The Life of Apollonius of Tyana: Book V: Chapters 11-20

CHAPTER XI

But as matters in the west were in such an inflamed condition, Apollonius and his friends returned thence towards Libya and the Tyrrhenian land; and, partly on foot and partly by sea, they made their way to Sicily, where they stopped at Lilybaeum. Then they coasted along to Messina and to the Straits, where the junction of the Tyrrhenian Sea with the Adriatic gives rise to the dangers of the Charybdis. Here they say they heard that Nero had taken to flight, tough Vindex was dead; and that various claimants were snatching at the throne, some from Rome itself, and others from various countries. Now when his companions asked him what would be the issue of these events, and who would gain possession of the throne, he answered: "Many Thebans will have it." For he compared the pretenders, namely, Vitellius and Galba and Otho, in view of the short lease of power which they enjoyed, to Thebans, for it was only during a very short time that they held dominion over the Hellenic world.

CHAPTER XII

That he was enabled to make such forecasts by some divine impulse, and that it is no sound inference to infer, as some people do, that our hero was a wizard, is clear from what I have already said. But let us consider these facts also: wizards, whom for my part I reckon to be the most unfortunate of mankind, claim to alter the course of destiny, by having recourse either to the torture of lost spirits or to barbaric sacrifices, or to certain incantations or anointings; and many of them when accused of such practices have admitted that they were adepts in such practices. But Apollonius submitted himself to the decrees of the Fates, and only foretold that things must come to pass; and his foreknowledge was gained not by wizardry, but from what the gods revealed to him. And when among the Indians he beheld their tripods and their dumb waiters and other automata, which I described as entering the room on their own accord, he did not ask how they were contrived, nor did he ask to be informed; he only praised them, but did not aspire to imitate them.

CHAPTER XIII

Now when they reached Syracuse a woman of a leading family was brought to bed of such a monster as never any woman had delivered of before: for her child had three heads, and each head had a neck of its own, but below them was a single body. Of the vulgar and stupid interpretations of this prodigy, one was that it signified the impending ruin

CHAPTER XIV

Next they came to Catana, where is Mount Etna; and they say that they heard from the inhabitants of

1 of Etna; but they themselves came to more plausible conclusions and more in keeping with philosophy. And they say that Apollonius began the discussion by asking his companions: "Is there such a thing as mythology?" "Yes, by Zeus," answered Menippus, "and I mean by it that which furnishes poets with their themes." "What then do you think of Aesop?" "He is a mythologist and writer of fables and no more." "And which set of myths show any wisdom?" "Those of the poets," he answered, "because they are represented in the poems as having taken place." "And what then do you think of the stories of Aesop?" "Frogs," he answered, "and donkeys and nonsense only fit to be swallowed by old women and children." "And yet for my own part," said Apollonius, "I find them more conducive to wisdom than the others. For those others, of which all poetry is so fond, and which deal with heroes, positively destroy the souls of their hearers, because the poet relates stories of outlandish passion and of incestuous marriages, and repeats calumnies against the gods, of how they ate their own children, and committed crimes of meanness, and quarreled with one another; and the affectation and pretense of reality leads passionate and jealous people and miserlike and ambitious persons to imitate the stories. Aesop on the other hand had in the first place the wisdom never to identify himself with those who put such stories into verse, but took a line

1 or something of the kind, dismisses his chorus and departs, Aesop adds an oracle to his story, and dismisses his hearers just as they reach the conclusion he wished to lead the up to.

CHAPTER XV

And as for myself, O Menippus, my mother taught me a story about the wisdom of Aesop when I was a mere child, and told me that he was once a shepherd, and was tending his flocks hard by a temple of Hermes, and that he was a passionate lover of wisdom and prayed to Hermes that he might receive it. Many other people, she said, also resorted to the temple of Hermes asking for the same gift, and one of them would hang on the altar gold, another silver, another a herald's wand of ivory, and others other rich presents of the kind. Now Aesop, she said, was not in a position to own any of these things; but he saved up what he had, and poured a libation of as much milk as a sheep would give at one milking in honor of Hermes, and brought a honeycomb and laid it on the altar, big enough to fill the hand, and he thought too of regaling the god with myrtle berries, or perhaps by laying just a few roses or violets at the altar. 'For,' said he, 'would you, O Hermes, have me weave crowns for you and neglect my sheep?' Now when on the appointed day they arrived for the distribution of the gifts of wisdom, Hermes as the god of wisdom and eloquence and also of gain and profit, said to him who, as you may well suppose, had made the biggest offering: 'Here is philosophy for you'; and to him who had made the next handsomest present, he said: 'Do you take your place among the orators'; and to others he said: 'You shall have the gift of astronomy or you shall be a musician, or you shall be an epic poet and write in heroic metre, or you shall

CHAPTER XVI

Perhaps I have done a foolish thing," went on Apollonius, "for it was my intention to recall you to more scientific and truer explanations than the poetical myths given by the vulgar of Etna; and I have let myself be drawn into a eulogy of myths. However, the digression has not been without a charm of its own, for the myth which we repudiate is not one of Aesop's stories, but belongs to the class of dramatic stories which fill the mouths of our poets. For they say that a certain Typho or Enceladus lies bound under the mountain, and in his death agony breathes out this fire that we see. Now I admit that

CHAPTER XVII

"What then is the explanation of such mountains? It is this: the earth by affording a mixture of asphalt and sulphur, begins to smoke of its own nature, but it does not yet belch out fire; if however it be cavernous and hollow and there be spirit or force circulating underneath it, it at once lifts up into the air as it were a beacon-fire; this flame gathers force, and gets hold of all around, and then like water it streams of the mountains and flows into the plains, and the mass of fire reaches the sea, forming mouths, out of which it issues, like the mouths of rivers. And as for the place of the Pious Ones, around whom the fire flowed, we will allow that such exists even here; but at the same time let us not forget that the whole earth affords secure ground

CHAPTER XVIII

He stayed in Sicily and taught philosophy there as long as he had sufficient interest in doing so, and then repaired to Greece about the rising of Arcturus. After a pleasant sail he arrived at Leucas, where he said: "Let us get out of this ship, for it is better not to continue in it our voyage to Achaea." No one took any notice of the utterance except those who knew the sage well, but he himself together with those who desired to make the voyage with him embarked on a Leucadian ship, and reached the port of Lechaeum; meanwhile the Syracusan ship sank as it entered the Crisaean Gulf.

CHAPTER XIX

At Athens he was initiated by the same hierophant of whom he had delivered a prophecy to his predecessor; here he met Demetrius the philosopher, for after the episode of Nero's bath and of his speech about it, Demetrius continued to live at Athens, with such noble courage that he did not quit Athens even during the period when Nero was outraging Greece over the games. Demetrius said that he had fallen in with Musonius at the Isthmus,

CHAPTER XX

Apollonius spent the winter in various Hellenic temples, and towards spring he embarked on the road for Egypt, after administering many rebukes indeed, yet giving much good counsel to the cities, many of which won his approval, for he never refused praise when anything was done in a right and sensible way. When he descended to the Piraeus, he found a ship riding there with its sails set, just about to start for Ionia; but the owner would not allow him to embark, for he wished to go on a private cruise. Apollonius asked him what his freight consisted of. "Of gods," he replied, "whose images I am exporting to Ionia, some made of gold and stone, and others of ivory and gold." "And are you going to dedicate them or what?" "I am going to sell them," he replied, "to those who desire to dedicate them." "Then you are afraid, my most excellent man, lest we should steal your images on board ship?" "I am not afraid of that," he answered, "but I do not think

1 of the Hyrcanians and of the Scythians —far be it from me to name these—and so you think you are doing no impiety? It is true that there are babbling buffoons who hang upon their persons images of Demeter or Dionysus, and pretend that they are nurtured by the gods they carry; but as for feeding on the gods themselves as you do, without ever being surfeited on this diet, that is a horrible commerce and one, I should say, savoring of lunacy, even if you have no misgivings of your own about the consequences." And having administered this rebuke he took his passage on another ship.

Footnotes

1:493:1 There is a pun in the Greek between Typhô = Typhon and typho = to smoke.

1:495:1 Eurip. Alcestis, last line.

1:507:1 Probably temple slaves or prostitutes.