ks on Pythagoras and India instruct posterity to the tenth
generation! I return to Palimbothra, where I am held in honour on the
self-same account that here renders me ridiculous. It shall be my study to
enlighten the natives respecting their obligations to Pythagoras, whose
name I did not happen to hear while I abode among them."

THE DUMB ORACLE

Many the Bacchi that brandish the rod:
Few that be filled with the fire of the God.

I

In the days of King Attalus, before oracles had lost their credit, one of
peculiar reputation, inspired, as was believed, by Apollo, existed in the
city of Dorylseum, in Phrygia. Contrary to usage, its revelations were
imparted through the medium of a male priest. It was rarely left unthronged
by devout questioners, whose inquiries were resolved in writing, agreeably
to the method delivered by the pious Lucian, in his work "Concerning False
Prophecy." [*] Sometimes, on extraordinary occasions, a voice, evidently
that of the deity, was heard declaring the response from the innermost
recesses of the shrine. The treasure house of the sanctuary was stored with
tripods and goblets, in general wrought from the precious metals; its
coffers were loaded with coins and ingots; the sacrifices of wealthy
suppliants and the copious offerings in kind of the country people provided
superabundantly for the daily maintenance of the temple servitors; while a
rich endowment in land maintained the dignity of its guardians, and of the
officiating priest. The latter reverend personage was no less eminent for
prudence than for piety; on which account the Gods had rewarded him with
extreme obesity. At length he died, whether of excess in meat or in drink
is not agreed among historians.

[Footnote: _Pseudomantis_, cap. 19-21.]

The guardians of the temple met to choose a successor, and, naturally
desirous that the sanctity of the oracle should suffer no abatement,
elected a young priest of goodly presence and ascetic life; the humblest,
purest, most fervent, and most ingenuous of the sons of men. So rare a
choice might well be expected to be accompanied by some extraordinary
manifestation, and, in fact, a prodigy took place which filled the sacred
authorities with dismay. The responses of the oracle ceased suddenly and
altogether. No revelation was vouchsafed to the pontiff in his slumbers; no
access of prophetic fury constrained him to disclose the secrets of the
future; no voice rang fro