[p. 19] time he warned us to take care lest in any way those sycophants should worm their way into our confidence by sometimes seeming to stumble upon, and give utterance to, something true. “For they do not,” said he, “say anything that is tangible, definite or comprehensible, but depending upon slippery and roundabout conjecture, groping with cautious steps between truth and falsehood, as if walking in the dark, they go their way. And after making many attempts they either happen suddenly on the truth without knowing it, or led by the great credulity of those who consult them, they get hold by cunning of something true, and therefore obviously find it easier to come somewhere near the truth in past events than in those to come. Yet all the true things which they say through accident or cunning,” said he, “are not a thousandth part of the falsehoods which they utter.” But besides these remarks which I heard Favorinus make, I recall many testimonies of the ancient poets, by which delusive fallacies of this kind are refuted. Among these is the following saying of Pacuvius: 1
Could men divine the future, they'd match Jove.Also this from Accius, who writes: 2
I trust the augurs not, who with mere wordsFavorinus too, wishing to deter and turn away young men from such calculators of nativities and from certain others of that kind, who profess to reveal all the future by means of magic arts, concluded with arguments of this sort, to show that they ought by no means to be resorted to and consulted.
Enrich men's ears, to load themselves with gold.
