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1 " Men always makes gods in their own image. "
― Xenophanes
2 " The Ethiops say that their gods are flat-nosed and black,While the Thracians say that theirs have blue eyes and red hair.Yet if cattle or horses or lions had hands and could draw,And could sculpt like men, then the horses would draw their godsLike horses, and cattle like cattle; and each they would shapeBodies of gods in the likeness, each kind, of their own. "
3 " The gods did riot: enrich man with a knowledge of all thingsfrom the beginning of life.Yet man seeks, and in timeinvents what may be better. "
4 " The truth is that no man ever was or will bewho understands the gods and all I speak of.If you stumble on some rocks of the whole truthyou never know it. There is always speculation. "
5 " 1Man made his gods, and furnished themwith his own body, voice, and garments.2If a horse or lion or a slow ox had agile hands for paint and sculpture,the horse would make his god a horse,the ox would sculpt an ox.3Our gods have flat noses and black skinssay the Ethiopians. The Thracians sayour gods have red hair and hazel eyes. "
6 " Whom they call Iris is also a raincloud that we see as purple, scarlet and green. "
7 " Everything comes from the earth,and everything ends in the earth. "
8 " One day a dog was being thrashed in the street,and behold, Pythagoras, philosopher of spirits,was walking by.His heart was in his mouthfor the poor pup.'Stop! Stop!' he cried.'Don't beat him any more.This is my dear friend's soul.I recognize the voice when I hear him bark. "
9 " There is one God, supreme among gods and men,who is like mortals in neither body nor mind. "
10 " One god there is, in no way like mortal creatures either in bodily form or in the thought of his mind. The whole of him sees, the whole of him thinks, the whole of him hears. He stays always motionless in the same place; it is not fitting that he should move about now this way, now that. "
11 " The gods did not reveal, from the beginning,All things to us, but in the course of timeThrough seeking we may learn and know things better.But as for certain truth, no man has known it,Nor shall he know it,neither of the godsNor yet of all the things of which I speak.For even if by chance he were to utterThe final truth, he would himself not know it:For all is but a woven web of guesses "
12 " No man knows distinctly anything, and no man ever will. "
13 " If an ox could paint a picture, his god would look like an ox. "
14 " One must be a sage to recognize a sage. "
15 " For all things come from earth, and all things end by becoming earth. "
16 " But if horses or cattle or lions had hands, or were able to draw with their hands and do the works that men can do, horses would draw the forms of the gods like horses, and cattle like cattle, and they would make their bodies such as they had themselves. "
― Xenophanes , Fragments of Xenophanes
