon them: yet whence to you, by how many names they fill this census, or whether there are any unknown to you and never brought into use or into notice? For it is not easy to know whether the multitude of their numbers is defined and fixed, or whether it is without any sum of popularity and not limited by any reckoning. 2. For suppose we imagine that you worship a thousand gods or rather five thousand: yet in the nature of things it may perhaps happen that there are a hundred thousand gods, it may be more than this, indeed, as we said a little above, the total of gods may be nothing | f. 66 | and not bounded by a numerable circumscription.

Aut igitur et vos impii, qui praeter deos paucos reliquorum officia non obitis, aut si vobis veniam ceterorum ignorantiae postulatis, eandem et nobis conciliabitis veniam, si pro parte consimili eorum religionibus abstinemus quos esse omnino nescimus.

Therefore either you impious ones, who, apart from a few gods, do not discharge the offices of the rest, or if you ask pardon for the others’ ignorance, you will grant the same pardon to us, if in like part we abstain from the religions of those whom we do not know to exist at all.

6.1. Et tamen ne nos quisquam pervicaciter arbitretur sacramenta nolle suscipere ceterorum quaecumque sunt numinum. Devotas etenim mentes et manus protendimus supplices neque aspernamur quocumque invitaveritis accedere, si modo diascamus, quinam isti sunt divini quos nobis ingeritis, et quos par sit adiungi summi regis ac principis venerationi. 2. "Saturnus, inquit, et Ianus est, Minerva Iuno Apollo Venus Triptolemus Hercules atque alii [et] ceteri, quibus magnificas aedes cunctis paene in urbibus religiosa consecravit antiquitas". - Invitare nos forsitan ad istorum numinum potuissetis cultum, si non ipsi vos primi opinionum turpium foeditate talia de illis confingeretis quae non modo illorum polluerent dignitatem sed minime illos esse qualitatibus conprobaretis adiunctis.

6.1. And yet let no one stubbornly suppose that we are unwilling to receive the sacraments of whatever other numina there may be. For we stretch forth devout minds and hands as suppliants and do not spurn to approach wherever you invite us, provided only that we may learn who these divine ones are that you thrust upon us, and to whom it would be fitting to be joined in the veneration of the highest king and prince. 2. "Saturn," he says, "and Janus is, Minerva, Juno, Apollo, Venus, Triptolemus, Hercules and others [and] the rest, to whom ancient piety consecrated magnificent temples in almost all cities." — You might perhaps have invited us to the cult of those numina, if you yourselves had not first, by the fouling of your shameful opinions, invented such things about them which not only pollute their dignity but in no wise attest them to possess the qualities you append.

3. Adduci enim primum hoc ut credamus non possumus, immortalem illam praestantissimamque naturam divisam esse per sexus et esse partem unam mares, partem esse alteram feminas. 4. Quem quidem locum plene iamdudum homines pectoris vivi tam Romanis litteris explicavere quam Graecis, et ante omnes Tullius [Cic.,nat.d.] Romani disertissimus generis nullam veritus impietatis invidiam ingenue constanter et libere quid super tali opinatione | f 66 b | sentiret pietate cum maiore monstravit: a quo si res sumere iudicii veritate conscriptas, non verborum luculentias pergeretis, perorata esset haec causa nec secundas ut dicitur actiones nobis ab infantibus postularet.

3. For first we cannot be induced to believe that that immortal and most preeminent nature was divided by sexes, and that one part is males, the other females. 4. This passage indeed men of living mind long ago explained fully both in Roman letters and in Greek, and above all Tullius [Cic.,nat.d.], the most eloquent of the Romans by birth, fearing no envy of impiety, ingenuously, steadfastly and freely showed with greater piety what he thought concerning such an opinion | f 66 b |: from whom, if you would take matters written with the truth of judgment, you would not pursue the lucubrations of words — this cause would have been closed and would not, as they say, demand second performances from us by infants.

7.1. Sed quid aucupia verborum splendoremque sermonis peti ab hoc dicam, cum sciam esse non paucos, qui aversentur et fugiant libros de hoc eius nec in aurem velint admittere lectionem opinionum suarum praesumpta vincentem, cumque alios audiam mussitare indignanter et dicere, oportere statui per senatum, aboleantur ut haec scripta quibus Christiana religio comprobetur et vetustatis opprimatur auctoritas? 2. Quinimmo, si fiditis exploratum vos dicere quicquam de diis vestris, erroris convincite Ciceronem, temeraria et impia dictitare refellitote, redarguite, conprobate. Nam intercipere scripta et publicatam velle submergere lectionem non est deos defendere sed veritatis testificationem timere.

7.1. But why should I speak as if to seek the allurements of words and the splendour of discourse from this, since I know there are not few who would turn away and flee his books on this matter and would not even wish to admit into their ear the reading of opinions presumed victorious by their own presumption, and since I hear others mutter indignantly and say, it ought to be decreed by the Senate that they be abolished, that those writings by which the Christian religion are proved and the authority of antiquity is overthrown be suppressed? 2. Nay, if you are confident that you can say anything proved about your gods, convict Cicero of error, refute his rash and impious dicta, rebuke, prove them. For to intercept writings and to desire to drown published reading is not to defend the gods but to fear the testimony of truth.

8.1. Ac ne tamen et nobis inconsideratus aliquis calumniam moveat, tamquam deum quem colimus marem esse credamus, ea scilicet causa, quod eum cum loquimur pronuntiamus genere masculino, intellegat non sexum sed usu et familiaritate sermonis appellationem eius et significantiam promi. 2. Non enim deus mas est, sed nomen eius generis masculini est, quod idem vos dicere religione in vestra non quitis. Nam consuestis in precibus ' sive tu deus es sive dea '[Gel. II, 28.1] dicere, quae dubitationis exceptio dare vos diis sexum diiunctione ex ipsa declarat.

8.1. And lest some heedless person cast a slander upon us, as if we believed the god whom we worship to be male simply because when we speak of him we pronounce him in the masculine gender, let him understand that it is not sex but the usage and familiarity of speech that we give as the appellation and signification of him. 2. For the word deus is not male in essence, but its name is of the masculine gender, which you likewise call by that gender in your religion. For you are accustomed in prayers to say 'whether thou art god or goddess,'[Gel. II, 28.1] which very exception of doubt by the distinction declares to you the sex of the gods.

3. Adduci ergo non possumus, ut corpora credamus deum. Nam esse necesse est corpora, si sunt | f. 67 | mares ac feminae,insignificativa et generum disiunctione. Quis enim vel exigui sensus nescit terrenorum ab illo animantium conditore non alia de causa generis diversi sexus institutos esse atque formatos, nisi ut per coitus et conubia corporum res caduca et labilis successionis perpetuae innovatione duraret?

3. We therefore cannot be led to believe that gods are bodies. For it would be necessary that bodies exist, if they are | f. 67 | males and females,insignificativa et by a separation of genera. For who, even of the smallest sense, does not know that the maker of the earthly living things instituted and formed them of different sexes for no other cause than that, through coitus and conubia of bodies, the perishable and slippery affairs might endure by the perpetual renewal of succession?

[Plat.. Conv. 25-26.]

[Plato. Conv. 25-26.]

9.1. Quid ergo? dicemus deos procreare, deos nasci, et idcirco his additas genitalium membrorum partes, ut sufficere prolem possent, et nova quaque suboriente fetura quicquid prior aetas abstulisset recidiva substitutio subrogaret? 2. Ergo si haec ita sunt, id est si dii procreant superi et siper <terre>nas leges experiuntur se sexus, suntque inmortales nec frigoribus fiunt senectutis effeti, sequitur ut debeant plena esse diis omnia neque innumeros caelos eorum capere multitudinem posse, siquidem et ipsi perpetuo generant et per suboles subolum multiplicata semper innumerabilitas ampliatur: aut si obscenitas coeundi ita ut decet ab diis abest, quae causa ratio que monstrabitur, cur insigniti sint his locis, quibus sexus se solet - libidinum propriarum admonitionibus recognoscere?

9.1. What then? shall we say that gods procreate, that gods are born, and therefore that to them were added the genital members, so that they might suffice for offspring, and that with every newly arising brood the revived substitution might replace whatever the earlier age had taken away? 2. Therefore if these things are so, that is if the gods above procreate and the sexes are tried byper <terre>nas laws, and are immortal and not wasted by the chills of senescence, it follows that everything must be ample for the gods and that innumerable heavens could not contain their multitude, since they themselves beget perpetually and by offspring multiplied progeny the unnumberableness is ever increased: or if the obscenity of coitus, as becomes, is absent from the gods, what cause or reason will be shown why they are marked with those places by which sex customarily — by the admonitions of their own libidinous impulses — recognizes itself?

3. Neque enim veri est simile, haberi haec frustra aut inprovidam in illis suam ludere voluisse naturam, ut eos his partibus aggeraret quibus utendum non esset. Ut enim ad usus certos manus pedes oculi ceteraque constructio membrorum sua quaeque in officia constituta est, ita convenit credere in sui muneris functionem comparatas esse has partes: aut confitendum est, in deorum corporibus esse aliquid vacuum, quod sit frustra atque inaniter fabricatum.

3. For it is neither like the truth that these things are held in vain, nor that nature wished to play heedlessly in them, heaping on those parts for which there would be no use. For just as hands, feet, eyes and the other construction of members were each appointed for certain uses, so it is fitting to believe that these parts were prepared for the function of their own office; or one must confess that there is some void in the bodies of the gods, which has been fashioned in vain and emptily.

10.1. | f. 67b | Quid dicitis, o sancti atque inpolluti antistites religionum? Habent ergo dii sexus et genitalium membrorum circumferunt foeditates, quas ex oribus verecundis infame est suis appellationibus promere? 2. Quid ergo iam superest, nisi ut eos credamus inmundorum quadripedum ritu in libidinum furias gestire, cupiditatibus rabidis ire in mutuas complexiones et ad postremum fractis dissolutisque corporibus voluptatis enervatione languescere?

10.1. | f. 67b | What do you say, O holy and undefiled antistites of religions? Have then the gods sexes and do they carry about the foulnesses of genital members, which it is disgraceful to utter with their modest mouths by their own names? 2. What then remains, unless that we believe them to behave like unclean quadrupeds in the rite of lust, to go mad with raging desires into mutual embraces, and finally, with bodies broken and dissolved, to languish from the enervation of pleasure?

3. Et quoniam quaedam sunt feminarum generis propria, sequitur ut deas quoque credamus circumactis persolvere suas mensibus leges, fastidiosos ducere atque habere conceptus, aboriri perferre et praepropero partu septimanas edere aliquando feturas. O pura, o sancta atque ab omni turpitudinis labe disparata atque abiuncta divinitas! 4. Havet animus atque ardet, in chalcidicis illis magnis atque in palatiis caeli deos deasque conspicere intectis corporibus atque nudis, ab Iaccho Vererem, Musa ut praedicat Lucretia [Lucr.

3. And since there are certain things proper to the female gender, it follows that we should also believe that goddesses, their menses turned, pay their laws, carry and have fastidious conceptions, bear off abortions and endure miscarriages, and by too-early birth sometimes bring forth at seven months fetuses. O pure, O holy and from every stain of turpitude separated and cut-off divinity! 4. The mind is seized and burns to behold the gods and goddesses in those great chalcidic theatres and in the palaces of heaven with bodies uncovered and naked, from Iacchus to Vererem, as the Muse that Lucretia [Lucr.

IV, 1168], mammosam, Hellespontiacum Priapum inter deas virgines atque matres circumferentem res illas proeliorum semper in expeditionem paratas. 5. Havet, inquam, videre deas gravidas, deas fetas gliscentibus que per dies alvis intestini ponderis morositate cunctari, parturire alias tractu longo et manus obstetricias quaerere, illas telis gravibus et dolorum acuminibus fixas heiulare, tortari et inter haec omnia suppetias Iunonis implorare Lucinae. Nonne multo est rectius maledicere, conviciari atque alia ingerere diis probra, quam sub obtentu pio talia de his monstra | f. 68 | opinionum indignitate praesumere?

IV, 1168], mammosed, Hellespontic Priapus among goddesses — virgins and mothers — carrying about those matters always ready for battle and for expedition. 5. It longs, I say, to see goddesses pregnant, goddesses with swollen wombs delaying for days with the sluggishness of the inward weight of their bellies, to give birth at other times after a long travail and to seek midwives’ hands, to wail, fixed by heavy shafts and the sharp points of pains, to be tortured and amid all this to implore the aid of Juno Lucina. Is it not far more proper to curse them, to revile and fling other reproaches at the gods, than, under a pious pretext, to presume such monsters of opinion about them by reason of unworthy judgments? | f. 68 |

11.1. Et audetis adscribere causam nobis offensionis deorum, cum, si iudicatio fiat, certissima in vobis repperiatur haec esse et in contumelia quam opinamini stare? Nam si dii, ut dicitis, adficiuntur ira et animorum indignationibus incalescunt. cur eos non putemus aegre atque aegerrime sustinere, dari sibi a vobis sexus, quibus canes porcique formati sunt, et cum ita cíedatis, non aliter se fingi et ignominiosa cum ostentatione proponi?

11.1. And do you dare to ascribe to us the cause of the gods’ offence, when, if a judgment be made, this will be discovered most certainly in you to be a thing standing in insult rather than in the other matter you suppose? For if the gods, as you say, are afflicted and grow hot with anger and the indignations of minds, why should we not reckon that they suffer these things ill and very grievously, their sexes having been given them by you — by which dogs and swine are formed — and when thus you treat them, do they not in no other wise seem to be fashioned and set forth with ignominious ostentation?

2. Ergo cum haec ita sint, o miseriarum omnium causa vos estis, vos deos impellitis, vos excitatis infestare omnibus malis terras et nova quaeque eotidie struere, quibus ulcisci se possint tot a vobis iniuriis et maledictionibus exasperati: maledictionibus, inquam, et iniuriis, quas partim fabulis turpibus, partim opinionibus indecoris, quas vestri theologi, quas poetae, quas ipsi vos quoque ignominiosis celebratis in ritibus, res perditas invenietis humanas et abiecisse clavum deos, si modo illorum curam spectat mortalium regere: atque administrare fortunas [Cic.,nat.d. III, 21,53ss]. 3. Nam nobis quidem cur irascantur non habent, quos vident et sentiunt neque se colere neque deridere, quod dicitur, et honestius quam vos multo de sui nominis dignitate existimare, quam credere.

2. Therefore, since these things are thus, you are the cause of all miseries: you impel the gods, you excite them to harry the lands with every evil and to contrive new things day by day, whereby, exasperated, they may avenge themselves on so many injuries and maledictions from you — maledictions, I say, and injuries, which partly by shameful fables, partly by indecorous opinions, which your theologi, which poets, which even you yourselves celebrate ignominiously in rites, you will find to be losses for human affairs and to have cast down the gods, if indeed it is their concern to govern the care of mortals: and to administer fortunes [Cic.,nat.d. III, 21,53ss]. 3. For they have no reason to be angry with us, whom they see and feel neither to worship nor, as is said, to deride, and whom they judge much more honorably than you in the dignity of their name, than to believe.

12.1. De sexu hactenus. Nunc ad speciem veniamus et formas, quibus esse descriptos deos superos creditis, quibus immo formatis et templorum amplissimis conlocatis in sedibus. 2. Neque quisquam Iudaeicas in hoc loco nobis opponat et Sadducei generis fabulas, tamquam formas tribuamus et nos deo: hoc enim putatur | f. 68b | in eorum litteris dici et velutre certa atque auctoritate firmari: quae aut nihil ad nos attinent nec ex aliqua portione quicquam habent commune nobiscum, aut si sunt <ut> creditur sociae, quaerendi sunt vobis altioris intellegentiae doctores, per quos possitis addiscere quibus modis conveniat litterarum illarum nubes atque involucra relaxare.

12.1. Of sex thus far. Now let us come to appearance and to the forms in which you believe the gods above to be depicted, which indeed are fashioned and placed in the most ample temples in their seats. 2. Nor let anyone set against us here the Jewish and Sadducean kind fables, as if we assign forms to God: for this is thought | f. 68b | to be said in their writings and to be established, as it were,by sure fact and authority: which either have nothing to do with us and share no portion in common with us, or if they are, as is believed, allied, you should seek out teachers of higher understanding among you, through whom you may learn by what modes it is fitting to relax the cloud and the veils of those letters.

3. Nostra de hoc sententia talis est. Naturam omnem divinam, quae neque esse coeperit aliquando nec vitalem ad terminum sit aliquando ventura, liniamentis carere corporeis neque ullas formarum effigies possidere, quibus extima circumscriptio membrorum solet coagmenta finire. Quicquid enim tale est, mortale esse arbitramur et labile; nec obtinere perpetuam posse credimus aevitatem quod extremis coercitum finibus necessaria circumcludit extremitas.

3. Our judgment on this matter is as follows. We hold that every divine nature, which neither began to be at any time nor is destined to become mortal at any limit, is devoid of bodily liniments and possesses no effigies of forms by which the outer circumscriptions of members are wont to bound corporeal joints. For whatever is such we reckon to be mortal and perishable; nor do we believe that that which is enclosed by necessary bounds at its extremes can obtain perpetual duration.

13.1. At vero vos deos parum est formarum quod amplectimini mensione, filo et adterminatis humano, et quod indignius multo est, terrenorum corporum circumcaesura finitis. Quid ergo dicemus? Caput deos gestare tereti rotunditate collectum, retinaculis nervorum dorso inligatum ac pectori et ad cervicum necessarias flexiones consertionibus verticularum atque o ossea substructione fulciri?

13.1. But truly, your notion of the gods is too much of forms that you embrace with a thread and to human limits, and—what is much more unworthy—with the circumcision of earthly bodies bounded by termini. What then shall we say? That the gods bear a head gathered into a smooth roundness, fastened to the back by retentive cords of nerves and supported for the chest and for the neck by the articulations of vertebrae necessary for flexions and by an osseous substruction?

2. Quod si accipiemus ut verum sit, aures etiam sequitur ut habeant curvis perterebratas anfractibus, oculorum orbiculos mobiles, superciliorum marginibus obumbratos, suspensum imbricem narium, munctionibus muculentis et spiritali commeabilem tractui, subactionibus ciborum dentes trini generis atque in officia trina compositos, manus ministras | f. 69 | operum, articulis digitis et cubitorum mobilitate tractabiles, corporibus sustinendis pedes, explicandis gressibus et suggerendis anticipationibus itionum. 3. Quodsi ea quae prompta sunt, consentaneum est et illa portari quae sub costis earumque sub cratibus cutes contegunt atque omentorum membranulae, gurguliones ventriculos lienes pulmones vesiculas iecora, intestinorum volubilium tractus et per omnia viscera commeantes purpurei sanguinis venas cum arteriis spiritalibus coniugatas [Cic.,nat.d. II, 55.138].

2. But if we take it to be true, it follows that the ears must also have curved, bored anfractuosities; mobile orbicules of the eyes; brows shadowed by their margins; a suspended imbrex of the nostrils; mucous sneezings fit for a spiritual, commensurable tract; by the subjections of foods, teeth of three kinds and arranged into three offices; hands ministering to works, manageable by the articulations of the fingers and the mobility of the elbows; feet for sustaining bodies, for unfolding steps and for furnishing anticipatory supports of walking. 3. And if those things that lie open are granted, it is consistent that those be carried which lie beneath the ribs and the skin that covers their struts, and the membranes of the omenta, the gurgling passages, stomachs, spleens, lungs, vesicles, livers, the winding tracts of the intestines, and through all the viscera the veins bearing purple blood, joined with spirital arteries [Cic., nat.d. II, 55.138].

14.1. An numquid caelestium corpora foeditatibus his carent, et quoniam cibis mortalibus abstinent, edentulos eos esse parvolum credendum est ritu et viduatos interioribus cunctis tamquam utres sufflatos turgidorum corporum inanitate pendere? 2. Quid quod, si haec ita sunt, erit vobis necessarium contueri, similesne sint dii omnes an formarum dispari circumscriptione teneantur. Si enim par cunctis atque una est omnibus similitudinis species, non absurdum est credere errare eos fallique cognitionis in mutuae comprehensione.

14.1. Or are the bodies of the celestials free from these defilements, and since they abstain from mortal foods must they be thought edentulous and of small stature by rite, and deprived of all inward parts, hanging like bellows blown up — the swollen bodies sagging from inanition? 2. What then, if these things are so, will it be necessary for you to consider: whether all the gods are alike, or whether they are held by a diverse circumscription of forms. For if the type of similarity is equal and one for all, it is not absurd to believe that they err and are deceived in mutual apprehension of knowledge.

Sin autem gerunt discrimen in vultibus, sequitur ut intellegi debeat, non alia de causa dissimilitudines his datas, nisi ut singuli se possent differentium signorum proprietatibus noscitare. 3. Ergo esse dicendum est quosdam capitones cilunculos frontones labeones in his, alios mentones naevios atque nasicas, hos displosis naribus, illos resimis, nonnullos turgentibus malis aut buccarum cumulatione sacrivoces, nannos longos medios macilentos pingues crassos, hos capillorum intortionibus crispulos, calvitiis alios | f. 69b | et glabritatibus rasos: neque opinari nos falso vestrae produnt atque indicant officinae, siquidem cum facitis atque informatis deos, hos crinitos ef fingitis, alios leves [lenes], senes iuvenes pueros aquilos caesios ravos seminudos intectos aut, ne frigus incommodet, fluidarum vestium superiectione perfusos.

If, however, they carry distinction in their faces, it follows that one must understand that these dissimilarities are not given for any other cause than that individuals might know one another by the properties of differing signs. 3. Therefore it must be said that there are some *capitones*, *cilunculi*, *frontones*, *labeones* among them, others *mentones*, mole‑marked and *nasicas*; these with flared nostrils, those with upturned ones, some with swollen cheeks or with a piling up of the buccae — *sacrivoces* — dwarfs, long ones, middling, gaunt, fat, thick; some with hair twisted into curls, others shaved by baldness | f. 69b | and made smooth‑faced: nor do we falsely conjecture, your workshop itself betrays and shows this, since when you fashion and mould gods you make some of them hairy, others smooth, old men, youths, boys, pale‑blue (*caesios*), tawny (*ravos*), half‑naked, clothed, or — lest the cold discomfort them — overlaid with flowing garments.

15.1. Quisquamne est hominum rationis alicuius sapore contactus, qui pilos et lanugines credat in deorum corporibus nasci, qui annorum in illis inesse discrimina, qui et per varias tegminum atque amictuum formas vestitos hos ire atque ab aestibus sese frigoribusque tutari? Quod qui habet verum, et hoc necesse est tamquam verum accipiat: esse deos fullones, esse tonsores, qui vel sacras eluant vestes velcapillos imminuant silvescentium crinium velleribus involutos. 2. Itane istud non turpe, non impietatis et contumeliae plenum est, moribundi et caduci animantis liniamenta diis dare, insignire his partibus, quas enumerare, quas persequi probus audext nemo nec sine summae foeditatis horrore mentis imaginatione concipere?

15.1. Is there anyone of human reason and taste so touched who would believe that hairs and down are born on the bodies of the gods, that distinctions of years exist in them, that they go clothed in various coverings and garments and thus protect themselves from heat and cold? If this is true, and it must be received as true if held, then gods are fullers, then barbers exist who either wash sacred garments or trim the hairs wrapped in the fleeces of growing locks. 2. Is this not shameful, is it not full of impiety and insult, to give the markings of a dying and decaying creature to the gods, to brand them with those parts which no honest man would dare enumerate or pursue, nor conceive without the utmost horror of mind at the foulness?

hocine est illud fastidium vestrum, sapientia haec adrogans, qua despuitis nos ut rudes atque omnem scientiam remini rerum vobis divinarum patere? 3. Aegyptiorum ridetis aenigmata, quod mutorum animantium formas divinis inseruerint causis easdemque quod species multo ture accipiant et reliquo caerimoniarum paratu: vos effigies hominum tamquam deorum veneramini potestates nec pudet his ora terreni animalis imponere, erroris alios et stultitiae condemnare et in erroris eiusdem similitudine ac vitio | f. 70 | deprehendi.

Is this then your fastidiousness, this arrogating wisdom, by which, spurning us as rude, you claim that all knowledge of divine things lies open to you? 3. You deride the enigmas of the Egyptians, because they ascribed the forms of mute animals to divine causes and because they suppose that such forms receive abundant incense and the rest of the ceremonial apparatus: you venerate images of men as if they were powers of gods, and are not ashamed to set upon them the faces of a terrestrial animal, while condemning others for error and folly and yet are caught in the same likeness and vice of error | f. 70 |.

16.1. Nisi forte dicetis alias quidem inesse diis formas, et honoris et dotis causa, species vos eis accommodavisse mortalium: quod maioris multo est contumeliae quam erroris aliquid ignoratione fecisse. Nam si vos fateremini id quod vestra, suspicio credidisset formamentis adtribuisse divinis, minus erat iniuriae praesumpta, in opinatione peccasse: nunc vero cum aliud creditis et aliud fingitis, et in eos estis contumeliosi quibus id adtribuitis quod eis confitemini non esse, et inreligiosi esse monstramini, cum id adoratis quod fingitis, non quod in re esse ipsaque in veritate[est] censetis. 2. Si aselluli canes porci humanum aliquid saperent fingendique haberent artes idemque nos vellent cultu aliquo prosequi et statuarum consecrationibus honorare, quantas nobis irarum flammas, indignationum quos turbines concitarent, si suorum corporum formas nostra vellent portare atque obtinere simulacra?

16.1. Unless perhaps you will say that other forms indeed are in the gods, and for the sake of honor and dower you have fitted the appearances of mortals to them: which is a much greater contumely than to have done something through ignorance as an error. For if you would confess that which your suspicion had believed you had attributed to divine formings, it would have been less injury presumed, to have erred in opinion: but now, when you believe one thing and invent another, and you are contumelious toward those to whom you attribute that which you yourselves admit is not in them, you are shown irreligious, since you adore what you fabricate, not what you hold to be actually in the thing and in truth. 2. If little asses, dogs, pigs had any human taste and arts of feigning, and wished likewise to pursue us with some cult and to honor us with consecrations of statues, what flames of our wrath, what storms of indignation would they raise, if they desired to bear and obtain the forms of our bodies as their images?

Quantas, inquam, irarum flamma suffunderent, excitarent, si urbis conditor Romulus asinina staret in facie, si sanctus Pompilius in canina, si porcina, sub specie nomen esset Catonis aut Marci Ciceronis inscriptum? 3. Ita ergo stoliditatem vestram non rideri, si rident, vestris ab numinibus remini, aut quoniam censetis adfici eos ira, non insanire, non furere neque pro iniuriis et contumeliis tantis ultum ire se velle iaculari que in vos ea quae dolor suetus est iacere et offensionis acerbitas comminisci? Quanto fuerat rectius elephantorum his formas, pantherarum aut tigridum, taurorum equorumque donare?

How great, I say, the flames of wrath would flood and kindle, if the city's founder Romulus stood with an asinine face, if the holy Pompilius with a canine, if porcine, and beneath that guise the name of Cato or Marcus Cicero were inscribed? Would they not, then, if they laugh, be laughing at your numina and your superstition, or since you deem that they are affected by anger, that they do not rave, do not rage nor, as avengers for such injuries and affronts, hurl against you those very things which pain is wont to cast and the bitterness of offence to mingle? How much more fitting would it have been to assign to these the forms of elephants, of panthers or tigers, of bulls and horses?

Nam quid in homine | f. 70b | pulchrum est, quid, quaeso, admirabile vel decorum, nisi quod et clurino cum pecore nescio quis auctor [Ennius apud Cic. nat. deor.

For what in a man | f. 70b | is beautiful, what, I pray, admirable or comely, unless that which, even to a clurino with his flock, some author—Ennius, apud Cicero in De Natura Deorum—assigns?

I, 97] voluit esse commune?

I, 97] did he wish to be common?

17.1. "Sed si vobis, inquiunt, nostra opinatio displicet, vos demonstrate, vos dicite, qua sit deus praeditus forma". - Si veram vultis audire sententiam, aut nullam habet deus formam, aut si informatus est aliqua, ea quae sit profecto nescimus. Aeque enim quod vidimus numquam nescire esse ducimus turpe aut ex re prohibemur aliorum sententias refutare, quia super hoc nostram nullam ipsi sententiam promimus. 2. Ut enim, si vitreus esse dicatur mundus, si argenteus, ferreus vel ex fragili conglobatus et fabricatus [est] testa, non dubitemus falsum esse contendere, quamvis quae sit eius materia nesciamus, ita cum de specie agatur dei, quam perhibetis convincimus non esse, etiamsi quae sit minus possumus explicare.

17.1. "But if, they say, our opinio (opinion) displeases you, you demonstrate, you say by what form God is endowed." - If you wish to hear the true sententia (opinion), either God has no form at all, or if he is informed by some form, that which it is we certainly do not know. For likewise we do not deem it shameful ever to be ignorant of what we have not seen, nor are we by that fact barred from refuting the opinions of others, since on this point we ourselves advance no definite sententia. 2. For just as, if the world is said to be vitreous, or argentous (silver), ferrous (iron), or compacted and fabricated from a fragile shell, we would not doubt to contend that this is false, although we do not know what its materia (material) is, so when the species of God is treated, which you assert, we convict it of not being, even if we are the less able to expound what it might be.

18.1. "Quid ergo, inquiet aliquis, non audit deus, non loquitur, non ante se positas res videt, non intuetur?". - Suo forsitan genere, non nostro. Neque enim veri aliquid scire tanta in re possumus aut suspicionibus indagare, quas esse apud nos liquet instabiles, lubricas et valnorum similitudines somniorum. 2. Si enim dixerimus isdem illum rationibus videre quibus et nos videmus, sequitur ut intellegi debeat, superiectas pupulis eum habere membranulas, conivere, nictare, radiis aut imaginibus cernere, aut quod oculis commune est omnibus, sine alterius luminis commixtione nihil omnino conspicere.

18.1. "What then, someone asks, does God not hear, does he not speak, does he not see the things placed before him, does he not behold?" - Perhaps in his own genus, not ours. For in so great a matter we are neither able to know the truth nor to investigate by conjectures, which among us are seen to be unstable, slippery, and the sickly similitudes of dreams. 2. For if we say that he sees by the same reasons by which we see, it follows that one must understand that he has little membranes overlaid on his pupils, that he squints, blinks, discerns by rays or images, or that which is common to all eyes, and without the admixture of another light sees nothing at all.

3. Quod ipsum similiter de aluditu ac de eloquii forma et verborum prolatione dicendum est: | f. 71 | si per aures audiat, eas quoque habere flexuosis tramitibus perforatas, qua inrepere vox possit sensum nuntiatura sermonis, aut si verba ore funduntur, labia habere cum dentibus, quorum inflictu et mobilitate multiiuga lingua sonos articulet et vocem in verba conformet.

3. The same must likewise be said about hearing and about the form of speech and the prolation of words: | f. 71 | if he hears through ears, that he likewise has them perforated with winding passages, by which a voice may creep in announcing the sense of speech; or if words are poured forth from the mouth, that he has lips with teeth, by whose strike and mobility the many‑yoked tongue may articulate sounds and shape the voice into words.

19.1. Ac si nostri animi mentem non recusatis audire, tantum abest, ut nos deo corporalia, liniamenta tribuamus, ut animorum etiam decora ipsas que virtutes, quibus eminere vix concessum est paucis, tantae rei vereamur adscribere. Quis enim deum dixerit fortem constantem frugi sapientem? quis probum, quis sobrium, quis immo aliquid nosse, quis intellegere, quis providere, quis ad fines officiorum certos actionum suarum decreta dirigentem?

19.1. And if our minds do not refuse to hear, far be it that we should attribute corporeal linaments to God; rather we tremble even to ascribe to him the very ornaments of souls themselves — those virtues by which to stand forth is scarcely granted to a few — lest we assign so great a thing. For who would call God strong, constant, frugal, wise? who honest, who sober, who indeed knowing anything, who understanding, who providing, who directing the certain decrees of his actions to the bounds of duties?

2. Humana sunt haec bona et ex oppositione vitiorum existimationem meruerunt habere laudabilem. Quis est autem tam optusi pectoris, tam bruti, qui humanis bonis deum esse dicat magnum aut ideo nominis maiestate praecellere quod vitiorum careat foeditate? 3. Quicquid de deo dixeris, quicquid tacitae mentis cogitatione conceperis, in humanum transilit et corrumpitur sensum, nec habet propriae significationis notam quod nostris dicitur verbis atque ad negotia humana compositis.

2. These goods are human, and by contrast with vices they have deserved to be held laudable in reputation. But who is so obtuse of heart, so brutish, as to say that God is great because of human goods, or excels in the majesty of the name for the reason that he is free from the foulness of vices? 3. Whatever you say of God, whatever you conceive in the thought of a tacit mind, passes over into the human and is corrupted in sense, nor does it retain the mark of its proper signification when it is expressed in our words and applied to human affairs.

Unus est hominis intellectus de dei natura certissimus, si scias et sentias nihil de illo posse mortali oratione depromi.

There is one most certain human intellect regarding the nature of God, if you know and feel that nothing about him can be drawn out by mortal oration.

20.1. Et haec vero prima est vestrorum numinum contumelia, quam de formis | f. 71b | et sexibus boni scilicet vindices et religiosi constituistis auctores. Illud vero quod sequitur quale est, quod deos nobis inducitis alios fabros, alios medicos, alios lanarios nautas citharistas auloedos venatores pastores et, quod super erat, rusticos? "Ille, inquit, musicus deus est, et hic alter divinus est". - Ceteri enim dii non sunt et ventura praedicere inscitia, nesciunt atque ignorantia futurorum.

20.1. And this indeed is the first contumely against your numina, which you have established as authors and, of course, champions and religious guardians from forms and sexes | f. 71b |. But what follows—of what sort is it—that you introduce to us other gods who are smiths, others physicians, others wool‑workers, sailors, citharists, auloedoi, hunters, shepherds and, what was left over, rustics? "That one," he says, "is a musical god, and this other is divine." For the remaining gods are not gods, and, ignorant, do not foretell things to come; they do not know the future.

2. "Obstetriciis ille informatus artibus, medicorum alius institutus est disciplinis". - Ergone singuli sua in re pollent nec in auxilium vocati alienis possunt in partibus subvenire? "Hic in sermone facundus est atque in verborum continuationibus promptus": - bardi enim sunt alii nec possunt aliquid scitum, si oratio facienda est, eloqui.

2. "That one was trained in obstetrical arts, another instructed in the disciplines of physicians." — Therefore do individuals excel in their own thing, and, if not called to help, cannot come to succor in others' parts? "This one is eloquent in speech and ready in the continuations of words": — for the others are bards and cannot utter anything learned, if an oration must be made.

21.1. Et rogo: "Quae ratio est, quae tam dura necessitas, quae causa, ut artificia, haec superi tamquam viles noverint atque habeant sellularii?". - In caelo enim cantatur et psallitur: ut intervalla et numeros vocum novem conserant scitulae ac modulentur sorores. Sunt insidereis motibus silvae, sunt lustra, sunt nemora: <ut>venationum praepotens habeatur in expeditionibus Diana. 2. Inminentia dii nesciunt et sortibus vivunt agitanturque fatalibus: ut quid cuique crastinus dies ferat aut hora, Latonius explicet atque aperiat vates.

21.1. And I ask: "What reason is there, what so harsh a necessity, what cause, that the gods should regard these arts as if base and have them as the work of tinkers?". - For in heaven is sung and psallied: the clever ones join intervals and the numbers of nine voices, and the sisters modulate. There are insidereis motibus woods, there are lustrations, there are groves: <ut> Diana be held all‑powerful in hunting expeditions. 2. The gods know not the imminences and live by lots and are driven by fatal sortes: so that what each tomorrow's day or hour will bring, the Latonian prophet may explain and reveal.

Ipse alio impletur deo et vi numinis premitur exagitaturque maioris: ut merito dicatur habeaturque divinus. Corripiuntur dii morbis et vulnerari, vexari aliqua ex re possunt: ut cum exegerit ratio, auxiliator | f. 72 | subveniat Epidaurius. 3. Parturiunt, pariunt: ut difficiles puerperiorum tricas Iuno mulceat corripiatque Lucina.

He himself is filled with another god and is pressed and driven by the force of a greater numen: so that rightly he is called and held divinus. Gods are seized by maladies and are wounded, some things can vex them: so that, when reason has exacted it, the helper | f. 72 | Epidaurian may come to their aid. They are in travail, they give birth: so that Juno soothes and chastises the difficult tricks of childbirth, and Lucina rebukes.

Rem rusticam tractant aut curant militaria, munera: ut flammis potens Vulcanus fabricetur his enses aut ruris ferramenta procudat. Vestis indigent tegmine: ut virgo Tritonia curiosius stamen neat et qualitate pro temporis aut trilices tunicas aut de serico <cur>et imponere. Accusant et diluunt crimina: ut Atlantea progenies eloquii primas ferat studiosa exercitatione quaesiti.

They handle the rustic thing or attend to military duties, gifts: so that Vulcan, potent in flames, may forge swords for them or hammer out rural tools. Clothing lacks a covering: so that the maiden Tritonia more curiously spin the thread and, according to quality or season, weave triple-woven tunics or from silk care to lay them on. They accuse and wash away crimes: so that the Atlantean progeny of eloquence may bear the first fruits, sought by studious practice.

22.1. "Set erras, inquit, et falleris; non enim ipsi opifices dii sunt, sed ingeniis hominum subiciunt has artes atque, ut vita sit instructior, tradunt scienda mortalibus". - Sed qui aliquam subicit ignaro ac nescio disciplinam, sollertem que hunc efficere nonnullius operis scientia contendit, sciat ipse necesse est primus id quod alterum colere constituit. Neque enim traditor alicuius esse scientiae potis est, ut non eius quod tradit praecepta habeat cognita et rationem teneat exercitatissime comprehensam. 2. Dii ergo sunt artifices primi, sive quod ipsi, ut dicitis, subdunt scientiam mentibus, sive quod immortales et geniti numquam genus omne terrenum vetustate temporis antecedunt.

22.1. "But you err, he says, and are deceived; for the gods themselves are not opifices, but they subject these artes to the ingenia of men and hand down scienda to mortals, that life may be the more instructed." - But he who subjects some, I know not what, disciplina to an ignorant man, and strives to make him sollertem by the scientia of some operis, let him know that he himself must first cultivate that which he has resolved the other to cultivate. For a traditor of any scientia cannot be, unless he has the precepts of that which he teaches known and holds the rationem most thoroughly grasped by exercitio. 2. Therefore the gods are the first artifices, either because they themselves, as you say, implant scientia into minds, or because immortaI and geniti precede every earthly genus in the antiquity of time.

Hoc est ergo quod quaeritur, cum sit nullus apud superos artibus his locus neque usus, illorum neque natura deposcat ingeniosum aliquid aut sellularium scire: cur esse dicatis in aliis <alios> perceptionibus gnarures [Plaut. Poen. Prol. 40, Most.

Therefore this is what is asked: since among the superiors there is neither place nor use for these arts, nor does their nature demand that the ingenious know anything of craftsmen’s trades or of little workshops: why do you say that they are skilled in other <alios> perceptions [Plaut. Poen. Prol. 40, Most.]

100] et habere sollertias, in quibus singuli se vincant | f. 72b | scientiarum cognitione discreti?

100] and to possess clever arts, in which each may outdo the other | f. 72b |, distinguished by knowledge of the sciences?

23.1. "Nisi forte hoc dicitis, deos artifices non esse, sedeos his artibus praesidere, curare, immo sub illorum posita esse tutela omnia quae administramus, quae gerimus, atque ut bene ac feliciter cedant, illorum provisione curari". - Quod quidem merito dici ac probabiliter videretur, si ad voluntatem semper sententiamque procederent ea quae obimus, quae gerimus aut in negotiis periclitamur humanis. 2. Cum vero in contrarium cotidie res vertantur neque ad propositum voluntatis actionum respondeant fines, ludentis est dicere, deos nobis superesse custodes, quos suspicio finxit nostra, non explorata veritascomprehendit. "Per maria <Matuta> tutissimas praestat commeantibus navigationes": - et cur insanum mare tam frequentes exposuit crudelium naufragiorum ruinas? "Salutaria et fida consilia nostris suggerit cogitationibus Consus": - et in contrarios exitus cur adsidue vertitur placitorum inopinata mutatio?

23.1. "Unless perhaps you say this: that the gods are not artificers, that they do not preside over these arts, do not care for them, nay that all things which we administer, which we conduct, and that they may go well and prosper, are under their laid-down tutelage and are tended by their providence." — Which indeed would be rightly said and would seem probable, if the things we undertake, the things we conduct, or in whose affairs we are imperiled as humans, always proceeded according to will and intention. 2. But when matters daily turn the other way and do not answer to the bounds of the will’s proposed actions, it is the play of one to say that the gods are guardians over us, whom suspicion has fashioned for us, not truth exploredcomprehendit. "Over the seas <Matuta> affords the most secure voyages to those who sail": — and why then has the mad sea exposed so many frequent cruel wrecks? "Consus suggests salutary and faithful counsels to our thoughts": — and why is the unforeseen change of pleas constantly turned into contrary outcomes?

3. "Armentorum et pecorum gregibus Pales praesunt Inuusque custodes": - et cur saeva contagia et pestilentes morbos ab aestivis avertere cessatione inimica non curant? "Flora illa genetrix": - et sancta obscenitate ludorum bene curat ut arva florescant: et cur cottidie gemmulas et pubescentes herbas adurit atque interficit nocentissimum frigus? "Puerperiis Iuno praeposita est et auxiliatur genetricibus fetis": - et matrum intereunt cur cotidie millia parricidalibus nixibus interemptae?

3. "To the herds and flocks Pales presides, and Inuus their guardians": - and why do cruel contagions and pestilential diseases not take care to be turned away by the cessation of summer unfriendly to them? "That Flora the mother": - and by the sacred obscenity of the games she sees well to make the fields flourish: and why does she daily scorch and kill the little buds and pubescent herbs with most harmful frost? "To women in childbirth Juno is set over and aids the womb-bearing mothers": - and why among mothers do thousands perish every day, cut down by parricidal snows?

4. "In tutela Vulcani est ignis et materies eius in illius | f. 73 | regimine constituta est": - et cur aedes frequentissime sacras atque urbium portiones ad cinerem patitur flammarum voracitate conlabi? "Divinationis scientiam largitur hariolantibus Pythius": - et cur obliquata, dubia, cur obscuritatibus submersa caliginis dat saepius subministrat que responsa? 5. "Aesculapius officiis et medendi artibus praeest": - et cur plura morborum et valetudinum genera ad sanitatem nequeunt incolumitatem que perduci, immo sub ipsis fiunt curantium manibus atrociora?

4. "In the tutelage of Vulcan is fire, and its materia is placed under his regimen" | f. 73 |: — and why does he suffer sacred houses and the portals of cities so frequently to collapse into ashes by the devouring voracity of flames? "Pythius bestows the science of divination on diviners": — and why does he more often supply responses oblique, doubtful, and sunk under the obscurities of darkness? 5. "Aesculapius presides over ministrations and the arts of healing": — and why can so many kinds of diseases and infirmities not be led to health and safety, nay, become more atrocious in the very hands of those who cure?

"Curat Mercurius ceromas, pugillatibus et luctationibus praeest": - et cur invictos omnes non perficit quibus praeest, cur unius in officio praesidatus hos victoriae compotes, alios vero perpetitur igominiosa infirmitate rideri?

"Mercury cares for the ceromas, presides over boxing and wrestling": - and why does he not complete all the invincible ones over whom he presides, why does he, having presided over one in office, make these partakers of victory, but subject others to be laughed at by ignominious weakness?

24.1. "Tutelatoribus, inquit, supplicat diis nemo, et idcirco singuli familiaribus officiis atque auxiliis desunt". - Nisi enim tura et salsas accipiant fruges, benefacere dii nequeunt, et nisi pecorum sanguine delibutas suas conspexerint arulas, suos deserunt atque abiciunt praesidatus? 2. Atquin ego rebar paulo ante, spontaneas esse numinum benignitates ultroque ab his fluere inexpectata benivolentiae munera. Numquid enim rex poli libamine aliquo exambitur aut hostia, ut omnia ista quibus vivitur commoda mortalium gentibus largiatur?

24.1. "He says no one offers supplication to tutelary gods, and therefore individuals lack familiar offices and aids." - For unless they receive incense and salted fruits, the gods cannot do good, and unless they have seen their little altars sprinkled with the blood of cattle, do they not abandon and cast off those under their protection? 2. But I was just now thinking that the benignities of the numina are spontaneous and that unexpected gifts of benevolence flow forth from them of their own accord. For does the king of the sky get appeased by any libation or victim so that he should bestow all those conveniences by which mortal nations live?

3. Non fervorem genitalem solis deus, noctis et tempora, ventos pluvias fruges cunctis subministrat aequaliter bonis, malis, iniustis, servis, pauperibus, divitibus? Hoc est enim proprium dei potentis ac veri, inexorata beneficia praebere fessis atque invalidis | f. 73b | rebus et multiformi semper asperitate vallatis. 4. Nam sacrificiis editis id quod poscaris adnuere, non est istud postulantibus subvenire sed benignitatis propriae munificentiam venditare.

3. Does not the generative fervor of the god supply the sun’s heat, night and seasons, winds, rains, and crops equally to all—good, bad, unjust, slaves, paupers, and the wealthy? For this is proper to a powerful and true god: to bestow unasked benefits upon the weary and the infirm, and upon things always encircled by manifold asperity | f. 73b |. 4. For to grant what is asked when sacrifices have been offered is not to succor those who ask, but to vend the munificence of one’s own benignity.

Ludimus et lascivimus tanta in re homines, et qui sit deus obliti, quid istius magnificentia nominis, quicquid vile vel sordidum suspiciosa potuimus credulitate confingere divis tutelaribus adrogamus.

We play and revel in so great a matter, and, having forgotten who the god is, we arrogate to the tutelary gods the magnificence of that name—whatever base or sordid thing we could, by suspicious credulity, fabricate.

25.1. "Unctionibus, inquit, superest Vnxia, cingulorum Cinxia replicationi, Victa et Potua sanctissimae victui | potuique procurant". - O egregia numinum et singularis interpretatio potestatum: nisi postes virorum adipali unguine oblinerentur ab sponsis, nisi virginalia vincula iam ferventes dissolverent atque imminentes mariti, nisi potarent et manderent homines, di nomina non haberent? 2. Quid, quod non contenti tam deformibus subdidisse atque inplicuisse deos curis, naturas his etiam feras truculentas immanes, malis gaudentes semper et humani generis adtribuitis vastitate.

25.1. "Of ointments," he says, "there remains Vnxia, Cinxia for the folding of girdles, Victa and Potua procure for the most sacrosanct sustenance and for power." — O excellent divination of the numina and singular interpretation of the potencies: unless the doorposts of men were smeared with the fatty unguent by brides, unless virginal bonds, now glowing, would dissolve and impending husbands, unless men drank and gnawed, would the gods have names? 2. What is more, not content to have thus subordinated and entangled the gods with such deformities and anxieties, you even ascribe to them these wild, truculent, savage natures, always rejoicing in evils and assigning devastation to the human race.

26.1. Non commemorabimus hoc loco deam Lavernam furum, Bellonas Discordias Furias et laeva illa quae constituitis numina taciturnitatis silentio praeterimus. Martem ipsum ponemus in medio et speciosam illam aupidinum matrem, ex quibus unum praeficitis proeliis, amoribus alteram et cupiditatis ardori. 2. "Potestatem, inquit, bellorum Mars habet". - Utrumne ut mota compescat an ut cessantia et quieta commoveat?

26.1. We will not here recount the goddess Laverna of thieves, Bellonas, Discords, the Furies, and that left-hand divinity which you have set among the numina of taciturnity—we pass these over in silence. We will place Mars himself in the middle, and that fair mother of Cupids, of whom you appoint one to be placed over battles, another over loves and the ardor of desire. 2. "Mars has the power of wars," he says. — Whether, that is, to quell those stirred or to rouse the inactive and quiet?

nam si sedator militaris insaniae est, cur cotidie bella non desunt? 3. sin autem concitor illorum est, deum ergo dicemus in voluptatis suae dulcedinem collidere | f. 74 | orbem totum, discordiarum et discriminum causas inter gentes serere terrarum longinquitate diiunctas, conducere ex diverso tot mortalium milia et intra verbi unius moras campos eadaveribus aggerare, sanguineos praecipitare torrentes, fundatissima delere imperia, aequare urbes solo, libertatem ingenuis abrogare et servitutis condicionem imponere, dissensionibus gaudere eivilibus, commorientium fratrum parricida nece et ad ultimum filiorum et patrum parricidali congressionis horrore.

for if the military man is a sedator of madness, why are wars not wanting every day? 3. but if he is rather an inciter of them, shall we then call him a god who, in the sweetness of his own voluptuousness, collides the whole orb, sows the causes of discords and separations among peoples by the remoteness of lands, brings together from different places so many thousands of mortals and, within the delay of one word, heaps the fields with corpses, hurls forth bloody torrents, utterly destroys the most firmly founded empires, levels cities to the ground, abrogates the liberty of freemen and imposes the condition of servitude, rejoices in civic dissensions, in the parricidal death of brothers dying together, and finally in the horror of the parricidal meeting of sons and fathers? | f. 74 |

27.1. Quod ipsum licebit in Venerem pari atque eadem ratione traducere. Nam si amoris haec flammas, sicut perhibetis et creditis, cogitationibus subdit humanis, sequitur ut intellegi debeat, quicquid labis et criminis ab insania proficiscitur tali, ut Veneriis debeat vulneribus imputari. 2. Ergone dea cogente in vilissimi nominis scorta suam saepius produnt etiam nobiles dignitatem, dissuuntur tenacium matrimoniorum nexus, incestas libidines necessitudo sanguinif inardescit, insaniunt in liberos matres, patres virginum suarum vota in se vertunt, contra decus aetatis senes in obscenos ingemunt curis iuvenalibus adpetitus, sapientes et fortes viri solvunt decreta constantiae virilitatis vigore mollito, innectuntur cervicibus laquei, conscenduntur ardentes rogi et per vastas atque altissimas rupes iaciunt se passim voluntariis saltibus praecipitati?

27.1. The same thing may be translated concerning Venus in an equal and identical manner. For if these flames of love, as you relate and believe, are subjected to human thoughts, it follows that whatever lapse and crime issues from such insanity must be understood to be imputed to Venus’s wounds. 2. Therefore, with the goddess urging, do even nobles more often expose the dignity of the vilest name; the bonds of tenacious marriages are dissolved, incestuous lusts the tie of kinship is inflamed, mothers go mad over their children, fathers turn their daughters’ vows upon themselves, aged men, against the decency of their years, groan into obscene cares, having been seized by youthful desire; wise and brave men set aside decrees of steadfastness, their masculine vigor softened; nooses are fastened about necks, they mount burning pyres and fling themselves here and there, hurled by voluntary leaps from vast and very high cliffs?

28.1. Quisquamne est hominum rationis alicuius primordiis indutus, qui divinitatis constantiam tam foedis polluat aut contaminet | f. 74b | moribus? Qui naturas attribuat diis tales, quas in agrestibus beluis lenitudo saepe permulsit atque extenuavit humana? 2. Ubinam, quaeso, est illud, quod ab omni perturbationis adfectu dii procul amoti sunt, quod lenes placidi mites, quod in genere virtutis unito perfectionis apicem atque ipsius retinent sapientiae summitatem?

28.1. Is there anyone in the first beginnings of human reason who would so foully pollute or contaminate the constancy of divinity | f. 74b | with base morals? Who would attribute to the gods natures such as human mildness has often soothed and attenuated in rustic beasts? 2. Where, I pray, is that thing — that the gods, being far removed from every affection of perturbation, are gentle, placid, mild — which, in the single genus of virtue, retains the apex of perfection and the very summit of wisdom?

Aut cur eos oramus, ut a nobis adversa atque inimica propellant, si malorum omnium quibus cotidie carpimur ipsi esse nobis repperiuntur auctores? 3. Quantumlibet nos impios, inreligiosos vocetis aut atheos, numquam fidem facietis esse amorum deos, esse bellorum, esse qui discordias conserant, qui furialibus stimulis animos inquietent. Aut enim verissime dii sunt, et ea quae commemorastis non faciunt: <aut si faciunt> ea quae dicitis, sine ulla dubitatione dii non sunt.

Or why do we beg them to drive away from us what is adverse and hostile, if they themselves are found to be the authors of all the evils by which we are daily consumed? 3. However much you may call us impious, irreligious, or atheists, you will never make it true that the gods are gods of loves, gods of wars, gods who sow discord, who, with furious goads, unsettle minds. For either truly they are gods, and they do not do the things you have recounted: <or if they do> the things you say, without any doubt they are not gods.

29.1. Et tamen possemus utcumque accipere a vobis has mentes impiarum plenissimas fictionum, si non multa de diis ipsi tam contraria promentes dissolventiaque ipsa sustinere animi compelleretis adsensum. 2. Cum enim singuli singulos anteire interioris contenditis scientiae laude, et deos ipsos quos opinamini tollitis et reponitis alios quos manifestum est non esse, et alius aliud de eisdem dicitis rebus, et innumeros esse conscribitis quos esse singulos semper consensio accepit humana. 3. Incipiamus ergo sollemniter ab Iano et nos patre, quem quidam ex vobis mundum, annum alii, solem esse prodidere nonnulli.

29.1. And yet we could in any case accept from you these minds, most full of impious fabrications, if you did not compel assent of the mind to sustain many things about the gods which you yourselves both put forward and so contradictorily undo. 2. For while each strives to outdo the others in praise of inward knowledge, and you exalt and set aside as gods those whom you suppose, others whom it is plain are not, and one says one thing and another another concerning the same matters, and you compose innumerable deities whom human consensus has always accepted as distinct individuals. 3. Let us therefore begin solemnly from Janus and our own father, whom some of you have proclaimed to be the world, others the year, others the sun.

Quod si accipiemus ut verum sit, sequitur ut intellegi debeat nullum umquam fuisse Ianum, quem ferunt caelo atque Hecata procreatum in Italia | f. 75 | regnasse primum, Ianiculi oppidi conditorem, patrem Fonti, Vulturni generum, Iuturnae maritum, atque ita per vos dei nomen eraditur, quem in cunctis anteponitis precibus et viam vobis pandere deorum ad audientiam creditis. 4. Rursus vero si Ianus est Annus, deus esse nec sic potest. Quis enim annum ignorat temporis esse circumscriptionem statam nec habere vim numinis id quod spatiis mensum et dierum dinumeratione conclusum est?

But if we accept it as true, it follows that it must be understood that there never was any Janus, whom they report born in heaven and by Hecate and first to have reigned in Italy | f. 75 |, the founder of the little town Ianicula, the father of Fontus, the father‑in‑law of Vulturnus, the husband of Juturna, and thus by you the very name of god is eradicated, him whom in all your prayers you set before others and believe opens for you the way to the hearing of the gods. 4. Again, however, if Janus is the Year, he cannot be a god in that case either. For who is ignorant that the year is a circumscription of time established, and that that which is measured by intervals (mensum) and by the reckoning of days does not possess the force of divinity?

5. Quod ipsum licebit in Saturnum non absimili ratione traducere. Nam si tempus significatur hoc nomine, Graecorum ut interpretes autumant, ut quod Kro/noj est habeatur Xro/noj, nullum est Saturnium numen. Quis est enim tam demens, qui tempus esse dicat deum, quod mensura cuiusdam est spatii in continua serie perpetuitatis inclusi?

5. That very name may likewise be transferred to Saturn by no dissimilar reasoning. For if time is signified by this name, as the Greek interpreters maintain, so that what is Kronos is taken to be Chronos, there is no Saturnine numen. For who is so insane as to call time a god, which is a measure of a certain space enclosed in a continuous series of perpetuity?

6. Atque ita ex ordine tolletur et iste caelestium, quem Caelo esse editum patre, magnorum esse procreatorem deorum, vitisatorem falciferum vetustas edidit prisca et minorum transmisit aetati.

6. And thus from the sequence will also be removed that one of the celestial ones, whom ancient time set forth as born of Caelus the father, the great procreator of the gods, the sickle‑bearing reaper, and handed down to a later (younger) age.

30.1. Nam quid de ipso dicemus Iove, quem solem esse dictitavere sapientes, agitantem pinnatos currus turba consequente divorum, aethera nonnulli flagrantem vi flammea atque ardoris inextinguibili vastitate? 2. Quod si liquet et constat, nullus ergo omnino est vobis auctoribus Iuppiter, qui patre editus Saturno atque Ope matre, ut genitoris evaderet rabiem, in aretensium finibus memoratur esse celatus. 3. Iam vero Iunonem opinatio nonne consimilis deorum tollit e censu?

30.1. For what shall we say of Jupiter himself, whom the sages continually called the Sun, driving feathered chariots with a throng of gods following, whom some declare to blaze the aether with a flaming force and an inextinguishable vastness of ardor? 2. And if that is clear and settled, then there is therefore no Jupiter at all among your authorities, who, born of father Saturn and mother Ops, in order that he might escape his sire’s rage, is said to have been hidden in the confines of the parched lands. 3. Now then, does not mere opinion likewise remove Juno from the census of the gods?

Nam si aer illa est, quemadmodum vos ludere ac dictitare consuestis Graeci nominis | f. 75b | praeposteritate repetita, nulla soror et coniunx omnipotentis repperietur Iovis, nulla Fluvionia, nulla Pomana, nulla Ossipagina, nulla Februtis Populonia Cinxia Caprotina, atque ita repperietur inanissima esse istius nominis fictio opinionis vacuae celebritate vulgata.

For if that aer is — just as you are wont to play with and to chant the Greek name, | f. 75b | with its order reversed — no sister and spouse of the almighty Iovis will be found, no Fluvionia, no Pomana, no Ossipagina, no Februtis, Populonia, Cinxia, Caprotina; and thus it will be discovered that the most inanest fiction of that name, spread by the fame of an empty opinion, is baseless.

31.1. Aristoteles, ut Granius memorat, vir ingenio praepotens atque in doctrina praecipuus, Minervam esse Lunam probabilibus argumentis explicat et litterata auctoritate demonstrat. Eandem hanc alii aetherium verticem et summitatis ipsius esse summam dixerunt, memoriam nonnulli, unde ipsum nomen Minerva quasi quaedam Meminerva formatum est. Quodsi accipit res fidem, nulla est ergo Metis filia, nulla Victoria est, nulla Iovis enata de cerebro inventrix oleae, nulla magisteriis artium et disciplinarum varietatibus erudita.

31.1. Aristotle, as Granius recalls, a man very mighty in genius and preeminent in learning, explains that Minerva is the Moon by probable arguments and demonstrates it with learned authority. Others have said that this same one is the aetherial summit and the very apex of the summit; some recall a memory whence the name Minerva is as if formed from Meminerva. But if one gives credence to these things, then there is no daughter of Metis, no Victoria, no Jove sprung from the brain the inventor of the olive, no one schooled in the masteries and varieties of arts and disciplines.

2. "Quod aqua nubat terram, appellatus est, inquiunt, cognominatus que Neptunus". - Si ergo liquoris optentio nominis huius appellatione signatur, nullus deus est omnino Neptunus, atque ita tollitur et removetur e medio Stygii frater Iovis Olympiique germanus, tridenti armatus ferro, pistricum dominus atque maenarum, rex salsorum gurgitum et tremebundi motator soli.

2. "Because water clouds the earth, it was named, they say, and surnamed Neptune." — If therefore the liquid's desirousness is signified by the appellation of this name, then there is no god at all called Neptune, and thus is taken away and removed from the midst the Stygian brother of Jove and true brother of Olympus, armed with an iron trident, lord of the surf and of the maenads, king of the briny gulfs and the trembling mover of the soil.

32.1. Mercurius etiam quasi quidam Medicurrius dictus est, et quod inter loquentes duo media currat et reciprocetur oratio, nominis huius concinnata est qualitas. Ergo si haec ita sunt, non est dei Mercurius nomen sed sermonis reciprocantis et vocis, atque ita hoc pacto aboletur et extinguitur caduceator ille Cyllenius in Algido fusus monte, verborum excogitator | f. 76 | et nominum, nundinarum mercium commerciorum que mutator. 2. Terram quidam e vobis, quod cunctis sufficiat animantibus victum, Matrem esse dixerunt Magnam, eandem hanc alii, quod salutarium seminum frugem gerat, Cererem esse pronuntiant, nonnulli autem Vestam, quod in mundo stet sola ceteris eius partibus mobilitate in perpetua constitutis.

32.1. Mercury also was called, as it were, Medicurrius, and because speech runs through the middle and is reciprocated between two speakers, the quality of this name is aptly fashioned. Therefore, if these things are so, Mercury is not the name of a god but of reciprocal speech and voice, and thus in this way that caduceator Cyllenius, poured out on Mount Algidus, the contriver of words and of names and changer of market-days, wares, and trades, is abolished and extinguished | f. 76 |. 2. Some of you have called the Earth Mother and Great, because she supplies sustenance to all living creatures; others proclaim this same one Ceres, because she bears the salutary seed-crop of grain; and still some [call her] Vesta, because in the world she alone stands while her other parts are established in perpetual mobility.

3. Quod si ratione profertur et adseveratur certa, trina pariter numina vobis interpretibus nulla sunt: non aeres, non Vesta deorum esse computabuntur in fastis, non ipsa denique Mater Deum, quam Nigidius autumat matrimonium tenuisse Saturni, dea recte poterit nuncupari, siquidem unius terrae haec sunt omnia nomina et his.sola praedicationibus indicatur.

3. If this is offered by reason and asserted as certain, then threefold numina are equally none for you interpreters: neither Aeres nor Vesta will be reckoned among the gods in the fasti, nor indeed can the Mother herself be rightly named a Goddess — whom Nigidius claims to have held Saturn’s marriage — since all these are names of one earth and are indicated only by their predications.

33.1. Praetermittimus hoc loco satietatis fuga Vulcanum, quem esse omnes ignem pari vocum pronuntiatis adsensu, quod ad cunctos veniat, Venerem, et quod sata in lucem proserpant, cognominatam esse Proserpinam: qua rursus in parte trium capita numinum tollitis, siquidem primum elementi est nomen, non sentientis vocabulum potestatis, libidinis alterum per cuncta animantia diffusae, tertium vero significat attollentia se germina et frugum subcrescentium motiones. 2. Quid, cum Liberum Apollinem Solem unum esse contenditis numen vocabulis amplificatum tribus, nonne sententiis vestris deorum imminuitur census et opinio praedicata dilabitur? Nam si verum est, solem eundem Liberum esse eundemque Apollinem, sequitur ut in rerum natura neque Apollo sit aliquis neque Liber, atque ita per vos | f. 76b | ipsos aboletur, eraditur Semeleius, Pythius, alter faeculentae hilaritatis dator, Sminthiorum alter pernicies murum.

33.1. We pass over here Vulcan, the flight of satiety, whom all with equal voices of assent pronounce to be fire; whom you call Venus because he comes to all, and Proserpina because the sown things creep forth into the light: by which again in part you raise three heads of the numina, since the first is a name of an element, not a term of a sentient power, the second a name of lust diffused through all animate beings, the third denotes the motions of germs lifting themselves and of fruits growing beneath. 2. But when you contend that Liber, Apollo, and the Sun are one divine power amplified by three names, is not the census of your gods diminished and the professed opinion dissolved? For if it is true that the same Sun is Liber and the same Apollo, it follows that in the nature of things neither Apollo nor Liber is any distinct being, and thus by you | f. 76b | they themselves are abolished: Semeleian is eradicated, Pythius, one the giver of foul hilarity, the other the bane of mice.

34.1. Non indocti apud vos viri neque quod induxerit libido garrientes Dianam Cererem Lunam caput esse unius dei triviali germanitate pronuntiant neque ut sunt trinae dissimilitudines nominum, personarum dissidentias tris esse: Lunam his omnibus vocari atque in eius vocamen reliquorum seriem coacervatam esse cognominum. 2. Quod si exploratum, si fixum est atque ita si esse rei veritas monstrat, cassum iterum nomen est Cereris, cassum Dianae, atque ita perducitur res eo, ut et illa frugum, sicut perhibetis, inventrix vobis ducibus atque auctoribus nulla sit, et expolietur Apollo germana, quam quondam puris in fontibus abluentem membrorum sordes corniger ille venator inspexit et poenam curiositatis invenit.

34.1. Men among you are not unlearned, nor — chattering what lust has led them — do they pronounce that Diana, Ceres, Luna are the head of one god by a trivial kinship, nor that because there are three dissimilarities of names there are three separate persons: that Luna is called by all these names and that the series of the others’ surnames is heaped into her appellation. 2. But if this is examined, if it is fixed, and thus the truth of the matter shows it to be so, then the name of Ceres is again empty, the name of Diana empty, and so the affair is carried to the point that that inventor of crops, as you report, is in no wise your leader and author, and Apollo, her brother, is blotted out — whom once that horned hunter, spying her washing the filth of her limbs in pure springs, discovered and suffered the penalty of curiosity.

35.1. In philosophiae memorabiles studio atque ad istius nominis columen vobis laudatoribus elevati universam istam molem mundi, cuius omnes amplexibus ambimur, tegimur ac sustinemur, animans esse unum sapiens rationale consultum probabili adseveratione definiunt: quorum si est vera et fixa, certa sententia, etiam illi continuo desinent dii esse quos in eius portionibus paulo ante immutatis nominibus constituebatis. 2. Ut enim homo unus nequit permanente sui corporis integritate in homines multos scindi, neque homines rursus multi disiunctionis differentia conservata in unius sensus simplicitatemque conflari, si ita mundus unum est animal et uniusmentis agitatione motatur, nec in plura potest numina dissipari nec si eius particulae | f. 77 | dii sunt, in unius animantis conscientiam cogi atque vertier. 3. Luna sol tellus aether astra membra sunt et mundi partes: quod si partes et membra sunt, animalia utique sui nominis non sunt: neque enim partes hoc ipsum esse quod totum est aliqua in re possunt, aut sibi sapere, sibi sentire, quod sine totius animantis adsensu nullis propriis adficiatur e motibus: 4. quo constituto ac posito summa omnis illuc redit, ut neque sol deus sit neque luna neque aether, tellus et cètera.

35.1. In the memorable study of philosophy, and lifted up by you laudatory patrons to the column of that name, they define this entire mass of the world, by whose embraces we are all encompassed, covered, and sustained, to be one animating thing — a wise, rational, deliberative being — by a probable asseveration: if their judgement is true and fixed, assuredly even those gods whom you a little before set up in its portions with altered names will straightaway cease to be gods. 2. For as one man cannot, while the integrity of his body remains, be split into many men, nor can many men, while the distinction of disjunction is preserved, be conflated back into the simplicity and unity of one sense, so if the world is one animal and is moved by the agitation of onementis, it cannot be dissipated into several numina, nor, if its particles | f. 77 | are gods, can they be compelled and turned into the conscience of one animating being. 3. The Moon, the Sun, the Earth, the ether, the stars are members and parts of the world: and if they are parts and members, they are certainly not animals of their own name; for parts cannot be that very thing which the whole is in any respect, nor can they think for themselves or feel for themselves, which without the assent of the whole animating being would be affected by no motions of their own. 4. On this constitution and premise the whole sum returns to one point, namely that neither the Sun is a god nor the Moon nor the ether, the Earth, and the rest.

Sunt enim partes mundi, non specialia numinum nomina, atque ita perficitur, omnia vobis turbantibus miscentibusque divina, ut in rerum natura unus deus constituatur mundus explosis omnibus ceteris, quin immo inaniter, vacue et sine ulla substantia constitutis.

For they are parts of the world, not special names of the gods, and thus it is brought about — all the divine things, by you who disturb and intermingle them — that in the nature of things the world is constituted as one god, the others being cast aside, nay rather established vainly, empty and without any substance.

36.1. Si totidem nos modis totidemque sententiis deorum vestrorum subrueremus fidem, nulli esset dubium, quin ira et rabie concitati ignes, feras et gladios atque alia postularetis suppliciorum in nos genera, quibus sitim soletis vestram nostri sanguinis adpetitione proluere. 2. Cum vero per vos ipsos prope omnis gens numinum sub ostentatione tollatur ingeniorum atque doctrinae, audetis intendere, nostri nominis causa res humanas ab diis premi, cum quidem, si verum est esse illos uspiam atque incalescere irarum flammis, nihil habeant iustius propter quod in vos saeviant quam quod eos negatis subsistere neque ulla esse in parte naturae.

36.1. If in as many modes and with as many opinions as there are we were to subvert the faith in your gods, there would be no doubt that, roused by anger and fury, you would demand fires, beasts, and swords and other kinds of punishments against us, by which you are wont to slake your thirst with the seeking of our blood. 2. But when, through you yourselves, nearly every people’s pantheon is removed under the show of talents and learning, you dare contend, for the sake of our name, that human affairs are pressed down by the gods; since indeed, if it is true that they exist anywhere and are heated by the flames of wrath, nothing would be more just for them to rage against you for than that you deny their subsistence and maintain that there is no part of nature in them.

37.1. Musas Mnaseas est auctor filias esse Telluris et Caeli, Iovis ceteri praedicant ex Memoria uxore vel Mente, has quidam virgines, alii matres fuisse conscribunt. 2. Libet enim iam paucis etiam illas partes attingere, quibus alius aliud eadem de re dicere opinionum diversitate monstramini. 3. Ephorus has igitur numero esse tris effert, Mnaseas, quem diximus, quattuor, Myrtilus inducit septem, octo adseverat Crates, ad extremum Hesiodus [Hesiodus: Theog.

37.1. The author Mnaseas says the Muses are daughters of Earth and Heaven; others proclaim them of Jove, from Memoria (as wife) or from Mind; some write that these were virgins, others that they were mothers. 2. For it is pleasing now briefly to touch also those points in which one man says one thing and another another about the same matter, showing the diversity of opinions. 3. Ephorus therefore carries them in number as three, Mnaseas, whom we mentioned, four, Myrtilus brings in seven, Crates asserts eight, lastly Hesiodus [Hesiodus: Theog.

75] novem cum nominibus prodit, dis caelum et sidera locupletans. 4. Nisi fallimur, ista dissensio nihil scientium verum est non ab rei veritate descendens. Nam si liquido sciretur quid sit, una esset vox omnium et in eiusdem sententiae finem cunctorum pergeret et conveniret adsensio.

75] he sets forth nine by name, enriching the gods, the heaven and the stars. 4. Unless we are mistaken, that dissension of the learned would not be true if it did not descend from the truth of the matter. For if it were clearly known what it is, there would be one voice of all, and the assent of everyone would advance to and converge upon the same conclusion of opinion.

38.1. Quonam modo igitur religionis potestis integrare vim plenam, cum circa ipsos erretis deos, aut ad venerabiles invitare nos cultus, cum nihil nos certi de ipsorum numinum comprehensione doceatis? 2. Ut enim de mediis conticiscamus auctoribus, aut ille primus eradit atque interficit sex divas Musas, si esse illas constat novem, aut iste ultimus et extremus sex adponit, quae nullae sunt, tribus solis in veritate constantibus, ut neque sciri possit aut comprehendi, quaenam debeant addi, quae demi, et in periculum deducatur religionis ipsius susceptio, aut id quod non est colens aut quod sit fortasse praeteriens. 3. Novensiles Piso deos esse credit novem in Sabinis apud Trebiam constitutos.

38.1. How then can you integrate the full force of religion, when you wander about the gods themselves, or invite us to venerable cults, when you teach us nothing certain about the comprehension of their numina? 2. For, to be silent concerning intermediate authorities, either that first one eradicates and destroys six divine Muses, if it is agreed that those are nine, or that last and extreme one adds six which are none, the three alone standing in truth, so that it cannot be known or grasped which ought to be added, which taken away, and the undertaking of religion itself is led into danger, either worshiping what is not or what perhaps passes by. 3. Piso of the Novensiles believes the gods to be nine, established among the Sabines at Trebia.

Hos Granius Musas putat consensum adcommodans Aelio, novenarium numerum tradit Varro, quod in movendis rebus potentissimus semper habeatur et maximus, novitatum Cornificius praesides, quod curantibus his omnia novitate integrentur et constent, deos novem Manilius quibus solis Iuppiter potestatem iaciendi sui permiserit fulminis. 4. Cincius numina peregrina novitate ex ipsa appellata pronuntiat; nam solere Romanos religiones | f. 78 | urbium superatarum partim privatim per familias spargere, partim publice consecrare, ac ne aliqui deorum multitudine aut ignorantia praeteriretur, brevitatis et compendii causa uno pariter nomine cunctos Novensiles invocari.

Granius thinks these to be the Muses, adapting a consensus to Aelius; Varro hands down the number nine, because that number is always held most powerful and greatest in moving matters; Cornificius presides over novelties, because for those who tend them all things are made whole and stand by novelty; Manilius [says] nine gods to whom Jupiter alone has entrusted the power of casting his thunderbolt. 4. Cincius proclaims foreign numina to be named from novelty itself; for it is the custom for Romans to scatter the religions | f. 78 | of conquered cities partly privately through families, partly to consecrate them publicly, and so that none should be passed over through multitude of gods or ignorance, for the sake of brevity and compendium they invoke all together by the single name Novensiles.

39.1. Sunt praeterea nonnulli, qui ex hominibus divos factos hac praedicant appellatione signari, ut est Hercules Bomulus Aesculapius Liber Aeneas. Sententiae, ut apparet, diversae sunt haec omnes, neque fieri per rerum naturam potest, ut qui opinionibus differunt veritatis unius habeantur auctores. Si enim Pisonis sententia vera est, Melius et Uranius mentiuntur, si quod dicitur ab his certum est, peritissimus errat Varro, qui rebus in .sub.stantia constitutis inanissimas subdit et res cassas.

39.1. There are furthermore certain men who proclaim that those made divine from among men are marked by this epithet, as Hercules, Bomulus, Aesculapius, Liber, Aeneas. All these opinions, as is clear, are diverse, and it cannot be by the nature of things that those who differ in their opinions should be held authors of one truth. For if Piso’s view is true, Melius and Uranius lie; if what is said by these men is certain, the most learned Varro is mistaken, who, fastening the most inanest notions upon things established in substance, sets forth empty matters.

2. Si novenarius numerus cognomen Novensilium ducit, Cornificius balare convincitur, qui novitati praesidentibus divis alienae potentiae vim donat. Quodsi opinio Cornificii vera est, inprudens Cincius invenitur, qui urbium victarum deos potestate adficit Novensilium numinum. Quodsi hi sunt quos Cincius praedicat, Manilius dicere repperietur falsum, qui alieni fulminis iaculatores sub istius vocaminis appellatione concludit.

2. If the novenary number bears the cognomen Novensilium, Cornificius is shown to bleat, who, presiding over novelties, grants to gods the force of alien potency. But if Cornificius’s opinion is true, Cincius is found imprudent, who endows the gods of conquered cities with the potestas of Novensiles’ numina. And if these are those whom Cincius proclaims, Manilius will be found to speak falsely, who confines the hurler[s] of another’s lightning under that very appellation.

3. Quodsi exploratum et verum est id quod Manilius autumat, in errore sunt hi maximo qui honoribus divinis auctos consecratosque mortales ab novitate honoris existimant nuncupari. Quodsi Novensiles hi sunt qui meruerunt ad sidera sublevari, postquam sunt vitae mortalitate defuncti, nulli prorsus Novensiles di sunt. 4. Ut enim servi milites magistri non sunt personarum | f. 78b | subiacentium nomina sed officiorum, condicionum et munerum, ita cum Novensiles dicimus, si nomen est istud eorum qui ex hominibus meruerunt dii esse, manifestum et promptum est, non personas specialiter definitas sed novitatem ipsam cognomine Novensilium nuncupari.

3. But if what Manilius affirms is examined and true, those are in the greatest error who think that mortals raised and consecrated by divine honors are now named after the novelty of honor. And if Novensiles are those who have merited to be lifted up to the stars after they have died the mortality of life, then by no means are there any Novensile gods. 4. For just as servants, soldiers, masters are not the names of the persons placed under them but of the offices, conditions, and duties, so when we say Novensiles, if that is the name of those who from men have merited to be gods, it is plain and evident that not particular persons are defined but the novelty itself is named by the cognomen Novensilium. | f. 78b |

40.1. Nigidius Penates deos Neptunum esse atque Apollinem prodidit, qui quondam muris immortalibus Ilium condicione adiuncta cinxerunt. Idem rursus in libro sexto exponit et decimo disciplinas Etruscas sequens, genera esse Penatium quattuor et esse Iovis ex his alios, alios Neptuni, inferorum tertios, mortalium hominum quartos, inexplicabile nescio quid dicens. 2. Caesius et ipse id sequens Fortunam arbitratur et Cererem, Genium Iovialem ac Palem, sed non illam feminam quam vulgaritas accipit sed masculini nescio quem generis ministrum Iovis ac vilicum.

40.1. Nigidius proclaims the Penates to be the gods Neptune and Apollo, who once encompassed Ilium with immortal walls, a condition attached. He again expounds the same in book six and ten, following Etruscan disciplines, that there are four kinds of Penates, and that some of these belong to Jupiter, others to Neptune, a third to the infernal powers, and the fourth to mortal men, saying some inexplicable thing, I know not what. 2. Caesius likewise, following this, considers Fortune and Ceres, the Jovial Genius and Pales, but not that woman whom common usage accepts, rather some male of whatever sort, a minister of Jupiter and a vilicus.

3. Varro qui sunt introrsus atque in intimis penetralibus caeli deos esse censet quos loquimur nec eorum numerum nec nomina sciri. Hos Consentes et Complices Etrusci aiunt et nominant, quod una oriantur et occidant una, sex mares et totidem feminas, nominibus ignotis et miserationis parcissimae; sed eos summi Iovis consiliarios ac principes existimari. 4. Nec defuerunt qui scriberent Iovem, Iunonem ac Minervam deos Penates existere, sine quibus vivere ac sapere nequeamus et qui penitus nos regant ratione, calore ac spiritu.

3. Varro, who holds that the gods are those inward and in the inner sanctuaries of the heaven which we speak of, says that neither their number nor their names are known. These the Etruscans call and name Consentes and Complices, because they rise together and set together, six males and as many females, with names unknown and of the stingiest compassion; but they are thought to be counselors and chiefs of highest Jupiter. 4. Nor were there lacking those who wrote that Jupiter, Juno, and Minerva are Penates-gods, without whom we could neither live nor be wise, and who rule us wholly by reason, heat, and spirit.

Ut videtis, et hic quoque nihil concinens dicitur, nihil una pronuntiatione finitur, nec est aliquid fidum, quo insistere mens possit veritati suae proxima suspicione | f. 79 | coniciens. Ita enim labant sententiae alteraque opinio ab altera convellitur, ut aut nihil ex omnibus verum sit aut si ab aliquo dicitur, tot rerum diversitatibus nesciatur.

As you see, here too it is said to be nothing harmonious, nothing concluded by a single pronouncement, nor is there anything faithful on which the mind can rest, casting toward the nearest suspicion of its own truth | f. 79 |. For thus judgments slip and one opinion is torn away from another, so that either nothing of them all is true, or if it is asserted by anyone, it is made unknown by the manifold diversities of things.

41.1. Possumus, si videtur, summatim aliquid et de Laribus dicere, quos arbitratur vulgus vicorum atque itinerum deos esse ex eo quod Graecia vicos cognominat lau/raj. 2. In diversis Nigidius scriptis modo tectorum domumque custodes, modo Curetas illos, qui occultasse [Lucr. II, 633-34] perhibentur Iovis aeribus aliquando vagitum, modo Digitos Samothracios, quos quinque indicant Graeci Idaeos Dactylos nuncupari.

41.1. We can, if it seems fitting, say briefly something also about the Lares, whom the common folk judge to be the gods of neighborhoods and of ways, from that because Greece names neighborhoods lau/raj. 2. In differing writings Nigidius calls them at one time the guardians of roofs and of the house, at another the Curetes , those who are said to have sometime hidden Jupiter’s crying in the airs [Lucr. II, 633-34], at another the Samothracian Digiti, whom the Greeks indicate are called the Idaean Dactyli, five in number.

Varro similiter haesitans nunc esse illos Manes et ideo Maniam matrem esse cognominatam Larum, nunc aerios rursus deos et heroas pronuntiat appellari, nunc antiquorum sententias sequens Larvas esse dicit Lares, quasi quosdam genios et functorum animas mortuorum.

Varro likewise, hesitating, sometimes holds them to be the Manes and therefore says that Mania is surnamed the mother of the Lares, sometimes again proclaims them to be airy gods and heroes so called, and sometimes, following the opinions of the ancients, says that the Lares are Larvae, as if certain genii and the souls of the deceased who discharged offices.

42.1. Infinitum est et inmensum species ire per singulas atque ipsis facere promptum libris, nullum esse a vobis deum neque existimatum neque creditum, de quo ambiguas discrepantisque sententias opinionum mille varietatibus prompseritis. 2. Sed brevitatis et fastidii causa satis haec est dixisse quae dicta sunt, et est operosum nimis coacervare in unum multa, cum ex uno et ex altero manifestum fiat et patet haesitare, labare nec quicquam vos certi de his rebus quas adseritis dicere. 3. Nisi forte dicetis: "Etiamsi personaliter ignoramus qui sunt Lares, qui sunt novensiles, qui Penates, esse illos tamen consensio ipsa vindicat auctorum et in numeris caelitum | f. 79 b | formam sui generis optinere". 4. - Et quemadmodum poterit an sit deus aliquis sciri, si ignorabitur et nescietur quid sit, aut postulatio ipsa beneficiorum valere, si exploratum non erit, non certum, quis ad quamque debeat consultationem vocari?

42.1. It would be endless and immeasurable to go through the matter in full and to make it ready in successive books themselves, that there is no god among you either supposed or believed in, about whom you would not have produced ambiguous and conflicting opinions in a thousand varieties. 2. But for the sake of brevity and to avoid fastidiousness it is enough to have said what has been said, and it is too laborious to heave many things into one, when from one and from another it becomes manifest and plain that you hesitate, waver, and cannot say anything certain about those matters you assert. 3. Unless perhaps you will say: “Even if personally we do not know who the Lares are, who the novensiles are, who the Penates are, yet consensus itself vindicates that the authorities hold them and that in the ranks of the caelic ones they obtain a form of their own kind.” 4. — And how, moreover, can it be known whether any one is a god, if it is ignored and unknown what he is, or how can the very petitioning of benefits avail, if it will not have been examined who should certainly be called to what consultation?

5. Omnis enim qui quaerit alicuius numinis impetrare responsum, debet necessario scire, cui supplicet, quem imploret, a quo rebus auxilia necessitatibus exposcat humanis, maxime cum vos ipsi et non omnes omnia deos posse praestare et dissimillimis ritibus singulorum animos refertis offensionesque placari.

5. For every one who seeks to obtain a response from some numen must necessarily know to whom he supplicates, whom he implores, from whom he asks for aids and human necessities, especially since you yourselves do not judge that all gods can perform all things, and by very dissimilar rites ascribe to individual gods minds and the placation of offences.

43.1. Etenim si hic atram, ille albam desiderat pellem, huic capite velato, illi sacrificandum est nudo, de matrimoniis ille consulitur, hic medellas incommoditatibus praestat, interesse non potest nihil an sit ille Novensilis an ille, cum ignoratio rerum, personarum confusio et deos [cogat] offendat et necessario piaculum contrahi ? 2. Finge enim me ipsum incommoditatis alicuius et declinandi periculi causa horum cuipiam numinum supplicare dicentem: "Adeste, adestote dii Penates, tu Apollo tuque Neptune omniaque haec mala quibus uror terreor vexor vestri numinis averruncate clementia": - eritne spes aliqua referendae ab his opis, si Ceres Pales Fortuna, Iovialis aut Genius, non Neptunus et Apollo Penates dii erunt? 3. Aut si Curetas pro Laribus invocaro, quos esse Digitos Samothracios pars vestrorum adseverat auctorum, quemadmodum his potero auxiliatoribus et propitiis uti, cum neque his | f. 80/ sua et aliena illis inposuero cognomina? Usque adeo res exigit propriatim deos scire, nec ambigere nec dubitare de uniuscuiusque vi, nomine, si alienis ritibus et appellationibus fuerint invocati, et aures habeant structas et piaculis nos teneant inexpiabilibus obligatos.

43.1. For if this one desires a black skin, that one a white, for this one the head must be veiled, for that one a sacrifice must be made with the head bare, about marriages that one is consulted, this one supplies remedies for inconveniences, can it make no difference whether one is Novensilis or the other, when ignorance of matters and confusion of persons both forces the gods to be offended and necessarily compels an expiatory offering to be incurred? 2. For suppose me myself, because of some inconvenience and to avert danger, saying that I pray to one of these numina: "Be present, be present, O Penates, you Apollo and you Neptune and drive off with the clemency of your divinity all these evils by which I am burned, terrified, and distressed": — will there be any hope of help being brought by these, if Ceres, Pales, Fortuna, the Jovial or the Genius, and not Neptune and Apollo, are the gods who are the Penates? 3. Or if I invoke the Curetes instead of the Lares, whom a part of your authors asserted to be the Samothracian Dactyls, how shall I be able to use these as auxiliaries and as propitious, when I shall not have imposed upon them their own and foreign surnames? | f. 80/ Thus far the matter demands that the gods be known by propriety, that one neither waver nor doubt about each one's power and name, if they have been invoked with alien rites and appellations, and that they have ears set and hold us bound by inexpiable expiations.

44.1. Quare si vobis liquet, in sublimibus palatiis caeli habitare, consistere multitudinem istam quam enumeratis deorum, in unius proloquii finibus convenit vos stare nec per varias distractos repugnantesque sententias fidem ipsis rebus quas struitis derogare. 2. Si Ianus est, Ianus sit, si Liber est, Liber sit, si Summanus, Summanus sit: hoc est enim confidere, hoc tenere, exploratae in rei cognitione defigi, non more caecorum atque errantium dicere: "Novensiles Musae sunt, Trebiani quinimmo dii sunt, immo novenarius numerus, subversarum potius vel urbium praesides", et in id periculum perducere res tantas, ut dum alios tollitis et reponitis alios, possit iure de cunctis an sint ulla in parte dubitari.

44.1. Wherefore if it is clear to you that they dwell in the lofty palaces of heaven, that this multitude which you enumerate of gods stands together within the limits of a single discourse, you ought not, by diverse and conflicting judgments, to derogate from the credibility of the very things which you have constructed. 2. If Janus is, let Janus be; if Liber is, let Liber be; if Summanus is, let Summanus be: for this is to trust, this is to hold, to be fixed upon a thing tried by inquiry, not, like the blind and wandering, to say "the Novensiles are Muses, indeed the Trebian gods are gods, nay a nove-numbered host, rather guardians of ruined cities," and to bring such matters to the peril that, while you lift some up and set others down, it may justly be questioned whether there is any part of them not open to doubt.