[
364a]
employed by
both laymen and poets. All with one accord reiterate that soberness and
righteousness are fair and honorable, to be sure, but unpleasant and
laborious, while licentiousness and injustice are pleasant and easy to win
and are only in opinion and by convention disgraceful. They say that
injustice pays better than justice, for the most part, and they do not
scruple to felicitate bad men who are rich or have other kinds of power to
do them honor in public and private, and to dishonor
[
364b]
and disregard those who are in any way weak or poor,
even while admitting that they are better men than the others. But the
strangest of all these speeches are the things they say about the gods
1 and virtue, how so it is
that the gods themselves assign to many good men misfortunes and an evil
life but to their opposites a contrary lot; and begging priests
2
and soothsayers go to rich men's doors and make them believe that they by
means of sacrifices and incantations have accumulated a treasure of power
from the gods
3 that can
expiate and cure with pleasurable festivals
[
364c]
any misdeed of a man or his ancestors, and that if a man
wishes to harm an enemy, at slight cost he will be enabled to injure just
and unjust alike, since they are masters of spells and enchantments
4 that constrain the gods to serve their end. And for all
these sayings they cite the poets as witnesses, with regard to the ease and
plentifulness of vice, quoting:“
Evil-doing in plenty a man shall find for the
seeking;
”
[
364d]
“
Smooth is the way and it lies near at hand and is easy to
enter;
But on the pathway of virtue the gods put sweat from the first
step,
”
Hes. WD 287-289
and a certain long and uphill road. And others cite Homer as a witness
to the beguiling of gods by men, since he too said:“
The gods themselves are moved by prayers,
And men by sacrifice and soothing vows,
”
[
364e]
“
And incense and libation turn their wills
Praying, whenever they have sinned and made transgression.
”
Hom. Il. 9.497
And they produce a bushel
5
of books of Musaeus and Orpheus, the offspring of the
Moon and of the Muses, as they affirm, and
these books they use in their ritual, and make not only ordinary men but
states believe that there really are remissions of sins and purifications
for deeds of injustice, by means of sacrifice and pleasant sport
6 for the
living,
