20. Julian adopts this gross conception by ascribing it to
his favourite Marcus Antoninus (Caesares p. 333). The Stoics
and Platonists hesitated between the analogy of bodies and
the purity of spirits; yet the gravest philosophers inclined
to the whimsical fancy of Aristophanes and Lucian, that an
unbelieving age might starve the immortal gods. See
Observations de Spanheim, p. 284, 444, etc.