9. Philostratus The Athenian, Life of Apollonius, 4.11-4.13, 4.16 (2nd cent. CE - missingth cent. CE)
| 4.11. Having purged the Ephesians of the plague, and having had enough of the people of Ionia, he started for Hellas. Having made his way then to Pergamum, and being pleased with the sanctuary of Asclepius, he gave hints to the supplicants of the god, what to do in order to obtain favorable dreams; and having healed many of them he came to the land of Ilium. And when his mind was glutted with all the traditions of their past, he went to visit the tombs of the Achaeans, and he delivered himself of many speeches over them, and he offered many sacrifices of a bloodless and pure kind; and then he bade his companions go on board ship, for he himself, he said, must spend a night on the mound of Achilles. Now his companions tried to deter him — for in fact the Dioscoridae and the Phaedimi, and a whole company of such already followed in the train of Apollonius — alleging that Achilles was still dreadful as a phantom; for such was the conviction about him of the inhabitants of Ilium. Nevertheless, said Apollonius, I know Achilles well and that he thoroughly delights in company; for he heartily welcomed Nestor when he came from Pylos, because he always had something useful to tell him; and he used to honor Phoenix with the title of foster-father and companion and so forth, because Phoenix entertained him with his talk; and he looked most mildly upon Priam also, although he was his bitterest enemy, so soon as he heard him talk; and when in the course of a quarrel he had an interview with Odysseus, he made himself so gracious that Odysseus thought him more handsome than terrible.For, I think that his shield and his plumes that wave so terribly, as they say, are a menace to the Trojans, because he can never forget what he suffered at their hands, when they played him false over the marriage. But I have nothing in common with Ilium, and I shall talk to him more pleasantly than his former companions; and if he slays me, as you say he will, why then I shall repose with Memnon and Cycnus, and perhaps Troy will bury me in a hollow sepulcher as they did Hector. Such were his words to his companions, half playful and half serious, as he went up alone to the barrow; but they went on board ship, for it was already evening. 4.12. But Apollonius came about dawn to them and said: Where is Antisthenes of Paros? And this person had joined their society seven days before in Ilium. And when Antisthenes answered that he was there, he said: Have you, O young man, any Trojan blood in your veins? Certainly I have, he said, for I am a Trojan by ancestry. And a descendant of Priam as well? asked Apollonius.Why yes, by Zeus, answered the other, and that is why I consider myself a good man and of good stock. That explains then, said the sage, why Achilles forbids me to associate with you; for after he bade me go as his deputy to the Thessalians in the matter of a complaint which he has against them, and I asked him whether there was anything else which I could do to please him, “yes', he said, “you must take care not to initiate the young man from Paros in your wisdom, for he is too much of a descendant of Priam, and the praise of Hector is never out of his mouth.' 4.13. Accordingly, Antisthenes went off though against his will; and when the day broke and the wind off shore increased in strength, and the ship was ready to put to sea, it was invaded in spite of its small dimensions by a number of other people who were anxious to share the voyage with Apollonius; for it was already autumn and the sea was not much to be trusted. They all then regarded Apollonius as one who was master of the tempest and of fire and of perils of all sorts, and so wished to go on board with him. But as the company was many times too great for the ship, spying a larger ship — for there were many in the neighborhood of the tomb of Ajax — he said: Let us go on board this, for it is a good thing to get home safely with as many as may be. He accordingly doubled the promontory of Troy, and then commanded the pilot to shape his course towards the country of the Aeolians, which lies over against Lesbos, and then to turn as close as he could to Methymna, and there to cast anchor. For there it was, he said, that Achilles declared Palamedes lay, where also they would find his image a cubit high, representing however a man older than was ever Palamedes. And at the moment of disembarking from the ship, he said: Let us show our respect, O ye Greeks, for so good a man to whom we owe all wisdom. For we shall anyhow prove ourselves better men than the Achaeans, if we pay tribute to the excellence of one whom they so unjustly slew. They then had hardly leapt of the ship, when he hit upon the tomb and found the statue buried beside it. And there were inscribed on the base of the statue the words: To the divine Palamedes. He accordingly set it up again in its place, as I myself saw; and he raised a shrine around it of the size which the worshippers of the goddess of the crossways, called Enodia, use; for it was large enough for ten persons at once to sit and drink and keep good cheer in; and having done so he offered up the following prayer: O Palamedes, do thou forget the wrath, wherewith thou wast wroth against the Achaeans, and grant that men may multiply in numbers and wisdom. Yea, O Palamedes, author of all eloquence, author the Muses, author of myself. 4.16. Therest of the company also besought him to tell them all about it, and as they were in a mood to listen to him, he said: Well, it was not by digging a ditch like Odysseus, nor by tempting souls with the blood of sheep, that I obtained a conversation with Achilles; but I offered up the prayer which the Indians say they use in approaching their heroes. “O Achilles,' I said, “most of mankind declare that you are dead, but I cannot agree with them, nor can Pythagoras, my spiritual ancestor. If then we hold the truth, show to us your own form; for you would profit not a little by showing yourself to my eyes, if you should be able to use them to attest your existence.” Thereupon a slight earthquake shook the neighborhood of the barrow, and a youth issued forth five cubits high, wearing a cloak ofThessalian fashion; but in appearance he was by no means the braggart figure which some imagine Achilles to have been. Though he was stern to look upon, he had never lost his bright look; and it seems to me that his beauty has never received its meed of praise, even though Homer dwelt at length upon it; for it was really beyond the power of words, and it is easier for the singer to ruin his fame in this respect than to praise him as he deserved. At first sight he was of the size which I have mentioned, but he grew bigger, till he was twice as large and even more than that; at any rate he appeared to me to be twelve cubits high just at that moment when he reached his complete stature, and his beauty grew apace with his length. He told me then that he had never at any time shorn off his hair, bit preserved it to inviolate for the river Spercheus, for this was the river of his first intimacy; but on his cheeks you saw the first down.And he addressed me and said: “I am pleased to have met you, since I have long wanted a man like yourself. For the Thessalians for a long time past have failed to present their offerings to my tomb, and I do not yet wish to show my wrath against them; for if I did so, they would perish more thoroughly than ever the Hellenes did on this spot; accordingly I resort to gentle advice, and would warn them not to violate ancient custom, nor to prove themselves worse men than the Trojans here, who though they were robbed of so many of their heroes by myself, yet sacrifice publicly to me, and also give me the tithes of their fruits of season, and olive branch in hand ask for a truce from my hostility. But this I will not grant, for the perjuries which they committed against me will not suffer Ilium ever to resume its pristine beauty, nor to regain the prosperity which yet has favored many a city that was destroyed of old; nay, if they rebuild it, things shall go as hard with them as if their city had been captured only yesterday. In order then to save me from bringing the Thessalian polity then to the same condition, you must go as my envoy to their council in behalf of the object I have mentioned.” “I will be your envoy,” I replied, “for the object of my embassy were to save them from ruin. But, O Achilles, I would ask something of you.” “I understand,” said he, “for it is plain you are going to ask about the Trojan war. So ask me five questions about whatever you like, and that the Fates approve of.” I accordingly asked him firstly, if he had obtained burial in accordance with the story of the poets. “I lie here,” he answered, “as was most delightful to myself and Patroclus; for you know we met in mere youth, and a single golden jar holds the remains of both of us, as if we were one. But as for the dirges of the Muses and Nereids, which they say are sung over me, the Muses, I may tell you, never once came here at all, though the Nereids still resort to the spot.” Next I asked him, if Polyxena was really slaughtered over his tomb; and he replied that this was true, but that she was not slain by the Achaeans, but that she came of her own free will to the sepulcher, and that so high was the value she set on her passion for him and she for her, that she threw herself upon an upright sword. The third questions was this: “Did Helen, O Achilles, really come to Troy or was it Homer that was pleased to make up the story?' “For a long time,” he replied, “we were deceived and tricked into sending envoys to the Trojans and fighting battles in her behalf, in the belief that she was in Ilium, whereas she really was living in Egypt and in the house of Proteus, whither she had been snatched away by Paris. But when we became convinced thereof, we continued to fight to win Troy itself, so as not to disgrace ourselves by retreat.” The fourth question which I ventured upon was this: “I wonder,” I said, “that Greece ever produced at any one time so many and such distinguished heroes as Homer says were gathered against Troy.' But Achilles answered: “Why even the barbarians did not fall far short of us, so abundantly then did excellence flourish all over the earth.” And my fifth question was this: “Why was it that Homer knew nothing about Palamedes, or if he knew him, then kept him out of your story?' “If Palamedes,' he answered, “never came to Troy, then Troy never existed either. But since this wisest and most warlike hero fell in obedience to Odysseus' whim, Homer does not introduce him into his poems, lest he should have to record the shame of Odysseus in his song.” And withal Achilles raised a wail over him as over one who was the greatest and most beautiful of men, the youngest and also the most warlike, one who in sobriety surpassed all others, and had often foregathered with the Muses. “But you,” he added, “O Apollonius, since sages have a tender regard for one another, you must care for his tomb and restore the image of Palamedes that has been so contemptuously cast aside; and it lies in Aeolis close to Methymna in Lesbos.' Wit these words and with the closing remarks concerning the youth from Paros, Achilles vanished with a flash of summer lightning, for indeed the cocks were already beginning their chant. |
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11. Origen, Against Celsus, 7.53 (3rd cent. CE - 3rd cent. CE)
| 7.53. After these remarks of Celsus, which we have done our best to refute, he goes on to address us thus: Seeing you are so eager for some novelty, how much better it would have been if you had chosen as the object of your zealous homage some one of those who died a glorious death, and whose divinity might have received the support of some myth to perpetuate his memory! Why, if you were not satisfied with Hercules or Æsculapius, and other heroes of antiquity, you had Orpheus, who was confessedly a divinely inspired man, who died a violent death. But perhaps some others have taken him up before you. You may then take Anaxarchus, who, when cast into a mortar, and beaten most barbarously, showed a noble contempt for his suffering, and said, 'Beat, beat the shell of Anaxarchus, for himself you do not beat,'- a speech surely of a spirit truly divine. But others were before you in following his interpretation of the laws of nature. Might you not, then, take Epictetus, who, when his master was twisting his leg, said, smiling and. unmoved, 'You will break my leg;' and when it was broken, he added, 'Did I not tell you that you would break it?' What saying equal to these did your god utter under suffering? If you had said even of the Sibyl, whose authority some of you acknowledge, that she was a child of God, you would have said something more reasonable. But you have had the presumption to include in her writings many impious things, and set up as a god one who ended a most infamous life by a most miserable death. How much more suitable than he would have been Jonah in the whale's belly, or Daniel delivered from the wild beasts, or any of a still more portentous kind! |
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