Page:The Deipnosophists (Volume 2).djvu/34

 33. I swear by Minerva that Menecrates the Syracusan himself would not have made such a boast as that, he who was nick-named Jupiter—a man who gave himself airs as being, by his skill in medicine, the only person who could cause man to live. Accordingly he compelled all who came to be cured by him of what is called the sacred disease, to enter into a written agreement that if they recovered they would be his slaves. And they followed him, one wearing the dress of Hercules, and being called Hercules, (and the man who was so called was Nicostratus, an Argive, who had been cured of the sacred disease, and he is mentioned by Ephippus, in his Peltast, where he says—

Did not Menecrates call himself a god, And Nicostratus of Argos a second Hercules?)

and another followed him in the dress of Mercury, having on a cloak and bearing a caduceus, and wings besides. As Nicagoras of Zelia did, who also became afterwards the tyrant of his country, as Baton relates in the history of the Tyrants at Ephesus. And Hegesander says that he called Astycreon, who had been cured by him, Apollo. And another of those who had been cured by him, went about with him to his cost, wearing the dress of Æsculapius. But Jupiter Menecrates himself, clad in purple, and having a golden crown upon his head, and holding a sceptre, and being shod with slippers, went about with his chorus of gods. And once, writing to Philip the king, he began his letter thus—

34. "Menecrates Jupiter to Philip greeting.

"You, indeed, are king of Macedonia, but I am king of medicine; and you are able, when you please, to put men to death, who are in health; but I am able to save those who are sick, and to cause those who are in good health, if they only follow my advice, to live to old age without being attacked by disease. Therefore the Macedonians attend you as body-guards; but all who wish to live attend me; for I, Jupiter, give them life."

And so Philip wrote back to him as to a man out of his senses,—"Philip wishes Menecrates soundness." And he wrote in similar style to Archidemus, also the king of the Lacedæmonians, and to every one else to whom he wrote at all; never omitting to give himself the name of Jupiter. And once Philip invited him and all his gods to supper, and