Well, but all men—ay, all nations—have acknowledged and féted Gods 3 was it all delusion?

Thank you; a timely reminder 3 national observances show better than anything else how vague religious theory is. Confusion is endless, and beliefs as many as believers. Scythia makes offerings to a scimetar, Thrace to the Samian runaway Zamolxis, Phrygia to a Month-God, Ethiopia to a Day-Goddess, Cyllene to Phales, Assyria to a dove, Persia to fire, Egypt to water. In Egypt, though, besides the universal worship of water, Mempbis has a private cult of the ox, Pelusium of the onion, other cities of the ibis or the crocodile, others again of baboon, cat, or monkey. Nay, the very villages have their specialities: one deifies the right shoulder, and another across the river the left; one a balf skull, another an earthenware bowl or platter. Come, my fine fellow, ts tt not all ridiculous?

What did I tell you, Gods? All this was sure to come out and be carefully overhauled. Zeus. You did, Momus, and your strictures were justified; if once we come safe out of this present peril, I will try to introduce reforms.

Infidel! where do you find the source of oracles and prophecies, if not in the Gods and their Providence?

About oracles, friend, the less said the better; I shall ask you to choose your instances, you see. Will Apollo's answer to the Lydian suit you? That was as symmetrical as a double-edged knife; or say, it faced both ways, like those Hermae which are made double, alike whether you look at front or back. Consider; will Croesus’s passage of the Halys destroy bis own realm, or Cyruss? Yet the wretched Sardian paid a long price for bis ambidextrous hexameter.

The man is realizing just my worst apprehensions, Where is our handsome musician now? Ah, there you are; go down and plead your own cause against him.

Hush, Momus; you are murdering our feelings; it is no time for recrimination.

Have a care, Damis; this is sacrilege, no less; what you say amounts to razing the temples and upsetting the altars.

Ob, not all the altars; what harm do they do, so long as incense and perfume is the worst of it? As for Artemis’s altar at Tauri, though, and her hideous feasts, I should like it overturned from base to cornice.

Whence comes this resistless plague among us? ‘There is none of us he spares; he is as free with his tongue as a tub orator, And grips by turns the innocent and guilty.

The innocent? You will not find many of those among us, Zeus. He will soon come to laying hands upon some of the great and eminent, I dare say.