9. What then? you say; do
you declare that these gods exist nowhere in the world, and have been
created by unreal fancies? Not we alone, but truth itself, and
reason, say so, and that common-sense in which all men share. For
who there who believes that there are gods of gain, and that they
preside over the getting of it, seeing that it springs very often from
the basest employments, and is always at the expense of others?
Who believes that Libentina, who that Burnus,
4126
is set over
those
lusts which
wisdom bids us avoid, and which, in a thousand ways, vile and filthy
wretches
4127
attempt and
practise? Who that Limentinus and Lima have the care of
thresholds, and do the duties of their keepers, when every day we see
the thresholds
of temples
and private houses destroyed and
overthrown, and that the infamous approaches to stews are not without
them? Who believes that the Limi
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watch over obliquities? who that
Saturnus presides over the sown crops? who that Montinus is the
guardian of mountains; Murcia,
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of the slothful? Who, finally,
would believe that Money is a goddess, whom your writings declare, as
though
she were
the greatest deity, to give golden
rings,
4130
the front seats
at games and shows, honours in the greatest number, the dignity of the
magistracy, and that which the indolent love most of all,—an
undisturbed ease, by means of riches.
4126
So the
ms.,
both Roman edd., Hild., and
Oehler; the others reading
Liburnum
, except Elm., who
reads
-am
, while Meursius conjectured
Liberum
—“Bacchus.”
4127
Lit., “shameful impurity seeks after;”
expetit
read by Gelenius, Canterus, and Oberthür, for the
unintelligible
ms.
reading
expeditur
, retained in both Roman edd.; the others reading
experitur
—“tries.”
4128
The
ms.
reads
Lemons
; Hild.
and Oehler,
Limones
; the others,
Limos
, as above.
4129
The
ms.,
LB., Hild., and Oehler
read
Murcidam
; the others,
Murciam
, as above.
4130
i.e., equestrian rank.