and recall again what you have said, and put in a claim for "Providence," and thrust Destiny aside altogether.

Zeus. By no means; on the contrary, it is Fate that brings each thing to pass through our agency.

Cyniskus. I understand. You say you are a kind of agents and ministers of the Fates. But, however, even so, it would be they who exercise providence, while you are, as it were, a sort of tools and instruments of theirs.

Zeus. How?

Cyniskus. How? Why, just as, I suppose, the carpenter's axe and auger work together, in some sort, for the creation of the work: but no one would say that they are the workman himself, nor the ship the work of the axe or the auger, but of the shipwright. Analogously, then, Destiny is she who acts as the shipwright in regard to each particular, while you are, I presume, the axes and augers of the Fates: and, as it seems, men ought to offer their sacrifices to Destiny, and demand their good things from her; whereas they approach you, honouring you with their processions and sacrifices. And yet they would not do it reasonably, even in honour of Destiny. For I don't

suppose it to be possible even for the Fates themselves to change or upset anything of what has been originally decreed respecting each several event. At all events, Atropos1 would not tolerate it, if anyone were to turn back the spindle, and undo the work of Klotho.

Zeus. And do you, Cyniskus, now require that not even the Fates be held in honour by men? Well, you seem to have for your object to throw everything into confusion. We, however, if for nothing else, should be justly honoured, at least, for our giving out oracles and predicting every particular thing which has been determined by the Fates.

Cyniskus. Upon a survey of the whole matter, it is useless, Zeus, for those to whom it is altogether impossible to guard themselves against them, to foreknow events that are to take place; unless you say this-that one who has learned beforehand that he will have to die by an iron spear-head, might be able to escape death by shutting himself up. But that is impossible: for Fate will drag him 1 As her name implies, the irreversible one," with whom is no variableness, neither shadow of turning."

out to set him hunting, and will deliver him up to the spear; and an Adrastus will hurl his javelin against the wild boar, and will miss him, but will slay the son of Kroesus; just as though the javelin had been carried against the youth by irresistible command of the Fates. The saying of Laius is, indeed, ridiculous, which says:

"Sow not, in heav'n's despite, a field of sons:

Sure death you'll meet from your own progeny."

For an exhortatory warning against events that will certainly so happen is, I imagine, superfluous. So, in fact, after the oracle, he did "sow," and "the progeny" slew him. Therefore, I don't see upon what pretence you demand pay for your oracular art. Why, I omit to mention that you Gods are accustomed to return to the majority of your clients oracular responses of double and ambiguous meaning, and don't make it over clear, whether the one who crosses the Halys will destroy his own kingdom, or that of Cyrus: 2 for the oracle might be made to mean both.

Zeus. Apollo, Cyniskus, had some cause for anger against Kroesus, inasmuch as he tempted him by boiling lamb's flesh and a tortoise together.3

3

Cyniskus. As a God, he ought not even to have been angry : but, however, it had been fated, I presume, for the Lydian that he should be deceived by the oracle; and, besides, Destiny spun for him, that he should not understand too clearly what was in store for him. So even your oracular art is her work.

Zeus. And do you leave nothing for us, but are we Gods without any purpose, and do we not import any sort of providence into human affairs, and are we, like a lot of axes and augers, in actual fact, unworthy of sacrifices? Indeed, I think you quite reasonably have a supreme contempt for Μὴ σπεῖρε τέκνων ἄλοκα δαιμόνων βίᾳ· Εἰ γὰρ τεκνώσεις παῖδ ἀποκτενεῖ σ' ὁ φύς.

Eurip. Dov. 118, 119. "Besäe nicht die Kinderfurche, dir verbieten es Die Götter! thust du es, so tödtet dich dein Sohn."

* See Ζεὺς Τραγῴδος, 29-31 ; Ἐκκλ. Θεῶν.

Wieland.

3 Ibid.

me, because, as you see, I forbear my hand, although ready to hurl my thunderbolt at you, all the time you are making all these cavillings against us.

Cyniskus. Shoot away, Zeus, if it has been fated for me to be struck by a thunderbolt; and I will not blame you at all for the stroke, but Klotho, who wounds me by your agency: for I would not affirm even that the thunderbolt was the cause of the wound. However, I will ask this of youyourself and Destiny-and do you answer me, also, on her behalf; for you reminded me by your threat: Why ever in the world do you leave alone robbers of your temples and pirates, and such a number of insolent wrong-doers, and men of outrage and violence, and perjurers, and frequently cast your bolt against some poor oak, or rock, or mast of a ship that has done you no harm; and, at times, against some good and just traveller? Why are you silent, Zeus? Or is it not lawful and right for me to know even thus much?

1

Zeus. Why, no, Cyniskus; and you are a meddlesome sort of fellow, and I don't know where you come from with these jumbled-up arguments.

Cyniskus. Then may I not even ask you this-you, I mean, and Providence and Destiny-why ever did Phokion, that good man, die in such poverty and want of the actual necessaries of life, and Aristeides before him; while Kallias and Alkibiades, youths unbridled in their licentiousness, abounded in wealth, and Meidias, the insolent upstart,

1 See Τίμων. 1-5.

2

2 This well-known Athenian statesman and military commander, contemporary with the Macedonian Philip and Alexander, fell a victim to the unjust suspicions of his countrymen of traitorous designs. He died by the ordinary Athenian method of public execution-the administration of hemlock-in his eighty-fifth year. Upon what authority Lucian reduces him to actual poverty, is not clear. Plutarch, who gives the details of his life, informs us that he was distinguished by his frugality and simplicity of diet, but does not state that he ever suffered from destitution. Lucian ('Aλne. 'IσT. ii. 23) places him in the Elysian paradise. As for Aristeides, his poverty seems to have been his own choice. It is of him that Plutarch makes the admirable remark at the expense of the kings and heroes of History. The Kallias here referred to, the stepson of Perikles, was known for his extravagant dissipation, Xenophon's Evμñóσɩv takes place at his house. Cf. Zevs Tpay. 48; Τίμων. 24.

and Charops of Egina, a man of infamous debauchery,1 who killed his mother by starvation. And, again, Sokrates, why was he handed over to the Eleven, while Meletus was not so ?2 and Sardanapalus, why had he kingly power, with his debauched character, and why were such a number of good and honourable Persians impaled or crucified by him, because they were not content with his proceedings? Not to mention to you things of the present time, or further particularize the wicked and the avaricious happy and fortunate, the good driven and carried off into captivity, oppressed through poverty, by diseases, and ten thousand evils.

Zeus. Why, don't you know, Cyniskus, what punishments the wicked endure after this life, or in how much happiness the good pass their time?

Cyniskus. You talk to me of Hades, and the Tityuses and Tantaluses. But, as far as I am concerned, whether there is anything at all of the sort I shall know clearly enough when I am dead: and, as for the present, I would prefer to pass my life happily during this life, as long as it might be, and, after death, to have my liver gnawed by sixteen vultures-but not, while here, to be as thirsty as Tantalus; and in the Islands of the Blessed to drink, reclining in the Elysian meadows with the heroes.3

Zeus. What do you say? Do you disbelieve or doubt that there are certain punishments and rewards, and a judgment-seat, where at length each one's life is inquired into?

Meidias, an Athenian plutocrat, is chiefly known as the enemy of Demosthenes the orator, who was deterred from delivering his carefullyprepared speech against the plutocrat by dread of his powerful influence. -See Plutarch, B. II. Of Charops of Ægina nothing seems to be known.

2 Meletus, or Melitus, a bad tragic poet, was the public accuser put forward by the enemies of Sokrates. Like other similar sykophants, he was afterwards made a sort of scape-goat by the fickle Athenian demos. The real informers were Anytus and others.-See Xenoph. "ATоμν. i. ; Lucian, Δημώναξ. 11; Δὶς Κατηγ. 6. The Eleven, or Νομοφύλακες, were officers entrusted with the execution of the decrees of the Areiopagus and of the Heliasts, and with the safe keeping of prisoners.

3 For Lucian's idea of the Elysian Fields, see the charming description of the Isle of the Blessed (in his 'Aλŋ0. 'Iσr. ii. 5-27) and its vanishing joys, in which some of the Lucianic commentators have discovered a covered satire on the 'Aπoкáλviç of the Christian Scriptures.

Cyniskus. I hear that a certain Minos, a Kretan, acts as judge in such matters; and answer me somewhat about him, too: for he is said to be your son.

Zeus. And why do you ask about him, Cyniscus ?
Cyniskus. Whom does he punish chiefly ?

Zeus. The wicked, of course, such as murderers and temple robbers.

Cyniskus. And whom does he despatch to the heroes ? Zeus. The good and holy, who have lived virtuously. Cyniskus. Why, Zeus ?

Zeus. Because some deserve reward, others punishment. Cyniskus. And, if a man have done some dire action unwittingly, does he deem him deserving, too, of being punished ?

Zeus. By no means.

Cyniskus. Nor, I suppose, if a man does some good action against his will, would he think it proper to reward him either?

Zeus. Why, no, to be sure.

Cyniskus. Then it befits him, Zeus, neither to punish nor to reward anybody?

Zeus. How, not anybody?

Cyniskus. Because we men do nothing of our own wills, but are compelled by some inevitable necessity, if, at least, those things are true which have been before admitted— namely, that Fate is the cause of everything. In fact, if a man commit a murder, she is the real murderess; and if he rob a temple, he does what it has been ordered him to do. So, if Minos intend to give just judgment, he will punish Destiny instead of Sisyphus,' and Fate instead of Tantalus. For what wrong did they commit, since they obeyed their orders?

Zeus (in a towering rage). It is no longer worth while

1 The well-known king of Korinth, equally famous for his commerce and his craft-ò KÉρdiσTos yÉVET' avôρwv. 'IX. vi. 153. By the poet of the Odyssey he is tortured in Tartarus for his misdeeds by the everlastingly rolling rock, or huge stone, which, as soon as pushed up the hill, rolled back again, 'Od. xi. 593-599. Cf. Lucretius, De Rerum Nat. iii, 1013; Æn. vi. 602; Ov. Met. iv. 460; Cicero, Disp. Tusc. i. 5, 10; Aristotle (Prop. iii. 19) represents the poet as employing the fable metaphorically. For Tantalus, see Nɛк. Aiaλ. xvii.