Orationes 3
Orationes 3 Imperial Aelius Aristides GreekSince I was absent from the Olympic festival, being by some chance unable in body to share with you in what was taking place, and having come into the uttermost danger from the sickness that then befell me—but having found Zeus the Saviour and Poseidon, brother of Zeus, the Securer, and having laid hold, as of some harbour, of this present health and safety, and of my time here among you; and since, moreover, a report of this kind was brought to me, that certain men longed for my presence, and these the most distinguished of them—not so much for my own sake, as I think, nor for the sake of my speeches, but displaying both their nobility and their love of honour in these matters, and the honour and goodwill toward their elders which mark all whose life is spent in such things, by whom they remember that on former occasions too they were often pleased and became happier in the common festivals of the Greeks—I resolved that I must not hesitate on these accounts to come forward before you, but that at one and the same time I must pay a double recompense to two brothers, the one earlier and
elder and in some sense customary, the other now about to begin. For it would not perhaps even be holy that I, who everywhere make mention of the divine, and whose discourse is for the most part concerned with these matters, should seem to have overlooked the contribution from my speeches toward this god alone of the gods, and that there should be no speech named after me dealing either with the god or with this very place in which we now are, but that so great a matter should have been neglected; concerning which it would perhaps be well for me first to propitiate the god and to win his favour—to grant me pardon for the past, if anything has been overlooked by me toward these things, and to receive these present offerings graciously and with a propitious mind, and both to grant other good things and to enable me to say something fitting. And if it should turn out otherwise, to look to my ability, and not to the magnitude of the subject, which is past telling—and that too when to say anything about these things and to attempt it is simply as if one should wish to count the cupfuls of the sea. Nevertheless, since this god is wont to make even the greatest and most boundless of the seas passable, and sometimes even with fair winds to those to whom he chances to be gracious, let our discourse about him too now be launched; and let it be made fast, in a sense, from the god himself as from a stern-cable, as one might say. Now, all that the first who philosophized about these matters thought right to refer to the nature of the whole—when they made their accounts about this god to be all that is moist in the universe, whether it be the greatest part of the whole, or even this very whole itself: I mean the moist substance so named, as the account of the poets also bears witness, declaring this to be the origin of the gods, as it is somewhere said, "Ocean, the origin of the gods," under another name, that of Ocean; and the nourishment and life of all things, both those that are divine and those of the lower portion; and on this account that this is the greatest oath of the gods, again under another name, that of the water of the Styx; and that the first men reckoned as gods the greatest and first springs and rivers,
and still further the streams; and that all things that share in generation are from there, and go back again thither in their dissolution; and that this is the curse of Homer when he prays that all may come to water, as the verse goes: "But may you all become water and earth"—and all the other things of this kind which have been said and discovered by wise men and poets: let these things either be wholly passed over by us, or be said only so far, at least in the present case. But the things that are common to all and familiar and before the eyes of all—of these it might now in some way be fitting to make mention. And not even these stand by themselves, but these too are said with the poets as witnesses.
For it is agreed that three sons were born to Cronus from Rhea their mother, Poseidon and Zeus and a third whom we hear of besides these. And indeed that they divided among themselves their father's lot, apportioning this whole by a most just distribution: that Zeus held heaven and the upper air and the things in these, and set out from there; that Poseidon held the sea; and the third brother the region beneath the earth. Let us now consider among ourselves which of them made his own realm more humane and more common: whether he who gave no one any share of it at all, or he who does give a share, but not before one has departed, or he who receives all men while they live and grants them to dwell with him and to be with him and share his citizenship, and to work upon the fairest of the lots, the sea, and all the good things that have been discovered from the sea, both from it and through it—and who has given himself in all things to the race of men. And indeed, in what did man differ from the self-grown trees on the earth, so long as he was on land only? What had he that was fine, before this god first opened the sea a little, and then threw it wide? Or what had he to see, what to hear?—he who did not even know the very earth on which he was, except what was at his feet, far less its limits,
or the other continent, or the land opposite. But those men of old lived in the manner of beasts, in holes and clefts and trees, the "blessed," as they are called. Than whom what was more wretched—men who neither knew anything nor had seen anything nor possessed anything, except what they had day by day, on an equal footing with the irrational animals? But when this god proclaimed that men should resort to him with confidence and feed upon the sea, and showed the manner by which, and removed from their souls the fear which, as though of a dread and fearful beast, they felt toward the sea—always expecting to be snatched up themselves and seeing the whole earth swept away together with the winds—then it is not even easy to say in words the multitude of good things that came to the land from the sea. And the greatest work of Poseidon was to bring both these together into one, and to make a friendship and intercourse between them. For before, this was not so, but earth and sea were at war with one another. But now they were settled together by this god, and he founded cities for men there, which we now call islands, so that not even in the sea does one long for the land, nor is one anything other than upon land. And he set free all things that are, and living creatures of every sort. And there too are plants, some for man's use, others for delight and pleasure. And indeed he set out a far more lavish table than the land, and found out countless places of rest, and, simply to say it, made man winged, all but using, as it were, certain wings to cross the sea, having ordered that he be borne along with the winds; and he begrudged him not even this, far less anything else—not as his eldest brother is said to have admitted one man only, Perseus, into his realm, and that one passing but a little way from earth and sea, and Bellerophon from here afterward, and that not to a good end. But this god admits everyone who wishes, both man and woman and the children themselves; and there are even some
whom he brought up out of the sea, like Apollo and Artemis. And for these Zeus might reasonably feel gratitude to him, because he neither looked on while Leto was driven about all that time for what had happened to her, nor while his offspring was all but neglected. And this god brought up the beauty of Aphrodite too out of himself, as if from some head, this one too, of the sea, in imitation of Zeus—or rather he was even before Zeus, not only in human matters but in divine ones, as the account told on Trojan Ida runs. And since we have mentioned Leto, it has occurred to me how many other loves he also helped his brother carry through; for both that of Io daughter of Inachus and that of fair Europa, and perhaps one and another besides, whose names are still even now among men. And the fair boy, with his fair mother, he made his own child and made both him and his mother sharers in his realm.
But this account awaits us for the time when it is fitting; now let us go through the works of Poseidon in their turn—what they are and how great, and how much his realm is worth. And next it would perhaps be fitting also to consider what kind the honours among men are, and how much they are worth. For all the most notable and famous parts of the earth have been named after Poseidon. At the entrances of the Euxine Sea, where the narrowest part of the sea spreads out from itself the great sea, there a dark rock is named, and gates of the sea which formerly seemed to be shut, and his temples and precincts and altars; and besides others, the sea that descends thence to us, and the place called Leucate, named after the Leucate here at Actium—not a rock, like that one, but much land advancing into the sea, silting it up over a great space in a half-circular shape, simply in the manner of a sickle, so that this is also the name for the silt-bank; and a certain account and myth is told of it, that here was done the deed concerning Cronus by his sons, the matter of the mutilation. And to one who passes over the Propontis and the
Hellespont, and crosses the islands called the Cyclades, on the side toward the Aegean Sea there is Euboea and its promontories, the harbour at Geraestus, and a temple of the god—which Homer too mentions in the return of the Achaeans and the sailing away from Ilium. And at the entrances into the Ionian Sea, there is the promontory of the god at Taenarum, and the putting out to sea from there. And Homer has represented him as journeying abroad to Aegae and Helice for a feast, and as running on high upon the waves, both he and his horses, without touching the sea; in the same way as he set under man a double conveyance, a chariot on land, and a ship on the sea. There are his temples and precincts and his altar fragrant with sacrifice, as he himself said—just as he sent Zeus his brother to the milk-eaters. For, once for all, if one must not belittle the account, all shores, all harbours, and all parts of the earth and sea are temples of Poseidon and dedications and statues and precincts and shrines. Yet nothing is so dear and beloved to him, nor so honoured, as this place at the Isthmus and this very spot. And this I call both the dwelling-place of Poseidon and his kingdom and his court—as Homer named the court of Zeus—and his base of operations. And I infer it both from other things and because he has turned hither all the sea from every quarter, setting gates on either side and throwing open to it this so-called Isthmus, toward the east and toward the west alike, and at the same time shutting it in, so that the seas should not mingle, by no great measure of land, but as it were by a narrow channel; and laying down a law and ordering them to guard upon these the boundaries of each, and again throwing it open and giving much spacious room ahead to each, of all the spectacles on land at once the most marvellous and the most pleasant: that men should sail in and sail out at the same time with fair winds, each set of them, and that under the same winds there should be both puttings-out and puttings-in, in this land and this
sea alone of all; and that all things from every quarter resort hither both by land and by sea; and that this is the place which from most ancient times has been hymned by the poets as a wealthy spot, both because of the multitude of the good things present, and because of the prosperity existing in it. For it is, as it were, a kind of market-place and common court of the Greeks and a festival—not the one which the Greek world fills up for it every two years, like this present one, but one held all year and every single day. And if there were, as among men, so also among cities a relation of public hospitality toward one another, this city would have this name and this honour everywhere; for it receives all into itself and sends them forth again from itself, and is the common refuge of all—like a kind of road and thoroughfare of all men, wherever one might only go, and a common city of the Greeks, simply like a kind of mother-city and a mother in this very respect. For, among other things, there is nowhere one might rest, as in a mother's bosom, more pleasantly or more lovingly, such a place of rest is it, and a refuge and salvation to all who come upon it. But indeed, how great a multitude of her beauty and her charms and her loves is attached to her, so that all are bound fast by her sweetness, and all alike are inflamed for her, and she has in herself "affections, longings, dalliance, blandishment," so as to steal away the wits even of those who think highly of themselves; and, if one must add anything else to these, all the things that are called the charms of the goddess—so that the city is clearly Aphrodite's, which it occurs to me to name her; whatever this girdle is, by which the goddess binds all to herself, and that this is, as it were, a necklace and collar of all Greece, and a precinct of the Nymphs, all the Naiads dwelling here, and a chamber of the Seasons, in which they sit the whole time and from which they come forth, opening the gates—whether you wish to call them Zeus's or Poseidon's. And if ever a strife about beauty fell
upon the cities, as is said once to have arisen among the goddesses against one another, it would be on Aphrodite's side. And about the form of the city, what could one say, which not even the eyes of all are sufficient to take in? Of its greatness, indeed, what greater proof could one make than that it stretches out to all seas, and is settled together with them and beside them—not this one, but not that, but all alike? And indeed, as a base of good order, the city still even now awards justice to the Greeks. Of wealth and of the multitude of good things, as much as is likely, the earth from every quarter and the sea from every quarter pouring upon it—it being as it were afloat in the midst of good things and washed all round by them, like some merchant-ship full of good things in a circle. And the wise too you would find by going along the road; and from inanimate things you might learn and hear—so many treasures of letters are there about the whole of it, wherever only one might look, both along the very roads and the porticoes. Further, the gymnasia, the schools, and studies and inquiries. Why, then, need one mention Sisyphus, or the cleverness of Sisyphus, or Corinthus son of Zeus, or Bellerophon son of Poseidon, or any other of the heroes and demigods? Or, again, what came after these—those who discovered weights and balances and measures, and the justice in these; and how this city built a ship, not a trireme only, but, I would say, the very Argo? At any rate the leader of its expedition appears, after the voyage back from there, both to have brought it down hither and to have moored it here. Or, again, the things on land, the so-called wing of Pegasus—whether you will speak of it as of a horse or as of a bird—and the first who dared to mount upon it, the rider in the air. But these things are ancient and fabulous; but the things still even now remembered, both the peaceful of them and the warlike,
than which of the Greek cities are they not more brilliant? Than which not more conspicuous, whether by land or by sea? Whose deeds and actions are more illustrious? But indeed the present occasion is not one of wars; so that neither would the mention of such things be made in season, while the Greeks are keeping festival and are of one mind in this fairest of festivals and the most renowned, coming together twice in two years into one, doubled beyond the others and added to, and outstripping the rest and again overtaking them, simply as in chariot-races—if only it were possible for men to see the chariot of Poseidon borne along—and while they come together over a common mixing-bowl and at once pour libations and sacrifice, and lead processions to Poseidon and Amphitrite and Palaemon and Leucothea. These things, then, it would be well both to hymn and to tell, and for you to spend your time in the discourses about them.
The things of Poseidon himself, then, have been told in a way and hymned, not blamably, as it seems to me; and I see that you too are so disposed. And, by Zeus, about the city itself one might speak in the briefest compass. But I see that there remains for us the account of the two gods, the boy and his mother—whether one must call it an account or a myth. And this I fear, and am very much in dread, and am at a loss how I am ever to dispose of it together with you: whether, as the many think and as Homer too agrees, we too are to be persuaded of sufferings of gods, such as the bonds of Ares and the servitudes of Apollo and the hurlings of Hephaestus into the sea, and so too the griefs of Ino and certain flights; or whether this is neither holy nor pious to say, especially when making an account about the gods—but this account must be banished by us not only outside the Isthmus and the Peloponnese, but even out of all Greece; and we must indeed purge away, going to both seas, if need be, Athamas, whoever he was, and his madness, whether it was real or falsely babbled by those most wretchedly destroyed
men who composed each of these things for us. As for Ino, either she neither was nor ever came to be such as the many say, or, if she was and came to be, yet she in no way belongs to the things that happen here. But Leucothea was a god straightway from the very beginning, and did not begin from where the many think. And if she was "endowed with voice," as he who said this said, yet she was not a mortal. But Homer has represented even gods as being like men, and indeed as speaking outright and conversing with men—both Athena and Hermes and Poseidon himself. And after these things it would perhaps be well for us, and dear to the gods, to say and to hear among ourselves: that Poseidon fell in love with Leucothea, and, having fallen in love, kept her with himself—in the same way as with Tyro daughter of Salmoneus and Amymone and some other fair woman—and that he hid her beneath the wave; and that her journeys hither from there, if indeed we must accept these too, came about not as of one fleeing in flight, but as of one going to a chamber, the sea; and that the boy, who was indeed from another bed, she did not carry off after seizing him, but as a deposit and a plaything and a gift to Poseidon. And that these things are so is shown both by the truth itself and by what is still even now said and done about them as about gods. For evils neither exist among the gods, nor could they ever come to be; for these things have been banished into the region toward the earth; nor sufferings and disasters. For only so could this become for someone a beginning of immortality. For evils come from evils, but the works of the gods are good. Otherwise it is in no way lawful for it to be. But if she was a man who was not fortunate, how then could she have become a god, tell me? But if she was dear to the gods, she would never have been unfortunate. And if she had not been such from the beginning, neither would she have become so afterward—for if the gods are able to free from evils, it is in their power not even to allow evils to approach them; and indeed, if they can give good things in return for evils, and the greatest thing, the portion of the immortal,
then to have been born straightway in such a condition. Leucothea, then, was a god straightway from the beginning, and disasters did not lead her to this, but her being such straightway from birth made it so that she came to be in no disaster at all. —Nor would she be a god among gods, nor would she have had such great power as we hear of. But now, since we must be persuaded by Homer's account, what concerns her threatens to be a kind of monarchy of the realm of the sea, and not even Poseidon himself to be permitted anything without her consenting. For let it be said, since he was not even able to take vengeance on the slayer of the boy, though he had these things too in his hands, as one might say, but only made a vain rushing sound, and there was nothing in his stirring up all things, nor in all he did, having snatched up his trident against the bulwark of this goddess—whether one must call it a veil, in the poetic phrase, or in some other way—and this was salvation and safety in the midst of the dread things: it is plain that these things came about not by force, nor against the god's will, but with Poseidon yielding to her in all things and permitting her to do whatever she wished. And the account has done well in coming to this point, especially because something fine has been revealed to us from it: that Leucothea is for us a kind of philosopher, not only compassionate and loving the Greeks; she who indeed saved Odysseus, the wisest and best of the Greeks, as also some other, and all those in whom there was love of wisdom, and who wish to be "intelligent" and "shrewd" and "sound-minded"—the very things said of Odysseus. These things, then, about her, dear even to Poseidon himself, as I think. And of Palaemon it is fine both to speak and to name his name, and to make an oath, and to take part in the rite and the celebration over him—so great a longing attaches to the boy, both to see him in a painting, here borne upon a dolphin, there even upon the very back of the sea, and there even in the arms of his
mother the bloom of the boy and his prime and his flower. For these are spectacles sweetest of spectacles, both to see and to hear; and that the sea should be present in the painting with him, and a calm—this too is fine—and the smiles of the boy toward Poseidon as he receives him with his robe. But nothing else whatever should be inscribed beside these things, such as in some places the fearful and impious paintings, which I marvel how the first who saw them ever endured, and did not come with anger upon their makers and the very hands that wrought them, or how they even now endure them in the midst of the temples. But it is not perhaps for me to censure such things. It remains, then, having prayed to Poseidon and Amphitrite and Leucothea and Palaemon and the Nereids and all the sea-divinities, both male and female, to grant safety and salvation by land and sea to the great king and to his whole house and to the race of the Greeks, and that in other respects we may flourish, and in our discourses may advance to what is fitting for each of us.