Alexander the False Prophet (43)

I want to include in my tale a dialogue between Glycon and one Sacerdos, a man of Tius, whose intelligence you will be able to appraise from his questions. I read the conversation in an inscription in letters of gold, at Tius, in the house of Sacerdos. “Tell me, Master Glycon,’ said he, “who are you?” “I am the latter-day Asclepius,’ he replied. “A different person from the one of former times? What do vou mean?” “It is not permitted you to hear that.” “How many years will you tarry among us delivering oracles?” “One thousand and three.” “Then where shall you go?” “To Bactra and that region, for the barbarians too must profit by my presence among

men.” ‘What of the other prophetic shrines, the one in Didymi, the one in Clarus, and the one in Delphi—do they still have your father Apollo as the source of their oracles, or are the predictions now given out there false?’”’ “This too you must not wish to know; it is not permitted.” “What about myself—what shall I be after my present life?”’ “A camel, then a horse, then a wise man and prophet just as great as Alexander.” That was Glycon’s conversation with Sacerdos; and in conclusion he uttered an oracle in verse, knowing that Sacerdos was a follower of Lepidus:[*]

Put not in Lepidus faith, for a pitiful doom is in waiting.

That was because he greatly feared Epicurus, as I have said before, seeing in him an opponent and critic of his trickery.