21. But perhaps
this foul pollution may be less apparent in the rest. Did, then,
the ruler of the heavens, the father of gods and men, who, by the
motion of his eyebrow, and by his nod, shakes the whole heavens and
makes them tremble,—did he find his origin in man and
woman? And unless both sexes abandoned themselves to
degrading pleasures in sensual embraces,4192
| 4192
Copulatis corporibus. |
would there be no
Jupiter, greatest of
all; and even to this time would the divinities have no king, and
heaven stand without its
lord? And why do we
marvel that you say
Jove sprang from a
woman’s
womb, seeing that your
authors relate
that he both had a
nurse, and in the next place maintained the
life
given to him by nourishment
drawn from a
foreign4193
| 4193
i.e., not his mother’s, but the dug of the goat Amalthea. |
breast?
What say you, O men? Did, then, shall I repeat,
the god
who makes the
thunder crash, lightens and hurls the thunderbolt, and
draws together
terrible clouds, drink in the
streams of the
breast,
wail as an
infant,
creep about, and, that he might
be persuaded
to cease his crying most foolishly protracted, was he made
silent
by the
noise of rattles,
4194
| 4194
Lit., “rattles heard.” |
and put to
sleep lying in a very soft
cradle, and lulled with broken words? O
devout assertion
of
the existence of gods, pointing out and declaring the venerable
majesty of their awful grandeur! Is it thus in your opinion, I
ask, that the exalted powers
4195
| 4195
Lit., “the eminence of the powers.” |
of
heaven are produced? do your gods
come forth to the
light by modes of
birth such as these, by which
asses, pigs, dogs, by which the whole of this unclean herd
4196
of earthly
beasts is conceived and begotten?
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