good offices for them, they did likewise canonise and adore for gods, and it was usually done, usitatum apud antiquos, as [6507]Jac.  Boissardus well observes, deificare homines qui beneficiis mortales juvarent, and the devil was still ready to second their intents, statim se ingessit illorum sepulchris, statuis, templis, aris, &c. he crept into their temples, statues, tombs, altars, and was ready to give oracles, cure diseases, do miracles, &c. as by Jupiter, Aesculapius, Tiresias, Apollo, Mopsus, Amphiaraus, &c. dii et Semi-dii. For so they were Semi-dii, demigods, some medii inter Deos et homines, as Max. [6508]Tyrius, the Platonist, ser. 26. et 27, maintains and justifies in many words.  “When a good man dies, his body is buried, but his soul, ex homine daemon evadit, becomes forthwith a demigod, nothing disparaged with malignity of air, or variety of forms, rejoiceth, exults and sees that perfect beauty with his eyes.  Now being deified, in commiseration he helps his poor friends here on earth, his kindred and allies, informs, succours, &c. punisheth those that are bad and do amiss, as a good genius to protect and govern mortal men appointed by the gods, so they will have it, ordaining some for provinces, some for private men, some for one office, some for another.  Hector and Achilles assist soldiers to this day; Aesculapius all sick men, the Dioscuri seafaring men, &c. and sometimes upon occasion they show themselves.  The Dioscuri, Hercules and Aesculapius, he saw himself (or the devil in his likeness) non somnians sed vigilans ipse vidi:”  So far Tyrius.  And not good men only do they thus adore, but tyrants, monsters, devils, (as [6509] Stuckius inveighs) Neros, Domitians, Heliogables, beastly women, and arrant whores amongst the rest.  “For all intents, places, creatures, they assign gods;”

“Et domibus, tectis, thermis, et equis soleatis
Assignare solent genios”------

saith Prudentius.  Cuna for cradles, Diverra for sweeping houses, Nodina knots, Prema, Pramunda, Hymen, Hymeneus, for weddings; Comus the god of good fellows, gods of silence, of comfort, Hebe goddess of youth, Mena menstruarum, &c. male and female gods, of all ages, sexes and dimensions, with beards, without beards, married, unmarried, begot, not born at all, but, as Minerva, start out of Jupiter’s head.  Hesiod reckons up at least 30,000 gods, Varro 300 Jupiters.  As Jeremy told them, their gods were to the multitude of cities;

       “Quicquid humus, pelagus, coelum miserabile gignit
        Id dixere deos, colles, freta, flumina, flammas.”

       “Whatever heavens, sea, and land begat,
        Hills, seas, and rivers, God was this and that.”