Cicero's Tusculan Disputations
you cautious of denying absolutely the being of any Gods? You dare not
deny it--which is very prudent in you, though here you are not afraid
of the people, but of the Gods themselves. I have known Epicureans who
reverence[92] even the least images of the Gods, though I perceive it
to be the opinion of some that Epicurus, through fear of offending
against the Athenian laws, has allowed a Deity in words and destroyed
him in fact; so in those his select and short sentences, which are
called by you [Greek: kyriai doxai],[93] this, I think, is the first:
"That being which is happy and immortal is not burdened with any labor,
and does not impose any on any one else."
XXXI. In his statement of this sentence, some think that he avoided
speaking clearly on purpose, though it was manifestly without design.
But they judge ill of a man who had not the least art. It is doubtful
whether he means that there is any being happy and immortal, or that if
there is any being happy, he must likewise be immortal. They do not
consider that he speaks here, indeed, ambiguously; but in many other
places both he and Metrodorus explain themselves as clearly as you have
done. But he believed there are Gods; nor have I ever seen any one who
was more exceedingly afraid of what he declared ought to be no objects
of fear, namely, death and the Gods, with the apprehensions of which
the common rank of people are very little affected; but he says that
the minds of all mortals are terrified by them. Many thousands of men
commit robberies in the face of death; others rifle all the temples
they can get into: such as these, no doubt, must be greatly terrified,
the one by the fears of death, and the others by the fear of the Gods.
But since you dare not (for I am now addressing my discourse to
Epicurus himself) absolutely deny the existence of the Gods, what
hinders you from ascribing a divine nature to the sun, the world, or
some eternal mind? I never, says he, saw wisdom and a rational soul in
any but a human form. What! did you ever observe anything like the sun,
the moon, or the five moving planets? The sun, terminating his course
in two extreme parts of one circle,[94] finishes his annual
revolutions. The moon, receiving her light from the sun, completes the
same course in the space of a month.[95] The five planets in the same
circle, some nearer, others more remote from the earth, begin the same
courses together, and finish them in different spaces of time. Did you
ever observe anything like this, Epicurus? So that, according to you,
there can be neither sun, moon, nor stars, because nothing can exist
but what we have touched or seen.[96] What! have you ever seen the
Deity himself? Why else do you believe there is any? If this doctrine
prevails, we must reject all that history relates or reason discovers;
and the people who inhabit inland countries must not believe there is
such a thing as the sea. This is so narrow a way of thinking that if
you had been born in Seriphus, and never had been from out of that
island, where you had frequently been in the habit of seeing little
hares and foxes, you would not, therefore, believe that there are such
beasts as lions and panthers; and if any one should describe an
elephant to you, you would think that he designed to laugh at you.
XXXII. You indeed, Velleius, have concluded your argument, not after
the manner of your own sect, but of the logicians, to which your people
are utter strangers. You have taken it for granted that the Gods are
happy. I allow it. You say that without virtue no one can be happy. I
willingly concur with you in this also. You likewise say that virtue
cannot reside where reason is not. That I must necessarily allow. You
add, moreover, that reason cannot exist but in a human form. Who, do
you think, will admit that? If it were true, what occasion was there to
come so gradually to it? And to what purpose? You might have answered
it on your own authority. I perceive your gradations from happiness to
virtue, and from virtue to reason; but how do you come from reason to
human form? There, indeed, you do not descend by degrees, but
precipitately.
Nor can I conceive why Epicurus should rather say the Gods are like men
than that men are like the Gods. You ask what is the difference; for,
say you, if this is like that, that is like this. I grant it; but this
I assert, that the Gods could not take their form from men; for the
Gods always existed, and never had a beginning, if they are to exist
eternally; but men had a beginning: therefore that form, of which the
immortal Gods are, must have had existence before mankind;
consequently, the Gods should not be said to be of human form, but our
form should be called divine. However, let this be as you will. I now
inquire how this extraordinary good fortune came about; for you deny
that reason had any share in the formation of things. But still, what
was this extraordinary fortune? Whence proceeded that happy concourse
of atoms which gave so sudden a rise to men in the form of Gods? Are we
to suppose the divine seed fell from heaven upon earth, and that men
sprung up in the likeness of their celestial sires? I wish you would
assert it; for I should not be unwilling to acknowledge my relation to
the Gods. But you say nothing like it; no, our resemblance to the Gods,
it seems, was by chance. Must I now seek for arguments to refute this
doctrine seriously? I wish I could as easily discover what is true as I
can overthrow what is false.
XXXIII. You have enumerated with so ready a memory, and so copiously,
the opinions of philosophers, from Thales the Milesian, concerning the
nature of the Gods, that I am surprised to see so much learning in a
Roman. But do you think they were all madmen who thought that a Deity
could by some possibility exist without hands and feet? Does not even
this consideration have weight with you when you consider what is the
use and advantage of limbs in men, and lead you to admit that the Gods
have no need of them? What necessity can there be of feet, without
walking; or of hands, if there is nothing to be grasped? The same may
be asked of the other parts of the body, in which nothing is vain,
nothing useless, nothing superfluous; therefore we may infer that no
art can imitate the skill of nature. Shall the Deity, then, have a
tongue, and not speak--teeth, palate, and jaws, though he will have no
use for them? Shall the members which nature has given to the body for
the sake of generation be useless to the Deity? Nor would the internal
parts be less superfluous than the external. What comeliness is there
in the heart, the lungs, the liver, and the rest of them, abstracted
from their use? I mention these because you place them in the Deity on
account of the beauty of the human form.
Depending on these dreams, not only Epicurus, Metrodorus, and Hermachus
declaimed against Pythagoras, Plato, and Empedocles, but that little
harlot Leontium presumed to write against Theophrastus: indeed, she had
a neat Attic style; but yet, to think of her arguing against
Theophrastus! So much did the garden of Epicurus[97] abound with these
liberties, and, indeed, you are always complaining against them. Zeno
wrangled. Why need I mention Albutius? Nothing could be more elegant or
humane than Phaedrus; yet a sharp expression would disgust the old man.
Epicurus treated Aristotle with great contumely. He foully slandered
Phaedo, the disciple of Socrates. He pelted Timocrates, the brother of
his companion Metrodorus, with whole volumes, because he disagreed with
him in some trifling point of philosophy. He was ungrateful even to
Democritus, whose follower he was; and his master Nausiphanes, from
whom he learned nothing, had no better treatment from him.
XXXIV. Zeno gave abusive language not only to those who were then
living, as Apollodorus, Syllus, and the rest, but he called Socrates,
who was the father of philosophy, the Attic buffoon, using the Latin
word _Scurra_. He never called Chrysippus by any name but Chesippus.
And you yourself a little before, when you were numbering up a senate,
as we may call them, of philosophers, scrupled not to say that the most
eminent men talked like foolish, visionary dotards. Certainly,
therefore, if they have all erred in regard to the nature of the Gods,
it is to be feared there are no such beings. What you deliver on that
head are all whimsical notions, and not worthy the consideration even
of old women. For you do not seem to be in the least aware what a task
you draw on yourselves, if you should prevail on us to grant that the
same form is common to Gods and men. The Deity would then require the
same trouble in dressing, and the same care of the body, that mankind
does. He must walk, run, lie down, lean, sit, hold, speak, and
discourse. You need not be told the consequence of making the Gods male
and female.
Therefore I cannot sufficiently wonder how this chief of yours came to
entertain these strange opinions. But you constantly insist on the
certainty of this tenet, that the Deity is both happy and immortal.
Supposing he is so, would his happiness be less perfect if he had not
two feet? Or cannot that blessedness or beatitude--call it which you
will (they are both harsh terms, but we must mollify them by use)--can
it not, I say, exist in that sun, or in this world, or in some eternal
mind that has not human shape or limbs? All you say against it is, that
you never saw any happiness in the sun or the world. What, then? Did
you ever see any world but this? No, you will say. Why, therefore, do
you presume to assert that there are not only six hundred thousand
worlds, but that they are innumerable? Reason tells you so. Will not
reason tell you likewise that as, in our inquiries into the most
excellent nature, we find none but the divine nature can be happy and
eternal, so the same divine nature surpasses us in excellence of mind;
and as in mind, so in body? Why, therefore, as we are inferior in all
other respects, should we be equal in form? For human virtue approaches
nearer to the divinity than human form.
XXXV. To return to the subject I was upon. What can be more childish
than to assert that there are no such creatures as are generated in the
Red Sea or in India? The most curious inquirer cannot arrive at the
knowledge of all those creatures which inhabit the earth, sea, fens,
and rivers; and shall we deny the existence of them because we never
saw them? That similitude which you are so very fond of is nothing to
the purpose. Is not a dog like a wolf? And, as Ennius says,
The monkey, filthiest beast, how like to man!
Yet they differ in nature. No beast has more sagacity than an elephant;
yet where can you find any of a larger size? I am speaking here of
beasts. But among men, do we not see a disparity of manners in persons
very much alike, and a similitude of manners in persons unlike? If this
sort of argument were once to prevail, Velleius, observe what it would
lead to. You have laid it down as certain that reason cannot possibly
reside in any but the human form. Another may affirm that it can exist
in none but a terrestrial being; in none but a being that is born, that
grows up, and receives instruction, and that consists of a soul, and an
infirm and perishable body; in short, in none but a mortal man. But if
you decline those opinions, why should a single form disturb you? You
perceive that man is possessed of reason and understanding, with all
the infirmities which I have mentioned interwoven with his being;
abstracted from which, you nevertheless know God, you say, if the
lineaments do but remain. This is not talking considerately, but at a
venture; for surely you did not think what an encumbrance anything