my opponent, it is right to honour the gods of heaven with
those things by which we are ourselves nourished and sus-
tained, and live ; which also they have, in their divine benevo-
lence, deigned to give to us for food. But the same gods
have given to you both cumin, cress, turnips, onions, parsley,
esculent thistles, radishes, gourds, rue, mint, basil, flea-bane,


1 Lit., ** you show yourselves,” prestatis.
? Lit., “most.” So Tibullus (leg. ii. 1, 18): “Pure things please
the gods. Come (i.e. to the sacrifice) with clean garments, and with
clean hands take water from the fountain,"— perfect cleanliness being
scrupulously insisted on.
? This Heraldus explains as **of worse omen," and Oehler as ** more
unclean.”

..* [ngenuz, i.e. such as any respectable person has.
. * To this the commentators have replied, that mules, asses, and dogs
were sacrificed to certain deities. We must either admit that Arnobius
has here fallen into error, or suppose that he refers merely to the animals
which were usually slain, or find a reason for his neglecting it in the
circumstances of each sacrifice.
924. THE SEVEN BOOKS OF [Boox vir.
