Commentary on the Dream of Scipio and the Saturnalia

ON THE DREAM OF SCIPIO

...and the explanation of itself. Just as Nature has withdrawn the understanding of itself from the common senses of men through a varied covering and veil of reality, so she has willed that her secrets be handled by the wise through fabulous narratives.
*by little cords The main text uses "cuniculis" (tunnels), while the margin suggests "funiculis" (cords/lines).

In this way, the mysteries themselves are covered by the tunnels of figures original: "cuniculis"; referring to hidden, underground passages of allegory, lest Nature show herself naked even to those who have set aside such things. Instead, while the leading men—who are conscious of the true secret through the interpretation of wisdom—may possess the truth, the rest should be content with a veneration for the figures that defend the secret from becoming cheap or debased.
This Numenius was a disciple of Pyrrho of Elis.

Finally, dreams revealed a grievance of the gods to Numenius A 2nd-century philosopher who sought to link Plato with Eastern wisdom., who was more curious about hidden matters than other philosophers, because he had publicized the Eleusinian sacred rites The secret religious initiation ceremonies of ancient Greece. by interpreting them. He dreamt that he saw the Eleusinian goddesses themselves standing in the dress of harlots before an open brothel; and when, in his amazement, he asked the cause of this shame so unbefitting of divinities, they responded angrily that he had forcibly dragged them from the very sanctuary of their modesty and prostituted them to every passerby.
*they wished

Indeed, the gods have always preferred to be known and worshipped in the way that antiquity itself fashioned in myth;
original: "maluerunt"; the margin suggests "uoluerunt" (they wished).
it assigned images and statues to those quite foreign to such forms, and assigned ages to those who know neither growth nor decay, and various garments and ornaments to those who have no bodies. Following this, Pythagoras himself and Empedocles, as well as Parmenides and Heraclitus, spoke of the gods through myths; and Timaeus did the same, when he followed their lineage as it had been handed down.

CHAPTER III.

Having tasted these things beforehand, and before we treat the words of the dream itself, we must first determine how many modes of dreaming scientific observation has identified, so that we may bring the license of the figures—which are thrust upon those at rest in every direction—under the definition and rule of ancient authority.