Holy patron of our washings, Goddess sought with many a vow,
By no golden robe encumbered, hear thy servants drawing now
Water, fragrant and delightful, from ambrosial depths below.
So Eudoxus was wrong in believing those who have made out that this was called ‘Water of Styx’. But they installed the Muses as assessors in prophecy and guardians of the place, by the fountain and the temple of Earth where the oracle used to be, because the responses were given in metre and in lyric strains. And some say further that the heroic metre was heard for the |E| first time here:
Bring in your feathers, ye birds, ye bees, bring wax at his bidding.
The God was in need, and dignity was waived![[103]]
XVIII. ‘More reasonable, that, Boethus,’ said Serapion, ‘and more in tune with the Muses. For we ought not to fight against the God, nor to remove, along with his prophecy, his Providence and Godhead also, but rather to seek fresh solutions for apparent contradictions, and never to surrender the reverent belief of our fathers.’ ‘Excellent Serapion!’ I said, ‘you are right. We were not abandoning Philosophy, as cleared out of the way and done for, because once upon a time philosophers |F| put out their dogmas and theories in verse, as Orpheus, Hesiod, Parmenides, Empedocles, Thales, whereas later on they gave it up, and have now all given it up—except you! In your hands Poetry is returning home to Philosophy, and clear and noble is the strain in which she rallies our young people. Astronomy again: she was not lowered in the hands of Aristarchus, Timocharis, Aristyllus, Hipparchus, all writing in prose, whereas Eudoxus, |403| Hesiod, and Thales used metre, if we assume that Thales really wrote the Astronomy attributed to him. Pindar actually expresses surprise at the neglect, in his own day, of a mode of melody....[[104]] There is nothing out of the way or absurd in seeking out the causes of such changes; but to remove arts and faculties altogether, whenever there is disturbance or variation in their details, is not fair.’
XIX. ‘And yet’, interposed Theon, ‘those instances have involved really great variations and novelties, whereas of the |B| oracles given here we know of many in prose even in old days, and those on no trifling matters. When the Lacedaemonians, as Thucydides[[105]] has told us in his history, consulted the God about their war with the Athenians, he promised them victory and mastery, and that “he himself will help them, invited or uninvited.” And again, that, if they did not restore Pleistoanax[[106]], they shall plough with a silver share.[[107]] When the Athenians consulted him about their expedition in Sicily, he directed them to bring the priestess of Erythrae to Athens; now the woman’s name was Peace. When Deinomenes the Siceliot inquired about his sons, the answer was that all three should |C| reign as tyrants. “And the worse for them, O Master Apollo”, rejoined Deinomenes. “That too”, added the God, “to form part of the answer.” You know that Gelo had the dropsy and Hiero the stone, while they reigned; Thrasybulus, the third, was involved in revolutions and wars and soon lost his throne. Then Procles, tyrant of Epidaurus, after putting many others to death in cruel and unlawful ways, at last killed Timarchus, who had come to him from Athens with money, after receiving him with hospitality and kindness; he thrust his body into a crate and flung it out to sea. This he did by the hands of Cleander of Aegina, no one else knew. Afterwards, when |D| himself in trouble, he sent his brother Cleotimus, to consult the oracle secretly about his own exile and retirement. The God answered that he granted exile to Procles, and retirement either to the place where he had ordered his Aeginetan friend to lodge the crate, or where the stag sheds his horn. The tyrant understood the God to bid him fling himself into the sea, or bury himself underground (for the stag buries his horn deep out of sight, when it falls off). He waited a short time, then, when his affairs became desperate, went into exile. But the friends of Timarchus caught and slew him, and cast out the corpse into the sea. |E| Now comes the strongest instance: the statutes by which Lycurgus regulated the Lacedaemonian constitution were given to him in prose. So Alyrius, Herodotus, Philochorus, and Ister, the men who most zealously set about collecting metrical prophecies, have written down oracular responses which were not in metre, and Theopompus, who was exceptionally interested |F| about the oracle, has administered a vigorous rebuke to those who do not hold that the Pythia prophesied in metre in those days; yet, when he wanted to prove the point, he has found an exceedingly small number of such answers, which shows that the others, even at that early time, were put forth in prose.
XX. ‘Some oracles, however, still run into metres, one of which has made “necessary business”[[108]] a household word. There is in Phocis a temple of “Hercules Woman-Hater”, where the practice is for the consecrated priest not to associate with a woman during his year. So they appoint comparatively old men to the priesthood. However, not very long ago, a young man of good character, but ambitious, who was in love with |404| a girl, accepted the office. At first he put constraint on himself and avoided her; but one day, when he was resting after wine and dancing, she burst in, and he yielded. Then, in his fear and confusion, he fled to the oracle, and proceeded to ask the God about his offence, and whether it admitted of excuse or expiation. He received this reply:
All needful business doth the God allow.