De Defectu Oraculorum

That other concept is, I think, more dignified and sublime, that the gods are not subject to outside control, but are their own masters, even as the twin sons of Tyndareüs[*](Castor and Pollux, the protectors of sailors.) come to the aid of men who are labouring in the storm,

1. Soothing the oncoming raging sea,
2. Taming the swift-driving blasts of the winds,[*](Repeated with some variants by Plutarch in Moralia, 1103 c-d; cf. Bergk, Poet. Lyr. Graec. iii. p. 730.)

not, however, sailing on the ships and sharing in the danger, but appearing above and rescuing; so, in the same way, one or another of the gods visits now this world and now that, led thither by pleasure in the sight, and co-operates with Nature in the directing of each. The Zeus of Homer[*](Homer, Il. xiii. 3.) turned his gaze not so very far away from the land of Troy towards the Thracian regions and the wandering tribes about the Danube; but the real Zeus has a fair and fitting variety of spectacles in numerous worlds, not viewing the infinite void outside nor concentrating his mind upon himself and nothing else, as some have imagined,[*](Cf. Aristotle, The Eudemian Ethics, vii. 12. 16 (1245 b 14).) but surveying from above the many works of gods and men and the movements and courses of the stars in their cycles. In fact, the Deity is not averse to changes, but has a very great joy therein, to judge, if need be, by the alternations and cycles in the heavens among the bodies that are visible there. Infinity is altogether senseless and unreasoning, and nowhere admits a god, but in all relations it brings into action the concept of chance and accident. But the Oversight and Providence in a limited group and number of worlds, when compared with that which has entered one body and become attached to one and reshapes and remodels it an infinite number of times, seems to me to contain nothing involving less dignity or greater labour.