held no beasts to be sacred, except on account of
some advantage which they had received from them. The ibis, a very
large bird, with strong legs and a horny long beak, destroys a great
number of serpents. These birds keep Egypt from pestilential diseases
by killing and devouring the flying serpents brought from the deserts
of Lybia by the south-west wind, which prevents the mischief that may
attend their biting while alive, or any infection when dead. I could
speak of the advantage of the ichneumon, the crocodile, and the cat;
but I am unwilling to be tedious; yet I will conclude with observing
that the barbarians paid divine honors to beasts because of the
benefits they received from them; whereas your Gods not only confer no
benefit, but are idle, and do no single act of any description
whatever.

XXXVII. "They have nothing to do," your teacher says. Epicurus truly,
like indolent boys, thinks nothing preferable to idleness; yet those
very boys, when they have a holiday, entertain themselves in some
sportive exercise. But we are to suppose the Deity in such an inactive
state that if he should move we may justly fear he would be no longer
happy. This doctrine divests the Gods of motion and operation; besides,
it encourages men to be lazy, as they are by this taught to believe
that the least labor is incompatible even with divine felicity.

But let it be as you would have it, that the Deity is in the form and
image of a man. Where is his abode? Where is his habitation? Where is
the place where he is to be found? What is his course of life? And what
is it that constitutes the happiness which you assert that he enjoys?
For it seems necessary that a being who is to be happy must use and
enjoy what belongs to him. And with regard to place, even those natures
which are inanimate have each their proper stations assigned to them:
so that the earth is the lowest; then water is next above the earth;
the air is above the water; and fire has the highest situation of all
allotted to it. Some creatures inhabit the earth, some the water, and
some, of an amphibious nature, live in both. There are some, also,
which are thought to be born in fire, and which often appear fluttering
in burning furnaces.

In the first place, therefore, I ask you, Where is the habitation of
your Deity? Secondly, What motive is it that stirs him from his place,
supposing he ever moves? And, lastly, since it is peculiar to animated
beings to have an incli