precept. Plutarch too in his above-mentioned treatise most forcibly and clearly shows the impiety of worshipping men as Gods, as is evident from the following extract:
“Those therefore, who think that things of this kind [i. e. fabulous stories of the Gods as if they were men] are but so many commemorations of the actions and disasters of kings and tyrants, who through transcendency in virtue or power, inscribed the title of divinity on their renown, and afterwards fell into great calamities and misfortunes, these employ the most easy method indeed of eluding the story, and not badly transfer things of evil report, from the Gods to men; and they are assisted in so doing by the narrations themselves. For the Egyptians relate, that Hermes was as to his body, with one arm longer than the other; that Typhon was in his complexion red; but Orus white, and Osiris black, as if they had been by nature men. Farther still, they also call Osiris a commander, and Canopus a pilot, from whom they say the star of that name was denominated. The ship likewise, which the Greeks call Argo, being the image of the ark of Osiris, and which therefore in honour of it is become a constellation, they make to ride not far from Orion and the Dog; of which they consider the one as sacred to Orus, but the other to Isis.
“I fear, however, that this [according to the proverb] would be to move things immoveable, and to declare war, not only, as Simonides says, against a great length of time, but also against many nations and families of mankind who are under the influence of divine inspiration through piety to these Gods; and would not in any respect fall short of transferring from heaven to earth, such great and venerable names, and of thereby shaking and dissolving that worship and belief, which has been implanted in almost all men from their very birth, would be opening great doors to the tribe of atheists, who convert divine into human concerns; and would likewise afford a large license to the impostures of Euemerus of Messina, who devised certain memoirs of an incredible and fictitious mythology,[1] and thereby spread every kind of atheism through the globe, by inscribing all the received Gods, without any discrimination, by the names of generals, naval-captains, and kings, who lived in remote periods of time. He further adds, that they are recorded in golden characters, in a certain country called Panchoa, at which neither any Barbarian or Grecian ever arrived, except Euemerus alone, who, as it seems, sailed to the Panchoans and Triphyllians, that neither have, nor ever had a being. And though the great actions of Semiramis are celebrated by the Assyrians, and those of Sesostris in Egypt; and though the Phrygians even to the present time, call
- ↑ Both Arnobius therefore and Minucius Felix were very unfortunate in quoting this impostor to prove that the Gods of the ancients had formerly been men. Vid. Arnob. lib. 4. Adversus Gentes, et Minucii Felicis Octavo. p. 350. 8vo. Parisiis, 1605.
