Book 17
7.8
And, the greater part of the temples and private houses might have been saved, and of the population as well, had not a sudden onrush of flames, sweeping over them for five days and nights, burned up whatever could be consumed.
7.9
I think the time has come to say a few words about the theories which the men of old have brought together about earthquakes; for the hidden depths of the truth itself have neither been sounded by this general ignorance of ours, nor even by the everlasting controversies of the natural philosophers, which are not yet ended after long study.
7.10
Hence in the books of ritualSee Cic., De Div. i. 33, 72; Festus, p. 285 M. and in those which are in conformity with the pontifical priesthood,The pontificales libri of Seneca, Epist. 108, 31. nothing is said about the god that causes earthquakes, and this with due caution, for fear that by naming one deity instead of another,The Roman ritual required that in addressing a god, the identity of the god must be made sure and he must be called by his proper name; cf. for example, Horace, Sat. ii. 6, 20, Matutine pater, seu lane libentius audis, and the altar at the foot of the Palatine, sei deo sei deivae sacrum. since it is not clear which of them thus shakes the earth, impieties may be perpetrated.
