The Statue of Hermes

All have been classed as burlesques[1] that show disrespect to the god involved and some scepticism concerning the efficacy of religious statues as objects of worship.

It is directed against self-conceit in general and concerns a visit to a statue maker made in human disguise by the god Hermes.

[7] In 1820, Jefferys Taylor wrote a sprightly version for children in which the sculptor assures Mercury that his statue merely serves as a make-weight when a set of the gods is bought.

[8] Illustrations of the tale, starting from the miniature in the Greek Medici Manuscript of about 1470, invariably feature the god pointing out his statue to the sculptor.

[9] An English copper engraving by David Jones for the specially commissioned Seven Fables of Aesop (1928) shows an up-to-date sculptor at work on the statue.

A dog of a pious turn of mind salutes the god's four-sided herma, a statue of the kind used to mark boundaries and stages along a road.

The story is numbered 307 in the Perry Index[14] and there are poetical versions in the Greek of Babrius[15] and the Latin of Avianus, although the latter account is told of Bacchus.

Deciding to sleep on the matter, he is visited by Hermes in a dream and is told that he has in his hands the decision to make him either a dead man or a divinity.

[17] The fable numbered 99 in the Perry Index[18] was not translated into English until it appeared in the substantial collection of Roger L'Estrange under the title "An image expos'd to sale".

[21] The story is numbered 285 in the Perry Index[22] and was versified in Greek by Babrius, drawing the moral that evil men will only comply when insulted.