30. But what shall we say of
Jove himself, whom the wise have repeatedly asserted to be the sun,
driving a winged chariot, followed by a crowd of deities;40094009 some, the ether,
blazing with mighty flames, and wasting fire which cannot be
extinguished? Now if this is clear and certain, there is, then,
according to you, no Jupiter at all; who, born of Saturn his father and
Ops his mother, is reported to have been concealed in the Cretan
territory, that he might escape his father’s rage. But now,
does not a similar mode of thought remove Juno from the list of
gods? For if she is the air, as you have been wont to jest and
say, repeating in reversed order the syllables of the Greek
name,40104010 there will be
found no sister and spouse of almighty Jupiter, no Fluonia,40114011 no Pomona, no
Ossipagina, no Februtis, Populonia, Cinxia, Caprotina; and thus the
invention of that name, spread abroad with a frequent but vain40124012 belief, will be
found to be wholly40134013 useless.