Thomas Gainsborough Cottage Girl with Dog and Pitcher

Thomas Gainsborough Cottage Girl with Dog and PitcherAlexandre Cabanel The Birth of VenusSandro Botticelli The Story of Nastagio degli Onesti
Brutha cowered.
"You stoned our envoy!" shouted Vorbis. "An unarmed man!"
"He brought it upon himself," said the Tyrant. "Aristocrates was there. He will tell you."
The tall man nodded and stood up.
"By tradition anyone may speak in the marketplace," he began.
"And be stonedhave finished, the exquisitors speak . . .
"No. By an amphora. Tuvelpit was in the crowd, you see."
"And striking honest men is considered proper godly behavior, is it?"
"Your missionary had said that people who did not believe in Om would suffer endless punishment. I have to tell you that the crowd considered this rude."
"And so they threw stones at him . . ."?" Vorbis demanded.Aristocrates held up a hand."Ah," he said, "anyone can say what they like in the square. We have another tradition, though, called free listening. Unfortunately, when people dislike what they hear, they can become a little . . . testy.""I was there too," said another advisor. "Your priest got up to speak and at first everything was fine, because people were laughing. And then he said that Om was the only real God, and everyone went quiet. And then he pushed over a statue of Tuvelpit, the God of Wine. That's when the trouble started.""Are you proposing to tell me he was struck by lightning?" said Vorbis.Vorbis was no longer shouting. His voice was level, without passion. The thought rose in Brutha's mind: this is how the exquisitors speak. When the inquisitors