O foolish Crœsus who hast made this choice,
To know when thou shalt hear thy dumb Son’s voice;
Better he still were mute, would nothing say,
When he first speaks, look for a dismal day.
This, if he contrived not the time and the means of his recovery, was no ordinary divination: yet how to make out the verity of the story some doubt may yet remain. For though the causes of deafness and dumbness were removed, yet since words are attained by hearing, and men speak not without instruction, how he should be able immediately to utter such apt and significant words, as Ἄνθρωπε, μὴ κτεῖνε Κροῖσον,[279] O Man slay not Crœsus, it cannot escape some doubt, since the Story also delivers, that he was deaf and dumb, that he then first began to speak, and spake all his life after.
Now, if Crœsus had consulted again for a clearer exposition of what was doubtfully delivered, whether the Oracle would have spake out the second time or afforded a clearer answer, some question might be made from the examples of his practice upon the like demands.
So when the Spartans had often fought with ill success against the Tegeates, they consulted the Oracle what God they should appease, to become victorious over them. The answer was, that they should remove the Bones of Orestes. Though the words were plain, yet the thing was obscure, and like finding out the Body of Moses. And therefore they once more demanded in what place they should find the same; unto whom he returned this answer,
When in the Tegean Plains a place thou find’st
Where blasts are made by two impetuous Winds,