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Question 18. Why do many of the richer sort pay tithe
of their estates to Hercules?
Solution. Is this the reason, that Hercules sacrificed the
tenth part of Geryon's oxen at Rome? Or that he freed
the Romans from the decimation under the Etrurians? Or
that these things have no sufficient ground of credit from
history, but that they sacrificed bountifully to Hercules, as
to a certain monstrous glutton and gormandizer of good
cheer? Or did they rather do it, restraining extravagant
riches as a nuisance to the commonwealth, as it were to
diminish something of that thriving constitution that grows
up to the highest pitch of corpulency; being of opinion
that Hercules was most of all honored with and rejoiced in
these frugalities and contractions of abundance, and that he
himself was frugal, content with a little, and every way
sparing in his way of living?
Plutarch. Plutarch's Morals. Translated from the Greek by several hands. Corrected and revised by. William W. Goodwin, PH. D. Boston. Little, Brown, and Company. Cambridge. Press Of John Wilson and son. 1874. 2.
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