Arnobius: ADVERSVS NATIONES LIBRI VII

1.1. Nunc quoniam summatim ostendimus, quam impias de diis vestris opinionum constitueritis infamias, equitur ut de templis, de simulacris etiam sacrificiisque dicamus deque alia serie quae his rebus adnea est et vicina copulatione coniuncta. 2. In hac enim consuestis parte crimen nobis maximum impietatis adfigere, quod neque aedes sacras venerationis ad officia construamus, non deorum alicuius simulacrum constituamus aut formam, non altaria fabricemus, non aras, non caesorum sanguinem animantium demus, non tura neque fruges salsas, non denique vinum liquens paterarum effusionibus inferamus. 3. Quae quidem nos cessamus non ideo vel exaedificare vel facere, tamquam inpias geramus et scelerosas mentes aut aliquem sumpserimus temeraria in deos desperatione contemptum, sed quod eos arbitramur et credimus - si modo dii certi sunt et nominis huius eminentia praediti - honorum haec genera aut risui habere si rideant aut indigne perpeti si motibus exasperentur irarum.

1.1. Now that we have briefly shown how impious the calumnies you have formed about your deities are, it follows that we should speak of temples, of images and of sacrifices as well, and of the other series of things that are akin to these and joined by close association. 2. For in this customary practice you lay upon us the greatest charge of impiety, because we do not erect sacred shrines for veneration, we do not set up any image or form of a god, we do not build altars, nor hearths, nor offer the blood of slain animals, nor incense nor salted fruits, nor finally pour liquid wine by paterae. 3. That indeed we cease to build or to make is not therefore because we bear impious or criminal minds or have adopted, in rash despair, a contempt for the gods, but because we judge and believe them—if indeed there are gods and endowed with the eminence of that name—to be either worthy of such honors or the object of ridicule if they laugh, or unworthy to endure if they provoke the stirrings of anger.

2.1. Ut enim noscatis, quid de isto nomine sentiamus iudicii que simus cuius, existimamus nos eos, si modo dii certi sunt, ut eadem rursus satiateque dicantur, cunctarum esse debere perfectarum que virtutum, sapientes iustos aves, si modo nulla est culpa quod eos laudibus adcumulamus humanis, intestinis pollentes bonis, nec extraneis adminiculis addicere quo illis integritas inoffensae beatitudinis conpleatur, ab adfectibus cunctis et cunctis perturbationibus | f. 121 b | liberos non ira effervere, non ullis cupiditatibus exlo citari, calamitatem inrogare nullis, non ex malis hominum crudelem accipere voluptatem, non terrere portentis, non prodigiosas ostentare formidines, non votorum debitis habere obnoxios et obligatos nec piaculares hostias signis minacibus postulare, non pestilentias, non morbos corruptione aeris inducere, non adurere siccitatibus fruges, non caedibus interesse bellorum, non urbium stragibus, non adversa his velle, non illorum commoditatibus suffragari: sed, quod magnarum est mentium, pari pendere cunctos lance et individuas cunctis benivolentias exhibere. 2. Caduci enim generis et infirmitatis humanae est contrariis agere: eosque quos tangat adfectio pati dolere deminui sapientium scita et pronuntiata definiunt nec posse aliter fieri quin legibus mortalitatis adstricti sint qui sint ullis perturbationibus mancipati. 3. Quod cum ita se habeat, qui possumus iudicari deos habere contemptui, quos, nisi sunt recti et magnarum mentium admiratione laudabiles, deos negamus existere nec potestatibus posse caelitibus applicari?

2.1. For that you may know what we think of that name and of what judgment we are and to whom we belong, we suppose that they, if indeed gods are certain, so that the same things may again be said and be enough, ought to be of all perfect virtues; wise, just, and good, if indeed there is no fault in that we heap upon them human praises—strong in inward goods, and not to addict to foreign aids, whereby their integrity of unoffended blessedness might be completed—free from all affections and all perturbations: not to boil with anger, not to be excited by any desires, not to inflict calamity on any, not to take cruel pleasure from the evils of men, not to terrify by portents, not to show prodigious fears, not to be beholden and bound by the debts of vows nor to demand expiatory victims by menacing signs, not to bring pestilences, not to bring diseases by the corruption of the air, not to parch crops by droughts, not to be involved in the slaughter of wars, not in the devastations of cities, not to will things adverse to these, not to support those advantages of theirs: but, which is of great minds, to weigh all things on a single scale and to show indivisible good-will to all. 2. For it is of a fallible and weak human kind to act by contraries: and those whom affection touches suffer; the decrees and proclamations of the wise define that grief diminishes and that it cannot be otherwise, since they are bound by the laws of mortality and are held in thrall to all perturbations. 3. Since this is so, by what right can we be judged to hold the gods in contempt, whom, unless they are righteous and praiseworthy by the admiration of great minds, we deny to exist and to be applicable to heavenly powers?

3.1. "Sed templa illis extruimus nulla nec eorum efflgies adoramus, non mactamus hostias, non tura ac vina libamus". - Et quid amplius possumus vel honoris eis attribuere vel dignitatis, quam quod eos in ea ponimus parte qua rerum caput ac dominum summum que ipsum regem, cui debent di una nobiscum, quod esse se sentiunt et vitali in substantia contineri? | f. 122 | 2. Numquid enim delubris ut templorum eum constructionibus honoramus? Numquid ei hostias caedimus?

3.1. "But we build no temples for them nor adore their effigies, we do not slaughter victims, we do not pour incense and wine." - And what more can we assign to them either of honor or of dignity than that which we place in them in that part by which they are the head and supreme lord of things, even that king himself, to whom the gods together with us owe that they are conscious of themselves and are contained in a vital substance? | f. 122 | 2. For do we honor him by shrines, by the constructions of temples? Do we slay victims to him?

Numquid alias res damus, quas libere, profundere non est rationis expensae sed tracti per consuetudinem moris? 3. Etenim plena dementia est, necessitatibus tuis potentiora metiri et quae tibi sint usui datoribus diis dare, et honorem istum, non contumeliam ducere. Templa igitur, quaerimus, in deorum quos usus aut in rei cuius necessitatem aut dicitis esse constructa aut esse rursus aedificanda censetis?

Do we give other things, which it is not the expenditure of reason to pour out freely but are poured forth through the custom of habit? 3. For it is full madness to mete out to your necessities things more powerful, and to give to the gods, the givers, what would be useful to you, and to reckon that honour, not an affront. Therefore we ask: do you hold that temples of the gods were built, or ought to be rebuilt, because of their use or because of the necessity of the thing or simply because you assert it?

4. Hiemalia sentiunt frigora aut solibus torrentur aestivis, pluvialibus nimbis perfluuntur, ventorum eos aut turbines vexant, incursionem pati periclitantur hostilem ferarum aut rabidos adpetitus, ut merito illos conveni;at tectorum munitionibus claudere, saxorum aut obiectióne tutari? 5. Templa enim haec quid sunt? Si humanam infirmitatem roges, nescio quid immane atque amplum: si deorum potentiam metiaris, successus quidam parvi atque ut verius eloquar genus angustissimum cavernarum paupertini cordis excogitatione suspensum.

4. Do winter-dwellings feel the cold, or are they scorched by summer suns, drenched by rainy clouds, harassed by winds or whirlwinds, endangered to suffer a hostile incursion of beasts or rabid assaults, so that it is fitting to enclose them with the fortifications of roofs and to protect them by a barricade of stones? 5. For what are these temples? If you ask concerning human infirmity, I know not—something monstrous and ample; if you measure by the power of the gods, the outcome is somewhat small and, to speak more truly, a most narrow kind, suspended by the contrivance of the caverns of a penurious heart.

6. Quorum si quaeris audire quis prior fuerit institutor, quis fabricator, aut Phoroneus, Aegyptius aut Merops tibi fuisse monstrabitur, ut tradit in Admirandis Varro, Iovis progenies Aeacus. Sint ergo haec licet aut ex molibus marmoreis structa, laquearibus aut renideant aureis, splendeant hic gemmae | f. 122b | et sidereos evomant variata interstinctione fulgores: terra sunt haec omnia et ex faece ultima vilioris materiae concreta. 7. Neque enim si vos ea pretiis carioribus penditis, delectari credendum est his deos nec recusare nec spernere quo minus se saepiant et eorum obiectibus coerceantur inclusi.

6. If you ask to hear which of them was first as founder, which as builder, you will be shown that it was either Phoroneus, the Egyptian, or Merops to you, as Varro relates in his Admirandis, Aeacus, progeny of Jove. Let therefore these be even built from marble masses, let their ceilings glitter with gold, let gems shine here | f. 122b | and vomit forth starry gleams by varied staining: all these things are of earth and concreted from the dregs of the vilest material. 7. For neither, if you pay these things with dearer prices, is it to be believed that the gods are delighted by them, nor that they refuse or scorn to be shut in and constrained by their objects.

8. "Templum, inquit, hoc Martis est, hoc Iunonis et Veneris, hoc Herculis Apollinis Ditis". - Quid est aliud dicere, quam domus haec Martis est, haec Iunonis et Veneris, Apollo hic habitat, in hac manet Hercules, illa Summanus? Ita non prima et maxima contumelia est habitationibus deos habere districtos, tuguriola his dare, conclavia et cellulas fabricari et eis existimari necessarias res esse, quae hominibus, felibus, quae sunt formiculis et lacertis, quae fugacibus, pavidis atque exiguis muribus?

8. "This temple," he says, "is of Mars, this of Juno and Venus, this of Hercules, of Apollo, of Dis." — What is it otherwise to say than: this house is Mars’s, this Juno’s and Venus’s, Apollo dwells here, in this remains Hercules, that one is Summanus? Is it not the first and greatest contumely to have the gods cramped into dwellings, to give them tuguriola, to fabricate chambers and cells for them and to think necessary those things which are for men, for beasts, which are for ants and lizards, which are for fugitives, fearful and tiny mice?

4.1. "Sed non, inquit, idcirco adtribuimus diis templa tamquam umidos ab his imbres ventos pluvias arceamus aut soles, sed ut eos possimus coram et com minus contueri, adfari de proximo et cum praesentibus quodammodo venerationum conloquia miscere". 2. - Sub axe enim nudo et sub aetherio tegmine invocati si fuerint, nihil audiunt, et nisi de proximo admoveantur his preces, tamquam nihil dicatur, obstructi atque immobiles stabunt. 3. Atquin nos arbitramur omnem deum omnino, si modo nominis huius vi pollet, ex quacumque mundi parte quod quisque fuerit locutus, tamquam si sit praesens, audire debere, immo quod quisque conceperit | f. 123 | sub obscuris et tacitis sensibus, cognitione anticipata praesumere, atque ut astra sol luna, cum supra terras meant, omnibus omnino cernentibus statim sunt et ubique praesentes, ita que convenit audientiam numinum nulli esse clausam linguae semperque esse praesentem, quamvis ad eam voces regionibus ex distantibus confluant. 4. Hoc est enim proprium deorum, conplere omnia vi sua, non partiliter uspiam sed ubique esse totos, non adesse non abesse, non cenatum ad Aethiopas pergere et post dies bis senos privatum ad domicilium redire.

4.1. "But not," he says, "for that reason do we assign temples to the gods as if to ward off from them wet rains, winds and storms or suns, but that we may be able to behold them more openly and less from afar, to address them up close and to mingle, in a manner, the conversations of veneration with those present." 2. For if they are invoked under a bare vault and beneath the ethereal covering, they hear nothing, and unless prayers are brought near to them, as if nothing were said, they will stand blocked and motionless. 3. Nay, we reckon that every god altogether, if only he has force by that name, from whatever part of the world anyone has spoken, ought to hear as if he were present; indeed to anticipate and to take up into himself whatever anyone has conceived under obscure and silent senses, and, just as the stars, sun and moon, when they move above the lands, are immediately and everywhere present to all who see, so it is fitting that the hearing of the numina be closed to no tongue and always be present, although voices to it flow from regions far off. | f. 123 | 4. For this is proper to the gods, to fill all things by their power, not partially somewhere but to be whole everywhere, not to be present and not to be absent, not to go to dine among the Ethiopians and after twelve days return private to a domicile.

5.1. Quod si ita non erit, tollitur omnis spes opis et erit in dubio, audiamini ab dis necne, si quando res sacras caerimoniarum conficitis debitis. 2. Constituamus enim noscendae rei causa templum numinis alicuius esse apud Canarias insulas, eiusdem apud ultimam Thylem, eiusdem apud Seras esse, apud furvos Garamantas et si qui sunt alii quos ab sui notitia maria montes silvae et quadrini disterminant cardines: si omnes uno in tempore rebus divinis factis, quod sua quosque necessitas rogitare compellit, poscantque de numine, referendi beneficii quaenam omnibus spes erit, si non undique ad se missam vocem deus exaudiet et erit ulla longinquitas, quo penetrare non possit auxilium poscentis oratio? 3. Aut enim nullis erit in partibus praesens, si uspiam poterit aliquando non esse, aut aderit unis tantum, quoniam praebere communiter suum non potest atque indiscretus auditum.

5.1. But if this be not so, all hope of aid is removed and it will be doubtful whether you are heard by the gods or not, when you perform sacred rites of established ceremonies. 2. For let us assume, for the sake of investigating the matter, that the temple of a certain numen is on the Canary Islands, the same on farthest Thule, the same among the Seres, among the swarthy Garamantes, and among whatever others there are whom seas, mountains, woods and the four cardinal points sever from their knowledge: if all, at one and the same time, in divine affairs performed — which the necessity of each compels them to request — should ask of the numen, what hope will there be of a benefit returned to all, if the god does not hear the voice sent to him from every quarter, and will there be any remoteness into which the petitioner’s prayer cannot penetrate? 3. For either he will be present in no region, if he can at any time be not present anywhere, or he will be present to only some, since he cannot universally bestow his own and his hearing would be indiscriminate.

| f. 123b | 4. Atque ita perficitur, ut aut nullis deus opituletur omnino, si occupatus re aliqua ad audiendas voces non quiverit advolare, aut exauditi tantummodo uni abeant soli, nihil egerint ceteri.

| f. 123b | 4. And thus it is brought about that either God succors absolutely none, if, occupied with some matter, he cannot advolare to hear voices, or that the heard ones depart to one alone, the rest having done nothing.

6.1. Quid quod multa ex his templa, quae tholis sunt aureis et sublimibus elata fastigiis, auctorum conscriptionibus conprobatur contegere cineres atque ossa etfunctorum esse corporum sepulturas [esse]? 2. Nonne patet et promptum est aut pro dis immortalibus mortuos vos colere aut inexpiabilem fieri numinibus contumeliam, quorum delubra et templa mortuorum superlata sunt bustis? 3. In historiarum Antiochus nono Athenis in Minervio memorat Caecropem esse mandatum terrae; in templo rursus eiusdem, quod in arce Larisae, esse conditus scribitur atque indicatur Acrisius, Ericthonius Poliadis in fano, Dairas et Immaradus fratres in Eleusinio consaepto, quod civitati subiectum est. 4. Quid Celei virgines?

6.1. What of the fact that many of these temples, which have golden tholoi and raised, lofty roofs, by the writings of authors are attested to cover the ashes and bones and to be the sepulchres of the deceased? 2. Is it not plain and manifest that either you worship the dead as immortal gods or you make an unexpiable affront to the numina whose shrines and temples are raised over the tombs of the dead? 3. In the histories Antiochus the Ninth records that in Athens, in the Minervium, Caecrops was committed to the earth; in the same temple again, which is on the citadel of Larissa, Acrisius is written to be interred and is indicated, Erectheus and Ericthonius in the sanctuary of Pallas, Dairas and Immaradus the brothers in the Eleusinian enclosure, which is subject to the city. 4. What of the Celean maidens?

non in Caereris Eleusiniae humationis <usae> perhibentur officio? non in Dianae delubro, quod in Apollinis constitutum est Delii, Hyperoche Laodiceque, quas advectas illuc esse finibus ex Hyperboreis indicatur? 5. In Didymaeo Milesio aleochum dicit habuisse suprema Leandrius funeris.

Are they not reported to have been used in the Eleusinian burial office at Caere? Are not Hyperoche and Laodice said to be in the temple of Diana, which is established at Delos of Apollo, and indicated to have been brought thither into those bounds from the Hyperboreans? 5. In the Didymaean–Milesian account Leandrius says that the aleochum had the supreme rites of the funeral.

Leucophrynae monumentum in fano apud Magnesiam Dianae esse Myndius profitetur ac memorat Zeno. 6. Sub Apollinis arula, quae Telmessi apud oppidum visitur, Telmessum esse conditum vatem non scriptis constantibus indicatur? 7. Ptolomaeus Agesarchi de Philopatore quem edidit primo.

Myndius professes that the monument of Leucophryna is in the shrine at Magnesia of Diana, and Zeno records it. 6. Is it indicated that Telmessus was founded by a seer beneath Apollo’s small altar, which is visited at the town of Telmessus, and that this is not attested by surviving writings? 7. Ptolemaeus, concerning Agesarchus and Philopator, which he first published.

Cinyram regem Paphi cum familia omni | f. 124 | sua, immo cum omni prosapia in Veneris templo situm esse litterarum auctoritate declarat. 8. Infinitum est et inmensum, quibus quique in fanis toto sint in orbe describere, nec exactam desiderat curam - quamvis poenam constituerit Aegyptus in eum qui publicasset quibus Apis iaceret absconditus - polyandria illa Varronis quibus templis contegantur quasque in se habeant superlati ponderis moles.

He declares by the authority of letters that Cinyras, king of Paphos, with his whole family | f. 124 | nay, with all his prosapia, is situated in the temple of Venus. 8. It is endless and immense to describe who and which things are in the fanes throughout the whole orb, nor does it demand exact care — although Egypt has ordained a penalty against him who should publish where the Apis lies hidden — those polyandria of Varron by which temples are covered and which contain in themselves masses of overwhelming weight.

7.1. Sed quid ego haec parva? Regnatoris in populi Capitolio qui est hominum qui ignoret Oli esse sepulchrum Vulcentani? 2. Quis est, inquam, qui non sciat ex fundaminum sedibus caput hominis evolutum non ante plurimum temporis aut solum sine partibus ceteris - hoc enim quidam ferunt - aut cum membris omnibus humationis officia sortitum?

7.1. But what am I to say of these small things? Who among men does not know that in the ruler’sin populi Capitolio Oli is the sepulchre of Vulcentanus? 2. Who is there, I ask, who does not know that from the foundations’ seats a man’s head was uncovered, not long before, either alone without the other parts — for some indeed report this — or, having obtained the duties of burial, with all its limbs?

3. Quod si planum fieri testimoniis postulatis auctorum, Sammonicus Granius Valerianus vobis et Fabius indicabunt, cuius Aulus fuerit filius, gentis et nationiscuius, per manus servuli vita fuerit spoliatus et lumine, quid de suis commeruerit civibus, ut ei sit abnegata telluris patriae sepultura. 4. Condiscetis etiam, quamvis nolle istud publicare se fingant, quid sit capite retecto factum vel in parte qua arcis curiosa fuerit obscuritate conclusum, ut immobilis videlicet atque fixa obsignati ominis perpetuitas staret. 5. Quod cum opprimi par esset et vetustatis obliteratione celari, conpositio nominis iecit in medium et cum suis causis per data sibi tempora inextinguibili fecit testificatione procedere, nec erubuit civitas maxima et numinum | f. 124b | cunctorum cultrix, cum vocabulum templo daret, ex Oli capite Capitolium quam ex nomine Iovio nuncupare.

3. But if it is to be made plain by the testimonies requested of the authors, Sammonicus, Granius, Valerianus will indicate to you and Fabius, of whom Aulus was the son, of what gens and nation, by the hands of a little servulus his life was stripped away and his sight taken, what he had merited for his own fellow-citizens, so that burial in the soil of his fatherland was denied him. 4. You will also learn, although they pretend not to wish to publish it, what was done with the head uncovered or in the part of the citadel which was shut up in curious obscurity, so that, immovable and fixed, the perpetuity of the sealed omen might stand. 5. And since that was about to be suppressed and hidden by the obliteration of antiquity, the composition of the name cast it into the open, and, with its reasons, caused it to proceed through the times granted it with inextinguishable testimony; nor did the greatest city, the worshipper of all the gods, blush when it gave a name to the temple, to call the Capitol from the head of Oli rather than from the name Iovius.

8.1. Satis igitur ut opinor ostendimus templa diis immortalibus aut inaniter iis esse constructa aut contra decus et potentiam creditam contumeliosis opinationibus fabricat? 2. Sequitur ut de signis aliquid simulacrisque dicamus, quae multa arte conponitis et religiosa observatione curatis. 3. Qua in parte si fides est ulla, constituere apud nos ipsos nullis considerationibus possumus utrumne istud serio et cum proposito faciatis gravi an ridendo res ipsas puerili alucinatione ludatis.

8.1. Therefore, as I think we have sufficiently shown, are the temples to the immortal gods either built in vain for them or, contrary to the honour and power attributed, fashioned by contemptuous conjectures? 2. It follows that we should say something about the statues and simulacra, which you have composed with much art and tended with religious observance. 3. In that matter, if there is any faith at all, we can by no considerations determine among ourselves whether you do this seriously and with intent, in a grave manner, or whether, laughing, you sport with the very things in puerile hallucination.

4. Si enim certum est apud vos deos esse, quos remini atque in summis caeli regionibus degere, quae causa, quae ratio est, ut simulacra ista fingantur a vobis, cum habeatis res certas, quibus preces possitis effundere et auxilium rebus in exigentibus postulare? 5. Sin autem non creditis aut, ut mediocriter dicatur, ambigitis, etiam sic ratio quaenam est dubiorum fingere atque instituere simulacra et quod esse non credas ventosa imitatione formare? 6. An numquid dicitis forte, praesentiam vobis quandam his numinum sub exhiberi simulacris, et quia deos videre non datum est eos in solidi et munia officiosa praestari?

4. For if it is certain among you that there are gods who remember and dwell in the highest regions of the sky, what cause, what rationale is there that these images should be fashioned by you, when you have certain things to which you can pour out prayers and demand aid for matters in need? 5. But if you do not believe, or, to speak moderately, you are in doubt, even so what reason is there to invent images of doubts and to form by a windy imitation that which you do not deem to be? 6. Or do you perhaps say that some presence of the divinities is offered to you under these images, and because it is not granted to see the gods they may be worshipped in a solid body and rendered officious ministrations?

7. Hoc qui dicit et adserit deos esse non credit, nec habere convincitur suis religionibus fidem cui opus est videre quod teneat, ne inane forte sit quod obscurum non videtur.

7. He who says this and asserts that the gods exist does not believe, nor is he proved to possess faith in his religions, who needs to see what he holds, lest perhaps what is unseen be empty.

9.1. "Deos, inquitis, per simulacra veneramur". - Quid ergo? Si haec non sint, coli se dii nesciunt nec inpertiri a vobis | f. 125 | ullum sibi existimabunt honorem? Per tramites ergo quosdam et per quaedam fidei commissa, ut dicitur, vestras sumunt atque accipiunt cultiones, et antequam hi sentiant quibus illud debetur obsequium, simulacris litatis prius et velut reliquias quasdam aliena ad illos ex auctoritate transmittitis.

9.1. "Deos, inquitis, per simulacra veneramur." — What then? If these are not, will the gods not know themselves to be worshipped nor reckon any honour conferred by you? Through certain channels then and through certain trusts committed of faith, as they say, they take and receive your cultions, and before those to whom that obedience is due perceive it, you first, with the simulacra propitiated, and as it were certain foreign reliquiae, transmit them to those gods by authority | f. 125 |.

2. Et quid fieri potis est iniuriosius contumeliosius durius, quam deum alterum scire et rei alteri supplicare? opem sperare de numine et nullius sensus ad effigiem deprecari? Nonne illud est, quaeso, quod in vulgaribus proverbiis dicitur: "Fabrum caedere cum ferias fullonem", et "Cum hominis consilium quaeras, ab asellis et porculis agendarum rerum sententias postulare"?

2. And what can be more injurious, more contemptuous, more harsh, than to know one god and to implore another thing? To hope for help from a numen and to beseech an image without any sense? Is that not, I pray, what in common proverbs is said: "to strike the smith when it is the fuller's holiday," and "When you seek the counsel of a man, to demand from she-asses and piglets the sententiae of matters to be done"?

10.1. Et unde novissime scitis, an simulacra haec omnia quae dis immortalibus vicaria substitutione formatis similitudinem referant habeant que divinam? 2. Potest enim fieri, ut barbatus in caelo sit qui esse a vobis effingitur levis, potest ut senectute provectior cui puerilem commodatis aetatem, potest ut hic ravus sit qui in veritate habeat oculos caesios, displosas ut gestitet nares quem esse vos facitis figuratisque nasicam. 3. Neque enim rectum est dicere aut appellare simulacrum quod non pariles lineas principali ab ore traducat: quod esse planum et certum manifestis poterit ab rebus agnosci.

10.1. And whence, finally, do you know whether all these simulacra, which are fashioned as vicaria substitutione for the immortal gods, bear a similitude of the divine? 2. For it can be that a man portrayed by you as barbatus is in heaven clean‑shaven; it can be that one whom you have proffered a youthful age is advanced in senectute; it can be that he whom you make raven‑haired in fact has grey (caesios) eyes, or that he whom you fashion with splayed (displosas) nostrils actually longs for a nose (nasicam). 3. For it is not right to call or name a simulacrum that which does not render corresponding lines taken from the principal mouth: that which is plain and certain can be recognized by manifest features.

Nam cum omnes homines teretem esse solem indubitabili luminum contemplatione videamus, os illi vos hominis et mortalium corporum liniamenta donastis. 4. Luna semper in motu est et ter denas facies | f. 123b | in restitutione accipit menstrua: vobis ducibus et figuratoribus femina est, vultu que est uno quae per habitus mille eottidiana instabilitate mutatur. 5. Intellegimus omnes ventos aeris esse fluorem pulsi et mundanis rationibus concitati: per vos hominum formae sunt bucinarum animantes tortus intestinis et domesticis flatibus.

For when we see by the indubitable contemplation of lights that the sun is round for all men, to that one you have bestowed the features of a man and the lineaments of mortal bodies. 4. The moon is always in motion and in the monthly restitution receives threefold aspects: to you, leaders and formers, she is a woman, and with a single face who through a thousand daily vicissitudes of habit is changed. 5. We understand all winds to be the fluid of the air, driven and stirred by mundane causes: by you the forms of men are the animated trumpets, contorted by inward and domestic blasts.

Inter deos videmus vestros leonis torvissimam faciem mero oblitam minio et nomine Frugiferio nuncupari. 6. Si simulacra haec omnia superorum sunt imagines numinum, ergo et in caelo habitare dicendus est deus talis, ad cuius formam et speciem simulacri huius similitudo directa est, et videlicet ut hic iste, ita illic ille sine reliquo corpore persona est et facies sola, fremebundus hiatibus torvidis, dirus sanguineo de colore, malum dentibus suis comprimens atque ut olim fessi canes unquam ore de patulo perpetuitate proiciens.7. Quod si utique non est, ita ut omnes existimamus non esse, quaenam tanta audacia est formam tibi quam volueris fingere ac dicere esse simulacrum dei quem probare non possis ulla esse in parte naturae?

Between the gods we behold your most grim face of a lion, smeared with wine and vermilion, and called by the name Frugiferius. 6. If all these simulacra of the supernal beings are images of the numina, then such a god must be said to dwell in heaven, to whose form and aspect the likeness of this image is directly conformed; and plainly as this one here, so there that one is a person without the rest of a body and a face alone, roaring with grim gapes, dreadful of sanguineous hue, pressing evil with its teeth and, as once exhausted dogs ever cast forth from an open mouth into perpetuity, projecting. 7. But if indeed it is not so, as we all judge it not to be, what great audacity is it to fashion for yourself whatever form you will and to declare it to be the simulacrum of a god which you cannot prove to be in any part of nature?

11.1. Ridetis temporibus priscis Persas fluvios coluisse, memorialia ut indicant scripta, informem Arabas lapidem, acinacem Scythiae nationes, ramum pro Cinxia Thespios, lignum Icarios pro Diana indolatum, Pessinuntios silicem pro Deum Matre, pro Marte Romanos hastam, Varronis ut indicant Musae, atque, ut Aethlius memorat, ante usum disciplinamque fictorum pluteum Samios pro Iunone: et abstinetis a risu, cum pro diis | f. 126 | immortalibus sigilliolis hominum et formis supplicatis humanis? 2. Quinimmo deos esse sigillaria ipsa censetis, nec praeter haec quicquam vim creditis habere divinam. Quid dicitis, o istis ergone dii caelites habent aures et tempora, cervices occipitium spinam lumbos latera poplites nates suffragines talos membraque alia cetera, quibus constructi nos sumus et quae prima in parte paulo plenius dicta sunt et scripto uberiore prolata?

11.1. You laugh that in ancient times the Persians cultivated rivers, as memorial writings show, the Arabs a shapeless stone, the nations of Scythia an acinaces, the Thespians a branch for Cynthia, the wood of Icaria for Diana grieving, the Pessinuntians a flint for the Mother-God, the Romans a spear for Mars, as the Muses indicate Varron, and, as Aethlius records, before use and training the painted shield of the Samians for Juno: and do you refrain from laughter, when for immortal gods you see little images and human forms supplicated by men? 2. Nay rather, you judge the very images to be gods, and apart from these you believe nothing to possess divine power. What say you, then, o you people, do the heavenly gods have ears and temples, necks, the occiput, a spine, loins, sides, knees, buttocks, supports, ankles and other limbs by which we are built — the very parts which were first a little more fully spoken of above and delivered in a richer written form?

3. Utinam liceret introspicere sensus vestros recessusque ipsos mentis, quibus varias volvitis atque initis obscurissimas cogitationes: repperiremus et vos ipsos eadem sentire quae nos neque alias gerere super numinum figuratione sententias. 4. Sed studiis facere quid pervicacibus possumus, quid intentantibus gladios novasque excogitantibus poenas? Minitantes adseritis malam scientissimi causam et quod semel sine ratione fecistis, ne videamini aliquando nescisse, defenditis meliusque putatis non vinci quam confessae cedere atque adnuere veritati.

3. Would that it were permitted to look into your sensus and the very recesses of the mind, by which you turn and weave most obscure cogitations at their inceptions: we would discover that you yourselves feel the same things as we and do not otherwise carry opinions about the figuration of the numina. 4. But what can we do with those obstinate in their studies, with those brandishing gladios and contriving new penalties? Threatening, you assert the cause of the most knowing to be evil, and because you once did something without reason, lest you ever seem to have been ignorant, you defend it and deem it better not to be conquered than to yield and to assent to confessed truth.

12.1. Ex huiusmodi causis illud etiam vobis coniventibus consecutum est, ut in deorum corporibus lasciviae artificum luderent darentque his formas qua,e cuilibet tristi possent esse derisui. 2. Itaque Hammon cum cornibus iam formatur et fingitur arietinis, Saturnus cum obunca falce custos ruris, ut aliquis ramorum luxuriantium tonsor, cum petaso gnatus Maiae, tamquam vias adgredi praeparet et solem pulveremque declinet, Liber membris cum mollibus et liquoris feminei dissolutissimus laxitate, Venus nuda et aperta, | f. 126b | tamquam si illam dicas publicare, divendere meritorii corporis formam, cum pilleo Vulcanus et malleo, manu liber sed dextera et fabrili expeditione succinctus, cum plectro et fidibus Delius, citharistae gestus servans, cantaturi et nenias histrionis, cum fuscina rex maris, tamquam illi pugna sit gladiatorii obeunda certaminis: neque ullum est repperire figmentum alicuius numinis, quod non habitus certos ferat fabrorum o liberalitate donatos. 3. Ecce si aliquis vobis nescientibus et ignaris rex urbanus et callidus ex foribus suis Solem tollat et in Mercurii transferat sedem, Mercurium rursus arripiat atque in Solis faciat commigrare delubrum - uterque enim a vobis glaber atque ore compingitur levi - det que huic radios, Solis capiti petasioculum superponat: quibus modis internoscere poteritis, utrumne Sol iste sit an ille Mercurius, cum habitus vobis deos, non oris soleat proprietas indicare?

12.1. From such causes moreover it has come about, with you also closing your eyes, that in the bodies of the gods the wantonness of craftsmen should play and should give them forms which to any melancholy person may be a subject of derision. 2. Thus Hammon is shaped and fashioned with rams’ horns, Saturn with a hooked sickle keeper of the fields, like some barber of luxuriant branches; Maia’s son with a petasus, as if to prepare to walk the roads and to turn away sun and dust; Liber with soft limbs and loosened by the looseness of a feminine liquor, Venus naked and open, as if you would say to prostitute and vend the meretricious shape of a body; Vulcan with a cap and hammer, free in hand but girded at the right by craft and industriousness; Delian with a plectrum and strings, keeping the gestures of a citharist, to sing and to intone the actor’s songs; the king of the sea with a trident, as if to make of him a gladiator to be proved in battle: nor is there found any fabrication of any divinity which does not bear certain habits bestowed by the liberality of the artisans. 3. See, if some urbane and cunning king, without your knowing and unknowing, should take the Sun from his doors and transfer his seat into Mercury, should seize Mercury again and make him migrate into the temple of the Sun—for both are by you shaved and dressed at the mouth with a light cap—and should give rays to this one, place a little cap upon the head of the Sun: by these modes you will be able to distinguish whether that is the Sun or that Mercury, when to you the habit of the gods, not the property of their face, is wont to indicate them?

4. consimili rursus translatione si nudo Iovi cornua detrahat et Martis temporibus adfigat, Martem armis spoliet et his rursus circumcludat Hammonem: interstinctio fieri quae poterit singulorum, cum qui Iuppiter fuerat idem possit existimari Mars esse et qui Mavors fuerat subintroire speciem Iovis possit Hammonis? 5. Usque adeo ludus est simulacra ista confingere, nomina illis tamquam propria dedicare, quibus si habitum detrahas, tollatur cognitio singulorum, deus pro deo credi, alter videri pro altero, immo pro utroque uterque possit existimari.

4. by a similar translation again, if he were to strip the naked Jove of his horns and fasten them to the season/attributes of Mars, he will despoil Mars of his arms and in turn surround Hammon with them: what destruction of the individuals could there be, when he who had been Iuppiter might be thought to be Mars, and he who had been Mavors might insinuate the likeness of Iovis into Hammon? 5. So far goes the game of fabricating those simulacra, and of dedicating to them names as if proper, that if you strip away their habit, the recognition of the individuals is taken away; a god is believed for a god, one appears for another, nay for either each may be supposed.

13.1. Sed quid ego dis datas falces et fuscinas rideo, quid cornua, | f. 127 | malleos et galeros, cum simulacra quaedam sciam certorum ferre hominum formas et infamium liniamenta meretricum? 2. Quis est enim qui ignoret Athenienses illos Hermas Alcibiadi ad corporis similitudinem fabricatos? quis Praxitelen nescit, Posidippi si relegat, ad formam Cratinae meretricis, quam infelix perdite diligebat, os Veneris Gnidiae sollertiarum coegisse certamine?

13.1. But why do I laugh at the sickles and tridents given to the gods, why at the horns, | f. 127 | hammers and helmets, when I know that certain statues bear the likenesses of particular men and the features of notorious courtesans? 2. For who is there that does not know those Hermes of the Athenians fashioned to the bodily similitude of Alcibiades? who does not know Praxiteles—if one sets aside Posidippus—to have, by a contest of arts, forced the mouth of the Venus of Gnidos into the form of the courtesan Cratina, whom the unhappy man loved desperately?

3. Sed sola est haec Venus, cui de scorti wltu translaticium decus auctum est? Phryna illa Thespiaca, sicut illi referunt qui negotia Thespiaca scriptitarunt, cum in acumine ipso esset pulchritudinis, venustatis et floris, exemplarium fuisse perhibetur cunctarum quae in opinione sunt Venerum sive per urbes Graias sive iste quo fluxit amor talium cupiditasque signorum. 4. Itaque artifices omnes ipsis isdem qui temporibus extiterunt quibus que primas dabat exprimendarum similitudinum veritas omni cura studioque certabant filum capitis prostituti Cythereia in simulacra traducere, ardebant artificumscita.

3. But is this Venus alone, to whom by the face of a prostitute a transferred splendour has been added? That Phryna of Thespiae, as those report who penned Thespian affairs, while she was in the very acme of beauty, charm, and bloom, is said to have been the exemplar of all those that in common opinion are Venuses, whether through the Greek cities or by that channel through which the love and desire for such images flowed. 4. Therefore all the artificers — those very same who lived in the times when truth first supplied models to be expressed — strove with every care and zeal to translate the hair-thread of the prostituted Cytherean into simulacra; the arts burned with skill.

alterque alterum vincere contentiosa aemulatione quaerebant, non Venus ut augustior fieret sed ut Phryna pro Venere staret. 5. Atque ita perducta est res eo ut pro diis immortalibus sacra meretricibus fierent et infelix religio signorum fabricationibus falleretur. Inter significes ille memoratus Phidias est primus: cum Olympii formam Iovis molimine operis <is> extulisset inmensi, super dei digito: "PANTARCES - inscripsit - PULCHER" - nomen autem fuerat amati ab se pueri atque obscena cupiditate | f. 127b | dilecti - neque ullo metu est aut religione commotus deum nomine prostibuli nuncupare, quinimmo exoleto Iovis numen simulacrumque sacrare.

and each strove to vanquish the other by contentious emulation, not that Venus might grow more august but that Phryna might stand for Venus. 5. And so the matter was driven to the point that sacred rites for the immortal gods were performed by courtesans, and the unhappy religion of images was deceived by fabrications. Among the sign-makers that have been mentioned, Phidias is first: when he had raised the form of Olympian Jupiter by the labour of his work, of immense size, above the god’s finger he inscribed "PANTARCES — PULCHER" — the name, however, had been of a boy loved by him and cherished with obscene desire | f. 127b | — and he was moved by neither fear nor religion to call the god by the name of a brothel; nay, rather, to consecrate as sacred the numen and simulacrum of Jupiter.

6. Usque adeo ludus est et puerilis adfectio sigillaria ista formare, adorare prodis ea, sanctitatibus accumulare divinis, cum ipsos videamus artifices in effingendis his ludere et libidinum propriarum monumenta sancire. 7. Quid est enim, si quaeras, cur Phidias ludere ac lascivire dubitaret, cum ante paululum temporis Iovem ipsum quem fecerat sciret aurum fuisse, lapides atque ossa informia disparata confusa seque horum omnium congregatorem atque vinctorem, habitus eis per se datos [in] membrorum similitudine fabricata et, quod inter omnia primum est, sui esse beneficium muneris, quod natus ipse esset atque in rebus adoraretur humanis?

6. Such is this play and childish fancy of glyptic art to fashion images, to bring them forth and to adore them, to heave sanctities upon the divine, that we see the very artisans at play in making them and solemnizing the monuments of their own lusts. 7. For what is it, if you ask, that made Phidias hesitate to toy and to indulge, when just a little before he knew that the Jupiter he had made had been gold, stones and shapeless bones severed, mixed and confounded, and himself the gatherer and binder together of all these, forms given them by his own hand fashioned in the semblance of limbs and, which above all is first, the benefit of the gift to be his own — that he was born and yet adored among human things?

14.1. Libet in hoc loco, tamquam si omnes adsint terrarum ex orbe nationes, unam facere contionem atque in aures haec omnium communiter audienda depromere. 2. "Quidnam est istud, homines, quod ipsi vos ultro in tam promptis ac perspicuis rebus voluntaria fallitis et circumscribitis caecitate? 3. Discutite aliquando caliginem regressique ad lumen mentis intuemini propius et videte istud quod agitur quale sit, si modo retinetis ius vestrum atque in finibushis datae rationis consiliique versamini.

14.1. It pleases me in this place, as if all the nations of the earth were present, to make one assembly and to bring forth into the ears what must be heard commonly by all. 2. "What is this, men, that you yourselves voluntarily deceive and circumscribe with blindness in matters so ready and perspicuous? 3. Dissipate the darkness once and, having returned to the light of the mind, look more closely and see that which is being done what sort it is, if only you retain your right and direct your counsel and reason given within these boundshis.

4. Simulacra ista quae vos terrent quaeque templis in omnibus prostrati atque humiles adoratis ossa lapides aera sunt, argentum aurum testa, ligum sumptum ex arbore aut commixtum glutinum gypso, ex ornatibus fortas| f. 128 |se meretriciis aut ex muliebri mundo, camellinis ex ossibus aut exIndici animalis dente, ex caccabulis, ollulis, ex candelabris et lucernis aut ex aliis obscenioribus vasculis congesta, conflata in has species ducta sunt atque in formas quas cernitis exierunt, fornacibus incocta figulinis, ex incudibus et malleis nata, grosis rasa, discobinata de limis, serris furfuraculis asceis secta dolata effossa, terebrarum excavata vertigine, runcinarum levigata de planis". 5. Ita iste non error est, non ut proprie dicatur amentia, deum credere quem tute ipse formaris, subplicare tremibundum fabricatae abs te rei, et cum scias et certus sis tui esse operis et digitorum partum, pronum in faciem ruere, opem rogare suppliciter adversisque in rebus atque in temporibus asperis propitii numinis favore succurrere?".

4. Those images that terrify you, which you, prostrate in all temples and humble, adore — bones, stones, bronze, silver, gold, potsherd, wood taken from a tree or mixed with glue, gypsum; from trappings, dressings of harlots or of a woman’s toilette, camel-bone from bones or from the tooth of anIndian animal, from cooking-pots, little pots, from candelabra and lamps or from other more obscene little vessels piled together — fashioned into these shapes and brought out into the forms which you behold, baked in kilns, born from anvils and hammers, scraped with knives, smoothed from filings, sawn with saws, planed with planes, cut with chisels, hollowed by the whirling of drills, leveled by adzes and runcinae. fortas| f. 128 |se. 5. Thus this is no error, not properly to be called madness, to believe a god whom you yourself make, to supplicate, trembling, the thing fashioned by your hand, and when you know and are certain that it is your work and the product of fingers, to fall prone upon your face, to beg help suppliantly and to entreat that against adverse circumstances and harsh times the favour of the deity may succour you?

15.1. Ecce si aliquis ponat in medio aes rude atque in opera nulla coniectum, argenti massas indomiti infectumque aurum, lignum, lapides atque ossa resque alias cetera? quibus signa consueta sunt et numinum simulacra constare, immo si aliquis ponat in medio conlisorum deorum vultus, confracta atque inminuta simulacra iubeatque vos idem frustis hostias et fragminibus caedere, informibus massis sacra et munia inpertire divina: audire a vobis exposcimus facturine istud sitis an contra quam imperabitur recusaturi? 2. Fortasse dicetis: "Qua causa?". - Quia nemo est in rebus humanis tam stolide caecus, qui argentum aes aurum gypsum ebur argillam deorum in numerum u referat ipsaque | f. 128b | per se dicat vim habere atque optinere divinam.

15.1. Behold, if someone were to place in the midst an unworked bronze and nothing wrought from it, masses of silver, untamed and unworked gold, wood, stones and bones and other things likewise — to which accustomed signs and simulacra of the gods are affixed — nay, if someone were to set in the middle the faces of joined gods, broken and reduced simulacra, and were to bid you to strike the same with scraps and fragments, to confer sacred rites and offerings upon formless masses and to bestow divine ministrations: we ask of you whether you will do this of your own will or whether you will refuse contrary to what is commanded? 2. Perhaps you will say: "For what reason?" — Because there is no one in human affairs so foolishly blind who would refer silver, bronze, gold, gypsum, ivory, clay, the gods, to a number and say that they themselves by their nature have force and possess divinity | f. 128b |.

3. Quaenam est ergo ratio, ut si omnia haec corpora intacta atque infecta permanserint, careant vi numinis atque auctoritate caelesti: ea formas si accipiant hominum, si auriculas nasos buccas labra oculos cilia, continuo dii fiant et in ordinem caelitum referantur et censum? 4. Novitatis aliquid fictio corporibus his addit, ut adiectione ipsa cogamini aliquid eis credere divinitatis maiestatisque conlatum? 5. In aurum aes mutat aut testulae vilitatem in argenteam cogit degenerare materiam?

3. What then is the reason, that if all these bodies remain intact and unworked, they lack the force of the numen and celestial authority: if they take on the forms of humans, if ears, noses, cheeks, lips, eyes, eyelashes are given, do they straightaway become gods and are restored into the order of the caelites and into the census? 4. Does some fiction of novelty add anything to these bodies, so that by that very addection you are compelled to believe that something of divinity and majesty has been conferred upon them? 5. Does copper change into gold, or do the vilenesses of potsherds drive the matter to degenerate into silver?

Quae insensilia fuerunt paulo ante, facit ut sint viva et spiritali agitatione moveantur? 6. Si quas foris habuere naturas eas omnes retinent simulacrorum in corporibus constituta, stupiditas quae tanta est - detrecto enim dicere caecitatem - rerum existimare naturas formarum qualitate mutari et accipere numen ex habitu quod in primigenio corpore iners fuerit et brutum et sensus mobilitate privatum.

Do those things which a little before were insensate make them alive and moved by a spiritual agitation? 6. If those things which externally had natures retain them all when set in the bodies of simulacra, what great stupidity it is — for I refuse to call it blindness — to judge that the natures of things are changed by the quality of their forms and that they receive a numen from the appearance which in the original body was inert and brutish and deprived of the mobility of sense.

16.1. Itaque immemores et obliti simulacrorum substantiae atque originis, quae sit, rationale homines anima, et sapientiae munere consiliique donatum coctilibus testis succumbitis, aeris lamminas adoratis, elephantorum ab dentibus secundas poscitis valetudines, magistratus imperia, potestates victorias adquisitiones lucra, messes optimas feracissimasque vindemias, et cum pateat, luceat, rebus fieri verba cum brutis, exaudiri vos remini ipsique vos ultro credulitatis vacuae circumscriptione traducitis? 2. O utinam liceret in simulacri alicuius medias introire | f. 129 | pendiigines, immo utinam liceret Olympiacos illos et Capitolinos Ioves diducere in membra resolutos omnesque illas partes quibus summa concluditur corporum discretas ac singulas contueri: iamdudum istos videretis deos, quos exterior levitas lenocinio fulgoris augustat, lamminarum flebilium esse crates, particularum coagmenta deformium, ab ruinarum casibus et dissolutionis metu subscudibus et catenis, uncis atque ansulis retentari interque omnes sinus commissurarumque iuncturas plumbum ire suffusum et salutares moras signorum diuturnitatibus commodare. 3. Videretis, inquam, iamdudum solas sine occipitiis facies, manus sine bracchiis semiplenas, ventres cum lateribus dimidiatos, plantarum inperfecta vestigia, et quod maxime risum ferat, parte ligneos (eos) ex una, at ex altera saxeos, inaequabili corporum constructione contractos.

16.1. And so, forgetful and oblivious of the substance and origin of the simulacra — what it is, a human soul rational and endowed with the office and counsel of wisdom? — you, witnesses of baked-clay things, succumb; you adore sheets of bronze, you demand secondhand healths from elephant teeth, you worship magistrates’ commands, powers, victories, acquisitions, profits, the best and most fruitful harvests, and when it is evident, when it shines, that things become words with brutes, that you yourselves are heard and, further, you lead yourselves astray by the very circumscription of empty credulity? 2. O that it were permitted to enter into the midst of some simulacrum’s casing | f. 129 | pendiginēs, yea O that it were permitted to lay open those Olympian and Capitoline Ioves, to separate them into limbs and resolve them and to behold each of those parts by which the bulk of bodies is confined, discrete and singular: you would long since have seen that those gods whom outward lightness magnifies in the glamour of splendour are cages of lamentable sheets, aggregates of deformed particulars, held up with the fear of collapse and dissolution by props and chains, retained with hooks and staples, and among all the hollows and junctions of their seams you would see lead poured and salutary delays provided to the duration of the signs. 3. You would see, I say, already faces without occiputs alone, hands without arms half-full, bellies halved with flanks, imperfect traces of feet, and what brings most laughter, partly wooden, on one side, but on the other stony, contracted in an unequal construction of bodies.

4. Quae si utique perspici obscuritatis arte non quirent, vel ipsa vos saltem quae in medio sita sunt docere atque monere debuerunt, agere vos nihil et circa res cassas officiorum impendere vanitates. 5. Ita enim non videtis spirantia haec signa, quorum plantas et genua contingitis et contrectatis orantes, modo casibus stillicidiorum labi, putredinis modo carie relaxari, ut nidoribus atque fumo suffita ac decolorata nigrescant, quemadmodum saecli longioris incuria perdant situ species et robigine convulnerentur exesa? 6. Ita, inquam, non videtis sub istorum simulacrorum cuivis steliones sorices mures blattasque lucifugas nidamenta ponere | f. 129b | atque habitare, spurcitias huc omnes atque alia usibus accommodata conducere, semirosi duritias panis [pannis], ossa in spem tracta, pannos lanuginem chartulas nidulorum in mollitiem sollicite, miserorum fomenta pullorum?

4. If indeed they do not seek to perceive these things by the art of removing obscurity, at least they should have taught and warned you about those images which stand in the middle, that you do nothing and lavish vanities around empty matters of duty. 5. For thus you do not see these living signs, whose feet and knees you touch and handle while they pray, now to drop by the occurrences of trickling, now to be loosened by putrefaction and decay, so that having been smeared with odors and smoke and discolored they blacken, even as the neglect of a longer age destroys their form and wounds them with rust, eating them away? 6. Thus, I say, do you not see mice and shrews and cockroaches that avoid the light placing nests under any of those images’ bases | f. 129b | and dwelling there, bringing in all filth and other things fit for use, half-rotten hard crusts of bread [rags], bones drawn in hope, rags, lint, scraps, the soft papers of nests carefully, the miserable fomentations of chicks?

7. Non in ore aliquando simulacri ab araneis ordiri retia atque insidiosos casses, quibus volatus innectere stridularum possint inpudentiumque muscarum? Non hirundines denique intra ipsos aedium circumvolantes tholos iacularier stercoris plenas et modo ipsos vultus, modo numinum ora depingere, barbam oculos nasos aliasque omnis partes, in quascumque se detulerit deonerati proluvies podicis? 8. Erubescite ergo vel sero atque ab animantibus mutis vias, rationes accipite doceantque vos eadem nihil numinis inesse simulacris, in quae obscena deicere neque metuunt neque vitant leges suas sequentia et instincta veritate naturae.

7. Are there not sometimes on the mouth of a simulacrum nets woven by spiders and treacherous snares, whereby the flight of chirping crickets and of shameless flies may be entangled? Are not swallows, moreover, flying about within the very houses, flinging dung‑filled pellets at the domes and now smearing the faces themselves, now the mouths of the gods, painting beard, eyes, noses and all other parts with whatever filth of the privy they have carried? 8. Be ashamed then, if belatedly, and learn the ways from mute animals; accept their reasons and let them teach you the same thing — that there is nothing of divinity in those images into which obscene things are cast, nor do they fear or avoid the laws which follow and are implanted by the truth of nature.

17.1. "Sed erras, inquit, et laberis: nam neque nos aera neque auri argentiqule materias neque alias quibus signa confiunt eas esse per se deos et religiosa decernimus numina, sed eos in his colimus eosque veneramur quos dedicatio infert sacra et fabrilibus efficit inhabitare simulacris". 2. - Non improba neque aspernabilis ratio, qua possit quivis tardus nec non et prudentissimus credere, deos relictis sedibus propriis id est caelo non recusare nec fugere habitacula inire terrena, quinimmo iure dedicationis inpulsos simulacrorum coalescere vinctioni. 3. In gypso ergo mansitant atque | f. 130 | in testulis dii vestri, quinimmo testularum et gypsi mentes, spiritus atque animae dii sunt? 4. Atque ut fieri augustiores vilissimae res possint, concludi se patiuntur et in sedis obscurae coercitione latitare?

17.1. "But you err, he says, and you slip: for neither do we decree the bronzes, nor the materials of gold and silver, nor other substances with which images are fashioned, to be gods in themselves and sacred numina; but we worship in these, and we venerate those whom dedication brings in, consecrates with sacred rites, and by artisanal works makes to inhabit the simulacra." 2. — Not an evil nor despicable reasoning, by which anyone, even the slowest and also the most prudent, may believe that the gods, having left their own seats, that is, heaven, do not refuse nor flee to enter earthly dwellings, nay rather, driven by the right of dedication, coalesce into the bond of images. 3. Do your gods therefore dwell in gypsum and | f. 130 | on tiles, nay are the minds, spirits, and souls of tiles and gypsum gods? 4. And that the vilest things may become more august, do they suffer themselves to be shut up and to lurk in the confinement of a dark seat?

5. Ergo illud a vobis parte in hac primum desideramus et postulamus audire: "Invitine hoc faciunt, id est iure dedicationis adtracti simulacrorum ineunt mansiones an proni et faciles neque ullis necessitatibus inrogatis?". 6. "Inviti hoc faciunt?". - Et qui fieri potis est ut in aliquam necessitatem inminuta maiestate cogantur? "Voluntariae obsecutionis adsensu?". - Et quid in testulis dii petunt, ut eas sedibus sidereis anteponant?vinctione sint ut propemodum colligati nobilitantes testulas et cetera quibus signa confiunt?

5. Therefore this we first desire and demand to hear from you in part: "Do they do this unwillingly, that is, drawn by the right of dedication into the dwellings of simulacra, or inclined and facile, not constrained by any necessities imposed?" 6. "Do they do this unwillingly?" — And how is it possible that, by diminished majesty, they should be driven into any necessity? "By the assent of voluntary subjection?" — And what do your gods seek in tiles, that they should set them before sidereal abodes?that they be by a bond as if nearly bound, ennobling the tiles and the other things by which images are formed?

18.1. Quid ergo? in materiis talibus semperne dii mansitant neque abeunt uspiam, etiam si res postulaverit maxima, an habent itus liberos, cum libuerit abire quocumque et ab suis sedibus simulacrisque discedere? 2. Si permanendi necessitatem patiuntur, quid miserius his esse aut quid infelicius poterit, quam si eos in basibus ita unci retinent et plumbeae vinctiones?

18.1. What then? In such materials do the gods always dwell and never go anywhere, even if the greatest need demands it, or do they have free exits, to go away wherever they please and to depart from their seats and simulacra? 2. If they suffer the necessity of remaining, what could be more miserable for them or more unhappy than if they are thus held fast in bases by hooked and leaden bonds?

3. Sed concedamus ut caelo et sidereis sedibus anteponant: divinitatis suae perdiderint potestatem; sin autem cum voluerint evolant et absolutum ius habent inania relinquere simulacra, ergo aliquo tempore desinent esse dii signa et in dubio stabit, quando sacra debeant reddi, quando his conveniat atque oporteat abstinere. 4. Saepenumero videmus ab artificibus haec signa modo parvula fieri et palmarem in minutiem contrahi, modo | f. 130b | in immensum tolli et admirabilem in amplitudinem sublevari. Ratione hac ergo sequitur ut intellegere debeamus in sigilliolis parvulis contrahere se deos et alieni ad corporis similitudinem coartari, at vero in vastis porrigere se longius atque in maximitate producere.

3. But let us concede that they place before heaven and the starry seats: they have destroyed the potency of their divinity; but if, when they wish, they fly forth and have an absolute right to abandon empty simulacra, then for some time they will cease to be gods and it will be doubtful when sacred rites ought to be restored, when it is fitting and proper to abstain from them. 4. Very often we see by artificers these images now made small and contracted into a palm‑size minuteness, now | f. 130b | raised into immensity and exalted to an admirable amplitude. By this reasoning therefore it follows that we must understand that in little sigilliols the gods contract themselves and are cramped, alien to the likeness of a body, whereas in vast ones they stretch themselves farther and are produced in greatest magnitude.

5. Ergo si hoc ita est, et in sedentibus signis deum sedere dicendum est et in stantibus stare, in procurrentibus currere, iacularier in iacientibus tela, ad illorum formare atque aptare se vultus et ad reliquos habitus figurati corporis similitudinem commodare.

5. Therefore if this is so, then in seated signs the god must be said to sit, and in standing ones to stand, in those running forward to run, in those hurling to cast weapons, in those lying down to lie; they form and adapt their faces to those postures and accommodate the remaining attitudes to the likeness of the shaped body.

19.1. "In simulacris dii habitant". - Singuline in singulis toti an partiliter atque in membra divisi? Nam neque unus deus in conpluribus potis est uno tempore inesse simulacris neque rursus in partes sectione interveniente divisus. 2. Constituamus enim decem milia simulacrorum toto esse in orbe Vulcani: numquid esse ut dixi decem omnibus in milibus potis est unus uno in tempore?

19.1. "In simulacris dii habitant." - Singly in each, wholly or sharewise and divided into members? For neither is one god able to be in many simulacra at one time, nor again, when a sectioning division intervenes, is he divided into parts. 2. For suppose there are ten thousand simulacra in the whole circle of Vulcan: is it possible, as I said, that one is able to be in all ten thousand, one in every thousand, at one time?

Non, opinor. Qua causa? quia quae sunt privata singulariaque natura multa fieri nequeunt simplicitatis suae integritate servata, et hoc amplius nequeunt, si hominum formas dii habent, opinatio ut vestra declarat.

No, I think not. For what cause? Because those things which are private and singular by nature cannot be many while their simplicity's integrity is preserved, nor can they any more, if the gods have the forms of men, as your opinion declares.

3. Neque enim manus a capite separata aut pes divisus a corpore summam possunt praestare totius, aut dicendum est portiones idem posse quod totum, cum consistere nequeat, nisi fuerit partium congregatione conflatum. 4. Si autem in cunctis idem esse dicetur, perit omnis ratio atque integritas veritatis, si hoc fuerit sumptum, posse unum in omnibus uno tempore permanere: aut | f. 131 | deorum est unusquisque dicendus ita ipsum semet ab ipso sese dividere, ut et ipse sit et alter, non aliquo discrimine separatus sed ipse idem et alius. 5. Quod quoniam recusat et respuit aspernaturque natura, aut innumeros dicendum est confitendumque esse Vulcanos, si in cunctis volumus eum degere atque inesse simulacris, aut erit in nullo, quia esse divisus natura prohibetur in plurimis.

3. For neither can a hand separated from the head nor a foot severed from the body give the sum of the whole, nor is it to be said that a portion can do the same as the whole, since a whole cannot subsist unless it has been conglutinated by the congregation of its parts. 4. But if it is said that the same thing is in all, every principle and integrity of truth perishes, if this is taken to mean that one can remain one in all at one and the same time: or | f. 131 | each of the gods must be said and confessed to divide himself from himself so that he is both himself and another, not separated by any distinction but himself the same and other. 5. Since nature refuses, repels, and scorns this, either innumerable Vulcans must be said and admitted, if we would have him dwell and be present in all the images, or he will be in none, because nature forbids being divided into many.

20.1. "Et tamen, o isti, si apertum vobis et liquidum oo est, in signorum visceribus deos vivere atque habitare caelites, cur eos sub validissimis clavibus ingentibusque sub claustris, sub repagulis, pessulis aliisque huiusmodi rebus custoditis, conservatis atque habetis inclusos, ac ne forte fur aliquis aut nocturnus inrepat latro, aedituis mille protegitis atque excubitoribus mille?". 2. Cur canes in Capitoliis pascitis? cur anseribus victum alimoniaque praebetis? Quinimmo si fiditis deos istic esse nec ab signis uspiam simulacrisque discedere, permittite illis curam sui, reserata sint semper atque aperta delubra, ac si quid a quopiam temeraria fuerit fraude subreptum, vim numinis monstrent et sub ipso furti atque operis nomine sacrilegos poenis convenientibus figant.

20.1. "And yet, O you people, if it is open and plain to you that the heavenly gods live and dwell in the entrails of the signs, why do you keep them shut up and enclosed under very strong bars and great locks, under bolts, under bars, hasps and other such things, guarded, preserved and held enclosed, and, lest perhaps some thief or nocturnal robber creep in, protect them with a thousand doors and a thousand watchmen?" 2. Why are dogs fed on the Capitolia? why do you provide victuals and sustenance with geese? Nay, if you trust that the gods are there and do not withdraw from the signs and images anywhere, permit them the care of themselves: let the shrines be always unlocked and open, and if anything has been stealthily taken by some rash fraud, let them show the force of the numen and affix on the sacrilegists, under the very name of theft and of the deed, penalties that are fitting.

3. Indigna enim res est et potentiam destruens auctoritatem ue, summorum custodiam numinum canum sollicitudinibus credere, et cum aliquam quaeras prohibendis formidinemfuribus, non ab ipsis petere sed in anserum ponere et collocare gingritibus.

3. For it is an unworthy thing, and destructive of power and authority, to entrust the guardianship of the highest gods to the care of dogs, and when you seek some dread to keep off robbers, not to ask it from the gods themselves but to place and set it upon geese and such trifles.

21.1. Antiochum Cyzicenum ferunt decem cubitorum Iovem ex delubro aureum sustulisse et ex aere bratteolis | f. 131b | substituisse fucatum. Si in simulacris praestosunt atque habitant dii suis, quibus negotiis Iuppiter, quibus curis fuerat inligatus, quominus privatas persequeretur iniurias et subpositum se sibi viliore in materia vindicaret? 2. Dionysius ille sed iunior, cum velamine aureo spoliaret Iovem et pro illo laneum subderet, iocularibus etiam facetiis ludens, cum esse illud in rigoribus algidum, hoc vaporum, onerosum illud in aestatibus diceret, hoc rursus sub ardoribus flabile: ubinam fuerat rex poli, ut praesentem se esse formidine aliqua conprobaret et urbanum scurrulam cruciatibus revocaret ad seria?

21.1. They report that Antiochus of Cyzicus took down a ten-cubit Jupiter from his shrine, and in place of the golden one substituted one painted from bronze plates. If the gods are present in and dwell in their images, by what affairs and what cares was Jupiter bound, that he should not pursue private injuries and should not vindicate himself when a cheaper material was set up in his stead? 2. And that same Dionysius the Younger, when he stripped Jupiter of his golden veil and put a woollen one beneath it, jesting with facetious quips, saying that the one was cold in frosts, this one of vapours, that burdensome in summers, this again flammable under the heats — where then was the king of the sky, that he might prove himself present by some dread and call back the urbane buffoon from his jests to serious punishments?

3. Nam quid Aesculapii gravitatem ab eo esse commemorem risam? quem cum barba spoliaret amplissima boni ponderis et philosophae densitatis, facinus esse dicebat indignum, ex Apolline procreatum patre levi et glabro simillimoque inpuberi ita barbatum filium fingi, ut in ancipiti relinquatur, uter eorum pater sit, uter filius, immo an sint generis et cognationis unius. 4. Quae cum omnia fierent et cum sacrilegis praedo inrisionibus loqueretur, si suberat numen in statua nomini eius maiestatique sacrata, cur oris contumeliam levigati et dehonestati vultus non iusta et merita persecutus est ultione demonstravitque hoc facto et se esse praesentem et custodia pertinaci suas aedes simulacraque tutari?

3. For why should the gravity of Aesculapius be remembered by him as a laughter? whom, when he stripped the beard of most ample good weight and of the density of philosophy, he called an unworthy deed — that from Apollo a father should beget a slight and beardless and very boyish son, and that a son should be made so bearded that it is left double-faced which of them is father, which son, nay whether they are of one gens and cognation. 4. And when all these things were done and when he spoke with sacrilegious pirate-like mockeries, if a numen was present in the statue consecrated to his name and majesty, why did he not pursue with just and merited vengeance the affront to the smoothed and dishonored visage, and by that deed show that he was present and by stubborn guardianship protected his house and his simulacra?

22.1. "Nisi forte neclegere deos dicetis haec damna nec putare esse idoneam causam, propter quam se exserant et nocentibus poenam violatae religionis infligant". 2. - Ergo si haec ita sunt, nec simulacra ipsi habere desiderant, | f. 132 | quae convelli et diripi perpetiuntur inpune, immo e contrario perdocent aspernari se illa, in quibus spretos ultione in aliqua significare non curant. 3. Philostephanus in Cypriacis auctor est, Pygmalionem regem Cypri simulacrum Veneris, quod sanctitatis apud Cyprios et religionis habebatur antiquae, adamasse ut feminam mente anima lumine rationis iudicioque caecatis solitumque dementem, tamquam si uxoria res esset, sublevato in lectulum numine copularier amplexibus atque ore resque alias agere libidinis vacuae imaginatione frustrabiles. 4. Consimili ratione Posidippus in eo libro, quem scriptum super Cnido indicat superque rebus eius, adulescentem haud ignobilem memorat - sed vocabulum eius obscurat - correptum amoribus Veneris, propter quam Cnidus in nomine est, amatorias et ipsum miscuisse lascivias cum eiusdem numinis signo genialibus usum toris et voluptatum consequentium finibus.

22.1. "Unless perhaps you will say that the gods neglect these losses and do not deem them a fitting cause, for which they thrust themselves forth and inflict punishment on the wrongdoers for violated religion." 2. - Therefore if these things are so, nor do they themselves desire to have the images which are torn away and ripped apart with impunity, nay rather they teach that they spurn those things in which, having been scorned, they do not care to signify themselves by any vengeance. | f. 132 | 3. Philostephanus in the Cypriacis is an authority that Pygmalion, king of Cyprus, loved a simulacrum of Venus, which among the Cyprians was held to be of antiquity and of sacred religion, so much that, his mind, soul, sight, reason, and judgment blinded, and grown wont to madness, he treated it as if it were a wedded woman: raised by divine power into a little bed, he joined it in embraces and with his mouth and performed other acts, deceived by the empty imagination of lust. 4. In a like fashion Posidippus, in that book which he marks as written concerning Cnidus and concerning its matters, relates a youth not ignoble — though he conceals his name — seized by the loves of Venus, on whose account the place is called Cnidus, and says that he mingled amorous lasciviousness even with the emblem of that same divinity, with connubial uses of beds and the attendant limits of pleasures.

5. Ut similiter rursum interrogem: "Si in aere atque in materiis ceteris quibus signa formata sunt superorum potentiae delitiscunt: ubinam gentium fuerant una atque altera Veneres, ut inpudicam patulantiem iuvenum propulsarent ab se longe et contactus impios cruciabili coercitione punirent? 6. Aut quoniam mites et ingeniis tranquillioribus deae sunt, quantum fuerat, miseris furialia ut restinguerent gaudia mentemque in sanam recreatis redducerent sensibus?".

5. And likewise again I ask: "If the powers of the heavenly ones lurk in the air and in the other materials out of which images are formed, where had the one and the other Venuses of the nations been, so that they might drive far from them the shameless, widespread licentiousness of youths and punish impious contacts with a crucial coercion? 6. Or since the goddesses are milder and of more tranquil minds, to what end would it have been, for the wretched, to extinguish those frenzied joys and, with their senses restored, to lead the mind back into sound health?"

23.1. Nisi forte, ut vos fertis, libidinis et voluptatum deae contumelias istas habuere gratissimas nec ultione facinus | f. l32b | existimavere condignum quod suas quoque mulceret mentes et quod ab se subdi humanis cupiditatibus scirent. 2. Sed si deae Veneres ingeniis placidioribus praeditae gerendum esse morem infortuniis iudicavere caecorum, cum Capitolium totiens edax ignis absumeret Iovemque ipsum Capitolinum cum uxore corripuisset ac filia, ubinam fulminator tempore illo fuit, ut sceleratum illud arceret incendium et a pestifero casu res suas ac semet et cunctam familiam vindicaret? 3. ubi Iuno regina, cum inclutum eius fanum sacerdotemque Chrysidem eadem vis flammae Argiva in civitate deleret?

23.1. Unless perhaps, as you assert, they held those affronts to the goddess most pleasing because of lust and voluptuousness, and judged the crime worthy of chastisement | f. l32b | which also soothed their own minds and which they knew to be subject to human cupidities. 2. But if the Veneres, endowed with milder wits, judged that one ought to conduct oneself with calmness amid misfortunes to the blind, when the Capitol so often was consumed by devouring fire and had seized even Jupiter the Capitoline with his wife and daughter, where then was the thunderer at that time to drive off that wicked conflagration and to vindicate his possessions and himself and his whole household from the pestilential disaster? 3. Where was Juno the queen, when that same force of flame destroyed his famed shrine and the priest Chryses in the Argive city?

ubi Serapis Aegyptius, cum consimili casu iacuit solutus in cinerem cum mysteriis omnibus atque Iside? ubi Liber Eleutherius, cum Athenis? ubi Diana, cum Ephesi?

where was Serapis the Egyptian, when, with a like fate, he lay dissolved into ash with all his mysteries and Isis? where was Liber Eleutherius, when Athens? where was Diana, when Ephesus?

ubi Dodonaeus Iuppiter, cum Dodonae? 4. ubi denique Apollo divinus, cum a piratis maritimisque praedonibus et spoliatus ita est et incensus, ut ex tot auri ponderibus quae infinita congesserant saecula ne unum quidem habuerit scripulum quod hirundinibus hospitis, Varro ut dicit set Menippeus, ostenderet? 5. Infiniti operis res est toto in orbe describere quae sint fana convulsa terrae motibus et tempestatibus, quae incensa ab hostibus, quae ab regibus et tyrannis, quae antistites, et sacerdotes et ipsi suspicione aversa nudaverint, quae ad ultimum fures et obserata pandentes remediorum obscuritate canacheni: quae tuta utique permanerent et nullis obnoxia fortuitis, si adessent dii praesides aut haberent aliquas templorum quemadmodum dicitur curas.

where was Dodonaean Jupiter, when Dodona? 4. where, finally, Apollo divinus, when he was so despoiled and set on fire by pirates and sea-rovers that of the countless weights of gold which the ages had heaped up he did not have even one small coin to show to the swallow of hospitality, as Varro says but Menippeus? 5. It would be an endless task to describe through the whole orb the things that are temples torn down by earthquakes and storms, which have been burned by enemies, which by kings and tyrants, which bishops and priests themselves, turned away by suspicion, have stripped bare, which at last thieves and bolted doors, opening remedies in the obscurity of canacheni: which would certainly remain safe and subject to no chance, if the presiding gods were present or if they had some oversight of the temples, as is said.

Nunc, vero quia cassa sunt et nullis | f. 133 | habitatoribus tecta, habet in illis fortuna ius suum, et perinde cunctis obiecta sunt casibus quam sunt omnia cetera motu interiore privata.

Now, however, because the dwellings are empty and the roofs have no inhabitants | f. 133 |, fortune has its right in them, and they are exposed to all mishaps just as all other things are, deprived of their inward motion.

24.1. "In parte hac eadem illud etiam dicere simulacrorum adsertores solent, non ignorasse antiquos nihil habere numinis signa neque ullum omnino inesse his sensum, sed propter indomitum atque inperitum vulgus, quae pairs in populis atque in civitatibus maxima est, salutariter ea consilioque formasse, ut velut quadam specie obiecta his numinum abicerent asperitatem metu arbitratique praesentibus sese sub dis agere facta impia deputarent et ad humana officia morum immutatione transirent: 2. nec propter aliam causam venerabiles formas auro eis argento que quaesitas, nisi ut adesse vis quaedam ipsis in fulgoribus crederetur, quae non oculorum tantum perstringeret sensum, verum etiam mentes ipsas augustissimae lucis radiationibus territaret". 3. Quod ratione cum aliqua videretur forsitam dici, si post condita deorum templa atque instituta simulacra nullus esset in mundo malus, nulla omnino nequitia, iustitia pax fides mortalium pectora possideret neque quisquam in terris nocens neque innocens diceretur, scelerosa opera nescientibus cunctis. 4. Nunc vero cum contra malis omnia plena sint, innocentiae paene interierit nomen, per momenta, per puncta examina maleficiorum nova noxiorum improbitate pariantur, dicere qui convenit, ad incutiendas formidines vulgo deorum instituta simulacra, cum praeter innumeras criminum et facinorum | f. 133b | formas ipsa etiam videamus templa sacrilegis violationibus adpeti ab tyrannis, ab regibus, ab latronibus et nocturnis a furibus ipsosque illos deos quos ad metus faciendos vetus finxit et consecravit antiquitas vadere in antra praedonum cum ipsis suis aureis metuendisque fulgoribus?

24.1. "In this same part those who assert about images also are accustomed to say this: that the ancients were not unaware that the signs had no divine power nor that any meaning at all resided in them, but for the unbridled and inexperienced common people — which is, among peoples and in cities, the greatest thing — they healthfully and by design fashioned those things, so that, as if by a certain appearance placed before them, they might cast away the harshness of the gods through fear and, thinking themselves present with the gods, account their deeds impious and pass over to human offices by a change of customs: 2. nor would they have adorned the venerable forms with gold and silver for any other cause than that a certain force might be believed to be present in their brightnesses, which would not only strike the sense of the eyes but also terrify the minds themselves with the radiation of most august light." 3. Which might perhaps seem to be said with some reason, if after the founding of temples of the gods and the established images no one in the world were wicked, there were absolutely no vice, justice, peace, and faith possessed the breasts of mortals, nor would anyone on earth be called guilty or innocent, with criminal acts unknown to all. 4. But now, since everything is full of the opposite — the name of innocence has almost perished; by moments, by points of examination new crimes of worse sort are born through wickedness — who ought to say that the instituted images of the gods are fit to cast terror among the people, when besides innumerable forms of crimes and atrocious deeds | f. 133b | we ourselves see temples themselves assailed by sacrilegious violations by tyrants, by kings, by brigands and nocturnal thieves, and those very gods whom ancient tradition contrived and consecrated to produce fear go into the caves of robbers with their own golden and fearsome brightnesses?

25.1. Quid enim, si verum et sine ulla gratificatione perspicias, signa ista quae dicunt habent in se magnum, ut merito sperarit atque existimarit antiquitas conspectu in illorum posse frangi hominum vitia et mores et maleficia temperari? 2. Falx messoria scilicet, quae est attributa Saturno, metum fuerat iniectura mortalibus, vitam vellent ut pacificam degere ac malitiosas abicere voluntates, fronte Ianus ancipiti aut dentata illa qua insignitus est clavis, riciniatus Iuppiter atque barbatus, dextra fomitem sustinens perdolatum in fulminis morem, Iunonius ille caestus, aut militari sub galea puellula delitiscens, deum Mater tympano, cum tibiis et cum psalteriis Musae, Mercuriuspinnatus, anguifero nitens Aesculapius baculo, Caeres mammis cum grandibus aut in Liberi dextera pendens potorius cantharus, Mulciber fabrili cum habitu aut Fortuna cum cornu pomis ficis aut frugibus autumnalibus pleno, semitectis femoribus Diana aut ad libidinem concitans Venus nuda, Anubis canina cum facie aut genitalibus propriis inferior Priapus.

25.1. For what if you perceive truly and without any gratification, that these images which they say possess in themselves so great a force, that antiquity rightly hoped and judged by their sight men’s vices and mores could be broken and maleficia tempered? 2. The reaping-sickle, to be sure, which is attributed to Saturn, was meant to inspire fear in mortals, that they would wish to lead a peaceful life and cast away malicious wills; Janus two-faced in front or that toothed key with which he is marked, Jupiter riciniate and bearded, in his right hand sustaining a tinderbox struck like a thunderbolt, that Junoian cestus, or a little maiden hiding beneath a military helmet, the god Mother tympanum, with tibiae and with psalteries the Muses, Mercurypinnatus, Aesculapius shining with a serpent-bearing staff, Ceres with ample breasts or Libera with a drinking cantharus hanging on her right hand, Mulciber in a smith’s garb or Fortune with a horn full of figs or autumnal fruits, Diana with semibared thighs or Venus naked, rousing to lust, Anubis canine-faced or lower Priapus with his proper genitals.

26.1. O species formidinum dirae metuendique terrores, propter quos genus hominum torpedine in perpetua adfigeretur, nihil moliretur attonitum ab omnique se actu sceleroso | f. 134 | flagitiosoque frenaret: falciculae claves caliandria fomites talaria baculi tympaniola tibiae psalteria, mammae promptae atque ingentes, cantharuli forcipes cornua que pomifera, nuda corpora feminarum et veretrorum magnitudines publicatae! 2. Nonne satius fuerat saltitare, cantare quam sub titulo gravitatis et severitatis obtentu tam frigida tamque inepta narrare simulacra ab antiquis ad peccata cohibenda et ad nocentium formata impiorumque formidines? 3. Usque adeone mortales saeculi illius ac temporis corde fuerant vacui, rationis sensusque nullius, ut ab actionibus improbis tamquam parvuli pusiones personarum monstruosissima torvitate, sannis etiam constringerentur et maniis?

26.1. O apparitions of dread and terrors to be feared, on account of which the race of men would have been fastened in perpetual torpor, nothing would they have set about, struck senseless and restrained from every wicked and criminal act | f. 134 |: little sickles, keys, caliandra, tinder, winged sandals, staffs, little tambours, pipes, psalteries, breasts ready and enormous, little pitchers, tongs and horns bearing fruit, the naked bodies of women and the exposed great sizes of virgins made public! 2. Would it not have been better to dance and to sing than under the guise of gravity and severity and a show of sternness to recount such cold and so inept simulacra from the ancients for restraining sins and for inspiring fear in the guilty? 3. Were mortals of that age and time so utterly empty of heart, of reason and of sense, that by wicked deeds—like little children—by the thrusts of persons with most monstrous grimness, by rages even, and by manias, they would be bound?

4. Et unde est in contrarium res versa, ut cum tam multa, in civitatibus templa sint plena omnium simulacris deorum, tot legibus et generibus suppliciorum tantis iri obviam nequeat multitudini noxiorum neque ullis remedis audacia possit abscidi, tantoque se magis maleficia congeminata multiplicent, quanto legibus iudiciisque contenditur imminuere facta crudelia et poenarum coercitione sedare? 5. Quodsi metus aliquos infligerent simulacra mortalibus, legum latio cessaret nec tam diversae cruces facinerosorum constituerentur audaciae. 6. Nunc vero quia constitit conprobatumque est re ipsa inanem esse opinionem timoris qui ab signis dicatur effluere, ad legum decursum est sanctiones, a quibus esset formido certissima et iam fixa constitutaque damnatio, quibus debent et ipsa simulacra quod incolumia | f. 134b | adhuc perstant et honoris alicuius concessione munita sunt.

4. And whence is it that the matter is turned to the contrary, that although in so many cities the temples are full at once of all the simulacra of the gods, and although so many laws and kinds of punishments are about to be opposed, the multitude of the guilty cannot be met nor can audacity be cut off by any remedies, and so much the more are wicked deeds heaped up and multiplied, the more it is strove by laws and judgments to lessen cruel deeds and to quell them by the coercion of punishments? 5. For if the simulacra were able to inflict some fears upon mortals, the promulgation of laws would cease and so many diverse crosses would not be established for the audacity of criminals. 6. But now because it has been established and proved by the thing itself that the opinion of fear which is said to flow from images is vain, the course of the laws has been taken up for sanctions, by which there would be a most certain and now fixed and constituted condemnation, by which even the simulacra themselves, which hitherto remain uninjured | f. 134b | are protected and furnished with some measure of honor.

27.1. Quoniam satis, ut res tulit, quam inaniter fiant simulacra monstratum est, de sacrificiis deinceps, de caedibus atque immolationibus hostiarum, de mero, de thure deque aliis omnibus quae in parte ista confiunt poscit ordo quam paucis et sine ullis circumlocutionibus dicere. 2. In hac enim consuestis parte invidias nobis tumultuosissimas concitare, appellare nos atheos, et quod minime a tribuamus diis, poenas etiam capitis beluarum crudelitatibus inrogare. 3. Quod quidem nos fatemur non contemptu facere atque aspernatione divina, sed quod existimemus huius potentias nominis nihil tale deposcere neque rerum huiusmodi cupiditatibus attineri.

27.1. Since it has been sufficiently shown, as the matter bore, how vainly simulacra are made, the order henceforth demands that I speak briefly and without any circumlocutions about sacrifices, about the slaughters and immolations of victims, about wine (mero), about incense (thure) and about all the other things practiced in this quarter. 2. For in this customary practice they stir up the most tumultuous envies against us, call us atheists, and, because we attribute the least a to the gods, they even impose upon us the penalties of capital punishment by the cruelties of beasts. 3. Which indeed we confess we do not out of contempt and scorn for the divine, but because we judge that the potentiae of that name demand nothing of the sort, nor are they reached by desires for such matters.