39
Or must he who grapples with the enemy and fights not be free from accountability nor go unscathed should he play the coward? For he does not help so much by hitting or wounding an enemy as he does harm by fleeing or retreating. He, therefore, who has been discharged from service is freed from military regulations: but he who asks leave to perform the offices of a soldier renders himself again accountable to the regulations and to his general.
40
Why is it not allowed the priest of Jupiter (Flamen Dialis) to anoint himself in the open air? Cf. Aulus Gellius, x. 15.
40
Is it because it used not to be proper or decent for sons to strip in their father’s sight, nor a son-in-law in the presence of his father-in-law, nor in ancient days did they bathe together? Cf. Cicero, De Oratore, ii. 55 (224), with Wilkins’s note. Now Jupiter is our father, and whatever is in the open air is in some way thought to be particularly in his sight.
40
Or, just as it is against divine ordinance to strip oneself in a shrine or a temple, so also did they scrupulously avoid the open air and the space beneath the heavens, since it was full of gods and spirits? Wherefore also we perform many necessary acts under a roof, hidden and concealed by our houses from the view of Divine powers.
40
Or are some regulations prescribed for the priest alone, while others are prescribed for all by the law through the priest? Wherefore also, in my country, to wear a garland, to wear the hair long, not to have any iron on one’s person, and not to set foot within the boundaries of Phocis, are the special functions of an archon: but not to taste fruit before the autumnal equinox nor to prune a vine before the vernal equinox are prohibitions disclosed to practically all alike through the archon: for those are the proper seasons for each of these acts.
