Laudator Temporis Acti

Diogenes Laertius 6.2.57 (on Diogenes the Cynic; tr. R.D. Hicks):

He went up to Anaximenes the rhetorician, who was fat, and said, "Let us beggars have something of your paunch; it will be a relief to you, and we shall get advantage."

Ἀναξιμένει τῷ ῥήτορι παχεῖ ὄντι προσελθών, "ἐπίδος καὶ ἡμῖν" ἔφη, "τοῖς πτωχοῖς τῆς γαστρός· καὶ γὰρ αὐτὸς κουφισθήσῃ καὶ ἡμᾶς ὠφελήσεις."

This is fragment 506 of Diogenes the Cynic in Gabriele Giannantoni, ed., Socraticorum Reliquiae, Vol. II (Naples: Bibliopolis, 1983), p. 594.

Livy 9.17.3 (tr. B.O. Foster):

It appears that in war the factors of chief importance are the numbers and valour of the soldiers, the abilities of the commanders, and Fortune, which, powerful in all the affairs of men, is especially so in war.

plurimum in bello pollere videntur militum copia et virtus, ingenia imperatorum, fortuna per omnia humana, maxime in res bellicas potens.

in res bellicas codd.: inter res bellicas vel in rebus bellicis Harant: in re bellica Mueller: re bellica Weissenborn

Tenney Frank (1876-1939), "Changing Conceptions of Literary and Philological Research," Journal of the History of Ideas 3.4 (October, 1942) 401-414 (at 413):

In our chosen fields we shall understand our authors better if we read what they read, see what they saw, believe for the moment what they believed, enjoy the art and music of their day, enter into their enthusiasms and hatreds, fight their battles with them, hobnob with their fellows, in a word, be their most intimate associates in all respects.

Terence, Phormio 597 (tr. John Sargeaunt):

For I'm the only thing in my house that I can call my own.

nam ego meorum solus sum meus.

Apollodorus of Carystus, fragment 25 Kassel and Austin, Poetae Comici Graeci, vol. II, p. 498 (tr. John Maxwell Edmonds):

For I'm the only thing I can call my own.

ἐγὼ γάρ εἰμι τῶν <ἐμῶν> ἐμός <μόνος>.

suppl. Guyet

E.M. Cioran (1911-1995), On the Heights of Despair, tr. Ilinca Zarifopol-Johnston (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1992), p. 6:

I don't understand why we must do things in this world, why we must have friends and aspirations, hopes and dreams. Wouldn't it better to retreat to a faraway corner of the world, where all its noise and complications would be heard no more? Then we could renounce culture and ambitions; we would lose everything and gain nothing; for what is there to be gained from this world?

J'ignore totalement pourquoi il faut faire quelque chose ici-bas, pourquoi il nous faut avoir des amis et des aspirations, des espoirs et des rêves. Ne serait-il pas mille fois préférable de se retirer à l'écart du monde, loin de tout ce qui fait son tumulte et ses complications? Nous renoncerions ainsi à la culture et aux ambitions, nous perdrions tout sans rien obtenir en échange. Mais que peut-on obtenir en ce monde?

Horace, Epistles 1.11.7-10 (tr. H. Rushton Fairclough):

You know what Lebedus is—a town more desolate than Gabii and
Fidenae: yet there would I love to live,
and forgetting my friends and by them forgotten,
gaze from the land on Neptune's distant rage.

scis Lebedus quid sit? Gabiis desertior atque
Fidenis vicus; tamen illic vivere vellem,
oblitus meorum, obliviscendus et illis,
Neptunum procul e terra spectare furentem.

Diogenes Laertius 6.2.54 (on Diogenes the Cynic; tr. R.D. Hicks):

To the question what wine he found pleasant to drink, he replied, "That for which other people pay."

ἐρωτηθεὶς ποῖον οἶνον ἡδέως πίνει, ἔφη, "τὸν ἀλλότριον."

This is fragment 193 of Diogenes the Cynic in Gabriele Giannantoni, ed., Socraticorum Reliquiae, Vol. II (Naples: Bibliopolis, 1983), p. 496.

Augustine, Sermons 306C.1 (tr. Edmund Hill, with his note):

What a splendid wall for wall posters⁴ this Quadratus had presided over!

4. Parietem signinarium. This odd word is not given in Lewis & Short's Latin Dictionary. I am guessing that here it indicates a wall—whitewashed, of course, because it was the White Mass—on which signs, advertisements, can be painted, and graffiti scrawled; it's a novel metaphor for a fervent community of martyrs: a billboard for Christ.

Latin text from Germain Morin, "La Massa candida et le martyr Quadratus d'après deux sermons inédits de S. Augustin," Atti della Pontificia Accademia romana di archeologia (Serie III). Rendiconti, Volume III (1925) 289-312 (at 296, with his note):

Quam magnum parietem signinarium (?)²⁰ regebat iste Quadratus!

²⁰ signinarium] Restitution conjecturale. Le manuscrit a sigmnarium, dont il n'y a rien à faire. Mais l'adjectif signinus est d'usage courant, par ex. «signinum opus» (PLIN. 55, 46, 5): «signini parietes» (PALLAD., 1, 17). On trouve aussi simplement «signinum, signina». La pensée m'est venue qu'Augustin avait pu former de là l'adjectif subsidiaire «signinarius»; le copiste aurait écrit un m au lieu de ni. Mons. Giov. Galbiati, Préfet de l'Ambrosienne, partage en cela ma manière de voir.

Signinarius isn't in Alexander Souter, A Glossary of Later Latin to 600 A.D. (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1949), either. Cf. Lewis & Short, p. 1696, s.v. Signia: Signinarius occurs as a proper name (or a profession?) in an African inscription — Corpus Inscriptionum Latinarum VIII 1 7462 (CAI IULI SIGNINARI).

John Vaillant, Fire Weather: On the Front Lines of a Burning World (New York: Alfred A. Knopf, 2023; rpt. New York: Vintage Books, 2024), p. 302, n. †:

Human flatulence alone generates about three quarters of a billion liters of methane per day, or 30 million cubic feet — enough to meet the daily cooking and heating needs of 140,000 northern city dwellers.

Hat tip: Jim K.

Labels: noctes scatologicae

Horace, Epistles 1.17.37 (tr. H. Rushton Fairclough):

He who feared he might not win sat still.

sedit qui timuit ne non succederet.

The same (tr. Colin Macleod):

A coward will always stick where he is.

Cf. Blaise Pascal, Pensées 139 Brunschvicg (tr. H.F. Stewart):

When I set myself, as I sometimes do, to consider human unrest in its various forms, and the perils and pains to which men expose themselves at court or in the camp (rich source of quarrels and passions, of bold and often unsuccessful ventures), I have often said that man's unhappiness arises from one thing only, namely that he cannot abide quietly in one room.

Quand je m'y suis mis quelquefois à considérer les diverses agitations des hommes et les périls et les peines où ils s'exposent dans la Cour, dans la guerre, d'où naissent tant de querelles, de passions, d'entreprises hardies et souvent mauvaises, etc., j'ai dit souvent que tout le malheur des hommes vient d'une seule chose, qui est de ne savoir pas demeurer en repos dans une chambre.

Jerome, Commentary on Matthew 23.27 (Corpus Christianorum, Series Latina, vol. 77, p. 217; tr. Thomas P. Scheck):

Just as tombs are smoothed over on the outside with chalk, adorned with marble, and distinguished with gold and colors, but inside they are full of dead men's bones, so also are bad teachers. They teach one thing and do something else. They may show purity in the quality of their clothing and in the humility of their words, but inwardly they are full of all filth, avarice, and lust.

quomodo sepulcra forinsecus lota sunt calce et ornata marmoribus et auro coloribusque distincta, intus autem plena sunt ossibus mortuorum, sic et perversi magistri, qui alia docent et alia faciunt, munditiam habitu vestis et verborum humilitate demonstrant: intus autem pleni sunt omni spurcitia et avaritia et libidine.

Saul Bellow (1915-2005), "Deep Readers of the World, Beware!" There Is Simply Too Much to Think About: Collected Nonfiction (New York: Viking, 2015), pp. 92-102 (at 92-93):

“Why, sir,” the student asks, “does Achilles drag the body of Hector around the walls of Troy?” “That sounds like a stimulating question. Most interesting. I’ll bite,” says the professor. “Well, you see, sir, the Iliad is full of circles—shields, chariot wheels and other round figures. And you know what Plato said about circles. The Greeks were all made for geometry.” “Bless your crew-cut head,” says the professor, “for such a beautiful thought. You have exquisite sensibility. Your approach is both deep and serious. Still, I always believed that Achilles did it because he was so angry.”

It would take an unusual professor to realize that Achilles was angry. To many teachers he would represent much but he would not be anything in particular. To be is too obvious. Our professor, however, is a “square” and the bright student is annoyed with him. Anger! What good is anger? Great literature is subtle, dignified, profound. Homer is as good as Plato anytime; and if Plato thought, Homer must surely have done so too, thought just as beautifully circle for circle.

Pindar, Pythian Odes 12.28-32 (tr. John Sandys):

But, if there be any bliss among mortal men, it doth not reveal itself without toil; yet a god may bring that bliss to an end, verily, even to-day. That which is fated cannot be fled; but a time shall come which, smiting with a stroke that is unforeseen, shall grant one boon beyond all hope, but shall withhold another.

εἰ δέ τις ὄλβος ἐν ἀνθρώποισιν, ἄνευ καμάτου
οὐ φαίνεται· ἐκ δὲ τελευτάσει νιν ἤτοι σάμερον
δαίμων—τὸ δὲ μόρσιμον οὐ παρφυκτόν,—ἀλλ᾽ ἔσται χρόνος        30
οὗτος, ὃ καί τιν᾽ ἀελπτίᾳ βαλὼν
ἔμπαλιν γνώμας τὸ μὲν δώσει, τὸ δ᾽ οὔπω.

Matthew 6:27 (NIV):

Can any one of you by worrying add a single hour to your life?

τίς δὲ ἐξ ὑμῶν μεριμνῶν δύναται προσθεῖναι ἐπὶ τὴν ἡλικίαν αὐτοῦ πῆχυν ἕνα;

Craig Keener ad loc.:

Anxiety will not add even the smallest unit of time to one's life. Some translations read as if one added a cubit to one's height (Schwarz 1980, speculatively retroverting into Aramaic; cf. Tert. Spec. 23), but the adjective "single" in the phrase "a single cubit" militates against this interpretation. Jesus in 6:27 refers not to adding a "mere" cubit to one’s height — which would be a considerable addition! — but to adding a "mere" cubit to one’s longevity (see Schweizer 1975: 165; Filson 1960: 101; France 1985: 140; cf. Ps 39:5), thus the NRSV translation, "a single hour." (Though a graphic image, a cubit as a metaphorical time unit was intelligible; cf., e.g., Ap. Rhod. 4.1510.) Jesus may employ intentional understatement here (rhetoricians would have called his figure "catachresis," whereby a related term substitutes for a more precise one, such as "short power" or "small height" — Rhet. ad Herenn. 4.33.45). Not only is it true that one cannot extend one's life by worrying; daily experience in our comparatively fast-paced culture confirms the wisdom of an earlier Jewish sage who observed that worry and a troubled heart actually shorten life (Sir 30:19-24; cf. Pub. Syr. 187). If much study is wearying to the flesh (Eccl 12:12), "worry" about wealth also banishes sleep and destroys the flesh (Sir 34:1).

Donald A. Hagner ad loc.:

Augustine, Sermons 306.8 (Patrologia Latina, vol. 38, col. 1404; tr. Edmund Hill):

A very great many of the ills of the human race, after all, have no other source but false and unfounded suspicions. You imagine someone hates you when perhaps he's fond of you; and that crooked suspicion makes you extremely hostile to someone who is extremely friendly. What's he to do, since you don't believe him or trust him, and he isn't able to show you his heart? He speaks to you and says, "I'm very fond of you." But because he could still say this and be lying—one uses the same words, after all, when lying as when telling the truth—you don't believe him, and still go on hating him.

Pleraque enim mala generis humani non aliunde oriuntur, nisi de suspicionibus falsis. Credis de homine quod oderit te, qui forte amat te; et per pravam suspicionem fis inimicissimus amicissimo. Quid faciat, cui non credis, et cor suum tibi demonstrare non valet? Loquitur tibi dicens, Amo te. Sed quia posset tibi hoc dicere et mentiens (ea sunt enim verba mentientis, quae vera dicentis), non credendo adhuc odisti.

Read eadem for ea in the parenthesis?