Book IV.

1. We would ask you, and you above all, O Romans, lords and princes of the world, whether you think that Piety, Concord, Safety, Honour, Virtue, Happiness, and other such names, to which we see you rear841    Cf. Matt. v. 39.    Lit., “see altars built.” altars and splendid temples, have divine power, and live in heaven?842    Lit., “in the regions of heaven.” or, as is usual, have you classed them with the deities merely for form’s sake, because we desire and wish these blessings to fall to our lot? For if, while you think them empty names without any substance, you yet deify them with divine honours,843    The ms. reads tam (corrected by the first four edd. tamen) in regionibus—“in the divine seats;” corrected, religionibus, as above, by Ursinus. you will have to consider whether that is a childish frolic, or tends to bring your deities into contempt,844    Lit., “to the deluding of your deities.” when you make equal, and add to their number vain and feigned names. But if you have loaded them with temples and couches, holding with more assurance that these, too, are deities, we pray you to teach us in our ignorance, by what course, in what way, Victory, Peace, Equity, and the others mentioned among the gods, can be understood to be gods, to belong to the assembly of the immortals?

1005A I. Interrogare vos libet, ipsosque ante omnia romanos dominos rerum ac principes, utrumne existimatis Pietatem, Concordiam, Salutem, Honorem, Virtutem, Felicitatem, caeteraque hujusmodi nomina, quibus aras videmus a vobis cum magnificis exaedificatas delubris, vim habere divinam, coelique in regionibus degere? aut, ut assolet, dicis causa ex eo, quod optamus et volumus bona ista nobis contingere, 1006A superorum retuleritis in censum? Nam si verba existimantes haec cassa, et nullius substantiae nomina, divinis tamen religionibus consecratis, erit vobis videndum, utrumne istud puerile sit ludicrum, an vestrorum numinum delusionem spectans, quibus coaequatis et adjungitis inanium figmenta verborum? Sin autem ex animi certiore sententia deos esse et haec rati, templis et pulvinaribus onerastis, inscitiam 1007A nostram ut doceatis oramus, Victoria, Pax Aequitas, et caetera quae in superioribus dicta sunt, quanam ratione, qua via intelligi possunt dii esse, atque ad superorum concilium pertinere?