Tfhio - JScholarship - Johns Hopkins University

APOLOGETICVS 23 81
method only of incitement. But enough of words; from this
point onward there must be a presentation of the thing itself,
by which we shall show that the nature of gods and daemons
is one. Let any one be produced in this very place under your
tribunals, who it is well known is under the influence of a
daemon; that spirit, if ordered by any Christian to speak, will
as readily confess itself a daemon, because it is true, as elsewhere
a god because it is untrue. Let someone hkewise be brought
forward from among those-who are thought to be under the
influence of a god, men who by breathing on altars acquire
a di-vine power from the odour of the sacrifice, who are cured
by exhahng, and force an utterance as they pant. This very
Maiden of the Heavens, the promisor of rains, this very Aesculapius,
the discoverer of cures, the ministers of another day to
Secordius, Tenatius and Asclepiodotus, men doomed to die—
unless they confess themselves daemons, not daring to he to
a Christian, forth-with shed the blood of that most insolent
Christian! What could be more e-vddent than a fact hke this ?
what more trustworthy than this demonstration? The simphcity
of truth is for aU eyes to see, its own excellence supports
it, suspicion is impossible. Do you say this result comes from
magic or some deception of that kind? You will not say it,
(even) if your eyes and ears allow you. But what can be insinuated
against that which is set forth in its naked simphcity ?
If, on the one hand, they are truly gods, why do they say falsely
that they are daemons? is it that they may please us? If so,
then your di-vinity is already subject to Christians, and that is
not to be considered di-vinity which is subject to a man, and
(if aught can add to the disgrace) to its actual foes. If on the
other hand they are daemons or angels, why do they answer
that they play the part of gods elsewhere? For, just as those
who are considered gods would have refused to caU themselves
daemons, if they had been tridy gods, of course lest they should
depose themselves from their high dignity, so also these whom
you know at once to be daemons, would not dare elsewhere to
pose as gods, if those gods whose names they usurp were gods of
any sort at all, since they would be afraid to misuse these higher
dignities .which, without doubt, they would also have te dread.
Therefore this di-vinity which you held fast is non-existent:
for, if it existed, it would neither be claimed by spirits in confession,
nor denied by gods. Since then both sides agree to our
admission, denying that the gods exist, you must recognise that
there is one class oidy, "viz. daemons, but that it is on both sides.
You must now seek for fresh gods, since those you had assumed
to exist, you learn are daemons. But by this same aid from us,
M. T. 6