You have often seen a crowd of ants running to and fro in and out of their city, some turning up a bit of dung, others dragging a bean- shell, or running away with half a grain of wheat. I make no doubt but they have architects, demagogues, senators, musicians, and philosophers amongst them. Men, my friend, are exactly like these: if you approve not of the comparison, recollect, if you please, the ancient Thessalian fables, and you will find that the Myrmidons, a most warlike nation, sprung originally from pismires.
When I had thus seen and diverted myself with everything, I shook my wings and flew off,
"To join the sacred senate of the skies." {178a}
Scarce had I gone a furlong, when the Moon, in a soft female voice, cried out to me, "Menippus, will you carry something for me to Jupiter, so may your journey be prosperous?" "With all my heart," said I, "if it is nothing very heavy." "Only a message," replied she, "a small petition to him: my patience is absolutely worn out by the philosophers, who are perpetually disputing about me, who I am, of what size, how it happens that I am sometimes round and full, at others cut in half; some say I am inhabited, others that I am only a looking-glass hanging over the sea, and a hundred conjectures of this kind; even my light, {178b} they say, is none of my own, but stolen from the Sun; thus endeavouring to set me and my brother together by the ears, not content with abusing him, and calling him a hot stone, and a mass of fire. In the meantime, I am no stranger to what these men, who look so grave and sour all day, are doing o' nights; but I see and say nothing, not thinking it decent to lay open their vile and abominable lives to the public; for when I catch them thieving, or practising any of their nocturnal tricks, I wrap myself up in a cloud, that I may not expose to the world a parcel of old fellows, who, in spite of their long beards, and professions of virtue, are guilty of every vice, and yet they are always railing at and abusing me. I swear by night I have often resolved to move farther off to get out of reach of their busy tongues; and I beg you would tell Jupiter that I cannot possibly stay here any longer, unless he will destroy these naturalists, stop the mouths of the logicians, throw down the Portico, burn the Academy, and make an end of the inhabitants of Peripatus; so may I enjoy at last a little rest, which these fellows are perpetually disturbing." "It shall be done," said I, and away I set out for heaven, where
"No tracks of beasts or signs of men are found."
In a little time the earth was invisible, and the moon appeared very small; and now, leaving the sun on my right hand, I flew amongst the stars, and on the third day reached my journey's end. At first I intended to fly in just as I was, thinking that, being half an eagle, I should not be discovered, as that bird was an old acquaintance of Jupiter's, but then it occurred to me that I might be found out by my vulture's wing, and laid hold on: deeming it, therefore, most prudent not to run the hazard, I went up, and knocked at the door: Mercury heard me, and asking my name, went off immediately, and carried it to his master; soon after I was let in, and, trembling and quaking with fear, found all the gods sitting together, and seemingly not a little alarmed at my appearance there, expecting probably that they should soon have a number of winged mortals travelling up to them in the same manner: when Jupiter, looking at me with a most severe and Titanic {180a} countenance, cried out,
"Say who thou art, and whence thy country, name
Thy parents--" {180b}
At this I thought I should have died with fear; I stood motionless, and astonished at the awfulness and majesty of his voice; but recovering myself in a short time, I related to him everything from the beginning, how desirous I was of knowing sublime truths, how I went to the philosophers, and hearing them contradict one another, and driven to despair, thought on the scheme of making me wings, with all that had happened in my journey quite up to heaven. I then delivered the message to him from the Moon, at which, softening his contracted brow, he smiled at me, and cried, "What were Otus and Ephialtes in comparison of Menippus, who has thus dared to fly up to heaven; but come, we now invite you to supper with us; to- morrow we will attend to your business, and dismiss you." At these words he rose up and went to that part of heaven where everything from below could be heard most distinctly; for this, it seems, was the time appointed to hear petitions. As we went along, he asked me several questions about earthly matters, such as, "How much corn is there at present in Greece? had you a hard winter last year? and did your cabbages want rain? is any of Phidias's family alive now? what is the reason that the Athenians have left off sacrificing to me for so many years? do they think of building up the Olympian temple again? are the thieves taken that robbed the Dodonaean?" When I had answered all these, "Pray, Menippus," said he, "what does mankind really think of me?" "How should they think of you," said I, "but with the utmost veneration, that you are the great sovereign of the gods." "There you jest," said he, "I am sure; I know well enough how fond they are of novelty, though you will not own it. There was a time, indeed, when I was held in some estimation, when I was the great physician, when I was everything, in short--
"When streets, and lanes, and all was full of Jove." {183a}
Pisa {183b} and Dodona {183c} were distinguished above every place, and I could not see for the smoke of sacrifices; but, since Apollo has set up his oracle at Delphi, and AEsculapius practises physic at Pergamus; since temples have been erected to Bendis {183d} at Thrace, to Anubis in Egypt, and to Diana at Ephesus, everybody runs after them; with them they feast, to them they offer up their hecatombs, and think it honour enough for a worn-out god, as I am, if they sacrifice once in six years at Olympia; whilst my altars are as cold and neglected as Plato's laws, or the syllogisms of Chrysippus."
With this and such-like chat we passed away the time, till we came to the place where the petitions were to be heard. Here we found several holes, with covers to them, and close to every one was placed a golden chair. Jupiter sat down in the first he came to, and lifting up the lid, listened to the prayers, which, as you may suppose, were of various kinds. I stooped down and heard several of them myself, such as, "O Jupiter, grant me a large empire!" "O Jupiter, may my leeks and onions flourish and increase!" "Grant Jupiter, that my father may die soon!" "Grant I may survive my wife!" "Grant I may not be discovered, whilst I lay wait for my brother!" "Grant that I may get my cause!" "Grant that I may be crowned at Olympia!" One sailor asked for a north wind, another for a south; the husbandman prayed for rain, and the fuller for sunshine. Jupiter heard them all, but did not promise everybody--
"--some the just request,
He heard propitious, and denied the rest." {185a}
Those prayers which he thought right and proper he let up through the hole, and blew the wicked and foolish ones back, that they might not rise to heaven. One petition, indeed, puzzled him a little; two men asking favours of him directly contrary to each other, at the same time, and promising the same sacrifice; he was at a loss which to oblige; he became immediately a perfect Academic, and like Pyrrho, {185b} was held in suspense between them. When he had done with the prayers, he sat down upon the next chair, over another hole, and listened to those who were swearing and making vows. When he had finished this business, and destroyed Hermodorus, the Epicurean, for perjury, he removed to the next seat, and gave audience to the auguries, oracles, and divinations; which having despatched, he proceeded to the hole that brought up the fume of the victims, together with the name of the sacrificer. Then he gave out his orders to the winds and storms: "Let there be rain to-day in Scythia, lightning in Africa, and snow in Greece; do you, Boreas, blow in Lydia, and whilst Notus lies still, let the north wind raise the waves of the Adriatic, and about a thousand measures of hail be sprinkled over Cappadocia."
When Jupiter had done all his business we repaired to the feast, for it was now supper-time, and Mercury bade me sit down by Pan, the Corybantes, Attis, and Sabazius, a kind of demi-gods who are admitted as visitors there. Ceres served us with bread, and Bacchus with wine; Hercules handed about the flesh, Venus scattered myrtles, and Neptune brought us fish; not to mention that I got slyly a little nectar and ambrosia, for my friend Ganymede, out of good- nature, if he saw Jove looking another way, would frequently throw me in a cup or two. The greater gods, as Homer tells us {187a} (who, I suppose, had seen them as well as myself,) never taste meat or wine, but feed upon ambrosia and get drunk with nectar, at the same time their greatest luxury is, instead of victuals, to suck in the fumes that rise from the victims, and the blood of the sacrifices that are offered up to them. Whilst we were at supper, Apollo played on the harp, Silenus danced a cordax, and the Muses repeated Hesiod's Theogony, and the first Ode of Pindar. When these recreations were over we all retired tolerably well soaked, {187b} to bed,
"Now pleasing rest had sealed each mortal eye,
And even immortal gods in slumber lie,
All but myself--" {187c}
I could not help thinking of a thousand things, and particularly how it came to pass that, during so long a time Apollo {188a} should never have got him a beard, and how there came to be night in heaven, though the sun is always present there and feasting with them. I slept a little, and early in the morning Jupiter ordered the crier to summon a council of the gods, and when they were all assembled, thus addressed himself to them.
"The stranger who came here yesterday, is the chief cause of my convening you this day. I have long wanted to talk with you concerning the philosophers, and the complaints now sent to us from the Moon make it immediately necessary to take the affair into consideration. There is lately sprung up a race of men, slothful, quarrelsome, vain-glorious, foolish, petulant, gluttonous, proud, abusive, in short what Homer calls,
"An idle burthen to the ground." {188b}
These, dividing themselves into sects, run through all the labyrinths of disputation, calling themselves Stoics, Academics, Epicureans, Peripatetics, and a hundred other names still more ridiculous; then wrapping themselves up in the sacred veil of virtue, they contract their brows and let down their beards, under a specious appearance hiding the most abandoned profligacy; like one of the players on the stage, if you strip him of his fine habits wrought with gold, all that remains behind is a ridiculous spectacle of a little contemptible fellow, hired to appear there for seven drachmas. And yet these men despise everybody, talk absurdly of the gods, and drawing in a number of credulous boys, roar to them in a tragical style about virtue, and enter into disputations that are endless and unprofitable. To their disciples they cry up fortitude and temperance, a contempt of riches and pleasures, and, when alone, indulge in riot and debauchery. The most intolerable of all is, that though they contribute nothing towards the good and welfare of the community, though they are
"Unknown alike in council and in field;"
yet are they perpetually finding fault with, abusing, and reviling others, and he is counted the greatest amongst them who is most impudent, noisy, and malevolent; if one should say to one of these fellows who speak ill of everybody, 'What service are you of to the commonwealth?' he would reply, if he spoke fairly and honestly, 'To be a sailor or a soldier, or a husbandman, or a mechanic, I think beneath me; but I can make a noise and look dirty, wash myself in cold water, go barefoot all winter, and then, like Momus, find fault with everybody else; if any rich man sups luxuriously, I rail at, and abuse him; but if any of my friends or acquaintance fall sick, and want my assistance, I take no notice of them.'
"Such, my brother gods, are the cattle which I complain of; and of all these the Epicureans are the worst, who assert that the gods take no care of human affairs, or look at all into them: it is high time, my brethren, that we should take this matter into consideration, for if once they can persuade the people to believe these things, you must all starve; for who will sacrifice to you, when they can get nothing by it? What the Moon accuses you of, you all heard yesterday from the stranger; consult, therefore, amongst yourselves, and determine what may best promote the happiness of mankind, and our own security." When Jupiter had thus spoken, the assembly rung with repeated cries, of "thunder, and lightning! burn, consume, destroy! down with them into the pit, to Tartarus, and the giants!" Jove, however, once more commanding silence, cried out, "It shall be done as you desire; they and their philosophy shall perish together: but at present, no punishments must be inflicted; for these four months to come, as you all know, it is a solemn feast, and I have declared a truce: next year, in the beginning of the spring, my lightning shall destroy them.
"As to Menippus, first cutting off his wings that he may not come here again, let Mercury carry him down to the earth."
Saying this, he broke up the assembly, and Mercury taking me up by my right ear, brought me down, and left me yesterday evening in the Ceramicus. And now, my friend, you have heard everything I had to tell you from heaven; I must take my leave, and carry this good news to the philosophers, who are walking in the Poecile.
