if dogs — for some things must needs be imagined, that matters may be seen more clearly — if, I say, dogs and asses, if wagtails along with them, if chattering swallows, and, equally with these, pigs, having received some sense of human feeling, were to reckon and suppose you to be gods, and were to offer sacred rites to you for honour's sake — not from other and other materials, but from those things by which it is their custom to be fed and to be sustained by natural appetite — we demand to hear from you whether you would judge this to be an honour, or rather a most grievous insult: when the swallows should slay flies for you, the wagtails should slaughter and consecrate little ants; when the asses should give hay upon your altars and offer chaff; when the dogs should lay on bones and burn up the discharge of human dung; and when, last of all, the little pigs should pour out for you the mire taken from their bristling wallows, muddy places, and quagmires?
Would you not, then, be inflamed that your dignities were spat upon, and would you not reckon it among atrocious injuries that you were received with dung? 'But you honour the gods with the bodies of bulls and the slaughter of other living creatures.' — And how does this differ from that, since these too, if not yet turned to it, will nevertheless become dung, and, with the interposition of a little time, will rot? In short, cease to place fire beneath the altars: assuredly you will now behold those sacred entrails of bulls, by which the honour of the gods is augmented by you, seething and heaving with worms, tainting and corrupting the state of the sky, and wounding the neighbouring regions with pestilential smells; so that, if the gods should bid you turn your care to your health, and thence to make your midday meals
or suppers of them, after the solemn manner, you would flee far away, and, cursing that kind of smell, would beg pardon of the gods above, and would swear to them that you would never make such sacrifices. Is not this, then, to play the fool, to confess, and to lay bare that you know not what God is, nor to what power the force and appellation of this name ought to be subjected and applied? You augment the gods with new foods, you honour them with reeking fumes and juices, and, because those things which feed you are pleasant and welcome to you, you believe that the gods too abound in the same pleasures — that, after the manner of barkers and dogs, they lay aside their savagery at a morsel and fawn upon those who offer it again and again.
And since our discourse now turns upon the matter of victims, what is the cause, what the reason, that although the immortal gods - granted, for our part, that any beings whatever are believed to be gods - ought to be of one mind or of one nature, of one kind and one quality, yet all of them are not appeased by all victims, but certain gods by certain ones according to the laws of their rites? Again let me ask what the reason is, that yonder god is honored with bulls, another with kids or with sheep, this one with sucking pigs, another with unshorn lambs, this one with virgin heifers, that one with horned she-goats, this one with barren cows, but that one with pregnant sows, this one with white beasts, that one with black, one with victims of the female sex, but another indeed with male animals?
For if victims are slaughtered to the gods for the sake of honor and reverence, what does it matter, what difference does it make, from the head of which animal this debt is paid, by which the god's anger and displeasure is laid to rest? Or is the blood of one somehow less pleasing and agreeable to one god, while the blood of another pours pleasure and gladness into another? Or, as is the custom, does one god, from fear of some scruple and religious observance, abstain from goat's flesh, while another abhors the touch of pork; to this one the entrails of sheep are rank, and lest it burden a weak stomach, this one avoids the toughness of beef and takes the tenderness of sucklings, so as to digest more readily? "But," he says, "you err and are mistaken:
for that female victims should be immolated to female deities, and males to males, is a hidden and inner rationale, remote from the knowledge of the common crowd." I do not inquire, I do not demand, what the laws of the rites prescribe or what they contain; but if reason should prevail and truth win out, that there is no distinction of sexes among the gods, and that they are not divided into any sexes, is it not necessary that all these accounts be dissolved, and be found to rest upon opinions believed by the most foolish? I will not summon the verdicts of wise men, who cannot restrain their laughter when they hear that distinctions of sex have been attributed to the immortal gods:
I ask of each individual man, whether he himself believes and persuades himself that the race of the gods is divided into sexes, that these are males and females, and are formed with a disposition of members fit for begetting offspring. But if the ordinances of the sacrifices prescribe that sex be immolated to the gods matched with sex - that is, females to female deities, but male victims to male gods - what is the reason in the matter of colors, that it should be fitting to slay white victims to these, but black and jet-black ones to those? "Because," he says, "to the gods above and to those who prevail in the favorableness of omens, a bright color is acceptable and its whiteness auspicious in its cheerfulness; but to the gods on the left, dwelling in the seats below, a dusky color is more pleasing, steeped in gloomy dyes." But if again reason should prevail,
that the name of the nether world is utterly empty and void, and that there are no realms beneath the earth nor Plutonian abodes, then it is necessary that this opinion too, which you hold concerning black beasts and the subterranean gods, prove groundless. But if there are no beings below, it is necessary that there be also no gods of the Manes. For how can it come about that, when there are no such places, there should be said to be any worshippers of things that do not exist? But let us grant, as you wish, both that there are nether regions, and that there are Manes, and that certain gods dwell among these, less favorable in omens and set over the more mournful affairs. And what is the cause, what the reason, that black victims of the darkest color are brought to them? "Because black things suit the black, and gloomy things are pleasing to the like."
What then? Do you not see how you, together with us, are foolishly making sport alike, since the flesh of victims is white, and the bones, teeth, fat, caul, together with the brains, and the soft marrow within the bones? "But their fleeces are black, and the bristles of the animals are black." Then immolate to the gods the wool alone and the little bristles plucked from the victims, and leave the unhappy beasts, though stripped and shorn, to draw the breath of heaven, and to lie down among their pastures, most harmless creatures. But if you deem those things which are black and of dusky color pleasing to the nether deities, why do you not take care that everything else too, which it is customary to bring to their sacrifices, be black and smoked and hideously colored? Dye the incense, if it is offered, the salted meal, and all the libations;
to the milk, the oil, the blood - the one that it may take on a purple color, the others that they may be sallow - pour in soot together with cinders. But if for you there is no scruple in bringing certain white things that retain their own brightness, you yourselves dissolve your own religious observances and rationales, since in the work of the sacrifices you preserve nothing single and consistent. But it is fitting in this place also to learn this from you. If a he-goat be slain to Jupiter, whom it is customary to sacrifice to father Liber and to Mercury, or if a barren ox be slain to Unxia, whom it is prescribed to assign to Proserpina by Tuscan rite and observance, what crime will there be in this, what of evils or wickedness incurred, since it makes no difference in the service, from the head of which animal that debt of honor is discharged?
"It is not lawful," he says, "to confound these things, nor is it a small offense to mix up the duties of rituals and their administration." - Explain, I beg, the reason. "Because it is the law that victims of a fixed kind be consecrated to fixed deities, and that fixed supplications be rendered." - And what again is the cause, that it should be the law that victims of a fixed kind be consecrated to fixed deities, and fixed supplications rendered? For this very law too ought to have its own cause and to arise and be derived from fixed reasons. Are you going to plead antiquity and custom? - You pronounce to me the decrees of men and the inventions of a blind creature:
but I, when I demand that a reason be produced for me, desire to hear either that something has fallen from heaven, or - what the matter rather requires - what is inherent in a bull's blood that it should be immolated to Jupiter, and not to Mercury or Liber? Or what nature belongs to a goat, that it should again be suited to these gods, but not fitting for Jupiter's sacrifices? Has a division of the animals been made among the gods? Was it agreed by the compact of some settlement, that one god should keep off from another's victim, and this one cease to usurp the rights over another's blood? Or is it as jealous little boys are unwilling to share the taste of their own animals; or as report has it to be the custom among most different nations, that the things held fit for food by these are rejected from the diet of others?
Therefore if these things are empty and have not the firmness of any reason, the very rationale of the sacrifices is also void. For how can that which follows have a suitable cause, when that very first thing, from which the second flows, is found to be utterly empty and void and established on no solidity? "To Earth," they say, "the mother, a pregnant and teeming sow is immolated, but to the virgin Minerva a virgin heifer is slain, never yet roused by any goad to attempt any work."
- But we, on the contrary, judge that neither ought a virgin to have been slain to a virgin, lest virginity be violated in the beast - the very thing in which that goddess most excels - nor pregnant and teeming beasts to Earth, for the sake of honoring that very fecundity which we all seek and pray may go forward in ever-inextinguishable fruitfulness. For if, because Tritonia is a virgin, therefore it is fitting that virgin victims be immolated to her, and because Earth is a mother, she is likewise to be received with pregnant sows, then Apollo too, because he is a musician, ought to be slain victims by musicians; and Aesculapius, because he is a physician, by physicians; and Vulcan, because he is a smith, by smiths; and Mercury, because he is eloquent, by the eloquent and the most articulate.
But if to say this is insane, or - to pronounce it more moderately - stupid, far more is it a matter of greater madness to slaughter teeming beasts to Earth because she is heavy with offspring, and chaste virgins to Minerva because she is pure, of untouched virginity. For as to what we hear said by you, that some of the gods are good, but others evil and more prone to the lust of doing harm, and that the solemnities of sacrifices are ministered to the former that they may benefit, but to the latter that they may not harm - by what reasoning that is said, we confess we cannot understand.
For to say that the gods are most kindly and have gentle natures is both holy and religious and true; but that some are evil and sinister, this is by no means to be admitted to our ears, for the reason that that divine power is far removed and disjoined by its nature from doing harm. But whatever is able to bring on the cause of calamity, what it may be must first be seen, and it ought to be set apart from the name of god by the very greatest difference. And so, that we may accommodate our assent to you, that there are gods who favor prosperous affairs and gods who favor adverse ones, even so there is no reason why you should allure some to prosperity, but soothe others with sacrifices and rewards that they may not harm: first, because the good gods cannot do ill, even if they have been honored with no sacrifice;
for whatever is mild and placid by nature is far removed and set apart from the practice and thought of doing harm; but the evil one knows not how to check its ferocity, though it be allured by a thousand thousand herds and altars. For neither can bitterness turn itself into sweetness, nor dryness into moisture, nor the heat of fire into cold, nor can that which is contrary to anything take upon itself and transform into its own nature that which is contrary to it. Just as, if you should stroke a viper with your hand, or coax a scorpion venomous as it is, the one would attack you with a bite, the other, drawing itself together, would fix its sting, and that fondling of yours would profit nothing, since both creatures are driven to harm not by the goads of anger but by a certain property of their nature:
so it profits nothing to wish to win over the sinister gods by victims, since whether you have done that or on the contrary have not done it, they act according to their own nature and are led to the things they habitually do by innate laws and by a certain necessity. What of the fact that in this way both classes of gods cease to exist in their own powers and to abide in their own qualities? For if a sacred rite is performed to the good that they may benefit, but supplication is made to the evil by the same reasoning that they may not harm, it follows that it must be understood that the favorable gods will bestow no benefit if they receive no gifts, and from this become evil; but the evil, if they receive gifts, will lay aside their intent of harming, and from this become good:
and thus the matter is brought to this pass, that neither are these gods on the right nor those on the left; or - what cannot happen - both are themselves on the right and both again on the left. Be it so; let it be granted that the unhappy beasts are not slain at the temples of the gods without some office of religion, and that what has been done from the usage of custom contains some cause of a reason. But if it seems grand and ample to slaughter bulls to the gods, if it seems so to burn up entire and solid the entrails of the animals, what do these remaining things mean, cohering with the disciplines of the magi, which they restored as pontifical mysteries in the hidden laws of the sacred rites and inserted into divine matters? What, I say, do these mean: 'apexaones,' 'hirciae,' 'silicernia,' 'longavi'?
These are the names of kinds of sausages, some stuffed with goat's blood, others with minced lungs. What of 'taedae,' what of 'neniae,' what of 'offae' - not the common ones, but those whose name and appellation is 'penitae'? Of these, the first is lard cut, according to custom, into tiny morsels for stuffing into dishes; the second is a stretch of intestine, through which the flux of the vitals is discharged, dried out by juices. But the 'offa penita' is when a bit of the flesh of the tail is cut off from the beast. What of 'polimina,' what of 'omenta,' what of 'palasea' or, as some name it, 'plasea'?
Of these, the name 'omentum' is a certain part by which the enveloping membranes of the bellies are bounded; 'plasea' is the tail of an ox smeared with fine flour and blood; while 'polimina' furthermore are those things which we more modestly call 'proles' (offspring), but which are wont to be named by the common folk with the appellation of 'testes' (testicles). What of 'fitilla,' what of 'frumen,' what of 'africia,' what of 'gratilla,' 'catumeum,' 'cumspolium,' 'cubula'? Of these, the two that come first are names of porridges, but differing in kind and quality; while the series that follows contains the significations of cakes - for these too do not have one and the same form.
For it is not fitting to name 'caro strebula,' the flesh taken from the haunches of bulls; nor 'pulpamenta,' the unroasted morsels, which are entrails first enlivened on spits and scorched over coals; nor finally 'salsamina,' which are a single mixture combined from four kinds of grain; nor likewise 'fendicae,' which are themselves guts, those which the speech of the common people is wont to call by that name when it expresses them; nor by the same reasoning 'rumae,' which are the first heads in the gullets, whereby it is the nature of ruminating beasts both to cast down their food and to bring it back up; nor 'magmenta,' nor 'augmina,' nor a thousand kinds either of 'sanguinamina' (blood-puddings) or 'fitillae' (porridges), to which you have given obscure names and, for the crowd, made them more venerable.
For if whatever things are done by men, and most of all in a sacred matter, ought to have their causes, and nothing in all affairs and in all administration is to be done without reason: expound to us and tell us, what is the cause, what the reason, that these things too should be given to the gods and burned up on the sacred altars. For in this place, most necessary above all to this cause, we tarry longer, we press on, we cling fast, desiring to learn what business a god has with porridges, what with cakes, what with the various stuffings, seasoned by the art of confection from a manifold and costly variety of ingredients. Are the deities affected by sumptuous dinners or luncheons, so that it is fitting to devise these countless dishes for them?
Do they labor under aversions of the stomach, and is a variety of flavors sought to expel their loathings, so that now roasted things, now raw are set before them, now half-cooked, now half-raw? But if the gods love to receive all these parts which you call 'praesiciae,' and they are pleasing to them by a sense either of some pleasure or of some sweetness, what intervenes, what forbids, that you should not bring in all these things at once together with the whole animals?
What is the cause, what the reason, that the 'caro strebula' should be added separately in the offering, the rumen, the tail, and the 'plasea' separately, the guts alone and the caul alone among the 'augmenta'? Are the celestial gods affected with varieties of relishes, as it is the custom to happen after the gorgings of rich and wealthy dinners, when they take these tiny scraps as sweet tidbits - not those by which they allay hunger, but that they may rouse the leisure of the palate and, though full, goad themselves on to an appetite of gluttony?
O wondrous greatness of the gods, comprehended by no men, understood by no natures, if indeed they are bought over to be beneficial by the testicles of beasts and by their rumens, and do not lay aside their wrath and passions until they have beheld the 'neniae' and 'offae penitae' prepared to be burned and rendered up to them! It follows that we should say something about incense and about wine, without any excess. For these kinds too are coupled and mixed among the ceremonies, and are employed in worship for the most part. And first we ask and inquire this of you concerning incense: whence or at what time you were able to come to know it or to learn it, so that you should rightly deem it either to be given to the gods, or most acceptable to their will.
For it is a well-nigh recent thing, and no inexplicable series of years, since the knowledge of it flowed forth into these regions and merited to have a part in the divine shrines.
For neither in heroic times, as it is believed and reported, was it known what incense was - as is proved by the ancient writers, in whose books no mention of it is found to be set down; nor did Etruria, the parent and mother of superstition, know its notion or fame, as the rites of the shrines indicate; nor in the four hundred years during which the Alban state flourished did it come into anyone's use when a sacred rite was being performed; nor did Romulus himself, nor Numa, that craftsman in devising religious observances, know either that it existed or was born - as the holy spelt shows, by which it was the custom to carry out the duties of the solemn sacrifices. Whence then did the use of it begin to be taken up,
or what novelty burst into the ancient and time-honored custom, so that what was not necessary through such great ages should take the first place in the ceremonies? For if without incense the office of religion goes lame, and its force is necessary which makes the celestials propitious and gentle to men, then a sin was committed by the ancients - nay rather, all their life was full of expiations owed - who through carelessness neglected to offer up that which was most agreeable to the pleasure of the gods. But if in ancient times neither men nor gods desired this material of incense, it is proved that even today it is furnished in vain and to no purpose, since antiquity did not believe it necessary, and novelty craved it without any reasons.
Finally, that we may always hold to that rule and definition by which it has been demonstrated and fixed that whatever is done by man ought to have its causes, in this part too we shall maintain it, so that we may ask of you what is the cause, what the reason, that grains of incense should be cast upon the altars before the very images of the deities, and that they should be deemed made familiar and gentle by the burning of them. What is acquired for these gods from a deed of this kind, or what accrues to their minds, that we should rightly judge these things to be duly expended and not burned up in vain and to no purpose?
For just as you ought to show why you give incense to the gods, so too it follows for the gods that you ought to bring forth their having some cause why they do not spurn it - nay rather, why they so familiarly covet it. "We honor the gods with these things," someone will perhaps say. - But we inquire not into your sense, but into that of the deities, nor what is done by you, but we ask what is weighed by them as to the value of the favor which is given in reward. But yet, O piety! how great or of what sort is that honor, which is achieved by the sweat of a tree and procured by the resin of that tree? For, lest perchance you be ignorant what incense is or whence it comes: it is a viscous gum flowing from the barks, just as from the almond or the cherry, coalescing by a tearlike distillation.
Does this then honor and augment the dignities of the gods above, or, if some offense has at any time been contracted, is it dissolved by the vapor of incense and the indignation lulled and appeased? Why then do you refrain from burning everywhere, without any distinction, the gum of any tree whatever? For if the deities are honored by this, and do not unworthily endure that Panchaean resins should burn for them, what does it matter whence the smoke is produced on the holy altars, or with what kind of gum the clouds of fumigation billow up? "Or will anyone perhaps say that incense is given to the gods above for this reason, that it has a sweet smell and soothes the sense of the nostrils, but the rest are harsh and, for the cause of offense, excluded?"
- For do the gods then have nostrils, with which to draw in aerial breaths, do they take in and give back the airs, so that the qualities of the differing smells can penetrate them? But if we grant that this is so, we join them to the law of mortality and shut them out from the bounds of divinity. For whatever breathes and draws reciprocal breaths through passable airs, that must needs be mortal, because it is sustained by the food of the air. But whatever is sustained by the food of the air, if you take away the returns by which the vital alternation is rendered and drawn back, its soul must needs be stifled, and its reason undermined, and its living power perish.
Therefore if the gods too breathe and draw an odor to themselves wrapped up in the accompanying air, it is not beside the point to say both that they live by external exhalations and that they can perish when their breathings are cut off. And how, in the end, do you know whether, if they are captivated by the sweetness of odors, the same things are pleasant to them as to you, and soothe and affect your natures with a like sense? Is it not possible that things which bring you pleasure may on the contrary seem harsh and grievous to them? For since the sentiments of the gods are diverse and their substances not one, by what reasoning can it be brought about that a thing diverse in quality should feel one and the same contact and receive it alike?
Do we not daily perceive that even among the animals sprung from the earth the same things are to some bitter or sweet, deadly to these which to those were not born unto destruction, so that the very things which soothe those with pleasant odors breathe pestilential exhalations upon the bodies of others? But the cause that this happens and comes about lies not in the things - which cannot at one and the same time be deadly and salutary, sweet and bitter together - but according as each thing has been made, so is it affected toward the contact of the thing coming from without; it does not receive a quality born from the impulsions of the things, but from the nature of its own sense and touch. But this whole account lies far removed from the gods, nor is it separated by the interposition of a scanty boundary.
For if it is true, as is believed by the wise, that these gods are incorporeal and not upheld by any eminence of vigor, then odor is empty in their regard, nor can any breath of some smell move them perceptibly, not even if you should burn a thousand pounds of male incense and this whole sky be shut in by the fog of overflowing vapors. For that which has not strength and corporeal substance cannot be touched by a corporeal substance: but odor is a body, as is indicated by the nostrils when they are touched: therefore it cannot by any reasoning be perceived by a god, who lacks a thing of body and is deprived of all sense and contact. Wine is the companion of incense, which we likewise demand be explained, why it should be poured over the kindled offering.
For unless a reason why it is done is shown, and it shall not have its cause set forth, then that thing is no longer to be charged with a laughable error, but - to speak more expressly - with insanity, madness, blindness. For, as has already been said quite often, everything that is done ought to have its cause manifest, and not veiled by the obscurity of some darkness. If therefore you have confidence in the deed, open up, show why this liquid is given, that is, why wine is poured over the altars.
For do the bodies of the deities feel a parching thirst, and are their drynesses necessarily to be tempered with some moisture? Is it their custom, as it is ours who are mortals, to intersperse drinks among our dinners, and likewise after solid meals of cakes and porridges and slaughtered victims, that the food may more easily rot and be cooked through, do they very frequently irrigate themselves and take wine? Give, I pray, cups to the immortal gods that they may drink; bring forth flagons, bowls, and ladles; and since they cram themselves with fat bulls and with rich, sumptuous feasts, lest any morsel ill-swallowed should stick in the passage of the stomach, run to their aid, make haste;
give unmixed wine to Jupiter Best and Greatest, lest he choke; he longs to belch and cannot, and unless that obstruction slips and dissolves, there is the greatest danger lest his crushed breath be interrupted, and heaven remain widowed and left without its administrators. "But," he says, "in vain do you ride roughshod over us: for we do not pour out unmixed wine to the gods above for such causes, as though we deem them either to thirst or to drink or to rejoice in the pleasant effect of it. It is given to them, therefore, for honor; so that their loftiness may become higher, ampler, and more august, we make libations upon the very altars and stir up the venerable embers with rekindled coals."
- And what graver insult can be inflicted on the gods than if you should believe that they become propitious upon receiving unmixed wine, or should deem that a great honor is paid to them, if only you have cast and dripped the dew of a little wine upon a glowing coal? Our discourse is not with men devoid of reason, nor with those to whom the truth of common understanding is lacking: there is wisdom in you too, there is sense, and you yourselves know by your inner judgment that we speak truth in your presence. But what can we do with those who are unwilling to consider the matters themselves deeply and to converse with their own selves? For you do what you see done, not what you are confident ought to be done: