Legatio Ad Gaium

Bacchus rendered the vine susceptible of cultivation, and extracted a most delicious drink from it, which is at the same time most beneficial to the souls and bodies of men, leading the first to cheerfulness, working in them a forgetfulness of evils and a hope of blessings, and making the latter more healthy, and vigorous, and active, and supple.

And individually it renders each man better, and alters populous families and households, leading them from a squalid and laborious life of vexation to a course of relaxation and cheerful happiness, and causing to every city on earth, both Grecian and barbarian, incessant festivity, and mirth, and [*](The passage in Homer is to be found at Odyssey iv. 363. It is imitated more concisely by Virgil, who makes Cyrene tell Aristaeus— Verum ubi correptum manibus vinclisque tenebis Turn variae eludent species atque ora ferarum; Fiet enim subito sus horridus atraque tigris Squamosusque draco et fulva cervice Icaena Aut acrem flammae sonitum dabit, atque ita vinclis Excidet, aut in aquas tenues dilapsus abibit.-Georg. iv. 410. Which is thus translated by "Instant he wears, elusive of the rape, The mimic force of every savage shape: Or glides with liquid lapse a murm’ring stream, Or wrapt in flame, he glows at every limb. Yet still retentive, with redoubled might Thro’ each vain passive form constrains his flight. But when, his native shape resumed, he stands Patient of conquest, and your muse demands; The cause that urg’d the bold attempt declare, And soothe the vanquish’d with a victor’s prayer. The bands relaxed, implore the seer to say What godhead interdicts the wat’ry way." )

Again, it is said that the twin sons of Jupiter, Castor and Pollux, are partakers of immortality. For since the one was mortal and the other immortal, the one who had had the more excellent portion assigned to him did not choose to behave in a selfish manner, but rather to display his good will and affection towards his brother;

for having acquired the idea that eternity was never-ending, and considering that he was to live for ever, and that his brother was to be dead for ever, and that in conjunction with his own immortality he should likewise be enduring an undying sorrow on account of his brother, he conceived and carried out a most marvellous system of counterbalancing, mingling mortality with himself and immortality with his brother, and thus he modified inequality, which is the beginning of all injustice, by equality, which is the fountain of justice.

All these beings, O Caius! were admired on account of the benefits which they had conferred on mankind, and they are admired for them even up to the present time, and they were deservedly thought worthy of veneration and of the very highest honours. But come now, and tell us yourself in what achievement of yours do you pride yourself and boast yourself as being in the least similar to their actions?

Have you imitated the twin sons of Jupiter in their brotherly affection, that I may begin with that point? Did you not rather, O hard-hearted and most pitiless of men! inhumanly slaughter your brother, the joint inheritor of the kingdom with you, even before he had arrived at the full vigour of manhood, when he was still in early youth. Did you not afterwards banish your sisters, lest they also should cause you any reasonable apprehension of the deprivation and loss of your imperial power?

Have you imitated Bacchus in any respect? Have you been an inventor of any new blessings to mankind? Have you filled the whole of the habitable world with joy as he did? Are all Asia and Europe inadequate to contain the gifts which have been showered upon mankind by you?

No doubt you have invented new arts and sciences, like a common pest and murderer of your kind, by which you have changed all pleasant and acceptable things into vexation and sorrow, and have made life miserable and intolerable to all men everywhere, appropriating

But I suppose you imitated Hercules in your unwearied labours and your incessant displays of valour and virtue; you, O most wretched of men! having filled every continent and every island with good laws, and principles of justice, and wealth, and comfort, and prosperity, and abundance of other blessings, you, wretched man, full of all cowardice and iniquity, who have emptied every city of all the things which can conduce to stability and prosperity, and have made them full of everything which leads to trouble and confusion, and the most utter misery and desolation.