absurd forms of superstition, are claimed by his opponent as arguments on the other side. Timocles compares the world to a ship, which could not keep its course without a steersman. Damis replies that if there were, indeed, a divinity at the helm of this world's affairs, he would surely parcel out the duties of his crew better than he appears to do—putting the rascals and lubbers in command, and letting the best men be stowed away in holes and corners, and kept on short rations besides. Timocles, as a last resource, threatens to break the head of his opponent, who runs away laughing. Jupiter is in doubt, however, on which side the real victory lies. Mercury consoles him that the gods have still the majority on their side—three-fourths of the Greeks, all the rabble, and all the barbarians. "Nay, my son," replies Jupiter, "but that saying of Darius had much truth, which he uttered of his faithful general Zopyrus: I, too, had rather have one man like Damis on my side than ten thousand Babylonians."[1]
The satire, in its bold scepticism, seems to go much beyond the "Dialogues of the Gods." In those, it is but the absurdities of the popular mythology—always incredible, one cannot but think, to the educated intelligence—which he ridicules and exposes; a creed which, if it could be supposed to have any influence upon the moral conduct of men, could only have had an influence for evil. But in that which has now been sketched, he attacks the belief in a divine providence
- ↑ The story is told by Herodotus, iii. 154.
