BOOK I.

I. There are many things in philosophy, my dear Brutus, which are not

as yet fully explained to us, and particularly (as you very well know)

that most obscure and difficult question concerning the Nature of the

Gods, so extremely necessary both towards a knowledge of the human mind

and the practice of true religion: concerning which the opinions of men

are so various, and so different from each other, as to lead strongly

to the inference that ignorance[72] is the cause, or origin, of

philosophy, and that the Academic philosophers have been prudent in

refusing their assent to things uncertain: for what is more unbecoming

to a wise man than to judge rashly? or what rashness is so unworthy of

the gravity and stability of a philosopher as either to maintain false

opinions, or, without the least hesitation, to support and defend what

he has not thoroughly examined and does not clearly comprehend?

In the question now before us, the greater part of mankind have united

to acknowledge that which is most probable, and which we are all by

nature led to suppose, namely, that there are Gods. Protagoras[73]

doubted whether there were any. Diagoras the Melian and Theodorus of

Cyrene entirely believed there were no such beings. But they who have

affirmed that there are Gods, have expressed such a variety of

sentiments on the subject, and the disagreement between them is so

great, that it would be tiresome to enumerate their opinions; for they

give us many statements respecting the forms of the Gods, and their

places of abode, and the employment of their lives. And these are

matters on which the philosophers differ with the most exceeding

earnestness. But the most considerable part of the dispute is, whether

they are wholly inactive, totally unemployed, and free from all care

and administration of affairs; or, on the contrary, whether all things

were made and constituted by them from the beginning; and whether they

will continue to be actuated and governed by them to eternity. This is

one of the greatest points in debate; and unless this is decided,

mankind must necessarily remain in the greatest of errors, and ignorant

of what is most important to be known.

II. For there are some philosophers, both ancient and modern, who have

conceived that the Gods take not the least cognizance of human affairs.

But if their doctrine be true, of what avail is piety, sanctity, or

religion? for these are feelings and marks of devotion which are

offered to the Gods by men with uprightness and holiness, on the ground

that men are the objects of the attention of the Gods, and that many

benefits are conferred by the immortal Gods on the human race. But if

the Gods have neither the power nor the inclination to help us; if they

take no care of us, and pay no regard to our actions; and if there is

no single advantage which can possibly accrue to the life of man; then

what reason can we have to pay any adoration, or any honors, or to

prefer any prayers to them? Piety, like the other virtues, cannot have

any connection with vain show or dissimulation; and without piety,

neither sanctity nor religion can be supported; the total subversion of

which must be attended with great confusion and disturbance in life.

I do not even know, if we cast off piety towards the Gods, but that

faith, and all the associations of human life, and that most excellent

of all virtues, justice, may perish with it.

There are other philosophers, and those, too, very great and

illustrious men, who conceive the whole world to be directed and

governed by the will and wisdom of the Gods; nor do they stop here, but

conceive likewise that the Deities consult and provide for the

preservation of mankind. For they think that the fruits, and the

produce of the earth, and the seasons, and the variety of weather, and

the change of climates, by which all the productions of the earth are

brought to maturity, are designed by the immortal Gods for the use of

man. They instance many other things, which shall be related in these

books; and which would almost induce us to believe that the immortal

Gods had made them all expressly and solely for the benefit and

advantage of men. Against these opinions Carneades has advanced so much

that what he has said should excite a desire in men who are not

naturally slothful to search after truth; for there is no subject on

which the learned as well as the unlearned differ so strenuously as in

this; and since their opinions are so various, and so repugnant one to

another, it is possible that none of them may be, and absolutely

impossible that more than one should be, right.

III. Now, in a cause like this, I may be able to pacify well-meaning

opposers, and to confute invidious censurers, so as to induce the

latter to repent of their unreasonable contradiction, and the former to

be glad to learn; for they who admonish one in a friendly spirit should

be instructed, they who attack one like enemies should be repelled. But

I observe that the several books which I have lately published[74] have

occasioned much noise and various discourse about them; some people

wondering what the reason has been why I have applied myself so

suddenly to the study of philosophy, and others desirous of knowing

what my opinion is on such subjects. I likewise perceive that many

people wonder at my following that philosophy[75] chiefly which seems

to take away the light, and to bury and envelop things in a kind of

artificial night, and that I should so unexpectedly have taken up the

defence of a school that has been long neglected and forsaken. But it

is a mistake to suppose that this application to philosophical studies

has been sudden on my part. I have applied myself to them from my

youth, at no small expense of time and trouble; and I have been in the

habit of philosophizing a great deal when I least seemed to think about

it; for the truth of which I appeal to my orations, which are filled

with quotations from philosophers, and to my intimacy with those very

learned men who frequented my house and conversed daily with me,

particularly Diodorus, Philo, Antiochus, and Posidonius,[76] under whom

I was bred; and if all the precepts of philosophy are to have reference

to the conduct of life, I am inclined to think that I have advanced,

both in public and private affairs, only such principles as may be

supported by reason and authority.

IV. But if any one should ask what has induced me, in the decline of

life, to write on these subjects, nothing is more easily answered; for

when I found myself entirely disengaged from business, and the

commonwealth reduced to the necessity of being governed by the

direction and care of one man,[77] I thought it becoming, for the sake

of the public, to instruct my countrymen in philosophy, and that it

would be of importance, and much to the honor and commendation of our

city, to have such great and excellent subjects introduced in the Latin

tongue. I the less repent of my undertaking, since I plainly see that I

have excited in many a desire, not only of learning, but of writing;

for we have had several Romans well grounded in the learning of the

Greeks who were unable to communicate to their countrymen what they had

learned, because they looked upon it as impossible to express that in

Latin which they had received from the Greeks. In this point I think I

have succeeded so well that what I have done is not, even in

copiousness of expression, inferior to that language.

Another inducement to it was a melancholy disposition of mind, and the

great and heavy oppression of fortune that was upon me; from which, if

I could have found any surer remedy, I would not have sought relief in

this pursuit. But I could procure ease by no means better than by not

only applying myself to books, but by devoting myself to the

examination of the whole body of philosophy. And every part and branch

of this is readily discovered when every question is propounded in

writing; for there is such an admirable continuation and series of

things that each seems connected with the other, and all appear linked

together and united.

V. Now, those men who desire to know my own private opinion on every

particular subject have more curiosity than is necessary. For the force

of reason in disputation is to be sought after rather than authority,

since the authority of the teacher is often a disadvantage to those who

are willing to learn; as they refuse to use their own judgment, and

rely implicitly on him whom they make choice of for a preceptor. Nor

could I ever approve this custom of the Pythagoreans, who, when they

affirmed anything in disputation, and were asked why it was so, used to

give this answer: "He himself has said it;" and this "he himself," it

seems, was Pythagoras. Such was the force of prejudice and opinion that

his authority was to prevail even without argument or reason.

They who wonder at my being a follower of this sect in particular may

find a satisfactory answer in my four books of Academical Questions.

But I deny that I have undertaken the protection of what is neglected

and forsaken; for the opinions of men do not die with them, though they

may perhaps want the author's explanation. This manner of

philosophizing, of disputing all things and assuming nothing certainly,

was begun by Socrates, revived by Arcesilaus, confirmed by Carneades,

and has descended, with all its power, even to the present age; but I

am informed that it is now almost exploded even in Greece. However, I

do not impute that to any fault in the institution of the Academy, but

to the negligence of mankind. If it is difficult to know all the

doctrines of any one sect, how much more is it to know those of every

sect! which, however, must necessarily be known to those who resolve,

for the sake of discovering truth, to dispute for or against all

philosophers without partiality.

I do not profess myself to be master of this difficult and noble

faculty; but I do assert that I have endeavored to make myself so; and

it is impossible that they who choose this manner of philosophizing

should not meet at least with something worthy their pursuit. I have

spoken more fully on this head in another place. But as some are too

slow of apprehension, and some too careless, men stand in perpetual

need of caution. For we are not people who believe that there is

nothing whatever which is true; but we say that some falsehoods are so

blended with all truths, and have so great a resemblance to them, that

there is no certain rule for judging of or assenting to propositions;

from which this maxim also follows, that many things are probable,

which, though they are not evident to the senses, have still so

persuasive and beautiful an aspect that a wise man chooses to direct

his conduct by them.

VI. Now, to free myself from the reproach of partiality, I propose to

lay before you the opinions of various philosophers concerning the

nature of the Gods, by which means all men may judge which of them are

consistent with truth; and if all agree together, or if any one shall

be found to have discovered what may be absolutely called truth, I will

then give up the Academy as vain and arrogant. So I may cry out, in the

words of Statius, in the Synephebi,

Ye Gods, I call upon, require, pray, beseech, entreat, and

implore the attention of my countrymen all, both young and

old;

yet not on so trifling an occasion as when the person in the play

complains that,

In this city we have discovered a most flagrant iniquity:

here is a professed courtesan, who refuses money from her

lover;

but that they may attend, know, and consider what sentiments they ought

to preserve concerning religion, piety, sanctity, ceremonies, faith,

oaths, temples, shrines, and solemn sacrifices; what they ought to

think of the auspices over which I preside;[78] for all these have

relation to the present question. The manifest disagreement among the

most learned on this subject creates doubts in those who imagine they

have some certain knowledge of the subject.

Which fact I have often taken notice of elsewhere, and I did so more

especially at the discussion that was held at my friend C. Cotta's

concerning the immortal Gods, and which was carried on with the

greatest care, accuracy, and precision; for coming to him at the time

of the Latin holidays,[79] according to his own invitation and message

from him, I found him sitting in his study,[80] and in a discourse with

C. Velleius, the senator, who was then reputed by the Epicureans the

ablest of our countrymen. Q. Lucilius Balbus was likewise there, a

great proficient in the doctrine of the Stoics, and esteemed equal to

the most eminent of the Greeks in that part of knowledge. As soon as

Cotta saw me, You are come, says he, very seasonably; for I am having a

dispute with Velleius on an important subject, which, considering the

nature of your studies, is not improper for you to join in.

VII. Indeed, says I, I think I am come very seasonably, as you say; for

here are three chiefs of three principal sects met together. If M.

Piso[81] was present, no sect of philosophy that is in any esteem would

want an advocate. If Antiochus's book, replies Cotta, which he lately

sent to Balbus, says true, you have no occasion to wish for your friend

Piso; for Antiochus is of the opinion that the Stoics do not differ

from the Peripatetics in fact, though they do in words; and I should be

glad to know what you think of that book, Balbus. I? says he. I wonder

that Antiochus, a man of the clearest apprehension, should not see what

a vast difference there is between the Stoics, who distinguish the

honest and the profitable, not only in name, but absolutely in kind,

and the Peripatetics, who blend the honest with the profitable in such

a manner that they differ only in degrees and proportion, and not in

kind. This is not a little difference in words, but a great one in

things; but of this hereafter. Now, if you think fit, let us return to

what we began with.

With all my heart, says Cotta. But that this visitor (looking at me),

who is just come in, may not be ignorant of what we are upon, I will

inform him that we were discoursing on the nature of the Gods;

concerning which, as it is a subject that always appeared very obscure

to me, I prevailed on Velleius to give us the sentiments of Epicurus.

Therefore, continues he, if it is not troublesome, Velleius, repeat

what you have already stated to us. I will, says he, though this

new-comer will be no advocate for me, but for you; for you have both,

adds he, with a smile, learned from the same Philo to be certain of

nothing.[82] What we have learned from him, replied I, Cotta will

discover; but I would not have you think I am come as an assistant to

him, but as an auditor, with an impartial and unbiassed mind, and not

bound by any obligation to defend any particular principle, whether I

like or dislike it.

VIII. After this, Velleius, with the confidence peculiar to his sect,

dreading nothing so much as to seem to doubt of anything, began as if

he had just then descended from the council of the Gods, and Epicurus's

intervals of worlds. Do not attend, says he, to these idle and

imaginary tales; nor to the operator and builder of the World, the God

of Plato's Timæus; nor to the old prophetic dame, the [Greek: Pronoia]

of the Stoics, which the Latins call Providence; nor to that round,

that burning, revolving deity, the World, endowed with sense and

understanding; the prodigies and wonders, not of inquisitive

philosophers, but of dreamers!

For with what eyes of the mind was your Plato able to see that

workhouse of such stupendous toil, in which he makes the world to be

modelled and built by God? What materials, what tools, what bars, what

machines, what servants, were employed in so vast a work? How could the

air, fire, water, and earth pay obedience and submit to the will of the

architect? From whence arose those five forms,[83] of which the rest

were composed, so aptly contributing to frame the mind and produce the

senses? It is tedious to go through all, as they are of such a sort

that they look more like things to be desired than to be discovered.

But, what is more remarkable, he gives us a world which has been not

only created, but, if I may so say, in a manner formed with hands, and

yet he says it is eternal. Do you conceive him to have the least skill

in natural philosophy who is capable of thinking anything to be

everlasting that had a beginning? For what can possibly ever have been

put together which cannot be dissolved again? Or what is there that had

a beginning which will not have an end? If your Providence, Lucilius,

is the same as Plato's God, I ask you, as before, who were the

assistants, what were the engines, what was the plan and preparation of

the whole work? If it is not the same, then why did she make the world

mortal, and not everlasting, like Plato's God?

IX. But I would demand of you both, why these world-builders started up

so suddenly, and lay dormant for so many ages? For we are not to

conclude that, if there was no world, there were therefore no ages. I

do not now speak of such ages as are finished by a certain number of

days and nights in annual courses; for I acknowledge that those could

not be without the revolution of the world; but there was a certain

eternity from infinite time, not measured by any circumscription of

seasons; but how that was in space we cannot understand, because we

cannot possibly have even the slightest idea of time before time was. I

desire, therefore, to know, Balbus, why this Providence of yours was

idle for such an immense space of time? Did she avoid labor? But that

could have no effect on the Deity; nor could there be any labor, since

all nature, air, fire, earth, and water would obey the divine essence.

What was it that incited the Deity to act the part of an ædile, to

illuminate and decorate the world? If it was in order that God might be

the better accommodated in his habitation, then he must have been

dwelling an infinite length of time before in darkness as in a dungeon.

But do we imagine that he was afterward delighted with that variety

with which we see the heaven and earth adorned? What entertainment

could that be to the Deity? If it was any, he would not have been

without it so long.

Or were these things made, as you almost assert, by God for the sake of

men? Was it for the wise? If so, then this great design was adopted for

the sake of a very small number. Or for the sake of fools? First of

all, there was no reason why God should consult the advantage of the

wicked; and, further, what could be his object in doing so, since all

fools are, without doubt, the most miserable of men, chiefly because

they are fools? For what can we pronounce more deplorable than folly?

Besides, there are many inconveniences in life which the wise can learn

to think lightly of by dwelling rather on the advantages which they

receive; but which fools are unable to avoid when they are coming, or

to bear when they are come.

X. They who affirm the world to be an animated and intelligent being

have by no means discovered the nature of the mind, nor are able to

conceive in what form that essence can exist; but of that I shall speak

more hereafter. At present I must express my surprise at the weakness

of those who endeavor to make it out to be not only animated and

immortal, but likewise happy, and round, because Plato says that is the

most beautiful form; whereas I think a cylinder, a square, a cone, or a

pyramid more beautiful. But what life do they attribute to that round

Deity? Truly it is a being whirled about with a celerity to which

nothing can be even conceived by the imagination as equal; nor can I

imagine how a settled mind and happy life can consist in such motion,

the least degree of which would be troublesome to us. Why, therefore,

should it not be considered troublesome also to the Deity? For the

earth itself, as it is part of the world, is part also of the Deity. We

see vast tracts of land barren and uninhabitable; some, because they

are scorched by the too near approach of the sun; others, because they

are bound up with frost and snow, through the great distance which the

sun is from them. Therefore, if the world is a Deity, as these are

parts of the world, some of the Deity's limbs must be said to be

scorched, and some frozen.

These are your doctrines, Lucilius; but what those of others are I will

endeavor to ascertain by tracing them back from the earliest of ancient

philosophers. Thales the Milesian, who first inquired after such

subjects, asserted water to be the origin of things, and that God was

that mind which formed all things from water. If the Gods can exist

without corporeal sense, and if there can be a mind without a body, why

did he annex a mind to water?

It was Anaximander's opinion that the Gods were born; that after a

great length of time they died; and that they are innumerable worlds.

But what conception can we possibly have of a Deity who is not eternal?

Anaximenes, after him, taught that the air is God, and that he was

generated, and that he is immense, infinite, and always in motion; as

if air, which has no form, could possibly be God; for the Deity must

necessarily be not only of some form or other, but of the most

beautiful form. Besides, is not everything that had a beginning subject

to mortality?

XI. Anaxagoras, who received his learning from Anaximenes, was the

first who affirmed the system and disposition of all things to be

contrived and perfected by the power and reason of an infinite mind; in

which infinity he did not perceive that there could be no conjunction

of sense and motion, nor any sense in the least degree, where nature

herself could feel no impulse. If he would have this mind to be a sort

of animal, then there must be some more internal principle from whence

that animal should receive its appellation. But what can be more

internal than the mind? Let it, therefore, be clothed with an external

body. But this is not agreeable to his doctrine; but we are utterly

unable to conceive how a pure simple mind can exist without any

substance annexed to it.

Alcmæon of Crotona, in attributing a divinity to the sun, the moon, and

the rest of the stars, and also to the mind, did not perceive that he

was ascribing immortality to mortal beings.

Pythagoras, who supposed the Deity to be one soul, mixing with and

pervading all nature, from which our souls are taken, did not consider

that the Deity himself must, in consequence of this doctrine, be maimed

and torn with the rending every human soul from it; nor that, when the

human mind is afflicted (as is the case in many instances), that part

of the Deity must likewise be afflicted, which cannot be. If the human

mind were a Deity, how could it be ignorant of any thing? Besides, how

could that Deity, if it is nothing but soul, be mixed with, or infused

into, the world?

Then Xenophanes, who said that everything in the world which had any

existence, with the addition of intellect, was God, is as liable to

exception as the rest, especially in relation to the infinity of it, in

which there can be nothing sentient, nothing composite.

Parmenides formed a conceit to himself of something circular like a

crown. (He names it Stephane.) It is an orb of constant light and heat

around the heavens; this he calls God; in which there is no room to

imagine any divine form or sense. And he uttered many other absurdities

on the same subject; for he ascribed a divinity to war, to discord, to

lust, and other passions of the same kind, which are destroyed by

disease, or sleep, or oblivion, or age. The same honor he gives to the

stars; but I shall forbear making any objections to his system here,

having already done it in another place.

XII. Empedocles, who erred in many things, is most grossly mistaken in

his notion of the Gods. He lays down four natures[84] as divine, from

which he thinks that all things were made. Yet it is evident that they

have a beginning, that they decay, and that they are void of all sense.

Protagoras did not seem to have any idea of the real nature of the

Gods; for he acknowledged that he was altogether ignorant whether there

are or are not any, or what they are.

What shall I say of Democritus, who classes our images of objects, and

their orbs, in the number of the Gods; as he does that principle

through which those images appear and have their influence? He deifies

likewise our knowledge and understanding. Is he not involved in a very

great error? And because nothing continues always in the same state, he

denies that anything is everlasting, does he not thereby entirely

destroy the Deity, and make it impossible to form any opinion of him?

Diogenes of Apollonia looks upon the air to be a Deity. But what sense

can the air have? or what divine form can be attributed to it?

It would be tedious to show the uncertainty of Plato's opinion; for, in

his Timæus, he denies the propriety of asserting that there is one

great father or creator of the world; and, in his book of Laws, he

thinks we ought not to make too strict an inquiry into the nature of

the Deity. And as for his statement when he asserts that God is a being

without any body--what the Greeks call [Greek: asômatos]--it is

certainly quite unintelligible how that theory can possibly be true;

for such a God must then necessarily be destitute of sense, prudence,

and pleasure; all which things are comprehended in our notion of the

Gods. He likewise asserts in his Timæus, and in his Laws, that the

world, the heavens, the stars, the mind, and those Gods which are

delivered down to us from our ancestors, constitute the Deity. These

opinions, taken separately, are apparently false; and, together, are

directly inconsistent with each other.

Xenophon has committed almost the same mistakes, but in fewer words. In

those sayings which he has related of Socrates, he introduces him

disputing the lawfulness of inquiring into the form of the Deity, and

makes him assert the sun and the mind to be Deities: he represents him

likewise as affirming the being of one God only, and at another time of

many; which are errors of almost the same kind which I before took

notice of in Plato.

XIII. Antisthenes, in his book called the Natural Philosopher, says

that there are many national and one natural Deity; but by this saying

he destroys the power and nature of the Gods. Speusippus is not much

less in the wrong; who, following his uncle Plato, says that a certain

incorporeal power governs everything; by which he endeavors to root out

of our minds the knowledge of the Gods.

Aristotle, in his third book of Philosophy, confounds many things

together, as the rest have done; but he does not differ from his master

Plato. At one time he attributes all divinity to the mind, at another

he asserts that the world is God. Soon afterward he makes some other

essence preside over the world, and gives it those faculties by which,

with certain revolutions, he may govern and preserve the motion of it.

Then he asserts the heat of the firmament to be God; not perceiving the

firmament to be part of the world, which in another place he had

described as God. How can that divine sense of the firmament be

preserved in so rapid a motion? And where do the multitude of Gods

dwell, if heaven itself is a Deity? But when this philosopher says that

God is without a body, he makes him an irrational and insensible being.

Besides, how can the world move itself, if it wants a body? Or how, if

it is in perpetual self-motion, can it be easy and happy?

Xenocrates, his fellow-pupil, does not appear much wiser on this head,

for in his books concerning the nature of the Gods no divine form is

described; but he says the number of them is eight. Five are moving

planets;[85] the sixth is contained in all the fixed stars; which,

dispersed, are so many several members, but, considered together, are

one single Deity; the seventh is the sun; and the eighth the moon. But

in what sense they can possibly be happy is not easy to be understood.

From the same school of Plato, Heraclides of Pontus stuffed his books

with puerile tales. Sometimes he thinks the world a Deity, at other

times the mind. He attributes divinity likewise to the wandering stars.

He deprives the Deity of sense, and makes his form mutable; and, in the

same book again, he makes earth and heaven Deities.

The unsteadiness of Theophrastus is equally intolerable. At one time he

attributes a divine prerogative to the mind; at another, to the

firmament; at another, to the stars and celestial constellations.

Nor is his disciple Strato, who is called the naturalist, any more

worthy to be regarded; for he thinks that the divine power is diffused

through nature, which is the cause of birth, increase, and diminution,

but that it has no sense nor form.

XIV. Zeno (to come to your sect, Balbus) thinks the law of nature to be

the divinity, and that it has the power to force us to what is right,

and to restrain us from what is wrong. How this law can be an animated

being I cannot conceive; but that God is so we would certainly

maintain. The same person says, in another place, that the sky is God;

but can we possibly conceive that God is a being insensible, deaf to

our prayers, our wishes, and our vows, and wholly unconnected with us?

In other books he thinks there is a certain rational essence pervading

all nature, indued with divine efficacy. He attributes the same power

to the stars, to the years, to the months, and to the seasons. In his

interpretation of Hesiod's Theogony,[86] he entirely destroys the

established notions of the Gods; for he excludes Jupiter, Juno, and

Vesta, and those esteemed divine, from the number of them; but his

doctrine is that these are names which by some kind of allusion are

given to mute and inanimate beings. The sentiments of his disciple

Aristo are not less erroneous. He thought it impossible to conceive the

form of the Deity, and asserts that the Gods are destitute of sense;

and he is entirely dubious whether the Deity is an animated being or

not.

Cleanthes, who next comes under my notice, a disciple of Zeno at the

same time with Aristo, in one place says that the world is God; in

another, he attributes divinity to the mind and spirit of universal

nature; then he asserts that the most remote, the highest, the

all-surrounding, the all-enclosing and embracing heat, which is called

the sky, is most certainly the Deity. In the books he wrote against

pleasure, in which he seems to be raving, he imagines the Gods to have

a certain form and shape; then he ascribes all divinity to the stars;

and, lastly, he thinks nothing more divine than reason. So that this

God, whom we know mentally and in the speculations of our minds, from

which traces we receive our impression, has at last actually no visible

form at all.

XV. Persæus, another disciple of Zeno, says that they who have made

discoveries advantageous to the life of man should be esteemed as Gods;

and the very things, he says, which are healthful and beneficial have

derived their names from those of the Gods; so that he thinks it not

sufficient to call them the discoveries of Gods, but he urges that they

themselves should be deemed divine. What can be more absurd than to

ascribe divine honors to sordid and deformed things; or to place among

the Gods men who are dead and mixed with the dust, to whose memory all

the respect that could be paid would be but mourning for their loss?

Chrysippus, who is looked upon as the most subtle interpreter of the

dreams of the Stoics, has mustered up a numerous band of unknown Gods;

and so unknown that we are not able to form any idea about them, though

our mind seems capable of framing any image to itself in its thoughts.

For he says that the divine power is placed in reason, and in the

spirit and mind of universal nature; that the world, with a universal

effusion of its spirit, is God; that the superior part of that spirit,

which is the mind and reason, is the great principle of nature,

containing and preserving the chain of all things; that the divinity is

the power of fate, and the necessity of future events. He deifies fire

also, and what I before called the ethereal spirit, and those elements

which naturally proceed from it--water, earth, and air. He attributes

divinity to the sun, moon, stars, and universal space, the grand

container of all things, and to those men likewise who have obtained

immortality. He maintains the sky to be what men call Jupiter; the air,

which pervades the sea, to be Neptune; and the earth, Ceres. In like

manner he goes through the names of the other Deities. He says that

Jupiter is that immutable and eternal law which guides and directs us

in our manners; and this he calls fatal necessity, the everlasting

verity of future events. But none of these are of such a nature as to

seem to carry any indication of divine virtue in them. These are the

doctrines contained in his first book of the Nature of the Gods. In the

second, he endeavors to accommodate the fables of Orpheus, Musæus,

Hesiod, and Homer to what he has advanced in the first, in order that

the most ancient poets, who never dreamed of these things, may seem to

have been Stoics. Diogenes the Babylonian was a follower of the

doctrine of Chrysippus; and in that book which he wrote, entitled "A

Treatise concerning Minerva," he separates the account of Jupiter's

bringing-forth, and the birth of that virgin, from the fabulous, and

reduces it to a natural construction.

XVI. Thus far have I been rather exposing the dreams of dotards than

giving the opinions of philosophers. Not much more absurd than these

are the fables of the poets, who owe all their power of doing harm to

the sweetness of their language; who have represented the Gods as

enraged with anger and inflamed with lust; who have brought before our

eyes their wars, battles, combats, wounds; their hatreds, dissensions,

discords, births, deaths, complaints, and lamentations; their

indulgences in all kinds of intemperance; their adulteries; their

chains; their amours with mortals, and mortals begotten by immortals.

To these idle and ridiculous flights of the poets we may add the

prodigious stories invented by the Magi, and by the Egyptians also,

which were of the same nature, together with the extravagant notions of

the multitude at all times, who, from total ignorance of the truth, are

always fluctuating in uncertainty.

Now, whoever reflects on the rashness and absurdity of these tenets

must inevitably entertain the highest respect and veneration for

Epicurus, and perhaps even rank him in the number of those beings who

are the subject of this dispute; for he alone first founded the idea of

the existence of the Gods on the impression which nature herself hath

made on the minds of all men. For what nation, what people are there,

who have not, without any learning, a natural idea, or prenotion, of a

Deity? Epicurus calls this [Greek: prolêpsis]; that is, an antecedent

conception of the fact in the mind, without which nothing can be

understood, inquired after, or discoursed on; the force and advantage

of which reasoning we receive from that celestial volume of Epicurus

concerning the Rule and Judgment of Things.

XVII. Here, then, you see the foundation of this question clearly laid;

for since it is the constant and universal opinion of mankind,

independent of education, custom, or law, that there are Gods, it must

necessarily follow that this knowledge is implanted in our minds, or,

rather, innate in us. That opinion respecting which there is a general

agreement in universal nature must infallibly be true; therefore it

must be allowed that there are Gods; for in this we have the

concurrence, not only of almost all philosophers, but likewise of the

ignorant and illiterate. It must be also confessed that the point is

established that we have naturally this idea, as I said before, or

prenotion, of the existence of the Gods. As new things require new

names, so that prenotion was called [Greek: prolêpsis] by Epicurus; an

appellation never used before. On the same principle of reasoning, we

think that the Gods are happy and immortal; for that nature which hath

assured us that there are Gods has likewise imprinted in our minds the

knowledge of their immortality and felicity; and if so, what Epicurus

hath declared in these words is true: "That which is eternally happy

cannot be burdened with any labor itself, nor can it impose any labor

on another; nor can it be influenced by resentment or favor: because

things which are liable to such feelings must be weak and frail." We

have said enough to prove that we should worship the Gods with piety,

and without superstition, if that were the only question.

For the superior and excellent nature of the Gods requires a pious

adoration from men, because it is possessed of immortality and the most

exalted felicity; for whatever excels has a right to veneration, and

all fear of the power and anger of the Gods should be banished; for we

must understand that anger and affection are inconsistent with the

nature of a happy and immortal being. These apprehensions being

removed, no dread of the superior powers remains. To confirm this

opinion, our curiosity leads us to inquire into the form and life and

action of the intellect and spirit of the Deity.

XVIII. With regard to his form, we are directed partly by nature and

partly by reason. All men are told by nature that none but a human form

can be ascribed to the Gods; for under what other image did it ever

appear to any one either sleeping or waking? and, without having

recourse to our first notions,[87] reason itself declares the same; for

as it is easy to conceive that the most excellent nature, either

because of its happiness or immortality, should be the most beautiful,

what composition of limbs, what conformation of lineaments, what form,

what aspect, can be more beautiful than the human? Your sect, Lucilius

(not like my friend Cotta, who sometimes says one thing and sometimes

another), when they represent the divine art and workmanship in the

human body, are used to describe how very completely each member is

formed, not only for convenience, but also for beauty. Therefore, if

the human form excels that of all other animal beings, as God himself

is an animated being, he must surely be of that form which is the most

beautiful. Besides, the Gods are granted to be perfectly happy; and

nobody can be happy without virtue, nor can virtue exist where reason

is not; and reason can reside in none but the human form; the Gods,

therefore, must be acknowledged to be of human form; yet that form is

not body, but something like body; nor does it contain any blood, but

something like blood. Though these distinctions were more acutely

devised and more artfully expressed by Epicurus than any common

capacity can comprehend; yet, depending on your understanding, I shall

be more brief on the subject than otherwise I should be. Epicurus, who

not only discovered and understood the occult and almost hidden secrets

of nature, but explained them with ease, teaches that the power and

nature of the Gods is not to be discerned by the senses, but by the

mind; nor are they to be considered as bodies of any solidity, or

reducible to number, like those things which, because of their

firmness, he calls [Greek: Steremnia];[88] but as images, perceived by

similitude and transition. As infinite kinds of those images result

from innumerable individuals, and centre in the Gods, our minds and

understanding are directed towards and fixed with the greatest delight

on them, in order to comprehend what that happy and eternal essence is.

XIX. Surely the mighty power of the Infinite Being is most worthy our

great and earnest contemplation; the nature of which we must

necessarily understand to be such that everything in it is made to

correspond completely to some other answering part. This is called by

Epicurus [Greek: isonomia]; that is to say, an equal distribution or

even disposition of things. From hence he draws this inference, that,

as there is such a vast multitude of mortals, there cannot be a less

number of immortals; and if those which perish are innumerable, those

which are preserved ought also to be countless. Your sect, Balbus,

frequently ask us how the Gods live, and how they pass their time?

Their life is the most happy, and the most abounding with all kinds of

blessings, which can be conceived. They do nothing. They are

embarrassed with no business; nor do they perform any work. They

rejoice in the possession of their own wisdom and virtue. They are

satisfied that they shall ever enjoy the fulness of eternal pleasures.

XX. Such a Deity may properly be called happy; but yours is a most

laborious God. For let us suppose the world a Deity--what can be a more

uneasy state than, without the least cessation, to be whirled about the

axle-tree of heaven with a surprising celerity? But nothing can be

happy that is not at ease. Or let us suppose a Deity residing in the

world, who directs and governs it, who preserves the courses of the

stars, the changes of the seasons, and the vicissitudes and orders of

things, surveying the earth and the sea, and accommodating them to the

advantage and necessities of man. Truly this Deity is embarrassed with

a very troublesome and laborious office. We make a happy life to

consist in a tranquillity of mind, a perfect freedom from care, and an

exemption from all employment. The philosopher from whom we received

all our knowledge has taught us that the world was made by nature; that

there was no occasion for a workhouse to frame it in; and that, though

you deny the possibility of such a work without divine skill, it is so

easy to her, that she has made, does make, and will make innumerable

worlds. But, because you do not conceive that nature is able to produce

such effects without some rational aid, you are forced, like the tragic

poets, when you cannot wind up your argument in any other way, to have

recourse to a Deity, whose assistance you would not seek, if you could

view that vast and unbounded magnitude of regions in all parts; where

the mind, extending and spreading itself, travels so far and wide that

it can find no end, no extremity to stop at. In this immensity of

breadth, length, and height, a most boundless company of innumerable

atoms are fluttering about, which, notwithstanding the interposition of

a void space, meet and cohere, and continue clinging to one another;

and by this union these modifications and forms of things arise, which,

in your opinions, could not possibly be made without the help of

bellows and anvils. Thus you have imposed on us an eternal master, whom

we must dread day and night. For who can be free from fear of a Deity

who foresees, regards, and takes notice of everything; one who thinks

all things his own; a curious, ever-busy God?

Hence first arose your [Greek: Heimarmenê], as you call it, your fatal

necessity; so that, whatever happens, you affirm that it flows from an

eternal chain and continuance of causes. Of what value is this

philosophy, which, like old women and illiterate men, attributes

everything to fate? Then follows your [Greek: mantikê], in Latin called

_divinatio_, divination; which, if we would listen to you, would plunge

us into such superstition that we should fall down and worship your

inspectors into sacrifices, your augurs, your soothsayers, your

prophets, and your fortune-tellers.

Epicurus having freed us from these terrors and restored us to liberty,

we have no dread of those beings whom we have reason to think entirely

free from all trouble themselves, and who do not impose any on others.

We pay our adoration, indeed, with piety and reverence to that essence

which is above all excellence and perfection. But I fear my zeal for

this doctrine has made me too prolix. However, I could not easily leave

so eminent and important a subject unfinished, though I must confess I

should rather endeavor to hear than speak so long.

XXI. Cotta, with his usual courtesy, then began. Velleius, says he,

were it not for something which you have advanced, I should have

remained silent; for I have often observed, as I did just now upon

hearing you, that I cannot so easily conceive why a proposition is true

as why it is false. Should you ask me what I take the nature of the

Gods to be, I should perhaps make no answer. But if you should ask

whether I think it to be of that nature which you have described, I

should answer that I was as far as possible from agreeing with you.

However, before I enter on the subject of your discourse and what you

have advanced upon it, I will give you my opinion of yourself. Your

intimate friend, L. Crassus, has been often heard by me to say that you

were beyond all question superior to all our learned Romans; and that

few Epicureans in Greece were to be compared to you. But as I knew what

a wonderful esteem he had for you, I imagined that might make him the

more lavish in commendation of you. Now, however, though I do not

choose to praise any one when present, yet I must confess that I think

you have delivered your thoughts clearly on an obscure and very

intricate subject; that you are not only copious in your sentiments,

but more elegant in your language than your sect generally are. When I

was at Athens, I went often to hear Zeno, by the advice of Philo, who

used to call him the chief of the Epicureans; partly, probably, in

order to judge more easily how completely those principles could be

refuted after I had heard them stated by the most learned of the

Epicureans. And, indeed, he did not speak in any ordinary manner; but,

like you, with clearness, gravity, and elegance; yet what frequently

gave me great uneasiness when I heard him, as it did while I attended

to you, was to see so excellent a genius falling into such frivolous

(excuse my freedom), not to say foolish, doctrines. However, I shall

not at present offer anything better; for, as I said before, we can in

most subjects, especially in physics, sooner discover what is not true

than what is.

XXII. If you should ask me what God is, or what his character and

nature are, I should follow the example of Simonides, who, when Hiero

the tyrant proposed the same question to him, desired a day to consider

of it. When he required his answer the next day, Simonides begged two

days more; and as he kept constantly desiring double the number which

he had required before instead of giving his answer, Hiero, with

surprise, asked him his meaning in doing so: "Because," says he, "the

longer I meditate on it, the more obscure it appears to me." Simonides,

who was not only a delightful poet, but reputed a wise and learned man

in other branches of knowledge, found, I suppose, so many acute and

refined arguments occurring to him, that he was doubtful which was the

truest, and therefore despaired of discovering any truth.

But does your Epicurus (for I had rather contend with him than with

you) say anything that is worthy the name of philosophy, or even of

common-sense?

In the question concerning the nature of the Gods, his first inquiry

is, whether there are Gods or not. It would be dangerous, I believe, to

take the negative side before a public auditory; but it is very safe in

a discourse of this kind, and in this company. I, who am a priest, and

who think that religions and ceremonies ought sacredly to be

maintained, am certainly desirous to have the existence of the Gods,

which is the principal point in debate, not only fixed in opinion, but

proved to a demonstration; for many notions flow into and disturb the

mind which sometimes seem to convince us that there are none. But see

how candidly I will behave to you: as I shall not touch upon those

tenets you hold in common with other philosophers, consequently I shall

not dispute the existence of the Gods, for that doctrine is agreeable

to almost all men, and to myself in particular; but I am still at

liberty to find fault with the reasons you give for it, which I think

are very insufficient.

XXIII. You have said that the general assent of men of all nations and

all degrees is an argument strong enough to induce us to acknowledge

the being of the Gods. This is not only a weak, but a false, argument;

for, first of all, how do you know the opinions of all nations? I

really believe there are many people so savage that they have no

thoughts of a Deity. What think you of Diagoras, who was called the

atheist; and of Theodorus after him? Did not they plainly deny the very

essence of a Deity? Protagoras of Abdera, whom you just now mentioned,

the greatest sophist of his age, was banished by order of the Athenians

from their city and territories, and his books were publicly burned,

because these words were in the beginning of his treatise concerning

the Gods: "I am unable to arrive at any knowledge whether there are, or

are not, any Gods." This treatment of him, I imagine, restrained many

from professing their disbelief of a Deity, since the doubt of it only

could not escape punishment. What shall we say of the sacrilegious, the

impious, and the perjured? If Tubulus Lucius, Lupus, or Carbo the son

of Neptune, as Lucilius says, had believed that there were Gods, would

either of them have carried his perjuries and impieties to such excess?

Your reasoning, therefore, to confirm your assertion is not so

conclusive as you think it is. But as this is the manner in which other

philosophers have argued on the same subject, I will take no further

notice of it at present; I rather choose to proceed to what is properly

your own.

I allow that there are Gods. Instruct me, then, concerning their

origin; inform me where they are, what sort of body, what mind, they

have, and what is their course of life; for these I am desirous of

knowing. You attribute the most absolute power and efficacy to atoms.

Out of them you pretend that everything is made. But there are no

atoms, for there is nothing without body; every place is occupied by

body, therefore there can be no such thing as a vacuum or an atom.

XXIV. I advance these principles of the naturalists without knowing

whether they are true or false; yet they are more like truth than those

statements of yours; for they are the absurdities in which Democritus,

or before him Leucippus, used to indulge, saying that there are certain

light corpuscles--some smooth, some rough, some round, some square,

some crooked and bent as bows--which by a fortuitous concourse made

heaven and earth, without the influence of any natural power. This

opinion, C. Velleius, you have brought down to these our times; and you

would sooner be deprived of the greatest advantages of life than of

that authority; for before you were acquainted with those tenets, you

thought that you ought to profess yourself an Epicurean; so that it was

necessary that you should either embrace these absurdities or lose the

philosophical character which you had taken upon you; and what could

bribe you to renounce the Epicurean opinion? Nothing, you say, can

prevail on you to forsake the truth and the sure means of a happy life.

But is that the truth? for I shall not contest your happy life, which

you think the Deity himself does not enjoy unless he languishes in

idleness. But where is truth? Is it in your innumerable worlds, some of

which are rising, some falling, at every moment of time? Or is it in

your atomical corpuscles, which form such excellent works without the

direction of any natural power or reason? But I was forgetting my

liberality, which I had promised to exert in your case, and exceeding

the bounds which I at first proposed to myself. Granting, then,

everything to be made of atoms, what advantage is that to your

argument? For we are searching after the nature of the Gods; and

allowing them to be made of atoms, they cannot be eternal, because

whatever is made of atoms must have had a beginning: if so, there were

no Gods till there was this beginning; and if the Gods have had a

beginning, they must necessarily have an end, as you have before

contended when you were discussing Plato's world. Where, then, is your

beatitude and immortality, in which two words you say that God is

expressed, the endeavor to prove which reduces you to the greatest

perplexities? For you said that God had no body, but something like

body; and no blood, but something like blood.

XXV. It is a frequent practice among you, when you assert anything that

has no resemblance to truth, and wish to avoid reprehension, to advance

something else which is absolutely and utterly impossible, in order

that it may seem to your adversaries better to grant that point which

has been a matter of doubt than to keep on pertinaciously contradicting

you on every point: like Epicurus, who, when he found that if his atoms

were allowed to descend by their own weight, our actions could not be

in our own power, because their motions would be certain and necessary,

invented an expedient, which escaped Democritus, to avoid necessity. He

says that when the atoms descend by their own weight and gravity, they

move a little obliquely. Surely, to make such an assertion as this is

what one ought more to be ashamed of than the acknowledging ourselves

unable to defend the proposition. His practice is the same against the

logicians, who say that in all propositions in which yes or no is

required, one of them must be true; he was afraid that if this were

granted, then, in such a proposition as "Epicurus will be alive or dead

to-morrow," either one or the other must necessarily be admitted;

therefore he absolutely denied the necessity of yes or no. Can anything

show stupidity in a greater degree? Zeno,[89] being pressed by

Arcesilas, who pronounced all things to be false which are perceived by

the senses, said that some things were false, but not all. Epicurus was

afraid that if any one thing seen should be false, nothing could be

true; and therefore he asserted all the senses to be infallible

directors of truth. Nothing can be more rash than this; for by

endeavoring to repel a light stroke, he receives a heavy blow. On the

subject of the nature of the Gods, he falls into the same errors. While

he would avoid the concretion of individual bodies, lest death and

dissolution should be the consequence, he denies that the Gods have

body, but says they have something like body; and says they have no

blood, but something like blood.

XXVI. It seems an unaccountable thing how one soothsayer can refrain

from laughing when he sees another. It is yet a greater wonder that you

can refrain from laughing among yourselves. It is no body, but

something like body! I could understand this if it were applied to

statues made of wax or clay; but in regard to the Deity, I am not able

to discover what is meant by a quasi-body or quasi-blood. Nor indeed

are you, Velleius, though you will not confess so much. For those

precepts are delivered to you as dictates which Epicurus carelessly

blundered out; for he boasted, as we see in his writings, that he had

no instructor, which I could easily believe without his public

declaration of it, for the same reason that I could believe the master

of a very bad edifice if he were to boast that he had no architect but

himself: for there is nothing of the Academy, nothing of the Lyceum, in

his doctrine; nothing but puerilities. He might have been a pupil of

Xenocrates. O ye immortal Gods, what a teacher was he! And there are

those who believe that he actually was his pupil; but he says

otherwise, and I shall give more credit to his word than to another's.

He confesses that he was a pupil of a certain disciple of Plato, one

Pamphilus, at Samos; for he lived there when he was young, with his

father and his brothers. His father, Neocles, was a farmer in those

parts; but as the farm, I suppose, was not sufficient to maintain him,

he turned school-master; yet Epicurus treats this Platonic philosopher

with wonderful contempt, so fearful was he that it should be thought he

had ever had any instruction. But it is well known he had been a pupil

of Nausiphanes, the follower of Democritus; and since he could not deny

it, he loaded him with insults in abundance. If he never heard a

lecture on these Democritean principles, what lectures did he ever

hear? What is there in Epicurus's physics that is not taken from

Democritus? For though he altered some things, as what I mentioned

before of the oblique motions of the atoms, yet most of his doctrines

are the same; his atoms--his vacuum--his images--infinity of

space--innumerable worlds, their rise and decay--and almost every part

of natural learning that he treats of.

Now, do you understand what is meant by quasi-body and quasi-blood? For

I not only acknowledge that you are a better judge of it than I am, but

I can bear it without envy. If any sentiments, indeed, are communicated

without obscurity, what is there that Velleius can understand and Cotta

not? I know what body is, and what blood is; but I cannot possibly find

out the meaning of quasi-body and quasi-blood. Not that you

intentionally conceal your principles from me, as Pythagoras did his

from those who were not his disciples; or that you are intentionally

obscure, like Heraclitus. But the truth is (which I may venture to say

in this company), you do not understand them yourself.

XXVII. This, I perceive, is what you contend for, that the Gods have a

certain figure that has nothing concrete, nothing solid, nothing of

express substance, nothing prominent in it; but that it is pure,

smooth, and transparent. Let us suppose the same with the Venus of Cos,

which is not a body, but the representation of a body; nor is the red,

which is drawn there and mixed with the white, real blood, but a

certain resemblance of blood; so in Epicurus's Deity there is no real

substance, but the resemblance of substance.

Let me take for granted that which is perfectly unintelligible; then

tell me what are the lineaments and figures of these sketched-out

Deities. Here you have plenty of arguments by which you would show the

Gods to be in human form. The first is, that our minds are so

anticipated and prepossessed, that whenever we think of a Deity the

human shape occurs to us. The next is, that as the divine nature excels

all things, so it ought to be of the most beautiful form, and there is

no form more beautiful than the human; and the third is, that reason

cannot reside in any other shape.

First, let us consider each argument separately. You seem to me to

assume a principle, despotically I may say, that has no manner of

probability in it. Who was ever so blind, in contemplating these

subjects, as not to see that the Gods were represented in human form,

either by the particular advice of wise men, who thought by those means

the more easily to turn the minds of the ignorant from a depravity of

manners to the worship of the Gods; or through superstition, which was

the cause of their believing that when they were paying adoration to

these images they were approaching the Gods themselves. These conceits

were not a little improved by the poets, painters, and artificers; for

it would not have been very easy to represent the Gods planning and

executing any work in another form, and perhaps this opinion arose from

the idea which mankind have of their own beauty. But do not you, who

are so great an adept in physics, see what a soothing flatterer, what a

sort of procuress, nature is to herself? Do you think there is any

creature on the land or in the sea that is not highly delighted with

its own form? If it were not so, why would not a bull become enamored

of a mare, or a horse of a cow? Do you believe an eagle, a lion, or a

dolphin prefers any shape to its own? If nature, therefore, has

instructed us in the same manner, that nothing is more beautiful than

man, what wonder is it that we, for that reason, should imagine the

Gods are of the human form? Do you suppose if beasts were endowed with

reason that every one would not give the prize of beauty to his own

species?

XXVIII. Yet, by Hercules (I speak as I think)! though I am fond enough

of myself, I dare not say that I excel in beauty that bull which

carried Europa. For the question here is not concerning our genius and

elocution, but our species and figure. If we could make and assume to

ourselves any form, would you be unwilling to resemble the sea-triton

as he is painted supported swimming on sea-monsters whose bodies are

partly human? Here I touch on a difficult point; for so great is the

force of nature that there is no man who would not choose to be like a

man, nor, indeed, any ant that would not be like an ant. But like what

man? For how few can pretend to beauty! When I was at Athens, the whole

flock of youths afforded scarcely one. You laugh, I see; but what I

tell you is the truth. Nay, to us who, after the examples of ancient

philosophers, delight in boys, defects are often pleasing. Alcæus was

charmed with a wart on a boy's knuckle; but a wart is a blemish on the

body; yet it seemed a beauty to him. Q. Catulus, my friend and

colleague's father, was enamored with your fellow-citizen Roscius, on

whom he wrote these verses:

As once I stood to hail the rising day,

Roscius appearing on the left I spied:

Forgive me, Gods, if I presume to say

The mortal's beauty with th' immortal vied.

Roscius more beautiful than a God! yet he was then, as he now is,

squint-eyed. But what signifies that, if his defects were beauties to

Catulus?

XXIX. I return to the Gods. Can we suppose any of them to be

squint-eyed, or even to have a cast in the eye? Have they any warts?

Are any of them hook-nosed, flap-eared, beetle-browed, or jolt-headed,

as some of us are? Or are they free from imperfections? Let us grant

you that. Are they all alike in the face? For if they are many, then

one must necessarily be more beautiful than another, and then there

must be some Deity not absolutely most beautiful. Or if their faces are

all alike, there would be an Academy[90] in heaven; for if one God does

not differ from another, there is no possibility of knowing or

distinguishing them.

What if your assertion, Velleius, proves absolutely false, that no form

occurs to us, in our contemplations on the Deity, but the human? Will

you, notwithstanding that, persist in the defence of such an absurdity?

Supposing that form occurs to us, as you say it does, and we know

Jupiter, Juno, Minerva, Neptune, Vulcan, Apollo, and the other Deities,

by the countenance which painters and statuaries have given them, and

not only by their countenances, but by their decorations, their age,

and attire; yet the Egyptians, the Syrians, and almost all barbarous

nations,[91] are without such distinctions. You may see a greater

regard paid by them to certain beasts than by us to the most sacred

temples and images of the Gods; for many shrines have been rifled, and

images of the Deities have been carried from their most sacred places

by us; but we never heard that an Egyptian offered any violence to a

crocodile, an ibis, or a cat. What do you think, then? Do not the

Egyptians esteem their sacred bull, their Apis, as a Deity? Yes, by

Hercules! as certainly as you do our protectress Juno, whom you never

behold, even in your dreams, without a goat-skin, a spear, a shield,

and broad sandals. But the Grecian Juno of Argos and the Roman Juno are

not represented in this manner; so that the Grecians, the Lanuvinians,

and we, ascribe different forms to Juno; and our Capitoline Jupiter is

not the same with the Jupiter Ammon of the Africans.

XXX. Therefore, ought not a natural philosopher--that is, an inquirer

into the secrets of nature--to be ashamed of seeking a testimony to

truth from minds prepossessed by custom? According to the rule you have

laid down, it may be said that Jupiter is always bearded, Apollo always

beardless; that Minerva has gray and Neptune azure eyes; and, indeed,

we must then honor that Vulcan at Athens, made by Alcamenes, whose

lameness through his thin robes appears to be no deformity. Shall we,

therefore, receive a lame Deity because we have such an account of him?

Consider, likewise, that the Gods go by what names we give them. Now,

in the first place, they have as many names as men have languages; for

Vulcan is not called Vulcan in Italy, Africa, or Spain, as you are

called Velleius in all countries. Besides, the Gods are innumerable,

though the list of their names is of no great length even in the

records of our priests. Have they no names? You must necessarily

confess, indeed, they have none; for what occasion is there for

different names if their persons are alike?

How much more laudable would it be, Velleius, to acknowledge that you

do not know what you do not know than to follow a man whom you must

despise! Do you think the Deity is like either me or you? You do not

really think he is like either of us. What is to be done, then? Shall I

call the sun, the moon, or the sky a Deity? If so, they are

consequently happy. But what pleasures can they enjoy? And they are

wise too. But how can wisdom reside in such shapes? These are your own

principles. Therefore, if they are not of human form, as I have proved,

and if you cannot persuade yourself that they are of any other, why are

you cautious of denying absolutely the being of any Gods? You dare not

deny it--which is very prudent in you, though here you are not afraid

of the people, but of the Gods themselves. I have known Epicureans who

reverence[92] even the least images of the Gods, though I perceive it

to be the opinion of some that Epicurus, through fear of offending

against the Athenian laws, has allowed a Deity in words and destroyed

him in fact; so in those his select and short sentences, which are

called by you [Greek: kyriai doxai],[93] this, I think, is the first:

"That being which is happy and immortal is not burdened with any labor,

and does not impose any on any one else."

XXXI. In his statement of this sentence, some think that he avoided

speaking clearly on purpose, though it was manifestly without design.

But they judge ill of a man who had not the least art. It is doubtful

whether he means that there is any being happy and immortal, or that if

there is any being happy, he must likewise be immortal. They do not

consider that he speaks here, indeed, ambiguously; but in many other

places both he and Metrodorus explain themselves as clearly as you have

done. But he believed there are Gods; nor have I ever seen any one who

was more exceedingly afraid of what he declared ought to be no objects

of fear, namely, death and the Gods, with the apprehensions of which

the common rank of people are very little affected; but he says that

the minds of all mortals are terrified by them. Many thousands of men

commit robberies in the face of death; others rifle all the temples

they can get into: such as these, no doubt, must be greatly terrified,

the one by the fears of death, and the others by the fear of the Gods.

But since you dare not (for I am now addressing my discourse to

Epicurus himself) absolutely deny the existence of the Gods, what

hinders you from ascribing a divine nature to the sun, the world, or

some eternal mind? I never, says he, saw wisdom and a rational soul in

any but a human form. What! did you ever observe anything like the sun,

the moon, or the five moving planets? The sun, terminating his course

in two extreme parts of one circle,[94] finishes his annual

revolutions. The moon, receiving her light from the sun, completes the

same course in the space of a month.[95] The five planets in the same

circle, some nearer, others more remote from the earth, begin the same

courses together, and finish them in different spaces of time. Did you

ever observe anything like this, Epicurus? So that, according to you,

there can be neither sun, moon, nor stars, because nothing can exist

but what we have touched or seen.[96] What! have you ever seen the

Deity himself? Why else do you believe there is any? If this doctrine

prevails, we must reject all that history relates or reason discovers;

and the people who inhabit inland countries must not believe there is

such a thing as the sea. This is so narrow a way of thinking that if

you had been born in Seriphus, and never had been from out of that

island, where you had frequently been in the habit of seeing little

hares and foxes, you would not, therefore, believe that there are such

beasts as lions and panthers; and if any one should describe an

elephant to you, you would think that he designed to laugh at you.

XXXII. You indeed, Velleius, have concluded your argument, not after

the manner of your own sect, but of the logicians, to which your people

are utter strangers. You have taken it for granted that the Gods are

happy. I allow it. You say that without virtue no one can be happy. I

willingly concur with you in this also. You likewise say that virtue

cannot reside where reason is not. That I must necessarily allow. You

add, moreover, that reason cannot exist but in a human form. Who, do

you think, will admit that? If it were true, what occasion was there to

come so gradually to it? And to what purpose? You might have answered

it on your own authority. I perceive your gradations from happiness to

virtue, and from virtue to reason; but how do you come from reason to

human form? There, indeed, you do not descend by degrees, but

precipitately.

Nor can I conceive why Epicurus should rather say the Gods are like men

than that men are like the Gods. You ask what is the difference; for,

say you, if this is like that, that is like this. I grant it; but this

I assert, that the Gods could not take their form from men; for the

Gods always existed, and never had a beginning, if they are to exist

eternally; but men had a beginning: therefore that form, of which the

immortal Gods are, must have had existence before mankind;

consequently, the Gods should not be said to be of human form, but our

form should be called divine. However, let this be as you will. I now

inquire how this extraordinary good fortune came about; for you deny

that reason had any share in the formation of things. But still, what

was this extraordinary fortune? Whence proceeded that happy concourse

of atoms which gave so sudden a rise to men in the form of Gods? Are we

to suppose the divine seed fell from heaven upon earth, and that men

sprung up in the likeness of their celestial sires? I wish you would

assert it; for I should not be unwilling to acknowledge my relation to

the Gods. But you say nothing like it; no, our resemblance to the Gods,

it seems, was by chance. Must I now seek for arguments to refute this

doctrine seriously? I wish I could as easily discover what is true as I

can overthrow what is false.

XXXIII. You have enumerated with so ready a memory, and so copiously,

the opinions of philosophers, from Thales the Milesian, concerning the

nature of the Gods, that I am surprised to see so much learning in a

Roman. But do you think they were all madmen who thought that a Deity

could by some possibility exist without hands and feet? Does not even

this consideration have weight with you when you consider what is the

use and advantage of limbs in men, and lead you to admit that the Gods

have no need of them? What necessity can there be of feet, without

walking; or of hands, if there is nothing to be grasped? The same may

be asked of the other parts of the body, in which nothing is vain,

nothing useless, nothing superfluous; therefore we may infer that no

art can imitate the skill of nature. Shall the Deity, then, have a

tongue, and not speak--teeth, palate, and jaws, though he will have no

use for them? Shall the members which nature has given to the body for

the sake of generation be useless to the Deity? Nor would the internal

parts be less superfluous than the external. What comeliness is there

in the heart, the lungs, the liver, and the rest of them, abstracted

from their use? I mention these because you place them in the Deity on

account of the beauty of the human form.

Depending on these dreams, not only Epicurus, Metrodorus, and Hermachus

declaimed against Pythagoras, Plato, and Empedocles, but that little

harlot Leontium presumed to write against Theophrastus: indeed, she had

a neat Attic style; but yet, to think of her arguing against

Theophrastus! So much did the garden of Epicurus[97] abound with these

liberties, and, indeed, you are always complaining against them. Zeno

wrangled. Why need I mention Albutius? Nothing could be more elegant or

humane than Phædrus; yet a sharp expression would disgust the old man.

Epicurus treated Aristotle with great contumely. He foully slandered

Phædo, the disciple of Socrates. He pelted Timocrates, the brother of

his companion Metrodorus, with whole volumes, because he disagreed with

him in some trifling point of philosophy. He was ungrateful even to

Democritus, whose follower he was; and his master Nausiphanes, from

whom he learned nothing, had no better treatment from him.

XXXIV. Zeno gave abusive language not only to those who were then

living, as Apollodorus, Syllus, and the rest, but he called Socrates,

who was the father of philosophy, the Attic buffoon, using the Latin

word _Scurra_. He never called Chrysippus by any name but Chesippus.

And you yourself a little before, when you were numbering up a senate,

as we may call them, of philosophers, scrupled not to say that the most

eminent men talked like foolish, visionary dotards. Certainly,

therefore, if they have all erred in regard to the nature of the Gods,

it is to be feared there are no such beings. What you deliver on that

head are all whimsical notions, and not worthy the consideration even

of old women. For you do not seem to be in the least aware what a task

you draw on yourselves, if you should prevail on us to grant that the

same form is common to Gods and men. The Deity would then require the

same trouble in dressing, and the same care of the body, that mankind

does. He must walk, run, lie down, lean, sit, hold, speak, and

discourse. You need not be told the consequence of making the Gods male

and female.

Therefore I cannot sufficiently wonder how this chief of yours came to

entertain these strange opinions. But you constantly insist on the

certainty of this tenet, that the Deity is both happy and immortal.

Supposing he is so, would his happiness be less perfect if he had not

two feet? Or cannot that blessedness or beatitude--call it which you

will (they are both harsh terms, but we must mollify them by use)--can

it not, I say, exist in that sun, or in this world, or in some eternal

mind that has not human shape or limbs? All you say against it is, that

you never saw any happiness in the sun or the world. What, then? Did

you ever see any world but this? No, you will say. Why, therefore, do

you presume to assert that there are not only six hundred thousand

worlds, but that they are innumerable? Reason tells you so. Will not

reason tell you likewise that as, in our inquiries into the most

excellent nature, we find none but the divine nature can be happy and

eternal, so the same divine nature surpasses us in excellence of mind;

and as in mind, so in body? Why, therefore, as we are inferior in all

other respects, should we be equal in form? For human virtue approaches

nearer to the divinity than human form.

XXXV. To return to the subject I was upon. What can be more childish

than to assert that there are no such creatures as are generated in the

Red Sea or in India? The most curious inquirer cannot arrive at the

knowledge of all those creatures which inhabit the earth, sea, fens,

and rivers; and shall we deny the existence of them because we never

saw them? That similitude which you are so very fond of is nothing to

the purpose. Is not a dog like a wolf? And, as Ennius says,

The monkey, filthiest beast, how like to man!

Yet they differ in nature. No beast has more sagacity than an elephant;

yet where can you find any of a larger size? I am speaking here of

beasts. But among men, do we not see a disparity of manners in persons

very much alike, and a similitude of manners in persons unlike? If this

sort of argument were once to prevail, Velleius, observe what it would

lead to. You have laid it down as certain that reason cannot possibly

reside in any but the human form. Another may affirm that it can exist

in none but a terrestrial being; in none but a being that is born, that

grows up, and receives instruction, and that consists of a soul, and an

infirm and perishable body; in short, in none but a mortal man. But if

you decline those opinions, why should a single form disturb you? You

perceive that man is possessed of reason and understanding, with all

the infirmities which I have mentioned interwoven with his being;

abstracted from which, you nevertheless know God, you say, if the

lineaments do but remain. This is not talking considerately, but at a

venture; for surely you did not think what an encumbrance anything

superfluous or useless is, not only in a man, but a tree. How

troublesome it is to have a finger too much! And why so? Because

neither use nor ornament requires more than five; but your Deity has

not only a finger more than he wants, but a head, a neck, shoulders,

sides, a paunch, back, hams, hands, feet, thighs, and legs. Are these

parts necessary to immortality? Are they conducive to the existence of

the Deity? Is the face itself of use? One would rather say so of the

brain, the heart, the lights, and the liver; for these are the seats of

life. The features of the face contribute nothing to the preservation

of it.

XXXVI. You censured those who, beholding those excellent and stupendous

works, the world, and its respective parts--the heaven, the earth, the

seas--and the splendor with which they are adorned; who, contemplating

the sun, moon, and stars; and who, observing the maturity and changes

of the seasons, and vicissitudes of times, inferred from thence that

there must be some excellent and eminent essence that originally made,

and still moves, directs, and governs them. Suppose they should mistake

in their conjecture, yet I see what they aim at. But what is that great

and noble work which appears to you to be the effect of a divine mind,

and from which you conclude that there are Gods? "I have," say you, "a

certain information of a Deity imprinted in my mind." Of a bearded

Jupiter, I suppose, and a helmeted Minerva.

But do you really imagine them to be such? How much better are the

notions of the ignorant vulgar, who not only believe the Deities have

members like ours, but that they make use of them; and therefore they

assign them a bow and arrows, a spear, a shield, a trident, and

lightning; and though they do not behold the actions of the Gods, yet

they cannot entertain a thought of a Deity doing nothing. The Egyptians

(so much ridiculed) held no beasts to be sacred, except on account of

some advantage which they had received from them. The ibis, a very

large bird, with strong legs and a horny long beak, destroys a great

number of serpents. These birds keep Egypt from pestilential diseases

by killing and devouring the flying serpents brought from the deserts

of Lybia by the south-west wind, which prevents the mischief that may

attend their biting while alive, or any infection when dead. I could

speak of the advantage of the ichneumon, the crocodile, and the cat;

but I am unwilling to be tedious; yet I will conclude with observing

that the barbarians paid divine honors to beasts because of the

benefits they received from them; whereas your Gods not only confer no

benefit, but are idle, and do no single act of any description

whatever.

XXXVII. "They have nothing to do," your teacher says. Epicurus truly,

like indolent boys, thinks nothing preferable to idleness; yet those

very boys, when they have a holiday, entertain themselves in some

sportive exercise. But we are to suppose the Deity in such an inactive

state that if he should move we may justly fear he would be no longer

happy. This doctrine divests the Gods of motion and operation; besides,

it encourages men to be lazy, as they are by this taught to believe

that the least labor is incompatible even with divine felicity.

But let it be as you would have it, that the Deity is in the form and

image of a man. Where is his abode? Where is his habitation? Where is

the place where he is to be found? What is his course of life? And what

is it that constitutes the happiness which you assert that he enjoys?

For it seems necessary that a being who is to be happy must use and

enjoy what belongs to him. And with regard to place, even those natures

which are inanimate have each their proper stations assigned to them:

so that the earth is the lowest; then water is next above the earth;

the air is above the water; and fire has the highest situation of all

allotted to it. Some creatures inhabit the earth, some the water, and

some, of an amphibious nature, live in both. There are some, also,

which are thought to be born in fire, and which often appear fluttering

in burning furnaces.

In the first place, therefore, I ask you, Where is the habitation of

your Deity? Secondly, What motive is it that stirs him from his place,

supposing he ever moves? And, lastly, since it is peculiar to animated

beings to have an inclination to something that is agreeable to their

several natures, what is it that the Deity affects, and to what purpose

does he exert the motion of his mind and reason? In short, how is he

happy? how eternal? Whichever of these points you touch upon, I am

afraid you will come lamely off. For there is never a proper end to

reasoning which proceeds on a false foundation; for you asserted

likewise that the form of the Deity is perceptible by the mind, but not

by sense; that it is neither solid, nor invariable in number; that it

is to be discerned by similitude and transition, and that a constant

supply of images is perpetually flowing on from innumerable atoms, on

which our minds are intent; so that we from that conclude that divine

nature to be happy and everlasting.

XXXVIII. What, in the name of those Deities concerning whom we are now

disputing, is the meaning of all this? For if they exist only in

thought, and have no solidity nor substance, what difference can there

be between thinking of a Hippocentaur and thinking of a Deity? Other

philosophers call every such conformation of the mind a vain motion;

but you term it "the approach and entrance of images into the mind."

Thus, when I imagine that I behold T. Gracchus haranguing the people in

the Capitol, and collecting their suffrages concerning M. Octavius, I

call that a vain motion of the mind: but you affirm that the images of

Gracchus and Octavius are present, which are only conveyed to my mind

when they have arrived at the Capitol. The case is the same, you say,

in regard to the Deity, with the frequent representation of which the

mind is so affected that from thence it may be clearly understood that

the Gods[98] are happy and eternal.

Let it be granted that there are images by which the mind is affected,

yet it is only a certain form that occurs; and why must that form be

pronounced happy? why eternal? But what are those images you talk of,

or whence do they proceed? This loose manner of arguing is taken from

Democritus; but he is reproved by many people for it; nor can you

derive any conclusions from it: the whole system is weak and imperfect.

For what can be more improbable than that the images of Homer,

Archilochus, Romulus, Numa, Pythagoras, and Plato should come into my

mind, and yet not in the form in which they existed? How, therefore,

can they be those persons? And whose images are they? Aristotle tells

us that there never was such a person as Orpheus the poet;[99] and it

is said that the verse called Orphic verse was the invention of

Cercops, a Pythagorean; yet Orpheus, that is to say, the image of him,

as you will have it, often runs in my head. What is the reason that I

entertain one idea of the figure of the same person, and you another?

Why do we image to ourselves such things as never had any existence,

and which never can have, such as Scyllas and Chimæras? Why do we frame

ideas of men, countries, and cities which we never saw? How is it that

the very first moment that I choose I can form representations of them

in my mind? How is it that they come to me, even in my sleep, without

being called or sought after?

XXXIX. The whole affair, Velleius, is ridiculous. You do not impose

images on our eyes only, but on our minds. Such is the privilege which

you have assumed of talking nonsense with impunity. But there is, you

say, a transition of images flowing on in great crowds in such a way

that out of many some one at least must be perceived! I should be

ashamed of my incapacity to understand this if you, who assert it,

could comprehend it yourselves; for how do you prove that these images

are continued in uninterrupted motion? Or, if uninterrupted, still how

do you prove them to be eternal? There is a constant supply, you say,

of innumerable atoms. But must they, for that reason, be all eternal?

To elude this, you have recourse to equilibration (for so, with your

leave, I will call your [Greek: Isonomia]),[100] and say that as there

is a sort of nature mortal, so there must also be a sort which is

immortal. By the same rule, as there are men mortal, there are men

immortal; and as some arise from the earth, some must arise from the

water also; and as there are causes which destroy, there must likewise

be causes which preserve. Be it as you say; but let those causes

preserve which have existence themselves. I cannot conceive these your

Gods to have any. But how does all this face of things arise from

atomic corpuscles? Were there any such atoms (as there are not), they

might perhaps impel one another, and be jumbled together in their

motion; but they could never be able to impart form, or figure, or

color, or animation, so that you by no means demonstrate the

immortality of your Deity.

XL. Let us now inquire into his happiness. It is certain that without

virtue there can be no happiness; but virtue consists in action: now

your Deity does nothing; therefore he is void of virtue, and

consequently cannot be happy. What sort of life does he lead? He has a

constant supply, you say, of good things, without any intermixture of

bad. What are those good things? Sensual pleasures, no doubt; for you

know no delight of the mind but what arises from the body, and returns

to it. I do not suppose, Velleius, that you are like some of the

Epicureans, who are ashamed of those expressions of Epicurus,[101] in

which he openly avows that he has no idea of any good separate from

wanton and obscene pleasures, which, without a blush, he names

distinctly. What food, therefore, what drink, what variety of music or

flowers, what kind of pleasures of touch, what odors, will you offer to

the Gods to fill them with pleasures? The poets indeed provide them

with banquets of nectar and ambrosia, and a Hebe or a Ganymede to serve

up the cup. But what is it, Epicurus, that you do for them? For I do

not see from whence your Deity should have those things, nor how he

could use them. Therefore the nature of man is better constituted for a

happy life than the nature of the Gods, because men enjoy various kinds

of pleasures; but you look on all those pleasures as superficial which

delight the senses only by a titillation, as Epicurus calls it. Where

is to be the end of this trifling? Even Philo, who followed the

Academy, could not bear to hear the soft and luscious delights of the

Epicureans despised; for with his admirable memory he perfectly

remembered and used to repeat many sentences of Epicurus in the very

words in which they were written. He likewise used to quote many, which

were more gross, from Metrodorus, the sage colleague of Epicurus, who

blamed his brother Timocrates because he would not allow that

everything which had any reference to a happy life was to be measured

by the belly; nor has he said this once only, but often. You grant what

I say, I perceive; for you know it to be true. I can produce the books,

if you should deny it; but I am not now reproving you for referring all

things to the standard of pleasure: that is another question. What I am

now showing is, that your Gods are destitute of pleasure; and

therefore, according to your own manner of reasoning, they are not

happy.

XLI. But they are free from pain. Is that sufficient for beings who are

supposed to enjoy all good things and the most supreme felicity? The

Deity, they say, is constantly meditating on his own happiness, for he

has no other idea which can possibly occupy his mind. Consider a

little; reflect what a figure the Deity would make if he were to be

idly thinking of nothing through all eternity but "It is very well with

me, and I am happy;" nor do I see why this happy Deity should not fear

being destroyed, since, without any intermission, he is driven and

agitated by an everlasting incursion of atoms, and since images are

constantly floating off from him. Your Deity, therefore, is neither

happy nor eternal.

Epicurus, it seems, has written books concerning sanctity and piety

towards the Gods. But how does he speak on these subjects? You would

say that you were listening to Coruncanius or Scævola, the

high-priests, and not to a man who tore up all religion by the roots,

and who overthrew the temples and altars of the immortal Gods; not,

indeed, with hands, like Xerxes, but with arguments; for what reason is

there for your saying that men ought to worship the Gods, when the Gods

not only do not regard men, but are entirely careless of everything,

and absolutely do nothing at all?

But they are, you say, of so glorious and excellent a nature that a

wise man is induced by their excellence to adore them. Can there be any

glory or excellence in that nature which only contemplates its own

happiness, and neither will do, nor does, nor ever did anything?

Besides, what piety is due to a being from whom you receive nothing? Or

how can you, or any one else, be indebted to him who bestows no

benefits? For piety is only justice towards the Gods; but what right

have they to it, when there is no communication whatever between the

Gods and men? And sanctity is the knowledge of how we ought to worship

them; but I do not understand why they are to be worshipped, if we are

neither to receive nor expect any good from them.

XLII. And why should we worship them from an admiration only of that

nature in which we can behold nothing excellent? and as for that

freedom from superstition, which you are in the habit of boasting of so

much, it is easy to be free from that feeling when you have renounced

all belief in the power of the Gods; unless, indeed, you imagine that

Diagoras or Theodorus, who absolutely denied the being of the Gods,

could possibly be superstitious. I do not suppose that even Protagoras

could, who doubted whether there were Gods or not. The opinions of

these philosophers are not only destructive of superstition, which

arises from a vain fear of the Gods, but of religion also, which

consists in a pious adoration of them.

What think you of those who have asserted that the whole doctrine

concerning the immortal Gods was the invention of politicians, whose

view was to govern that part of the community by religion which reason

could not influence? Are not their opinions subversive of all religion?

Or what religion did Prodicus the Chian leave to men, who held that

everything beneficial to human life should be numbered among the Gods?

Were not they likewise void of religion who taught that the Deities, at

present the object of our prayers and adoration, were valiant,

illustrious, and mighty men who arose to divinity after death?

Euhemerus, whom our Ennius translated, and followed more than other

authors, has particularly advanced this doctrine, and treated of the

deaths and burials of the Gods; can he, then, be said to have confirmed

religion, or, rather, to have totally subverted it? I shall say nothing

of that sacred and august Eleusina, into whose mysteries the most

distant nations were initiated, nor of the solemnities in Samothrace,

or in Lemnos, secretly resorted to by night, and surrounded by thick

and shady groves; which, if they were properly explained, and reduced

to reasonable principles, would rather explain the nature of things

than discover the knowledge of the Gods.

XLIII. Even that great man Democritus, from whose fountains Epicurus

watered his little garden, seems to me to be very inferior to his usual

acuteness when speaking about the nature of the Gods. For at one time

he thinks that there are images endowed with divinity, inherent in the

universality of things; at another, that the principles and minds

contained in the universe are Gods; then he attributes divinity to

animated images, employing themselves in doing us good or harm; and,

lastly, he speaks of certain images of such vast extent that they

encompass the whole outside of the universe; all which opinions are

more worthy of the country[102] of Democritus than of Democritus

himself; for who can frame in his mind any ideas of such images? who

can admire them? who can think they merit a religious adoration?

But Epicurus, when he divests the Gods of the power of doing good,

extirpates all religion from the minds of men; for though he says the

divine nature is the best and the most excellent of all natures, he

will not allow it to be susceptible of any benevolence, by which he

destroys the chief and peculiar attribute of the most perfect being.

For what is better and more excellent than goodness and beneficence? To

refuse your Gods that quality is to say that no man is any object of

their favor, and no Gods either; that they neither love nor esteem any

one; in short, that they not only give themselves no trouble about us,

but even look on each other with the greatest indifference.

XLIV. How much more reasonable is the doctrine of the Stoics, whom you

censure? It is one of their maxims that the wise are friends to the

wise, though unknown to each other; for as nothing is more amiable than

virtue, he who possesses it is worthy our love, to whatever country he

belongs. But what evils do your principles bring, when you make good

actions and benevolence the marks of imbecility! For, not to mention

the power and nature of the Gods, you hold that even men, if they had

no need of mutual assistance, would be neither courteous nor

beneficent. Is there no natural charity in the dispositions of good

men? The very name of love, from which friendship is derived, is dear

to men;[103] and if friendship is to centre in our own advantage only,

without regard to him whom we esteem a friend, it cannot be called

friendship, but a sort of traffic for our own profit. Pastures, lands,

and herds of cattle are valued in the same manner on account of the

profit we gather from them; but charity and friendship expect no

return. How much more reason have we to think that the Gods, who want

nothing, should love each other, and employ themselves about us! If it

were not so, why should we pray to or adore them? Why do the priests

preside over the altars, and the augurs over the auspices? What have we

to ask of the Gods, and why do we prefer our vows to them?

But Epicurus, you say, has written a book concerning sanctity. A

trifling performance by a man whose wit is not so remarkable in it, as

the unrestrained license of writing which he has permitted himself; for

what sanctity can there be if the Gods take no care of human affairs?

Or how can that nature be called animated which neither regards nor

performs anything? Therefore our friend Posidonius has well observed,

in his fifth book of the Nature of the Gods, that Epicurus believed

there were no Gods, and that what he had said about the immortal Gods

was only said from a desire to avoid unpopularity. He could not be so

weak as to imagine that the Deity has only the outward features of a

simple mortal, without any real solidity; that he has all the members

of a man, without the least power to use them--a certain unsubstantial

pellucid being, neither favorable nor beneficial to any one, neither

regarding nor doing anything. There can be no such being in nature; and

as Epicurus said this plainly, he allows the Gods in words, and

destroys them in fact; and if the Deity is truly such a being that he

shows no favor, no benevolence to mankind, away with him! For why

should I entreat him to be propitious? He can be propitious to none,

since, as you say, all his favor and benevolence are the effects of

imbecility.

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