Who, then, is Janus, with whom Varro commences? He is the world.Certainly a very brief and unambiguous reply.Why, then, do they say that the beginnings of things pertain to him, but the ends to another whom they call Terminus? For they say that two months have been dedicated to these two gods, with reference to beginnings and ends--January to Janus, and February to Terminus-over and above those ten months which commence with March and end with December.And they say that that is the reason why the Terminalia are celebrated in the month of February, the same month in which the sacred purification is made which they call Februum, and from which the month derives its name.[1]
Do the beginnings of things, therefore, pertain to the world, which is Janus, and not also the ends, since another god has been placed over them? Do they not own that all things which they say begin in this world also come to an end in this world?
What folly it is, to give him only half power in work, when in his image they give him two faces! Would it not be a far more elegant way of interpreting the two-faced image, to say that Janus and Terminus are the same, and that the one face has reference to beginnings, the other to ends? For one who works ought to have respect to both.For he who in every forthputting of activity does not look back on the beginning, does not look forward to the end.Wherefore it is necessary that prospective intention be connected with retrospective memory.For how shall one find how to finish anything, if he has forgotten what it was which he had begun? But if they thought that the blessed life is begun in this world, and perfected beyond the world, and for that reason attributed to Janus, that is, to the world, only the power of beginnings, they should certainly have preferred Terminus to him, and should not have shut him out from the number of the select gods.Yet even now, when the beginnings and ends of temporal things are represented by these two gods, more honor ought to have been given to Terminus.For the greater joy is that which is felt when anything is finished; but things begun are always cause of much anxiety until they are brought to an end, which end he who begins anything very greatly longs for, fixes his mind on, expects, desires; nor does any one ever rejoice over anything he has begun, unless it be brought to an end.
CHAP.8.--FOR WHAT REASON THE WORSHIPPERS OF JANUS HAVE MADE HIS IMAGEWITH TWO
FACES, WHEN THEY WOULD SOMETIMES HAVE IT BE SEEN WITH FOUR.
But now let the interpretation of the two-faced image be produced.For they say that it has two faces, one before and one behind, because our gaping mouths seem to resemble the world: whence the Greeks call the palate ou?rno?s, and some Latin poets,[2] he says, have called the heavens palatum [the palate]; and from the gaping mouth, they say, there is a way out in the direction of the teeth, and a way in in the direction of the gullet.See what the world has been brought to on account of a Greek or a poetical word for our palate! Let this god be worshipped only on account of saliva, which has two open doorways under the heavens of the palate,--one through which part of it may be spitten out, the other through which part of it may be swallowed down.Besides, what is more absurd than not to find in the world itself two doorways opposite to each other, through which it may either receive anything into itself, or cast it out from itself; and to seek of our throat and gullet, to which the world has no resemblance, to make up an image of the world in Janus, because the world is said to resemble the palate, to which Janus bears no likeness?
But when they make him four-faced, and call him double Janus, they interpret this as having reference to the four quarters of the world, as though the world looked out on anything, like Janus through his four faces.Again, if Janus is the world, and the world consists of four quarters, then the image of the two-faced Janus is false.Or if it is true, because the whole world is sometimes understood by the expression east and west, will any one call the world double when north and south also are mentioned, as they call Janus double when he has four faces? They have no way at all of interpreting, in relation to the world, four doorways by which to go in and to come out as they did in the case of the two-faced Janus, where they found, at any rate in the human mouth, something which answered to what they said about him; unless perhaps Neptune come to their aid, and hand them a fish, which, besides the mouth and gullet, has also the openings of the gills, one on each side.Nevertheless, with all the doors, no soul escapes this vanity but that one which hears the truth saying, "I am the door."[3]
CHAP.9.--CONCERNING THE POWER OF JUPITER, AND A COMPARISON OF JUPITERWITH JANUS.
But they also show whom they would have Jove (who is also called Jupiter)understood to be.He is the god, say they, who has the power of the causes by which anything comes to be in the world.
And how great a thing this is, that most noble verse of Virgil testifies:
"Happy is he who has learned the causes of things."[4]
But why is Janus preferred to him? Let that most acute and most learned man answer us this question."Because," says he, "Janus has dominion over first things, Jupiter over highest[1] things.
Therefore Jupiter is deservedly held to be the king of all things; for highest things are better than first things: for although first things precede in time, highest things excel by dignity."Now this would have been rightly said had the first parts of things which are done been distinguished from the highest parts; as, for instance, it is the beginning of a thing done to set out, the highest part to arrive.The commencing to learn is the first part of a thing begun, the acquirement of knowledge is the highest part.And so of all things: the beginnings are first, the ends highest.
