Men interested in athletics and in the care of
their bodies think not only of condition and exercise
but: also of relaxation in season; in fact, they
consider this the principal part of training. In like
manner students, I think, after much reading of
serious works may profitably relax their minds and
put them in better trim for future labour.

 
It
would be appropriate recreation for them if they
were to take up the sort of reading that, instead of
affording just pure amusement based on wit and
humour, also boasts a little food for thought that the
Muses would not altogether spurn; and I think
they will consider the present work something
of the kind. They will find it enticing not only
for the novelty of its subject, for the humour of its
plan and because I tell all kinds of lies in a plausible
and specious way, but also because everything in my
story is a more or less comical parody of one or


 

another of the poets, historians and philosophers of
old, who have written much that smacks of miracles
and fables. I would cite them by name, were it
not that you yourself will recognise them from
your reading.

 
One of them is Ctesias, son of
Ctesiochus, of Cnidos, who wrote a great deal about
India and its characteristics that he had never seen
himself nor heard from anyone else with a reputation
for truthfulness. Iambulus also wrote much that
was strange about the countries in the great sea: he
made up a falsehood that is patent to everybody, but
wrote a story that is not uninteresting for all that.
 The writings of Ctesias and Iambulus are lost; also those
of Antonius Diogenes, whose story, On the Wonders beyond
Thule, was according to Photius (Bibb., cod. 166, 111 b) the
fountain-head of Lucian’s tale. 
Many others, with the same intent, have written about
imaginary travels and journeys of theirs, telling of
huge beasts, cruel men and strange ways of living.
Their guide and instructor in this sort of charlatanry
is Homer’s Odysseus, who tells Alcinous and his
court about winds in bondage, one-eyed men, carfnibals and savages; also about animals with many
heads, and transformations of his comrades wrought
with drugs. This stuff, and much more like it, is
what our friend humbugged the illiterate Phaeacians
with!

 

Well, on reading all these authors, I did
not find much fault with them for their lying, as I
saw that this was already a common practice even
among men who profess philosophy. A slap at Plato’s Republic (x. 614 A seg.), as the scholiast
says. 
I did wonder,
though, that they thought that they could write untruths and not get caught at it. Therefore, as I myself,
thanks to my vanity, was eager to hand something




 

down to posterity, that I might not be the only one
excluded from the privileges of poetic licence, and
as I had nothing true to tell, not having had any
adventures of significance, I took to lying. But my
lying is far more honest than theirs, for though I
tell the truth in nothing else, I shall at least be
truthful in saying that I ama liar. I think I can
escape the censure of the world by my own admission that I am not telling a word of truth. Be it
understood, then, that I am writing about things
which I have neither seen nor had to do with nor
learned from others—which, in fact, do not exist at
all and, in the nature of things, cannot exist.
 Compare the protestations of Ctesias and of Antonius
Diogenes (Phot. cod. 72, 49-50; 166, 109 b). 
Therefore my readers should on no account believe
in them.

 

Once upon a time, setting out from the Pillars
of Hercules and heading for the western ocean with
a fair wind, I went a-voyaging. The motive and
purpose of my journey lay in my intellectual activity
and desire for adventure, and in my wish to find
out what the end of the ocean was, and who the
people were that lived on the other side. On this
account I put aboard a good store of provisions,
stowed water enough, enlisted in the venture fifty of
my acquaintances who were like-minded with myself,
got together also a great quantity of arms, shipped
the best sailing-master to be had at a big inducement, and put my boat—she was a pinnace—in trim
for a long and difficult voyage.