[107]
I indeed, O priests, have always understood that in undertaking religious
obligations the main thing is to interpret what the intention of the
immortal gods appears to be. Nor is piety towards the gods anything but an
honourable opinion of their divine power and intentions, while you suppose
that nothing is required by them which is unjust or dishonourable. That
disgrace to the city could not find one single man, not even when he had
everything in his power, to whom he could adjudge, or deliver, or make a
present of my house; though he himself was inflamed with a great desire for
that spot and for the house, and though, on that account alone, that
excellent man had brought in that exceedingly just bill of his to make
himself master of my property, yet even in the height of his madness he did
not dare to take possession of my house, with the desire of which he had
been so excited. Do you think that the immortal gods were willing to remove
into the house of that man to whose labour and prudence it was owing that
they still retained possession of their own temples, dismantled and ruined
as it was by the nefarious robbery of a most worthless man?
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