Dialogues of the Gods

Perseus Greek · Perseus Greek · 287 sections

15.1.1
Stop quarrelling, you two; you’re just like a couple of men. It’s quite improper and out of place at the table of the gods.
15.1.2
But, Zeus, do you really mean this medicine man to have a place above me?
15.1.3
He does, by Zeus, for I’m your better.
15.1.4
How, you crackbrain? Because Zeus blasted you with his thunderbolt for your impious doings, and you’ve now received immortality because he relented and pitied you?
15.1.5
You must have forgotten, Heracles, how you too were scorched to death on Oeta, that you taunt me with getting burned.
15.1.6
That doesn’t mean our lives were the same. I’m the son of Zeus, and performed all those labours cleaning up the world, by overcoming monsters, and punishing men of violence; but you’re just a herb-chopper and quack, useful perhaps among suffering humanity for administering potions, but without one manly deed to show.
15.2.1
Have you nothing to say of how I healed your burns, when you came up half-scorched the other day? Between the tunic and the fire after it, your body was in a fine mess. Besides, if nothing else, I was never a slave like you, carding wool in Lydia, wearing purple, and being beaten with Omphale’s golden sandal. What’s more, I never killed my wife and children in a fit of spleen.
15.2.2
If you don’t stop insulting me, you’ll pretty soon find out that your immortality won’t help you much. I’ll pick you up and throw you head first out of heaven, so that you’ll crack your skull, and not even Apollo the Healer will be able to do anything for you.
15.2.3
Stop it, I say; don’t disturb our dinner-party, or I’ll send you both from the table. But it’s only reasonable, Heracles, that Asclepius should have a place above you, as he died before you.
16.1.1
Why so down in the mouth, Apollo?
16.1.2
It’s my bad luck in love, Hermes.
16.1.3
Ah, yes, that could well make a chap sad. But what’s your bad luck? Still sore about Daphne?
16.1.4
Oh, no; I’m in mourning for my Laconian darling, Oebalus’ son.
16.1.5
Is Hyacinthus dead then?
16.1.6
He certainly is.
16.1.7
Who did it, Apollo? Who was so insensible to charm as to kill that lovely boy?
16.1.8
I did it with my own hand.
16.1.9
What! Were you mad, Apollo?
16.1.10
No, it was an unlucky accident.
16.1.11
How? I’d like to hear how it happened.
16.2.1
He was learning to throw the quoit, and I was throwing it with him, when Zephyrus did it—curse that wind above them all—Zephyrus, too, had been in love with him for a long time, but the boy wouldn’t look at him, and he couldn’t stand his contempt. Well, I threw my quoit as usual, and Zephyrus blew down from Taygetus, and dashed it down on the boy’s head. Blood poured out where it hit him, and he died on the spot, poor lad. I shot back at Zephyrus with my arrows and chased him hard, all the way back to the mountain. The boy I’ve had buried in Amyclae, where he was struck down by the discus, and I’ve made the earth send up from his blood the sweetest and fairest flower of them all, one which bears lettering of mourning for the dead one. Do you think it’s unreasonable of me to have a broken heart?
16.2.2
Yes I do, my good chap. You knew you’d chosen a mortal to love; so you mustn’t be vexed at his death.
17.1.1
To think, Apollo, that a poor cripple and mere artisan like him has married the two fairest of the fair, Aphrodite and Charis!
17.1.2
That’s just good luck, my dear fellow; but what does surprise me is that they can stand living with him, especially when they see him bathed in sweat, bending over his furnace, with soot all over his face. And yet they embrace a creature like that and kiss him and sleep with him.
17.1.3
That annoys me too, and makes me jealous of Hephaestus. You can show off your fine hair, Apollo, and play on your harp, and be proud of your beauty, and I of my fine physique and my lyre, but when it comes to bedtime, we’ve got to sleep alone.
17.2.1
I’m Generally unlucky in love; at least I lost my two special sweethearts, Daphne and Hyacinthus. Daphne so loathes and shuns me that she’s chosen to turn into a tree rather than share my company, and Hyacinthus was killed by that quoit. All that’s left of them for me is wreaths.
17.2.2
And I once with Aphrodite—but I mustn’t boast.
17.2.3
I know. They say she presented you with Hermaphroditus. But tell me, if you can, why Aphrodite and Charis are not jealous of each other.
17.3.1
Because, my dear fellow, Charis keeps company with him in Lemnos, and Aphrodite in heaven. Besides, Aphrodite is most wrapped up in Ares, and in love with him, and so doesn’t trouble much about this blacksmith fellow.
17.3.2
Do you think Hephaestus knows of this?
17.3.3
Of course he does, but what can he do when he sees Ares is such a fine strapping young fellow, and a man of war? So he keeps quiet. But he’s threatening to invent some sort of trap for them, and to catch them in a net on the bed.
17.3.4
That’s news to me; but I know I’d like to be destined to fall into that trap myself.
18.1.1
My dear Leto, the children you’ve given to Zeus are beautiful too.
18.1.2
My dear Hera, we can’t all have children like Hephaestus.
18.1.3
Cripple though he is, he’s certainly useful; he’s an excellent craftsman, and has done a fine job of work on our heaven; what’s more, he’s married Aphrodite, and she thinks the world of him, but as for your children—the girl’s far too much of a tomboy and roamer of the mountains, and now, to cap it all, she’s gone off to Scythia, and everyone knows about her diet there, how she murders visitors and eats them, just like the Scythian cannibals themselves; while Apollo pretends to know everything, be it archery, harping, medicine or prophecy, and has set up prophecy factories in Delphi, Claros, Colophon and Didyma, deceiving his customers by giving crooked replies, hedging between two possible answers, so that there’s no risk of a slip-up. He gets rich in this way, for there are plenty of fools as willing victims of his quackery. However, the more intelligent people see through most of his mystery-mongering. The prophet himself didn’t know he was going to kill his darling with that quoit, and didn’t foretell that Daphne would run away from him, for all his beauty and fine hair. So I can’t see why you thought you had better children than Niobe.
18.2.1
Anyway, I know how it vexes you to see my children among the gods, murderer and false prophet though you call them—particularly when they praise my daughter for her beauty, and all admire my son for his harp-playing at dinner.
18.2.2
You make me laugh, Leto. Who could admire one that Marsyas would have beaten at music and skinned alive with his own hands, if the Muses had chosen to judge fairly? But as it was, he was tricked and wrongly lost the vote, poor fellow, and had to die. And your pretty maid is so pretty that, when she found out that Actaeon had seen her, she was afraid the young fellow would tell everyone how hideous she was, and set her hounds on him. I won’t bother pointing out she could never have been a midwife, if she were a virgin herself.
18.2.3
Living with Zeus and sharing his throne has swollen your head, Hera, and so you don’t mind how you insult others. But it won’t be long before I see you in tears again—the next time he leaves you and goes down to earth as a bull or swan.
19.1.1
What’s this I hear you’re up to, Mistress Moon? They say that every time you get over Caria, you stop your team and gaze at Endymion sleeping out of doors in hunter’s fashion, and sometimes even leave your course and go down to him.
19.1.2
Ask your own son, Aphrodite; it’s his fault.
19.1.3
You needn’t tell me. He’s got a cheek right enough. See what he’s done to me, his own mother. First he brought me down to Ida after Anchises the Trojan, and then to Mount Libanus after that Assyrian lad ; and then he made Persephone fall in love with the boy and robbed me of half my sweetheart. So I’ve threatened him time and again, if he doesn’t stop it, I’ll smash his archery set and strip off his wings. Last time I even took my sandal to his behind. But somehow or other, though he’s scared for the moment and begs for mercy, it’s not long before he’s forgotten all about it.
19.2.1
But tell me, is Endymion good-looking? If so, your plight is sorry indeed.
19.2.2
I think he’s very good-looking, Aphrodite, especially when he sleeps with his cloak under him on the rock, with his javelins just slipping out of his left hand as he holds them, and his right hand bent upwards round his head and framing his face makes a charming picture, while he’s relaxed in sleep and breathing in the sweetest way imaginable. Then I creep down quietly on tip-toe, so as not to waken him and give him a fright, and then—but you can guess; there’s no need to tell you what happens next. You must remember I’m dying of love.
20.1.1
Eros, my boy, you must watch what you’re about. I don’t mean on earth, when you persuade men to work against themselves or each other, but in heaven too, when you make Zeus turn into shape after shape, changing him into whatever you choose for the time, and bring Lady Moon down from the sky, and sometimes keep the Sun-god lingering at Clymene’s side forgetful of his driving. You may go scot-free for the liberties you take with me, your mother but you’ve had the audacity even to turn the thoughts of Rhea to love of boys and have her pining for that Phrygian lad —at her time of life, too, and she the mother of so many gods! Now you’ve driven her mad, and she’s taken her team of lions and her Corybants, who are just as mad as herself, and is wandering up and down Ida; she keeps shrieking for Attis, while the Corybants slash their arms with swords, or let down their hair and rush madly over the mountains, or blow on the horn, thunder on the drums, or bang cymbals; it’s just chaotic frenzy all over Ida. So I fear everything; yes, your mother’s afraid of such goings on, for you’re just one big nuisance, and I’m scared that one day Rhea, in a fit of madness, or, more likely, when still in her right mind, will tell her Corybants to catch you and tear you to pieces or throw you to her lions. That’s what I fear, when I see you running such risks.
20.2.1
Don’t worry, mother; I’m quite used to the lions already; I often get up on their backs, grab hold of their manes and have a ride on them, and they make a fuss of me, letting me put my hand in their mouths, and licking it all over, and then let me take it out again. But what time will Rhea have to devote to me? She’s thinking of Attis the whole time. Anyway, what harm do I do by showing what beauty is like? It’s up to you to keep your hands off things of beauty; so you shouldn’t blame me for this. Or would you rather stop loving Ares and have him stop loving you?
20.2.2
How smart you are. Got us all under your thumb, haven’t you? But you’ll remember what I’ve been saying one day.
21.1.1
What’s the joke, Hermes?
21.1.2
It’s the funniest thing I ever saw, Apollo.
21.1.3
Well tell me, so that I too can hear and share the joke.
21.1.4
Aphrodite has been surprised with Ares, and Hephaestus has caught them and tied them up.
21.1.5
How? It sounds as if you have a good story to tell.
21.1.6
He’d known about all this for a long time, and had been out to catch them. He put invisible cords round the bed, and went off to work at his furnace. Then Ares crept in, unnoticed, as he thought, but the Sun-god saw him and told Hephaestus. And when they’d got on the bed, and were in the act, and in his trap, the cords folded themselves round about them, and Hephaestus put in an appearance. Aphrodite, being in the nude, was most embarrassed that she couldn’t hide her nakedness, while Ares tried at first to escape, hoping to break the cords, but later on, realising he was prisoner and couldn’t escape, kept begging for mercy.
21.2.1
And what’s happened? Has Hephaestus let him go?
21.2.2
Not yet, but he’s got all the gods together, and is showing them the guilty pair. They’re lying there bound together naked, hiding their faces and blushing, and I must say I found it a most delightful spectacle. Why, they’re almost in the act.
21.2.3
Isn’t that blacksmith ashamed himself to put on show this insult to his marriage?
21.2.4
Not a bit of it. He’s standing over them, chortling. But I personally, if truth must be told, envied Ares for having made a conquest of the fairest of the goddesses, and even for being a fellow-prisoner with her.
21.2.5
Do you mean you wouldn’t have minded being tied up in such circumstances?
21.2.6
Would you, my dear fellow? Just come and have a look. If you don’t make the same wish when you’ve seen them, you’ll earn my praise.
22.1.1
I’d be ashamed of such a son, if he were mine, Zeus. He’s so effeminate, and such a degenerate sot, putting ribbons in his hair, spending most of his time with mad women, himself a bigger softie than any of them, and dancing to drums, pipes and cymbals. Indeed he’s like anyone but you his father, Zeus.
22.1.2
Yet, Hera, this wearer of females’ ribbons, this “bigger softie than the women”, has subdued Lydia and the inhabitants of Tmolus, and forced the Thracians into subjection; he’s been on an expedition against Indians with this army of women, capturing their elephants and seizing their country, and when their king dared to stand up to him for a little, he took him prisoner and carried him off; and while he was doing all this, he was dancing and cavorting the whole time, and used nothing but wands of ivy, drunk and possessed though you say he was. And if any one dares to scoff at his rites and insult him, punishes him by tying him up with vine-twigs *, or makes the mans mother tear him to pieces as though he were a fawn. Can’t you see in this manly courage, worthy of his father? If these activities are accompanied by fun and soft living, why grudge him these things, especially if you imagine what he would be like if sober, when he can do this when tipsy?
22.2.1
It sounds as if you’ll be all for his invention, too—I mean the vine and its juice—though you see how drunks behave, staggering about and turning to violence, quite maddened by their drink. Take Icarius , the first one to whom he gave the vine—he was killed by his boon companions with mattocks.
22.2.2
That doesn’t get you anywhere. You can’t blame wine or Dionysus for such things, but drinking to excess, and swilling down neat wine beyond what’s decent. But the man who drinks in moderation will become more cheerful and better company, and never treat any of his cronies as Icarius was treated. I see what’s wrong with you, Hera; you’re still jealous and haven’t forgotten Semele, judging by the way you find fault with all that’s best in Dionysus.
23.1.1
Why is it, Eros, that though you’ve triumphed over all the other gods, Zeus, Poseidon, Apollo, Rhea and myself, your mother, you make an exception of Athena and keep clear of her, and for her your torch has no fire, your quiver no arrows, and you no bow or sense of aim?
23.1.2
I’m afraid of her, mother. She scares me with her flashing eyes, and she’s terribly like a man. Why, when I string my bow and go after her, I get terrified at the first shake of her crest, and start trembling and dropping my arrows from my hands.
23.1.3
Well, didn’t you find Ares more frightening? Yet you disarmed him and conquered him.
23.1.4
No. He’s glad to welcome and encourage me, but Athena always glowers at me. Once I just flew past with my torch near her, and says she, “If you come near me, as sure as I’m Zeus’ daughter, I’ll run my spear through you, or catch you by the foot and throw you into Tartarus, or I’ll tear you to bits with my own hands and then”—she hurled many threats like that at me. Besides she stares at me so grimly and, oh, she’s got on her breast that terrible face with the snaky hair—that’s what scares me most of all. It gives me the creeps and makes me run the moment I see it.
23.2.1
Do you mean to tell me you’re afraid of Athena and her Gorgon, though you don’t fear the thunderbolt of Zeus? But why do you leave the Muses unwounded? Why are they safe from your arrows? Do they too have tossing plumes and Gorgons on display?
23.2.2
I have respect for them, mother; they’re so solemn, always with something to think about or busy with their music; I often stand beside them, bewitched by their melodies.
23.2.3
Never mind them, then, seeing that they’re so solemn; but why don’t you wound Artemis?
23.2.4
It’s quite impossible to catch her; she’s always running away over the mountains. Besides, she’s now got a love of her own.
23.2.5
And its object, my child?
23.2.6
Hunting deer and fawn, chasing them and catching them, or shooting them down; that’s all she cares about. But that brother of hers, though he’s an archer too and a long shot—
23.2.7
I know, my boy, you’ve hit him often enough with your arrows.
24.1.1
See what you’ve done, you confounded Titan! You’ve destroyed everything on the earth by trusting a foolish boy with your car. Some places he’s scorched by driving close to the earth, and elsewhere he’s frozen everything to death by taking the heat right away, bringing chaos and confusion on the whole wide world. Why, if I hadn’t realised what was afoot, and brought him down with my thunderbolt, there’d have been nothing left of mankind. A pretty poor driver of the chariot you sent us out—for all his good looks!
24.1.2
It’s all my fault, Zeus, but don’t be angry with me for giving in to my boy. He kept nagging at me to let him. How could I have expected such trouble to follow?
24.1.3
Didn’t you know what a delicate operation it was, how getting the least bit off course spoils everything? Didn’t you know how the horses are full of mettle and need a tight rein? Let it go slack, and they take the bit in their teeth right away, as of course they did with him, running away with him, now to the left, and after a moment to the right, and sometimes right back on their tracks, and up and down, doing just what they liked, and he didn’t know how to deal with them.
24.2.1
I knew all that. That’s why I held out for a long time and wouldn’t trust him to drive. But when he started weeping and begging and imploring, and his mother Clymene joined in, I planted him in the car and told him how to stand, how long he was to climb giving the horses their head, how long to descend again, and how to be in control of the reins and keep his mettlesome team in check. Yes, and I warned him how dangerous it was not to drive straight, but the poor boy, mounted on so great a fire and looking down on yawning space, lost his nerve, and can you wonder? Then the horses, sensing it wasn’t me in the chariot, didn’t care two hoots for the lad and left their course with these terrible results. He dropped the reins—I suppose he was afraid of falling out, and clung to the rail. But he’s already had his punishment, Zeus, and my grief is punishment enough for me.
24.3.1
Punishment enough, you say, for such effrontery? All right, I forgive you this time, but if ever again you commit such an offence, or send out another like him in your place, you’ll soon find out my thunderbolt’s a lot hotter than your fire. The boy, then, can be buried by his sisters beside the Eridanus, where he fell after the spill. They can weep tears of amber over him and become poplars in their sorrow, and you’d better patch up your car—the pole’s broken and one of the wheels is in smithereens—bring up your horses and get on with your round. And I hope you won’t forget all this in a hurry.
25.1.1
Can you tell me, Hermes, which of these two is Castor and which is Pollux? I can’t tell them apart.
25.1.2
The one with us yesterday was Castor, this one is Pollux.
25.1.3
How can you tell? They look identical.
25.1.4
This one, Apollo, has on his face the marks of the injuries he’s got from his opponents when boxing, and especially from Bebryx, the son of Amycus, when he sailed on that expedition with Jason. The other has no marks like that; his face is free from blemish.
25.1.5
Thanks for telling me the difference, for all the rest’s the same, the half egg-shell on the head, and the star above it, the javelin in the hand, and a white horse each; so I’ve often called Pollux Castor and Castor Pollux. And there’s something else you can tell me. Why don’t we see them together? Why do they take turns of being dead and being a god?
25.2.1
That’s because of their brotherly love. When one of the sons of Leda had to die, and one to be immortal, they shared out the immortality in this way themselves.
25.2.2
Not a very clever way of sharing it, was it, Hermes? This way they won’t even see each other, and that’s what they wanted most of all, I take it. How can they, when one’s with the gods and one with the dead? Another thing; I play the prophet, Asclepius goes in for doctoring, you teach wrestling and are an excellent trainer, Artemis is a mid-wife, and everyone else among us has some special craft, which helps gods or men. But what will we get them to do? We can’t have big strapping fellows like them sitting in idleness all day stuffing themselves.
25.2.3
You needn’t worry. They’ve been put on to serving Poseidon; they must ride over the sea, and anywhere they see sailors in a storm, they must perch on the vessel and keep the crew safe.
25.2.4
A useful vocation that, Hermes, and one of salvation.

Perseus Greek. CTS URN tlg0062.tlg068.perseus-eng3. Via the Perseus Digital Library / Open Greek and Latin TEI corpora. Licence: Available under a Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 International License. Source.