As I asked myself, with much and long reflection, by what means I might be of use to as many people as possible — so that I should never let slip an occasion of serving the commonwealth — none greater offered itself than if I should hand down to my fellow citizens the paths of the noblest arts; and this, I judge, I have already achieved in a good many books. For in that book entitled the Hortensius I exhorted men, as forcefully as I could, to the study of philosophy; and in the four books of the Academica I set out which manner of philosophizing I judged the least arrogant, and at once the most consistent and the most refined.

Vetus opinio est iam usque ab heroicis ducta temporibus, eaque et populi Romani et omnium gentium firmata consensu, versari quandam inter homines divinationem, quam Graeci mantikh/n appellant, id est praesensionem et scientiam rerum futurarum. Magnifica quaedam res et salutaris, si modo est ulla, quaque proxime ad deorum vim natura mortalis possit accedere. Itaque ut alia nos melius multa quam Graeci, sic huic praestantissimae rei nomen nostri a divis, Graeci, ut Plato interpretatur, a furore duxerunt.

And since the foundation of philosophy is laid in the ends of good and evil, that subject was thoroughly cleared by me in five books, so that what was said by each philosopher, and what was said against each, might be understood. As many books followed, the Tusculan Disputations, which laid open the matters most necessary for living happily. For the first is on the contempt of death, the second on the endurance of pain, the third on the assuaging of grief, the fourth on the remaining disturbances of the mind; the fifth embraced that subject which most of all illuminates the whole of philosophy, for it teaches that, for living happily, virtue is sufficient to itself.

Gentem quidem nullam video neque tam humanam atque doctam neque tam inmanem tamque barbaram, quae non significari futura et a quibusdam intellegi praedicique posse censeat. Principio Assyrii, ut ab ultumis auctoritatem repetam, propter planitiam magnitudinemque regionum, quas incolebant, cum caelum ex omni parte patens atque apertum intuerentur, traiectiones motusque stellarum observitaverunt, quibus notatis, quid cuique significaretur, memoriae prodiderunt. Qua in natione Chaldaei non ex artis, sed ex gentis vocabulo nominati diuturna observatione siderum scientiam putantur effecisse, ut praedici posset, quid cuique eventurum et quo quisque fato natus esset. Eandem artem etiam Aegyptii longinquitate temporum innumerabilibus paene saeculis consecuti putantur. Cilicum autem et Pisidarum gens et his finituma Pamphylia, quibus nationibus praefuimus ipsi, volatibus avium cantibusque ut certissimis signis declarari res futuras putant.

When these had been published, three books were completed De Natura Deorum, in which the whole inquiry into that subject is contained. And so that it might be plainly and fully rounded off, I have set about writing these books on divination; and if, as I intend, I add to them a work on fate, ample satisfaction will have been given to this whole inquiry. To these books must be reckoned also the six De Re Publica, which I wrote at the time when I held the helm of the commonwealth — a great subject, proper to philosophy, treated most copiously by Plato, Aristotle, Theophrastus, and the whole household of the Peripatetics. For why should I speak of the Consolation? — which to me at least brings no small healing, and which I think will profit others greatly besides. Lately there has also been interposed that book which I sent to our friend Atticus, Cato Maior de Senectute; and above all, since by philosophy a man is made good and brave, our Cato must be placed in the number of these books.

Quam vero Graecia coloniam misit in Aeoliam, Ioniam, Asiam, Siciliam, Italiam sine Pythio aut Dodonaeo aut Hammonis oraculo? aut quod bellum susceptum ab ea sine consilio deorum est? Nec unum genus est divinationis publice privatimque celebratum. Nam, ut omittam ceteros populos, noster quam multa genera conplexus est! Principio huius urbis parens Romulus non solum auspicato urbem condidisse, sed ipse etiam optumus augur fuisse traditur. Deinde auguribus et reliqui reges usi, et exactis regibus nihil publice sine auspiciis nec domi nec militiae gerebatur. Cumque magna vis videretur esse et inpetriendis consulendisque rebus et monstris interpretandis ac procurandis in haruspicum disciplina, omnem hanc ex Etruria scientiam adhibebant, ne genus esset ullum divinationis, quod neglectum ab iis videretur.

And since Aristotle, and Theophrastus likewise — men outstanding alike in subtlety and in abundance — joined to philosophy the precepts of speaking as well, my own books on oratory too seem fit to be referred to the same number of books. So there will be three De Oratore, a fourth the Brutus, a fifth the Orator. So far this was the tally; and toward what remained I was pressing with eager spirit, so prepared that, unless some weightier cause had stood in the way, I would have suffered no province of philosophy to lie unillumined by Latin letters and unopened. For what greater or better service can we render the commonwealth than if we teach and instruct the young? — especially in these manners and these times, in which it has so far slipped that it must be reined in and held in check by all our resources.

Et cum duobus modis animi sine ratione et scientia motu ipsi suo soluto et libero incitarentur, uno furente, altero somniante, furoris divinationem Sibyllinis maxime versibus contineri arbitrati eorum decem interpretes delectos e civitate esse voluerunt. Ex quo genere saepe hariolorum etiam et vatum furibundas praedictiones, ut Octaviano bello Cornelii Culleoli, audiendas putaverunt. Nec vero somnia graviora, si quae ad rem publicam pertinere visa sunt, a summo consilio neglecta sunt. Quin etiam memoria nostra templum Iunonis Sospitae L. Iulius, qui cum P. Rutilio consul fuit, de senatus sententia refecit ex Caeciliae, Baliarici filiae, somnio.

Nor indeed do I trust that this can be brought about — what is not even to be demanded — that all the young should turn themselves to these studies. A few, would that there were! Yet their industry might range widely through the commonwealth. For my part I take a harvest of my labor even from those who, already advanced in age, find rest in my books; by their eagerness to read, my own eagerness to write is more keenly spurred day by day; and these, indeed, I have found to be more numerous than I had supposed. This too is a magnificent thing, and a glory to the men of Rome — that they should have no need of Greek letters for philosophy;

Atque haec, ut ego arbitror, veteres rerum magis eventis moniti quam ratione docti probaverunt. Philosophorum vero exquisita quaedam argumenta, cur esset vera divinatio, collecta sunt; e quibus, ut de antiquissumis loquar, Colophonius Xenophanes unus, qui deos esse diceret, divinationem funditus sustulit; reliqui vero omnes praeter Epicurum balbutientem de natura deorum divinationem probaverunt, sed non uno modo. Nam cum Socrates omnesque Socratici Zenoque et ii, qui ab eo essent profecti, manerent in antiquorum philosophorum sententia vetere Academia et Peripateticis consentientibus, cumque huic rei magnam auctoritatem Pythagoras iam ante tribuisset, qui etiam ipse augur vellet esse, plurumisque locis gravis auctor Democritus praesensionem rerum futurarum conprobaret, Dicaearchus Peripateticus cetera divinationis genera sustulit, somniorum et furoris reliquit, Cratippusque, familiaris noster, quem ego parem summis Peripateticis iudico, isdem rebus fidem tribuit, reliqua divinationis genera reiecit.

which I shall surely attain, if I complete what I have begun. And to me, in fact, the cause of expounding philosophy was furnished by the grievous calamity of the state, when amid civil arms I could neither guard the commonwealth in my own fashion, nor do nothing, nor find what else, at least worthy of me, I might do. My fellow citizens, then, will grant me their pardon — or rather will be grateful — that, when the commonwealth lay in the power of a single man, I neither hid myself away, nor deserted my post, nor cast myself down, nor bore myself as one angry at a man or at the times; nor, furthermore, did I either flatter or admire another’s fortune in such a way that I should repent of my own. For this very thing I had learned from Plato and from philosophy: that there are certain natural revolutions of commonwealths, so that they are held now by leading men, now by the people, sometimes by single rulers.

Sed cum Stoici omnia fere illa defenderent, quod et Zeno in suis commentariis quasi semina quaedam sparsisset et ea Cleanthes paulo uberiora fecisset, accessit acerrumo vir ingenio, Chrysippus, qui totam de divinatione duobus libris explicavit sententiam, uno praeterea de oraclis, uno de somniis; quem subsequens unum librum Babylonius Diogenes edidit, eius auditor, duo Antipater, quinque noster Posidonius. Sed a Stoicis vel princeps eius disciplinae, Posidonii doctor, discipulus Antipatri, degeneravit, Panaetius, nec tamen ausus est negare vim esse divinandi, sed dubitare se dixit. Quod illi in aliqua re invitissumis Stoicis Stoico facere licuit, id nos ut in reliquis rebus faciamus, a Stoicis non concedetur? praesertim cum id, de quo Panaetio non liquet, reliquis eiusdem disciplinae solis luce videatur clarius.

And when this had befallen our own commonwealth, then, stripped of my former functions, I began to renew these studies, both that my mind might be lightened of its troubles by this means above all, and that I might be of use to my fellow citizens in whatever way I could. For in my books I delivered my opinion as in the Senate, I addressed the assembly, I supposed philosophy to have been put in place for me in lieu of administering the commonwealth. Now, since I have begun to be consulted on public affairs, my labor must be given to the commonwealth — or rather all my thought and care must be set upon it, and only so much left to this study as shall be free from public office and duty. But of this elsewhere, and at greater length; now let us return to the discussion we set ourselves.

Sed haec quidem laus Academiae praestantissumi philosophi iudicio et testimonio conprobata est. Etenim nobismet ipsis quaerentibus, quid sit de divinatione iudicandum, quod a Carneade multa acute et copiose contra Stoicos disputata sint, verentibusque, ne temere vel falsae rei vel non satis cognitae adsentiamur, faciendum videtur, ut diligenter etiam atque etiam argumenta cum argumentis comparemus, ut fecimus in iis tribus libris, quos de natura deorum scripsimus. Nam cum omnibus in rebus temeritas in adsentiendo errorque turpis est, tum in eo loco maxime, in quo iudicandum est, quantum auspiciis rebusque divinis religionique tribuamus; est enim periculum, ne aut neglectis iis impia fraude aut susceptis anili superstitione obligemur.

For when my brother Quintus had discoursed on divination in the terms set down in the preceding book, and we seemed to have walked about enough, we sat down in the library that is in the Lyceum. And I said: You have defended the Stoics’ opinion with care, Quintus, and in the Stoic manner; and — what most delights me — you have used very many of our own examples, and those indeed clear and illustrious. I must reply, then, to what you have said, but in such a way that I affirm nothing, that I question everything, doubting for the most part and distrusting even myself. For if I had anything certain to say, I myself would be playing the diviner — I, who deny that divination exists.

Quibus de rebus et alias saepe et paulo accuratius nuper, cum essem cum Q. fratre in Tusculano, disputatum est. Nam cum ambulandi causa in Lyceum venissemus (id enim superiori gymnasio nomen est), Perlegi, ille inquit, tuum paulo ante tertium de natura deorum, in quo disputatio Cottae quamquam labefactavit sententiam meam, non funditus tamen sustulit. Optime vero, inquam; etenim ipse Cotta sic disputat, ut Stoicorum magis argumenta confutet quam hominum deleat religionem. Tum Quintus: Dicitur quidem istuc, inquit, a Cotta, et vero saepius, credo, ne communia iura migrare videatur; sed studio contra Stoicos disserendi deos mihi videtur funditus tollere.

What moves me, in fact, is that question which Carneades above all was wont to ask: of what things divination is concerned — whether of those that are perceived by the senses. But these we do see, hear, taste, smell, touch. Is there, then, anything in these matters that we perceive by foresight or by some stirring of the mind rather than by nature itself? Or could that diviner — whoever he is — if he were robbed of his eyes, as Tiresias was, say which things are white, which black; or, if he were deaf, discern the varieties or the measures of sounds? To none, therefore, of the things that are taken in by sense is divination applied. And yet not even in those matters that are handled by an art is there any need of divination. For we are accustomed to bring to the sick not seers or fortune-tellers but physicians; nor, in truth, do those who wish to use the lyre or the pipe receive instruction in handling them from haruspices, but from musicians.

Eius rationi non sane desidero quid respondeam; satis enim defensa religio est in secundo libro a Lucilio, cuius disputatio tibi ipsi, ut in extremo tertio scribis, ad veritatem est visa propensior. Sed, quod praetermissum est in illis libris (credo, quia commodius arbitratus es separatim id quaeri deque eo disseri), id est de divinatione, quae est earum rerum, quae fortuitae putantur, praedictio atque praesensio, id, si placet, videamus quam habeat vim et quale sit. Ego enim sic existimo, si sint ea genera divinandi vera, de quibus accepimus quaeque colimus, esse deos, vicissimque, si di sint, esse qui divinent.

The same reasoning holds in letters and in the rest of the subjects that have a discipline. Do you suppose that those said to divine can answer whether the sun is greater than the earth or only as great as it appears; whether the moon uses its own light or the sun’s; what motion the sun and the moon have, and what the five stars that are said to wander? Neither do those reckoned diviners profess that they will say these things, nor, of the figures described in geometry, which are true and which false; for these belong to the mathematicians, not to the fortune-tellers. As for those matters that are dealt with in philosophy, is there anything that any of the diviners is wont either to answer or to be consulted on — what is good, what evil, what neither? For these are proper to the philosophers.

Arcem tu quidem Stoicorum, inquam, Quinte, defendis, siquidem ista sic reciprocantur, ut et, si divinatio sit, di sint et, si di sint, sit divinatio. Quorum neutrum tam facile, quam tu arbitraris, conceditur. Nam et natura significari futura sine deo possunt et, ut sint di, potest fieri, ut nulla ab iis divinatio generi humano tributa sit. Atque ille: Mihi vero, inquit, satis est argumenti et esse deos et eos consulere rebus humanis, quod esse clara et perspicua divinationis genera iudico. De quibus quid ipse sentiam, si placet, exponam, ita tamen, si vacas animo neque habes aliquid, quod huic sermoni praevertendum putes.

And what of duty? Does anyone consult a haruspex on how he is to live with his parents, with his brothers, with his friends? On how he is to use his money, how his honors, how his command? These matters are usually referred to wise men, not to diviners. And what of the things handled by the dialecticians or by the natural philosophers — can any of them be divined? Whether the world is one or many; what are the first beginnings of things, from which all things are born: that is the wisdom of the natural philosophers. And how you are to undo the Liar — which they call pseudomenon — or how you are to withstand the heap (which, if need be, one might call by a Latin word the "piler," but there is no need; for, just as philosophy itself, so many words of the Greeks, and so too "sorites," are sufficiently worn into Latin speech): these too, then, the dialecticians will pronounce upon, not the diviners. And what of when it is asked what the best constitution of the commonwealth is, what laws, what manners are useful or useless — shall haruspices be summoned from Etruria, or shall leading men and chosen experts in civil affairs determine it?

Ego vero, inquam, philosophiae, Quinte, semper vaco; hoc autem tempore, cum sit nihil aliud, quod lubenter agere possim, multo magis aveo audire, de divinatione quid sentias. Nihil, inquit, equidem novi, nec quod praeter ceteros ipse sentiam; nam cum antiquissimam sententiam, tum omnium populorum et gentium consensu conprobatam sequor. Duo sunt enim divinandi genera, quorum alterum artis est, alterum naturae.

But if there is no divination of the things that lie under the senses, nor of those contained in the arts, nor of those discussed in philosophy, nor of those that turn upon public affairs, then of what things it may be I do not understand at all; for either it ought to be of all things, or some matter must be assigned to it in which it can be exercised. But there is no divination of all things, as reason has shown, nor is there found any place or matter over which we could set divination in charge. See, then, whether there is no divination at all. There is a certain common Greek verse to this effect: He who shall conjecture well — that man I shall pronounce the best seer. Will a seer, then, conjecture better than a helmsman what storm threatens, or attain by conjecture the nature of a disease more keenly than a physician, or the conduct of a war more prudently than a general?

Quae est autem gens aut quae civitas, quae non aut extispicum aut monstra aut fulgora interpretantium aut augurum aut astrologorum aut sortium (ea enim fere artis sunt) aut somniorum aut vaticinationum (haec enim duo naturalia putantur) praedictione moveatur? Quarum quidem rerum eventa magis arbitror quam causas quaeri oportere. Est enim vis et natura quaedam, quae tum observatis longo tempore significationibus, tum aliquo instinctu inflatuque divino futura praenuntiat. Quare omittat urguere Carneades, quod faciebat etiam Panaetius requirens, Iuppiterne cornicem a laeva, corvum ab dextera canere iussisset. Observata sunt haec tempore inmenso et in significatione eventis animadversa et notata. Nihil est autem, quod non longinquitas temporum excipiente memoria prodendisque monumentis efficere atque adsequi possit.

But I noticed, Quintus, that you carefully drew divination away from those conjectures which involve art and good judgment, and away from those things which are grasped by the senses or by the crafts, and that you defined it thus: divination is the prediction and foreknowledge of those things which are fortuitous. First, you are rolled back to the same point. For the physician and the helmsman and the general all have a foreknowledge of fortuitous things. Could any haruspex or augur or seer or dreamer conjecture better than a physician whether a sick man will recover from his disease, than a helmsman whether a ship will escape from danger, than a general whether an army will escape from an ambush?

Mirari licet, quae sint animadversa a medicis herbarum genera, quae radicum ad morsus bestiarum, ad oculorum morbos, ad vulnera, quorum vim atque naturam ratio numquam explicavit, utilitate et ars est et inventor probatus. Age ea, quae quamquam ex alio genere sunt, tamen divinationi sunt similiora, videamus: Atque etiam ventos praemonstrat saepe futuros Inflatum mare, cum subito penitusque tumescit, Saxaque cana salis niveo spumata liquore Tristificas certant Neptuno reddere voces, Aut densus stridor cum celso e vertice montis Ortus adaugescit scopulorum saepe repulsus. Atque his rerum praesensionibus Prognostica tua referta sunt. Quis igitur elicere causas praesensionum potest? etsi video Boe+thum Stoicum esse conatum, qui hactenus aliquid egit, ut earum rationem rerum explicaret, quae in mari caelove fierent.

And yet you said that not even this belonged to the diviner — to foresee, by certain signs, impending winds or rains (and on this point some of my own renderings of Aratus were recited by you from memory), even though these very things are fortuitous; for they happen more often than not, but not always. Where, then, is this foreknowledge of fortuitous things which you call divination, and on what does it operate? For the things that can be foreseen by art or by reasoning or by experience or by conjecture, these you hold should be assigned not to diviners but to experts. So it is left that the only fortuitous things that can be divined are those which can be foreseen by no art and no wisdom — as, if anyone had said many years beforehand that the famous Marcus Marcellus, who was three times consul, would perish in a shipwreck, he would surely have divined it; for by no other art and by no wisdom could he have known it. Foreknowledge, then, of such things as are set in the lap of fortune is divination.

Illa vero cur eveniant, quis probabiliter dixerit? Cana fulix itidem fugiens e gurgite ponti Nuntiat horribilis clamans instare procellas Haud modicos tremulo fundens e gutture cantus. Saepe etiam pertriste canit de pectore carmen Et matutinis acredula vocibus instat, Vocibus instat et adsiduas iacit ore querellas, Cum primum gelidos rores aurora remittit. Fuscaque non numquam cursans per litora cornix Demersit caput et fluctum cervice recepit.

Can there, then, be any foreknowledge of things which have no rational ground at all for their coming to be? For what else are luck, fortune, chance, and outcome, except when something has fallen out and come to pass in such a way that it could also have fallen out and come to pass otherwise? How, then, can a thing that happens at random by blind chance and the rolling of fortune be foreknown and predicted?

Videmus haec signa numquam fere mentientia nec tamen, cur ita fiat, videmus. Vos quoque signa videtis, aquai dulcis alumnae, Cum clamore paratis inanis fundere voces Absurdoque sono fontis et stagna cietis. Quis est, qui ranunculos hoc videre suspicari possit? sed inest in ranunculis vis et natura quaedam significans aliquid per se ipsa satis certa, cognitioni autem hominum obscurior. Mollipedesque boves spectantes lumina caeli Naribus umiferum duxere ex ae+re sucum. Non quaero, cur, quoniam, quid eveniat, intellego. Iam vero semper viridis semperque gravata Lentiscus triplici solita grandescere fetu Ter fruges fundens tria tempora monstrat arandi. Ne hoc quidem quaero, cur haec arbor una ter floreat aut cur arandi maturitatem ad signum floris accommodet;

A physician foresees a worsening disease by reasoning, a general an ambush, a helmsman a storm; and yet even these men, who form no opinion without sure reasoning, are often deceived — as the farmer, when he sees the flower of the olive, thinks he will see the fruit as well, and not without reason; yet sometimes even so he is deceived. But if those men are deceived who say nothing without some probable conjecture and reasoning, what is to be thought of the conjecture of those who foresee the future by entrails, or birds, or portents, or oracles, or dreams? I am not yet saying how worthless these signs are — the cleft of the liver, the cawing of the raven, the flight of the eagle, the shooting of a star, the cries of men in frenzy, lots, dreams; of each of these I shall speak in its place; for now I speak of them all together.

hoc sum contentus, quod, etiamsi, cur quidque fiat, ignorem, quid fiat, intellego. Pro omni igitur divinatione idem, quod pro rebus iis, quas commemoravi, respondebo. Quid scammoneae radix ad purgandum, quid aristolochia ad morsus serpentium possit, quae nomen ex inventore repperit, rem ipsam inventor ex somnio, video, quod satis est; cur possit, nescio. Sic ventorum et imbrium signa, quae dixi, rationem quam habeant, non satis perspicio; vim et eventum agnosco, scio, adprobo. Similiter, quid fissum in extis, quid fibra valeat, accipio; quae causa sit, nescio. Atque horum quidem plena vita est; extis enim omnes fere utuntur. Quid? de fulgurum vi dubitare num possumus? Nonne cum multa alia mirabilia, tum illud in primis: Cum Summanus in fastigio Iovis optumi maxumi, qui tum erat fictilis, e caelo ictus esset nec usquam eius simulacri caput inveniretur, haruspices in Tiberim id depulsum esse dixerunt, idque inventum est eo loco, qui est ab haruspicibus demonstratus.

How can anything be foreseen as going to be, when it has neither any cause nor any mark to show that it will be? Eclipses of the sun, and likewise of the moon, are predicted for many years in advance by those who pursue the motions of the heavenly bodies by calculation; for they predict the things which the necessity of nature is going to bring about. They see, from the most regular motion of the moon, when she, set opposite the sun, will run into the shadow of the earth, which is the cone of night, so that she must necessarily be darkened; and when that same moon, placed beneath and over against the sun, will darken its light to our eyes; in what sign each of the wandering stars will be at each time; and what rising of some sign, and what setting, will fall on each day. You see by what reasoning those proceed who say these things beforehand.

Sed quo potius utar aut auctore aut teste quam te? cuius edidici etiam versus, et lubenter quidem, quos in secundo de consulatu Urania Musa pronuntiat: Principio aetherio flammatus Iuppiter igni Vertitur et totum conlustrat lumine mundum Menteque divina caelum terrasque petessit, Quae penitus sensus hominum vitasque retentat Aetheris aeterni saepta atque inclusa cavernis. Et, si stellarum motus cursusque vagantis Nosse velis, quae sint signorum in sede locatae, Quae verbo et falsis Graiorum vocibus erant, Re vera certo lapsu spatioque feruntur, Omnia iam cernes divina mente notata.

But those who say that a treasure will be found, or an inheritance will come, what do they follow? Or in what nature of things does that future event reside? But if these things, and others of the same kind, have any such necessity, what is there left, then, that we should suppose to happen by chance or by random fortune? For nothing is so contrary to reason and constancy as fortune, so that it does not seem to me to fall even within a god’s power to know what is going to happen by chance and at random. For if he knows it, then it will certainly come to pass; but if it will certainly come to pass, there is no such thing as fortune; yet there is such a thing as fortune; therefore there is no foreknowledge of fortuitous things.

Nam primum astrorum volucris te consule motus Concursusque gravis stellarum ardore micantis Tu quoque, cum tumulos Albano in monte nivalis Lustrasti et laeto mactasti lacte Latinas, Vidisti et claro tremulos ardore cometas, Multaque misceri nocturna strage putasti, Quod ferme dirum in tempus cecidere Latinae, Cum claram speciem concreto lumine luna Abdidit et subito stellanti nocte perempta est. Quid vero Phoebi fax, tristis nuntia belli, Quae magnum ad columen flammato ardore volabat, Praecipitis caeli partis obitusque petessens? Aut cum terribili perculsus fulmine civis Luce serenanti vitalia lumina liquit? Aut cum se gravido tremefecit corpore tellus? Iam vero variae nocturno tempore visae Terribiles formae bellum motusque monebant, Multaque per terras vates oracla furenti Pectore fundebant tristis minitantia casus,

Or, if you deny that there is such a thing as fortune, and say that everything which happens and which will happen has been determined by fate from all eternity, then change your definition of divination, which you said was the foreknowledge of fortuitous things. For if nothing can come to be, nothing befall, nothing come to pass, except what from all eternity has been certain to be at a fixed time, what fortune can there be? And once fortune is taken away, what room is left for divination — which you have called the foreknowledge of fortuitous things? Although you did say that everything which happens or will happen is held fast by fate. The very name of fate is downright old-womanish and full of superstition; yet still, among the Stoics much is said about that fate; of which I shall speak elsewhere; for now, only what is necessary.

Atque ea, quae lapsu tandem cecidere vetusto, Haec fore perpetuis signis clarisque frequentans Ipse deum genitor caelo terrisque canebat. Nunc ea, Torquato quae quondam et consule Cotta Lydius ediderat Tyrrhenae gentis haruspex, Omnia fixa tuus glomerans determinat annus. Nam pater altitonans stellanti nixus Olympo Ipse suos quondam tumulos ac templa petivit Et Capitolinis iniecit sedibus ignis. Tum species ex aere vetus venerataque Nattae Concidit, elapsaeque vetusto numine leges, Et divom simulacra peremit fulminis ardor.

If all things come about by fate, what good does divination do me? For what the diviner predicts is indeed going to be, so that I do not even know what to make of that affair, when an eagle called back our friend Deiotarus from his journey; for if he had not turned back, he would have had to lodge in that chamber which collapsed the very next night, and so he would have been crushed beneath the ruin. But that — if it had been fated — he would not have escaped; and if it had not been fated, he would not have fallen into that mishap. What help, then, is divination? Or what is the point of these warnings to me — whether lots, or entrails, or any prediction? For if it was fated that the fleets of the Roman people in the First Punic War should be destroyed, the one by shipwreck, the other sunk by the Carthaginians, then even if the sacred chickens had given a most favorable feeding-omen to the consuls Lucius Junius and Publius Claudius, the fleets would have been destroyed all the same. But if, had the auspices been obeyed, the fleets were not going to be destroyed, then they were not destroyed by fate; and yet you hold that all things come about by fate;

Hic silvestris erat Romani nominis altrix, Martia, quae parvos Mavortis semine natos Uberibus gravidis vitali rore rigabat; Quae tum cum pueris flammato fulminis ictu Concidit atque avolsa pedum vestigia liquit. Tum quis non artis scripta ac monumenta volutans Voces tristificas chartis promebat Etruscis? Omnes civilem generosa a stirpe profectam Vitare ingentem cladem pestemque monebant Vel legum exitium constanti voce ferebant Templa deumque adeo flammis urbemque iubebant Eripere et stragem horribilem caedemque vereri; Atque haec fixa gravi fato ac fundata teneri, Ni prius excelsum ad columen formata decore Sancta Iovis species claros spectaret in ortus. Tum fore ut occultos populus sanctusque senatus Cernere conatus posset, si solis ad ortum Conversa inde patrum sedes populique videret.

therefore there is no such thing as divination. But if it was fated that in the Second Punic War the army of the Roman people should be destroyed at Lake Trasimene, could that have been avoided, had the consul Flaminius obeyed those signs and those auspices by which he was forbidden to fight? Certainly it could. Either, then, the army was not destroyed by fate, or, if it was destroyed by fate (which is certainly what you must say), then even if he had obeyed the auspices, the same thing would have come to pass; for the fates cannot be changed. Where, then, is this divination of the Stoics? For if all things come about by fate, it can give us no warning to be more careful; for in whatever way we conduct ourselves, that will still happen which is going to happen. But if it can be averted, there is no fate; and so there is not even divination, since divination is of things to come. But nothing is going to happen for certain, when by some act of expiation it can be brought about that it does not happen.

Haec tardata diu species multumque morata Consule te tandem celsa est in sede locata, Atque una fixi ac signati temporis hora Iuppiter excelsa clarabat sceptra columna, Et clades patriae flamma ferroque parata Vocibus Allobrogum patribus populoque patebat. Rite igitur veteres, quorum monumenta tenetis, Qui populos urbisque modo ac virtute regebant, Rite etiam vestri, quorum pietasque fidesque Praestitit et longe vicit sapientia cunctos, Praecipue coluere vigenti numine divos. Haec adeo penitus cura videre sagaci, Otia qui studiis laeti tenuere decoris,

And, for that matter, I do not think that the knowledge of things to come is even useful to us. For what kind of life would Priam have had, if from his youth he had known what outcomes he was going to have in old age? Let us leave the legends and look at things nearer home. In my Consolation I gathered together the gravest ends of the most illustrious men of our state. What of it, then? To pass over the earlier ones — do you think it would have been useful to Marcus Crassus, at the time when he flourished with the greatest wealth and fortunes, to know that, after his son Publius was killed and his army destroyed, he was destined to perish beyond the Euphrates in disgrace and dishonor? Or do you suppose that Gnaeus Pompey would have taken joy in his three consulships, his three triumphs, and the glory of his greatest deeds, if he had known that he was going to be butchered in the desolation of Egypt with his army lost, and that after his death those things would follow which we cannot speak of without tears?

Inque Academia umbrifera nitidoque Lyceo Fuderunt claras fecundi pectoris artis. E quibus ereptum primo iam a flore iuventae Te patria in media virtutum mole locavit. Tu tamen anxiferas curas requiete relaxans, Quod patriae vacat, id studiis nobisque sacrasti. Tu igitur animum poteris inducere contra ea, quae a me disputantur de divinatione, dicere, qui et gesseris ea, quae gessisti, et ea, quae pronuntiavi, accuratissume scripseris?

And what of Caesar — what agony of soul, do we think, would he have spent his life in, had he divined that he would lie butchered in that Senate which he himself had for the greater part recruited, in the Hall of Pompey, before the very image of Pompey himself, with so many of his own centurions looking on, slain by the noblest citizens, some of them men he had himself decked out in every distinction, lying there so that not one even of his slaves, let alone of his friends, would come near his body? Surely, then, ignorance of future evils is more useful than knowledge of them.

Quid? quaeris, Carneades, cur haec ita fiant aut qua arte perspici possint? Nescire me fateor, evenire autem te ipsum dico videre. Casu, inquis. Itane vero? quicquam potest casu esse factum, quod omnes habet in se numeros veritatis? Quattuor tali iacti casu Venerium efficiunt; num etiam centum Venerios, si quadringentos talos ieceris, casu futuros putas? Aspersa temere pigmenta in tabula oris liniamenta efficere possunt; num etiam Veneris Coae pulchritudinem effici posse aspersione fortuita putas? Sus rostro si humi A litteram inpresserit, num propterea suspicari poteris Andromacham Ennii ab ea posse describi? Fingebat Carneades in Chiorum lapicidinis saxo diffisso caput extitisse Panisci; credo, aliquam non dissimilem figuram, sed certe non talem, ut eam factam a Scopa diceres. Sic enim se profecto res habet, ut numquam perfecte veritatem casus imitetur.

For this, at any rate, can in no way be said, especially by the Stoics: Pompey would not have gone to arms, Crassus would not have crossed the Euphrates, Caesar would not have taken up the civil war. Therefore their ends were not fated; yet you hold that all things come about by fate; nothing, then, would it have profited those men to divine; and, what is more, they would have lost all the enjoyment of their earlier life; for what could be a delight to them as they brooded on their own ends? So, whichever way the Stoics turn, all their cleverness must lie prostrate. For if the thing that is going to come to pass can come to pass in either this way or that, fortune has the greatest power; and the things that are fortuitous cannot be certain. But if it is certain what is going to be in each matter at each time, what is there in which the haruspices help me? For when they have said that the most grievous things are portended, they add at the very end that everything will fall out more lightly once the divine rites of expiation have been performed;

At non numquam ea, quae praedicta sunt, minus eveniunt. Quae tandem id ars non habet? earum dico artium, quae coniectura continentur et sunt opinabiles. An medicina ars non putanda est? quam tamen multa fallunt. Quid? gubernatores nonne falluntur? An Achivorum exercitus et tot navium rectores non ita profecti sunt ab Ilio, ut profectione laeti piscium lasciviam intuerentur, ut ait Pacuvius, nec tuendi satietas capere posset? Ínterea prope iam óccidente sóle inhorrescít mare, Ténebrae conduplicántur noctisque ét nimbum occaecát nigror. Num igitur tot clarissimorum ducum regumque naufragium sustulit artem gubernandi? aut num imperatorum scientia nihil est, quia summus imperator nuper fugit amisso exercitu? aut num propterea nulla est rei publicae gerendae ratio atque prudentia, quia multa Cn. Pompeium, quaedam M. Catonem, non nulla etiam te ipsum fefellerunt? Similis est haruspicum responsio omnisque opinabilis divinatio; coniectura enim nititur, ultra quam progredi non potest.

For if nothing happens outside of fate, nothing can be lightened by an act of worship. This is Homer’s view, when he brings on Jupiter complaining that he could not snatch his son Sarpedon from death against fate. The same thing is signified by that line of the Greek poet, turned to this sense: That which is fixed to be overmasters even Jove on high. The whole notion of fate seems to me to be justly mocked even in a line of Atellan farce; but in matters so grave there is no place for jesting. Let the argument, then, be brought to its conclusion. For if nothing can be foreseen of those things that happen by chance, since they cannot be certain, there is no divination; but if they can be foreseen on this ground, that they are certain and fated, then again there is no divination — for you were saying that divination has to do with fortuitous things.

Ea fallit fortasse non numquam, sed tamen ad veritatem saepissime derigit; est enim ab omni aeternitate repetita, in qua cum paene innumerabiliter res eodem modo evenirent isdem signis antegressis, ars est effecta eadem saepe animadvertendo ac notando. Auspicia vero vestra quam constant! quae quidem nunc a Romanis auguribus ignorantur (bona hoc tua venia dixerim), a Cilicibus, Pamphyliis, Pisidis, Lyciis tenentur.

But let this have been, as it were, a first sally of my discourse with light-armed troops; now let us engage at close quarters and try, if we can, to dislodge the horns of your argument. For you were saying that there are two kinds of divination, one by art, the other natural; that the kind by art consists partly in conjecture, partly in long-continued observation; that the natural kind is what the mind seizes or receives from without, from the divine power, the source from which we all have our minds drawn off, or received, or poured as a libation. As the kinds of divination by art you laid down roughly these: that of those who read entrails, and of those who foretell from lightning-flashes and portents; then that of the augurs, and of those who use signs or omens; and every conjectural kind you placed roughly within this same class.

Nam quid ego hospitem nostrum, clarissumum atque optumum virum, Deiotarum regem, commemorem? qui nihil umquam nisi auspicato gerit. Qui cum ex itinere quodam proposito et constituto revertisset aquilae admonitus volatu, conclave illud, ubi erat mansurus, si ire perrexisset, proxima nocte corruit.

The natural kind, on the other hand, seemed either to be uttered and, as it were, poured out in an excitement of the mind, or to be foreseen by a mind set free, during sleep, from the senses and from cares. Moreover, you derived all divination from three things — from a god, from fate, from nature. Yet even so, since you could explain nothing, you fought with a marvelous abundance of made-up examples. About this I should like to say, first of all, this: I judge it not the part of a philosopher to use witnesses, who may be true by chance or false and counterfeit out of malice; one ought to teach by arguments and reasons why each thing is so, not by outcomes, and least of all by outcomes which I am at liberty not to believe.

Itaque, ut ex ipso audiebam, persaepe revertit ex itinere, cum iam progressus esset multorum dierum viam. Cuius quidem hoc praeclarissimum est, quod, posteaquam a Caesare tetrarchia et regno pecuniaque multatus est, negat se tamen eorum auspiciorum, quae sibi ad Pompeium proficiscenti secunda evenerint, paenitere; senatus enim auctoritatem et populi Romani libertatem atque imperii dignitatem suis armis esse defensam, sibique eas aves, quibus auctoribus officium et fidem secutus esset, bene consuluisse; antiquiorem enim sibi fuisse possessionibus suis gloriam. Ille mihi videtur igitur vere augurari. Nam nostri quidem magistratus auspiciis utuntur coactis; necesse est enim offa obiecta cadere frustum ex pulli ore, cum pascitur;

Let me begin from haruspicy, which I think ought to be cultivated for the sake of the commonwealth and of the common religion. But we are alone; it is permitted to search out the truth without giving offense — for me especially, who am in doubt about most of these matters. Let us examine the entrails first, if you please. Can anyone, then, be persuaded that the things said to be signified by entrails have been learned by the haruspices through long-continued observation? How long-continued was that observation? Or over how long a stretch of time could it have been carried on? Or in what way was it agreed among them which part is hostile, which part friendly, which cleft betokens danger, which some advantage? Or did the Etruscan haruspices, the Elians, the Egyptians, the Carthaginians compare these matters among themselves? But that, besides being something that could not have happened, cannot even be imagined; for we see different peoples interpret the entrails in different ways, and that there is no single discipline common to all.

quod autem scriptum habetis †aut tripudium fieri, si ex ea quid in solidum ceciderit, hoc quoque, quod dixi, coactum tripudium solistimum dicitis. Itaque multa auguria, multa auspicia, quod Cato ille sapiens queritur, neglegentia collegii amissa plane et deserta sunt. Nihil fere quondam maioris rei nisi auspicato ne privatim quidem gerebatur, quod etiam nunc nuptiarum auspices declarant, qui re omissa nomen tantum tenent. Nam ut nunc extis (quamquam id ipsum aliquanto minus quam olim), sic tum avibus magnae res inpetriri solebant. Itaque, sinistra dum non exquirimus, in dira et in vitiosa incurrimus.

And surely, if there is in the entrails some force that reveals things to come, that force must necessarily either be bound up with the nature of things or be shaped in some way by the will of the gods and by divine power. With the nature of things — so great, so glorious, diffused through all regions and motions — what can a cock’s gall-bladder have in common (for there are those who say that these entrails above all are the most telling), nay, what natural thing has the liver or the heart or the lung of a fat bull, that could reveal what is going to be?

Ut P. Claudius, Appii Caeci filius, eiusque collega L. Iunius classis maxumas perdiderunt, cum vitio navigassent. Quod eodem modo evenit Agamemnoni; qui, cum Achivi coepissent. inter se strépere aperteque ártem obterere extíspicum, Sólvere imperát secundo rúmore adversáque avi. Sed quid vetera? M. Crasso quid acciderit, videmus, dirarum obnuntiatione neglecta. In quo Appius, collega tuus, bonus augur, ut ex te audire soleo, non satis scienter virum bonum et civem egregium censor C. Ateium notavit, quod ementitum auspicia subscriberet. Esto; fuerit hoc censoris, si iudicabat ementitum; at illud minime auguris, quod adscripsit ob eam causam populum Romanum calamitatem maximam cepisse. Si enim ea causa calamitatis fuit, non in eo est culpa, qui obnuntiavit, sed in eo, qui non paruit. Veram enim fuisse obnuntiationem, ut ait idem augur et censor, exitus adprobavit; quae si falsa fuisset, nullam adferre potuisset causam calamitatis. Etenim dirae, sicut cetera auspicia, ut omina, ut signa, non causas adferunt, cur quid eveniat, sed nuntiant eventura, nisi provideris.

Democritus, to be sure, trifles not unwittily, in the manner of a natural philosopher — a class than which nothing is more arrogant: What lies before their feet no man regards; they scan the regions of the sky. Yet he holds that by the condition and color of the entrails this much, at any rate, is revealed: the kind of fodder, and the abundance or scantiness of the things the earth brings forth; and he thinks that healthfulness too, or pestilence, is signified by the entrails. O blessed mortal! who, I am quite certain, was never at a loss for amusement. That this man should have been delighted by such great trifles, so as not to see that the thing would then be probable only if the entrails of all the beasts changed themselves at the same time into the same condition and color! But if at the same hour one beast’s liver is sleek and full, another’s rough and shrunken, what is there that could be revealed by the condition and color of the entrails?

Non igitur obnuntiatio Ateii causam finxit calamitatis, sed signo obiecto monuit Crassum, quid eventurum esset, nisi cavisset. Ita aut illa obnuntiatio nihil valuit aut, si, ut Appius iudicat, valuit, id valuit, ut peccatum haereat non in eo, qui monuerit, sed in eo, qui non obtemperarit. Quid? lituus iste vester, quod clarissumum est insigne auguratus, unde vobis est traditus? Nempe eo Romulus regiones direxit tum, cum urbem condidit. Qui quidem Romuli lituus, id est incurvum et leviter a summo inflexum bacillum, quod ab eius litui, quo canitur, similitudine nomen invenit, cum situs esset in curia Saliorum, quae est in Palatio, eaque deflagravisset, inventus est integer.

Or is this of the same sort as that saying of Pherecydes which was cited by you? — who, when he had seen water drawn from a well, said an earthquake was going to come. Too little shamelessly, I suppose, do they dare, when an earthquake has occurred, to say what force produced it; do they actually foreknow, even beforehand, that it is going to happen, from the color of the spring-water? Many things of this sort are said in the schools, but take care that it not be unnecessary to believe them all.

Quid? multis annis post Romulum Prisco regnante Tarquinio quis veterum scriptorum non loquitur, quae sit ab Atto Navio per lituum regionum facta discriptio? Qui cum propter paupertatem sues puer pasceret, una ex iis amissa vovisse dicitur, si recuperasset, uvam se deo daturum, quae maxima esset in vinea; itaque sue inventa ad meridiem spectans in vinea media dicitur constitisse, cumque in quattuor partis vineam divisisset trisque partis aves abdixissent, quarta parte, quae erat reliqua, in regiones distributa mirabili magnitudine uvam, ut scriptum videmus, invenit. Qua re celebrata cum vicini omnes ad eum de rebus suis referrent, erat in magno nomine et gloria.

But let those Democritean claims be true, by all means: when do we ever search out such things from the entrails? Or when have we ever heard anything of that kind from a haruspex once the entrails have been inspected? They warn of dangers from water or from fire; now they announce inheritances, now losses; they handle the friendly and vital cleft; they consider the head of the liver from every side most carefully; and if it is in fact not found, they think nothing more grievous could have befallen.

Ex quo factum est, ut eum ad se rex Priscus arcesseret. Cuius cum temptaret scientiam auguratus, dixit ei cogitare se quiddam; id possetne fieri, consuluit. Ille augurio acto posse respondit. Tarquinius autem dixit se cogitasse cotem novacula posse praecidi. Tum Attum iussisse experiri. Ita cotem in comitium allatam inspectante et rege et populo novacula esse discissam. Ex eo evenit, ut et Tarquinius augure Atto Navio uteretur et populus de suis rebus ad eum referret.

These things, certainly, could not have been observed, as I taught above. They are therefore inventions of art, not of antiquity — if there is any art at all of things unknown. But what kinship do they have with the nature of things? Even granting that it is joined together and continuous by one accord — which I see has found favor with the natural philosophers, and most of all with those who said that everything which exists is one — what can the universe have bound up with the finding of a treasure? For if by the entrails an increase of money is revealed to me, and that happens by nature, then, first, the entrails are joined to the universe, and second, my gain is contained within the nature of things. Are the natural philosophers not ashamed to say such things? For granted that there is now in the nature of things some contagion — which I concede there is (for the Stoics gather many instances; thus the little livers of mice are said to swell in winter, and dry pennyroyal to flower on the very day of the winter solstice, and inflated bladders to burst, and the seeds of apples enclosed in their middle to turn themselves into opposite directions, and now some strings on a lyre to resound when others are struck, and oysters and all shellfish to wax along with the moon and to wane along with it, and trees in the winter season — when the moon is at the same time waning, because they are then dried out — to be thought timely for cutting.

Cotem autem illam et novaculam defossam in comitio supraque inpositum puteal accepimus. Negemus omnia, comburamus annales, ficta haec esse dicamus, quidvis denique potius quam deos res humanas curare fateamur; quid? quod scriptum apud te est de Ti. Graccho, nonne et augurum et haruspicum conprobat disciplinam? qui cum tabernaculum vitio cepisset inprudens, quod inauspicato pomerium transgressus esset, comitia consulibus rogandis habuit. Nota res est et a te ipso mandata monumentis. Sed et ipse augur Ti. Gracchus auspiciorum auctoritatem confessione errati sui conprobavit, et haruspicum disciplinae magna accessit auctoritas, qui recentibus comitiis in senatum introducti negaverunt iustum comitiorum rogatorem fuisse.

Why should I say more about the straits or the tides of the sea? whose ebb and flow are governed by the motion of the moon. Six hundred instances of the same sort might be brought forward, so that the natural kinship of things far apart appears) — let us grant this; for it is no obstacle at all to the present argument. Surely it does not follow that, if there is a cleft of a certain kind in the liver, gain is revealed? By what bond of nature and, as it were, harmony and accord — which the Greeks call sympatheian — can either the cleft of a liver agree with my little profit, or my paltry gain with the sky, the earth, and the nature of things? I will concede this very point, if you wish, even though I shall have made a great sacrifice of my case if I concede that there is any agreement at all of nature with the entrails;

Iis igitur adsentior, qui duo genera divinationum esse dixerunt, unum, quod particeps esset artis, alterum, quod arte careret. Est enim ars in iis, qui novas res coniectura persequuntur, veteres observatione didicerunt. Carent autem arte ii, qui non ratione aut coniectura observatis ac notatis signis, sed concitatione quadam animi aut soluto liberoque motu futura praesentiunt, quod et somniantibus saepe contingit et non numquam vaticinantibus per furorem, ut Bacis Boeotius, ut Epimenides Cres, ut Sibylla Erythraea. Cuius generis oracla etiam habenda sunt, non ea, quae aequatis sortibus ducuntur, sed illa, quae instinctu divino adflatuque funduntur; etsi ipsa sors contemnenda non est, si et auctoritatem habet vetustatis, ut eae sunt sortes, quas e terra editas accepimus; quae tamen ductae ut in rem apte cadant, fieri credo posse divinitus. Quorum omnium interpretes, ut grammatici poe+tarum, proxime ad eorum, quos interpretantur, divinationem videntur accedere.

but even granting that, how does it come about that the man who wishes to obtain his request sacrifices a victim suited to his affairs? This was what I did not think could be resolved. But how merrily it is resolved! I am ashamed — not of you, indeed, whose memory I even admire, but of Chrysippus, Antipater, Posidonius, who say this very same thing that has been said by you: that in choosing the victim there is a guide, a certain force, perceptive and divine, which is diffused throughout the whole universe. But this is far better still, what was both employed by you and is said by them: that when someone wishes to sacrifice, then a change of the entrails takes place, so that either something is wanting or something is in excess;

Quae est igitur ista calliditas res vetustate robustas calumniando velle pervertere? Non reperio causam. Latet fortasse obscuritate involuta naturae; non enim me deus ista scire, sed his tantum modo uti voluit. Utar igitur nec adducar aut in extis totam Etruriam delirare aut eandem gentem in fulgoribus errare aut fallaciter portenta interpretari, cum terrae saepe fremitus, saepe mugitus, saepe motus multa nostrae rei publicae, multa ceteris civitatibus gravia et vera praedixerint.

for all things, they say, obey the divine power of the gods. These things, believe me, not even old women now think true. Or do you suppose that, if one man should choose a given calf he will find its liver without a head, and if another, with a head? Can this loss of the head, or its addition, take place so suddenly that the entrails accommodate themselves to the fortune of the one sacrificing? Do you not see that there is a certain throw of the dice in the choosing of victims, especially when the thing itself instructs us? For when the entrails have been most grievous, without a head — than which nothing seems more dire — often with the very next victim the offering is most beautifully favorable. Where, then, are those threats of the earlier entrails? Or how did so great an appeasement of the gods come about so suddenly? But you bring forward that, in the entrails of a fat bull, when Caesar was sacrificing, there was no heart; and that, because it could not have happened that the victim should have lived without a heart, we must judge that the heart perished at the moment when it was being sacrificed.

Quid? qui inridetur, partus hic mulae nonne, quia fetus extitit in sterilitate naturae, praedictus est ab haruspicibus incredibilis partus malorum? Quid? Ti. Gracchus P. F., qui bis consul et censor fuit, idemque et summus augur et vir sapiens civisque praestans, nonne, ut C. Gracchus, filius eius, scriptum reliquit, duobus anguibus domi conprehensis haruspices convocavit? qui cum respondissent, si marem emisisset, uxori brevi tempore esse moriendum, si feminam, ipsi, aequius esse censuit se maturam oppetere mortem quam P. Africani filiam adulescentem; feminam emisit, ipse paucis post diebus est mortuus. Inrideamus haruspices, vanos, futtiles esse dicamus, quorumque disciplinam et sapientissimus vir et eventus ac res conprobavit, contemnamus, condemnemus etiam Babylonem et eos, qui e Caucaso caeli signa servantes numeris et modis stellarum cursus persequuntur, condemnemus, inquam, hos aut stultitiae aut vanitatis aut inpudentiae, qui quadringenta septuaginta milia annorum, ut ipsi dicunt, monumentis conprehensa continent, et mentiri iudicemus nec, saeculorum reliquorum iudicium quod de ipsis futurum sit, pertimescere.

How does it come about that you grasp the one thing — that the ox could not have lived without its heart — but fail to see the other, that the heart could not, all at once, have flown off to who knows where? For my part, I can either not know what power the heart has for living, or suspect that the ox had contracted some disease, and that its heart was thin and shrunken and withered, unlike a heart at all. But you — what reason have you to think that, if a heart was in that fat bull a little while before, it suddenly perished in the very act of sacrifice? Or was it that, having looked upon Caesar, robed in purple and heartless, the heart was itself bereft? Believe me, you are betraying the very city of philosophy while you defend its outposts; for while you would have the haruspex’s art be true, you are overturning the whole study of nature. The head is found in the liver, the heart in the entrails; then it will vanish the instant you have sprinkled the meal and the wine; a god will snatch it away, some force will make away with it or eat it up. Nature, then, will not bring about the rise and the passing of all things, and there will be something that either rises out of nothing or sinks suddenly into nothing. What natural philosopher ever said this? The haruspices say it; do you, then, judge that they are to be believed sooner than the natural philosophers?

Age, barbari vani atque fallaces; num etiam Graiorum historia mentita est? Quae Croeso Pythius Apollo, ut de naturali divinatione dicam, quae Atheniensibus, quae Lacedaemoniis, quae Tegeatis, quae Argivis, quae Corinthiis responderit, quis ignorat? Collegit innumerabilia oracula Chrysippus nec ullum sine locuplete auctore atque teste; quae, quia nota tibi sunt, relinquo; defendo unum hoc: Numquam illud oraclum Delphis tam celebre et tam clarum fuisset neque tantis donis refertum omnium populorum atque regum, nisi omnis aetas oraclorum illorum veritatem esset experta.

And again: when sacrifice is made to several gods, how on earth does it turn out that the offering is favorable to some and not favorable to others? And what inconstancy is this among the gods, that they should threaten by the first set of entrails and promise well by the second? Or what discord so great among them — often even among the nearest kin — that Apollo’s entrails should be good and Diana’s not good? What is so plain as this: that, since the victims are brought up at random, the entrails are such for each man as the victim that has fallen to him? But — you object — this very thing has something divine in it, namely which victim falls to each man, just as in the casting of lots, which lot is drawn for each. Of lots presently; though you, for your part, do not strengthen the case of the victims by likening it to the lots, but rather weaken the lots by setting them alongside the victims.

Idem iam diu non facit. Ut igitur nunc in minore gloria est, quia minus oraculorum veritas excellit, sic tum nisi summa veritate in tanta gloria non fuisset. Potest autem vis illa terrae, quae mentem Pythiae divino adflatu concitabat, evanuisse vetustate, ut quosdam evanuisse et exaruisse amnes aut in alium cursum contortos et deflexos videmus. Sed, ut vis, acciderit; magna enim quaestio est; modo maneat id, quod negari non potest, nisi omnem historiam perverterimus, multis saeclis verax fuisse id oraculum.

When we have sent a man to the Aequimaelium to fetch a lamb for us to sacrifice, is the lamb that is brought to me really the one that has entrails fitted to my affairs, and is it not by chance but with a god for guide that the slave is led to that lamb? For if you say that in this matter too there is a chance that is, as it were, a kind of lot bound up with the will of the gods, I am sorry that our Stoics have given the Epicureans so great an opening to laugh at them; for you are not unaware how they deride such things.

Sed omittamus oracula; veniamus ad somnia. De quibus disputans Chrysippus multis et minutis somniis colligendis facit idem, quod Antipater ea conquirens, quae Antiphontis interpretatione explicata declarant illa quidem acumen interpretis, sed exemplis grandioribus decuit uti. Dionysii mater, eius qui Syracosiorum tyrannus fuit, ut scriptum apud Philistum est, et doctum hominem et diligentem et aequalem temporum illorum, cum praegnans hunc ipsum Dionysium alvo contineret, somniavit se peperisse Satyriscum. Huic interpretes portentorum, qui Galeotae tum in Sicilia nominabantur, responderunt, ut ait Philistus, eum, quem illa peperisset, clarissimum Graeciae diuturna cum fortuna fore.

And indeed they can do so more easily; for it was by way of a joke that Epicurus brought in his very gods — transparent and ventilated, dwelling between two worlds, as if between two groves, for fear of falling debris, and he holds that they have the same limbs we have, and yet make no use whatever of those limbs. So this man, doing away with the gods by a certain roundabout, has good reason not to hesitate to do away with divination as well; but the Stoics are not, like him, consistent with themselves. For his god, having no business of his own nor of another’s, cannot impart divination to men; your god, on the other hand, can withhold it, and none the less govern the world and care for men.

Num te ad fabulas revoco vel nostrorum vel Graecorum poe+tarum? Narrat enim et apud Ennium Vestalis illa: Eccita cum tremulis anus attulit artubus lumen, Talia tum memorat lacrimans exterrita somno: “Eurydica prognata, pater quam noster amavit, Vires vitaque corpus meum nunc deserit omne. Nam me visus homo pulcher per amoena salicta Et ripas raptare locosque novos; ita sola Postilla, germana soror, errare videbar Tardaque vestigare et quaerere te neque posse Corde capessere; semita nulla pedem stabilibat.

Why, then, do you entangle yourselves in those snares that you can never unravel? For this is how, when they are in more of a hurry, they are accustomed to draw the conclusion: If there are gods, there is divination; but there are gods; therefore there is divination. Far more probable is this: but there is no divination; therefore there are no gods. See how rashly they commit themselves to the position that, if there is no divination, there are no gods. For divination is plainly done away with, while the existence of the gods must be held fast.

Exin compellare pater me voce videtur His verbis: "O gnata, tibi sunt ante gerendae Aerumnae, post ex fluvio fortuna resistet." Haec ecfatus pater, germana, repente recessit Nec sese dedit in conspectum corde cupitus, Quamquam multa manus ad caeli caerula templa Tendebam lacrumans et blanda voce vocabam. Vix aegro tum corde meo me somnus reliquit.”

And once this divination by the inspection of entrails is done away with, the whole of the haruspex’s art is done away with. For portents and lightning follow upon it. Now in the case of lightning, long observation prevails; in the case of portents, reasoning and conjecture are for the most part brought to bear. What is it, then, that has been observed in lightning? The Etruscans divided the heaven into sixteen parts. That was easy enough — to double the four that we have, and afterward to do the same again, so as to say from this from which part the bolt had come. First, what difference does that make? And next, what does it signify? Is it not plain that it was out of the first amazement of men — because they had taken fright at thunderclaps and the hurling of lightning — that they believed Jupiter, all-powerful over all things, brings these about? And so in our records we have it written: When Jupiter thunders or makes lightning, it is forbidden to hold an assembly of the people.

Haec, etiamsi ficta sunt a poe+ta, non absunt tamen a consuetudine somniorum. Sit sane etiam illud commenticium, quo Priamus est conturbatus, quia. máter gravida párere ex se ardentém facem Visást in somnis Hécuba; quo factó pater Rex ípse Priamus sómnio mentís metu Percúlsus curis súmptus suspirántibus Exsácrificabat hóstiis balántibus. Tum cóniecturam póstulat pacém petens, Ut se édoceret, óbsecrans Apóllinem, Quo sése vertant tántae sortes sómnium. Ibi éx oraclo vóce divina édidit Apóllo, puerum, prímus Priamo quí foret Postílla natus, témperaret tóllere; Eum ésse exitium Tróiae, pestem Pérgamo.

This was perhaps established for the sake of the commonwealth; for they wished there to be grounds for not holding the assemblies. And so lightning is a fault only for the assemblies, though the very same thing we reckon the best of all auspices, if it has come on the left. But of auspices in another place; now of lightning. What, then, ought to be less said by natural philosophers than that anything certain is signified by things uncertain? For I do not suppose you are the kind of man to think the Cyclopes forged Jupiter’s thunderbolt on Aetna;

Sint haec, ut dixi, somnia fabularum, hisque adiungatur etiam Aeneae somnium, quod in nostri Fabii Pictoris Graecis annalibus eius modi est, ut omnia, quae ab Aenea gesta sunt quaeque illi acciderunt, ea fuerint, quae ei secundum quietem visa sunt. Sed propiora videamus. Cuiusnam modi est Superbi Tarquinii somnium, de quo in Bruto Accii loquitur ipse?

for it would be a marvel how Jupiter could hurl it so many times, when he had but one; nor in fact did he warn men by lightning what they ought to do or beware. For it is the Stoics’ view that those exhalations of the earth which are cold, once they have begun to flow, are winds; but when they have wrapped themselves in a cloud and have begun to part and tear apart its thinnest portions, and to do this more thickly and more violently, then both flashes and thunderclaps arise; and if, by the clashing of the clouds, a heat is forced out and discharges itself, that is the thunderbolt. From a thing, then, which we see brought about by the force of nature, with no constancy, at no fixed time — from this do we look for a signifying of things to follow? Surely, if Jupiter were signifying these things, he would not send out so many bolts in vain! For what does he accomplish when he has hurled a bolt into the middle of the sea?

Quoniám quieti córpus nocturno ínpetu Dedí sopore plácans artus lánguidos, Visúst in somnis pástor ad me appéllere Pecús lanigerum exímia puchritúdine; Duós consanguineos árietes inde éligi Praeclárioremque álterum immoláre me; Deinde eíus germanum córnibus conítier, In me árietare, eoque íctu me ad casúm dari; Exín prostratum térra, graviter saúcium, Resupínum in caelo cóntueri máximum ac Mirifícum facinus: déxtrorsum orbem flámmeum Radiátum solis líquier cursú novo. Eius igitur somnii a coniectoribus quae sit interpretatio facta, videamus:

What, when into the highest mountains, as for the most part he does? What, when into deserted wastes? What, when onto the shores of those nations among whom these things are not even observed? But — a head was found in the Tiber. As if I denied that these men have some art! It is divination I deny. For the division of the heaven, which I spoke of before, and the marking of certain things, teaches whence the bolt has come, whither it has withdrawn; but what it signifies, no reasoning teaches. Yet you press me with my own verses: For the high-thundering Father, leaning on starry Olympus, Once aimed his bolts at his own mounds and temples, And cast his fires upon the Capitoline seats. Then Natta’s statue, then the images of the gods, And Romulus and Remus with their nursing beast Were struck down by the force of the bolt and fell; And concerning these matters the responses of the haruspices proved most true.

Réx, quae in vita usúrpant homines, cógitant, curánt, vident, Quaéque agunt vigilántes agitantque, éa, cui in somno áccidunt, Mínus mirandum est; dí rem tantam haud témere inproviso ófferunt. Próin vide ne, quém tu esse hebetem députes aeque ác pecus, Ís sapientiá munitum péctus egregié gerat Téque regno expéllat; nam id, quod dé sole ostentúmst tibi, Pópulo commutátionem rérum portendít fore Pérpropinquam. Haec béne verruncent pópulo. Nam quod ad déxteram Cépit cursum ab laéva signum praépotens, pulchérrume Aúguratum est rém Romanam públicam summám fore. Age nunc ad externa redeamus.

And there was this marvel besides: that at the very moment when the disclosure of the conspiracy was being made in the Senate, the statue of Jupiter — two years after it had been commissioned — was being set in place on the Capitol. — Will you, then (for this is how you were pressing me), bring yourself to defend that case both against your own deeds and against your own writings? — You are my brother; on that account I hold back. But what, after all, does it harm you here? Is it the matter, which is what it is, or I, who wish the truth to be laid bare? And so I say nothing against you; from you I ask the reasoned account of the whole haruspex’s art. But you have flung yourself into a wonderful hiding-place; for, because you understood that you would be hard pressed when I inquired from you the causes of each several kind of divination, you spent many words to the effect that, since you saw the facts, you did not seek the reason and the cause — that what happens, not why it happens, is what bears on the matter. As if I would grant either that it happens, or that it belonged to a philosopher not to ask the cause

Matrem Phalaridis scribit Ponticus Heraclides, doctus vir, auditor et discipulus Platonis, visam esse videre in somnis simulacra deorum, quae ipsa domi consecravisset; ex iis Mercurium e patera, quam dextera manu teneret, sanguinem visum esse fundere; qui cum terram attigisset, refervescere videretur sic, ut tota domus sanguine redundaret. Quod matris somnium inmanis filii crudelitas conprobavit. Quid ego, quae magi Cyro illi principi interpretati sint, ex Dinonis Persicis proferam? Nam cum dormienti ei sol ad pedes visus esset, ter eum scribit frustra adpetivisse manibus, cum se convolvens sol elaberetur et abiret; ei magos dixisse, quod genus sapientium et doctorum habebatur in Persis, ex triplici adpetitione solis triginta annos Cyrum regnaturum esse portendi. Quod ita contigit; nam ad septuagesimum pervenit, cum quadraginta natus annos regnare coepisset.

why each thing happens! And at just that point you were quoting my own Prognostics, and the kinds of plants, the scammony and the aristolochia-root, whose cause you did not know, though you saw their power and effect. The whole comparison fails. For the causes of weather signs have been pursued, both by Boethus the Stoic, whom you named, and by our own Posidonius too; and even if the causes of those plants are not found, still the facts themselves could be observed and noted. But Natta’s statue, or the bronze of the laws struck from the sky — what is there in them that is observed and ancient? The Pinarii Nattae are noble; from the nobility, then, comes danger. So cleverly did Jupiter think it out! Romulus, still at the breast, was struck by the bolt; therefore danger is shown to the city, the very one that he founded. How shrewdly Jupiter informs us by tokens! But at the same time the statue of Jupiter was being set in place at which the conspiracy was being disclosed. And you, of course, would rather hold that this was done by the will of the gods than by chance — and that the contractor who had taken on the making of that column from Cotta and Torquatus was not the slower through idleness or want of means, but was held in reserve by the immortal gods for that very hour.

Est profecto quiddam etiam in barbaris gentibus praesentiens atque divinans, siquidem ad mortem proficiscens Callanus Indus, cum inscenderet in rogum ardentem, O praeclarum discessum, inquit, e vita, cum, ut Herculi contigit, mortali corpore cremato in lucem animus excesserit! Cumque Alexander eum rogaret, si quid vellet, ut diceret, Optime, inquit; propediem te videbo. Quod ita contigit; nam Babylone paucis post diebus Alexander est mortuus. Discedo parumper a somniis, ad quae mox revertar. Qua nocte templum Ephesiae Dianae deflagravit, eadem constat ex Olympiade natum esse Alexandrum, atque, ubi lucere coepisset, clamitasse magos pestem ac perniciem Asiae proxuma nocte natam. Haec de Indis et magis.

I do not, for my part, altogether despair that these things are true; but I do not know, and I wish to learn from you. For when certain things seemed to me to come about by chance in such a way as to have been foretold by the diviners, you said much about chance — that a Venus-throw can be cast by chance with four dice thrown, but that with four hundred throws a hundred Venus-throws cannot come up by chance. First, I do not know why they cannot, but I do not press the point; for you abound in parallels. You have your spattering of paints, and the snout of a pig, and a great many others besides. You say, too, that Carneades invented the story about the head of the little Pan; as if it could not have come about by chance, and as if it were not necessary that in every block of marble there should be heads worthy even of Praxiteles! For those very heads are produced by taking away, and nothing whatever is brought to the marble by Praxiteles; rather, when much has been taken away and the lines of the face have been reached, then you may understand that the thing now polished into shape was within all along.

Redeamus ad somnia. Hannibalem Coelius scribit, cum columnam auream, quae esset in fano Iunonis Laciniae, auferre vellet dubitaretque, utrum ea solida esset an extrinsecus inaurata, perterebravisse, cumque solidam invenisset, statuisse tollere; ei secundum quietem visam esse Iunonem praedicere, ne id faceret, minarique, si fecisset, se curaturam, ut eum quoque oculum, quo bene videret, amitteret, idque ab homine acuto non esse neglectum; itaque ex eo auro, quod exterebratum esset, buculam curasse faciendam et eam in summa columna conlocavisse.

Something of that kind, then, could also have come into being of its own accord in the quarries of Chios. But grant that this is a fiction; what of it? Have you never noticed in the clouds the shape of a lion or of a hippocentaur? It is possible, then — the very thing you were just now denying — for chance to imitate the truth. But since we have argued enough about entrails and about lightnings, the portents remain, so that the whole of haruspicy may be handled through. You brought up the case of a mule’s giving birth. The thing is marvelous, for the reason that it does not happen often; but if it could not have happened, it would not have happened. And let this hold against all portents: that what could not have come to pass never has come to pass; while if it could, there is nothing to wonder at. For ignorance of causes, in a novel matter, produces wonder; but the same ignorance, when it is about things in common use, does not make us wonder. For the man who wonders that a mule has given birth does not know in what way a mare gives birth, or in general what nature it is that brings about the birth of a living thing. But what he sees often, he does not wonder at, even though he does not know why it happens; what he has not seen before, if it occurs, he reckons to be a portent. Which, then, is the portent — when the mule conceived, or when she gave birth?

Hoc item in Sileni, quem Coelius sequitur, Graeca historia est (is autem diligentissume res Hannibalis persecutus est): Hannibalem, cum cepisset Saguntum, visum esse in somnis a Iove in deorum concilium vocari; quo cum venisset, Iovem imperavisse, ut Italiae bellum inferret, ducemque ei unum e concilio datum, quo illum utentem cum exercitu progredi coepisse; tum ei ducem illum praecepisse, ne respiceret; illum autem id diutius facere non potuisse elatumque cupiditate respexisse; tum visam beluam vastam et immanem circumplicatam serpentibus, quacumque incederet, omnia arbusta, virgulta, tecta pervertere, et eum admiratum quaesisse de deo, quodnam illud esset tale monstrum; et deum respondisse vastitatem esse Italiae praecepisseque, ut pergeret protinus, quid retro atque a tergo fieret, ne laboraret.

The conception, perhaps, is contrary to nature; but the birth is all but necessary. But why say more? Let us look at the origin of haruspicy; thus we shall most easily judge what authority it has. A certain Tages, it is said, in the territory of Tarquinii, when the earth was being plowed and a furrow had been driven rather deep, suddenly rose up and addressed the man who was plowing. Now this Tages, as it stands in the books of the Etruscans, is said to have appeared with the look of a boy, but to have had the wisdom of an old man. When the plowman, dumbstruck at the sight of him, raised a great cry in his amazement, a crowd gathered, and in a short time the whole of Etruria assembled at that spot; then he spoke at length, with many listening, who took down all his words and committed them to writing; and the whole discourse was that in which the discipline of haruspicy is contained. Afterward this grew, as new matters were learned and referred back to those same first principles. This is what we have received from them; this is what their writings preserve; this is the fountainhead they hold their discipline to have.

Apud Agathoclem scriptum in historia est Hamilcarem Karthaginiensem, cum oppugnaret Syracusas, visum esse audire vocem, se postridie cenaturum Syracusis; cum autem is dies inluxisset, magnam seditionem in castris eius inter Poenos et Siculos milites esse factam; quod cum sensissent Syracusani, inproviso eos in castra inrupisse, Hamilcaremque ab iis vivum esse sublatum. Ita res somnium conprobavit. Plena exemplorum est historia, tum referta vita communis.

Is there any need, then, of a Carneades to refute these things? any need of an Epicurus? Is there anyone so out of his wits as to believe that this thing was plowed up — shall I call it a god or a man? If a god, why had he hidden himself in the earth against his nature, so that, laid open by the plow, he might look upon the light? Could not the same god, indeed, have handed down the discipline to men from some higher place? But if that Tages was a man, in what way could he live buried under the earth? And from what source, moreover, could he himself have learned the things he was teaching to others? But I am more foolish than the very men who believe these things, in arguing against them at such length. That old saying of Cato’s, however, is quite shrewd, who used to say that he wondered a haruspex did not laugh when he caught sight of a haruspex.

At vero P. Decius ille Q. F., qui primus e Deciis consul fuit, cum esset tribunus militum M. Valerio A. Cornelio consulibus a Samnitibusque premeretur noster exercitus, cum pericula proeliorum iniret audacius monereturque, ut cautior esset, dixit, quod extat in annalibus, se sibi in somnis visum esse, cum in mediis hostibus versaretur, occidere cum maxuma gloria. Et tum quidem incolumis exercitum obsidione liberavit; post triennium autem, cum consul esset, devovit se et in aciem Latinorum inrupit armatus. Quo eius facto superati sunt et deleti Latini. Cuius mors ita gloriosa fuit, ut eandem concupisceret filius.

For how few of all the things foretold by these men come to pass? Or, if anything does come to pass, what reason can be brought to show that it did not come about by chance? King Prusias, when Hannibal, in exile at his court, urged that battle be joined, kept saying that he did not dare, because the entrails forbade it. Do you say so? Hannibal replied. You would rather trust a little scrap of veal than an old commander? And what of Caesar himself, when he was warned by the foremost haruspex not to cross over into Africa before the winter solstice — did he not cross over? And had he not done so, all the forces of his adversaries would have gathered into one place. Why should I rehearse the responses of the haruspices — countless ones, indeed, I could — which either had no outcomes at all, or outcomes the very reverse?

Sed veniamus nunc, si placet, ad somnia philosophorum. Est apud Platonem Socrates, cum esset in custodia publica, dicens Critoni, suo familiari, sibi post tertium diem esse moriendum; vidisse se in somnis pulchritudine eximia feminam, quae se nomine appellans diceret Homericum quendam eius modi versum: Tertia te Phthiae tempestas laeta locabit. Quod, ut est dictum, sic scribitur contigisse. Xenophon Socraticus (qui vir et quantus!) in ea militia, qua cum Cyro minore perfunctus est, sua scribit somnia, quorum eventus mirabiles exstiterunt.

In this civil war, immortal gods, how many tricks they played! What responses of the haruspices were sent to us in Greece from Rome! What things were told to Pompey! For he was very much moved by entrails and by portents. I have no wish to rehearse them, nor indeed is there any need, least of all to you, who were there yourself; yet you see that nearly everything turned out contrary to what had been said. But enough of this; now let us come to the portents.

Mentiri Xenophontem an delirare dicemus? Quid? singulari vir ingenio Aristoteles et paene divino ipsene errat an alios vult errare, cum scribit Eudemum Cyprium, familiarem suum, iter in Macedoniam facientem Pheras venisse, quae erat urbs in Thessalia tum admodum nobilis, ab Alexandro autem tyranno crudeli dominatu tenebatur; in eo igitur oppido ita graviter aegrum Eudemum fuisse, ut omnes medici diffiderent; ei visum in quiete egregia facie iuvenem dicere fore ut perbrevi convalesceret, paucisque diebus interiturum Alexandrum tyrannum, ipsum autem Eudemum quinquennio post domum esse rediturum. Atque ita quidem prima statim scribit Aristoteles consecuta, et convaluisse Eudemum, et ab uxoris fratribus interfectum tyrannum; quinto autem anno exeunte, cum esset spes ex illo somnio in Cyprum illum ex Sicilia esse rediturum, proeliantem eum ad Syracusas occidisse; ex quo ita illud somnium esse interpretatum, ut, cum animus Eudemi e corpore excesserit, tum domum revertisse videatur.

You read out many things written by me myself in my consulship; you brought forward many gathered before the Marsic War by Sisenna; you cited many recorded by Callisthenes before the Lacedaemonians’ disastrous battle at Leuctra. Of these I shall indeed speak one by one, as far as it seems good; but something must be said about them all together as well. For what is this signifying, as if proceeding from the gods, this giving notice, so to speak, of calamities? And what do the immortal gods intend, in the first place by signifying things which we cannot understand without interpreters, and in the second place by signifying things which we have no power to guard against? Why, not even decent men do this — to foretell to their friends impending calamities which those friends can in no way escape; just as physicians, although they often understand the case, nevertheless never tell the sick that they are going to die of that disease. For every prediction of an evil is approved only when, to the prediction, a means of precaution is attached.

Adiungamus philosophis doctissimum hominem, poe+tam quidem divinum, Sophoclem; qui, cum ex aede Herculis patera aurea gravis subrepta esset, in somnis vidit ipsum deum dicentem, qui id fecisset. Quod semel ille iterumque neglexit. Ubi idem saepius, ascendit in Arium pagum, detulit rem; Areopagitae conprehendi iubent eum, qui a Sophocle erat nominatus; is quaestione adhibita confessus est pateramque rettulit. Quo facto fanum illud Indicis Herculis nominatum est.

In what way, then, did either the portents or their interpreters help the Lacedaemonians of old, or our own people lately? And if these are to be reckoned signs of the gods, why were they so obscure? For if it was so that we might understand what was going to happen, the matter ought to have been declared openly; or it ought not to have been declared even covertly, if they did not wish these things to be known. And then again, all conjecture, on which divination rests, is often drawn off by the dispositions of men into many, or differing, or even contrary directions. For as in judicial cases the conjecture of the prosecutor is one thing and that of the defender another, and yet each is plausible, so in all those matters which seem to be tracked down by conjecture, the reasoning is found to face two ways. But where things are brought about now by nature, now by chance, and sometimes resemblance even breeds error, it is great folly to make the gods the authors of those things, and not to seek the causes of things.

Sed quid ego Graecorum? nescio quo modo me magis nostra delectant. Omnes hoc historici, Fabii, Gellii, sed proxume Coelius: Cum bello Latino ludi votivi maxumi primum fierent, civitas ad arma repente est excitata, itaque ludis intermissis instaurativi constituti sunt. Qui ante quam fierent, cumque iam populus consedisset, servus per circum, cum virgis caederetur, furcam ferens ductus est. Exin cuidam rustico Romano dormienti visus est venire, qui diceret praesulem sibi non placuisse ludis, idque ab eodem iussum esse eum senatui nuntiare; illum non esse ausum. Iterum esse idem iussum et monitum, ne vim suam experiri vellet; ne tum quidem esse ausum. Exin filium eius esse mortuum, eandem in somnis admonitionem fuisse tertiam. Tum illum etiam debilem factum rem ad amicos detulisse, quorum de sententia lecticula in curiam esse delatum, cumque senatui somnium enarravisset, pedibus suis salvum domum revertisse. Itaque somnio comprobato a senatu ludos illos iterum instauratos memoriae proditum est.

You believe that the Boeotian seers at Lebadia foresaw, from the crowing of the barnyard cocks, that victory would be the Thebans’ — because cocks that have been beaten are wont to be silent, while the victors crow. By means of hens, then, was Jupiter giving a sign to so great a state? And do those birds not crow except when they have won? But on that occasion they were crowing, and they had not won. That, you will say, is precisely the portent. A great one, to be sure — as if it had been the fishes that crowed, and not the cocks! But what time is there at which they do not crow, whether of night or of day? And if it is by liveliness, and a kind of gladness, so to speak, that the victors are roused to crow, some other gladness too could have come about, by which they were moved to crowing.

C. vero Gracchus multis dixit, ut scriptum apud eundem Coelium est, sibi in somnis quaesturam pete re dubita nti Ti. fratrem visum esse dicere, quam vellet cunctaretur, tamen eodem sibi leto, quo ipse interisset, esse pereundum. Hoc, ante quam tribunus plebi C. Gracchus factus esset, et se audisse scribit Coelius et dixisse eum multis. Quo somnio quid inveniri potest certius? Quid? illa duo somnia, quae creberrume commemorantur a Stoicis, quis tandem potest contemnere? unum de Simonide: Qui cum ignotum quendam proiectum mortuum vidisset eumque humavisset haberetque in animo navem conscendere, moneri visus est, ne id faceret, ab eo, quem sepultura adfecerat; si navigavisset, eum naufragio esse periturum; itaque Simonidem redisse, perisse ceteros, qui tum navigassent. Alterum ita traditum clarum admodum somnium:

Democritus, indeed, in the finest terms explains the cause why cocks crow before dawn: it is because, when the food has been driven down from the breast and distributed through the whole body and softened, they utter their song, sated now with rest; cocks which indeed, in the silence of the night, as Ennius says, favor their ruddy throats, and with song and applause press down their wings. Since, then, this creature is so songful of its own accord, what came into Callisthenes’s head, to say that the gods had given the cocks a sign for crowing, when either nature or chance could have brought it about?

Cum duo quidam Arcades familiares iter una facerent et Megaram venissent, alterum ad cauponem devertisse, ad hospitem alterum. Qui ut cenati quiescerent, concubia nocte visum esse in somnis ei, qui erat in hospitio, illum alterum orare, ut subveniret, quod sibi a caupone interitus pararetur; eum primo perterritum somnio surrexisse; dein cum se conlegisset idque visum pro nihilo habendum esse duxisset, recubuisse; tum ei dormienti eundem illum visum esse rogare, ut, quoniam sibi vivo non subvenisset, mortem suam ne inultam esse pateretur; se interfectum in plaustrum a caupone esse coniectum et supra stercus iniectum; petere, ut mane ad portam adesset, prius quam plaustrum ex oppido exiret. Hoc vero eum somnio commotum mane bubulco praesto ad portam fuisse, quaesisse ex eo, quid esset in plaustro; illum perterritum fugisse, mortuum erutum esse, cauponem re patefacta poenas dedisse.

It was reported to the Senate that it had rained blood, that the river Atratus too had flowed with blood, that the statues of the gods had sweated. Do you suppose that Thales or Anaxagoras or any natural philosopher would have believed these reports? For neither blood nor sweat comes save from a body. But both a certain discoloration, arising from some contact with the earth, can be very like blood, and moisture gliding on from outside — as we see on plastered walls in a south wind — seems to imitate sweat. And in war these things appear both more numerous and greater to men who are afraid; the same things are not so much remarked upon in peace. There is this besides: that in fear and danger, while such things are the more readily believed, they are also the more freely invented with impunity.

Quid hoc somnio dici potest divinius? Sed quid aut plura aut vetera quaerimus? Saepe tibi meum narravi, saepe ex te audivi tuum somnium: me, cum Asiae pro cos. praeessem, vidisse in quiete, cum tu equo advectus ad quandam magni fluminis ripam provectus subito atque delapsus in flumen nusquam apparuisses, me contremuisse timore perterritum; tum te repente laetum exstitisse eodemque equo adversam ascendisse ripam, nosque inter nos esse conplexos. Facilis coniectura huius somnii, mihique a peritis in Asia praedictum est fore eos eventus rerum, qui acciderunt. Venio nunc ad tuum.

But are we so frivolous and unconsidering that, if mice have gnawed something — gnawing being their one and only business — we should think it a monstrous sign? Before the Marsic War, because mice had gnawed the shields at Lanuvium, as you have told it, the haruspices said that this was a very great portent — as if, in truth, it made any difference at all whether mice, gnawing something day and night, had gnawed away shields or sieves! For if we are to follow such things, then because mice lately gnawed away my Plato’s Republic, I ought to have been mightily afraid for the commonwealth; or, if it had been Epicurus’s book On Pleasure that was gnawed, I should suppose the price of provisions in the market was going to rise.

Audivi equidem ex te ipso, sed mihi saepius noster Sallustius narravit, cum in illa fuga nobis gloriosa, patriae calamitosa in villa quadam campi Atinatis maneres magnamque partem noctis vigilasses, ad lucem denique arte et graviter dormire te coepisse; itaque, quamquam iter instaret, tamen silentium fieri iussisse se neque esse passum te excitari; cum autem experrectus esses hora secunda fere, te sibi somnium narravisse: visum tibi esse, cum in locis solis maestus errares, C. Marium cum fascibus laureatis quaerere ex te, quid tristis esses, cumque tu te patria vi pulsum esse dixisses, prehendisse eum dextram tuam et bono animo te iussisse esse lictorique proxumo tradidisse, ut te in monumentum suum deduceret, et dixisse in eo tibi salutem fore. Tum et se exclamasse Sallustius narrat reditum tibi celerem et gloriosum paratum, et te ipsum visum somnio delectari. Nam illud mihi ipsi celeriter nuntiatum est, ut audivisses in monumento Marii de tuo reditu magnificentissumum illud senatus consultum esse factum referente optumo et clarissumo viro consule, idque frequentissimo theatro incredibili clamore et plausu comprobatum, dixisse te nihil illo Atinati somnio fieri posse divinius.

Or do those other things really terrify us, whenever some monstrous creatures are said to have been born, either from a beast or from a human being? For all of which — not to be too long-winded — there is one single account. For whatever comes into being, of whatever kind it is, must necessarily have a cause from nature, so that, even if it has come into existence contrary to custom, it nevertheless cannot come into existence contrary to nature. Investigate the cause, therefore, in a novel and wonderful matter, if you can; and if you find none, hold this nevertheless as ascertained, that nothing could have come about without a cause, and drive off that terror which the newness of the thing has brought you by the reasoning of nature. So neither a rumbling of the earth, nor a parting of the sky, nor a rain of stones or of blood, nor the shooting of a star, nor torches seen in the sky shall terrify you.

At multa falsa. Immo obscura fortasse nobis. Sed sint falsa quaedam; contra vera quid dicimus? Quae quidem multo plura evenirent, si ad quietem integri iremus. Nunc onusti cibo et vino perturbata et confusa cernimus. Vide, quid Socrates in Platonis Politia loquatur. Dicit enim: “Cum dormientibus ea pars animi, quae mentis et rationis sit particeps, sopita langueat, illa autem, in qua feritas quaedam sit atque agrestis inmanitas, cum sit inmoderato obstupefacta potu atque pastu, exsultare eam in somno inmoderateque iactari. Itaque huic omnia visa obiciuntur a mente ac ratione vacua, ut aut cum matre corpus miscere videatur aut cum quovis alio vel homine vel deo, saepe belua, atque etiam trucidare aliquem et impie cruentari multaque facere inpure atque taetre cum temeritate et inpudentia.

If I were to seek from Chrysippus the causes of all these things, that very champion of divination would never call them the work of chance; he would render a natural account of them all. For nothing can come about without a cause; nor does anything happen that cannot happen; nor, if a thing has happened that could happen, ought it to be reckoned a portent. There are, then, no portents at all. For if what rarely happens is to be thought a portent, then a wise man is a portent; for I suppose a mule has given birth more often than a wise man has existed. The argument, therefore, comes to this conclusion: that nothing which could not happen has ever happened, and that nothing which could happen is a portent;

At qui salubri et moderato cultu atque victu quieti se tradiderit ea parte animi, quae mentis et consilii est, agitata et erecta saturataque bonarum cogitationum epulis, eaque parte animi, quae voluptate alitur, nec inopia enecta nec satietate affluenti (quorum utrumque praestringere aciem mentis solet, sive deest naturae quippiam sive abundat atque affluit), illa etiam tertia parte animi, in qua irarum existit ardor, sedata atque restincta, tum eveniet duabus animi temerariis partibus compressis, ut illa tertia pars rationis et mentis eluceat et se vegetam ad somniandum acremque praebeat, tum ei visa quietis occurrent tranquilla atque veracia.” Haec verba ipsa Platonis expressi.

so that there is no portent whatsoever. This too a certain interpreter and reader of portents is said to have answered, not without wit, to a man who had once brought before him as a kind of showing the fact that a snake at his house had coiled itself around a beam: "It would have been a showing," he said, "if the beam had coiled itself around the snake." By this reply he plainly enough declared that nothing which can happen is to be held a showing. Gaius Gracchus wrote to Marcus Pomponius that, when two snakes had been caught in the house, the haruspices were summoned by his father. Why snakes rather than lizards, rather than mice? Because these last are everyday creatures, and snakes are not — as if it mattered, when a thing can happen, how often it does happen. Yet I do wonder this: if the release of the female snake was bringing death to Tiberius Gracchus, while the release of the male snake was deadly to Cornelia, why he released either of the two; for he writes nothing of what the haruspices answered would come to pass if neither snake were released. But death overtook Gracchus. From some cause, I suppose, of a graver illness, not from the release of a serpent; for the ill luck of the haruspices is not so great that what they have said would come to pass never happens even by chance.

Epicurum igitur audiemus potius? Namque Carneades concertationis studio modo hoc, modo illud ait; ille, quod sentit; sentit autem nihil umquam elegans, nihil decorum. Hunc ergo antepones Platoni et Socrati? qui ut rationem non redderent, auctoritate tamen hos minutos philosophos vincerent. Iubet igitur Plato sic ad somnum proficisci corporibus adfectis, ut nihil sit, quod errorem animis perturbationemque adferat. Ex quo etiam Pythagoriis interdictum putatur, ne faba vescerentur, quod habet inflationem magnam is cibus tranquillitati mentis quaerenti vera contrariam.

For I should marvel at that other thing, if I believed it — what you said in Homer, that Calchas augured the years of the Trojan War from the number of the sparrows; of his conjecture Agamemnon speaks thus in Homer, as I in my leisure have rendered it: Endure, men, and bear with steadfast spirit your hard labors, that we may come to know whether the prophecies of our augur Calchas hold true or whether the promptings of his breast were empty. For all of them keep that portent in remembering mind, all who were not robbed of the light by deadly fates. When first Aulis was clothed with the Argive fleets, which were bearing ruin to Priam and destruction to Troy, we, about the cold waters, at the smoking altars, appeasing the gods’ will with gold-decked bulls beneath the shady plane, where a spring of water flows forth, saw a dragon of monstrous shape and coil, a terrible thing, dart from the altar at a stroke from Jupiter; which seized the nestlings on the plane-tree’s bough, hedged in their covering of leaves; and when it had devoured eight of them, the ninth, the mother, flew above with quivering cry; her too the savage creature mangled, tearing her vitals with monstrous bite.

Cum ergo est somno sevocatus animus a societate et a contagione corporis, tum meminit praeteritorum, praesentia cernit, futura providet; iacet enim corpus dormientis ut mortui, viget autem et vivit animus. Quod multo magis faciet post mortem, cum omnino corpore excesserit. Itaque adpropinquante morte multo est divinior. Nam et id ipsum vident, qui sunt morbo gravi et mortifero adfecti, instare mortem; itaque iis occurrunt plerumque imagines mortuorum, tumque vel maxume laudi student, eosque, qui secus, quam decuit, vixerunt, peccatorum suorum tum maxume paenitet.

Him, when he had slain the birds so tender and their mother, the same Saturnian father who had brought him into the light hid away and shaped into the hard covering of stone. But we, standing in fear, beheld the marvelous monstrous sign turning about in the very midst of the gods’ altars. Then Calchas spoke these words with confident voice: "Why are you suddenly stunned and benumbed, Achaeans? The very Creator of the gods has given us these portents, slow and far too late, but with everlasting fame and praise. For as many birds as you see slaughtered by the foul tooth, so many years of war shall we drain to the dregs at Troy; which in the tenth shall fall, and shall sate the Achaeans with vengeance." These things Calchas declared; and these things you now see brought to ripeness. But what sort of augury is that, of years rather than of months or of days, drawn from sparrows?

Divinare autem morientes illo etiam exemplo confirmat Posidonius, quod adfert, Rhodium quendam morientem sex aequales nominasse et dixisse, qui primus eorum, qui secundus, qui deinde deinceps moriturus esset. Sed tribus modis censet deorum adpulsu homines somniare, uno, quod provideat animus ipse per sese, quippe qui deorum cognatione teneatur, altero, quod plenus ae+r sit inmortalium animorum, in quibus tamquam insignitae notae veritatis appareant, tertio, quod ipsi di cum dormientibus conloquantur. Idque, ut modo dixi, facilius evenit adpropinquante morte, ut animi futura augurentur.

And why does he draw his conjecture from the little sparrows, in which there was no monstrous sign, yet stay silent about the dragon, which is said — a thing that could not happen — to have been turned to stone? And lastly, what likeness has a sparrow to years? As for that snake which appeared to Sulla while he was sacrificing, I remember both: that Sulla, when he was about to lead out his army on campaign, sacrificed, and that the snake came forth from the altar, and that on that day the affair was brilliantly conducted — not by the haruspex’s counsel, but by the commander’s.

Ex quo et illud est Callani, de quo ante dixi, et Homerici Hectoris, qui moriens propinquam Achilli mortem denuntiat. Neque enim illud verbum temere consuetudo adprobavisset, si ea res nulla esset omnino: Praésagibat ánimus frustra me íre, cum exirém domo. Sagire enim sentire acute est; ex quo sagae anus, quia multa scire volunt, et sagaces dicti canes. Is igitur, qui ante sagit, quam oblata res est, dicitur praesagire, id est futura ante sentire.

And these kinds of showings have nothing marvelous about them; once they have happened, they are then drawn into a conjecture by some interpretation — so that those grains of wheat heaped into the mouth of the boy Midas, or the bees you said had settled on the lips of the boy Plato, are not so much marvelous as prettily conjectured; and these very things might either have been false themselves, or the things that were predicted might have fallen out by chance. About Roscius himself, that story may indeed be false — that he was coiled about by a snake; but that there was a snake in his cradle is not so much a wonder, especially in the district of Solonium, where snakes are wont to traffic about the hearth. As for the haruspices’ answering that nothing would be more illustrious, nothing more noble, than he, I marvel that the immortal gods should have shown a future actor his renown, and shown none to Africanus.

Inest igitur in animis praesagitio extrinsecus iniecta atque inclusa divinitus. Ea si exarsit acrius, furor appellatur, cum a corpore animus abstractus divino instinctu concitatur. H. Séd quid oculis rábere visa es dérepente ardéntibus? U/bi paulo ante sápiens illa vírginalis modéstia? Máter, optumárum multo múlier melior múlierum, Míssa sum supérstitiosis háriolatiónibus; Námque Apollo fátis fandis démentem invitám ciet. Vírgines vereór aequalis, pátris mei meum factúm pudet, O/ptumi viri/; mea mater, túi me miseret, méi piget. O/ptumam progéniem Priamo péperisti extra me; hóc dolet. Mén obesse, illós prodesse, me óbstare, illos óbsequi? O poe+ma tenerum et moratum atque molle! Sed hoc minus ad rem;

And then you have gathered up the Flaminian showings too: that he himself and his horse suddenly fell down — hardly a marvel, this; that the standard of the first hastatus could not be pulled up — perhaps the standard-bearer was pulling it up timidly, having planted it confidently. For what wonder did the horse of Dionysius bring, in that it emerged from a river and had bees in its mane? But because in a short time he began to reign, what had happened by chance took on the force of a showing. But at Sparta arms rang out in the temple of Hercules, and of the same god at Thebes the closed doors suddenly opened of themselves, and those shields that had been fixed up high were found upon the ground. Since none of these things could happen without some movement, what reason is there why we should say they were brought about by divine agency rather than by chance?

illud, quod volumus, expressum est, ut vaticinari furor vera soleat. A/dest, adest fax óbvoluta sánguine atque íncendio! Múltos annos látuit; cives, férte opem et restínguite. Deus inclusus corpore humano iam, non Cassandra loquitur. Iámque mari magnó classis cita Téxitur; exitium éxamen rapit; A/dveniet, fera vélivolantibus Návibus complebít manus litora. Tragoedias loqui videor et fabulas.

But on the head of the statue of Lysander at Delphi there sprang up a crown of rough weeds, and that suddenly. Is that so? Do you suppose the weed’s crown sprang up before the seed had been sown? And the rough weed, I believe, came from the droppings of birds, not from human planting; and besides, whatever is on the head can look like a crown. As for what you said — that at the same time the golden stars of Castor and Pollux set up at Delphi fell down, and were nowhere found again — that seems rather the work of thieves than of the gods.

At ex te ipso non commenticiam rem, sed factam eiusdem generis audivi: C. Coponium ad te venisse Dyrrhachium, cum praetorio imperio classi Rhodiae praeesset, cumprime hominem prudentem atque doctum, eumque dixisse remigem quendam e quinqueremi Rhodiorum vaticinatum madefactum iri minus xxx diebus Graeciam sanguine, rapinas Dyrrhachii et conscensionem in naves cum fuga fugientibusque miserabilem respectum incendiorum fore, sed Rhodiorum classi propinquum reditum ac domum itionem dari; tum neque te ipsum non esse commotum Marcumque Varronem et M. Catonem, qui tum ibi erant, doctos homines, vehementer esse perterritos; paucis sane post diebus ex Pharsalia fuga venisse Labienum; qui cum interitum exercitus nuntiavisset, reliqua vaticinationis brevi esse confecta.

The wickedness of the ape at Dodona, however, committed to writing in the Greek histories, fills me with wonder. What could be less of a wonder than that that most monstrous beast overturned the urn and scattered the lots? And the historians declare that no showing more grievous than this befell the Spartans! Then there was that prediction of the men of Veii: that if the Alban lake overflowed and flowed down into the sea, Rome would perish; but if it were held back, Veii would — so the Alban water was drawn off to the benefit of the suburban farmland, not to the preservation of citadel and city. But a little later a voice was heard warning men to take care that Rome not be captured by the Gauls; and from this an altar was consecrated on the New Way to Aius the Speaker. What then? This Aius the Speaker, when no one knew him, both spoke and uttered words and from that got his name; but after he found a seat and an altar and a name, he fell dumb? The same may be said of Moneta: from whom, apart from the matter of the pregnant sow, of what have we ever been warned?

Nam et ex horreis direptum effusumque frumentum vias omnis angiportusque constraverat, et naves subito perterriti metu conscendistis et noctu ad oppidum respicientes flagrantis onerarias, quas incenderant milites, quia sequi noluerant, videbatis; postremo a Rhodia classe deserti verum vatem fuisse sensistis.

Enough, and more than enough, about showings; there remain the auspices, and those lots which are drawn — not the lots that are poured forth in prophesying, which we more truly call oracles, and about which we shall speak when we come to natural divination. There remains also the matter of the Chaldeans; but first let us look at the auspices. A hard place for an augur, this, to argue against. For a Marsian augur, perhaps; but for a Roman, the easiest. For we are not the kind of augurs who foretell the future by observation of birds and the rest of the signs. And yet I believe that Romulus, who founded the city after taking the auspices, held the opinion that there was a science of augury in foreseeing things — for antiquity went astray in many matters — a science which we now see altered, whether by use, or by learning, or by the lapse of time; but the custom is retained, the religion, the discipline, the augural law, the authority of the college, both for the opinion of the common people and for the great advantages of the state.

Exposui quam brevissime potui somnii et furoris oracla, quae carere arte dixeram. Quorum amborum generum una ratio est, qua Cratippus noster uti solet, animos hominum quadam ex parte extrinsecus esse tractos et haustos (ex quo intellegitur esse extra divinum animum, humanus unde ducatur), humani autem animi eam partem, quae sensum, quae motum, quae adpetitum habeat, non esse ab actione corporis seiugatam; quae autem pars animi rationis atque intellegentiae sit particeps, eam tum maxume vigere, cum plurimum absit a corpore.

Nor in truth were Publius Claudius and Lucius Junius, the consuls, anything but deserving of every punishment, who sailed against the auspices; for the religion ought to have been obeyed, and the ancestral custom not so defiantly spurned. With justice, then, was the one condemned by the people’s verdict, while the other took his own life. Flaminius did not obey the auspices, and so he perished with his army. But a year later Paulus did obey; did he fall any the less, with his army, in the battle of Cannae? For granting that there are auspices, which there are not, at least these that we use — whether by the tripudium or from the sky — are images of auspices, in no way auspices themselves. "Quintus Fabius, I wish you to attend me at the taking of the auspice"; he answers: "I have heard." Among our forefathers, a man skilled in the matter was called in for this; now, anyone you please. But it is necessary that the man understand what silence is; for that is what we call silence in the auspices — what is free of every flaw.

Itaque expositis exemplis verarum vaticinationum et somniorum Cratippus solet rationem concludere hoc modo: Si sine oculis non potest exstare officium et munus oculorum, possunt autem aliquando oculi non fungi suo munere, qui vel semel ita est usus oculis, ut vera cerneret, is habet sensum oculorum vera cernentium. Item igitur, si sine divinatione non potest officium et munus divinationis exstare, potest autem quis, cum divinationem habeat, errare aliquando nec vera cernere, satis est ad confirmandam divinationem semel aliquid esse ita divinatum, ut nihil fortuito cecidisse videatur. Sunt autem eius generis innumerabilia; esse igitur divinationem confitendum est. Quae vero aut coniectura explicantur aut eventis animadversa ac notata sunt, ea genera divinandi, ut supra dixi, non naturalia, sed artificiosa dicuntur;

To understand this belongs to the accomplished augur; but that other man, who is called in for the auspice, when the one taking the auspices has given the command thus — "Declare it, if it shall seem to be silence" — neither looks up nor looks about him; he straightway answers that it seems to be silence. Then the first: "Declare it, if they shall feed." — "They are feeding." — What birds? Or where? "He has brought," he says, "chickens in a cage" — the man who from this very thing is named the chicken-keeper. These, then, are the birds that serve as Jupiter’s messengers! Whether they feed or not, what does it matter? Nothing to the auspices; but because, when they feed, something must necessarily fall from the mouth and strike the earth — a "ground-striking" terripavium it was called at first, then a "ground-stamping" terripudium; and this last is now called a tripudium — when, then, a morsel has fallen from the chicken’s mouth, then a tripudium solistimum is announced to the man taking the auspices.

in quo haruspices, augures coniectoresque numerantur. Haec inprobantur a Peripateticis, a Stoicis defenduntur. Quorum alia sunt posita in monumentis et disciplina, quod Etruscorum declarant et haruspicini et fulgurales et rituales libri, vestri etiam augurales, alia autem subito ex tempore coniectura explicantur, ut apud Homerum Calchas, qui ex passerum numero belli Troiani annos auguratus est, et ut in Sullae scriptum historia videmus, quod te inspectante factum est, ut, cum ille in agro Nolano inmolaret ante praetorium, ab infima ara subito anguis emergeret, cum quidem C. Postumius haruspex oraret illum, ut in expeditionem exercitum educeret; id cum Sulla fecisset, tum ante oppidum Nolam florentissuma Samnitium castra cepit.

Can this augury, then, hold anything divine, when it is so forced and squeezed out of the bird? That the most ancient augurs did not use it is shown by this: we have an old decree of the college that any bird whatever can give the tripudium. There would be an augury then, if only the bird were free to give it of itself; then that bird might be seen as the interpreter and attendant of Jupiter. But as it is, when the creature is shut up in a cage and half dead with starvation, if it pounces on a lump of mash and something drops from its mouth — do you take this for an augury, and suppose that Romulus was in the habit of taking the auspices in this fashion?

Facta coniectura etiam in Dionysio est, paulo ante quam regnare coepit; qui cum per agrum Leontinum iter faciens equum ipse demisisset in flumen, submersus equus voraginibus non exstitit; quem cum maxima contentione non potuisset extrahere, discessit, ut ait Philistus, aegre ferens. Cum autem aliquantum progressus esset, subito exaudivit hinnitum respexitque et equum alacrem laetus aspexit, cuius in iuba examen apium consederat. Quod ostentum habuit hanc vim, ut Dionysius paucis post diebus regnare coeperit.

Again, do you not think that those who took the auspices used once to watch the sky themselves? Now they give the order to the keeper of the chickens, and he reports back. Lightning on the left we hold to be the best of auguries for all matters except elections — and that exception was established for the sake of the state, so that the leading men of the citizenry should be the interpreters of the auspices, whether in the people’s trials, or in the enacting of laws, or in the creation of magistrates. But on the strength of a letter from Tiberius Gracchus, the consuls Scipio and Figulus, when the augurs had judged that they had been elected with a flaw in the proceedings, laid down their office. Who denies that augury is a discipline? It is divination that I deny. But the haruspices are diviners — they whom Tiberius Gracchus, on account of the sudden death of the man who had collapsed without warning while reporting the result of the prerogative century, brought before the Senate, and who declared that the officer who put the question had not been lawful.

Quid? Lacedaemoniis paulo ante Leuctricam calamitatem quae significatio facta est, cum in Herculis fano arma sonuerunt Herculisque simulacrum multo sudore manavit! At eodem tempore Thebis, ut ait Callisthenes, in templo Herculis valvae clausae repagulis subito se ipsae aperuerunt, armaque, quae fixa in parietibus fuerant, ea sunt humi inventa. Cumque eodem tempore apud Lebadiam Trophonio res divina fieret, gallos gallinaceos in eo loco sic adsidue canere coepisse, ut nihil intermitterent; tum augures dixisse Boeotios Thebanorum esse victoriam, propterea quod avis illa victa silere soleret, canere, si vicisset.

First, take care that they did not pronounce against the man who had been the officer of the century; for it was he who had died, and they could say that without divination, by mere conjecture. Then perhaps it was by chance, which is by no means to be removed from this kind of case. For what could Etruscan haruspices know either about the tent’s being correctly taken or about the law of the pomerium? For my part I agree rather with Gaius Marcellus than with Appius Claudius, both of whom were my colleagues, and I judge that the law of the augurs, although it was first established on the belief in divination, was nevertheless afterward preserved and retained for the sake of the state.

Eademque tempestate multis signis Lacedaemoniis Leuctricae pugnae calamitas denuntiabatur. Namque et in Lysandri, qui Lacedaemoniorum clarissimus fuerat, statua, quae Delphis stabat, in capite corona subito exstitit ex asperis herbis et agrestibus, stellaeque aureae, quae Delphis erant a Lacedaemoniis positae post navalem illam victoriam Lysandri, qua Athenienses conciderunt, qua in pugna quia Castor et Pollux cum Lacedaemoniorum classe visi esse dicebantur, eorum insignia deorum, stellae aureae, quas dixi, Delphis positae paulo ante Leuctricam pugnam deciderunt neque repertae sunt.

But on this point more elsewhere; for now, so much. Let us look at foreign auguries, which are not so much matters of art as of superstition. They use nearly all birds, we very few; some are unlucky to them, others to us. Deiotarus used to question me about the discipline of our augury, and I him about his. Immortal gods, how great the difference was! So great that some things were even contrary. And he always used those auguries of his, whereas we — except while we hold the auspices taken on behalf of the people — how much do we use ours? Our ancestors would not have war conducted except under the auspices; yet for how many years now have wars been conducted by proconsuls and propraetors

Maximum vero illud portentum isdem Spartiatis fuit, quod, cum oraclum ab Iove Dodonaeo petivissent de victoria sciscitantes legatique vas illud, in quo inerant sortes, collocavissent, simia, quam rex Molossorum in deliciis habebat, et sortes ipsas et cetera, quae erant ad sortem parata, disturbavit et aliud alio dissupavit. Tum ea, quae praeposita erat oraclo, sacerdos dixisse dicitur de salute Lacedaemoniis esse, non de victoria cogitandum.

who hold no auspices at all! And so they neither cross rivers under the auspices nor take auspices by the tripudium. Where, then, is the divination by birds? Since wars are conducted by men who hold no auspices, it appears to have been retained for the affairs of the city and abolished for those of war. As for the auspice of the spear-points — which is wholly a military auspice — the famous Marcus Marcellus, five times consul, gave it up entirely, that same man being both a commander and an augur of the first rank. And indeed he used to say that, whenever he wished to carry through some affair without being hindered by the auspices, he was accustomed to make his journey in a closed litter. Like to this is the rule we augurs lay down, that to keep a yoke-auspice from occurring they should bid the beasts be unyoked.

Quid? bello Punico secundo nonne C. Flaminius consul iterum neglexit signa rerum futurarum magna cum clade rei publicae? Qui exercitu lustrato cum Arretium versus castra movisset et contra Hannibalem legiones duceret, et ipse et equus eius ante signum Iovis Statoris sine causa repente concidit nec eam rem habuit religioni obiecto signo, ut peritis videbatur, ne committeret proelium. Idem cum tripudio auspicaretur, pullarius diem proelii committendi differebat. Tum Flaminius ex eo quaesivit, si ne postea quidem pulli pascerentur, quid faciendum censeret. Cum ille quiescendum respondisset, Flaminius: Praeclara vero auspicia, si esurientibus pullis res geri poterit, saturis nihil geretur! itaque signa convelli et se sequi iussit. Quo tempore cum signifer primi hastati signum non posset movere loco nec quicquam proficeretur, plures cum accederent, Flaminius re nuntiata suo more neglexit. Itaque tribus iis horis concisus exercitus atque ipse interfectus est.

What else is it to refuse to be warned by Jupiter than to contrive that either no auspice can come about, or, if it does come about, none can be seen? For that point is quite ridiculous — your saying that Deiotarus does not regret the auspices that were given him when he set out to join Pompey, because, having followed his loyalty, he discharged his duty toward the friendship of the Roman people; and that praise and glory were more precious to him than his kingdom and his possessions. I believe it, indeed; but this has nothing to do with the auspices. For no crow could croak to him that he was acting rightly in preparing to defend the freedom of the Roman people; he felt that himself, as in fact he did feel.

Magnum illud etiam, quod addidit Coelius, eo tempore ipso, cum hoc calamitosum proelium fieret, tantos terrae motus in Liguribus, Gallia compluribusque insulis totaque in Italia factos esse, ut multa oppida conruerint, multis locis labes factae sint terraeque desederint fluminaque in contrarias partes fluxerint atque in amnes mare influxerit. Fiunt certae divinationum coniecturae a peritis. Midae illi Phrygi, cum puer esset, dormienti formicae in os tritici grana congesserunt. Divitissumum fore praedictum est; quod evenit. At Platoni cum in cunis parvulo dormienti apes in labellis consedissent, responsum est singulari illum suavitate orationis fore. Ita futura eloquentia provisa in infante est.

Birds signify outcomes, whether adverse or favorable. I see that Deiotarus made use of the auspices of virtue, which forbid us to look to fortune so long as loyalty is upheld. But if the birds showed prosperous outcomes, then surely they deceived. He fled from the battle with Pompey — a grievous hour! He parted from him — a sorrowful thing! He saw Caesar at one and the same time enemy and guest — what is more bitter than that? And Caesar, when he had snatched from him the tetrarchy of the Trocmi and given it to some hanger-on of his from Pergamum, and had likewise stripped from him the Armenia granted by the Senate, and when he had been received by him with the most magnificent hospitality, left him plundered, both his host and a king. But I am wandering too far afield; I shall return to my theme. If we are after outcomes, which are what the birds are consulted for, in no way were they prosperous for Deiotarus; but if we are after duties, these were sought from his own virtue, not from the auspices.

Quid? amores ac deliciae tuae, Roscius, num aut ipse aut pro eo Lanuvium totum mentiebatur? Qui cum esset in cunabulis educareturque in Solonio, qui est campus agri Lanuvini, noctu lumine apposito experrecta nutrix animadvertit puerum dormientem circumplicatum serpentis amplexu. Quo aspectu exterrita clamorem sustulit. Pater autem Roscii ad haruspices rettulit, qui responderunt nihil illo puero clarius, nihil nobilius fore. Atque hanc speciem Pasiteles caelavit argento et noster expressit Archias versibus. Quid igitur expectamus? an dum in foro nobiscum di immortales, dum in viis versentur, dum domi? qui quidem ipsi se nobis non offerunt, vim autem suam longe lateque diffundunt, quam tum terrae cavernis includunt, tum hominum naturis implicant. Nam terrae vis Pythiam Delphis incitabat, naturae Sibyllam. Quid enim? non videmus, quam sint varia terrarum genera? ex quibus et mortifera quaedam pars est, ut et Ampsancti in Hirpinis et in Asia Plutonia, quae vidimus, et sunt partes agrorum aliae pestilentes, aliae salubres, aliae, quae acuta ingenia gignant, aliae, quae retunsa; quae omnia fiunt et ex caeli varietate et ex disparili adspiratione terrarum.

Drop, then, the staff of Romulus, which you say could not be burned in that great fire; despise the whetstone of Attus Navius. There ought to be no place in philosophy for invented little tales. It was rather the part of a philosopher, with respect to the whole of augury, first to see its very nature, then its discovery, then its consistency. What, then, is the nature that brings it about that birds wandering this way and that, here and there, should signify something and now forbid action, now command it, whether by their song or by their flight? And why is it granted to some birds to make a valid auspice from the left, to others from the right? In what manner, again, or when, or by whom shall we say these things were discovered? The Etruscans at least have a boy ploughed up from the earth as the founder of their discipline; whom have we? Attus Navius? But Romulus and Remus were some years older, both of them augurs, as we have received the account. Or shall we say these things were the discoveries of the Pisidians, or the Cilicians, or the Phrygians? Is it your pleasure, then, to have men devoid of humanity as the authorities for divinity?

Fit etiam saepe specie quadam, saepe vocum gravitate et cantibus ut pellantur animi vehementius, saepe etiam cura et timore, qualis est illa Flexánima tamquam lýmphata aut Bacchí sacris Commóta in tumulis Teúcrum commemoráns suum. Atque etiam illa concitatio declarat vim in animis esse divinam. Negat enim sine furore Democritus quemquam poe+tam magnum esse posse, quod idem dicit Plato. Quem, si placet, appellet furorem, dum modo is furor ita laudetur, ut in Phaedro Platonis laudatus est. Quid? vestra oratio in causis, quid? ipsa actio potest esse vehemens et gravis et copiosa, nisi est animus ipse commotior? Equidem etiam in te saepe vidi et, ut ad leviora veniamus, in Aesopo, familiari tuo, tantum ardorem vultuum atque motuum, ut eum vis quaedam abstraxisse a sensu mentis videretur.

But all kings, peoples, and nations use the auspices. As if anything were so very common as to have no wisdom at all, or as if you yourself, in forming a judgment, took your stand on the multitude! How few there are who deny that pleasure is a good — most even call it the highest good! Are the Stoics, then, frightened off from their opinion by the throng of these? Or in most matters does the multitude follow their authority? What wonder is it, then, if in the auspices and in the whole of divination feeble minds take in those superstitions and cannot discern the truth?

Obiciuntur etiam saepe formae, quae reapse nullae sunt, speciem autem offerunt; quod contigisse Brenno dicitur eiusque Gallicis copiis, cum fano Apollinis Delphici nefarium bellum intulisset. Tum enim ferunt ex oraclo ecfatam esse Pythiam: Ego próvidebo rem ístam et albae vírgines. Ex quo factum, ut viderentur virgines ferre arma contra et nive Gallorum obrueretur exercitus. Aristoteles quidem eos etiam, qui valetudinis vitio furerent et melancholici dicerentur, censebat habere aliquid in animis praesagiens atque divinum. Ego autem haud scio an nec cardiacis hoc tribuendum sit nec phreneticis; animi enim integri, non vitiosi est corporis divinatio.

And what coherent, connected consistency is there among the augurs? In accordance with the usage of our augury Ennius said: Then it thundered well on the left, the weather being clear. But Homer’s Ajax, complaining to Achilles of the ferocity of the Trojans, announces some such thing in this manner: Jupiter sends forth prosperous things by these flashes on the right. So to us things on the left appear good, while to Greeks and barbarians things on the right appear the better. And yet I am well aware that the things which are good we call "left-hand," even if they are on the right; but certainly our people named the favorable thing "left" and foreigners named it "right," because for the most part it seemed the better.

Quam quidem esse re vera hac Stoicorum ratione concluditur: Si sunt di neque ante declarant hominibus, quae futura sint, aut non diligunt homines aut, quid eventurum sit, ignorant aut existumant nihil interesse hominum scire, quid sit futurum, aut non censent esse suae maiestatis praesignificare hominibus, quae sunt futura, aut ea ne ipsi quidem di significare possunt; at neque non diligunt nos (sunt enim benefici generique hominum amici) neque ignorant ea, quae ab ipsis constituta et designata sunt, neque nostra nihil interest scire ea, quae eventura sunt, (erimus enim cautiores, si sciemus) neque hoc alienum ducunt maiestate sua (nihil est enim beneficentia praestantius) neque non possunt futura praenoscere;

How great a disagreement this is! And again — that they use some birds, others use others, that they observe in different ways, that different birds give different responses — is it not necessary to admit that part of all this was taken up by error, part by superstition, much of it by deception? And to these superstitions you did not hesitate to add omens as well: that Aemilia, by saying Perseus had perished, was an omen for Paulus, an omen her father accepted; that Caecilia, saying she handed over her own seat to her sister’s daughter. Then those phrases: "Hold your tongues in good favor," and the prerogative century, the omen of the elections. This is the very thing — to be rich and eloquent against oneself. For when, in observing such things, will you be able to be calm and free in mind, so that in carrying out an affair you have not superstition but reason as your guide? Is it so? If someone says something out of his own affairs and his own talk, and some word of his falls aptly upon what you are doing or thinking, shall that thing bring you either fear or eagerness?

non igitur sunt di nec significant futura; sunt autem di; significant ergo; et non, si significant, nullas vias dant nobis ad significationis scientiam (frustra enim significarent), nec, si dant vias, non est divinatio; est igitur divinatio.

When Marcus Crassus was loading his army at Brundisium, a man in the harbor selling figs brought from Caunus kept crying out "Cauneans!" Let us say, if you please, that Crassus was warned by him to take care not to go — that he would not have perished, had he heeded the omen. But if we are to take up such things, then a stumble of the foot, the snapping of a shoe-strap, and sneezes will all have to be observed.

Hac ratione et Chrysippus et Diogenes et Antipater utitur. Quid est igitur, cur dubitandum sit, quin sint ea, quae disputavi, verissima, si ratio mecum facit, si eventa, si populi, si nationes, si Graeci, si barbari, si maiores etiam nostri, si denique hoc semper ita putatum est, si summi philosophi, si poe+- tae, si sapientissimi viri, qui res publicas constituerunt, qui urbes condiderunt? An, dum bestiae loquantur, exspectamus, hominum consentiente auctoritate contenti non sumus?

The lots remain, and the Chaldaeans, before we come to seers and to dreams. You think, then, that something must be said about lots? But what is a lot? Much the same thing as casting fingers, as throwing knucklebones, as throwing dice — matters in which recklessness and chance, not reason or deliberation, hold sway. The whole business was contrived by frauds, with an eye to gain, or to superstition, or to error. And just as we did in the case of haruspicy, so let us look at the reputed discovery of the most famous lots. The records of the people of Praeneste declare that one Numerius Suffustius, an honorable man and of good family, was driven by frequent dreams — at the last even threatening ones — being bidden to cut into a flint in a fixed spot, and that, terrified by the visions, while his fellow citizens laughed at him, he set about the task; and so, when the rock was broken through, the lots leapt out, carved in oak, in the characters of an ancient script. That place stands today, fenced about with religious awe, near the statue of the boy Jupiter, who, still at the breast, sits with Juno in the lap of Fortune reaching for her teat, and is worshipped most chastely by mothers.

Nec vero quicquam aliud adfertur, cur ea, quae dico, divinandi genera nulla sint, nisi quod difficile dictu videtur, quae cuiusque divinationis ratio, quae causa sit. Quid enim habet haruspex, cur pulmo incisus etiam in bonis extis dirimat tempus et proferat diem? quid augur, cur a dextra corvus, a sinistra cornix faciat ratum? quid astrologus, cur stella Iovis aut Veneris coniuncta cum luna ad ortus puerorum salutaris sit, Saturni Martisve contraria? Cur autem deus dormientes nos moneat, vigilantes neglegat? Quid deinde causae est, cur Cassandra furens futura prospiciat, Priamus sapiens hoc idem facere non queat?

At the same time, in that spot where the temple of Fortune now stands, they say that honey flowed from an olive tree, and that the haruspices declared those lots would be of the highest renown, and that at their command a chest was made from that olive, and the lots placed within it — the lots that to this day are drawn out at Fortune’s prompting. What, then, can there be of certainty in these, which at Fortune’s prompting are shuffled and drawn by a boy’s hand? And how, moreover, were those lots laid in that place? Who cut that oak, hewed it, inscribed it? Nothing, they say, that a god cannot bring about. Would that he had brought it about that the Stoics be wise, so that they should not believe everything with superstitious anxiety and misery! But this kind of divination, at least, common life has now hooted off the stage; the beauty and antiquity of the shrine still keeps alive the name of the Praenestine lots — and that only among the crowd.

Cur fiat quidque, quaeris. Recte omnino; sed non nunc id agitur; fiat necne fiat, id quaeritur. Ut, si magnetem lapidem esse dicam, qui ferrum ad se adliciat et attrahat, rationem, cur id fiat, adferre nequeam, fieri omnino neges. Quod idem facis in divinatione, quam et cernimus ipsi et audimus et legimus et a patribus accepimus. Neque ante philosophiam patefactam, quae nuper inventa est, hac de re communis vita dubitavit, et, posteaquam philosophia processit, nemo aliter philosophus sensit, in quo modo esset auctoritas.

For what magistrate, or what man of any distinction, makes use of lots? In other places, indeed, the lots have plainly grown cold. And so Clitomachus writes that Carneades used to say he had nowhere seen Fortune more fortunate than at Praeneste. Let us drop, then, this kind of divination. Let us come to the prodigies of the Chaldaeans; about whom Eudoxus, the pupil of Plato, by the judgment of the most learned men easily first in astrology, holds this opinion — which he left set down in writing — that in the matter of prediction and the marking out of each man’s life from his birthday, the Chaldaeans are least of all to be believed.

Dixi de Pythagora, de Democrito, de Socrate, excepi de antiquis praeter Xenophanem neminem, adiunxi veterem Academiam, Peripateticos, Stoicos; unus dissentit Epicurus. Quid vero hoc turpius, quam quod idem nullam censet gratuitam esse virtutem? Quis est autem, quem non moveat clarissumis monumentis testata consignataque antiquitas? Calchantem augurem scribit Homerus longe optumum, eumque ducem classium fuisse ad Ilium, auspiciorum credo scientia, non locorum.

Panaetius too, who alone among the Stoics rejected the predictions of the astrologers, names Anchialus and Cassander, the foremost astrologers of the age in which he himself lived, as men who, though they excelled in the other branches of astrology, did not employ this kind of prediction. Scylax of Halicarnassus, an intimate of Panaetius, outstanding in astrology and likewise a leading man in the governance of his own city, repudiated this whole Chaldaean manner of foretelling.

Amphilochus et Mopsus Argivorum reges fuerunt, sed iidem augures, iique urbis in ora marituma Ciliciae Graecas condiderunt; atque etiam ante hos Amphiaraus et Tiresias non humiles et obscuri neque eorum similes, ut apud Ennium est, Quí sui quaestus caúsa fictas súscitant senténtias, sed clari et praestantes viri, qui avibus et signis admoniti futura dicebant; quorum de altero etiam apud inferos Homerus ait solum sapere, ceteros umbrarum vagari modo; Amphiaraum autem sic honoravit fama Graeciae, deus ut haberetur, atque ut ab eius solo, in quo est humatus, oracla peterentur.

But to use reasoning and set the witnesses aside, here is how those argue who defend these Chaldaean predictions from the day of birth. They say there is a certain force in the sign-bearing circle, which in Greek is called the zōdiakos, of such a kind that each several part of that circle moves and alters the heavens in a different way, according as the stars stand at any given time in each of those parts and the parts adjacent to them; and that this force is variously stirred by those heavenly bodies which are called the wandering ones; and that when they have come into that very part of the circle in which lies the rising of the one being born, or into a part that holds something conjoined or in concord with it, they call those positions "triangles" and "squares." For since, with the approach and recession of the stars, such great turnings and changes of the seasons of the year and of the weather of the sky take place, and since by the force of the sun the things we see are brought about, they hold it not only resembling the truth but even true that, just as the air is tempered, so are children animated and formed as they come into the world, and that from this their talents, their characters, their mind, their body, the conduct of their life, and the chances and outcomes of each are shaped.

Quid? Asiae rex Priamus nonne et Helenum filium et Cassandram filiam divinantes habebat, alterum auguriis, alteram mentis incitatione et permotione divina? Quo in genere Marcios quosdam fratres, nobili loco natos, apud maiores nostros fuisse scriptum videmus. Quid? Polyidum Corinthium nonne Homerus et aliis multa et filio ad Troiam proficiscenti mortem praedixisse commemorat? Omnino apud veteres, qui rerum potiebantur, iidem auguria tenebant; ut enim sapere, sic divinare regale ducebant. Testis est nostra civitas, in qua et reges augures et postea privati eodem sacerdotio praediti rem publicam religionum auctoritate rexerunt.

What incredible raving! For not every error is to be called folly. To these men even Diogenes the Stoic concedes something — that they can predict, but only this far, of what nature each man will be and to what pursuit each will be best suited; the rest of what they profess, he denies can in any way be known. For the shapes of twins are alike, while their life and fortune are for the most part unalike. Procles and Eurysthenes, kings of the Lacedaemonians, were twin brothers.

Eaque divinationum ratio ne in barbaris quidem gentibus neglecta est, siquidem et in Gallia Druidae sunt, e quibus ipse Divitiacum Haeduum, hospitem tuum laudatoremque, cognovi, qui et naturae rationem, quam fusiologi/an Graeci appellant, notam esse sibi profitebatur et partim auguriis, partim coniectura, quae essent futura, dicebat, et in Persis augurantur et divinant magi, qui congregantur in fano commentandi causa atque inter se conloquendi, quod etiam idem vos quondam facere Nonis solebatis;

Yet they did not live the same number of years; for the life of Procles was the shorter, and he far excelled his brother in the glory of his deeds. But that very thing which the excellent Diogenes concedes to the Chaldaeans, by a kind of collusion, I deny can be understood at all. For since, as they themselves say, the rising of those who are born is governed by the moon, and the Chaldaeans observe and mark out as the natal stars whatever stars seem joined to the moon, they judge by the most deceptive sense of the eyes things that they ought to have seen by reason and by the mind. For the reasoning of the mathematicians teaches — and they ought to have known it — at how low a level the moon is borne, almost grazing the earth; how far it is from the nearest star, that of Mercury; how much farther from that of Venus; then by yet another interval how far it stands from the sun, by whose light it is thought to be illumined; while the remaining three intervals are infinite and immense — from the sun to the star of Mars, thence to that of Jupiter, from that to the star of Saturn, and thence to the heaven itself, which is the outermost and uttermost limit of the world.

nec quisquam rex Persarum potest esse, qui non ante magorum disciplinam scientiamque perceperit. Licet autem videre et genera quaedam et nationes huic scientiae deditas. Telmessus in Caria est, qua in urbe excellit haruspicum disciplina; itemque Elis in Peloponneso familias duas certas habet, Iamidarum unam, alteram Clutidarum, haruspicinae nobilitate praestantes. In Syria Chaldaei cognitione astrorum sollertiaque ingeniorum antecellunt.

What contagion, then, can reach from an almost infinite interval down to the moon, or rather to the earth? Again, when they say — as they must say — that all the births of all men, whoever are begotten in all the inhabited earth, are the same, and that the same things must necessarily befall all who are born under the same disposition of sky and stars, are they not such that it appears these interpreters of the heavens do not know even the nature of the heavens? For since those circles which divide the sky as if down the middle and bound our field of vision — which by the Greeks are called horizontes, and may most rightly be called by us the "bounding" circles — have the greatest variety and stand differently in different places, the risings and settings of the heavenly bodies must necessarily not take place at the same time for all.

Etruria autem de caelo tacta scientissume animadvertit eademque interpretatur, quid quibusque ostendatur monstris atque portentis. Quocirca bene apud maiores nostros senatus tum, cum florebat imperium, decrevit, ut de principum filiis x ex singulis Etruriae populis in disciplinam traderentur, ne ars tanta propter tenuitatem hominum a religionis auctoritate abduceretur ad mercedem atque quaestum. Phryges autem et Pisidae et Cilices et Arabum natio avium significationibus plurimum obtemperant, quod idem factitatum in Umbria accepimus.

But if by their force the sky is tempered now in this way, now in that, how can there be the same force at work upon those being born, when the difference of the sky is so great? In these regions which we inhabit, the Dog Star rises after the solstice, and indeed by some several days; but among the Troglodytes, as is written, before the solstice — so that, even if we now grant that some celestial force does reach to those begotten on earth, it must be confessed to them that those who are born at the same time can fall into unlike natures on account of the unlikeness of the sky; which is by no means to their liking, for they wish all who are born anywhere, having risen at the same time, to be born under the same condition.

Ac mihi quidem videntur e locis quoque ipsis, qui a quibusque incolebantur, divinationum oportunitates esse ductae. Etenim Aegyptii et Babylonii in camporum patentium aequoribus habitantes, cum ex terra nihil emineret, quod contemplationi caeli officere posset, omnem curam in siderum cognitione posuerunt, Etrusci autem, quod religione inbuti studiosius et crebrius hostias immolabant, extorum cognitioni se maxume dediderunt, quodque propter ae+ris crassitudinem de caelo apud eos multa fiebant, et quod ob eandem causam multa invisitata partim e caelo, alia ex terra oriebantur, quaedam etiam ex hominum pecudumve conceptu et satu, ostentorum exercitatissimi interpretes exstiterunt. Quorum quidem vim, ut tu soles dicere, verba ipsa prudenter a maioribus posita declarant. Quia enim ostendunt, portendunt, monstrant, praedicunt, ostenta, portenta, monstra, prodigia dicuntur.

But what madness is so great as to suppose that, amid the greatest motions and changes of the sky, it makes no difference what wind, what rain, what weather there is in any place? — when of these things there are often such great unlikenesses in neighboring places that frequently one storm falls at Tusculum, another at Rome. Those who sail mark this above all, since in rounding the headlands they often feel the greatest changes of the winds. Since, then, there is now this calm, now that disturbance of the sky, is it the part of men in their senses to say that this — which assuredly does not bear upon it — does not bear upon the births of those being born, and yet to say that that something or other, thin and tenuous, which can in no way be felt and can scarcely even be understood — whatever tempering comes from the moon and the rest of the heavenly bodies — does bear upon the births of children? And again: that they do not understand the force of seeds — which counts for most in begetting and procreating — is utterly abolished, is this a middling error? For who does not see that children copy from their parents both their forms and their characters and most of their bearing and movements? — which would not happen if these things were brought about, not by the force and nature of those who beget, but by the tempering of the moon and the governance of the sky.

Arabes autem et Phryges et Cilices, quod pastu pecudum maxume utuntur campos et montes hieme et aestate peragrantes, propterea facilius cantus avium et volatus notaverunt; eademque et Pisidiae causa fuit et huic nostrae Umbriae. Tum Caria tota praecipueque Telmesses, quos ante dixi, quod agros uberrumos maximeque fertiles incolunt, in quibus multa propter fecunditatem fingi gignique possunt, in ostentis animadvertendis diligentes fuerunt.

And again: that those born at one and the same point of time have unlike natures and lives and fortunes — does this not declare plainly enough that the time of birth has no bearing on the leading of one’s life? Unless perhaps we suppose that no one was conceived and born at the very same time as Africanus. Was there ever, then, any man like him?

Quis vero non videt in optuma quaque re publica plurimum auspicia et reliqua divinandi genera valuisse? Quis rex umquam fuit, quis populus, qui non uteretur praedictione divina? neque solum in pace, sed in bello multo etiam magis, quo maius erat certamen et discrimen salutis. Omitto nostros, qui nihil in bello sine extis agunt, nihil sine auspiciis domi habent auspicia; externa videamus: Namque et Athenienses omnibus semper publicis consiliis divinos quosdam sacerdotes, quos ma/nteis vocant, adhibuerunt, et Lacedaemonii regibus suis augurem adsessorem dederunt, itemque senibus (sic enim consilium publicum appellant) augurem interesse voluerunt, iidemque de rebus maioribus semper aut Delphis oraclum aut ab Hammone aut a Dodona petebant.

And again: is there any doubt that many men, though they were so born as to have certain parts deformed against nature, were restored and corrected by nature, when she had recalled herself, or else by art and medicine? — as those whose tongues so clung that they could not speak were freed by the cutting of the scalpel. Many too have removed a fault of nature by practice and exercise, as the Phalerean writes of Demosthenes, who, when he could not pronounce the letter r, brought it about by exercise that he pronounced it most distinctly. But if these things had been engendered and handed over by a star, no power could change them. And again: does not the unlikeness of places bring with it an unlikeness in the procreation of men? It is easy enough to run over in speech how far Indians and Persians, Ethiopians and Syrians differ in body and in mind, so that the variety and unlikeness is past believing.

Lycurgus quidem, qui Lacedaemoniorum rem publicam temperavit, leges suas auctoritate Apollinis Delphici confirmavit; quas cum vellet Lysander commutare, eadem est prohibitus religione. Atque etiam qui praeerant Lacedaemoniis, non contenti vigilantibus curis in Pasiphaae fano, quod est in agro propter urbem, somniandi causa excubabant, quia vera quietis oracla ducebant.

From which it is understood that the situation of lands has more force toward birth than the touch of the moon. For when they say that the Babylonians spent four hundred and seventy thousand years in testing and trying out children, whoever happened to be born, they deceive us; for if it had once been the regular practice, it would not have stopped — yet we have no authority who says it is done or knows it was done. Do you see that I am saying not the things that Carneades said, but the things that Panaetius, the foremost of the Stoics, said? But I also ask this: were all who fell in the battle of Cannae under one star? Their end, at any rate, was one and the same. And what of those singular in talent and spirit — were they too under one star? For what time is there in which countless men are not born? And yet surely no one is like Homer.

Ad nostra iam redeo. Quotiens senatus decemviros ad libros ire iussit! quantis in rebus quamque saepe responsis haruspicum paruit! Nam et cum duo visi soles sunt et cum tres lunae et cum faces, et cum sol nocte visus est, et cum e caelo fremitus auditus, et cum caelum discessisse visum est atque in eo animadversi globi, delata etiam ad senatum labe agri Privernatis, cum ad infinitam altitudinem terra desedisset Apuliaque maximis terrae motibus conquassata esset (quibus portentis magna populo Romano bella perniciosaeque seditiones denuntiabantur; inque his omnibus responsa haruspicum cum Sibyllae versibus congruebant); quid?

And if it bears on the matter under what disposition of the heaven and arrangement of the stars each living thing comes into being, this must necessarily hold not only among men but among beasts as well — than which what more absurd can be said? Lucius Tarutius of Firmum, our friend, learned above all in the Chaldean calculations, even traced back the birthday of our own city to that festival of the Parilia on which we have received that it was founded by Romulus, and he said that Rome was born when the moon was in the Balance, and did not hesitate to sing her fates.

cum Cumis Apollo sudavit, Capuae Victoria? quid? ortus androgyni nonne fatale quoddam monstrum fuit? quid? cum fluvius Atratus sanguine fluxit? quid? cum saepe lapidum, sanguinis non numquam, terrae interdum, quondam etiam lactis imber defluxit? quid? cum in Capitolio ictus Centaurus e caelo est, in Aventino portae et homines, Tusculi aedes Castoris et Pollucis Romaeque Pietatis: nonne et haruspices ea responderunt, quae evenerunt, et in Sibyllae libris eaedem repertae praedictiones sunt?

O the mighty force of error! Did even a city’s birthday have any bearing on the force of the stars and the moon? Grant that in a child it matters from what disposition of the heaven he drew his first breath — could this have any force in the brick or the mortar out of which the city was made? But why say more? Every day they are refuted. How many things spoken by the Chaldeans to Pompey, how many to Crassus, how many to this very Caesar I remember — that not one of them would die except in old age, except at home, except in glory! So that it seems to me most strange that anyone still exists who even now believes those whose predictions he sees refuted every day by the event and the outcome.

Caeciliae Q. filiae somnio modo Marsico bello templum est a senatu Iunoni Sospitae restitutum. Quod quidem somnium Sisenna cum disputavisset mirifice ad verbum cum re convenisse, tum insolenter, credo ab Epicureo aliquo inductus, disputat somniis credi non oportere. Idem contra ostenta nihil disputat exponitque initio belli Marsici et deorum simulacra sudavisse, et sanguinem fluxisse, et discessisse caelum, et ex occulto auditas esse voces, quae pericula belli nuntiarent, et Lanuvii clipeos, quod haruspicibus tristissumum visum esset, a muribus esse derosos.

There remain two kinds of divination which we are said to have from nature, not from art: the kind by prophesying and the kind by dreaming; of these, Quintus, let us, if you please, hold our discussion. Indeed I am willing, said he; for I assent wholly to what you have argued thus far, and, to speak truly, although your discourse has confirmed me, still even of my own accord I judged the Stoics’ view of divination too superstitious; this reasoning of the Peripatetics moved me more — of the old Dicaearchus and of him who now flourishes, Cratippus — who hold that there is in the minds of men a kind of oracle, from which they have a presentiment of things to come, if the mind is either stirred by divine frenzy or, relaxed in sleep, moved freely and unbound. About these kinds I should very much like to hear what you think and by what reasonings you weaken them.

Quid, quod in annalibus habemus Veienti bello, cum lacus Albanus praeter modum crevisset, Veientem quendam ad nos hominem nobilem perfugisse, eumque dixisse ex fatis, quae Veientes scripta haberent, Veios capi non posse, dum lacus is redundaret, et, si lacus emissus lapsu et cursu suo ad mare profluxisset, perniciosum populo Romano; sin autem ita esset eductus, ut ad mare pervenire non posset, tum salutare nostris fore? Ex quo illa admirabilis a maioribus Albanae aquae facta deductio est. Cum autem Veientes bello fessi legatos ad senatum misissent, tum ex iis quidam dixisse dicitur non omnia illum transfugam ausum esse senatui dicere; in isdem enim fatis scriptum Veientes habere fore ut brevi a Gallis Roma caperetur, quod quidem sexennio post Veios captos factum esse videmus.

When he had said this, I then began again to speak, as if from a fresh starting point. I am not unaware, Quintus, said I, that you have always felt thus — that you doubted the other kinds of divination, but approved those two, of frenzy and of dreaming, which seemed to flow from a free mind. I shall say, then, what I think about those two kinds themselves, when first I have seen what force there is in the Stoics’ conclusion of reasoning and in our friend Cratippus. For you said that Chrysippus and Diogenes and Antipater conclude in this manner: If there are gods and they do not declare to men beforehand what things are to come, then either they do not love men, or they are ignorant of what will come to pass, or they think it is no concern of men’s to know what will be, or they do not judge it consistent with their majesty to signify beforehand to men what is to come, or even the gods themselves cannot signify those things; but they neither fail to love us (for they are beneficent and friendly to the race of men) nor are ignorant of those things which were established and appointed by themselves;

Saepe etiam et in proeliis Fauni auditi et in rebus turbidis veridicae voces ex occulto missae esse dicuntur; cuius generis duo sint ex multis exempla, sed maxuma: Nam non multo ante urbem captam exaudita vox est a luco Vestae, qui a Palatii radice in novam viam devexus est, ut muri et portae reficerentur; futurum esse, nisi provisum esset, ut Roma caperetur. Quod neglectum tum, cum caveri poterat, post acceptam illam maximam cladem expiatum est; ara enim Aio Loquenti, quam saeptam videmus, exadversus eum locum consecrata est. Atque etiam scriptum a multis est, cum terrae motus factus esset, ut sue plena procuratio fieret, vocem ab aede Iunonis ex arce extitisse; quocirca Iunonem illam appellatam Monetam. Haec igitur et a dis significata et a nostris maioribus iudicata contemnimus?

nor is it no concern of ours to know the things that are to come (for we shall be more wary if we know); nor do they reckon this foreign to their majesty (for nothing is more excellent than beneficence); nor are they unable to foreknow things to come; the gods, therefore, do not exist, nor do they signify things to come to us; but the gods do exist; therefore they signify; and it is not the case that, if they signify things to come, they give us no ways to the knowledge of their significations (for they would signify in vain); nor, if they give the ways, is there no divination; therefore there is divination.

Neque solum deorum voces Pythagorei observitaverunt, sed etiam hominum, quae vocant omina. Quae maiores nostri quia valere censebant, idcirco omnibus rebus agendis quod bonum, faustum, felix fortu- natumque esset praefabantur, rebusque divinis, quae publice fierent, ut faverent linguis, imperabatur inque feriis imperandis, ut ’ litibus et iurgiis se abstinerent ’. Itemque in lustranda colonia ab eo, qui eam deduceret, et cum imperator exercitum, censor populum lustraret, bonis nominibus, qui hostias ducerent, eligebantur. Quod idem in dilectu consules observant, ut primus miles fiat bono nomine.

O the sharp men! How few the words by which they think the business is finished! They take up, to draw their conclusion, things of which nothing is granted to them. But a conclusion of reasoning is to be approved in which that which is doubted is brought out from things not in doubt. Do you see Epicurus, whom the Stoics are wont to call dull and unschooled — how he concluded that what we say is the whole of nature is infinite? What is finite, he says, has an extremity. Who would not grant this? But what has an extremity is discerned from something else outside it. This too must be conceded. But that which is the whole is not discerned from something else outside it. Not even this can be denied. Since, then, it has no extremity, it must necessarily be infinite.

Quae quidem a te scis et consule et imperatore summa cum religione esse servata. Praerogativam etiam maiores omen iustorum comitiorum esse voluerunt. Atque ego exempla ominum nota proferam: L. Paulus consul iterum, cum ei bellum ut cum rege Perse gereret obtigisset, ut ea ipsa die domum ad vesperum rediit, filiolam suam Tertiam, quae tum erat admodum parva, osculans animum advertit tristiculam. Quid est, inquit, mea Tertia? quid tristis es? Mi pater, inquit, Persa periit. Tum ille artius puellam conplexus: Accipio, inquit, mea filia, omen. Erat autem mortuus catellus eo nomine.

Do you see how he arrived at a doubtful matter from things conceded? This you dialecticians do not do; not only do you not take up to draw your conclusion the things that are conceded by all, but you take up things which, even when conceded, do nothing the more to bring about what you wish. For first you take up this: If there are gods, they are beneficent toward men. Who will grant you this? Epicurus? — who denies that the gods care for anything, either another’s affairs or their own. Or our own Ennius? — who speaks, with great applause and the people assenting: I have always said the race of the gods of heaven exists, and shall say so, But I think they do not care what the human race may do. And indeed he gives the reason why he holds this opinion; but there is no need to say what follows; it is enough to understand only this — that these men take for certain what is doubtful and disputed.

L. Flaccum, flaminem Martialem, ego audivi, cum diceret Caeciliam Metelli, cum vellet sororis suae filiam in matrimonium conlocare, exisse in quoddam sacellum ominis capiendi causa, quod fieri more veterum solebat. Cum virgo staret et Caecilia in sella sederet neque diu ulla vox exstitisset, puellam defatigatam petisse a matertera, ut sibi concederet, paulisper ut in eius sella requiesceret; illam autem dixisse: Vero, mea puella, tibi concedo meas sedes. Quod omen res consecuta est; ipsa enim brevi mortua est, virgo autem nupsit, cui Caecilia nupta fuerat. Haec posse contemni vel etiam rideri praeclare intellego, sed id ipsum est deos non putare, quae ab iis significantur, contemnere.

It follows next that the gods are ignorant of nothing, since all things were established by them. But here how great is the contest of most learned men denying that these things were established by the immortal gods! But, you say, it is our concern to know the things that are going to come to pass. There is a great book of Dicaearchus to the effect that it is better not to know these things than to know them. They deny that this is foreign to the majesty of the gods. As if, forsooth, the gods peered into everyone’s hovel to see what would profit each man.

Quid de auguribus loquar? Tuae partes sunt, tuum inquam, auspiciorum patrocinium debet esse. Tibi App. Claudius augur consuli nuntiavit addubitato Salutis augurio bellum domesticum triste ac turbulentum fore; quod paucis post mensibus exortum paucioribus a te est diebus oppressum. Cui quidem auguri vehementer adsentior; solus enim multorum annorum memoria non decantandi augurii, sed divinandi tenuit disciplinam. Quem inridebant collegae tui eumque tum Pisidam, tum Soranum augurem esse dicebant; quibus nulla videbatur in auguriis aut praesensio aut scientia veritatis futurae; sapienter aiebant ad opinionem imperitorum esse fictas religiones. Quod longe secus est; neque enim in pastoribus illis, quibus Romulus praefuit, nec in ipso Romulo haec calliditas esse potuit, ut ad errorem multitudinis religionis simulacra fingerent. Sed difficultas laborque discendi disertam neglegentiam reddidit; malunt enim disserere nihil esse in auspiciis quam, quid sit, ediscere.

“Nor are they unable to foreknow things to come.” Those deny that they can, to whom it is not acceptable that what is to be is certain. Do you see, then, that the things which are doubtful are taken up as certain and conceded? Then they twist about and conclude thus: Therefore it is not both the case that the gods exist and that they do not signify things to come; for this they now think established. Then they assume: But the gods do exist — which itself is not conceded by all. Therefore they signify. Not even this follows; for they can fail to signify and yet be gods. Nor, if they signify, do they fail to give some ways to the knowledge of the signification. But this too is possible — that they do not give them to man, yet have them themselves; for why should they give them to the Etruscans rather than to the Romans? Nor, if they give the ways, is there no divination. Grant that the gods give them, which is absurd; what does it matter, if we cannot receive them? The last point is: Therefore there is divination. Let it be the last; still it is not brought about; for from false premises, as we learned from them, the true cannot be brought about. The whole conclusion, therefore, lies in ruins.

Quid est illo auspicio divinius, quod apud te in Mario est? ut utar potissumum auctore te: Hic Iovis altisoni subito pinnata satelles Arboris e trunco serpentis saucia morsu Subrigit ipsa feris transfigens unguibus anguem Semianimum et varia graviter cervice micantem Quem se intorquentem lanians rostroque cruentans Iam satiata animos, iam duros ulta dolores Abicit ecflantem et laceratum adfligit in unda Seque obitu a solis nitidos convertit ad ortus. Hanc ubi praepetibus pinnis lapsuque volantem Conspexit Marius, divini numinis augur, Faustaque signa suae laudis reditusque notavit, Partibus intonuit caeli pater ipse sinistris. Sic aquilae clarum firmavit Iuppiter omen.

Let us now come to that excellent man, our friend Cratippus. If, says he, without eyes the function and office of eyes cannot exist, yet eyes can sometimes fail to perform their office, then whoever has even once so used his eyes that he discerned true things, that man has the sense of eyes that discern truly. Likewise, then, if without divination the function and office of divination cannot exist, yet when someone has divination he can sometimes err and not discern truly, it is enough, to confirm divination, that something has even once been so divined that nothing seems to have fallen out by chance; and of that kind there are countless cases; therefore it must be confessed that divination exists. Wittily and briefly; but since he twice took up what he wished, even if he should find us ready to concede, still that which he assumes can in no way be conceded.

Atque ille Romuli auguratus pastoralis, non urbanus fuit nec fictus ad opiniones inperitorum, sed a certis acceptus et posteris traditus. Itaque Romulus augur, ut apud Ennium est, cum fratre item augure Curantes magna cum cura tum cupientes Regni dant operam simul auspicio augurioque. †In monte Remus auspicio se devovet atque secundam Solus avem servat. At Romulus pulcher in alto Quaerit Aventino, servat genus altivolantum. Certabant, urbem Romam Remoramne vocarent. Omnibus cura viris, uter esset induperator. Exspectant; veluti, consul quom mittere signum Volt, omnes avidi spectant ad carceris oras,

If, he says, the eyes sometimes err, still, because they have at some time seen rightly, there is in them the power of seeing; likewise, if anyone has once made something out in divination, he, even when he errs, is still to be reckoned to have the power of divining. Consider, I beg you, our Cratippus, how alike these things are; for to me they do not seem alike. For the eyes, in discerning true things, use nature and sense, whereas minds, if ever they have seen true things either by prophesying or by dreaming, have used fortune and chance; unless perhaps you think those will concede to you, who hold dreams to be no more than dreams, that if ever some dream has turned out true, this did not happen by chance. But let us grant you those two premises (the things the dialecticians call lemmata, though we prefer to speak Latin); still the assumption (which the same men call the proslēpsis) will not be granted.

Quam mox emittat pictis e faucibus currus, Sic exspectabat populus atque ore timebat, Rebus utri magni victoria sit data regni. Interea sol albus recessit in infera noctis. Exin candida se radiis dedit icta foras lux, Et simul ex alto longe pulcherruma praepes Laeva volavit avis. Simul aureus exoritur sol, Cedunt de caelo ter quattuor corpora sancta Avium, praepetibus sese pulchrisque locis dant. Conspicit inde sibi data Romulus esse priora, Auspicio regni stabilita scamna solumque.

But Cratippus assumes his minor premise in this fashion: There are, however, countless presentiments that are not fortuitous. And I say there are none — see how great the dispute is; and once the minor premise is not granted, there is no conclusion. But we are shameless, you say, in not granting it, when the thing is so plain. What is plain? That many turn out true, he says. What of the fact that far more turn out false? Does not that very inconstancy, which is the property of fortune, teach that fortune, not nature, is the cause? Then, Cratippus, if that conclusion of yours is true — for it is with you that I have to do — do you not see that the same reasoning can be used by the haruspices too, and by the readers of lightning, and the interpreters of portents, and the augurs, and the casters of lots, and the Chaldeans? Of which kinds there is not one out of which something has not turned out just as it was predicted. Therefore either those kinds of divination too exist — the very ones you most rightly reject — or, if they do not exist, I do not see why these two should exist that you leave standing. So, by the very reasoning by which you bring these in, those others can exist that you do away with.

Sed ut, unde huc digressa est, eodem redeat oratio: si nihil queam disputare, quam ob rem quidque fiat, et tantum modo fieri ea, quae commemoravi, doceam, parumne Epicuro Carneadive respondeam? Quid, si etiam ratio exstat artificiosae praesensionis facilis, divinae autem paulo obscurior? Quae enim extis, quae fulgoribus, quae portentis, quae astris praesentiuntur, haec notata sunt observatione diuturna. Adfert autem vetustas omnibus in rebus longinqua observatione incredibilem scientiam; quae potest esse etiam sine motu atque inpulsu deorum, cum, quid ex quoque eveniat, et quid quamque rem significet, crebra animadversione perspectum est.

And what authority does that frenzy carry, which you call divine, that the madman should see what the wise man does not, and that the one who has lost his human senses should attain the senses of the gods? We pay heed to the verses of the Sibyl, which she is said to have poured out in her frenzy. Of these the interpreter was thought, lately, on some false rumor among men, to be going to declare in the Senate that the man whom in plain fact we had as king must also be called king, if we wished to be safe. If this is in the books, to what man does it point, and to what time? For cleverly did the one who composed them bring it about that, whatever should happen, it should seem to have been predicted, since all definition of men and times had been removed.

Altera divinatio est naturalis, ut ante dixi; quae physica disputandi subtilitate referenda est ad naturam deorum, a qua, ut doctissimis sapientissimisque placuit, haustos animos et libatos habemus; cumque omnia completa et referta sint aeterno sensu et mente divina, necesse est cognatione divinorum animorum animos humanos commoveri. Sed vigilantes animi vitae necessitatibus serviunt diiunguntque se a societate divina vinclis corporis inpediti.

He also brought in a screen of obscurity, so that the same verses might seem capable of being fitted now to one matter, now to another. That this song is not the work of one in a frenzy is shown both by the poem itself — for it is more a thing of art and care than of impulse and excitement — and above all by what is called the acrostic akrostichis, when in order, out of the first letters of each successive verse, some sense is woven together, as in certain lines of Ennius: Quintus Ennius made this. That, surely, is more the mark of an attentive mind than of a frenzied one.

Rarum est quoddam genus eorum, qui se a corpore avocent et ad divinarum rerum cognitionem cura omni studioque rapiantur. Horum sunt auguria non divini impetus, sed rationis humanae; nam et natura futura praesentiunt, ut aquarum eluviones et deflagrationem futuram aliquando caeli atque terrarum; alii autem in re publica exercitati, ut de Atheniensi Solone accepimus, orientem tyrannidem multo ante prospiciunt; quos prudentes possumus dicere, id est providentes, divinos nullo modo possumus, non plus quam Milesium Thalem, qui, ut obiurgatores suos convinceret ostenderetque etiam philosophum, si ei commodum esset, pecuniam facere posse, omnem oleam, ante quam florere coepisset, in agro Milesio coe+misse dicitur.

And in the Sibylline verses the whole sense of each utterance is spelled out from the first letters of the first verse of that utterance. This is the work of a writer, not of a man in a frenzy — of one applying care, not of a madman. For which reason let us keep the Sibyl set apart and shut away, so that — as has been handed down from our ancestors — the books may not even be read without the order of the Senate, and may serve rather for the laying aside of religious scruples than for the taking of them up; and let us deal with the priests in charge, that they bring forth from those books anything whatever rather than a king, whom hereafter neither the gods nor men will suffer to be at Rome. But many, you say, have often prophesied true things, as Cassandra: And now upon the great sea and, the same a little after: Alas, behold Are you then forcing me to believe even the poets?

Animadverterat fortasse quadam scientia olearum ubertatem fore. Et quidem idem primus defectionem solis, quae Astyage regnante facta est, praedixisse fertur. Multa medici, multa gubernatores, agricolae etiam multa praesentiunt, sed nullam eorum divinationem voco, ne illam quidem, qua ab Anaximandro physico moniti Lacedaemonii sunt, ut urbem et tecta linquerent armatique in agro excubarent, quod terrae motus instaret, tum cum et urbs tota corruit et e monte Taygeto extrema montis quasi puppis avolsa est. Ne Pherecydes quidem, ille Pythagorae magister, potius divinus habebitur quam physicus, quod, cum vidisset haustam aquam de iugi puteo, terrae motus dixit instare.

Let these things have what charm you will; let them be helped along by words, by sentiments, by measures, by melodies; yet we owe no authority, no credence, to invented matters. And in the same way I judge that we must believe neither some Publicius or other, nor the Marcian seers, nor the secret oracles of Apollo — of which some are openly fabricated, some rashly babbled out, and have never won the approval of anyone even of middling sense, much less of a man of judgment.

Nec vero umquam animus hominis naturaliter divinat, nisi cum ita solutus est et vacuus, ut ei plane nihil sit cum corpore; quod aut vatibus contingit aut dormientibus. Itaque ea duo genera a Dicaearcho probantur et, ut dixi, a Cratippo nostro; si propterea, quod ea proficiscuntur a natura, sint summa sane, modo ne sola; sin autem nihil esse in observatione putant, multa tollunt, quibus vitae ratio continetur. Sed quoniam dant aliquid, idque non parvum, vaticinationes cum somniis, nihil est, quod cum his magnopere pugnemus, praesertim cum sint, qui omnino nullam divinationem probent.

What? you will say — did not that rower from Coponius’s fleet foretell the things that came to pass? He did indeed, and the very things that all of us at that time feared might happen. For we heard that camp had been pitched against camp in Thessaly, and it seemed to us that Caesar’s army had both more audacity, seeing it had brought war upon its own country, and more strength on account of long service; but as for the issue of the battle, there was not one of us who did not fear it — though, as befitted steady men, not openly. But that Greek — what wonder if, in the greatness of his fear, as commonly happens, he parted from his steadiness, from his mind, from his very self? And in that disturbance of soul he, deranged, declared would come to pass the very things that, when sane, he feared would come to pass. Which, I ask you, by gods and men, is more like the truth: that the crazed rower, or that some one of us who were there at the time — myself, Cato, Varro, Coponius himself — could discern the counsels of the immortal gods?

Ergo et ii, quorum animi spretis corporibus evolant atque excurrunt foras, ardore aliquo inflammati atque incitati cernunt illa profecto, quae vaticinantes pronuntiant, multisque rebus inflammantur tales animi, qui corporibus non inhaerent, ut ii, qui sono quodam vocum et Phrygiis cantibus incitantur. Multos nemora silvaeque, multos amnes aut maria commovent, quorum furibunda mens videt ante multo, quae sint futura. Quo de genere illa sunt: Eheú videte! Iúdicabit ínclitum iudícium inter deás tris aliquis, Quó iudicio Lácedaemonia múlier, Furiarum úna, adveniet. Eodem enim modo multa a vaticinantibus saepe praedicta sunt, neque solum verbis, sed etiam Versibus, quos olim Fauni vatesque canebant. Similiter Marcius et Publicius vates cecinisse dicuntur;

But now I come to you: O holy Apollo, you who hold fast the fixed navel of the lands, whence first the savage, superstitious, wild voice came forth. For with your oracles Chrysippus filled a whole volume — partly false, as I think; partly true by chance, as happens very often in every kind of utterance; partly twisting in their speech and obscure, so that the interpreter has need of an interpreter and the lot itself must be referred to lots; partly ambiguous, and such as must be carried before a dialectician. For when that lot was given out to the richest king of Asia: Croesus, crossing the Halys, will overthrow a great might of wealth — he supposed he would overthrow the might of his enemies; but it was his own that he overthrew.

quo de genere Apollinis operta prolata sunt. Credo etiam anhelitus quosdam fuisse terrarum, quibus inflatae mentes oracla funderent. Atque haec quidem vatium ratio est, nec dissimilis sane somniorum. Nam quae vigilantibus accidunt vatibus, eadem nobis dormientibus. Viget enim animus in somnis liber ab sensibus omnique inpeditione curarum iacente et mortuo paene corpore. Qui quia vixit ab omni aeternitate versatusque est cum innumerabilibus animis, omnia, quae in natura rerum sunt, videt, si modo temperatis escis modicisque potionibus ita est adfectus, ut sopito corpore ipse vigilet. Haec somniantis est divinatio.

Yet whichever of the two had happened, the oracle would have been true. But why should I ever believe this was given out to Croesus? Or why should I hold Herodotus more truthful than Ennius? Could the one have invented less about Croesus than Ennius about Pyrrhus? For who is there who would believe that this answer was given to Pyrrhus from the oracle of Apollo: I say that you, descendant of Aeacus, the Romans can conquer? First, Apollo never spoke in Latin; next, that lot is unheard of among the Greeks; besides, by Pyrrhus’s time Apollo had already given up making verses; and lastly, although the race of the Aeacidae was ever, as it stands in Ennius, a dull-witted breed, stronger in war than strong in wisdom — still he could have understood this ambiguity of the verse: that "you the Romans can conquer" has no more force toward himself than toward the Romans. For that ambiguity which deceived Croesus could have fooled even Chrysippus; but this one not even Epicurus.

Hic magna quaedam exoritur, neque ea naturalis, sed artificiosa somniorum Antiphontis interpretatio eodemque modo et oraculorum et vaticinationum sunt enim explanatores, ut grammatici poe+tarum. Nam ut aurum et argentum, aes, ferrum frustra natura divina genuisset, nisi eadem docuisset, quem ad modum ad eorum venas perveniretur, nec fruges terrae bacasve arborum cum utilitate ulla generi humano dedisset, nisi earum cultus et conditiones tradidisset, materiave quicquam iuvaret, nisi consectionis eius fabricam haberemus, sic cum omni utilitate, quam di hominibus dederunt, ars aliqua coniuncta est, per quam illa utilitas percipi possit. Item igitur somniis, vaticinationibus, oraclis, quod erant multa obscura, multa ambigua, explanationes adhibitae sunt interpretum.

But — and this is the chief point — why are oracles no longer given out in that fashion at Delphi, not only in our own age but for a long time now, so that nothing can be more contemptible? At this point, when they are hard pressed, they say that the power of that place has vanished with age — the place from which came that breath of the earth, by which the Pythia, her mind stirred up, would give out oracles. You would think they were speaking of wine or pickled fish, which vanish with age. It is the power of a place that is in question, and a power not merely natural but even divine; and how, pray, did it vanish? With age, you will say. What age is there that can wear out a divine power? And what is so divine as a breath out of the earth so moving the mind that it makes it foresee things to come — so that it not only discerns them long before, but even pronounces them in number and verse? But when did that power vanish? Was it after men began to be less credulous?

Quo modo autem aut vates aut somniantes ea videant, quae nusquam etiam tunc sint, magna quaestio est. Sed explorata si sint ea, quae ante quaeri debeant, sint haec, quae quaerimus, faciliora. Continet enim totam hanc quaestionem ea ratio, quae est de natura deorum, quae a te secundo libro est explicata dilucide. Quam si obtinemus, stabit illud, quod hunc locum continet, de quo agimus, esse deos, et eorum providentia mundum administrari, eosdemque consulere rebus humanis, nec solum universis, verum etiam singulis. Haec si tenemus, quae mihi quidem non videntur posse convelli, profecto hominibus a dis futura significari necesse est.

Demosthenes indeed, who lived nearly three hundred years ago, even then said that the Pythia "philippized" philippizein — that is, as it were, sided with Philip. And by this he meant that she had been corrupted by Philip; from which one may judge that in other Delphic oracles too there was something not sincere. But somehow these superstitious and almost fanatical philosophers seem to prefer anything whatever to admitting they have been fools. You would rather have it that the thing has vanished and been quenched — the thing that, if it had ever existed, would surely be eternal — than not believe what is not to be believed.

Sed distinguendum videtur, quonam modo. Nam non placet Stoicis singulis iecorum fissis aut avium cantibus interesse deum; neque enim decorum est nec dis dignum nec fieri ullo pacto potest; sed ita a principio inchoatum esse mundum, ut certis rebus certa signa praecurrerent, alia in extis, alia in avibus, alia in fulgoribus, alia in ostentis, alia in stellis, alia in somniantium visis, alia in furentium vocibus. Ea quibus bene percepta sunt, ii non saepe falluntur; male coniecta maleque interpretata falsa sunt non rerum vitio, sed interpretum inscientia. Hoc autem posito atque concesso, esse quandam vim divinam hominum vitam continentem, non difficile est, quae fieri certe videmus, ea qua ratione fiant, suspicari. Nam et ad hostiam deligendam potest dux esse vis quaedam sentiens, quae est toto confusa mundo, et tum ipsum, cum immolare velis, extorum fieri mutatio potest, ut aut absit aliquid aut supersit; parvis enim momentis multa natura aut adfingit aut mutat aut detrahit.

A like error is found in dreams; and how far back is the defense of these fetched! Our souls, they hold, are divine, and are drawn from a source outside, and the world is filled full with a multitude of souls in concord with one another; and so, by this divinity of the mind itself and its conjunction with minds outside, what is to come is discerned. The soul, Zeno thinks, is contracted, and as it were slips and sinks down — and this very thing is to be asleep. And further, Pythagoras and Plato, weightiest of authorities, that we may see surer things in our sleep, bid us go to our rest prepared by a certain regimen of diet — the Pythagoreans, indeed, abstaining from beans at all costs, as if it were the mind, and not the belly, that is bloated by that food. But somehow nothing can be said so absurd that it is not said by some one of the philosophers.

Quod ne dubitare possimus, maximo est argumento, quod paulo ante interitum Caesaris contigit. Qui cum immolaret illo die, quo primum in sella aurea sedit et cum purpurea veste processit, in extis bovis opimi cor non fuit. Num igitur censes ullum animal, quod sanguinem habeat, sine corde esse posse? †Qua ille rei novitate perculsus, cum Spurinna diceret timendum esse, ne et consilium et vita deficeret; earum enim rerum utramque a corde proficisci. Postero die caput in iecore non fuit. Quae quidem illi portendebantur a dis immortalibus, ut videret interitum, non ut caveret. Cum igitur eae partes in extis non reperiuntur, sine quibus victuma illa vivere nequisset, intellegendum est in ipso immolationis tempore eas partes, quae absint, interisse.

Do we think, then, that the souls of sleepers are moved of themselves in their dreaming, or, as Democritus thinks, are struck by a vision that comes from without and from elsewhere? For whether it is in this way or in that, very many false things can appear as true to those who dream. For to men sailing, the things that stand still seem to move; and by a certain fixing of the eyes, the one light of a lamp seems two. Why should I speak of the madmen, of the drunk — how many false things appear to them? But if such visions are not to be believed, why dreams should be believed I do not know. For one may dispute about these errors, if you like, just as about dreams: so that, if the things that stand still should seem to move, you might say it signifies an earthquake or some sudden flight; while by the doubled light of the lamp is declared that discord and sedition are afoot. And further, from the visions of the mad or the drunk countless inferences can be drawn by conjecture,

Eademque efficit in avibus divina mens, ut tum huc, tum illuc volent alites, tum in hac, tum in illa parte se occultent, tum a dextra, tum a sinistra parte canant oscines. Nam si animal omne, ut vult, ita utitur motu sui corporis, prono, obliquo, supino, membraque, quocumque vult, flectit, contorquet, porrigit, contrahit eaque ante efficit paene, quam cogitat, quanto id deo est facilius, cuius numini parent omnia! Idemque mittit et signa nobis eius generis, qualia permulta historia tradidit, quale scriptum illud videmus:

which seem to be going to come to pass. For who is there who, hurling the javelin all day long, will not sometimes hit the mark? We dream whole nights through, and there is scarcely one on which we do not sleep — and then we marvel when, once in a while, what we dreamed turns out true? What is so uncertain as the throw of the dice? Yet there is no one who, throwing often, does not sometimes throw a Venus, and now and then even twice and three times over. Are we, then, like fools, to prefer to say that this came about by the impulse of Venus rather than by chance? But if at all other times false appearances are not to be believed, I do not see what special property sleep has, in which falsehoods should prevail in place of truths.

si luna paulo ante solis ortum defecisset in signo Leonis, fore ut armis Dareus et Persae ab Alexandro et Macedonibus proelio vincerentur Dareusque moreretur, et, si puella nata biceps esset, seditionem in populo fore, corruptelam et adulterium domi, et, si mulier leonem peperisse visa esset, fore ut ab exteris gentibus vinceretur ea res publica, in qua id contigisset. Eiusdem generis etiam illud est, quod scribit Herodotus, Croesi filium, cum esset infans, locutum; quo ostento regnum patris et domum funditus concidisse. Caput arsisse Servio Tullio dormienti quae historia non prodidit? Ut igitur, qui se tradidit quieti praeparato animo cum bonis cogitationibus, tum rebus ad tranquillitatem adcommodatis, certa et vera cernit in somnis, sic castus animus purusque vigilantis et ad astrorum et ad avium reliquorumque signorum et ad extorum veritatem est paratior.

But if nature had been so arranged that sleepers should act out the things they dreamed, then all who went to bed would have to be bound; for as dreamers they would make wilder motions than any madman. And if the appearances of madmen are not to be trusted, because they are false, why one should trust the appearances of dreamers, which are even far more disordered, I do not understand. Or is it because the mad do not report their appearances to an interpreter, whereas those who have dreamed do report them? I ask further: if I should wish to write something, or to read, or to sing with the voice or on the lyre, or to set out something geometrical or physical or dialectical, must I wait for a dream, or must the art be employed — the art without which none of these things can be done or carried through? And further still, not even if I wished to sail would I steer the ship according to what I had dreamed; for the penalty would be immediate.

Hoc nimirum est illud, quod de Socrate accepimus, quodque ab ipso in libris Socraticorum saepe dicitur, esse divinum quiddam, quod daimo/nion appellat, cui semper ipse paruerit numquam impellenti, saepe revocanti. Et Socrates quidem (quo quem auctorem meliorem quaerimus?) Xenophonti consulenti, sequereturne Cyrum, posteaquam exposuit, quae ipsi videbantur: Et nostrum quidem, inquit, humanum est consilium; sed de rebus et obscuris et incertis ad Apollinem censeo referundum, ad quem etiam Athenienses publice de maioribus rebus semper rettulerunt.

How, then, is it fitting that the sick should seek their cure from an interpreter of dreams rather than from a physician? Can Aesculapius, can Serapis prescribe for us a treatment for our health through sleep, while Neptune cannot do so for helmsmen? And if Minerva will give medicine without a physician, will the Muses not give to dreamers the knowledge of writing, of reading, of the other arts? But if a treatment for health were given, these other things I have spoken of would be given too; and since they are not given, medicine is not given either; and once that is taken away, all the authority of dreams is taken away.

Scriptum est item, cum Critonis, sui familiaris, oculum alligatum vidisset, quaesivisse, quid esset; cum autem ille respondisset in agro ambulanti ramulum adductum, ut remissus esset, in oculum suum recidisse, tum Socrates: Non enim paruisti mihi revocanti, cum uterer, qua soleo, praesagitione divina. Idem etiam Socrates, cum apud Delium male pugnatum esset Lachete praetore fugeretque cum ipso Lachete, ut ventum est in trivium, eadem, qua ceteri, fugere noluit. Quibus quaerentibus, cur non eadem via pergeret, deterreri se a deo dixit; cum quidem ii, qui alia via fugerant, in hostium equitatum inciderunt. Permulta conlecta sunt ab Antipatro, quae mirabiliter a Socrate divinata sunt; quae praetermittam; tibi enim nota sunt, mihi ad commemorandum non necessaria.

But let these points too be reckoned obvious; now let us look at the deeper matters. For either some divine power, taking thought for us, makes the significations of dreams, or interpreters understand — out of a certain agreement and conjunction of nature, which they call sympatheian — what suits each thing from dreams and what follows upon each thing; or neither of these holds, but there is a certain constant and long-continued observation of what tends to come about and what tends to follow, when such-and-such has been seen in sleep. First, then, it must be understood that there is no divine power that produces dreams. And this at least is plain: that no appearances of dreams proceed from the will of the gods; for the gods would do this for our sake, that we might be able to foresee things to come.

Illud tamen eius philosophi magnificum ac paene divinum, quod, cum impiis sententiis damnatus esset, aequissimo animo se dixit mori; neque enim domo egredienti neque illud suggestum, in quo causam dixerat, ascendenti signum sibi ullum, quod consuesset, a deo quasi mali alicuius inpendentis datum. Equidem sic arbitror, etiamsi multa fallant eos, qui aut arte aut coniectura divinare videantur, esse tamen divinationem; homines autem, ut in ceteris artibus, sic in hac posse falli. Potest accidere, ut aliquod signum dubie datum pro certo sit acceptum, potest aliquod latuisse aut ipsum, aut quod esset illi contrarium. Mihi autem ad hoc, de quo disputo, probandum satis est non modo plura, sed etiam pauciora divine praesensa et praedicta reperiri.

How few there are, then, who obey their dreams, who understand them, who remember them! And how many, on the other hand, who despise them and reckon that superstition the mark of a feeble and old-womanish mind! What reason is there, then, why a god, taking thought for these men, should warn through dreams those who judge such things worthy of no care — nor even of remembrance? For a god cannot be ignorant of what mind each man is of; nor is it worthy of a god to do anything in vain and without cause, which is at odds even with the consistency of a human being. So, if most dreams are either not known or neglected, then either the god does not know this, or he uses the signification of dreams in vain; and neither of these befits a god. We must therefore admit that nothing is signified by a god through dreams.

Quin etiam hoc non dubitans dixerim, si unum aliquid ita sit praedictum praesensumque, ut, cum evenerit, ita cadat, ut praedictum sit, neque in eo quicquam casu et fortuito factum esse appareat, esse certe divinationem, idque esse omnibus confitendum. Quocirca primum mihi videtur, ut Posidonius facit, a deo, de quo satis dictum est, deinde a fato, deinde a natura vis omnis divinandi ratioque repetenda. Fieri igitur omnia fato ratio cogit fateri. Fatum autem id appello, quod Graeci ei(marme/nhn, id est ordinem seriemque causarum, cum causae causa nexa rem ex se gignat. Ea est ex omni aeternitate fluens veritas sempiterna. Quod cum ita sit, nihil est factum, quod non futurum fuerit, eodemque modo nihil est futurum, cuius non causas id ipsum efficientes natura contineat.

This too I ask: why, if a god gives us these appearances for the sake of our foreseeing, he does not rather give them to the waking than to the sleeping. For whether some external and adventitious impulse stirs the minds of sleepers, or the minds move of themselves, or whatever other cause it is that makes us seem in our sleep to see, to hear, to do something — that same cause could have been present in the waking too; and if the gods did this for our sake in our sleep, they would do the same for the waking — especially since Chrysippus, refuting the Academics, says that the things which appear to the waking are by far clearer and more certain than those which appear to dreamers. It was therefore more worthy of divine beneficence, when they were taking thought for us, to give clearer appearances to the waking man than dimmer ones through sleep. And since this is not done, dreams are not to be thought divine.

Ex quo intellegitur, ut fatum sit non id, quod superstitiose, sed id, quod physice dicitur, causa aeterna rerum, cur et ea, quae praeterierunt, facta sint et, quae instant, fiant et, quae sequuntur, futura sint. Ita fit, ut et observatione notari possit, quae res quamque causam plerumque consequatur, etiamsi non semper (nam id quidem adfirmare difficile est), easdemque causas veri simile est rerum futurarum cerni ab iis, qui aut per furorem eas aut in quiete videant.

And indeed, what need is there of circuit and roundabout, that one should have to use interpreters of dreams, rather than that a god, if he was truly taking thought for us, should say outright, "Do this, do not do this," and give that appearance to the waking rather than to the sleeping? Then again, who would dare to say that all dreams are true? Some dreams are true,
but not all of them need be. says Ennius. What, pray, is that distinction — what marks the true, what the false? And if the true are sent by a god, where do the false come from? For if these too are divine, what is more inconsistent than a god? And what is more witless than to rouse the minds of mortals with false and lying appearances? But if the true appearances are divine, while the false and empty ones are human, what is that license of assignment, that a god should make this one and nature that one, rather than that a god should make all of them — which you deny — or nature all of them? And since you deny the former, the latter must necessarily be confessed.

Praeterea cum fato omnia fiant, id quod alio loco ostendetur, si quis mortalis possit esse, qui conligationem causarum omnium perspiciat animo, nihil eum profecto fallat. Qui enim teneat causas rerum futurarum, idem necesse est omnia teneat, quae futura sint. Quod cum nemo facere nisi deus possit, relinquendum est homini, ut signis quibusdam consequentia declarantibus futura praesentiat. Non enim illa, quae futura sunt, subito exsistunt, sed est quasi rudentis explicatio sic traductio temporis nihil novi efficientis et primum quidque replicantis. Quod et ii vident, quibus naturalis divinatio data est, et ii, quibus cursus rerum observando notatus est. Qui etsi causas ipsas non cernunt, signa tamen causarum et notas cernunt; ad quas adhibita memoria et diligentia et monumentis superiorum efficitur ea divinatio, quae artificiosa dicitur, extorum, fulgorum, ostentorum signorumque caelestium.

By "nature" I mean that by which the mind can never be empty of agitation and motion, holding still. When, through the languor of the body, it can use neither the limbs nor the senses, it falls upon various and uncertain appearances out of the remnants — as Aristotle says — that cling, of those things which the man did or thought about while awake; and from the disturbance of these there arise at times marvelous shapes of dreams. And if some of these are false, others true, by what mark they are to be told apart I should very much like to know. If there is none, why are we to listen to those interpreters? But if there is some such mark, I am eager to hear what it is — yet they will be stuck.

Non est igitur, ut mirandum sit ea praesentiri a divinantibus, quae nusquam sint; sunt enim omnia, sed tempore absunt. Atque ut in seminibus vis inest earum rerum, quae ex iis progignuntur, sic in causis conditae sunt res futurae, quas esse futuras aut concitata mens aut soluta somno cernit aut ratio aut coniectura praesentit. Atque ut ii, qui solis et lunae reliquorumque siderum ortus, obitus motusque cognorunt, quo quidque tempore eorum futurum sit, multo ante praedicunt, sic, qui cursum rerum eventorumque consequentiam diuturnitate pertractata notaverunt, aut semper aut, si id difficile est, plerumque, quodsi ne id quidem conceditur, non numquam certe, quid futurum sit, intellegunt. Atque haec quidem et quaedam eiusdem modi argumenta, cur sit divinatio, ducuntur a fato.

For now it comes to a contest: which is the more probable — that the immortal gods, surpassing in the excellence of all things, run about around the couches, and indeed the truckle-beds, of all mortals wherever they are, and, when they have seen someone snoring, cast upon him certain twisted and obscure appearances, which he, terrified out of sleep, carries off in the morning to an interpreter — or that it comes about by nature, that the mind, nimbly agitated, seems in sleep to see what it had seen while awake? Which is more worthy of philosophy — to interpret these things by the superstition of hag-wives, or by the explanation of nature? So that, even if a true conjecture of dreams could now be made, still those who profess it could not make it; for they are drawn from the most worthless and unlettered sort. Yet your Stoics deny that anyone but the wise man can be divine.

A natura autem alia quaedam ratio est, quae docet, quanta sit animi vis seiuncta a corporis sensibus, quod maxime contingit aut dormientibus aut mente permotis. Ut enim deorum animi sine oculis, sine auribus, sine lingua sentiunt inter se, quid quisque sentiat, (ex quo fit, ut homines, etiam cum taciti optent quid aut voveant, non dubitent, quin di illud exaudiant) sic animi hominum, cum aut somno soluti vacant corpore aut mente permoti per se ipsi liberi incitati moventur, cernunt ea, quae permixti cum corpore animi videre non possunt.

Chrysippus, indeed, defines divination in these words: a power that recognizes and sees and sets forth the signs which are portended to men by the gods; and that its task is to know beforehand of what mind the gods are toward men, and what each thing signifies, and in what manner these things are to be attended to and expiated. And the same man defines the interpretation of dreams in this way: that it is a power discerning and explaining what is signified to men by the gods in their sleep. What then? For these things is there need of moderate good sense, or of both outstanding talent and perfect learning? But of such a sort we have known no one.

Atque hanc quidem rationem naturae difficile est fortasse traducere ad id genus divinationis, quod ex arte profectum dicimus, sed tamen id quoque rimatur, quantum potest, Posidonius. Esse censet in natura signa quaedam rerum futurarum. Etenim Ceos accepimus ortum Caniculae diligenter quotannis solere servare coniecturamque capere, ut scribit Ponticus Heraclides, salubrisne an pestilens annus futurus sit. Nam si obscurior et quasi caliginosa stella extiterit, pingue et concretum esse caelum, ut eius adspiratio gravis et pestilens futura sit; sin inlustris et perlucida stella apparuerit, significari caelum esse tenue purumque et propterea salubre.

See, then, that even if I should grant you that divination exists — which I shall never do — we still could find no one who is divine. And of what sort is that mind of the gods, if they signify to us in sleep neither the things which we may understand of ourselves, nor the things for which we can have interpreters? For the gods are like men who would cast upon us things of which we have neither the knowledge nor an expounder — as if Carthaginians or Spaniards were to speak in our Senate without an interpreter.

Democritus autem censet sapienter instituisse veteres, ut hostiarum immolatarum inspicerentur exta; quorum ex habitu atque ex colore tum salubritatis, tum pestilentiae signa percipi, non numquam etiam, quae sit vel sterilitas agrorum vel fertilitas futura. Quae si a natura profecta observatio atque usus agnovit, multa adferre potuit dies, quae animadvertendo notarentur, ut ille Pacuvianus, qui in Chryse physicus inducitur, minime naturam rerum cognosse videatur: nam isti quí linguam avium intéllegunt Plusque éx alieno iécore sapiunt quam éx suo, Magis aúdiendum quam aúscultandum cénseo. Cur? quaeso, cum ipse paucis interpositis versibus dicas satis luculente: Quídquid est hoc, ómnia animat, fórmat, alit, augét, creat, Sépelit recipitque ín sese omnia ómniumque idémst pater, Índidemque eadem aéque oriuntur de íntegro atque eodem óccidunt. Quid est igitur, cur, cum domus sit omnium una, eaque communis, cumque animi hominum semper fuerint futurique sint, cur ii, quid ex quoque eveniat, et quid quamque rem significet, perspicere non possint? Haec habui, inquit, de divinatione quae dicerem.

And indeed, to what end are the obscurities and riddles of dreams? For the gods ought to have wished us to understand the things by which they would warn us for our own sake. What? Is no poet, no natural philosopher obscure?

Nunc illa testabor, non me sortilegos neque eos, qui quaestus causa hariolentur, ne psychomantia quidem, quibus Appius, amicus tuus, uti solebat, agnoscere; non habeo denique nauci Marsum augurem, non vicanos haruspices, non de circo astrologos, non Isiacos coniectores, non interpretes somniorum; non enim sunt ii aut scientia aut arte divini, Séd superstitiósi vates ínpudentesque hárioli Aút inertes aút insani aut quíbus egestas ímperat, Quí sibi semitám non sapiunt, álteri monstránt viam; Quíbus divitias póllicentur, áb iis drachumam ipsí petunt. De hís divitiis síbi deducant dráchumam, reddant cétera. Atque haec quidem Ennius, qui paucis ante versibus esse deos censet, sed eos non curare opinatur, quid agat humanum genus. Ego autem, qui et curare arbitror et monere etiam ac multa praedicere, levitate, vanitate, malitia exclusa divinationem probo. Quae cum dixisset Quintus, Praeclare tu quidem, inquam, paratus

As I asked myself, with much and long reflection, by what means I might be of use to as many people as possible — so that I should never let slip an occasion of serving the commonwealth — none greater offered itself than if I should hand down to my fellow citizens the paths of the noblest arts; and this, I judge, I have already achieved in a good many books. For in that book entitled the Hortensius I exhorted men, as forcefully as I could, to the study of philosophy; and in the four books of the Academica I set out which manner of philosophizing I judged the least arrogant, and at once the most consistent and the most refined.

Quaerenti mihi multumque et diu cogitanti, quanam re possem prodesse quam plurimis, ne quando intermitterem consulere rei publicae, nulla maior occurrebat, quam si optimarum artium vias traderem meis civibus; quod conpluribus iam libris me arbitror consecutum. Nam et cohortati sumus, ut maxime potuimus, ad philosophiae studium eo libro, qui est inscriptus Hortensius, et, quod genus philosophandi minime adrogans maximeque et constans et elegans arbitraremur, quattuor Academicis libris ostendimus.

And since the foundation of philosophy is laid in the ends of good and evil, that subject was thoroughly cleared by me in five books, so that what was said by each philosopher, and what was said against each, might be understood. As many books followed, the Tusculan Disputations, which laid open the matters most necessary for living happily. For the first is on the contempt of death, the second on the endurance of pain, the third on the assuaging of grief, the fourth on the remaining disturbances of the mind; the fifth embraced that subject which most of all illuminates the whole of philosophy, for it teaches that, for living happily, virtue is sufficient to itself.

Cumque fundamentum esset philosophiae positum in finibus bonorum et malorum, perpurgatus est is locus a nobis quinque libris, ut, quid a quoque, et quid contra quemque philosophum diceretur, intellegi posset. Totidem subsecuti libri Tusculanarum disputationum res ad beate vivendum maxime necessarias aperuerunt. Primus enim est de contemnenda morte, secundus de tolerando dolore, de aegritudine lenienda tertius, quartus de reliquis animi perturbationibus, quintus eum locum conplexus est, qui totam philosophiam maxime inlustrat; docet enim ad beate vivendum virtutem se ipsa esse contentam.

When these had been published, three books were completed De Natura Deorum, in which the whole inquiry into that subject is contained. And so that it might be plainly and fully rounded off, I have set about writing these books on divination; and if, as I intend, I add to them a work on fate, ample satisfaction will have been given to this whole inquiry. To these books must be reckoned also the six De Re Publica, which I wrote at the time when I held the helm of the commonwealth — a great subject, proper to philosophy, treated most copiously by Plato, Aristotle, Theophrastus, and the whole household of the Peripatetics. For why should I speak of the Consolation? — which to me at least brings no small healing, and which I think will profit others greatly besides. Lately there has also been interposed that book which I sent to our friend Atticus, Cato Maior de Senectute; and above all, since by philosophy a man is made good and brave, our Cato must be placed in the number of these books.

Quibus rebus editis tres libri perfecti sunt de natura deorum, in quibus omnis eius loci quaestio continetur. Quae ut plane esset cumulateque perfecta, de divinatione ingressi sumus his libris scribere; quibus, ut est in animo, de fato si adiunxerimus, erit abunde satis factum toti huic quaestioni. Atque his libris adnumerandi sunt sex de re publica, quos tum scripsimus, cum gubernacula rei publicae tenebamus. Magnus locus philosophiaeque proprius a Platone, Aristotele, Theophrasto totaque Peripateticorum familia tractatus uberrime. Nam quid ego de Consolatione dicam? quae mihi quidem ipsi sane aliquantum medetur, ceteris item multum illam profuturam puto. Interiectus est etiam nuper liber is, quem ad nostrum Atticum de senectute misimus; in primisque, quoniam philosophia vir bonus efficitur et fortis, Cato noster in horum librorum numero ponendus est.

And since Aristotle, and Theophrastus likewise — men outstanding alike in subtlety and in abundance — joined to philosophy the precepts of speaking as well, my own books on oratory too seem fit to be referred to the same number of books. So there will be three De Oratore, a fourth the Brutus, a fifth the Orator. So far this was the tally; and toward what remained I was pressing with eager spirit, so prepared that, unless some weightier cause had stood in the way, I would have suffered no province of philosophy to lie unillumined by Latin letters and unopened. For what greater or better service can we render the commonwealth than if we teach and instruct the young? — especially in these manners and these times, in which it has so far slipped that it must be reined in and held in check by all our resources.

Cumque Aristoteles itemque Theophrastus, excellentes viri cum subtilitate, tum copia, cum philosophia dicendi etiam praecepta coniunxerint, nostri quoque oratorii libri in eundem librorum numerum referendi videntur. Ita tres erunt de oratore, quartus Brutus, quintus orator. Adhuc haec erant; ad reliqua alacri tendebamus animo sic parati, ut, nisi quae causa gravior obstitisset, nullum philosophiae locum esse pateremur, qui non Latinis litteris inlustratus pateret. Quod enim munus rei publicae adferre maius meliusve possumus, quam si docemus atque erudimus iuventutem? his praesertim moribus atque temporibus, quibus ita prolapsa est, ut omnium opibus refrenanda atque coe+rcenda sit.

Nor indeed do I trust that this can be brought about — what is not even to be demanded — that all the young should turn themselves to these studies. A few, would that there were! Yet their industry might range widely through the commonwealth. For my part I take a harvest of my labor even from those who, already advanced in age, find rest in my books; by their eagerness to read, my own eagerness to write is more keenly spurred day by day; and these, indeed, I have found to be more numerous than I had supposed. This too is a magnificent thing, and a glory to the men of Rome — that they should have no need of Greek letters for philosophy;

Nec vero id effici posse confido, quod ne postulandum quidem est, ut omnes adulescentes se ad haec studia convertant. Pauci utinam! quorum tamen in re publica late patere poterit industria. Equidem ex iis etiam fructum capio laboris mei, qui iam aetate provecti in nostris libris adquiescunt; quorum studio legendi meum scribendi studium vehementius in dies incitatur; quos quidem plures, quam rebar, esse cognovi. Magnificum illud etiam Romanisque hominibus gloriosum, ut Graecis de philosophia litteris non egeant;

which I shall surely attain, if I complete what I have begun. And to me, in fact, the cause of expounding philosophy was furnished by the grievous calamity of the state, when amid civil arms I could neither guard the commonwealth in my own fashion, nor do nothing, nor find what else, at least worthy of me, I might do. My fellow citizens, then, will grant me their pardon — or rather will be grateful — that, when the commonwealth lay in the power of a single man, I neither hid myself away, nor deserted my post, nor cast myself down, nor bore myself as one angry at a man or at the times; nor, furthermore, did I either flatter or admire another’s fortune in such a way that I should repent of my own. For this very thing I had learned from Plato and from philosophy: that there are certain natural revolutions of commonwealths, so that they are held now by leading men, now by the people, sometimes by single rulers.

quod adsequar profecto, si instituta perfecero. Ac mihi quidem explicandae philosophiae causam adtulit casus gravis civitatis, cum in armis civilibus nec tueri meo more rem publicam nec nihil agere poteram nec, quid potius, quod quidem me dignum esset, agerem, reperiebam. Dabunt igitur mihi veniam mei cives vel gratiam potius habebunt, quod, cum esset in unius potestate res publica, neque ego me abdidi neque deserui neque adflixi neque ita gessi, quasi homini aut temporibus iratus, neque porro ita aut adulatus aut admiratus fortunam sum alterius, ut me meae paeniteret. Id enim ipsum a Platone philosophiaque didiceram, naturales esse quasdam conversiones rerum publicarum, ut eae tum a principibus tenerentur, tum a populis, aliquando a singulis.

And when this had befallen our own commonwealth, then, stripped of my former functions, I began to renew these studies, both that my mind might be lightened of its troubles by this means above all, and that I might be of use to my fellow citizens in whatever way I could. For in my books I delivered my opinion as in the Senate, I addressed the assembly, I supposed philosophy to have been put in place for me in lieu of administering the commonwealth. Now, since I have begun to be consulted on public affairs, my labor must be given to the commonwealth — or rather all my thought and care must be set upon it, and only so much left to this study as shall be free from public office and duty. But of this elsewhere, and at greater length; now let us return to the discussion we set ourselves.

Quod cum accidisset nostrae rei publicae, tum pristinis orbati muneribus haec studia renovare coepimus, ut et animus molestiis hac potissimum re levaretur et prodessemus civibus nostris, qua re cumque possemus. In libris enim sententiam dicebamus, contionabamur, philosophiam nobis pro rei publicae procuratione substitutam putabamus. Nunc quoniam de re publica consuli coepti sumus, tribuenda est opera rei publicae, vel omnis potius in ea cogitatio et cura ponenda, tantum huic studio relinquendum, quantum vacabit a publico officio et munere. Sed haec alias pluribus; nunc ad institutam disputationem revertamur.

For when my brother Quintus had discoursed on divination in the terms set down in the preceding book, and we seemed to have walked about enough, we sat down in the library that is in the Lyceum. And I said: You have defended the Stoics’ opinion with care, Quintus, and in the Stoic manner; and — what most delights me — you have used very many of our own examples, and those indeed clear and illustrious. I must reply, then, to what you have said, but in such a way that I affirm nothing, that I question everything, doubting for the most part and distrusting even myself. For if I had anything certain to say, I myself would be playing the diviner — I, who deny that divination exists.

Nam cum de divinatione Quintus frater ea disseruisset, quae superiore libro scripta sunt, satisque ambulatum videretur, tum in bibliotheca, quae in Lycio est, adsedimus. Atque ego: Adcurate tu quidem, inquam, Quinte, et Stoice Stoicorum sententiam defendisti, quodque me maxime delectat, plurimis nostris exemplis usus es, et iis quidem claris et inlustribus. Dicendum est mihi igitur ad ea, quae sunt a te dicta, sed ita, nihil ut adfirmem, quaeram omnia, dubitans plerumque et mihi ipse diffidens. Si enim aliquid certi haberem, quod dicerem, ego ipse divinarem, qui esse divinationem nego.

What moves me, in fact, is that question which Carneades above all was wont to ask: of what things divination is concerned — whether of those that are perceived by the senses. But these we do see, hear, taste, smell, touch. Is there, then, anything in these matters that we perceive by foresight or by some stirring of the mind rather than by nature itself? Or could that diviner — whoever he is — if he were robbed of his eyes, as Tiresias was, say which things are white, which black; or, if he were deaf, discern the varieties or the measures of sounds? To none, therefore, of the things that are taken in by sense is divination applied. And yet not even in those matters that are handled by an art is there any need of divination. For we are accustomed to bring to the sick not seers or fortune-tellers but physicians; nor, in truth, do those who wish to use the lyre or the pipe receive instruction in handling them from haruspices, but from musicians.

Etenim me movet illud, quod in primis Carneades quaerere solebat, quarumnam rerum divinatio esset, earumne, quae sensibus perciperentur. At eas quidem cernimus, audimus, gustamus, olfacimus, tangimus. Num quid ergo in his rebus est, quod provisione aut permotione mentis magis quam natura ipsa sentiamus? aut num nescio qui ille divinus, si oculis captus sit, ut Tiresias fuit, possit, quae alba sint, quae nigra, dicere aut, si surdus sit, varietates vocum aut modos noscere? Ad nullam igitur earum rerum, quae sensu accipiuntur, divinatio adhibetur. Atqui ne in iis quidem rebus, quae arte tractantur, divinatione opus est. Etenim ad aegros non vates aut hariolos, sed medicos solemus adducere, nec vero, qui fidibus aut tibiis uti volunt, ab haruspicibus accipiunt earum tractationem, sed a musicis.

The same reasoning holds in letters and in the rest of the subjects that have a discipline. Do you suppose that those said to divine can answer whether the sun is greater than the earth or only as great as it appears; whether the moon uses its own light or the sun’s; what motion the sun and the moon have, and what the five stars that are said to wander? Neither do those reckoned diviners profess that they will say these things, nor, of the figures described in geometry, which are true and which false; for these belong to the mathematicians, not to the fortune-tellers. As for those matters that are dealt with in philosophy, is there anything that any of the diviners is wont either to answer or to be consulted on — what is good, what evil, what neither? For these are proper to the philosophers.

Eadem in litteris ratio est reliquisque rebus, quarum est disciplina. Num censes eos, qui divinare dicuntur, posse respondere, sol maiorne quam terra sit an tantus, quantus videatur? lunaque suo lumine an solis utatur? sol, luna quem motum habeat? quem quinque stellae, quae errare dicuntur? Nec haec, qui divini habentur, profitentur se esse dicturos, nec eorum, quae in geometria describuntur, quae vera, quae falsa sint; sunt enim ea mathematicorum, non hariolorum. De illis vero rebus, quae in philosophia versantur, num quid est, quod quisquam divinorum aut respondere soleat aut consuli, quid bonum sit, quid malum, quid neutrum? sunt enim haec propria philosophorum.

And what of duty? Does anyone consult a haruspex on how he is to live with his parents, with his brothers, with his friends? On how he is to use his money, how his honors, how his command? These matters are usually referred to wise men, not to diviners. And what of the things handled by the dialecticians or by the natural philosophers — can any of them be divined? Whether the world is one or many; what are the first beginnings of things, from which all things are born: that is the wisdom of the natural philosophers. And how you are to undo the Liar — which they call pseudomenon — or how you are to withstand the heap (which, if need be, one might call by a Latin word the "piler," but there is no need; for, just as philosophy itself, so many words of the Greeks, and so too "sorites," are sufficiently worn into Latin speech): these too, then, the dialecticians will pronounce upon, not the diviners. And what of when it is asked what the best constitution of the commonwealth is, what laws, what manners are useful or useless — shall haruspices be summoned from Etruria, or shall leading men and chosen experts in civil affairs determine it?

Quid? de officio num quis haruspicem consulit, quem ad modum sit cum parentibus, cum fratribus, cum amicis vivendum? quem ad modum utendum pecunia, quem ad modum honore, quem ad modum imperio? Ad sapientes haec, non ad divinos referri solent. Quid? quae a dialecticis aut a physicis tractantur, num quid eorum divinari potest? unusne mundus sit an plures, quae sint initia rerum, ex quibus nascuntur omnia: physicorum est ista prudentia. Quo modo autem mentientem, quem yeudo/menon vocant, dissolvas aut quem ad modum soriti resistas (quem, si necesse sit, Latino verbo liceat acervalem appellare; sed nihil opus est; ut enim ipsa philosophia et multa verba Graecorum, sic sorites satis Latino sermone tritus est): ergo haec quoque dialectici dicent, non divini. Quid? cum quaeritur, qui sit optimus rei publicae status, quae leges, qui mores aut utiles aut inutiles, haruspicesne ex Etruria arcessentur, an principes statuent et delecti viri periti rerum civilium?

But if there is no divination of the things that lie under the senses, nor of those contained in the arts, nor of those discussed in philosophy, nor of those that turn upon public affairs, then of what things it may be I do not understand at all; for either it ought to be of all things, or some matter must be assigned to it in which it can be exercised. But there is no divination of all things, as reason has shown, nor is there found any place or matter over which we could set divination in charge. See, then, whether there is no divination at all. There is a certain common Greek verse to this effect: He who shall conjecture well — that man I shall pronounce the best seer. Will a seer, then, conjecture better than a helmsman what storm threatens, or attain by conjecture the nature of a disease more keenly than a physician, or the conduct of a war more prudently than a general?

Quodsi nec earum rerum, quae subiectae sensibus sunt, ulla divinatio est nec earum, quae artibus continentur, nec earum, quae in philosophia disseruntur, nec earum, quae in re publica versantur, quarum rerum sit, nihil prorsus intellego; nam aut omnium debet esse, aut aliqua ei materia danda est, in qua versari possit. Sed nec omnium divinatio est, ut ratio docuit, nec locus nec materia invenitur, cui divinationem praeficere possimus. Vide igitur, ne nulla sit divinatio. Est quidam Graecus vulgaris in hanc sententiam versus: Bene quí coniciet, vátem hunc perhibebo óptumum. Num igitur aut, quae tempestas inpendeat, vates melius coniciet quam gubernator aut morbi naturam acutius quam medicus aut belli administrationem prudentius quam inperator coniectura adsequetur?

But I noticed, Quintus, that you carefully drew divination away from those conjectures which involve art and good judgment, and away from those things which are grasped by the senses or by the crafts, and that you defined it thus: divination is the prediction and foreknowledge of those things which are fortuitous. First, you are rolled back to the same point. For the physician and the helmsman and the general all have a foreknowledge of fortuitous things. Could any haruspex or augur or seer or dreamer conjecture better than a physician whether a sick man will recover from his disease, than a helmsman whether a ship will escape from danger, than a general whether an army will escape from an ambush?

Sed animadverti, Quinte, te caute et ab iis coniecturis, quae haberent artem atque prudentiam, et ab iis rebus, quae sensibus aut artificiis perciperentur, abducere divinationem eamque ita definire: divinationem esse earum rerum praedictionem et praesensionem, quae essent fortuitae. Primum eodem revolveris. Nam et medici et gubernatoris et imperatoris praesensio est rerum fortuitarum. Num igitur aut haruspex aut augur aut vates quis aut somnians melius coniecerit aut e morbo evasurum aegrotum aut e periculo navem aut ex insidiis exercitum quam medicus, quam gubernator, quam imperator?

And yet you said that not even this belonged to the diviner — to foresee, by certain signs, impending winds or rains (and on this point some of my own renderings of Aratus were recited by you from memory), even though these very things are fortuitous; for they happen more often than not, but not always. Where, then, is this foreknowledge of fortuitous things which you call divination, and on what does it operate? For the things that can be foreseen by art or by reasoning or by experience or by conjecture, these you hold should be assigned not to diviners but to experts. So it is left that the only fortuitous things that can be divined are those which can be foreseen by no art and no wisdom — as, if anyone had said many years beforehand that the famous Marcus Marcellus, who was three times consul, would perish in a shipwreck, he would surely have divined it; for by no other art and by no wisdom could he have known it. Foreknowledge, then, of such things as are set in the lap of fortune is divination.

Atqui ne illa quidem divinantis esse dicebas, ventos aut imbres inpendentes quibusdam praesentire signis (in quo nostra quaedam Aratea memoriter a te pronuntiata sunt), etsi haec ipsa fortuita sunt; plerumque enim, non semper eveniunt. Quae est igitur aut ubi versatur fortuitarum rerum praesensio, quam divinationem vocas? Quae enim praesentiri aut arte aut ratione aut usu aut coniectura possunt, ea non divinis tribuenda putas, sed peritis. Ita relinquitur, ut ea fortuita divinari possint, quae nulla nec arte nec sapientia provideri possunt; ut, si quis M. Marcellum illum, qui ter consul fuit, multis annis ante dixisset naufragio esse periturum, divinasset profecto; nulla enim arte alia id nec sapientia scire potuisset. Talium ergo rerum, quae in fortuna positae sunt, praesensio divinatio est.

Can there, then, be any foreknowledge of things which have no rational ground at all for their coming to be? For what else are luck, fortune, chance, and outcome, except when something has fallen out and come to pass in such a way that it could also have fallen out and come to pass otherwise? How, then, can a thing that happens at random by blind chance and the rolling of fortune be foreknown and predicted?

Potestne igitur earum rerum, quae nihil habent rationis, quare futurae sint, esse ulla praesensio? Quid est enim aliud fors, quid fortuna, quid casus, quid eventus, nisi cum sic aliquid cecidit, sic evenit, ut vel aliter cadere atque evenire potuerit? Quo modo ergo id, quod temere fit caeco casu et volubilitate fortunae, praesentiri et praedici potest?

A physician foresees a worsening disease by reasoning, a general an ambush, a helmsman a storm; and yet even these men, who form no opinion without sure reasoning, are often deceived — as the farmer, when he sees the flower of the olive, thinks he will see the fruit as well, and not without reason; yet sometimes even so he is deceived. But if those men are deceived who say nothing without some probable conjecture and reasoning, what is to be thought of the conjecture of those who foresee the future by entrails, or birds, or portents, or oracles, or dreams? I am not yet saying how worthless these signs are — the cleft of the liver, the cawing of the raven, the flight of the eagle, the shooting of a star, the cries of men in frenzy, lots, dreams; of each of these I shall speak in its place; for now I speak of them all together.

Medicus morbum ingravescentem ratione providet, insidias imperator, tempestates gubernator; et tamen ii ipsi saepe falluntur, qui nihil sine certa ratione opinantur; ut agricola, cum florem oleae videt, bacam quoque se visurum putat, non sine ratione ille quidem; sed non numquam tamen fallitur. Quodsi falluntur ii, qui nihil sine aliqua probabili coniectura ac ratione dicunt, quid existimandum est de coniectura eorum, qui extis aut avibus aut ostentis aut oraclis aut somniis futura praesentiunt? Nondum dico, quam haec signa nulla sint, fissum iecoris, corvi cantus, volatus aquilae, stellae traiectio, voces furentium, sortes, somnia; de quibus singulis dicam suo loco; nunc de universis.

How can anything be foreseen as going to be, when it has neither any cause nor any mark to show that it will be? Eclipses of the sun, and likewise of the moon, are predicted for many years in advance by those who pursue the motions of the heavenly bodies by calculation; for they predict the things which the necessity of nature is going to bring about. They see, from the most regular motion of the moon, when she, set opposite the sun, will run into the shadow of the earth, which is the cone of night, so that she must necessarily be darkened; and when that same moon, placed beneath and over against the sun, will darken its light to our eyes; in what sign each of the wandering stars will be at each time; and what rising of some sign, and what setting, will fall on each day. You see by what reasoning those proceed who say these things beforehand.

Qui potest provideri quicquam futurum esse, quod neque causam habet ullam neque notam, cur futurum sit? Solis defectiones itemque lunae praedicuntur in multos annos ab iis, qui siderum motus numeris persequuntur; ea praedicunt enim, quae naturae necessitas perfectura est. Vident ex constantissimo motu lunae, quando illa e regione solis facta incurrat in umbram terrae, quae est meta noctis, ut eam obscurari necesse sit, quandoque eadem luna subiecta atque opposita soli nostris oculis eius lumen obscuret, quo in signo quaeque errantium stellarum quoque tempore futura sit, qui exortus quoque die signi alicuius aut qui occasus futurus sit. Haec qui ante dicunt, quam rationem sequantur, vides.

But those who say that a treasure will be found, or an inheritance will come, what do they follow? Or in what nature of things does that future event reside? But if these things, and others of the same kind, have any such necessity, what is there left, then, that we should suppose to happen by chance or by random fortune? For nothing is so contrary to reason and constancy as fortune, so that it does not seem to me to fall even within a god’s power to know what is going to happen by chance and at random. For if he knows it, then it will certainly come to pass; but if it will certainly come to pass, there is no such thing as fortune; yet there is such a thing as fortune; therefore there is no foreknowledge of fortuitous things.

Qui thesaurum inventum iri aut hereditatem venturam dicunt, quid sequuntur? aut in qua rerum natura inest id futurum? Quodsi haec eaque, quae sunt eiusdem generis, habent aliquam talem necessitatem, quid est tandem, quod casu fieri aut forte fortuna putemus? Nihil enim est tam contrarium rationi et constantiae quam fortuna, ut mihi ne in deum quidem cadere videatur, ut sciat, quid casu et fortuito futurum sit. Si enim scit, certe illud eveniet; sin certe eveniet, nulla fortuna est; est autem fortuna; rerum igitur fortuitarum nulla praesensio est.

Or, if you deny that there is such a thing as fortune, and say that everything which happens and which will happen has been determined by fate from all eternity, then change your definition of divination, which you said was the foreknowledge of fortuitous things. For if nothing can come to be, nothing befall, nothing come to pass, except what from all eternity has been certain to be at a fixed time, what fortune can there be? And once fortune is taken away, what room is left for divination — which you have called the foreknowledge of fortuitous things? Although you did say that everything which happens or will happen is held fast by fate. The very name of fate is downright old-womanish and full of superstition; yet still, among the Stoics much is said about that fate; of which I shall speak elsewhere; for now, only what is necessary.

Aut si negas esse fortunam et omnia, quae fiunt quaeque futura sunt, ex omni aeternitate definita dicis esse fataliter, muta definitionem divinationis, quam dicebas praesensionem esse rerum fortuitarum. Si enim nihil fieri potest, nihil accidere, nihil evenire, nisi quod ab omni aeternitate certum fuerit esse futurum rato tempore, quae potest esse fortuna? qua sublata qui locus est divinationi? quae a te fortuitarum rerum est dicta praesensio. Quamquam dicebas omnia, quae fierent futurave essent, fato contineri. Anile sane et plenum superstitionis fati nomen ipsum; sed tamen apud Stoicos de isto fato multa dicuntur; de quo alias; nunc quod necesse est.

If all things come about by fate, what good does divination do me? For what the diviner predicts is indeed going to be, so that I do not even know what to make of that affair, when an eagle called back our friend Deiotarus from his journey; for if he had not turned back, he would have had to lodge in that chamber which collapsed the very next night, and so he would have been crushed beneath the ruin. But that — if it had been fated — he would not have escaped; and if it had not been fated, he would not have fallen into that mishap. What help, then, is divination? Or what is the point of these warnings to me — whether lots, or entrails, or any prediction? For if it was fated that the fleets of the Roman people in the First Punic War should be destroyed, the one by shipwreck, the other sunk by the Carthaginians, then even if the sacred chickens had given a most favorable feeding-omen to the consuls Lucius Junius and Publius Claudius, the fleets would have been destroyed all the same. But if, had the auspices been obeyed, the fleets were not going to be destroyed, then they were not destroyed by fate; and yet you hold that all things come about by fate;

Si omnia fato, quid mihi divinatio prodest? Quod enim is, qui divinat, praedicit, id vero futurum est, ut ne illud quidem sciam quale sit, quod Deiotarum, necessarium nostrum, ex itinere aquila revocavit; qui nisi revertisset, in eo conclavi ei cubandum fuisset, quod proxuma nocte corruit; ruina igitur oppressus esset. At id neque, si fatum fuerat, effugisset nec, si non fuerat, in eum casum incidisset. Quid ergo adiuvat divinatio? aut quid est, quod me moneant aut sortes aut exta aut ulla praedictio? Si enim fatum fuit classes populi Romani bello Punico primo, alteram naufragio, alteram a Poenis depressam, interire, etiamsi tripudium solistumum pulli fecissent L. Iunio et P. Claudio consulibus, classes tamen interissent. Sin, cum auspiciis obtemperatum esset, interiturae classes non fuerunt, non interierunt fato; vultis autem omnia fato;

therefore there is no such thing as divination. But if it was fated that in the Second Punic War the army of the Roman people should be destroyed at Lake Trasimene, could that have been avoided, had the consul Flaminius obeyed those signs and those auspices by which he was forbidden to fight? Certainly it could. Either, then, the army was not destroyed by fate, or, if it was destroyed by fate (which is certainly what you must say), then even if he had obeyed the auspices, the same thing would have come to pass; for the fates cannot be changed. Where, then, is this divination of the Stoics? For if all things come about by fate, it can give us no warning to be more careful; for in whatever way we conduct ourselves, that will still happen which is going to happen. But if it can be averted, there is no fate; and so there is not even divination, since divination is of things to come. But nothing is going to happen for certain, when by some act of expiation it can be brought about that it does not happen.

nulla igitur est divinatio. Quodsi fatum fuit bello Punico secundo exercitum populi Romani ad lacum Trasumennum interire, num id vitari potuit, si Flaminius consul iis signis iisque auspiciis, quibus pugnare prohibebatur, paruisset? Certe potuit. Aut igitur non fato interiit exercitus, aut, si fato (quod certe vobis ita dicendum est), etiamsi obtemperasset auspiciis, idem eventurum fuisset; mutari enim fata non possunt. Ubi est igitur ista divinatio Stoicorum? quae, si fato omnia fiunt, nihil nos admonere potest, ut cautiores simus; quoquo enim modo nos gesserimus, fiet tamen illud, quod futurum est; sin autem id potest flecti, nullum est fatum; ita ne divinatio quidem, quoniam ea rerum futurarum est. Nihil autem est pro certo futurum, quod potest aliqua procuratione accidere ne fiat.

And, for that matter, I do not think that the knowledge of things to come is even useful to us. For what kind of life would Priam have had, if from his youth he had known what outcomes he was going to have in old age? Let us leave the legends and look at things nearer home. In my Consolation I gathered together the gravest ends of the most illustrious men of our state. What of it, then? To pass over the earlier ones — do you think it would have been useful to Marcus Crassus, at the time when he flourished with the greatest wealth and fortunes, to know that, after his son Publius was killed and his army destroyed, he was destined to perish beyond the Euphrates in disgrace and dishonor? Or do you suppose that Gnaeus Pompey would have taken joy in his three consulships, his three triumphs, and the glory of his greatest deeds, if he had known that he was going to be butchered in the desolation of Egypt with his army lost, and that after his death those things would follow which we cannot speak of without tears?

Atque ego ne utilem quidem arbitror esse nobis futurarum rerum scientiam. Quae enim vita fuisset Priamo, si ab adulescentia scisset, quos eventus senectutis esset habiturus? Abeamus a fabulis, propiora videamus. Clarissimorum hominum nostrae civitatis gravissimos exitus in Consolatione collegimus. Quid igitur? ut omittamus superiores, Marcone Crasso putas utile fuisse tum, cum maxumis opibus fortunisque florebat, scire sibi interfecto Publio filio exercituque deleto trans Euphratem cum ignominia et dedecore esse pereundum? An Cn. Pompeium censes tribus suis consulatibus, tribus triumphis, maximarum rerum gloria laetaturum fuisse, si sciret se in solitudine Aegyptiorum trucidatum iri amisso exercitu, post mortem vero ea consecutura, quae sine lacrimis non possumus dicere?

And what of Caesar — what agony of soul, do we think, would he have spent his life in, had he divined that he would lie butchered in that Senate which he himself had for the greater part recruited, in the Hall of Pompey, before the very image of Pompey himself, with so many of his own centurions looking on, slain by the noblest citizens, some of them men he had himself decked out in every distinction, lying there so that not one even of his slaves, let alone of his friends, would come near his body? Surely, then, ignorance of future evils is more useful than knowledge of them.

Quid vero Caesarem putamus, si divinasset fore ut in eo senatu, quem maiore ex parte ipse cooptasset, in curia Pompeia ante ipsius Pompeii simulacrum tot centurionibus suis inspectantibus a nobilissumis civibus, partim etiam a se omnibus rebus ornatis, trucidatus ita iaceret, ut ad eius corpus non modo amicorum, sed ne servorum quidem quisquam accederet, quo cruciatu animi vitam acturum fuisse? Certe igitur ignoratio futurorum malorum utilior est quam scientia.

For this, at any rate, can in no way be said, especially by the Stoics: Pompey would not have gone to arms, Crassus would not have crossed the Euphrates, Caesar would not have taken up the civil war. Therefore their ends were not fated; yet you hold that all things come about by fate; nothing, then, would it have profited those men to divine; and, what is more, they would have lost all the enjoyment of their earlier life; for what could be a delight to them as they brooded on their own ends? So, whichever way the Stoics turn, all their cleverness must lie prostrate. For if the thing that is going to come to pass can come to pass in either this way or that, fortune has the greatest power; and the things that are fortuitous cannot be certain. But if it is certain what is going to be in each matter at each time, what is there in which the haruspices help me? For when they have said that the most grievous things are portended, they add at the very end that everything will fall out more lightly once the divine rites of expiation have been performed;

Nam illud quidem dici, praesertim a Stoicis, nullo modo potest: Non isset ad arma Pompeius, non transisset Crassus Euphratem, non suscepisset bellum civile Caesar. Non igitur fatalis exitus habuerunt; vultis autem evenire omnia fato; nihil ergo illis profuisset divinare; atque etiam omnem fructum vitae superioris perdidissent; quid enim posset iis esse laetum exitus suos cogitantibus? Ita, quoquo sese verterint Stoici, iaceat necesse est omnis eorum sollertia. Si enim id, quod eventurum est, vel hoc vel illo modo potest evenire, fortuna valet plurimum; quae autem fortuita sunt, certa esse non possunt. Sin autem certum est, quid quaque de re quoque tempore futurum sit, quid est, quod me adiuvent haruspices? qui cum res tristissimas portendi dixerunt, addunt ad extremum omnia levius casura rebus divinis procuratis;

For if nothing happens outside of fate, nothing can be lightened by an act of worship. This is Homer’s view, when he brings on Jupiter complaining that he could not snatch his son Sarpedon from death against fate. The same thing is signified by that line of the Greek poet, turned to this sense: That which is fixed to be overmasters even Jove on high. The whole notion of fate seems to me to be justly mocked even in a line of Atellan farce; but in matters so grave there is no place for jesting. Let the argument, then, be brought to its conclusion. For if nothing can be foreseen of those things that happen by chance, since they cannot be certain, there is no divination; but if they can be foreseen on this ground, that they are certain and fated, then again there is no divination — for you were saying that divination has to do with fortuitous things.

si enim nihil fit extra fatum, nihil levari re divina potest. Hoc sentit Homerus, cum querentem Iovem inducit, quod Sarpedonem filium a morte contra fatum eripere non posset. Hoc idem significat Graecus ille in eam sententiam versus: Quod fóre paratum est, íd summum exsuperát Iovem. Totum omnino fatum etiam Atellanio versu iure mihi esse inrisum videtur; sed in rebus tam severis non est iocandi locus. Concludatur igitur ratio: Si enim provideri nihil potest futurum esse eorum, quae casu fiunt, quia esse certa non possunt, divinatio nulla est; sin autem idcirco possunt provideri, quia certa sunt et fatalia, rursus divinatio nulla est; eam enim tu fortuitarum rerum esse dicebas.

But let this have been, as it were, a first sally of my discourse with light-armed troops; now let us engage at close quarters and try, if we can, to dislodge the horns of your argument. For you were saying that there are two kinds of divination, one by art, the other natural; that the kind by art consists partly in conjecture, partly in long-continued observation; that the natural kind is what the mind seizes or receives from without, from the divine power, the source from which we all have our minds drawn off, or received, or poured as a libation. As the kinds of divination by art you laid down roughly these: that of those who read entrails, and of those who foretell from lightning-flashes and portents; then that of the augurs, and of those who use signs or omens; and every conjectural kind you placed roughly within this same class.

Sed haec fuerit nobis tamquam levis armaturae prima orationis excursio; nunc comminus agamus experiamurque, si possimus cornua commovere disputationis tuae. Duo enim genera divinandi esse dicebas, unum artificiosum, alterum naturale; artificiosum constare partim ex coniectura, partim ex observatione diuturna; naturale, quod animus arriperet aut exciperet extrinsecus ex divinitate, unde omnes animos haustos aut acceptos aut libatos haberemus. Artificiosa divinationis illa fere genera ponebas: extispicum eorumque, qui ex fulgoribus ostentisque praedicerent, tum augurum eorumque, qui signis aut ominibus uterentur, omneque genus coniecturale in hoc fere genere ponebas.

The natural kind, on the other hand, seemed either to be uttered and, as it were, poured out in an excitement of the mind, or to be foreseen by a mind set free, during sleep, from the senses and from cares. Moreover, you derived all divination from three things — from a god, from fate, from nature. Yet even so, since you could explain nothing, you fought with a marvelous abundance of made-up examples. About this I should like to say, first of all, this: I judge it not the part of a philosopher to use witnesses, who may be true by chance or false and counterfeit out of malice; one ought to teach by arguments and reasons why each thing is so, not by outcomes, and least of all by outcomes which I am at liberty not to believe.

Illud autem naturale aut concitatione mentis edi et quasi fundi videbatur aut animo per somnum sensibus et curis vacuo provideri. Duxisti autem divinationem omnem a tribus rebus, a deo, a fato, a natura. Sed tamen cum explicare nihil posses, pugnasti commenticiorum exemplorum mirifica copia. De quo primum hoc libet dicere: Hoc ego philosophi non esse arbitror, testibus uti, qui aut casu veri aut malitia falsi fictique esse possunt; argumentis et rationibus oportet, quare quidque ita sit, docere, non eventis, iis praesertim, quibus mihi liceat non credere.

Let me begin from haruspicy, which I think ought to be cultivated for the sake of the commonwealth and of the common religion. But we are alone; it is permitted to search out the truth without giving offense — for me especially, who am in doubt about most of these matters. Let us examine the entrails first, if you please. Can anyone, then, be persuaded that the things said to be signified by entrails have been learned by the haruspices through long-continued observation? How long-continued was that observation? Or over how long a stretch of time could it have been carried on? Or in what way was it agreed among them which part is hostile, which part friendly, which cleft betokens danger, which some advantage? Or did the Etruscan haruspices, the Elians, the Egyptians, the Carthaginians compare these matters among themselves? But that, besides being something that could not have happened, cannot even be imagined; for we see different peoples interpret the entrails in different ways, and that there is no single discipline common to all.

Ut ordiar ab haruspicina, quam ego rei publicae causa communisque religionis colendam censeo. Sed soli sumus; licet verum exquirere sine invidia, mihi praesertim de plerisque dubitanti. Inspiciamus, si placet, exta primum. Persuaderi igitur cuiquam potest ea, quae significari dicuntur extis, cognita esse ab haruspicibus observatione diuturna? Quam diuturna ista fuit? aut quam longinquo tempore observari potuit? aut quo modo est conlatum inter ipsos, quae pars inimica, quae pars familiaris esset, quod fissum periculum, quod commodum aliquod ostenderet? An haec inter se haruspices Etrusci, Elii, Aegyptii, Poeni contulerunt? At id, praeterquam quod fieri non potuit, ne fingi quidem potest; alios enim alio more videmus exta interpretari, nec esse unam omnium disciplinam.

And surely, if there is in the entrails some force that reveals things to come, that force must necessarily either be bound up with the nature of things or be shaped in some way by the will of the gods and by divine power. With the nature of things — so great, so glorious, diffused through all regions and motions — what can a cock’s gall-bladder have in common (for there are those who say that these entrails above all are the most telling), nay, what natural thing has the liver or the heart or the lung of a fat bull, that could reveal what is going to be?

Et certe, si est in extis aliqua vis, quae declaret futura, necesse est eam aut cum rerum natura esse coniunctam aut conformari quodam modo numine deorum vique divina. Cum rerum natura tanta tamque praeclara in omnes partes motusque diffusa quid habere potest commune non dicam gallinaceum fel (sunt enim, qui vel argutissima haec exta esse dicant), sed tauri opimi iecur aut cor aut pulmo quid habet naturale, quod declarare possit, quid futurum sit?

Democritus, to be sure, trifles not unwittily, in the manner of a natural philosopher — a class than which nothing is more arrogant: What lies before their feet no man regards; they scan the regions of the sky. Yet he holds that by the condition and color of the entrails this much, at any rate, is revealed: the kind of fodder, and the abundance or scantiness of the things the earth brings forth; and he thinks that healthfulness too, or pestilence, is signified by the entrails. O blessed mortal! who, I am quite certain, was never at a loss for amusement. That this man should have been delighted by such great trifles, so as not to see that the thing would then be probable only if the entrails of all the beasts changed themselves at the same time into the same condition and color! But if at the same hour one beast’s liver is sleek and full, another’s rough and shrunken, what is there that could be revealed by the condition and color of the entrails?

Democritus tamen non inscite nugatur, ut physicus, quo genere nihil adrogantius: Quód est ante pedes, némo spectat, caéli scrutantúr plagas. Verum is tamen habitu extorum et colore declarari censet haec dumtaxat: pabuli genus et earum rerum, quas terra procreet, vel ubertatem vel tenuitatem; salubritatem etiam aut pestilentiam extis significari putat. O mortalem beatum! cui certo scio ludum numquam defuisse; huncine hominem tantis delectatum esse nugis, ut non videret tum futurum id veri simile, si omnium pecudum exta eodem tempore in eundem habitum se coloremque converterent? Sed si eadem hora aliae pecudis iecur nitidum atque plenum est, aliae horridum et exile, quid est, quod declarari possit habitu extorum et colore?

Or is this of the same sort as that saying of Pherecydes which was cited by you? — who, when he had seen water drawn from a well, said an earthquake was going to come. Too little shamelessly, I suppose, do they dare, when an earthquake has occurred, to say what force produced it; do they actually foreknow, even beforehand, that it is going to happen, from the color of the spring-water? Many things of this sort are said in the schools, but take care that it not be unnecessary to believe them all.

an hoc eiusdem modi est, quale Pherecydeum illud, quod est a te dictum? qui cum aquam ex puteo vidisset haustam, terrae motum dixit futurum. Parum, credo, inpudenter, quod, cum factus est motus, dicere audent, quae vis id effecerit; etiamne futurum esse aquae iugis colore praesentiunt? Multa istius modi dicuntur in scholis, sed credere omnia vide ne non sit necesse.

But let those Democritean claims be true, by all means: when do we ever search out such things from the entrails? Or when have we ever heard anything of that kind from a haruspex once the entrails have been inspected? They warn of dangers from water or from fire; now they announce inheritances, now losses; they handle the friendly and vital cleft; they consider the head of the liver from every side most carefully; and if it is in fact not found, they think nothing more grievous could have befallen.

Verum sint sane ista Democritea vera; quando ea nos extis exquirimus? aut quando aliquid eius modi ab haruspice inspectis extis audivimus? Ab aqua aut ab igni pericula monent; tum hereditates, tum damna denuntiant; fissum familiare et vitale tractant; caput iecoris ex omni parte diligentissime considerant; si vero id non est inventum, nihil putant accidere potuisse tristius.

These things, certainly, could not have been observed, as I taught above. They are therefore inventions of art, not of antiquity — if there is any art at all of things unknown. But what kinship do they have with the nature of things? Even granting that it is joined together and continuous by one accord — which I see has found favor with the natural philosophers, and most of all with those who said that everything which exists is one — what can the universe have bound up with the finding of a treasure? For if by the entrails an increase of money is revealed to me, and that happens by nature, then, first, the entrails are joined to the universe, and second, my gain is contained within the nature of things. Are the natural philosophers not ashamed to say such things? For granted that there is now in the nature of things some contagion — which I concede there is (for the Stoics gather many instances; thus the little livers of mice are said to swell in winter, and dry pennyroyal to flower on the very day of the winter solstice, and inflated bladders to burst, and the seeds of apples enclosed in their middle to turn themselves into opposite directions, and now some strings on a lyre to resound when others are struck, and oysters and all shellfish to wax along with the moon and to wane along with it, and trees in the winter season — when the moon is at the same time waning, because they are then dried out — to be thought timely for cutting.

Haec observari certe non potuerunt, ut supra docui. Sunt igitur artis inventa, non vetustatis, si est ars ulla rerum incognitarum; cum rerum autem natura quam cognationem habent? quae ut uno consensu iuncta sit et continens, quod video placuisse physicis, eisque maxume, qui omne, quod esset, unum esse dixerunt, quid habere mundus potest cum thesauri inventione coniunctum? Si enim extis pecuniae mihi amplificatio ostenditur idque fit natura, primum exta sunt coniuncta mundo, deinde meum lucrum natura rerum continetur. Nonne pudet physicos haec dicere? Ut enim iam sit aliqua in natura rerum contagio, quam esse concedo (multa enim Stoici colligunt; nam et musculorum iecuscula bruma dicuntur augeri, et puleium aridum florescere brumali ipso die, et inflatas rumpi vesiculas, et semina malorum, quae in iis mediis inclusa sint, in contrarias partis se vertere, iam nervos in fidibus aliis pulsis resonare alios, ostreisque et conchyliis omnibus contingere, ut cum luna pariter crescant pariterque decrescant, arboresque ut hiemali tempore cum luna simul senescente, quia tum exsiccatae sint, tempestive caedi putentur.

Why should I say more about the straits or the tides of the sea? whose ebb and flow are governed by the motion of the moon. Six hundred instances of the same sort might be brought forward, so that the natural kinship of things far apart appears) — let us grant this; for it is no obstacle at all to the present argument. Surely it does not follow that, if there is a cleft of a certain kind in the liver, gain is revealed? By what bond of nature and, as it were, harmony and accord — which the Greeks call sympatheian — can either the cleft of a liver agree with my little profit, or my paltry gain with the sky, the earth, and the nature of things? I will concede this very point, if you wish, even though I shall have made a great sacrifice of my case if I concede that there is any agreement at all of nature with the entrails;

Quid de fretis aut de marinis aestibus plura dicam? quorum accessus et recessus lunae motu gubernantur. Sescenta licet eiusdem modi proferri, ut distantium rerum cognatio naturalis appareat)—demus hoc; nihil enim huic disputationi adversatur; num etiam, si fissum cuiusdam modi fuerit in iecore, lucrum ostenditur? qua ex coniunctione naturae et quasi concentu atque consensu, quam sumpa/qeian Graeci appellant, convenire potest aut fissum iecoris cum lucello meo aut meus quaesticulus cum caelo, terra rerumque natura? Concedam hoc ipsum, si vis, etsi magnam iacturam causae fecero, si ullam esse convenientiam naturae cum extis concessero;

but even granting that, how does it come about that the man who wishes to obtain his request sacrifices a victim suited to his affairs? This was what I did not think could be resolved. But how merrily it is resolved! I am ashamed — not of you, indeed, whose memory I even admire, but of Chrysippus, Antipater, Posidonius, who say this very same thing that has been said by you: that in choosing the victim there is a guide, a certain force, perceptive and divine, which is diffused throughout the whole universe. But this is far better still, what was both employed by you and is said by them: that when someone wishes to sacrifice, then a change of the entrails takes place, so that either something is wanting or something is in excess;

sed tamen eo concesso qui evenit, ut is, qui impetrire velit, convenientem hostiam rebus suis immolet? Hoc erat, quod ego non rebar posse dissolvi. At quam festive dissolvitur! pudet me non tui quidem, cuius etiam memoriam admiror, sed Chrysippi, Antipatri, Posidonii, qui idem istuc quidem dicunt, quod est dictum a te, ad hostiam deligendam ducem esse vim quandam sentientem atque divinam, quae toto confusa mundo sit. Illud vero multo etiam melius, quod et a te usurpatum est et dicitur ab illis: cum immolare quispiam velit, tum fieri extorum mutationem, ut aut absit aliquid aut supersit;

for all things, they say, obey the divine power of the gods. These things, believe me, not even old women now think true. Or do you suppose that, if one man should choose a given calf he will find its liver without a head, and if another, with a head? Can this loss of the head, or its addition, take place so suddenly that the entrails accommodate themselves to the fortune of the one sacrificing? Do you not see that there is a certain throw of the dice in the choosing of victims, especially when the thing itself instructs us? For when the entrails have been most grievous, without a head — than which nothing seems more dire — often with the very next victim the offering is most beautifully favorable. Where, then, are those threats of the earlier entrails? Or how did so great an appeasement of the gods come about so suddenly? But you bring forward that, in the entrails of a fat bull, when Caesar was sacrificing, there was no heart; and that, because it could not have happened that the victim should have lived without a heart, we must judge that the heart perished at the moment when it was being sacrificed.

deorum enim numini parere omnia. Haec iam, mihi crede, ne aniculae quidem existimant. An censes, eundem vitulum si alius delegerit, sine capite iecur inventurum; si alius, cum capite? Haec decessio capitis aut accessio subitone fieri potest, ut se exta ad immolatoris fortunam accommodent? non perspicitis aleam quandam esse in hostiis deligendis, praesertim cum res ipsa doceat? Cum enim tristissuma exta sine capite fuerunt, quibus nihil videtur esse dirius, proxuma hostia litatur saepe pulcherrime. Ubi igitur illae minae superiorum extorum? aut quae tam subito facta est deorum tanta placatio? Sed adfers in tauri opimi extis immolante Caesare cor non fuisse; id quia non potuerit accidere, ut sine corde victuma illa viveret, iudicandum esse tum interisse cor, cum immolaretur.

How does it come about that you grasp the one thing — that the ox could not have lived without its heart — but fail to see the other, that the heart could not, all at once, have flown off to who knows where? For my part, I can either not know what power the heart has for living, or suspect that the ox had contracted some disease, and that its heart was thin and shrunken and withered, unlike a heart at all. But you — what reason have you to think that, if a heart was in that fat bull a little while before, it suddenly perished in the very act of sacrifice? Or was it that, having looked upon Caesar, robed in purple and heartless, the heart was itself bereft? Believe me, you are betraying the very city of philosophy while you defend its outposts; for while you would have the haruspex’s art be true, you are overturning the whole study of nature. The head is found in the liver, the heart in the entrails; then it will vanish the instant you have sprinkled the meal and the wine; a god will snatch it away, some force will make away with it or eat it up. Nature, then, will not bring about the rise and the passing of all things, and there will be something that either rises out of nothing or sinks suddenly into nothing. What natural philosopher ever said this? The haruspices say it; do you, then, judge that they are to be believed sooner than the natural philosophers?

Qui fit, ut alterum intellegas, sine corde non potuisse bovem vivere, alterum non videas, cor subito non potuisse nescio quo avolare? Ego enim possum vel nescire, quae vis sit cordis ad vivendum, vel suspicari contractum aliquo morbo bovis exile et exiguum et vietum cor et dissimile cordis fuisse; tu vero quid habes, quare putes, si paulo ante cor fuerit in tauro opimo, subito id in ipsa immolatione interisse? an quod aspexit vestitu purpureo excordem Caesarem, ipse corde privatus est? Urbem philosophiae, mihi crede, proditis, dum castella defenditis; nam, dum haruspicinam veram esse vultis, physiologiam totam pervertitis. Caput est in iecore, cor in extis; iam abscedet, simul ac molam et vinum insperseris; deus id eripiet, vis aliqua conficiet aut exedet. Non ergo omnium ortus atque obitus natura conficiet, et erit aliquid, quod aut ex nihilo oriatur aut in nihilum subito occidat. Quis hoc physicus dixit umquam? haruspices dicunt; his igitur quam physicis credendum potius existumas?

And again: when sacrifice is made to several gods, how on earth does it turn out that the offering is favorable to some and not favorable to others? And what inconstancy is this among the gods, that they should threaten by the first set of entrails and promise well by the second? Or what discord so great among them — often even among the nearest kin — that Apollo’s entrails should be good and Diana’s not good? What is so plain as this: that, since the victims are brought up at random, the entrails are such for each man as the victim that has fallen to him? But — you object — this very thing has something divine in it, namely which victim falls to each man, just as in the casting of lots, which lot is drawn for each. Of lots presently; though you, for your part, do not strengthen the case of the victims by likening it to the lots, but rather weaken the lots by setting them alongside the victims.

Quid? cum pluribus deis immolatur, qui tandem evenit, ut litetur aliis, aliis non litetur? quae autem inconstantia deorum est, ut primis minentur extis, bene promittant secundis? aut tanta inter eos dissensio, saepe etiam inter proxumos, ut Apollinis exta bona sint, Dianae non bona? Quid est tam perspicuum quam, cum fortuito hostiae adducantur, talia cuique exta esse, qualis cuique obtigerit hostia? At enim id ipsum habet aliquid divini, quae cuique hostia obtingat, tamquam in sortibus, quae cui ducatur. Mox de sortibus; quamquam tu quidem non hostiarum causam confirmas sortium similitudine, sed infirmas sortis conlatione hostiarum.

When we have sent a man to the Aequimaelium to fetch a lamb for us to sacrifice, is the lamb that is brought to me really the one that has entrails fitted to my affairs, and is it not by chance but with a god for guide that the slave is led to that lamb? For if you say that in this matter too there is a chance that is, as it were, a kind of lot bound up with the will of the gods, I am sorry that our Stoics have given the Epicureans so great an opening to laugh at them; for you are not unaware how they deride such things.

An, cum in Aequimaelium misimus, qui adferat agnum, quem immolemus, is mihi agnus adfertur, qui habet exta rebus accommodata, et ad eum agnum non casu, sed duce deo servus deducitur? Nam si casum in eo quoque dicis esse quasi sortem quandam cum deorum voluntate coniunctam, doleo tantam Stoicos nostros Epicureis inridendi sui facultatem dedisse; non enim ignoras, quam ista derideant.

And indeed they can do so more easily; for it was by way of a joke that Epicurus brought in his very gods — transparent and ventilated, dwelling between two worlds, as if between two groves, for fear of falling debris, and he holds that they have the same limbs we have, and yet make no use whatever of those limbs. So this man, doing away with the gods by a certain roundabout, has good reason not to hesitate to do away with divination as well; but the Stoics are not, like him, consistent with themselves. For his god, having no business of his own nor of another’s, cannot impart divination to men; your god, on the other hand, can withhold it, and none the less govern the world and care for men.

Et quidem illi facilius facere possunt; deos enim ipsos iocandi causa induxit Epicurus perlucidos et perflabilis et habitantis tamquam inter duos lucos sic inter duos mundos propter metum ruinarum, eosque habere putat eadem membra, quae nos, nec usum ullum habere membrorum. Ergo hic circumitione quadam deos tollens recte non dubitat divinationem tollere; sed non, ut hic sibi constat, item Stoici. Illius enim deus nihil habens nec sui nec alieni negotii non potest hominibus divinationem inpertire; vester autem deus potest non inpertire, ut nihilo minus mundum regat et hominibus consulat.

Why, then, do you entangle yourselves in those snares that you can never unravel? For this is how, when they are in more of a hurry, they are accustomed to draw the conclusion: If there are gods, there is divination; but there are gods; therefore there is divination. Far more probable is this: but there is no divination; therefore there are no gods. See how rashly they commit themselves to the position that, if there is no divination, there are no gods. For divination is plainly done away with, while the existence of the gods must be held fast.

Cur igitur vos induitis in eas captiones, quas numquam explicetis? Ita enim, cum magis properant, concludere solent: Si di sunt, est divinatio; sunt autem di; est ergo divinatio. Multo est probabilius: non est autem divinatio; non sunt ergo di. Vide, quam temere committant, ut, si nulla sit divinatio, nulli sint di. Divinatio enim perspicue tollitur, deos esse retinendum est.

And once this divination by the inspection of entrails is done away with, the whole of the haruspex’s art is done away with. For portents and lightning follow upon it. Now in the case of lightning, long observation prevails; in the case of portents, reasoning and conjecture are for the most part brought to bear. What is it, then, that has been observed in lightning? The Etruscans divided the heaven into sixteen parts. That was easy enough — to double the four that we have, and afterward to do the same again, so as to say from this from which part the bolt had come. First, what difference does that make? And next, what does it signify? Is it not plain that it was out of the first amazement of men — because they had taken fright at thunderclaps and the hurling of lightning — that they believed Jupiter, all-powerful over all things, brings these about? And so in our records we have it written: When Jupiter thunders or makes lightning, it is forbidden to hold an assembly of the people.

Atque hac extispicum divinatione sublata omnis haruspicina sublata est. Ostenta enim sequuntur et fulgura. Valet autem in fulguribus observatio diuturna, in ostentis ratio plerumque coniecturaque adhibetur. Quid est igitur, quod observatum sit in fulgure? Caelum in sedecim partis diviserunt Etrusci. Facile id quidem fuit, quattuor, quas nos habemus, duplicare, post idem iterum facere, ut ex eo dicerent, fulmen qua ex parte venisset. Primum id quid interest? deinde quid significat? Nonne perspicuum est ex prima admiratione hominum, quod tonitrua iactusque fulminum extimuissent, credidisse ea efficere rerum omnium praepotentem Iovem? Itaque in nostris commentariis scriptum habemus: Iove tonante, fulgurante comitia populi habere nefas.

This was perhaps established for the sake of the commonwealth; for they wished there to be grounds for not holding the assemblies. And so lightning is a fault only for the assemblies, though the very same thing we reckon the best of all auspices, if it has come on the left. But of auspices in another place; now of lightning. What, then, ought to be less said by natural philosophers than that anything certain is signified by things uncertain? For I do not suppose you are the kind of man to think the Cyclopes forged Jupiter’s thunderbolt on Aetna;

Hoc fortasse rei publicae causa constitutum est; comitiorum enim non habendorum causas esse voluerunt. Itaque comitiorum solum vitium est fulmen, quod idem omnibus rebus optumum auspicium habemus, si sinistrum fuit. Sed de auspiciis alio loco, nunc de fulgoribus. Quid igitur minus a physicis dici debet quam quicquam certi significari rebus incertis? Non enim te puto esse eum, qui Iovi fulmen fabricatos esse Cyclopas in Aetna putes;

for it would be a marvel how Jupiter could hurl it so many times, when he had but one; nor in fact did he warn men by lightning what they ought to do or beware. For it is the Stoics’ view that those exhalations of the earth which are cold, once they have begun to flow, are winds; but when they have wrapped themselves in a cloud and have begun to part and tear apart its thinnest portions, and to do this more thickly and more violently, then both flashes and thunderclaps arise; and if, by the clashing of the clouds, a heat is forced out and discharges itself, that is the thunderbolt. From a thing, then, which we see brought about by the force of nature, with no constancy, at no fixed time — from this do we look for a signifying of things to follow? Surely, if Jupiter were signifying these things, he would not send out so many bolts in vain! For what does he accomplish when he has hurled a bolt into the middle of the sea?

nam esset mirabile, quo modo id Iuppiter totiens iaceret, cum unum haberet; nec vero fulminibus homines, quid aut faciendum esset aut cavendum, moneret. Placet enim Stoicis eos anhelitus terrae, qui frigidi sint, cum fluere coeperint, ventos esse; cum autem se in nubem induerint eiusque tenuissimam quamque partem coeperint dividere atque disrumpere idque crebrius facere et vehementius, tum et fulgores et tonitrua existere; si autem nubium conflictu ardor expressus se emiserit, id esse fulmen. Quod igitur vi naturae, nulla constantia, nullo rato tempore videmus effici, ex eo significationem rerum consequentium quaerimus? Scilicet, si ista Iuppiter significaret, tam multa frustra fulmina emitteret! Quid enim proficit, cum in medium mare fulmen iecit?

What, when into the highest mountains, as for the most part he does? What, when into deserted wastes? What, when onto the shores of those nations among whom these things are not even observed? But — a head was found in the Tiber. As if I denied that these men have some art! It is divination I deny. For the division of the heaven, which I spoke of before, and the marking of certain things, teaches whence the bolt has come, whither it has withdrawn; but what it signifies, no reasoning teaches. Yet you press me with my own verses: For the high-thundering Father, leaning on starry Olympus, Once aimed his bolts at his own mounds and temples, And cast his fires upon the Capitoline seats. Then Natta’s statue, then the images of the gods, And Romulus and Remus with their nursing beast Were struck down by the force of the bolt and fell; And concerning these matters the responses of the haruspices proved most true.

quid, cum in altissimos montis, quod plerumque fit? quid, cum in desertas solitudines? quid, cum in earum gentium oras, in quibus haec ne observantur quidem? At inventum est caput in Tiberi. Quasi ego artem aliquam istorum esse negem! divinationem nego. Caeli enim distributio, quam ante dixi, et certarum rerum notatio docet, unde fulmen venerit, quo concesserit; quid significet autem, nulla ratio docet. Sed urges me meis versibus: Nam pater altitonans stellanti nixus Olympo Ipse suos quondam tumulos ac templa petivit Et Capitolinis iniecit sedibus ignis. Tum statua Nattae, tum simulacra deorum Romulusque et Remus cum altrice belua vi fulminis icti conciderunt, deque his rebus haruspicum extiterunt responsa verissuma.

And there was this marvel besides: that at the very moment when the disclosure of the conspiracy was being made in the Senate, the statue of Jupiter — two years after it had been commissioned — was being set in place on the Capitol. — Will you, then (for this is how you were pressing me), bring yourself to defend that case both against your own deeds and against your own writings? — You are my brother; on that account I hold back. But what, after all, does it harm you here? Is it the matter, which is what it is, or I, who wish the truth to be laid bare? And so I say nothing against you; from you I ask the reasoned account of the whole haruspex’s art. But you have flung yourself into a wonderful hiding-place; for, because you understood that you would be hard pressed when I inquired from you the causes of each several kind of divination, you spent many words to the effect that, since you saw the facts, you did not seek the reason and the cause — that what happens, not why it happens, is what bears on the matter. As if I would grant either that it happens, or that it belonged to a philosopher not to ask the cause

Mirabile autem illud, quod eo ipso tempore, quo fieret indicium coniurationis in senatu, signum Iovis biennio post, quam erat locatum, in Capitolio conlocabatur.—Tu igitur animum induces (sic enim mecum agebas) causam istam et contra facta tua et contra scripta defendere?—Frater es; eo vereor. Verum quid tibi hic tandem nocet? resne, quae talis est, an ego, qui verum explicari volo? Itaque nihil contra dico, a te rationem totius haruspicinae peto. Sed te mirificam in latebram coniecisti; quod enim intellegeres fore ut premerere, cum ex te causas unius cuiusque divinationis exquirerem, multa verba fecisti te, cum res videres, rationem causamque non quaerere; quid fieret, non cur fieret, ad rem pertinere. Quasi ego aut fieri concederem aut esset philosophi causam,

why each thing happens! And at just that point you were quoting my own Prognostics, and the kinds of plants, the scammony and the aristolochia-root, whose cause you did not know, though you saw their power and effect. The whole comparison fails. For the causes of weather signs have been pursued, both by Boethus the Stoic, whom you named, and by our own Posidonius too; and even if the causes of those plants are not found, still the facts themselves could be observed and noted. But Natta’s statue, or the bronze of the laws struck from the sky — what is there in them that is observed and ancient? The Pinarii Nattae are noble; from the nobility, then, comes danger. So cleverly did Jupiter think it out! Romulus, still at the breast, was struck by the bolt; therefore danger is shown to the city, the very one that he founded. How shrewdly Jupiter informs us by tokens! But at the same time the statue of Jupiter was being set in place at which the conspiracy was being disclosed. And you, of course, would rather hold that this was done by the will of the gods than by chance — and that the contractor who had taken on the making of that column from Cotta and Torquatus was not the slower through idleness or want of means, but was held in reserve by the immortal gods for that very hour.

cur quidque fieret, non quaerere! Et eo quidem loco et Prognostica nostra pronuntiabas et genera herbarum, scammoniam aristolochiamque radicem, quarum causam ignorares, vim et effectum videres. Dissimile totum; nam et prognosticorum causas persecuti sunt et Boëthus Stoicus, qui est a te nominatus, et noster etiam Posidonius, et, si causae non reperiantur istarum rerum, res tamen ipsae observari animadvertique potuerunt. Nattae vero statua aut aera legum de caelo tacta quid habent observatum ac vetustum? Pinarii Nattae nobiles; a nobilitate igitur periculum. Hoc tam callide Iuppiter ex cogitavit! Romulus lactens fulmine ictus; urbi igitur periculum ostenditur, ei quam ille condidit. Quam scite per notas nos certiores facit Iuppiter! At eodem tempore signum Iovis conlocabatur, quo coniuratio indicabatur. Et tu scilicet mavis numine deorum id factum quam casu arbitrari, et redemptor, qui columnam illam de Cotta et de Torquato conduxerat faciendam, non inertia aut inopia tardior fuit, sed a deis inmortalibus ad istam horam reservatus est.

I do not, for my part, altogether despair that these things are true; but I do not know, and I wish to learn from you. For when certain things seemed to me to come about by chance in such a way as to have been foretold by the diviners, you said much about chance — that a Venus-throw can be cast by chance with four dice thrown, but that with four hundred throws a hundred Venus-throws cannot come up by chance. First, I do not know why they cannot, but I do not press the point; for you abound in parallels. You have your spattering of paints, and the snout of a pig, and a great many others besides. You say, too, that Carneades invented the story about the head of the little Pan; as if it could not have come about by chance, and as if it were not necessary that in every block of marble there should be heads worthy even of Praxiteles! For those very heads are produced by taking away, and nothing whatever is brought to the marble by Praxiteles; rather, when much has been taken away and the lines of the face have been reached, then you may understand that the thing now polished into shape was within all along.

Non equidem plane despero ista esse vera, sed nescio et discere a te volo. Nam cum mihi quaedam casu viderentur sic evenire, ut praedicta essent a divinantibus, dixisti multa de casu, ut Venerium iaci posse casu quattuor talis iactis, sed quadringentis centum Venerios non posse casu consistere. Primum nescio, cur non possint, sed non pugno; abundas enim similibus. Habes et respersionem pigmentorum et rostrum suis et alia permulta. Idem Carneadem fingere dicis de capite Panisci; quasi non potuerit id evenire casu et non in omni marmore necesse sit inesse vel Praxitelia capita! Illa enim ipsa efficiuntur detractione, neque quicquam illuc adfertur a Praxitele; sed cum multa sunt detracta et ad liniamenta oris perventum est, tum intellegas illud, quod iam expolitum sit, intus fuisse.

Something of that kind, then, could also have come into being of its own accord in the quarries of Chios. But grant that this is a fiction; what of it? Have you never noticed in the clouds the shape of a lion or of a hippocentaur? It is possible, then — the very thing you were just now denying — for chance to imitate the truth. But since we have argued enough about entrails and about lightnings, the portents remain, so that the whole of haruspicy may be handled through. You brought up the case of a mule’s giving birth. The thing is marvelous, for the reason that it does not happen often; but if it could not have happened, it would not have happened. And let this hold against all portents: that what could not have come to pass never has come to pass; while if it could, there is nothing to wonder at. For ignorance of causes, in a novel matter, produces wonder; but the same ignorance, when it is about things in common use, does not make us wonder. For the man who wonders that a mule has given birth does not know in what way a mare gives birth, or in general what nature it is that brings about the birth of a living thing. But what he sees often, he does not wonder at, even though he does not know why it happens; what he has not seen before, if it occurs, he reckons to be a portent. Which, then, is the portent — when the mule conceived, or when she gave birth?

Potest igitur tale aliquid etiam sua sponte in lapicidinis Chiorum extitisse. Sed sit hoc fictum; quid? in nubibus numquam animadvertisti leonis formam aut hippocentauri? Potest igitur, quod modo negabas, veritatem casus imitari. Sed quoniam de extis et de fulgoribus satis est disputatum, ostenta restant, ut tota haruspicina sit pertractata. Mulae partus prolatus est a te. Res mirabilis, propterea quia non saepe fit; sed si fieri non potuisset, facta non esset. Atque hoc contra omnia ostenta valeat, numquam, quod fieri non potuerit, esse factum; sin potuerit, non esse mirandum. Causarum enim ignoratio in re nova mirationem facit; eadem ignoratio si in rebus usitatis est, non miramur. Nam qui mulam peperisse miratur, is, quo modo equa pariat, aut omnino quae natura partum animantis faciat, ignorat. Sed quod crebro videt, non miratur, etiamsi, cur fiat, nescit; quod ante non vidit, id si evenit, ostentum esse censet. Utrum igitur cum concepit mula an cum peperit, ostentum est?

The conception, perhaps, is contrary to nature; but the birth is all but necessary. But why say more? Let us look at the origin of haruspicy; thus we shall most easily judge what authority it has. A certain Tages, it is said, in the territory of Tarquinii, when the earth was being plowed and a furrow had been driven rather deep, suddenly rose up and addressed the man who was plowing. Now this Tages, as it stands in the books of the Etruscans, is said to have appeared with the look of a boy, but to have had the wisdom of an old man. When the plowman, dumbstruck at the sight of him, raised a great cry in his amazement, a crowd gathered, and in a short time the whole of Etruria assembled at that spot; then he spoke at length, with many listening, who took down all his words and committed them to writing; and the whole discourse was that in which the discipline of haruspicy is contained. Afterward this grew, as new matters were learned and referred back to those same first principles. This is what we have received from them; this is what their writings preserve; this is the fountainhead they hold their discipline to have.

conceptio contra naturam fortasse, sed partus prope necessarius. Sed quid plura? ortum videamus haruspicinae; sic facillume, quid habeat auctoritatis, iudicabimus. Tages quidam dicitur in agro Tarquiniensi, cum terra araretur et sulcus altius esset impressus, extitisse repente et eum adfatus esse, qui arabat. Is autem Tages, ut in libris est Etruscorum, puerili specie dicitur visus, sed senili fuisse prudentia. Eius adspectu cum obstipuisset bubulcus clamoremque maiorem cum admiratione edidisset, concursum esse factum, totamque brevi tempore in eum locum Etruriam convenisse; tum illum plura locutum multis audientibus, qui omnia verba eius exceperint litterisque mandarint; omnem autem orationem fuisse eam, qua haruspicinae disciplina contineretur; eam postea crevisse rebus novis cognoscendis et ad eadem illa principia referendis. Haec accepimus ab ipsis, haec scripta conservant, hunc fontem habent disciplinae.

Is there any need, then, of a Carneades to refute these things? any need of an Epicurus? Is there anyone so out of his wits as to believe that this thing was plowed up — shall I call it a god or a man? If a god, why had he hidden himself in the earth against his nature, so that, laid open by the plow, he might look upon the light? Could not the same god, indeed, have handed down the discipline to men from some higher place? But if that Tages was a man, in what way could he live buried under the earth? And from what source, moreover, could he himself have learned the things he was teaching to others? But I am more foolish than the very men who believe these things, in arguing against them at such length. That old saying of Cato’s, however, is quite shrewd, who used to say that he wondered a haruspex did not laugh when he caught sight of a haruspex.

Num ergo opus est ad haec refellenda Carneade? num Epicuro? estne quisquam ita desipiens, qui credat exaratum esse, deum dicam an hominem? Si deum, cur se contra naturam in terram abdiderat, ut patefactus aratro lucem aspiceret? quid? idem nonne poterat deus hominibus disciplinam superiore e loco tradere? Si autem homo ille Tages fuit, quonam modo potuit terra oppressus vivere? unde porro illa potuit, quae docebat alios, ipse didicisse? Sed ego insipientior quam illi ipsi, qui ista credunt, qui quidem contra eos tam diu disputem. Vetus autem illud Catonis admodum scitum est, qui mirari se aiebat, quod non rideret haruspex, haruspicem cum vidisset.

For how few of all the things foretold by these men come to pass? Or, if anything does come to pass, what reason can be brought to show that it did not come about by chance? King Prusias, when Hannibal, in exile at his court, urged that battle be joined, kept saying that he did not dare, because the entrails forbade it. Do you say so? Hannibal replied. You would rather trust a little scrap of veal than an old commander? And what of Caesar himself, when he was warned by the foremost haruspex not to cross over into Africa before the winter solstice — did he not cross over? And had he not done so, all the forces of his adversaries would have gathered into one place. Why should I rehearse the responses of the haruspices — countless ones, indeed, I could — which either had no outcomes at all, or outcomes the very reverse?

Quota enim quaeque res evenit praedicta ab istis? aut, si evenit quippiam, quid adferri potest, cur non casu id evenerit? Rex Prusias, cum Hannibali apud eum exsulanti depugnari placeret, negabat se audere, quod exta prohiberent. Ain tu? inquit, carunculae vitulinae mavis quam imperatori veteri credere? Quid? ipse Caesar cum a summo haruspice moneretur, ne in Africam ante brumam transmitteret, nonne transmisit? quod ni fecisset, uno in loco omnes adversariorum copiae convenissent. Quid ego haruspicum responsa commemorem (possum equidem innumerabilia), quae aut nullos habuerint exitus aut contrarios?

In this civil war, immortal gods, how many tricks they played! What responses of the haruspices were sent to us in Greece from Rome! What things were told to Pompey! For he was very much moved by entrails and by portents. I have no wish to rehearse them, nor indeed is there any need, least of all to you, who were there yourself; yet you see that nearly everything turned out contrary to what had been said. But enough of this; now let us come to the portents.

Hoc civili bello, di inmortales! quam multa luserunt! quae nobis in Graeciam Roma responsa haruspicum missa sunt! quae dicta Pompeio! etenim ille admodum extis et ostentis movebatur. Non lubet commemorare, nec vero necesse est, tibi praesertim, qui interfuisti; vides tamen omnia fere contra, ac dicta sint, evenisse. Sed haec hactenus; nunc ad ostenta veniamus.

You read out many things written by me myself in my consulship; you brought forward many gathered before the Marsic War by Sisenna; you cited many recorded by Callisthenes before the Lacedaemonians’ disastrous battle at Leuctra. Of these I shall indeed speak one by one, as far as it seems good; but something must be said about them all together as well. For what is this signifying, as if proceeding from the gods, this giving notice, so to speak, of calamities? And what do the immortal gods intend, in the first place by signifying things which we cannot understand without interpreters, and in the second place by signifying things which we have no power to guard against? Why, not even decent men do this — to foretell to their friends impending calamities which those friends can in no way escape; just as physicians, although they often understand the case, nevertheless never tell the sick that they are going to die of that disease. For every prediction of an evil is approved only when, to the prediction, a means of precaution is attached.

Multa me consule a me ipso scripta recitasti, multa ante Marsicum bellum a Sisenna collecta attulisti, multa ante Lacedaemoniorum malam pugnam in Leuctricis a Callisthene commemorata dixisti; de quibus dicam equidem singulis, quoad videbitur; sed dicendum etiam est de universis. Quae est enim ista a deis profecta significatio et quasi denuntiatio calamitatum? quid autem volunt di inmortales primum ea significantes, quae sine interpretibus non possimus intellegere, deinde ea, quae cavere nequeamus? At hoc ne homines quidem probi faciunt, ut amicis inpendentis calamitates praedicant, quas illi effugere nullo modo possint, ut medici, quamquam intellegunt saepe, tamen numquam aegris dicunt illo morbo eos esse morituros; omnis enim praedictio mali tum probatur, cum ad praedictionem cautio adiungitur.

In what way, then, did either the portents or their interpreters help the Lacedaemonians of old, or our own people lately? And if these are to be reckoned signs of the gods, why were they so obscure? For if it was so that we might understand what was going to happen, the matter ought to have been declared openly; or it ought not to have been declared even covertly, if they did not wish these things to be known. And then again, all conjecture, on which divination rests, is often drawn off by the dispositions of men into many, or differing, or even contrary directions. For as in judicial cases the conjecture of the prosecutor is one thing and that of the defender another, and yet each is plausible, so in all those matters which seem to be tracked down by conjecture, the reasoning is found to face two ways. But where things are brought about now by nature, now by chance, and sometimes resemblance even breeds error, it is great folly to make the gods the authors of those things, and not to seek the causes of things.

Quid igitur aut ostenta aut eorum interpretes vel Lacedaemonios olim vel nuper nostros adiuverunt? quae si signa deorum putanda sunt, cur tam obscura fuerunt? si enim, ut intellegeremus, quid esset eventurum, aperte declarari oportebat, aut ne occulte quidem, si ea sciri nolebant. Iam vero coniectura omnis, in qua nititur divinatio, ingeniis hominum in multas aut diversas aut etiam contrarias partis saepe diducitur. Ut enim in causis iudicialibus alia coniectura est accusatoris, alia defensoris et tamen utriusque credibilis, sic in omnibus iis rebus, quae coniectura investigari videntur, anceps reperitur oratio. Quas autem res tum natura, tum casus adfert, non numquam etiam errorem creat similitudo, magna stultitia est earum rerum deos facere effectores, causas rerum non quaerere.

You believe that the Boeotian seers at Lebadia foresaw, from the crowing of the barnyard cocks, that victory would be the Thebans’ — because cocks that have been beaten are wont to be silent, while the victors crow. By means of hens, then, was Jupiter giving a sign to so great a state? And do those birds not crow except when they have won? But on that occasion they were crowing, and they had not won. That, you will say, is precisely the portent. A great one, to be sure — as if it had been the fishes that crowed, and not the cocks! But what time is there at which they do not crow, whether of night or of day? And if it is by liveliness, and a kind of gladness, so to speak, that the victors are roused to crow, some other gladness too could have come about, by which they were moved to crowing.

Tu vates Boeotios credis Lebadiae vidisse ex gallorum gallinaceorum cantu victoriam esse Thebanorum, quia galli victi silere solerent, canere victores. Hoc igitur per gallinas Iuppiter tantae civitati signum dabat? An illae aves, nisi cum vicerunt, canere non solent? At tum canebant nec vicerant. Id enim est, inquies, ostentum. Magnum vero! quasi pisces, non galli cecinerint! Quod autem est tempus, quo illi non cantent, vel nocturnum vel diurnum? Quodsi victores alacritate et quasi laetitia ad canendum excitantur, potuit accidisse alia quoque laetitia, qua ad cantum moverentur.

Democritus, indeed, in the finest terms explains the cause why cocks crow before dawn: it is because, when the food has been driven down from the breast and distributed through the whole body and softened, they utter their song, sated now with rest; cocks which indeed, in the silence of the night, as Ennius says, favor their ruddy throats, and with song and applause press down their wings. Since, then, this creature is so songful of its own accord, what came into Callisthenes’s head, to say that the gods had given the cocks a sign for crowing, when either nature or chance could have brought it about?

Democritus quidem optumis verbis causam explicat, cur ante lucem galli canant; depulso enim de pectore et in omne corpus diviso et mitificato cibo cantus edere quiete satiatos; qui quidem silentio noctis, ut ait Ennius, favent faucíbus russis Cantú plausuque premúnt alas. Cum igitur hoc animal tam sit canorum sua sponte, quid in mentem venit Callistheni dicere deos gallis signum dedisse cantandi, cum id vel natura vel casus efficere potuisset?

It was reported to the Senate that it had rained blood, that the river Atratus too had flowed with blood, that the statues of the gods had sweated. Do you suppose that Thales or Anaxagoras or any natural philosopher would have believed these reports? For neither blood nor sweat comes save from a body. But both a certain discoloration, arising from some contact with the earth, can be very like blood, and moisture gliding on from outside — as we see on plastered walls in a south wind — seems to imitate sweat. And in war these things appear both more numerous and greater to men who are afraid; the same things are not so much remarked upon in peace. There is this besides: that in fear and danger, while such things are the more readily believed, they are also the more freely invented with impunity.

Sanguine pluisse senatui nuntiatum est, Atratum etiam fluvium fluxisse sanguine, deorum sudasse simulacra. Num censes his nuntiis Thalen aut Anaxagoran aut quemquam physicum crediturum fuisse? nec enim sanguis nec sudor nisi e corpore. Sed et decoloratio quaedam ex aliqua contagione terrena maxume potest sanguini similis esse, et umor adlapsus extrinsecus, ut in tectoriis videmus austro, sudorem videtur imitari. Atque haec in bello plura et maiora videntur timentibus, eadem non tam animadvertuntur in pace; accedit illud etiam, quod in metu et periculo cum creduntur facilius, tum finguntur inpunius.

But are we so frivolous and unconsidering that, if mice have gnawed something — gnawing being their one and only business — we should think it a monstrous sign? Before the Marsic War, because mice had gnawed the shields at Lanuvium, as you have told it, the haruspices said that this was a very great portent — as if, in truth, it made any difference at all whether mice, gnawing something day and night, had gnawed away shields or sieves! For if we are to follow such things, then because mice lately gnawed away my Plato’s Republic, I ought to have been mightily afraid for the commonwealth; or, if it had been Epicurus’s book On Pleasure that was gnawed, I should suppose the price of provisions in the market was going to rise.

Nos autem ita leves atque inconsiderati sumus, ut, si mures corroserint aliquid, quorum est opus hoc unum, monstrum putemus? Ante vero Marsicum bellum quod clipeos Lanuvii, ut a te dictum est, mures rosissent, maxumum id portentum haruspices esse dixerunt; quasi vero quicquam intersit, mures diem noctem aliquid rodentes scuta an cribra corroserint! Nam si ista sequimur, quod Platonis Politian nuper apud me mures corroserunt, de re publica debui pertimescere, aut, si Epicuri de voluptate liber rosus esset, putarem annonam in macello cariorem fore.

Or do those other things really terrify us, whenever some monstrous creatures are said to have been born, either from a beast or from a human being? For all of which — not to be too long-winded — there is one single account. For whatever comes into being, of whatever kind it is, must necessarily have a cause from nature, so that, even if it has come into existence contrary to custom, it nevertheless cannot come into existence contrary to nature. Investigate the cause, therefore, in a novel and wonderful matter, if you can; and if you find none, hold this nevertheless as ascertained, that nothing could have come about without a cause, and drive off that terror which the newness of the thing has brought you by the reasoning of nature. So neither a rumbling of the earth, nor a parting of the sky, nor a rain of stones or of blood, nor the shooting of a star, nor torches seen in the sky shall terrify you.

An vero illa nos terrent, si quando aliqua portentosa aut ex pecude aut ex homine nata dicuntur? quorum omnium, ne sim longior, una ratio est. Quicquid enim oritur, qualecumque est, causam habeat a natura necesse est, ut, etiamsi praeter consuetudinem extiterit, praeter naturam tamen non possit existere. Causam igitur investigato in re nova atque admirabili, si poteris; si nullam reperies, illud tamen exploratum habeto, nihil fieri potuisse sine causa, eumque terrorem, quem tibi rei novitas attulerit, naturae ratione depellito. Ita te nec terrae fremitus nec caeli discessus nec lapideus aut sanguineus imber nec traiectio stellae nec faces visae terrebunt.

If I were to seek from Chrysippus the causes of all these things, that very champion of divination would never call them the work of chance; he would render a natural account of them all. For nothing can come about without a cause; nor does anything happen that cannot happen; nor, if a thing has happened that could happen, ought it to be reckoned a portent. There are, then, no portents at all. For if what rarely happens is to be thought a portent, then a wise man is a portent; for I suppose a mule has given birth more often than a wise man has existed. The argument, therefore, comes to this conclusion: that nothing which could not happen has ever happened, and that nothing which could happen is a portent;

Quorum omnium causas si a Chrysippo quaeram, ipse ille divinationis auctor numquam illa dicet facta fortuito naturalemque rationem omnium reddet; nihil enim fieri sine causa potest; nec quicquam fit, quod fieri non potest; nec, si id factum est, quod potuit fieri, portentum debet videri; nulla igitur portenta sunt. Nam si, quod raro fit, id portentum putandum est, sapientem esse portentum est; saepius enim mulam peperisse arbitror quam sapientem fuisse. Illa igitur ratio concluditur: nec id, quod non potuerit fieri, factum umquam esse, nec, quod potuerit, id portentum esse;

so that there is no portent whatsoever. This too a certain interpreter and reader of portents is said to have answered, not without wit, to a man who had once brought before him as a kind of showing the fact that a snake at his house had coiled itself around a beam: "It would have been a showing," he said, "if the beam had coiled itself around the snake." By this reply he plainly enough declared that nothing which can happen is to be held a showing. Gaius Gracchus wrote to Marcus Pomponius that, when two snakes had been caught in the house, the haruspices were summoned by his father. Why snakes rather than lizards, rather than mice? Because these last are everyday creatures, and snakes are not — as if it mattered, when a thing can happen, how often it does happen. Yet I do wonder this: if the release of the female snake was bringing death to Tiberius Gracchus, while the release of the male snake was deadly to Cornelia, why he released either of the two; for he writes nothing of what the haruspices answered would come to pass if neither snake were released. But death overtook Gracchus. From some cause, I suppose, of a graver illness, not from the release of a serpent; for the ill luck of the haruspices is not so great that what they have said would come to pass never happens even by chance.

ita omnino nullum esse portentum. Quod etiam coniector quidam et interpres portentorum non inscite respondisse dicitur ei, qui quondam ad eum rettulisset quasi ostentum, quod anguis domi vectem circumiectus fuisset: Tum esset, inquit, ostentum, si anguem vectis circumplicavisset. Hoc ille responso satis aperte declaravit nihil habendum esse, quod fieri posset, ostentum. C. Gracchus ad M. Pomponium scripsit duobus anguibus domi conprehensis haruspices a patre convocatos. Qui magis anguibus quam lacertis, quam muribus? Quia sunt haec cotidiana, angues non item; quasi vero referat, quod fieri potest, quam id saepe fiat. Ego tamen miror, si emissio feminae anguis mortem adferebat Ti. Graccho, emissio autem maris anguis erat mortifera Corneliae, cur alteram utram emiserit; nihil enim scribit respondisse haruspices, si neuter anguis emissus esset, quid esset futurum. At mors insecuta Gracchum est. Causa quidem, credo, aliqua morbi gravioris, non emissione serpentis; neque enim tanta est infelicitas haruspicum, ut ne casu quidem umquam fiat, quod futurum illi esse dixerint.

For I should marvel at that other thing, if I believed it — what you said in Homer, that Calchas augured the years of the Trojan War from the number of the sparrows; of his conjecture Agamemnon speaks thus in Homer, as I in my leisure have rendered it: Endure, men, and bear with steadfast spirit your hard labors, that we may come to know whether the prophecies of our augur Calchas hold true or whether the promptings of his breast were empty. For all of them keep that portent in remembering mind, all who were not robbed of the light by deadly fates. When first Aulis was clothed with the Argive fleets, which were bearing ruin to Priam and destruction to Troy, we, about the cold waters, at the smoking altars, appeasing the gods’ will with gold-decked bulls beneath the shady plane, where a spring of water flows forth, saw a dragon of monstrous shape and coil, a terrible thing, dart from the altar at a stroke from Jupiter; which seized the nestlings on the plane-tree’s bough, hedged in their covering of leaves; and when it had devoured eight of them, the ninth, the mother, flew above with quivering cry; her too the savage creature mangled, tearing her vitals with monstrous bite.

Nam illud mirarer, si crederem, quod apud Homerum Calchantem dixisti ex passerum numero belli Troiani annos auguratum; de cuius coniectura sic apud Homerum, ut nos otiosi convertimus, loquitur Agamemnon: Ferte, viri, et duros animo tolerate labores, Auguris ut nostri Calchantis fata queamus Scire ratosne habeant an vanos pectoris orsus. Namque omnes memori portentum mente retentant, Qui non funestis liquerunt lumina fatis. Argolicis primum ut vestita est classibus Aulis, Quae Priamo cladem et Troiae pestemque ferebant, Nos circum latices gelidos fumantibus aris Aurigeris divom placantes numina tauris Sub platano umbrifera, fons unde emanat aquai+, Vidimus inmani specie tortuque draconem Terribilem, Iovis ut pulsu penetraret ab ara; Qui platani in ramo foliorum tegmine saeptos Corripuit pullos; quos cum consumeret octo, Nona super tremulo genetrix clangore volabat; Cui ferus inmani laniavit viscera morsu.

Him, when he had slain the birds so tender and their mother, the same Saturnian father who had brought him into the light hid away and shaped into the hard covering of stone. But we, standing in fear, beheld the marvelous monstrous sign turning about in the very midst of the gods’ altars. Then Calchas spoke these words with confident voice: "Why are you suddenly stunned and benumbed, Achaeans? The very Creator of the gods has given us these portents, slow and far too late, but with everlasting fame and praise. For as many birds as you see slaughtered by the foul tooth, so many years of war shall we drain to the dregs at Troy; which in the tenth shall fall, and shall sate the Achaeans with vengeance." These things Calchas declared; and these things you now see brought to ripeness. But what sort of augury is that, of years rather than of months or of days, drawn from sparrows?

Hunc, ubi tam teneros volucris matremque peremit, Qui luci ediderat, genitor Saturnius idem Abdidit et duro formavit tegmine saxi. Nos autem timidi stantes mirabile monstrum Vidimus in mediis divom versarier aris. Tum Calchas haec est fidenti voce locutus: Quidnam torpentes subito obstipuistis, Achivi? Nobis haec portenta deum dedit ipse creator Tarda et sera nimis, sed fama ac laude perenni. Nam quot avis taetro mactatas dente videtis, Tot nos ad Troiam belli exanclabimus annos; Quae decumo cadet et poena satiabit Achivos. Edidit haec Calchas; quae iam matura videtis. Quae tandem ista auguratio est ex passeribus annorum potius quam aut mensuum aut dierum?

And why does he draw his conjecture from the little sparrows, in which there was no monstrous sign, yet stay silent about the dragon, which is said — a thing that could not happen — to have been turned to stone? And lastly, what likeness has a sparrow to years? As for that snake which appeared to Sulla while he was sacrificing, I remember both: that Sulla, when he was about to lead out his army on campaign, sacrificed, and that the snake came forth from the altar, and that on that day the affair was brilliantly conducted — not by the haruspex’s counsel, but by the commander’s.

Cur autem de passerculis coniecturam facit, in quibus nullum erat monstrum, de dracone silet, qui, id quod fieri non potuit, lapideus dicitur factus? postremo quid simile habet passer annis? Nam de angue illo, qui Sullae apparuit immolanti, utrumque memini, et Sullam, cum in expeditionem educturus esset, immolavisse, et anguem ab ara extitisse, eoque die rem praeclare esse gestam non haruspicis consilio, sed imperatoris.

And these kinds of showings have nothing marvelous about them; once they have happened, they are then drawn into a conjecture by some interpretation — so that those grains of wheat heaped into the mouth of the boy Midas, or the bees you said had settled on the lips of the boy Plato, are not so much marvelous as prettily conjectured; and these very things might either have been false themselves, or the things that were predicted might have fallen out by chance. About Roscius himself, that story may indeed be false — that he was coiled about by a snake; but that there was a snake in his cradle is not so much a wonder, especially in the district of Solonium, where snakes are wont to traffic about the hearth. As for the haruspices’ answering that nothing would be more illustrious, nothing more noble, than he, I marvel that the immortal gods should have shown a future actor his renown, and shown none to Africanus.

Atque haec ostentorum genera mirabile nihil habent; quae cum facta sunt, tum ad coniecturam aliqua interpretatione revocantur, ut illa tritici grana in os pueri Midae congesta aut apes, quas dixisti in labris Platonis consedisse pueri, non tam mirabilia sint quam coniecta belle; quae tamen vel ipsa falsa esse vel ea, quae praedicta sunt, fortuito cecidisse potuerunt. De ipso Roscio potest illud quidem esse falsum, ut circumligatus fuerit angui, sed ut in cunis fuerit anguis, non tam est mirum, in Solonio praesertim, ubi ad focum angues nundinari solent. Nam quod haruspices responderint nihil illo clarius, nihil nobilius fore, miror deos immortales histrioni futuro claritatem ostendisse, nullam ostendisse Africano.

And then you have gathered up the Flaminian showings too: that he himself and his horse suddenly fell down — hardly a marvel, this; that the standard of the first hastatus could not be pulled up — perhaps the standard-bearer was pulling it up timidly, having planted it confidently. For what wonder did the horse of Dionysius bring, in that it emerged from a river and had bees in its mane? But because in a short time he began to reign, what had happened by chance took on the force of a showing. But at Sparta arms rang out in the temple of Hercules, and of the same god at Thebes the closed doors suddenly opened of themselves, and those shields that had been fixed up high were found upon the ground. Since none of these things could happen without some movement, what reason is there why we should say they were brought about by divine agency rather than by chance?

Atque etiam a te Flaminiana ostenta collecta sunt: quod ipse et equus eius repente conciderit; non sane mirabile hoc quidem! quod evelli primi hastati signum non potuerit; timide fortasse signifer evellebat, quod fidenter infixerat. Nam Dionysii equus quid attulit admirationis, quod emersit e flumine quodque habuit apes in iuba? Sed quia brevi tempore regnare coepit, quod acciderat casu, vim habuit ostenti. At Lacedaemoniis in Herculis fano arma sonuerunt, eiusdemque dei Thebis valvae clausae subito se aperuerunt, eaque scuta, quae fuerant sublime fixa, sunt humi inventa. Horum cum fieri nihil potuerit sine aliquo motu, quid est, cur divinitus ea potius quam casu facta esse dicamus?

But on the head of the statue of Lysander at Delphi there sprang up a crown of rough weeds, and that suddenly. Is that so? Do you suppose the weed’s crown sprang up before the seed had been sown? And the rough weed, I believe, came from the droppings of birds, not from human planting; and besides, whatever is on the head can look like a crown. As for what you said — that at the same time the golden stars of Castor and Pollux set up at Delphi fell down, and were nowhere found again — that seems rather the work of thieves than of the gods.

At in Lysandri statuae capite Delphis extitit corona ex asperis herbis, et quidem subita. Itane? censes ante coronam herbae extitisse, quam conceptum esse semen? herbam autem asperam credo avium congestu, non humano satu; iam, quicquid in capite est, id coronae simile videri potest. Nam quod eodem tempore stellas aureas Castoris et Pollucis Delphis positas decidisse, neque eas usquam repertas esse dixisti, furum id magis factum quam deorum videtur.

The wickedness of the ape at Dodona, however, committed to writing in the Greek histories, fills me with wonder. What could be less of a wonder than that that most monstrous beast overturned the urn and scattered the lots? And the historians declare that no showing more grievous than this befell the Spartans! Then there was that prediction of the men of Veii: that if the Alban lake overflowed and flowed down into the sea, Rome would perish; but if it were held back, Veii would — so the Alban water was drawn off to the benefit of the suburban farmland, not to the preservation of citadel and city. But a little later a voice was heard warning men to take care that Rome not be captured by the Gauls; and from this an altar was consecrated on the New Way to Aius the Speaker. What then? This Aius the Speaker, when no one knew him, both spoke and uttered words and from that got his name; but after he found a seat and an altar and a name, he fell dumb? The same may be said of Moneta: from whom, apart from the matter of the pregnant sow, of what have we ever been warned?

Simiae vero Dodonaeae improbitatem historiis Graecis mandatam esse demiror. Quid minus mirum quam illam monstruosissumam bestiam urnam evertisse, sortes dissupavisse? Et negant historici Lacedaemoniis ullum ostentum hoc tristius accidisse! Nam illa praedicta Veientium, si lacus Albanus redundasset isque in mare fluxisset, Romam perituram; si repressus esset, Veios ita aqua Albana deducta ad utilitatem agri suburbani, non ad arcem urbemque retinendam. At paulo post audita vox est monentis, ut providerent, ne a Gallis Roma caperetur; ex eo Aio Loquenti aram in nova via consecratam. Quid ergo? Aius iste Loquens, cum eum nemo norat, et aiebat et loquebatur et ex eo nomen invenit; posteaquam et sedem et aram et nomen invenit, obmutuit? Quod idem dici de Moneta potest; a qua praeterquam de sue plena quid umquam moniti sumus?

Enough, and more than enough, about showings; there remain the auspices, and those lots which are drawn — not the lots that are poured forth in prophesying, which we more truly call oracles, and about which we shall speak when we come to natural divination. There remains also the matter of the Chaldeans; but first let us look at the auspices. A hard place for an augur, this, to argue against. For a Marsian augur, perhaps; but for a Roman, the easiest. For we are not the kind of augurs who foretell the future by observation of birds and the rest of the signs. And yet I believe that Romulus, who founded the city after taking the auspices, held the opinion that there was a science of augury in foreseeing things — for antiquity went astray in many matters — a science which we now see altered, whether by use, or by learning, or by the lapse of time; but the custom is retained, the religion, the discipline, the augural law, the authority of the college, both for the opinion of the common people and for the great advantages of the state.

Satis multa de ostentis; auspicia restant et sortes eae, quae ducuntur, non illae, quae vaticinatione funduntur, quae oracla verius dicimus; de quibus tum dicemus, cum ad naturalem divinationem venerimus. Restat etiam de Chaldaeis; sed primum auspicia videamus. Difficilis auguri locus ad contra dicendum. Marso fortasse, sed Romano facillumus. Non enim sumus ii nos augures, qui avium reliquorumve signorum observatione futura dicamus. Et tamen credo Romulum, qui urbem auspicato condidit, habuisse opinionem esse in providendis rebus augurandi scientiam (errabat enim multis in rebus antiquitas), quam vel usu iam vel doctrina vel vetustate immutatam videmus; retinetur autem et ad opinionem vulgi et ad magnas utilitates rei publicae mos, religio, disciplina, ius augurium, collegii auctoritas.

Nor in truth were Publius Claudius and Lucius Junius, the consuls, anything but deserving of every punishment, who sailed against the auspices; for the religion ought to have been obeyed, and the ancestral custom not so defiantly spurned. With justice, then, was the one condemned by the people’s verdict, while the other took his own life. Flaminius did not obey the auspices, and so he perished with his army. But a year later Paulus did obey; did he fall any the less, with his army, in the battle of Cannae? For granting that there are auspices, which there are not, at least these that we use — whether by the tripudium or from the sky — are images of auspices, in no way auspices themselves. "Quintus Fabius, I wish you to attend me at the taking of the auspice"; he answers: "I have heard." Among our forefathers, a man skilled in the matter was called in for this; now, anyone you please. But it is necessary that the man understand what silence is; for that is what we call silence in the auspices — what is free of every flaw.

Nec vero non omni supplicio digni P. Claudius L. Iunius consules, qui contra auspicia navigaverunt; parendum enim religioni fuit nec patrius mos tam contumaciter repudiandus. Iure igitur alter populi iudicio damnatus est, alter mortem sibi ipse conscivit. Flaminius non paruit auspiciis, itaque periit cum exercitu. At anno post Paulus paruit; num minus cecidit in Cannensi pugna cum exercitu? Etenim, ut sint auspicia, quae nulla sunt, haec certe, quibus utimur, sive tripudio sive de caelo, simulacra sunt auspiciorum, auspicia nullo modo. Q. Fabi, te mihi in auspicio esse volo; respondet: audivi. Hic apud maiores nostros adhibebatur peritus, nunc quilubet. Peritum autem esse necesse est eum, qui, silentium quid sit, intellegat; id enim silentium dicimus in auspiciis, quod omni vitio caret.

To understand this belongs to the accomplished augur; but that other man, who is called in for the auspice, when the one taking the auspices has given the command thus — "Declare it, if it shall seem to be silence" — neither looks up nor looks about him; he straightway answers that it seems to be silence. Then the first: "Declare it, if they shall feed." — "They are feeding." — What birds? Or where? "He has brought," he says, "chickens in a cage" — the man who from this very thing is named the chicken-keeper. These, then, are the birds that serve as Jupiter’s messengers! Whether they feed or not, what does it matter? Nothing to the auspices; but because, when they feed, something must necessarily fall from the mouth and strike the earth — a "ground-striking" terripavium it was called at first, then a "ground-stamping" terripudium; and this last is now called a tripudium — when, then, a morsel has fallen from the chicken’s mouth, then a tripudium solistimum is announced to the man taking the auspices.

Hoc intellegere perfecti auguris est; illi autem, qui in auspicium adhibetur, cum ita imperavit is, qui auspicatur: dicito, si silentium esse videbitur, nec suspicit nec circumspicit; statim respondet silentium esse videri. Tum ille: dicito, si pascentur.— Pascuntur.— Quae aves? aut ubi? Attulit, inquit, in cavea pullos is, qui ex eo ipso nominatur pullarius. Haec sunt igitur aves internuntiae Iovis! quae pascantur necne, quid refert? Nihil ad auspicia; sed quia, cum pascuntur, necesse est aliquid ex ore cadere et terram pavire (terripavium primo, post terripudium dictum est; hoc quidem iam tripudium dicitur)—cum igitur offa cecidit ex ore pulli, tum auspicanti tripudium solistimum nuntiatur.

Can this augury, then, hold anything divine, when it is so forced and squeezed out of the bird? That the most ancient augurs did not use it is shown by this: we have an old decree of the college that any bird whatever can give the tripudium. There would be an augury then, if only the bird were free to give it of itself; then that bird might be seen as the interpreter and attendant of Jupiter. But as it is, when the creature is shut up in a cage and half dead with starvation, if it pounces on a lump of mash and something drops from its mouth — do you take this for an augury, and suppose that Romulus was in the habit of taking the auspices in this fashion?

Ergo hoc auspicium divini quicquam habere potest, quod tam sit coactum et expressum? Quo antiquissumos augures non esse usos argumento est, quod decretum collegii vetus habemus omnem avem tripudium facere posse. Tum igitur esset auspicium (si modo esset ei liberum) se ostendisse; tum avis illa videri posset interpres et satelles Iovis; nunc vero inclusa in cavea et fame enecta si in offam pultis invadit, et si aliquid ex eius ore cecidit, hoc tu auspicium aut hoc modo Romulum auspicari solitum putas?

Again, do you not think that those who took the auspices used once to watch the sky themselves? Now they give the order to the keeper of the chickens, and he reports back. Lightning on the left we hold to be the best of auguries for all matters except elections — and that exception was established for the sake of the state, so that the leading men of the citizenry should be the interpreters of the auspices, whether in the people’s trials, or in the enacting of laws, or in the creation of magistrates. But on the strength of a letter from Tiberius Gracchus, the consuls Scipio and Figulus, when the augurs had judged that they had been elected with a flaw in the proceedings, laid down their office. Who denies that augury is a discipline? It is divination that I deny. But the haruspices are diviners — they whom Tiberius Gracchus, on account of the sudden death of the man who had collapsed without warning while reporting the result of the prerogative century, brought before the Senate, and who declared that the officer who put the question had not been lawful.

Iam de caelo servare non ipsos censes solitos, qui auspicabantur? Nunc imperant pullario; ille renuntiat. Fulmen sinistrum auspicium optumum habemus ad omnis res praeterquam ad comitia; quod quidem institutum rei publicae causa est, ut comitiorum vel in iudiciis populi vel in iure legum vel in creandis magistratibus principes civitatis essent interpretes. At Ti. Gracchi litteris Scipio et Figulus consules, cum augures iudicassent eos vitio creatos esse, magistratu se abdicaverunt. Quis negat augurum disciplinam esse? divinationem nego. At haruspices divini; quos cum Ti. Gracchus propter mortem repentinam eius, qui in praerogativa referenda subito concidisset, in senatum introduxisset, non iustum rogatorem fuisse dixerunt.

First, take care that they did not pronounce against the man who had been the officer of the century; for it was he who had died, and they could say that without divination, by mere conjecture. Then perhaps it was by chance, which is by no means to be removed from this kind of case. For what could Etruscan haruspices know either about the tent’s being correctly taken or about the law of the pomerium? For my part I agree rather with Gaius Marcellus than with Appius Claudius, both of whom were my colleagues, and I judge that the law of the augurs, although it was first established on the belief in divination, was nevertheless afterward preserved and retained for the sake of the state.

Primum vide, ne in eum dixerint, qui rogator centuriae fuisset; is enim erat mortuus; id autem sine divinatione coniectura poterant dicere. Deinde fortasse casu, qui nullo modo est ex hoc genere tollendus. Quid enim scire Etrusci haruspices aut de tabernaculo recte capto aut de pomerii iure potuerunt? Equidem adsentior C. Marcello potius quam App. Claudio, qui ambo mei collegae fuerunt, existimoque ius augurum, etsi divinationis opinione principio constitutum sit, tamen postea rei publicae causa conservatum ac retentum.

But on this point more elsewhere; for now, so much. Let us look at foreign auguries, which are not so much matters of art as of superstition. They use nearly all birds, we very few; some are unlucky to them, others to us. Deiotarus used to question me about the discipline of our augury, and I him about his. Immortal gods, how great the difference was! So great that some things were even contrary. And he always used those auguries of his, whereas we — except while we hold the auspices taken on behalf of the people — how much do we use ours? Our ancestors would not have war conducted except under the auspices; yet for how many years now have wars been conducted by proconsuls and propraetors

Sed de hoc loco plura in aliis, nunc hactenus. Externa enim auguria, quae sunt non tam artificiosa quam superstitiosa, videamus. Omnibus fere avibus utuntur, nos admodum paucis; alia illis sinistra sunt, alia nostris. Solebat ex me Deiotarus percontari nostri augurii disciplinam, ego ex illo sui. Di immortales! quantum differebat! ut quaedam essent etiam contraria. Atque ille iis semper utebatur, nos, nisi dum a populo auspicia accepta habemus, quam multum iis utimur? Bellicam rem administrari maiores nostri nisi auspicato noluerunt; quam multi anni sunt, cum bella a proconsulibus et a propraetoribus administrantur,

who hold no auspices at all! And so they neither cross rivers under the auspices nor take auspices by the tripudium. Where, then, is the divination by birds? Since wars are conducted by men who hold no auspices, it appears to have been retained for the affairs of the city and abolished for those of war. As for the auspice of the spear-points — which is wholly a military auspice — the famous Marcus Marcellus, five times consul, gave it up entirely, that same man being both a commander and an augur of the first rank. And indeed he used to say that, whenever he wished to carry through some affair without being hindered by the auspices, he was accustomed to make his journey in a closed litter. Like to this is the rule we augurs lay down, that to keep a yoke-auspice from occurring they should bid the beasts be unyoked.

qui auspicia non habent! Itaque nec amnis transeunt auspicato nec tripudio auspicantur. Ubi ergo avium divinatio? quae, quoniam ab iis, qui auspicia nulla habent, bella administrantur, ad urbanas res retenta videtur, a bellicis esse sublata. Nam ex acuminibus quidem, quod totum auspicium militare est, iam M. Marcellus ille quinquiens consul totum omisit, idem imperator, idem augur optumus. Et quidem ille dicebat, si quando rem agere vellet, ne impediretur auspiciis, lectica operta facere iter se solere. Huic simile est, quod nos augures praecipimus, ne iuges auspicium obveniat, ut iumenta iubeant diiungere.

What else is it to refuse to be warned by Jupiter than to contrive that either no auspice can come about, or, if it does come about, none can be seen? For that point is quite ridiculous — your saying that Deiotarus does not regret the auspices that were given him when he set out to join Pompey, because, having followed his loyalty, he discharged his duty toward the friendship of the Roman people; and that praise and glory were more precious to him than his kingdom and his possessions. I believe it, indeed; but this has nothing to do with the auspices. For no crow could croak to him that he was acting rightly in preparing to defend the freedom of the Roman people; he felt that himself, as in fact he did feel.

Quid est aliud nolle moneri a Iove nisi efficere, ut aut ne fieri possit auspicium aut, si fiat, videri? Nam illud admodum ridiculum, quod negas Deiotarum auspiciorum, quae sibi ad Pompeium proficiscenti facta sint, paenitere, quod fidem secutus amicitiamque populi Romani functus sit officio; antiquiorem enim sibi fuisse laudem et gloriam quam regnum et possessiones suas. Credo equidem, sed hoc nihil ad auspicia; nec enim ei cornix canere potuit recte eum facere, quod populi Romani libertatem defendere pararet; ipse hoc sentiebat, sicuti sensit.

Birds signify outcomes, whether adverse or favorable. I see that Deiotarus made use of the auspices of virtue, which forbid us to look to fortune so long as loyalty is upheld. But if the birds showed prosperous outcomes, then surely they deceived. He fled from the battle with Pompey — a grievous hour! He parted from him — a sorrowful thing! He saw Caesar at one and the same time enemy and guest — what is more bitter than that? And Caesar, when he had snatched from him the tetrarchy of the Trocmi and given it to some hanger-on of his from Pergamum, and had likewise stripped from him the Armenia granted by the Senate, and when he had been received by him with the most magnificent hospitality, left him plundered, both his host and a king. But I am wandering too far afield; I shall return to my theme. If we are after outcomes, which are what the birds are consulted for, in no way were they prosperous for Deiotarus; but if we are after duties, these were sought from his own virtue, not from the auspices.

Aves eventus significant aut adversos aut secundos; virtutis auspiciis video esse usum Deiotarum, quae vetat spectare fortunam, dum praestetur fides. Aves vero si prosperos eventus ostenderunt, certe fefellerunt. Fugit e proelio cum Pompeio; grave tempus! Discessit ab eo; luctuosa res! Caesarem eodem tempore hostem et hospitem vidit; quid hoc tristius? Is cum ei Trocmorum tetrarchian eripuisset et adseculae suo Pergameno nescio cui dedisset eidemque detraxisset Armeniam a senatu datam, cumque ab eo magnificentissumo hospitio acceptus esset, spoliatum reliquit et hospitem et regem. Sed labor longius; ad propositum revertar. Si eventa quaerimus, quae exquiruntur avibus, nullo modo prospera Deiotaro; sin officia, a virtute ipsius, non ab auspiciis petita sunt.

Drop, then, the staff of Romulus, which you say could not be burned in that great fire; despise the whetstone of Attus Navius. There ought to be no place in philosophy for invented little tales. It was rather the part of a philosopher, with respect to the whole of augury, first to see its very nature, then its discovery, then its consistency. What, then, is the nature that brings it about that birds wandering this way and that, here and there, should signify something and now forbid action, now command it, whether by their song or by their flight? And why is it granted to some birds to make a valid auspice from the left, to others from the right? In what manner, again, or when, or by whom shall we say these things were discovered? The Etruscans at least have a boy ploughed up from the earth as the founder of their discipline; whom have we? Attus Navius? But Romulus and Remus were some years older, both of them augurs, as we have received the account. Or shall we say these things were the discoveries of the Pisidians, or the Cilicians, or the Phrygians? Is it your pleasure, then, to have men devoid of humanity as the authorities for divinity?

Omitte igitur lituum Romuli, quem in maximo incendio negas potuisse comburi; contemne cotem Atti Navii. Nihil debet esse in philosophia commenticiis fabellis loci; illud erat philosophi potius, totius augurii primum naturam ipsam videre, deinde inventionem, deinde constantiam. Quae est igitur natura, quae volucris huc et illuc passim vagantis efficiat ut significent aliquid et tum vetent agere, tum iubeant aut cantu aut volatu? cur autem aliis a laeva, aliis a dextra datum est avibus ut ratum auspicium facere possint? Quo modo autem haec aut quando aut a quibus inventa dicemus? Etrusci tamen habent exaratum puerum auctorem disciplinae suae; nos quem? Attumne Navium? At aliquot annis antiquior Romulus et Remus, ambo augures, ut accepimus. An Pisidarum aut Cilicum aut Phrygum ista inventa dicemus? Placet igitur humanitatis expertis habere divinitatis auctores?

But all kings, peoples, and nations use the auspices. As if anything were so very common as to have no wisdom at all, or as if you yourself, in forming a judgment, took your stand on the multitude! How few there are who deny that pleasure is a good — most even call it the highest good! Are the Stoics, then, frightened off from their opinion by the throng of these? Or in most matters does the multitude follow their authority? What wonder is it, then, if in the auspices and in the whole of divination feeble minds take in those superstitions and cannot discern the truth?

At omnes reges, populi, nationes utuntur auspiciis. Quasi vero quicquam sit tam valde quam nihil sapere vulgare, aut quasi tibi ipsi in iudicando placeat multitudo! Quotus quisque est, qui voluptatem neget esse bonum? plerique etiam summum bonum dicunt. Num igitur eorum frequentia Stoici de sententia deterrentur? aut num plerisque in rebus sequitur eorum auctoritatem multitudo? Quid mirum igitur, si in auspiciis et in omni divinatione inbecilli animi superstitiosa ista concipiant, verum dispicere non possint?

And what coherent, connected consistency is there among the augurs? In accordance with the usage of our augury Ennius said: Then it thundered well on the left, the weather being clear. But Homer’s Ajax, complaining to Achilles of the ferocity of the Trojans, announces some such thing in this manner: Jupiter sends forth prosperous things by these flashes on the right. So to us things on the left appear good, while to Greeks and barbarians things on the right appear the better. And yet I am well aware that the things which are good we call "left-hand," even if they are on the right; but certainly our people named the favorable thing "left" and foreigners named it "right," because for the most part it seemed the better.

Quae autem est inter augures conveniens et coniuncta constantia? Ad nostri augurii consuetudinem dixit Ennius: Tum tonuit laevum bene tempestate serena. At Homericus Aiax apud Achillem querens de ferocitate Troianorum nescio quid hoc modo nuntiat: Prospera Iuppiter his dextris fulgoribus edit. Ita nobis sinistra videntur, Graiis et barbaris dextra meliora. Quamquam haud ignoro, quae bona sint, sinistra nos dicere, etiamsi dextra sint; sed certe nostri sinistrum nominaverunt externique dextrum, quia plerumque id melius videbatur.

How great a disagreement this is! And again — that they use some birds, others use others, that they observe in different ways, that different birds give different responses — is it not necessary to admit that part of all this was taken up by error, part by superstition, much of it by deception? And to these superstitions you did not hesitate to add omens as well: that Aemilia, by saying Perseus had perished, was an omen for Paulus, an omen her father accepted; that Caecilia, saying she handed over her own seat to her sister’s daughter. Then those phrases: "Hold your tongues in good favor," and the prerogative century, the omen of the elections. This is the very thing — to be rich and eloquent against oneself. For when, in observing such things, will you be able to be calm and free in mind, so that in carrying out an affair you have not superstition but reason as your guide? Is it so? If someone says something out of his own affairs and his own talk, and some word of his falls aptly upon what you are doing or thinking, shall that thing bring you either fear or eagerness?

Haec quanta dissensio est! Quid? quod aliis avibus utuntur, aliis signis, aliter observant, alia respondent, non necesse est fateri partim horum errore susceptum esse, partim superstitione, multa fallendo? Atque his superstitionibus non dubitasti etiam omina adiungere. Aemilia Paulo Persam perisse, quod pater omen accepit; Caecilia se sororis filiae sedes suas tradere. Iam illa: Favete linguis et praerogativam, omen comitiorum. Hoc est ipsum esse contra se copiosum et disertum. Quando enim ista observans quieto et libero animo esse poteris, ut ad rem gerendam non superstitionem habeas, sed rationem ducem? Itane? si quis aliquid ex sua re atque ex suo sermone dixerit et eius verbum aliquod apte ceciderit ad id, quod ages aut cogitabis, ea res tibi aut timorem adferet aut alacritatem?

When Marcus Crassus was loading his army at Brundisium, a man in the harbor selling figs brought from Caunus kept crying out "Cauneans!" Let us say, if you please, that Crassus was warned by him to take care not to go — that he would not have perished, had he heeded the omen. But if we are to take up such things, then a stumble of the foot, the snapping of a shoe-strap, and sneezes will all have to be observed.

Cum M. Crassus exercitum Brundisii inponeret, quidam in portu caricas Cauno advectas vendens Cauneas clamitabat. Dicamus, si placet, monitum ab eo Crassum, caveret ne iret; non fuisse periturum, si omini paruisset. Quae si suscipiamus, pedis offensio nobis et abruptio corrigiae et sternumenta erunt observanda.

The lots remain, and the Chaldaeans, before we come to seers and to dreams. You think, then, that something must be said about lots? But what is a lot? Much the same thing as casting fingers, as throwing knucklebones, as throwing dice — matters in which recklessness and chance, not reason or deliberation, hold sway. The whole business was contrived by frauds, with an eye to gain, or to superstition, or to error. And just as we did in the case of haruspicy, so let us look at the reputed discovery of the most famous lots. The records of the people of Praeneste declare that one Numerius Suffustius, an honorable man and of good family, was driven by frequent dreams — at the last even threatening ones — being bidden to cut into a flint in a fixed spot, and that, terrified by the visions, while his fellow citizens laughed at him, he set about the task; and so, when the rock was broken through, the lots leapt out, carved in oak, in the characters of an ancient script. That place stands today, fenced about with religious awe, near the statue of the boy Jupiter, who, still at the breast, sits with Juno in the lap of Fortune reaching for her teat, and is worshipped most chastely by mothers.

Sortes restant et Chaldaei, ut ad vates veniamus et ad somnia. Dicendum igitur putas de sortibus? Quid enim sors est? Idem prope modum, quod micare, quod talos iacere, quod tesseras, quibus in rebus temeritas et casus, non ratio nec consilium valet. Tota res est inventa fallaciis aut ad quaestum aut ad superstitionem aut ad errorem. Atque ut in haruspicina fecimus, sic videamus, clarissumarum sortium quae tradatur inventio. Numerium Suffustium Praenestinorum monumenta declarant, honestum hominem et nobilem, somniis crebris, ad extremum etiam minacibus cum iuberetur certo in loco silicem caedere, perterritum visis irridentibus suis civibus id agere coepisse; itaque perfracto saxo sortis erupisse in robore insculptas priscarum litterarum notis. Is est hodie locus saeptus religiose propter Iovis pueri, qui lactens cum Iunone Fortunae in gremio sedens mammam adpetens castissime colitur a matribus.

At the same time, in that spot where the temple of Fortune now stands, they say that honey flowed from an olive tree, and that the haruspices declared those lots would be of the highest renown, and that at their command a chest was made from that olive, and the lots placed within it — the lots that to this day are drawn out at Fortune’s prompting. What, then, can there be of certainty in these, which at Fortune’s prompting are shuffled and drawn by a boy’s hand? And how, moreover, were those lots laid in that place? Who cut that oak, hewed it, inscribed it? Nothing, they say, that a god cannot bring about. Would that he had brought it about that the Stoics be wise, so that they should not believe everything with superstitious anxiety and misery! But this kind of divination, at least, common life has now hooted off the stage; the beauty and antiquity of the shrine still keeps alive the name of the Praenestine lots — and that only among the crowd.

Eodemque tempore in eo loco, ubi Fortunae nunc est aedes, mel ex olea fluxisse dicunt, haruspicesque dixisse summa nobilitate illas sortis futuras, eorumque iussu ex illa olea arcam esse factam, eoque conditas sortis, quae hodie Fortunae monitu tolluntur. Quid igitur in his potest esse certi, quae Fortunae monitu pueri manu miscentur atque ducuntur? quo modo autem istae positae in illo loco? quis robur illud cecidit, dolavit, inscripsit? Nihil est, inquiunt, quod deus efficere non possit. Utinam sapientis Stoicos effecisset, ne omnia cum superstitiosa sollicitudine et miseria crederent! Sed hoc quidem genus divinationis vita iam communis explosit; fani pulchritudo et vetustas Praenestinarum etiam nunc retinet sortium nomen, atque id in volgus.

For what magistrate, or what man of any distinction, makes use of lots? In other places, indeed, the lots have plainly grown cold. And so Clitomachus writes that Carneades used to say he had nowhere seen Fortune more fortunate than at Praeneste. Let us drop, then, this kind of divination. Let us come to the prodigies of the Chaldaeans; about whom Eudoxus, the pupil of Plato, by the judgment of the most learned men easily first in astrology, holds this opinion — which he left set down in writing — that in the matter of prediction and the marking out of each man’s life from his birthday, the Chaldaeans are least of all to be believed.

Quis enim magistratus aut quis vir inlustrior utitur sortibus? ceteris vero in locis sortes plane refrixerunt. Quod Carneadem Clitomachus scribit dicere solitum, nusquam se fortunatiorem quam Praeneste vidisse Fortunam. Ergo hoc divinationis genus omittamus. Ad Chaldaeorum monstra veniamus; de quibus Eudoxus, Platonis auditor, in astrologia iudicio doctissimorum hominum facile princeps, sic opinatur, id quod scriptum reliquit, Chaldaeis in praedictione et in notatione cuiusque vitae ex natali die minime esse credendum.

Panaetius too, who alone among the Stoics rejected the predictions of the astrologers, names Anchialus and Cassander, the foremost astrologers of the age in which he himself lived, as men who, though they excelled in the other branches of astrology, did not employ this kind of prediction. Scylax of Halicarnassus, an intimate of Panaetius, outstanding in astrology and likewise a leading man in the governance of his own city, repudiated this whole Chaldaean manner of foretelling.

Nominat etiam Panaetius, qui unus e Stoicis astrologorum praedicta reiecit, Anchialum et Cassandrum, summos astrologos illius aetatis, qua erat ipse, cum in ceteris astrologiae partibus excellerent, hoc praedictionis genere non usos. Scylax Halicarnassius, familiaris Panaetii, excellens in astrologia idemque in regenda sua civitate princeps, totum hoc Chaldaicum praedicendi genus repudiavit.

But to use reasoning and set the witnesses aside, here is how those argue who defend these Chaldaean predictions from the day of birth. They say there is a certain force in the sign-bearing circle, which in Greek is called the zōdiakos, of such a kind that each several part of that circle moves and alters the heavens in a different way, according as the stars stand at any given time in each of those parts and the parts adjacent to them; and that this force is variously stirred by those heavenly bodies which are called the wandering ones; and that when they have come into that very part of the circle in which lies the rising of the one being born, or into a part that holds something conjoined or in concord with it, they call those positions "triangles" and "squares." For since, with the approach and recession of the stars, such great turnings and changes of the seasons of the year and of the weather of the sky take place, and since by the force of the sun the things we see are brought about, they hold it not only resembling the truth but even true that, just as the air is tempered, so are children animated and formed as they come into the world, and that from this their talents, their characters, their mind, their body, the conduct of their life, and the chances and outcomes of each are shaped.

Sed ut ratione utamur omissis testibus, sic isti disputant, qui haec Chaldaeorum natalicia praedicta defendunt: Vim quandam esse aiunt signifero in orbe, qui Graece zwdiako/s dicitur, talem, ut eius orbis una quaeque pars alia alio modo moveat inmutetque caelum, perinde ut quaeque stellae in his finitumisque partibus sint quoque tempore, eamque vim varie moveri ab iis sideribus, quae vocantur errantia; cum autem in eam ipsam partem orbis venerint, in qua sit ortus eius, qui nascatur, aut in eam, quae coniunctum aliquid habeat aut consentiens, ea triangula illi et quadrata nominant. Etenim cum †tempore anni tempestatumque caeli conversiones commutationesque tantae fiant accessu stellarum et recessu, cumque ea vi solis efficiantur, quae videmus, non veri simile solum, sed etiam verum esse censent perinde, utcumque temperatus sit ae+r, ita pueros orientis animari atque formari, ex eoque ingenia, mores, animum, corpus, actionem vitae, casus cuiusque eventusque fingi.

What incredible raving! For not every error is to be called folly. To these men even Diogenes the Stoic concedes something — that they can predict, but only this far, of what nature each man will be and to what pursuit each will be best suited; the rest of what they profess, he denies can in any way be known. For the shapes of twins are alike, while their life and fortune are for the most part unalike. Procles and Eurysthenes, kings of the Lacedaemonians, were twin brothers.

O delirationem incredibilem! non enim omnis error stultitia dicenda est. Quibus etiam Diogenes Stoicus concedit aliquid, ut praedicere possint dumtaxat, qualis quisque natura et ad quam quisque maxume rem aptus futurus sit; cetera, quae profiteantur, negat ullo modo posse sciri; etenim geminorum formas esse similis, vitam atque fortunam plerumque disparem. Procles et Eurysthenes, Lacedaemoniorum reges, gemini fratres fuerunt.

Yet they did not live the same number of years; for the life of Procles was the shorter, and he far excelled his brother in the glory of his deeds. But that very thing which the excellent Diogenes concedes to the Chaldaeans, by a kind of collusion, I deny can be understood at all. For since, as they themselves say, the rising of those who are born is governed by the moon, and the Chaldaeans observe and mark out as the natal stars whatever stars seem joined to the moon, they judge by the most deceptive sense of the eyes things that they ought to have seen by reason and by the mind. For the reasoning of the mathematicians teaches — and they ought to have known it — at how low a level the moon is borne, almost grazing the earth; how far it is from the nearest star, that of Mercury; how much farther from that of Venus; then by yet another interval how far it stands from the sun, by whose light it is thought to be illumined; while the remaining three intervals are infinite and immense — from the sun to the star of Mars, thence to that of Jupiter, from that to the star of Saturn, and thence to the heaven itself, which is the outermost and uttermost limit of the world.

At ii nec totidem annos vixerunt; anno enim Procli vita brevior fuit, multumque is fratri rerum gestarum gloria praestitit. At ego id ipsum, quod vir optumus, Diogenes, Chaldaeis quasi quadam praevaricatione concedit, nego posse intellegi. Etenim cum, ut ipsi dicunt, ortus nascentium luna moderetur, eaque animadvertant et notent sidera natalicia Chaldaei, quaecumque lunae iuncta videantur, oculorum fallacissimo sensu iudicant ea, quae ratione atque animo videre debebant. Docet enim ratio mathematicorum, quam istis notam esse oportebat, quanta humilitate luna feratur terram paene contingens, quantum absit a proxuma Mercurii stella, multo autem longius a Veneris, deinde alio intervallo distet a sole, cuius lumine conlustrari putatur; reliqua vero tria intervalla infinita et inmensa, a sole ad Martis, inde ad Iovis, ab eo ad Saturni stellam, inde ad caelum ipsum, quod extremum atque ultumum mundi est.

What contagion, then, can reach from an almost infinite interval down to the moon, or rather to the earth? Again, when they say — as they must say — that all the births of all men, whoever are begotten in all the inhabited earth, are the same, and that the same things must necessarily befall all who are born under the same disposition of sky and stars, are they not such that it appears these interpreters of the heavens do not know even the nature of the heavens? For since those circles which divide the sky as if down the middle and bound our field of vision — which by the Greeks are called horizontes, and may most rightly be called by us the "bounding" circles — have the greatest variety and stand differently in different places, the risings and settings of the heavenly bodies must necessarily not take place at the same time for all.

Quae potest igitur contagio ex infinito paene intervallo pertinere ad lunam vel potius ad terram? Quid? cum dicunt, id quod iis dicere necesse est, omnis omnium ortus, quicumque gignantur in omni terra, quae incolatur, eosdem esse, eademque omnibus, qui eodem statu caeli et stellarum nati sint, accidere necesse esse, nonne eius modi sunt, ut ne caeli quidem naturam interpretes istos caeli nosse appareat? Cum enim illi orbes, qui caelum quasi medium dividunt et aspectum nostrum definiunt, qui a Graecis o(ri/zontes nominantur, a nobis finientes rectissume nominari possunt, varietatem maxumam habeant aliique in aliis locis sint, necesse est ortus occasusque siderum non fieri eodem tempore apud omnis.

But if by their force the sky is tempered now in this way, now in that, how can there be the same force at work upon those being born, when the difference of the sky is so great? In these regions which we inhabit, the Dog Star rises after the solstice, and indeed by some several days; but among the Troglodytes, as is written, before the solstice — so that, even if we now grant that some celestial force does reach to those begotten on earth, it must be confessed to them that those who are born at the same time can fall into unlike natures on account of the unlikeness of the sky; which is by no means to their liking, for they wish all who are born anywhere, having risen at the same time, to be born under the same condition.

Quodsi eorum vi caelum modo hoc, modo illo modo temperatur, qui potest eadem vis esse nascentium, cum caeli tanta sit dissimilitudo? In his locis, quae nos incolimus, post solstitium Canicula exoritur, et quidem aliquot diebus, at apud Troglodytas, ut scribitur, ante solstitium, ut, si iam concedamus aliquid vim caelestem ad eos, qui in terra gignuntur, pertinere, confitendum sit illis eos, qui nascuntur eodem tempore, posse in dissimilis incidere naturas propter caeli dissimilitudinem; quod minime illis placet; volunt enim illi omnis eodem tempore ortos, qui ubique sint nati, eadem condicione nasci.

But what madness is so great as to suppose that, amid the greatest motions and changes of the sky, it makes no difference what wind, what rain, what weather there is in any place? — when of these things there are often such great unlikenesses in neighboring places that frequently one storm falls at Tusculum, another at Rome. Those who sail mark this above all, since in rounding the headlands they often feel the greatest changes of the winds. Since, then, there is now this calm, now that disturbance of the sky, is it the part of men in their senses to say that this — which assuredly does not bear upon it — does not bear upon the births of those being born, and yet to say that that something or other, thin and tenuous, which can in no way be felt and can scarcely even be understood — whatever tempering comes from the moon and the rest of the heavenly bodies — does bear upon the births of children? And again: that they do not understand the force of seeds — which counts for most in begetting and procreating — is utterly abolished, is this a middling error? For who does not see that children copy from their parents both their forms and their characters and most of their bearing and movements? — which would not happen if these things were brought about, not by the force and nature of those who beget, but by the tempering of the moon and the governance of the sky.

Sed quae tanta dementia est, ut in maxumis motibus mutationibusque caeli nihil intersit, qui ventus, qui imber, quae tempestas ubique sit? quarum rerum in proxumis locis tantae dissimilitudines saepe sunt, ut alia Tusculi, alia Romae eveniat saepe tempestas; quod, qui navigant, maxume animadvertunt, cum in flectendis promunturiis ventorum mutationes maxumas saepe sentiunt. Haec igitur cum sit tum serenitas, tum perturbatio caeli, estne sanorum hominum hoc ad nascentium ortus pertinere non dicere quod non certe pertinet, illud nescio quid tenue, quod sentiri nullo modo, intellegi autem vix potest, quae a luna ceterisque sideribus caeli temperatio fiat, dicere ad puerorum ortus pertinere? Quid? quod non intellegunt seminum vim, quae ad gignendum procreandumque plurimum valeat, funditus tolli, mediocris erroris est? Quis enim non videt et formas et mores et plerosque status ac motus effingere a parentibus liberos? quod non contingeret, si haec non vis et natura gignentium efficeret, sed temperatio lunae caelique moderatio.

And again: that those born at one and the same point of time have unlike natures and lives and fortunes — does this not declare plainly enough that the time of birth has no bearing on the leading of one’s life? Unless perhaps we suppose that no one was conceived and born at the very same time as Africanus. Was there ever, then, any man like him?

Quid? quod uno et eodem temporis puncto nati dissimilis et naturas et vitas et casus habent, parumne declarat nihil ad agendam vitam nascendi tempus pertinere? nisi forte putamus neminem eodem tempore ipso et conceptum et natum, quo Africanum. Num quis igitur talis fuit?

And again: is there any doubt that many men, though they were so born as to have certain parts deformed against nature, were restored and corrected by nature, when she had recalled herself, or else by art and medicine? — as those whose tongues so clung that they could not speak were freed by the cutting of the scalpel. Many too have removed a fault of nature by practice and exercise, as the Phalerean writes of Demosthenes, who, when he could not pronounce the letter r, brought it about by exercise that he pronounced it most distinctly. But if these things had been engendered and handed over by a star, no power could change them. And again: does not the unlikeness of places bring with it an unlikeness in the procreation of men? It is easy enough to run over in speech how far Indians and Persians, Ethiopians and Syrians differ in body and in mind, so that the variety and unlikeness is past believing.

Quid? illudne dubium est, quin multi, cum ita nati essent, ut quaedam contra naturam depravata haberent, restituerentur et corrigerentur ab natura, cum se ipsa revocasset, aut arte atque medicina? ut, quorum linguae sic inhaererent, ut loqui non possent, eae scalpello resectae liberarentur. Multi etiam naturae vitium meditatione atque exercitatione sustulerunt, ut Demosthenem scribit Phalereus, cum rho dicere nequiret, exercitatione fecisse, ut planissume diceret. Quodsi haec astro ingenerata et tradita essent, nulla res ea mutare posset. Quid? dissimilitudo locorum nonne dissimilis hominum procreationes habet? quas quidem percurrere oratione facile est, quid inter Indos et Persas, Aethiopas et Syros differat corporibus, animis, ut incredibilis varietas dissimilitudoque sit.

From which it is understood that the situation of lands has more force toward birth than the touch of the moon. For when they say that the Babylonians spent four hundred and seventy thousand years in testing and trying out children, whoever happened to be born, they deceive us; for if it had once been the regular practice, it would not have stopped — yet we have no authority who says it is done or knows it was done. Do you see that I am saying not the things that Carneades said, but the things that Panaetius, the foremost of the Stoics, said? But I also ask this: were all who fell in the battle of Cannae under one star? Their end, at any rate, was one and the same. And what of those singular in talent and spirit — were they too under one star? For what time is there in which countless men are not born? And yet surely no one is like Homer.

Ex quo intellegitur plus terrarum situs quam lunae tactus ad nascendum valere. Nam quod aiunt quadringenta septuaginta milia annorum in periclitandis experiundisque pueris, quicumque essent nati, Babylonios posuisse, fallunt; si enim esset factitatum, non esset desitum; neminem autem habemus auctorem, qui id aut fieri dicat aut factum sciat. Videsne me non ea dicere, quae Carneades, sed ea, quae princeps Stoicorum Panaetius dixerit? Ego autem etiam haec requiro: omnesne, qui Cannensi pugna ceciderint, uno astro fuerint; exitus quidem omnium unus et idem fuit. Quid? qui ingenio atque animo singulares, num astro quoque uno? quod enim tempus, quo non innumerabiles nascantur? at certe similis nemo Homeri.

And if it bears on the matter under what disposition of the heaven and arrangement of the stars each living thing comes into being, this must necessarily hold not only among men but among beasts as well — than which what more absurd can be said? Lucius Tarutius of Firmum, our friend, learned above all in the Chaldean calculations, even traced back the birthday of our own city to that festival of the Parilia on which we have received that it was founded by Romulus, and he said that Rome was born when the moon was in the Balance, and did not hesitate to sing her fates.

Et, si ad rem pertinet, quo modo caelo adfecto conpositisque sideribus quodque animal oriatur, valeat id necesse est non in hominibus solum, verum in bestiis etiam; quo quid potest dici absurdius? L. quidem Tarutius Firmanus, familiaris noster, in primis Chaldaicis rationibus eruditus, urbis etiam nostrae natalem diem repetebat ab iis Parilibus, quibus eam a Romulo conditam accepimus, Romamque, in iugo cum esset luna, natam esse dicebat nec eius fata canere dubitabat.

O the mighty force of error! Did even a city’s birthday have any bearing on the force of the stars and the moon? Grant that in a child it matters from what disposition of the heaven he drew his first breath — could this have any force in the brick or the mortar out of which the city was made? But why say more? Every day they are refuted. How many things spoken by the Chaldeans to Pompey, how many to Crassus, how many to this very Caesar I remember — that not one of them would die except in old age, except at home, except in glory! So that it seems to me most strange that anyone still exists who even now believes those whose predictions he sees refuted every day by the event and the outcome.

O vim maxumam erroris! Etiamne urbis natalis dies ad vim stellarum et lunae pertinebat? Fac in puero referre, ex qua adfectione caeli primum spiritum duxerit; num hoc in latere aut in caemento, ex quibus urbs effecta est, potuit valere? Sed quid plura? cotidie refelluntur. Quam multa ego Pompeio, quam multa Crasso, quam multa huic ipsi Caesari a Chaldaeis dicta memini, neminem eorum nisi senectute, nisi domi, nisi cum claritate esse moriturum! ut mihi permirum videatur quemquam exstare, qui etiam nunc credat iis, quorum praedicta cotidie videat re et eventis refelli.

There remain two kinds of divination which we are said to have from nature, not from art: the kind by prophesying and the kind by dreaming; of these, Quintus, let us, if you please, hold our discussion. Indeed I am willing, said he; for I assent wholly to what you have argued thus far, and, to speak truly, although your discourse has confirmed me, still even of my own accord I judged the Stoics’ view of divination too superstitious; this reasoning of the Peripatetics moved me more — of the old Dicaearchus and of him who now flourishes, Cratippus — who hold that there is in the minds of men a kind of oracle, from which they have a presentiment of things to come, if the mind is either stirred by divine frenzy or, relaxed in sleep, moved freely and unbound. About these kinds I should very much like to hear what you think and by what reasonings you weaken them.

Restant duo divinandi genera, quae habere dicimur a natura, non ab arte, vaticinandi et somniandi; de quibus, Quinte, inquam, si placet, disseramus. Mihi vero, inquit, placet; his enim, quae adhuc disputasti, prorsus adsentior, et, vere ut loquar, quamquam tua me oratio confirmavit, tamen etiam mea sponte nimis superstitiosam de divinatione Stoicorum sententiam iudicabam; haec me Peripateticorum ratio magis movebat et veteris Dicaearchi et eius, qui nunc floret, Cratippi, qui censent esse in mentibus hominum tamquam oraclum aliquod, ex quo futura praesentiant, si aut furore divino incitatus animus aut somno relaxatus solute moveatur ac libere. His de generibus quid sentias et quibus ea rationibus infirmes, audire sane velim.

When he had said this, I then began again to speak, as if from a fresh starting point. I am not unaware, Quintus, said I, that you have always felt thus — that you doubted the other kinds of divination, but approved those two, of frenzy and of dreaming, which seemed to flow from a free mind. I shall say, then, what I think about those two kinds themselves, when first I have seen what force there is in the Stoics’ conclusion of reasoning and in our friend Cratippus. For you said that Chrysippus and Diogenes and Antipater conclude in this manner: If there are gods and they do not declare to men beforehand what things are to come, then either they do not love men, or they are ignorant of what will come to pass, or they think it is no concern of men’s to know what will be, or they do not judge it consistent with their majesty to signify beforehand to men what is to come, or even the gods themselves cannot signify those things; but they neither fail to love us (for they are beneficent and friendly to the race of men) nor are ignorant of those things which were established and appointed by themselves;

Quae cum ille dixisset, tum ego rursus quasi ab alio principio sum exorsus dicere: Non ignoro, inquam, Quinte, te semper ita sensisse, ut de ceteris divinandi generibus dubitares, ista duo, furoris et somnii, quae a libera mente fluere viderentur, probares. Dicam igitur, de istis ipsis duobus generibus mihi quid videatur, si prius, et Stoicorum conclusio rationis et Cratippi nostri quid valeat, videro. Dixisti enim et Chrysippum et Diogenem et Antipatrum concludere hoc modo: Si sunt di neque ante declarant hominibus, quae futura sint, aut non diligunt homines aut, quid eventurum sit, ignorant aut existumant nihil interesse hominum scire, quid sit futurum, aut non censent esse suae maiestatis praesignificare hominibus, quae sunt futura, aut ea ne ipsi quidem di significare possunt; at neque non diligunt nos (sunt enim benefici generique hominum amici) neque ignorant ea, quae ab ipsis constituta et designata sunt;

nor is it no concern of ours to know the things that are to come (for we shall be more wary if we know); nor do they reckon this foreign to their majesty (for nothing is more excellent than beneficence); nor are they unable to foreknow things to come; the gods, therefore, do not exist, nor do they signify things to come to us; but the gods do exist; therefore they signify; and it is not the case that, if they signify things to come, they give us no ways to the knowledge of their significations (for they would signify in vain); nor, if they give the ways, is there no divination; therefore there is divination.

neque nostra nihil interest scire ea, quae futura sunt, (erimus enim cautiores, si sciemus) neque hoc alienum ducunt maiestate sua (nihil est enim beneficentia praestantius) neque non possunt futura praenoscere; non igitur di sunt nec significant nobis futura; sunt autem di; significant ergo; et non, si significant futura, nullas dant vias nobis ad significationum scientiam (frustra enim significarent) nec, si dant vias, non est divinatio; est igitur divinatio.

O the sharp men! How few the words by which they think the business is finished! They take up, to draw their conclusion, things of which nothing is granted to them. But a conclusion of reasoning is to be approved in which that which is doubted is brought out from things not in doubt. Do you see Epicurus, whom the Stoics are wont to call dull and unschooled — how he concluded that what we say is the whole of nature is infinite? What is finite, he says, has an extremity. Who would not grant this? But what has an extremity is discerned from something else outside it. This too must be conceded. But that which is the whole is not discerned from something else outside it. Not even this can be denied. Since, then, it has no extremity, it must necessarily be infinite.

O acutos homines! quam paucis verbis confectum negotium putant! ea sumunt ad concludendum, quorum iis nihil conceditur. Conclusio autem rationis ea probanda est, in qua ex rebus non dubiis id, quod dubitatur, efficitur. Videsne Epicurum, quem hebetem et rudem dicere solent Stoici, quem ad modum, quod in natura rerum omne esse dicimus, id infinitum esse concluserit? Quod finitum est, inquit, habet extremum. Quis hoc non dederit? Quod autem habet extremum, id cernitur ex alio extrinsecus. Hoc quoque est concedendum. At, quod omne est, id non cernitur ex alio extrinsecus. Ne hoc quidem negari potest. Nihil igitur cum habeat extremum, infinitum sit necesse est.

Do you see how he arrived at a doubtful matter from things conceded? This you dialecticians do not do; not only do you not take up to draw your conclusion the things that are conceded by all, but you take up things which, even when conceded, do nothing the more to bring about what you wish. For first you take up this: If there are gods, they are beneficent toward men. Who will grant you this? Epicurus? — who denies that the gods care for anything, either another’s affairs or their own. Or our own Ennius? — who speaks, with great applause and the people assenting: I have always said the race of the gods of heaven exists, and shall say so, But I think they do not care what the human race may do. And indeed he gives the reason why he holds this opinion; but there is no need to say what follows; it is enough to understand only this — that these men take for certain what is doubtful and disputed.

Videsne, ut ad rem dubiam a concessis rebus pervenerit? Hoc vos dialectici non facitis, nec solum ea non sumitis ad concludendum, quae ab omnibus concedantur, sed ea sumitis, quibus concessis nihilo magis efficiatur, quod velitis. Primum enim hoc sumitis: Si sunt di, benefici in homines sunt. Quis hoc vobis dabit? Epicurusne? qui negat quicquam deos nec alieni curare nec sui; an noster Ennius? qui magno plausu loquitur adsentiente populo: E/go deum genus ésse semper díxi et dicam caélitum, Séd eos non curáre opinor, quíd agat humanúm genus. Et quidem, cur sic opinetur, rationem subicit; sed nihil est necesse dicere, quae sequuntur; tantum sat est intellegi, id sumere istos pro certo, quod dubium controversumque sit.

It follows next that the gods are ignorant of nothing, since all things were established by them. But here how great is the contest of most learned men denying that these things were established by the immortal gods! But, you say, it is our concern to know the things that are going to come to pass. There is a great book of Dicaearchus to the effect that it is better not to know these things than to know them. They deny that this is foreign to the majesty of the gods. As if, forsooth, the gods peered into everyone’s hovel to see what would profit each man.

Sequitur porro, nihil deos ignorare, quod omnia sint ab iis constituta. Hic vero quanta pugna est doctissumorum hominum negantium esse haec a dis inmortalibus constituta! At nostra interest scire ea, quae eventura sunt. Magnus Dicaearchi liber est nescire ea melius esse quam scire. Negant id esse alienum maiestate deorum. Scilicet casas omnium introspicere, ut videant, quid cuique conducat.

“Nor are they unable to foreknow things to come.” Those deny that they can, to whom it is not acceptable that what is to be is certain. Do you see, then, that the things which are doubtful are taken up as certain and conceded? Then they twist about and conclude thus: Therefore it is not both the case that the gods exist and that they do not signify things to come; for this they now think established. Then they assume: But the gods do exist — which itself is not conceded by all. Therefore they signify. Not even this follows; for they can fail to signify and yet be gods. Nor, if they signify, do they fail to give some ways to the knowledge of the signification. But this too is possible — that they do not give them to man, yet have them themselves; for why should they give them to the Etruscans rather than to the Romans? Nor, if they give the ways, is there no divination. Grant that the gods give them, which is absurd; what does it matter, if we cannot receive them? The last point is: Therefore there is divination. Let it be the last; still it is not brought about; for from false premises, as we learned from them, the true cannot be brought about. The whole conclusion, therefore, lies in ruins.

’Neque non possunt futura praenoscere.’ Negant posse ii, quibus non placet esse certum, quid futurum sit. Videsne igitur, quae dubia sint, ea sumi pro certis atque concessis? Deinde contorquent et ita concludunt: Non igitur et sunt di nec significant futura; id enim iam perfectum arbitrantur. Deinde adsumunt: Sunt autem di, quod ipsum non ab omnibus conceditur. Significant ergo. Ne id quidem sequitur; possunt enim non significare et tamen esse di. Nec, si significant, non dant vias aliquas ad scientiam significationis. At id quoque potest, ut non dent homini, ipsi habeant; cur enim Tuscis potius quam Romanis darent? Nec, si dant vias, nulla est divinatio. Fac dare deos, quod absurdum est; quid refert, si accipere non possumus? Extremum est: Est igitur divinatio. Sit extremum, effectum tamen non est; ex falsis enim, ut ab ipsis didicimus, verum effici non potest. Iacet igitur tota conclusio.

Let us now come to that excellent man, our friend Cratippus. If, says he, without eyes the function and office of eyes cannot exist, yet eyes can sometimes fail to perform their office, then whoever has even once so used his eyes that he discerned true things, that man has the sense of eyes that discern truly. Likewise, then, if without divination the function and office of divination cannot exist, yet when someone has divination he can sometimes err and not discern truly, it is enough, to confirm divination, that something has even once been so divined that nothing seems to have fallen out by chance; and of that kind there are countless cases; therefore it must be confessed that divination exists. Wittily and briefly; but since he twice took up what he wished, even if he should find us ready to concede, still that which he assumes can in no way be conceded.

Veniamus nunc ad optumum virum, familiarem nostrum, Cratippum. Si sine oculis, inquit, non potest exstare officium et munus oculorum, possunt autem aliquando oculi non fungi suo munere, qui vel semel ita est usus oculis, ut vera cerneret, is habet sensum oculorum vera cernentium. Item igitur, si sine divinatione non potest officium et munus divinationis exstare, potest autem, cum quis divinationem habeat, errare aliquando nec vera cernere, satis est ad confirmandam divinationem semel aliquid ita esse divinatum, nihil ut fortuito cecidisse videatur; sunt autem eius generis innumerabilia; esse igitur divinationem confitendum est. Festive et breviter; sed cum bis sumpsit, quod voluit, etiamsi faciles nos ad concedendum habuerit, id tamen, quod adsumit, concedi nullo modo potest.

If, he says, the eyes sometimes err, still, because they have at some time seen rightly, there is in them the power of seeing; likewise, if anyone has once made something out in divination, he, even when he errs, is still to be reckoned to have the power of divining. Consider, I beg you, our Cratippus, how alike these things are; for to me they do not seem alike. For the eyes, in discerning true things, use nature and sense, whereas minds, if ever they have seen true things either by prophesying or by dreaming, have used fortune and chance; unless perhaps you think those will concede to you, who hold dreams to be no more than dreams, that if ever some dream has turned out true, this did not happen by chance. But let us grant you those two premises (the things the dialecticians call lemmata, though we prefer to speak Latin); still the assumption (which the same men call the proslēpsis) will not be granted.

Si, inquit, aliquando oculi peccent, tamen, quia recte aliquando viderunt, inest in iis vis videndi; item, si quis semel aliquid in divinatione dispexerit, is, etiam cum peccet, tamen existumandus sit habere vim divinandi. Vide, quaeso, Cratippe noster, quam sint ista similia; nam mihi non videntur. Oculi enim vera cernentes utuntur natura atque sensu, animi, si quando vel vaticinando vel somniando vera viderunt, usi sunt fortuna atque casu; nisi forte concessuros tibi existumas eos, qui somnia pro somniis habent, si quando aliquod somnium verum evaserit, non id fortuito accidisse. Sed demus tibi istas duas sumptiones (ea quae lh/mmata appellant dialectici, sed nos Latine loqui malumus), adsumptio tamen (quam pro/slhyin iidem vocant) non dabitur.

But Cratippus assumes his minor premise in this fashion: There are, however, countless presentiments that are not fortuitous. And I say there are none — see how great the dispute is; and once the minor premise is not granted, there is no conclusion. But we are shameless, you say, in not granting it, when the thing is so plain. What is plain? That many turn out true, he says. What of the fact that far more turn out false? Does not that very inconstancy, which is the property of fortune, teach that fortune, not nature, is the cause? Then, Cratippus, if that conclusion of yours is true — for it is with you that I have to do — do you not see that the same reasoning can be used by the haruspices too, and by the readers of lightning, and the interpreters of portents, and the augurs, and the casters of lots, and the Chaldeans? Of which kinds there is not one out of which something has not turned out just as it was predicted. Therefore either those kinds of divination too exist — the very ones you most rightly reject — or, if they do not exist, I do not see why these two should exist that you leave standing. So, by the very reasoning by which you bring these in, those others can exist that you do away with.

Adsumit autem Cratippus hoc modo: Sunt autem innumerabiles praesensiones non fortuitae. At ego dico nullam (vide, quanta sit controversia); iam adsumptione non concessa nulla conclusio est. At impudentes sumus, qui, cum tam perspicuum sit, non concedamus. Quid est perspicuum? Multa vera, inquit evadere. Quid, quod multo plura falsa? Nonne ipsa varietas, quae est propria fortunae, fortunam esse causam, non naturam esse docet? Deinde, si tua ista conclusio, Cratippe, vera est (tecum enim mihi res est), non intellegis eadem uti posse et haruspices et fulguratores et interpretes ostentorum et augures et sortilegos et Chaldaeos? quorum generum nullum est, ex quo non aliquid, sicut praedictum sit, evaserit. Ergo aut ea quoque genera divinandi sunt, quae tu rectissume inprobas, aut, si ea non sunt, non intellego, cur haec duo sint, quae relinquis. Qua ergo ratione haec inducis, eadem illa possunt esse, quae tollis.

And what authority does that frenzy carry, which you call divine, that the madman should see what the wise man does not, and that the one who has lost his human senses should attain the senses of the gods? We pay heed to the verses of the Sibyl, which she is said to have poured out in her frenzy. Of these the interpreter was thought, lately, on some false rumor among men, to be going to declare in the Senate that the man whom in plain fact we had as king must also be called king, if we wished to be safe. If this is in the books, to what man does it point, and to what time? For cleverly did the one who composed them bring it about that, whatever should happen, it should seem to have been predicted, since all definition of men and times had been removed.

Quid vero habet auctoritatis furor iste, quem divinum vocatis, ut, quae sapiens non videat, ea videat insanus, et is, qui humanos sensus amiserit, divinos adsecutus sit? Sibyllae versus observamus, quos illa furens fudisse dicitur. Quorum interpres nuper falsa quadam hominum fama dicturus in senatu putabatur eum, quem re vera regem habebamus, appellandum quoque esse regem, si salvi esse vellemus. Hoc si est in libris, in quem hominem et in quod tempus est? callide enim, qui illa composuit, perfecit, ut, quodcumque accidisset, praedictum videretur hominum et temporum definitione sublata.

He also brought in a screen of obscurity, so that the same verses might seem capable of being fitted now to one matter, now to another. That this song is not the work of one in a frenzy is shown both by the poem itself — for it is more a thing of art and care than of impulse and excitement — and above all by what is called the acrostic akrostichis, when in order, out of the first letters of each successive verse, some sense is woven together, as in certain lines of Ennius: Quintus Ennius made this. That, surely, is more the mark of an attentive mind than of a frenzied one.

Adhibuit etiam latebram obscuritatis, ut iidem versus alias in aliam rem posse accommodari viderentur. Non esse autem illud carmen furentis cum ipsum poe+ma declarat (est enim magis artis et diligentiae quam incitationis et motus), tum vero ea, quae a)krostixi/s dicitur, cum deinceps ex primis primi cuiusque versus litteris aliquid conectitur, ut in quibusdam Ennianis: Q. Ennius fecit. Id certe magis est attenti animi quam furentis.

And in the Sibylline verses the whole sense of each utterance is spelled out from the first letters of the first verse of that utterance. This is the work of a writer, not of a man in a frenzy — of one applying care, not of a madman. For which reason let us keep the Sibyl set apart and shut away, so that — as has been handed down from our ancestors — the books may not even be read without the order of the Senate, and may serve rather for the laying aside of religious scruples than for the taking of them up; and let us deal with the priests in charge, that they bring forth from those books anything whatever rather than a king, whom hereafter neither the gods nor men will suffer to be at Rome. But many, you say, have often prophesied true things, as Cassandra: And now upon the great sea and, the same a little after: Alas, behold Are you then forcing me to believe even the poets?

Atque in Sibyllinis ex primo versu cuiusque sententiae primis litteris illius sententiae carmen omne praetexitur. Hoc scriptoris est, non furentis, adhibentis diligentiam, non insani. Quam ob rem Sibyllam quidem sepositam et conditam habeamus, ut, id quod proditum est a maioribus, iniussu senatus ne legantur quidem libri valeantque ad deponendas potius quam ad suscipiendas religiones; cum antistitibus agamus, ut quidvis potius ex illis libris quam regem proferant, quem Romae posthac nec di nec homines esse patientur. At multi saepe vera vaticinati, ut Cassandra: Iamque mari magno eademque paulo post: Eheu videte Num igitur me cogis etiam fabulis credere?

Let these things have what charm you will; let them be helped along by words, by sentiments, by measures, by melodies; yet we owe no authority, no credence, to invented matters. And in the same way I judge that we must believe neither some Publicius or other, nor the Marcian seers, nor the secret oracles of Apollo — of which some are openly fabricated, some rashly babbled out, and have never won the approval of anyone even of middling sense, much less of a man of judgment.

quae delectationis habeant, quantum voles, verbis sententiis, numeris cantibus adiuventur; auctoritatem quidem nullam debemus nec fidem commenticiis rebus adiungere. Eodemque modo nec ego Publicio nescio cui nec Marciis vatibus nec Apollinis opertis credendum existimo; quorum partim ficta aperte, partim effutita temere numquam ne mediocri quidem cuiquam, non modo prudenti probata sunt.

What? you will say — did not that rower from Coponius’s fleet foretell the things that came to pass? He did indeed, and the very things that all of us at that time feared might happen. For we heard that camp had been pitched against camp in Thessaly, and it seemed to us that Caesar’s army had both more audacity, seeing it had brought war upon its own country, and more strength on account of long service; but as for the issue of the battle, there was not one of us who did not fear it — though, as befitted steady men, not openly. But that Greek — what wonder if, in the greatness of his fear, as commonly happens, he parted from his steadiness, from his mind, from his very self? And in that disturbance of soul he, deranged, declared would come to pass the very things that, when sane, he feared would come to pass. Which, I ask you, by gods and men, is more like the truth: that the crazed rower, or that some one of us who were there at the time — myself, Cato, Varro, Coponius himself — could discern the counsels of the immortal gods?

Quid? inquies, remex ille de classe Coponii nonne ea praedixit, quae facta sunt? Ille vero, et ea quidem, quae omnes eo tempore ne acciderent timebamus. Castra enim in Thessalia castris conlata audiebamus, videbaturque nobis exercitus Caesaris et audaciae plus habere, quippe qui patriae bellum intulisset, et roboris propter vetustatem; casum autem proelii nemo nostrum erat quin timeret, sed, ita ut constantibus hominibus par erat, non aperte. Ille autem Graecus, quid mirum, si magnitudine timoris, ut plerumque fit, a constantia atque a mente atque a se ipse discessit? qua perturbatione animi, quae, sanus cum esset, timebat ne evenirent, ea demens eventura esse dicebat. Utrum tandem, per deos atque homines! magis veri simile est vesanum remigem an aliquem nostrum, qui ibi tum eramus, me, Catonem, Varronem, Coponium ipsum, consilia deorum inmortalium perspicere potuisse?

But now I come to you: O holy Apollo, you who hold fast the fixed navel of the lands, whence first the savage, superstitious, wild voice came forth. For with your oracles Chrysippus filled a whole volume — partly false, as I think; partly true by chance, as happens very often in every kind of utterance; partly twisting in their speech and obscure, so that the interpreter has need of an interpreter and the lot itself must be referred to lots; partly ambiguous, and such as must be carried before a dialectician. For when that lot was given out to the richest king of Asia: Croesus, crossing the Halys, will overthrow a great might of wealth — he supposed he would overthrow the might of his enemies; but it was his own that he overthrew.

Sed iam ad te venio, O/ sancte Apollo, qui úmbilicum cértum terrarum óbsides, U/nde superstitiósa primum saéva evasit vóx fera. Tuis enim oraculis Chrysippus totum volumen inplevit partim falsis, ut ego opinor, partim casu veris, ut fit in omni oratione saepissime, partim flexiloquis et obscuris, ut interpres egeat interprete et sors ipsa ad sortes referenda sit, partim ambiguis, et quae ad dialecticum deferendae sint. Nam cum illa sors edita est opulentissumo regi Asiae: Croesus Halyn penetrans magnam pervertet opum vim, hostium vim se perversurum putavit, pervertit autem suam.

Yet whichever of the two had happened, the oracle would have been true. But why should I ever believe this was given out to Croesus? Or why should I hold Herodotus more truthful than Ennius? Could the one have invented less about Croesus than Ennius about Pyrrhus? For who is there who would believe that this answer was given to Pyrrhus from the oracle of Apollo: I say that you, descendant of Aeacus, the Romans can conquer? First, Apollo never spoke in Latin; next, that lot is unheard of among the Greeks; besides, by Pyrrhus’s time Apollo had already given up making verses; and lastly, although the race of the Aeacidae was ever, as it stands in Ennius, a dull-witted breed, stronger in war than strong in wisdom — still he could have understood this ambiguity of the verse: that "you the Romans can conquer" has no more force toward himself than toward the Romans. For that ambiguity which deceived Croesus could have fooled even Chrysippus; but this one not even Epicurus.

Utrum igitur eorum accidisset, verum oraclum fuisset. Cur autem hoc credam umquam editum Croeso? aut Herodotum cur veraciorem ducam Ennio? Num minus ille potuit de Croeso quam de Pyrrho fingere Ennius? Quis enim est, qui credat Apollinis ex oraculo Pyrrho esse responsum: Aio te, Aeacida, Romanos vincere posse? Primum Latine Apollo numquam locutus est; deinde ista sors inaudita Graecis est; praeterea Pyrrhi temporibus iam Apollo versus facere desierat; postremo, quamquam semper fuit, ut apud Ennium est, stolidum genus Aeacidarum, Bellipotentes sunt magis quam sapientipotentes, tamen hanc amphiboliam versus intellegere potuisset, vincere te Romanos nihilo magis in se quam in Romanos valere; nam illa amphibolia, quae Croesum decepit, vel Chrysippum potuisset fallere, haec vero ne Epicurum quidem.

But — and this is the chief point — why are oracles no longer given out in that fashion at Delphi, not only in our own age but for a long time now, so that nothing can be more contemptible? At this point, when they are hard pressed, they say that the power of that place has vanished with age — the place from which came that breath of the earth, by which the Pythia, her mind stirred up, would give out oracles. You would think they were speaking of wine or pickled fish, which vanish with age. It is the power of a place that is in question, and a power not merely natural but even divine; and how, pray, did it vanish? With age, you will say. What age is there that can wear out a divine power? And what is so divine as a breath out of the earth so moving the mind that it makes it foresee things to come — so that it not only discerns them long before, but even pronounces them in number and verse? But when did that power vanish? Was it after men began to be less credulous?

Sed, quod caput est, cur isto modo iam oracla Delphis non eduntur non modo nostra aetate, sed iam diu, iam ut nihil possit esse contemptius? Hoc loco cum urguentur, evanuisse aiunt vetustate vim loci eius, unde anhelitus ille terrae fieret, quo Pythia mente incitata oracla ederet. De vino aut salsamento putes loqui, quae evanescunt vetustate; de vi loci agitur, neque solum naturali, sed etiam divina; quae quo tandem modo evanuit? Vetustate, inquies. Quae vetustas est, quae vim divinam conficere possit? quid tam divinum autem quam adflatus e terra mentem ita movens, ut eam providam rerum futurarum efficiat? ut ea non modo cernat multo ante, sed etiam numero versuque pronuntiet. Quando ista vis autem evanuit? an postquam homines minus creduli esse coeperunt?

Demosthenes indeed, who lived nearly three hundred years ago, even then said that the Pythia "philippized" philippizein — that is, as it were, sided with Philip. And by this he meant that she had been corrupted by Philip; from which one may judge that in other Delphic oracles too there was something not sincere. But somehow these superstitious and almost fanatical philosophers seem to prefer anything whatever to admitting they have been fools. You would rather have it that the thing has vanished and been quenched — the thing that, if it had ever existed, would surely be eternal — than not believe what is not to be believed.

Demosthenes quidem, qui abhinc annos prope trecentos fuit, iam tum filippi/zein Pythiam dicebat, id est quasi cum Philippo facere. Hoc autem eo spectabat, ut eam a Philippo corruptam diceret; ex quo licet existumare in aliis quoque oraculis Delphicis aliquid non sinceri fuisse. Sed nescio quo modo isti philosophi superstitiosi et paene fanatici quidvis malle videntur quam se non ineptos. Evanuisse mavultis et extinctum esse id, quod si umquam fuisset, certe aeternum esset, quam ea, quae non sunt credenda, non credere.

A like error is found in dreams; and how far back is the defense of these fetched! Our souls, they hold, are divine, and are drawn from a source outside, and the world is filled full with a multitude of souls in concord with one another; and so, by this divinity of the mind itself and its conjunction with minds outside, what is to come is discerned. The soul, Zeno thinks, is contracted, and as it were slips and sinks down — and this very thing is to be asleep. And further, Pythagoras and Plato, weightiest of authorities, that we may see surer things in our sleep, bid us go to our rest prepared by a certain regimen of diet — the Pythagoreans, indeed, abstaining from beans at all costs, as if it were the mind, and not the belly, that is bloated by that food. But somehow nothing can be said so absurd that it is not said by some one of the philosophers.

Similis est error in somniis; quorum quidem defensio repetita quam longe est! Divinos animos censent esse nostros, eosque esse tractos extrinsecus, animorumque consentientium multitudine conpletum esse mundum; hac igitur mentis et ipsius divinitate et coniunctione cum externis mentibus cerni, quae sint futura. Contrahi autem animum Zeno et quasi labi putat atque concidere, id ipsum esse dormire. Iam Pythagoras et Plato, locupletissimi auctores, quo in somnis certiora videamus, praeparatos quodam cultu atque victu proficisci ad dormiendum iubent; faba quidem Pythagorei utique abstinere, quasi vero eo cibo mens, non venter infletur. Sed nescio quo modo nihil tam absurde dici potest, quod non dicatur ab aliquo philosophorum.

Do we think, then, that the souls of sleepers are moved of themselves in their dreaming, or, as Democritus thinks, are struck by a vision that comes from without and from elsewhere? For whether it is in this way or in that, very many false things can appear as true to those who dream. For to men sailing, the things that stand still seem to move; and by a certain fixing of the eyes, the one light of a lamp seems two. Why should I speak of the madmen, of the drunk — how many false things appear to them? But if such visions are not to be believed, why dreams should be believed I do not know. For one may dispute about these errors, if you like, just as about dreams: so that, if the things that stand still should seem to move, you might say it signifies an earthquake or some sudden flight; while by the doubled light of the lamp is declared that discord and sedition are afoot. And further, from the visions of the mad or the drunk countless inferences can be drawn by conjecture,

Utrum igitur censemus dormientium animos per sene ipsos in somniando moveri an, ut Democritus censet, externa et adventicia visione pulsari? Sive enim sic est sive illo modo, videri possunt permulta somniantibus falsa pro veris. Nam et navigantibus moveri videntur ea, quae stant, et quodam obtutu oculorum duo pro uno lucernae lumina. Quid dicam, insanis, quid ebriis quam multa falsa videantur? Quodsi eius modi visis credendum non est, cur somniis credatur, nescio. Nam tam licet de his erroribus, si velis, quam de somniis disputare, ut ea, quae stant, si moveri videantur, terrae motum significare dicas aut repentinam aliquam fugam, gemino autem lucernae lumine declarari dissensionem ac seditionem moveri. Iam ex insanorum aut ebriorum visis innumerabilia coniectura trahi possunt,

which seem to be going to come to pass. For who is there who, hurling the javelin all day long, will not sometimes hit the mark? We dream whole nights through, and there is scarcely one on which we do not sleep — and then we marvel when, once in a while, what we dreamed turns out true? What is so uncertain as the throw of the dice? Yet there is no one who, throwing often, does not sometimes throw a Venus, and now and then even twice and three times over. Are we, then, like fools, to prefer to say that this came about by the impulse of Venus rather than by chance? But if at all other times false appearances are not to be believed, I do not see what special property sleep has, in which falsehoods should prevail in place of truths.

quae futura videantur Quis est enim, qui totum diem iaculans non aliquando conliniet? Totas noctes somniamus, neque ulla est fere, qua non dormiamus, et miramur aliquando id, quod somniarimus, evadere? Quid est tam incertum quam talorum iactus? tamen nemo est, quin saepe iactans Venerium iaciat aliquando, non numquam etiam iterum ac tertium. Num igitur, ut inepti, Veneris id inpulsu fieri malumus quam casu dicere? Quodsi ceteris temporibus falsis visis credendum non est, non video, quid praecipui somnus habeat, in quo valeant falsa pro veris.

But if nature had been so arranged that sleepers should act out the things they dreamed, then all who went to bed would have to be bound; for as dreamers they would make wilder motions than any madman. And if the appearances of madmen are not to be trusted, because they are false, why one should trust the appearances of dreamers, which are even far more disordered, I do not understand. Or is it because the mad do not report their appearances to an interpreter, whereas those who have dreamed do report them? I ask further: if I should wish to write something, or to read, or to sing with the voice or on the lyre, or to set out something geometrical or physical or dialectical, must I wait for a dream, or must the art be employed — the art without which none of these things can be done or carried through? And further still, not even if I wished to sail would I steer the ship according to what I had dreamed; for the penalty would be immediate.

Quodsi ita natura paratum esset, ut ea dormientes agerent, quae somniarent, alligandi omnes essent, qui cubitum irent; maiores enim quam ulli insani efficerent motus somniantes. Quodsi insanorum visis fides non est habenda, quia falsa sunt, cur credatur somniantium visis, quae multo etiam perturbatiora sunt, non intellego; an quod insani sua visa coniectori non narrant, narrant, qui somniaverunt? Quaero etiam, si velim scribere quid aut legere aut canere vel voce vel fidibus aut geometricum quiddam aut physicum aut dialecticum explicare, somniumne exspectandum sit an ars adhibenda; sine qua nihil earum rerum nec fieri nec expediri potest. Atqui, ne si navigare quidem velim, ita gubernem, ut somniaverim; praesens enim poena sit.

How, then, is it fitting that the sick should seek their cure from an interpreter of dreams rather than from a physician? Can Aesculapius, can Serapis prescribe for us a treatment for our health through sleep, while Neptune cannot do so for helmsmen? And if Minerva will give medicine without a physician, will the Muses not give to dreamers the knowledge of writing, of reading, of the other arts? But if a treatment for health were given, these other things I have spoken of would be given too; and since they are not given, medicine is not given either; and once that is taken away, all the authority of dreams is taken away.

Qui igitur convenit aegros a coniectore somniorum potius quam a medico petere medicinam? An Aesculapius, an Serapis potest nobis praescribere per somnum curationem valetudinis, Neptunus gubernantibus non potest? et si sine medico medicinam dabit Minerva, Musae scribendi, legendi, ceterarum artium scientiam somniantibus non dabunt? At si curatio daretur valetudinis, haec quoque, quae dixi, darentur; quae quoniam non dantur, medicina non datur; qua sublata tollitur omnis auctoritas somniorum.

But let these points too be reckoned obvious; now let us look at the deeper matters. For either some divine power, taking thought for us, makes the significations of dreams, or interpreters understand — out of a certain agreement and conjunction of nature, which they call sympatheian — what suits each thing from dreams and what follows upon each thing; or neither of these holds, but there is a certain constant and long-continued observation of what tends to come about and what tends to follow, when such-and-such has been seen in sleep. First, then, it must be understood that there is no divine power that produces dreams. And this at least is plain: that no appearances of dreams proceed from the will of the gods; for the gods would do this for our sake, that we might be able to foresee things to come.

Sed haec quoque in promptu fuerint; nunc interiora videamus. Aut enim divina vis quaedam consulens nobis somniorum significationes facit, aut coniectores ex quadam convenientia et coniunctione naturae, quam vocant sumpa/qeian, quid cuique rei conveniat ex somniis, et quid quamque rem sequatur, intellegunt, aut eorum neutrum est, sed quaedam observatio constans atque diuturna est, cum quid visum secundum quietem sit, quid evenire et quid sequi soleat. Primum igitur intellegendum est nullam vim esse divinam effectricem somniorum. Atque illud quidem perspicuum est, nulla visa somniorum proficisci a numine deorum; nostra enim causa di id facerent, ut providere futura possemus.

How few there are, then, who obey their dreams, who understand them, who remember them! And how many, on the other hand, who despise them and reckon that superstition the mark of a feeble and old-womanish mind! What reason is there, then, why a god, taking thought for these men, should warn through dreams those who judge such things worthy of no care — nor even of remembrance? For a god cannot be ignorant of what mind each man is of; nor is it worthy of a god to do anything in vain and without cause, which is at odds even with the consistency of a human being. So, if most dreams are either not known or neglected, then either the god does not know this, or he uses the signification of dreams in vain; and neither of these befits a god. We must therefore admit that nothing is signified by a god through dreams.

Quotus igitur est quisque, qui somniis pareat, qui intellegat, qui meminerit? quam multi vero, qui contemnant eamque superstitionem inbecilli animi atque anilis putent! Quid est igitur, cur his hominibus consulens deus somniis moneat eos, qui illa non modo cura, sed ne memoria quidem digna ducant? Nec enim ignorare deus potest, qua mente quisque sit, nec frustra ac sine causa quid facere dignum deo est, quod abhorret etiam ab hominis constantia. Ita, si pleraque somnia aut ignorantur aut negleguntur, aut nescit hoc deus aut frustra somniorum significatione utitur; et horum neutrum in deum cadit; nihil igitur a deo somniis significari fatendum est.

This too I ask: why, if a god gives us these appearances for the sake of our foreseeing, he does not rather give them to the waking than to the sleeping. For whether some external and adventitious impulse stirs the minds of sleepers, or the minds move of themselves, or whatever other cause it is that makes us seem in our sleep to see, to hear, to do something — that same cause could have been present in the waking too; and if the gods did this for our sake in our sleep, they would do the same for the waking — especially since Chrysippus, refuting the Academics, says that the things which appear to the waking are by far clearer and more certain than those which appear to dreamers. It was therefore more worthy of divine beneficence, when they were taking thought for us, to give clearer appearances to the waking man than dimmer ones through sleep. And since this is not done, dreams are not to be thought divine.

Illud etiam requiro, cur, si deus ista visa nobis providendi causa dat, non vigilantibus potius det quam dormientibus. Sive enim externus et adventicius pulsus animos dormientium commovet, sive per se ipsi animi moventur, sive quae causa alia est, cur secundum quietem aliquid videre, audire, agere videamur, eadem causa vigilantibus esse poterat; idque si nostra causa di secundum quietem facerent, vigilantibus idem facerent, praesertim cum Chrysippus Academicos refellens permulto clariora et certiora esse dicat, quae vigilantibus videantur, quam quae somniantibus. Fuit igitur divina beneficentia dignius, cum consulerent nobis, clariora visa dare vigilanti quam obscuriora per somnum. Quod quoniam non fit, somnia divina putanda non sunt.

And indeed, what need is there of circuit and roundabout, that one should have to use interpreters of dreams, rather than that a god, if he was truly taking thought for us, should say outright, "Do this, do not do this," and give that appearance to the waking rather than to the sleeping? Then again, who would dare to say that all dreams are true? Some dreams are true,
but not all of them need be. says Ennius. What, pray, is that distinction — what marks the true, what the false? And if the true are sent by a god, where do the false come from? For if these too are divine, what is more inconsistent than a god? And what is more witless than to rouse the minds of mortals with false and lying appearances? But if the true appearances are divine, while the false and empty ones are human, what is that license of assignment, that a god should make this one and nature that one, rather than that a god should make all of them — which you deny — or nature all of them? And since you deny the former, the latter must necessarily be confessed.

Iam vero quid opus est circumitione et anfractu, ut sit utendum interpretibus somniorum potius, quam derecto deus, siquidem nobis consulebat, Hoc facito, hoc ne feceris diceret idque visum vigilanti potius quam dormienti daret? Iam vero quis dicere audeat vera omnia esse somnia? Aliquot somnia vera, inquit Ennius, sed omnia noenum necesse est. Quae est tandem ista distinctio? quae vera, quae falsa habet? et, si vera a deo mittuntur, falsa unde nascuntur? nam si ea quoque divina, quid inconstantius deo? quid inscitius autem est quam mentes mortalium falsis et mendacibus visis concitare? sin vera visa divina sunt, falsa autem et inania humana, quae est ista designandi licentia, ut hoc deus, hoc natura fecerit potius quam aut omnia deus, quod negatis, aut omnia natura? quodquoniam illud negatis, hoc necessario confitendum est.

By "nature" I mean that by which the mind can never be empty of agitation and motion, holding still. When, through the languor of the body, it can use neither the limbs nor the senses, it falls upon various and uncertain appearances out of the remnants — as Aristotle says — that cling, of those things which the man did or thought about while awake; and from the disturbance of these there arise at times marvelous shapes of dreams. And if some of these are false, others true, by what mark they are to be told apart I should very much like to know. If there is none, why are we to listen to those interpreters? But if there is some such mark, I am eager to hear what it is — yet they will be stuck.

Naturam autem eam dico, qua numquam animus insistens agitatione et motu esse vacuus potest. Is cum languore corporis nec membris uti nec sensibus potest, incidit in visa varia et incerta ex reliquiis, ut ait Aristoteles, inhaerentibus earum rerum, quas vigilans gesserit aut cogitaverit; quarum perturbatione mirabiles interdum existunt species somniorum; quae si alia falsa, alia vera, qua nota internoscantur, scire sane velim. Si nulla est, quid istos interpretes audiamus? sin quaepiam est, aveo audire, quae sit; sed haerebunt.

For now it comes to a contest: which is the more probable — that the immortal gods, surpassing in the excellence of all things, run about around the couches, and indeed the truckle-beds, of all mortals wherever they are, and, when they have seen someone snoring, cast upon him certain twisted and obscure appearances, which he, terrified out of sleep, carries off in the morning to an interpreter — or that it comes about by nature, that the mind, nimbly agitated, seems in sleep to see what it had seen while awake? Which is more worthy of philosophy — to interpret these things by the superstition of hag-wives, or by the explanation of nature? So that, even if a true conjecture of dreams could now be made, still those who profess it could not make it; for they are drawn from the most worthless and unlettered sort. Yet your Stoics deny that anyone but the wise man can be divine.

Venit enim iam in contentionem, utrum sit probabilius, deosne inmortalis, rerum omnium praestantia excellentis, concursare circum omnium mortalium, qui ubique sunt, non modo lectos, verum etiam grabatos et, cum stertentem aliquem viderint, obicere iis visa quaedam tortuosa et obscura, quae illi exterriti somno ad coniectorem mane deferant, an natura fieri, ut mobiliter animus agitatus, quod vigilans viderit, dormiens videre videatur. Utrum philosophia dignius, sagarum superstitione ista interpretari an explicatione naturae? ut, si iam fieri possit vera coniectura somniorum, tamen isti, qui profitentur, eam facere non possint; ex levissimo enim et indoctissimo genere constant. Stoici autem tui negant quemquam nisi sapientem divinum esse posse.

Chrysippus, indeed, defines divination in these words: a power that recognizes and sees and sets forth the signs which are portended to men by the gods; and that its task is to know beforehand of what mind the gods are toward men, and what each thing signifies, and in what manner these things are to be attended to and expiated. And the same man defines the interpretation of dreams in this way: that it is a power discerning and explaining what is signified to men by the gods in their sleep. What then? For these things is there need of moderate good sense, or of both outstanding talent and perfect learning? But of such a sort we have known no one.

Chrysippus quidem divinationem definit his verbis: vim cognoscentem et videntem et explicantem signa, quae a dis hominibus portendantur; officium autem esse eius praenoscere, dei erga homines mente qua sint quidque significent, quem ad modumque ea procurentur atque expientur. Idemque somniorum coniectionem definit hoc modo: esse vim cernentem et explanantem, quae a dis hominibus significentur in somnis. Quid ergo? ad haec mediocri opus est prudentia an et ingenio praestanti et eruditione perfecta? Talem autem cognovimus neminem.

See, then, that even if I should grant you that divination exists — which I shall never do — we still could find no one who is divine. And of what sort is that mind of the gods, if they signify to us in sleep neither the things which we may understand of ourselves, nor the things for which we can have interpreters? For the gods are like men who would cast upon us things of which we have neither the knowledge nor an expounder — as if Carthaginians or Spaniards were to speak in our Senate without an interpreter.

Vide igitur, ne, etiamsi divinationem tibi esse concessero, quod numquam faciam, neminem tamen divinum reperire possimus. Qualis autem ista mens est deorum, si neque ea nobis significant in somnis, quae ipsi per nos intellegamus, neque ea, quorum interpretes habere possimus? similes enim sunt dei, si ea nobis obiciunt, quorum nec scientiam neque explanatorem habeamus, tamquam si Poeni aut Hispani in senatu nostro loquerentur sine interprete.

And indeed, to what end are the obscurities and riddles of dreams? For the gods ought to have wished us to understand the things by which they would warn us for our own sake. What? Is no poet, no natural philosopher obscure?

Iam vero quo pertinent obscuritates et aenigmata somniorum? intellegi enim a nobis di velle debebant ea, quae nostra causa nos monerent. Quid? poe+ta nemo, nemo physicus obscurus?

Euphorion, to be sure, is excessively obscure; but Homer is not. Which, then, is the better? Heraclitus is very obscure, Democritus least of all. Are they, then, to be compared? You are advising me on my own account — about a thing I do not understand? Why, then, are you advising me at all? It is as if some physician should order a sick man to take "the earth-born, the grass-walker, the house-carrier, the bloodless," rather than say, in the way men speak, "a snail." For when Pacuvius’s Amphion had said, more obscurely, A four-foot beast, slow-paced, of the field, low-set, rough-coated, small of head, with a serpent’s neck, fierce of aspect, disemboweled, lifeless, yet with a living sound — then the Athenians answer: We do not understand, unless you put it plainly. And he, in a single word: A tortoise. Could you not, then, harpist, have said this from the start?

Ille vero nimis etiam obscurus Euphorion; at non Homerus. Uter igitur melior? Valde Heraclitus obscurus, minime Democritus. Num igitur conferendi? Mea causa me mones, quod non intellegam? Quid me igitur mones? ut si quis medicus aegroto imperet, ut sumat Terrigenam, herbigradam, domiportam, sanguine cassam, potius quam hominum more cocleam diceret. Nam Pacuvianus Amphio Quadrupés tardigrada, agréstis, humilis, áspera, Capité brevi, cervice ánguina, aspectú truci, Evíscerata, inánima, cum animalí sono cum dixisset obscurius, tum Attici respondent: Non íntellegimus, nísi si aperte díxeris. At ille uno verbo: Testudo. Non potueras hoc igitur a principio, citharista, dicere?

A certain man reports to an interpreter that he had dreamed an egg was hanging from the strap of his bedroom couch (this dream is in Chrysippus’s book); the interpreter answered that a treasure lay buried under the bed. The man digs, finds a quantity of gold, and surrounded by silver; he sent the interpreter as much of the silver as seemed fit. Then the interpreter said: Nothing from the yolk? — for it seemed to him that the gold had been signified by the yolk of the egg, the silver by the rest. Has no one else, then, ever dreamed of an egg? Why, then, did this nobody-or-other alone find a treasure? How many poor men, worthy of the gods’ protection, are admonished by no dream to the finding of a treasure! And for what reason was he so obscurely admonished, that a likeness of treasure should be hatched out of an egg, rather than be bidden plainly to seek a treasure, just as Simonides was plainly forbidden to sail?

Defert ad coniectorem quidam somniasse se ovum pendere ex fascea lecti sui cubicularis (est hoc in Chrysippi libro somnium); respondit coniector thensaurum defossum esse sub lecto. Fodit, invenit auri aliquantum, idque circumdatum argento, misit coniectori, quantulum visum est de argento. Tum ille: Nihilne, inquit, de vitello? id enim ei ex ovo videbatur aurum declarasse, reliquum argentum. Nemone igitur umquam alius ovum somniavit? cur ergo hic nescio qui thensaurum solus invenit? quam multi inopes digni praesidio deorum nullo somnio ad thensaurum reperiendum admonentur! Quam autem ob causam tam est obscure admonitus, ut ex ovo nasceretur thensauri similitudo, potius quam aperte thensaurum quaerere iuberetur, sicut aperte Simonides vetitus est navigare?

Obscure dreams, therefore, are least of all consonant with the majesty of the gods. Let us come to the open and clear ones, such as the story of that man murdered by the innkeeper at Megara, such as that of Simonides, who was forbidden to sail by the man he had buried, such also as that of Alexander, which I am surprised you passed over, Quintus. When Ptolemy, his close friend, had been struck in battle by a poisoned weapon, and was dying of that wound in the greatest pain, Alexander, sitting beside him, was lulled to sleep. Then in his sleep there appeared to him, it is said, that serpent which his mother Olympias kept, carrying a little root in its mouth and at the same time saying in what place it grew (and it was not far from that spot), and that its power was so great that it would easily heal Ptolemy. When Alexander, having awakened, told his friends the dream, men were sent to seek that little root; once found, both Ptolemy is said to have been healed and many soldiers who had been wounded by the same kind of weapon.

Ergo obscura somnia minime consentanea maiestati deorum. Ad aperta et clara veniamus, quale est de illo interfecto a caupone Megaris, quale de Simonide, qui ab eo, quem humarat, vetitus est navigare, quale etiam de Alexandro, quod a te praeteritum esse miror, Quinte. Cum Ptolomaeus, familiaris eius, in proelio telo venenato ictus esset eoque vulnere summo cum dolore moreretur, Alexander adsidens somno est consopitus. Tum secundum quietem visus ei dicitur draco is, quem mater Olympias alebat, radiculam ore ferre et simul dicere, quo illa loci nasceretur (neque is longe aberat ab eo loco), eius autem esse vim tantam, ut Ptolomaeum facile sanaret. Cum Alexander experrectus narrasset amicis somnium, emissi sunt, qui illam radiculam quaererent; qua inventa et Ptolomaeus sanatus dicitur et multi milites, qui erant eodem genere teli vulnerati.

Many dreams, too, have been brought forward by you out of the histories — of the mother of Phalaris, of the elder Cyrus, of the mother of Dionysius, of Hamilcar the Carthaginian, of Hannibal, of Publius Decius; and that famous one about the temple-leader is now widely known, and the dream of Gaius Gracchus too, and the recent one of Caecilia, daughter of Balearicus. But these are foreign and for that reason unknown to us, and some of them perhaps invented. For who is the authority for them? As for our own dreams, what have we to say? You, of me come up from the river and of my horse at the bank; I, of Marius bidding me be conducted into his memorial with the laurel-wreathed rods. There is, Quintus, one and the same account of all dreams; and that account, by the immortal gods! — let us see to it that it is not overborne by our superstition and corruption of judgment.

Multa etiam sunt a te ex historiis prolata somnia, matris Phalaridis, Cyri superioris, matris Dionysii, Poeni Hamilcaris, Hannibalis, P. Decii; pervulgatum iam illud de praesule, C. Gracchi etiam et recens Caeciliae, Baliarici filiae, somnium. Sed haec externa ob eamque causam ignota nobis sunt, non nulla etiam ficta fortasse. Quis enim auctor istorum? De nostris somniis quid habemus dicere? tu de emerso me et equo ad ripam, ego de Mario cum fascibus laureatis me in suum deduci iubente monumentum. Omnium somniorum, Quinte, una ratio est; quae, per deos inmortalis! videamus ne nostra superstitione et depravatione superetur.

For what Marius do you suppose was seen by me? His semblance, I imagine, and his image, as it seems to Democritus. From where did the image set out? For he holds that images flow from solid bodies and from fixed shapes; what, then, was the body of Marius? From that, he says, which had been his body. So this image of Marius was pursuing me into the plain of Atina? — Everything is full of images; for no semblance can be conceived except by the impact of images.

Quem enim tu Marium visum a me putas? Speciem, credo, eius et imaginem, ut Democrito videtur. Unde profectam imaginem? a corporibus enim solidis et a certis figuris vult fluere imagines; quod igitur Marii corpus erat? Ex eo, inquit, quod fuerat. Ista igitur me imago Marii in campum Atinatem persequebatur?—Plena sunt imaginum omnia; nulla enim species cogitari potest nisi pulsu imaginum.

What of it, then? Are these images so obedient to our command that, the moment we wish it, they come running? And even of those things which are nothing at all? For what shape is so unseen, so non-existent, that the mind cannot fashion it for itself? So that even things we have never seen we yet hold formed within us — the sites of towns, the figures of men.

—Quid ergo? istae imagines ita nobis dicto audientes sunt, ut, simul atque velimus, accurrant? etiamne earum rerum, quae nullae sunt? quae est enim forma tam invisitata, tam nulla, quam non sibi ipse fingere animus possit? ut, quae numquam vidimus, ea tamen informata habeamus, oppidorum situs, hominum figuras.

Surely, then, when I think either of the walls of Babylon or of Homer’s face, no image of them strikes me? Everything, then, that we wish can be known to us; for there is nothing about which we cannot think; no images, therefore, creep into the minds of sleepers from without, nor do any flow at all — and I have never known anyone who, with greater authority, said nothing. Of the soul such is the force and such the nature, that it is vigorous while waking by no incoming impact, but by its own motion of a certain incredible swiftness. When these souls are sustained by the limbs and the body and the senses, they discern, think, and feel all things more surely. But when these supports are withdrawn, and the soul is deserted by the languor of the body, then it is stirred of itself. And so within it both shapes move and actions, and many things seem to be heard, many to be said.

Num igitur, cum aut muros Babylonis aut Homeri faciem cogito, imago illorum me aliqua pellit? Omnia igitur, quae volumus, nota nobis esse possunt; nihil est enim, de quo cogitare nequeamus; nullae ergo imagines obrepunt in animos dormientium extrinsecus, nec omnino fluunt ullae, nec cognovi quemquam, qui maiore auctoritate nihil diceret. Animorum est ea vis eaque natura, ut vigeant vigilantes nullo adventicio pulsu, sed suo motu incredibili quadam celeritate. Hi cum sustinentur membris et corpore et sensibus, omnia certiora cernunt, cogitant, sentiunt. Cum autem haec subtracta sunt desertusque animus languore corporis, tum agitatur ipse per sese. Itaque in eo et formae versantur et actiones, et multa audiri, multa dici videntur.

These things, of course, in a feeble and slackened soul, move about in every way confused and varied, and most of all the remnants are set in motion and agitated within our souls of those matters about which, while waking, we have either thought or busied ourselves — as in me, in those days, Marius dwelt much in my mind, when I recalled with what greatness of soul, with what steadfastness, he had borne that grievous fall of his. This, I believe, was the cause of dreaming about him. And in you, thinking of me with anxiety, I suddenly appeared as though risen from the river. For there were in the souls of both of us the traces of our waking thoughts. But certain things were added — as for me the detail of Marius’s memorial, and for you that the horse on which I was riding, having gone down together with me, reappeared.

Haec scilicet in inbecillo remissoque animo multa omnibus modis confusa et variata versantur, maxumeque reliquiae rerum earum moventur in animis et agitantur, de quibus vigilantes aut cogitavimus aut egimus, ut mihi temporibus illis multum in animo Marius versabatur recordanti, quam ille gravem suum casum magno animo, quam constanti tulisset. Hanc credo causam de illo somniandi fuisse. Tibi autem de me cum sollicitudine cogitanti subito sum visus emersus e flumine. Inerant enim in utriusque nostrum animis vigilantium cogitationum vestigia. At quaedam adiuncta sunt, ut mihi de monumento Marii, tibi, quod equus, in quo ego vehebar, mecum una demersus rursus apparuit.

Or do you suppose any old woman would be so deranged as to believe in dreams, if these things did not now and then by chance, by accident, at random, fall together? To Alexander a serpent seemed to speak. It may well be that this is false, it may be true; but whichever it is, there is nothing marvelous in it; for he did not hear a serpent speak, but seemed to hear it — and indeed, to make it the greater, it spoke while holding the root in its mouth. But nothing is great for a dreamer. I ask, however, why Alexander had so brilliant a dream, so certain a one, and yet not this same man at other times, nor most men many dreams; I myself, at any rate, have had none worth speaking of besides this one about Marius, so far as I remember. So many nights, then, consumed to no purpose in so long a life!

An tu censes ullam anum tam deliram futuram fuisse, ut somniis crederet, nisi ista casu non numquam forte temere concurrerent? Alexandro draco loqui visus est. Potest omnino hoc esse falsum, potest verum; sed utrum est, non est mirabile; non enim audivit ille draconem loquentem, sed est visus audire, et quidem, quo maius sit, cum radicem ore teneret, locutus est. Sed nihil est magnum somnianti. Quaero autem, cur Alexandro tam inlustre somnium, tam certum, nec huic eidem alias, nec multa ceteris; mihi quidem praeter hoc Marianum nihil sane, quod meminerim. Frustra igitur consumptae tot noctes tam longa in aetate.

Now indeed, on account of my leaving off the work of the Forum, I have cut out my late-night studies and added midday naps, which I was not in the habit of using before; and yet, sleeping so much, I have been admonished by no dream, least of all about such great matters; nor do I ever seem to myself to be dreaming more than when I see the magistrates in the Forum or the Senate in the senate-house. For indeed (this is the second head of the division) what continuity and conjunction of nature is there — which, as I said, they call fellow-feeling sympatheian — of such a kind that a treasure ought to be understood out of an egg? For physicians understand the coming on and growth of diseases from certain things, and also certain signs of health, just as that very point — whether we are full or wasted — they say can be understood from a certain kind of dreams. But a treasure, an inheritance, an honor, a victory, and many things of that kind — by what natural kinship are they joined with dreams?

Nunc quidem propter intermissionem forensis operae et lucubrationes detraxi et meridiationes addidi, quibus uti antea non solebam, nec tam multum dormiens ullo somnio sum admonitus, tantis praesertim de rebus, nec mihi magis umquam videor, quam cum aut in foro magistratus aut in curia senatum video, somniare. Etenim (ex divisione hoc secundum est) quae est continuatio coniunctioque naturae, quam, ut dixi, vocant sumpa/qeian, eius modi, ut thensaurus ex ovo intellegi debeat? Nam medici ex quibusdam rebus et advenientis et crescentis morbos intellegunt, non nullas etiam valetudinis significationes, ut hoc ipsum, pleni enectine simus, ex quodam genere somniorum intellegi posse dicunt. Thensaurus vero et hereditas et honos et victoria et multa generis eiusdem qua cum somniis naturali cognatione iunguntur?

A certain man is said, when in his sleep he was joined in the embrace of Venus, to have voided gallstones. Here I see fellow-feeling; for such an object was presented to the sleeper that the force of nature, not a mistaken belief, brought about what came to pass. What nature, then, presented to Simonides that semblance by which he was forbidden to sail? Or what bond with nature had that dream of Alcibiades which is recorded? — who, a little before his death, seemed in his sleep to be wrapped in the cloak of his mistress. When he had been cast out unburied and lay deserted by all, his mistress covered his body with her own mantle. Was this, then, present in things to come, and did it have natural causes — or did chance bring it about both that it should be seen and that it should come to pass?

Dicitur quidam, cum in somnis complexu Venerio iungeretur, calculos eiecisse. Video sympathian; visum est enim tale obiectum dormienti, ut id, quod evenit, naturae vis, non opinio erroris effecerit. Quae igitur natura obtulit illam speciem Simonidi, a qua vetaretur navigare? aut quid naturae copulatum habuit Alcibiadis quod scribitur somnium? qui paulo ante interitum visus est in somnis amicae esse amictus amiculo. Is cum esset proiectus inhumatus ab omnibusque desertus iaceret, amica corpus eius texit suo pallio. Ergo hoc inerat in rebus futuris et causas naturalis habebat, an, et ut videretur et ut eveniret, casus effecit?

What of it? Do not the conjectures of the interpreters themselves declare their own ingenuity rather than any force or accord of nature? A runner, intending to set off for the Olympic games, seemed in his sleep to be carried in a four-horse chariot. In the morning he goes to an interpreter. And the man says: You will win; for that is what the swiftness and force of the horses signify. Afterward the same runner goes to Antiphon. But Antiphon says: You must necessarily be beaten; do you not see that four ran ahead of you? Behold another runner (and Chrysippus’s book is full of such dreams and the like, and Antipater’s full of them) — but I return to the runner: he reported to an interpreter that he had seemed in his sleep to be turned into an eagle. And the man says: You have won; for no bird flies more powerfully than that one. To this same man Antiphon says: Blockhead, do you not see that you have been beaten? For that bird, in pursuing and harrying other birds, is itself always the last.

Quid? ipsorum interpretum coniecturae nonne magis ingenia declarant eorum quam vim consensumque naturae? Cursor ad Olympia proficisci cogitans visus est in somnis curru quadrigarum vehi. Mane ad coniectorem. At ille: Vinces, inquit; id enim celeritas significat et vis equorum. Post idem ad Antiphontem. Is autem: Vincare, inquit, necesse est; an non intellegis quattuor ante te cucurrisse? Ecce alius cursor (atque horum somniorum et talium plenus est Chrysippi liber, plenus Antipatri) —sed ad cursorem redeo: Ad interpretem detulit aquilam se in somnis visum esse factum. At ille: Vicisti; ista enim avi volat nulla vehementius. Huic eidem Antipho: Baro, inquit, victum te esse non vides? ista enim avis insectans alias avis et agitans semper ipsa postrema est.

A certain married woman, eager to bear a child, was in doubt whether she was pregnant, and seemed in her sleep to have her womb sealed up. She reported it. The interpreter denied that she could have conceived, since it had been sealed. But another said she was pregnant; for, he said, an empty thing is not in the habit of being sealed. What art is this of the interpreter, playing tricks with his own wit? Or do those things I have mentioned, and the countless others the Stoics have gathered together, signify anything beyond the sharpness of men who draw a conjecture from some likeness, now this way, now that? Physicians have certain signs from the veins and the breathing of a sick man, and from many other things they have a presentiment of what is to come; pilots, when they have seen the squids leaping or the dolphins flinging themselves into harbor, judge that a storm is being signaled. These things can readily be explained by reason and traced back to nature; but the things I spoke of a little before, in no way at all.

Parere quaedam matrona cupiens dubitans, essetne praegnans, visa est in quiete obsignatam habere naturam. Rettulit. Negavit eam, quoniam obsignata fuisset, concipere potuisse. At alter praegnantem esse dixit; nam inane obsignari nihil solere. Quae est ars coniectoris eludentis ingenio? an ea, quae dixi, et innumerabilia, quae conlecta habent Stoici, quicquam significant nisi acumen hominum ex similitudine aliqua coniecturam modo huc, modo illuc ducentium? Medici signa quaedam habent ex venis et spiritu aegroti multisque ex aliis futura praesentiunt; gubernatores cum exsultantis lolligines viderunt aut delphinos se in portum conicientes, tempestatem significari putant. Haec ratione explicari et ad naturam revocari facile possunt, ea vero, quae paulo ante dixi, nullo modo.

But, you say, long-continued observation — for this one part remains — has made an art by the noting of things. Tell me, then: can dreams be observed? In what manner? For their varieties are countless. Nothing can be conceived so preposterous, so disordered, so monstrous, that we cannot dream it; how, then, can we either embrace these endless and ever-new things in memory, or mark them down by observation? The astrologers have noted the motions of the wandering stars; for an order was found in those stars that had not been supposed. Tell me, then, what is the order, or what is the running-together, of dreams; and how can true dreams be distinguished from false? — since the same dreams turn out one way for some, another for others, and not always in the same way even for the same persons. So that it seems strange to me that, when we are not in the habit of believing a liar even when he speaks the truth, these men, if some one dream has come out true, do not rather, out of many, withdraw their trust from the one, than, out of one, confirm a countless multitude.

At enim observatio diuturna (haec enim pars una restat) notandis rebus fecit artem. Ain tandem? somnia observari possunt? quonam modo? sunt enim innumerabiles varietates. Nihil tam praepostere, tam incondite, tam monstruose cogitari potest, quod non possimus somniare; quo modo igitur haec infinita et semper nova aut memoria conplecti aut observando notare possumus? Astrologi motus errantium stellarum notaverunt; inventus est enim ordo in iis stellis, qui non putabatur. Cedo tandem, qui sit ordo aut quae concursatio somniorum; quo modo autem distingui possunt vera somnia a falsis? cum eadem et aliis aliter evadant et isdem non semper eodem modo; ut mihi mirum videatur, cum mendaci homini ne verum quidem dicenti credere soleamus, quo modo isti, si somnium verum evasit aliquod, non ex multis potius uni fidem derogent quam ex uno innumerabilia confirment.

If, then, neither is god the maker of dreams, nor is there any fellowship of nature with dreams, nor could a science be found by observation, the result is that nothing whatever is to be attributed to dreams — especially since those very people who see them divine nothing; those who interpret them bring conjecture to bear, not nature; while chance, over almost countless ages, has in all matters produced more marvels than in the visions of dreams; and since nothing is more uncertain than conjecture, which can be drawn into various directions, and sometimes even into contrary ones.

Si igitur neque deus est effector somniorum neque naturae societas ulla cum somniis neque observatione inveniri potuit scientia, effectum est, ut nihil prorsus somniis tribuendum sit, praesertim cum illi ipsi, qui ea vident, nihil divinent, ii, qui interpretantur, coniecturam adhibeant, non naturam, casus autem innumerabilibus paene saeculis in omnibus plura mirabilia quam in somniorum visis effecerit, neque coniectura, quae in varias partis duci possit, non numquam etiam in contrarias, quicquam sit incertius.

Let this divination by dreams, then, be hissed off the stage along with the rest. For, to speak truly, superstition, spread abroad among the nations, has crushed the minds of almost all men and seized upon the weakness of mankind. This was said in those books on the nature of the gods, and it is the very thing I have most aimed at in this discussion. For I judged that I should do much good both to myself and to my countrymen, if I tore it up by the roots. Nor indeed — for I wish this to be carefully understood — is religion taken away when superstition is taken away. For it is the part of a wise man to guard the institutions of our ancestors by retaining the rites and ceremonies; and the beauty of the universe and the order of the heavenly things compel us to confess that there is some surpassing and eternal nature, and that the human race must look up to it and wonder at it.

Explodatur igitur haec quoque somniorum divinatio pariter cum ceteris. Nam, ut vere loquamur, superstitio fusa per gentis oppressit omnium fere animos atque hominum inbecillitatem occupavit. Quod et in iis libris dictum est, qui sunt de natura deorum, et hac disputatione id maxume egimus. Multum enim et nobismet ipsis et nostris profuturi videbamur, si eam funditus sustulissemus. Nec vero (id enim diligenter intellegi volo) superstitione tollenda religio tollitur. Nam et maiorum instituta tueri sacris caerimoniisque retinendis sapientis est, et esse praestantem aliquam aeternamque naturam, et eam suspiciendam admirandamque hominum generi pulchritudo mundi ordoque rerum caelestium cogit confiteri.

For which reason, just as religion, which is joined with the knowledge of nature, must be propagated, so all the roots of superstition must be pulled out. For it presses and bears down upon you, and, wherever you turn, it pursues you — whether you have heard a seer or an omen, whether you have sacrificed or caught sight of a bird, whether you have seen a Chaldaean or a haruspex, whether it has lightened, whether it has thundered, whether anything has been struck from the sky, whether anything has been born or done resembling a portent; and some one of these things must for the most part come to pass, so that it is never permitted to rest with a quiet mind.

Quam ob rem, ut religio propaganda etiam est, quae est iuncta cum cognitione naturae, sic superstitionis stirpes omnes eligendae. Instat enim et urget et, quo te cumque verteris, persequitur, sive tu vatem sive tu omen audieris, sive immolaris sive avem aspexeris, si Chaldaeum, si haruspicem videris, si fulserit, si tonuerit, si tactum aliquid erit de caelo, si ostenti simile natum factumve quippiam; quorum necesse est plerumque aliquid eveniat, ut numquam liceat quieta mente consistere.

Sleep seems to be the refuge from all toils and anxieties. Yet from that very thing the most numerous cares and fears are born; which, indeed, would have less force in themselves and be more despised, had not the philosophers taken up the patronage of dreams — and those not the most contemptible of them, but in the first rank for sharpness, men who see consequence and contradiction, who are reckoned all but finished and perfect. Had Carneades not withstood their license, I am not sure they would not by now be judged the only philosophers. With them is nearly all our debate and contention, not because we hold them in the greatest contempt, but because they seem to defend their views most sharply and most prudently. But since it is proper to the Academy to interpose no judgment of its own, to approve those things that seem most like the truth, to set causes side by side and to bring out what can be said for each view, and, with no authority of its own brought to bear, to leave the judgment of its hearers whole and free — we shall hold to this practice handed down from Socrates, and between us, if it please you, Quintus my brother, we shall use it as often as we can. “For my part,” said he, “nothing could be more welcome to me.” When this had been said, we rose.

Perfugium videtur omnium laborum et sollicitudinum esse somnus. At ex eo ipso plurumae curae metusque nascuntur; qui quidem ipsi per se minus valerent et magis contemnerentur, nisi somniorum patrocinium philosophi suscepissent, nec ii quidem contemptissimi, sed in primis acuti et consequentia et repugnantia videntes, qui prope iam absoluti et perfecti putantur. Quorum licentiae nisi Carneades restitisset, haud scio an soli iam philosophi iudicarentur. Cum quibus omnis fere nobis disceptatio contentioque est, non quod eos maxume contemnamus, sed quod videntur acutissime sententias suas prudentissimeque defendere. Cum autem proprium sit Academiae iudicium suum nullum interponere, ea probare, quae simillima veri videantur, conferre causas et, quid in quamque sententiam dici possit, expromere, nulla adhibita sua auctoritate iudicium audientium relinquere integrum ac liberum, tenebimus hanc consuetudinem a Socrate traditam eaque inter nos, si tibi, Quinte frater, placebit, quam saepissime utemur. Mihi vero, inquit ille, nihil potest esse iucundius. Quae cum essent dicta, surreximus.

C icero by Claude

On Divination

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