But the pains which you take with your etymologies deserve our pity.

That Saturn is so called because _se saturat annis_, he is full of years; Mavors, Mars, because _magna vortit_, he brings about mighty changes; Minerva, because _minuit_, she diminishes, or because _minatur_, she threatens; Venus, because _venit ad omnia_, she comes to all; Ceres, _a gerendo_, from bearing.

How dangerous is this method! for there are many names would puzzle you.

From what would you derive Vejupiter and Vulcan?
Though, indeed, if you can derive Neptune _a nando_, from swimming, in which you seem to me to flounder about yourself more than Neptune, you may easily find the origin of all names, since it is founded only upon the conformity of some one letter.

Zeno first, and after him Cleanthes and Chrysippus, are put to the unnecessary trouble of explaining mere fables, and giving reasons for the several appellations of every Deity; which is really owning that those whom we call Gods are not the representations of deities, but natural things, and that to judge otherwise is an error.
XXV.