The Parliament of the Gods (8-11)

From the moment that you, Zeus, once opened our doors to such as they and turned your attention to mortal women, everyone else has copied you, and not the male sex alone but—what is most unseemly—even the goddesses. Who does not know about Anchises, Tithonus, Endymion, Iasion, and the rest of them? So I think I shall omit those incidents, for it would take too long if I were to pass censure on them.

ZEUS Say nothing about Ganymede, Momus, for I shall be angry if you vex the little lad by disparaging his birth.

MOMUS Then am I not to speak of the eagle, either, and say that he too is in heaven, where he sits upon your royal sceptre and all but nests on your head, passing for a god?

Or must I omit him also, for the sake of Ganymede? But Attis at all events, Zeus, and Corybas[*] and Sabazius[*]—how did they get trundled in upon us?

Or Mithras yonder, the Mede, with his caftan and his cap, who does not even speak Greek, so that he cannot even understand if one drinks his health? The result is that the Scythians—the Getae among them—seeing all this have told us to go hang, and now confer immortality on their own account and elect as gods whomsoever they will, in the selfsame way that Zamolxis, a slave, obtained fraudulent admission to the roster, getting by with it somehow or other.[*]

All that, however, is as nothing, Gods.—You there, you dog-faced, linen-vested Egyptian, who are you, my fine fellow, and how do you make out that you are a god, with that bark of yours?[*] And with what idea does this spotted bull of Memphis[*] receive homage and give oracles and have prophets? I take shame to mention ibises and monkeys and billy-goats and other creatures far more ludicrous that somehow or other have been smuggled out of Egypt into heaven. How can you endure it, Gods, to see them worshipped as much as you, or even more? And you, Zeus, how can you put up with it when they grow ram’s horns upon you?[*]

ZEUS All these points that you mention about the Egyptians are in truth unseemly. Nevertheless, Momus, most of them are matters of symbolism and one who is not an adept in the mysteries really must not laugh at them.

MOMUS A lot we need mysteries, Zeus, to know that gods are gods, and dogheads are dogheads!

ZEUS Never mind, I say, about the Egyptians. Some other time we shall discuss their case at leisure. Go on and name the others.