Prometheus

Lucian of Samosata

The Works of Lucian of Samosata, complete, with exceptions specified in thepreface, Vol. 1. Fowler, H. W. and Fowlere, F.G., translators. Oxford at the Clarendon Press, 1905.

Prometheus O Cronus, and Iapetus, and Mother Earth! Behold the sufferings of the innocent!

Hermes Why, as to innocence,—to begin with, there was that business of the sacrificial meats, your manner of distributing which was most unfair, most disingenuous: you got all the choice parts for yourself, and put Zeus off with bones ‘wrapped up in shining fat’; I remember the passage in Hesiod; those are his very words. Then you made these human beings; creatures of unparalleled wickedness, the women especially. And, to crown all, you stole fire, the most precious possession of the Gods, and gave it to them. And with all this on your conscience, you protest that .ou have done nothing to deserve captivity.