[510] Of a surety, greater
perjurers
cannot
exist.
exist.
Aristophanes
!
!
_ just like the clouds.
SOCRATES. Well then, reflect what a noise is produced by your belly,
which is but small. Shall not the air, which is boundless, produce these
mighty claps of thunder?
STREPSIADES. But tell me this. Whence comes the lightning, the dazzling
flame, which at times consumes the man it strikes, at others hardly
singes him. Is it not plain, that 'tis Zeus hurling it at the perjurers?
SOCRATES. Out upon the fool! the driveller! he still savours of the
golden age! If Zeus strikes at the perjurers, why has he not blasted
Simon, Cleonymus and Theorus?
[510] Of a surety, greater perjurers cannot
exist. No, he strikes his own Temple, and Sunium, the promontory of
Athens,[511] and the towering oaks. Now, why should he do that? An oak is
no perjurer.
STREPSIADES. I cannot tell, but it seems to me well argued. What is the
thunder then?
SOCRATES. When a dry wind ascends to the Clouds and gets shut into them,
it blows them out like a bladder; finally, being too confined, it bursts
them, escapes with fierce violence and a roar to flash into flame by
reason of its own impetuosity.
STREPSIADES. Forsooth, 'tis just what happened to me one day. 'Twas at
the feast of Zeus! I was cooking a sow's belly for my family and I had
forgotten to slit it open. It swelled out and, suddenly bursting,
discharged itself right into my eyes and burnt my face.
CHORUS. Oh, mortal!
SOCRATES. Well then, reflect what a noise is produced by your belly,
which is but small. Shall not the air, which is boundless, produce these
mighty claps of thunder?
STREPSIADES. But tell me this. Whence comes the lightning, the dazzling
flame, which at times consumes the man it strikes, at others hardly
singes him. Is it not plain, that 'tis Zeus hurling it at the perjurers?
SOCRATES. Out upon the fool! the driveller! he still savours of the
golden age! If Zeus strikes at the perjurers, why has he not blasted
Simon, Cleonymus and Theorus?
[510] Of a surety, greater perjurers cannot
exist. No, he strikes his own Temple, and Sunium, the promontory of
Athens,[511] and the towering oaks. Now, why should he do that? An oak is
no perjurer.
STREPSIADES. I cannot tell, but it seems to me well argued. What is the
thunder then?
SOCRATES. When a dry wind ascends to the Clouds and gets shut into them,
it blows them out like a bladder; finally, being too confined, it bursts
them, escapes with fierce violence and a roar to flash into flame by
reason of its own impetuosity.
STREPSIADES. Forsooth, 'tis just what happened to me one day. 'Twas at
the feast of Zeus! I was cooking a sow's belly for my family and I had
forgotten to slit it open. It swelled out and, suddenly bursting,
discharged itself right into my eyes and burnt my face.
CHORUS. Oh, mortal!
