Imaginary Conversations and Poems: A Selection
away upon you. Xenophanes, my townsman of Samosata, was resolved to
buy a new horse: he had tried him, and liked him well enough. I asked
him why he wished to dispose of his old one, knowing how sure-footed
he was, how easy in his paces, and how quiet in his pasture. 'Very
true, O Lucian,' said he; 'the horse is a clever horse; noble eye,
beautiful figure, stately step; rather too fond of neighing and of
shuffling a little in the vicinity of a mare; but tractable and good
tempered.' 'I would not have parted with him then,' said I. 'The fact
is,' replied he, 'my grandfather, whom I am about to visit, likes no
horses but what are _Saturnized_. To-morrow I begin my journey: come
and see me set out.' I went at the hour appointed. The new purchase
looked quiet and demure; but _he_ also pricked up his ears, and gave
sundry other tokens of equinity, when the more interesting part of his
fellow-creatures came near him. As the morning oats began to operate,
he grew more and more unruly, and snapped at one friend of Xenophanes,
and sidled against another, and gave a kick at a third. 'All in play!
all in play!' said Xenophanes; 'his nature is more of a lamb's than a
horse's.' However, these mute salutations being over, away went
Xenophanes. In the evening, when my lamp had just been replenished for
the commencement of my studies, my friend came in striding as if he
were still across the saddle. 'I am apprehensive, O Xenophanes,' said
I, 'your new acquaintance has disappointed you.' 'Not in the least,'
answered he. 'I do assure you, O Lucian! he is the very horse I was
looking out for.' On my requesting him to be seated, he no more
thought of doing so than if it had been in the presence of the Persian
king. I then handed my lamp to him, telling him (as was true) it
contained all the oil I had in the house, and protesting I should be
happier to finish my Dialogue in the morning. He took the lamp into my
bedroom, and appeared to be much refreshed on his return.
Nevertheless, he treated his chair with great delicacy and
circumspection, and evidently was afraid of breaking it by too sudden
a descent. I did not revert to the horse: but he went on of his own
accord. 'I declare to you, O Lucian! it is impossible for me to be
mistaken in a palfrey. My new one is the only one in Samosata that
could carry me at one stretch to my grandfather's.' 'But _has_ he?'
said I, timidly. 'No; he has not yet,' answered my friend. 'To-morrow,
then, I am afraid, we really must lose you.' 'No,' said he; 'the horse
does trot hard: but he is the better for that: I shall soon get used
to him.' In fine, my worthy friend deferred his visit to his
grandfather: his rides were neither long nor frequent: he was ashamed
to part with his purchase, boasted of him everywhere, and, humane as
he is by nature, could almost have broken on the cross the quiet
contented owner of old Bucephalus.
_Timotheus._ Am I to understand by this, O Cousin Lucian, that I ought
to be contented with the impurities of paganism?
_Lucian._ Unless you are very unreasonable. A moderate man finds
plenty in it.
_Timotheus._ We abominate the Deities who patronize them, and we hurl
down the images of the monsters.
_Lucian._ Sweet cousin! be tenderer to my feelings. In such a tempest
as this, my spark of piety may be blown out. Hold your hand cautiously
before it, until I can find my way. Believe me, no Deities (out of
their own houses) patronize immorality; none patronize unruly
passions, least of all the fierce and ferocious. In my opinion, you
are wrong in throwing down the images of those among them who look on
you benignly: the others I give up to your discretion. But I think it
impossible to stand habitually in the presence of a sweet and open
countenance, graven or depicted, without in some degree partaking of
the character it expresses. Never tell any man that he can derive no
good, in his devotions, from this or from that: abolish neither hope
nor gratitude.
_Timotheus._ God is offended at vain efforts to represent Him.
_Lucian._ No such thing, my dear Timotheus. If you knew Him at all,
you would not talk of Him so irreverently. He is pleased, I am
convinced, at every effort to resemble Him, at every wish to remind
both ourselves and others of His benefits. You cannot think so often
of Him without an effigy.
_Timotheus._ What likeness is there in the perishable to the
Unperishable?
_Lucian._ I see no reason why there may not be a similitude. All that
the senses can comprehend may be represented by any material; clay or
fig-tree, bronze or ivory, porphyry or gold. Indeed I have a faint
remembrance that, according to your sacred volumes, man was made by
God after His own image. If so, man's intellectual powers are worthily
exercised in attempting to collect all that is beautiful, serene, and
dignified, and to bring Him back to earth again by showing Him the
noblest of His gifts, the work most like His own. Surely He cannot
hate or abandon those who thus cherish His memory, and thus implore
His regard. Perishable and imperfect is everything human: but in these
very qualities I find the best reason for striving to attain what is
least so. Would not any father be gratified by seeing his child
attempt to delineate his features? And would not the gratification be
rather increased than diminished by his incapacity? How long shall the
narrow mind of man stand between goodness and omnipotence? Perhaps the
effigy of your ancestor Isknos is unlike him; whether it is or no, you
cannot tell; but you keep it in your hall, and would be angry if
anybody broke it to pieces or defaced it. Be quite sure there are many
who think as much of their gods as you think of your ancestor Isknos,
and who see in their images as good a likeness. Let men have their own
way, especially their way to the temples. It is easier to drive them
out of one road than into another. Our judicious and good-humoured
Trajan has found it necessary on many occasions to chastise the
law-breakers of your sect, indifferent as he is what gods are
worshipped, so long as their followers are orderly and decorous. The
fiercest of the Dacians never knocked off Jupiter's beard, or broke an
arm off Venus; and the emperor will hardly tolerate in those who have
received a liberal education what he would punish in barbarians. Do
not wear out his patience: try rather to imitate his equity, his
equanimity, and forbearance.
_Timotheus._ I have been listening to you with much attention, O
Lucian! for I seldom have heard you speak with such gravity. And yet,
O Cousin Lucian! I really do find in you a sad deficiency of that
wisdom which alone is of any value. You talk of Trajan! what is
Trajan?
_Lucian._ A beneficent citizen, an impartial judge, a sagacious ruler;
the comrade of every brave soldier, the friend and associate of every
man eminent in genius, throughout his empire, the empire of the world.
All arts, all sciences, all philosophies, all religions, are protected
by him. Wherefore his name will flourish, when the proudest of these
have perished in the land of Egypt. Philosophies and religions will
strive, struggle, and suffocate one another. Priesthoods, I know not
how many, are quarrelling and scuffling in the street at this instant,
all calling on Trajan to come and knock an antagonist on the head; and
the most peaceful of them, as it wishes to be thought, proclaiming him
an infidel for turning a deaf ear to its imprecations. Mankind was
never so happy as under his guidance; and he has nothing now to do but
to put down the battles of the gods. If they must fight it out, he
will insist on our neutrality.
_Timotheus._ He has no authority and no influence over us in matters
of faith. A wise and upright man, whose serious thoughts lead him
forward to religion, will never be turned aside from it by any worldly
consideration or any human force.
_Lucian._ True: but mankind is composed not entirely of the upright
and the wise. I suspect that we may find some, here and there, who are
rather too fond of novelties in the furniture of temples; and I have
observed that new sects are apt to warp, crack, and split, under the
heat they generate. Our homely old religion has run into fewer
quarrels, ever since the Centaurs and Lapiths (whose controversy was
on a subject quite comprehensible), than yours has engendered in
twenty years.
_Timotheus._ We shall obviate that inconvenience by electing a supreme
Pontiff to decide all differences. It has been seriously thought about
long ago: and latterly we have been making out an ideal series down to
the present day, in order that our successors in the ministry may have
stepping-stones up to the fountain-head. At first the disseminators of
our doctrines were equal in their commission; we do not approve of
this any longer, for reasons of our own.
_Lucian._ You may shut, one after another, all our other temples, but,
I plainly see, you will never shut the temple of Janus. The Roman
Empire will never lose its pugnacious character while your sect
exists. The only danger is, lest the fever rage internally and consume
the vitals. If you sincerely wish your religion to be long-lived,
maintain in it the spirit of its constitution, and keep it patient,
humble, abstemious, domestic, and zealous only in the services of
humanity. Whenever the higher of your priesthood shall attain the
riches they are aiming at, the people will envy their possessions and
revolt from their impostures. Do not let them seize upon the palace,
and shove their God again into the manger.
_Timotheus._ Lucian! Lucian! I call this impiety.
_Lucian._ So do I, and shudder at its consequences. Caverns which at
first look inviting, the roof at the aperture green with overhanging
ferns and clinging mosses, then glittering with native gems and with
water as sparkling and pellucid, freshening the air all around; these
caverns grow darker and closer, until you find yourself among animals
that shun the daylight, adhering to the walls, hissing along the
bottom, flapping, screeching, gaping, glaring, making you shrink at
the sounds, and sicken at the smells, and afraid to advance or
retreat.
_Timotheus._ To what can this refer? Our caverns open on verdure, and
terminate in veins of gold.
_Lucian._ Veins of gold, my good Timotheus, such as your excavations
have opened and are opening, in the spirit of avarice and ambition,
will be washed (or as you would say, _purified_) in streams of blood.
Arrogance, intolerance, resistance to authority and contempt of law,
distinguish your aspiring sectarians from the other subjects of the
empire.
_Timotheus._ Blindness hath often a calm and composed countenance;
but, my Cousin Lucian! it usually hath also the advantage of a
cautious and a measured step. It hath pleased God to blind you, like
all the other adversaries of our faith; but He has given you no staff
to lean upon. You object against us the very vices from which we are
peculiarly exempt.
_Lucian._ Then it is all a story, a fable, a fabrication, about one of
your earlier leaders cutting off with his sword a servant's ear? If
the accusation is true, the offence is heavy. For not only was the
wounded man innocent of any provocation, but he is represented as
being in the service of the high priest at Jerusalem. Moreover, from
the direction and violence of the blow, it is evident that his life
was aimed at. According to law, you know, my dear cousin, all the
party might have been condemned to death, as accessories to an attempt
at murder. I am unwilling to think so unfavourably of your sect; nor
indeed do I see the possibility that, in such an outrage, the
principal could be pardoned. For any man but a soldier to go about
armed is against the Roman law, which, on that head, as on many