Juppiter Tragoedus

Momos What you say in praise of plain-speaking, Apollo, is very just, though you do not practice

Apollo By furnishing him, if we can manage it, with counsel: one of those clever men who would deliver worthily whatever Timokles devised and suggested to him.

Momos This is certainly a beardless utterance, and still in want of a school-master! To set up an advocate in an assemblage of philosophers to expound Timokles's views to the company! Damis to be present in person, and speak in his own character, but Timokles to use a mime and pour whatever he thinks into his ear, and the actor to deliver it, perhaps himself not understanding what he hears! Of course it would be ridiculous to the crowd. But let us consider this rather different idea.

You say, my admirable friend, that you are a seer, and you ask a good price for your services, and once even received bricks of gold. Why did you not give us an exhibition of your skill in the nick of time by telling us which of the Sophists is going to prevail in argument? For, of course, you know what the issue will be, since you are a seer.

Apollo How can I, Momos, when I have no tripod with me, and no incense and no prophetic fountain like Kastalia?

Momos Look, now, when you have got into a tight place you run away from conviction.

Zeus Never mind, my child. Speak out, and do not give this backbiter pretexts for slander, and for saying, in his sneering way, that your skill is dependent on your tripod and your water and your incense, and that unless you have these your art will be lost.

Apollo These things, father, are better done in Delphi or in Kolophon, where I have all the accessories to which I am accustomed. Still, bare as I am of these and unequipped, I will try to prophesy which of them will have the mastery. But you will bear with me if my verses should nor be very correct.

Momos Speak, but only make your remarks clear, Apollo, so that they will not need an advocate themselves or interpretation. This is not a case of sheep's flesh and tortoise being boiled together in Lydia. You know what our inquiry is about.

Zeus What in the world are you going to tell us, my child? The symptoms that precede the utterance are already alarming. His color is fading, his eyes are rolling, his hair is standing on end, and his gestures are those of a Korybant.

Apollo

Zeus Why do you burst out laughing at this, Momus? Surely there is nothing humorous in our present situation. Stop, wretch, or you will choke with laughing.

Momos How can I help laughing at such a clear, straightforward oracle?

Zeus Then, perhaps, you will kindly interpret to us what he says.

Momos It is perfectly plain, so that we shall not need Themistokles. The oracle says clearly that the seer is a juggler and that we are packasses,

Herakles I do not hesitate, father, to express my views, even though I am only a resident foreigner. My idea is that when they meet and are already engaged in discussion, then, if Timokles prove the better man, we will allow the meeting to proceed to our advantage. But if it turn out otherwise, then by your leave I will shake the Porch itself from its foundations and hurl it at Damis, so that the accursed wretch may not offer insult to us.

Zeus Heavens, Herakles, what a boorish speech, and how horribly Boeotian! To destroy so many for the sake of one wretch, and, what is more, the Porch with Marathon, Miltiades, Kynaegeiros and all? If all these should perish together, how would the orators continue to practise, deprived of the chief theme of their speeches? Moreover, in your lifetime it was perhaps possible to do even a thing of that kind; but since you have become a god, you have learned, I presume, that the Fates alone control these matters, and we have no voice in them.

Herakles Then, when I was slaying the lion or the hydra, the Fates were doing these things by my agency?

Zeus Certainly.

Herakles And at this moment if any one uses

Zeus By no means.

Herakles Then, Zeus, hear me declare myself frankly, for I am a boor, as the comic poet said, and I call a spade a spade. If this is our plight, I shall bid a long farewell to the worship and savor of burnt-offerings and blood of victims in heaven, and go off to Hades. There the ghosts, at least, of the beasts I slew will be afraid of me, if I have my bow, though I be unarmed beside.

Zeus Very well; nothing like a relative for turning state's evidence, as they say. You would have saved Damis the trouble of making these remarks by suggesting them yourself.

But who is this hasty - comer-bronze, wellformed, with a good outline and an obsolete coiffure? It must be your brother, Hermes, the one that stands in the market-place near the Porch. At all events, his hollows are full of pitch from having impressions of him taken daily by the statuaries. Why, my child, do you come to us at racing speed? Have you, perhaps, some fresh news from earth?

Hermagoras Great news, Zeus, and calling for the greatest attention.

Zeus Speak, then, if some new trouble has arisen unknown to us.

Hermagoras

Zeus Drop the iambics, there's a good fellow. I know whom you mean. But tell me this, whether they have already joined battle.

Hermagoras Not yet. They were still skirmishing and attacking each other from afar with the javelins of abuse.

Zeus What is there left for us to do now, deities, but bend down and listen to them? So let the Hours draw the bolt immediately and chase away the clouds and throw open the gates of heaven.

Heavens, what a crowd has gathered to hear them! But I am not very well satisfied with Timokles himself; he is trembling with confusion. He will ruin everything this day. Evidently he will not be able to stand against Damis. However, let us do what in us lies and pray for him.

Timokles What is this you say, Damis, you looter of temples? That the gods do not exist or exercise providence for men?

Damis That is what I say; but do you first answer me, and state what reason you have for believing in their existence.

Timokles I will not, you wretch. You answer me.

Damis I will not. Answer yourself.

Zeus So far our man has been far more successfully and loudly abusive. That's right, Timokles, pour on the abuse. Your strength lies there, since in other lines he stops your mouth and makes you dumb as a fish.

Timokles By Heaven, I will not answer you first if I know it.

Damis Then put your question, for you beat me that time by swearing. But spare abusive language, if you please.

Timokles Very well. Tell me, then, is it your opinion, accursed wretch, that the gods exert no providence?

Damis They do not.

Timokles What, is the universe, then, not the result of design?

Damis It is not.

Timokles And did no god arrange the whole superintendence of things either?

Damis No.

Timokles But all things are borne along haphazard by an unreasoning current?

Damis Yes.

Timokles Now can you men endure to hear this and not stone the guilty wretch?

Damis Why do you stir up the audience against me, Timokles? And who are you to show anger in the gods' behalf when they are not angry themselves? At least they have not handled me roughly, though they have heard me for a long time, supposing they do hear.

Timokles They hear, Damis, they hear, and they will take vengeance on you some day.

Damis And when would they have leisure for my case if, as you say, they are full of cares, managing the universe, infinite as it is? That is the reason they have not yet even punished you for your continual perjuries and your other crimes, which I will not specify lest I should be driven to use abusive language myself, contrary to our agreement. And yet I do not see how they could produce better proof of their own providence than by bringing your bad life to a bad end. But clearly they have gone abroad, across the ocean, perchance to visit the "blameless Ethiopians." At least it is their habit to go constantly to dine with them, and sometimes on their own invitation.

Timokles What shall I say in reply to such shameless effrontery?

Damis What I have been yearning to hear from you this long time: how you came to believe in the providence of the gods.

Timokles I was convinced of it first by the order of natural events: the sun who always travels the same road and the moon similarly, and the recurring seasons, and the growth of plants, and the birth of animals, and these animals themselves so ingeniously contrived that they feed themselves and reason, and move about and walk, and build houses and make shoes, and all the rest of it. Do not these seem to you the works of providence?

Damis Why, Timokles, you have assumed the very question in dispute, for it remains to be seen. whether each of these is accomplished by providence. That natural events are such as you describe I, too, admit, but it does not follow of necessity that they owe their existence to any intelligent foresight. For it is possible that they had some other origin, and yet have now a consistent and methodical existence. But this forced action of theirs you call 'order,' and then, forsooth, you fly into a rage if some one rejects your argument when, after recounting and praising the nature of objects, you go on to believe that this is a proof that each of them is also put in its

Timokles For my part, I do not think that additional proof is necessary; but still I will go on. Answer me, do you consider Homer the best of poets?

Damis Certainly.

Timokles Well, he convinced me by setting forth the providence of the gods.

Damis But, my astonishing friend, every one will grant you that Homer is a great poet, but not that he or any poet whatsoever is a reliable witness in these matters. For their concern, I imagine, is not for truth, but to charm their hearers; and on this account they lull us with metres and amuse us with stories, and devise the whole thing in the interests of pleasure. Still, I should be pleased to hear what passages of Homer chiefly convinced you.

Probably those in which he speaks of Zeus, and tells how his daughter and his brother and his wife plotted to put him in irons. And if Thetis had not perceived what was going on and called Briareos, our glorious Zeus would have been seized and tied up. It was in return for this and to repay his obligation to Thetis that he deceived Agamemnon by sending him a false dream for the destruction of many Greeks. Notice that he was unable to launch a thunderbolt