Laudator Temporis Acti

Almost all men are slaves, for the reason the Spartans gave to explain the servitude of the Persians, the inability to pronounce the syllable "No." Knowing how to pronounce this word and knowing how to live by oneself are the only two ways to preserve one's freedom and individuality.

Presque tous les hommes sont esclaves par la raison que les Spartiates donnaient de la servitude des Perses, faute de savoir prononcer la syllabe non. Savoir prononcer ce mot et savoir vivre seul sont les deux seuls moyens de conserver sa liberté et son caractère.

As for the Pyramids, there is nothing to wonder at in them so much as the fact that so many men could be found degraded enough to spend their lives constructing a tomb for some ambitious booby, whom it would have been wiser and manlier to have drowned in the Nile, and then given his body to the dogs.

The father will not agree with his children, nor the children with their father, nor guest with his host, nor comrade with comrade; nor will brother be dear to brother as aforetime. Men will dishonour their parents as they grow quickly old, and will carp at them, chiding them with bitter words, hard-hearted they, not knowing the fear of the gods. They will not repay their aged parents the cost of their nurture, for might shall be their right: and one man will sack another's city. There will be no favour for the man who keeps his oath or for the just or for the good; but rather men will praise the evil-doer and his violent dealing. Strength will be right and reverence will cease to be; and the wicked will hurt the worthy man, speaking false words against him, and will swear an oath upon them. Envy, foul-mouthed, delighting in evil, with scowling face, will go along with wretched men one and all. And then Aidos and Nemesis, with their sweet forms wrapped in white robes, will go from the wide-pathed earth and forsake mankind to join the company of the deathless gods: and bitter sorrows will be left for mortal men, and there will be no help against evil.

[Translator's note: Aidos, as a quality, is that feeling of reverence or shame which restrains men from wrong: Nemesis is the feeling of righteous indignation aroused especially by the sight of the wicked in undeserved prosperity.]

I do not know what meaning classical studies would have for our time if they were not untimely -- that is to say, acting counter to our time and thereby acting on our time and, let us hope, for the benefit of a time to come.

Ich wüsste nicht, was die classische Philologie in unserer Zeit für einen Sinn hätte, wenn nicht den, in ihr unzeitgemäss -- das heisst gegen die Zeit und dadurch auf die Zeit und hoffentlich zu Gunsten einer kommenden Zeit -- zu wirken.

This is frequently the relationship between classicists and the Greeks they study: they mean nothing to one another -- a state of affairs called 'objectivity'!

So verhalten sich häufig Philologen und Griechen zu einander: sie gehen sich gar nichts an -- das nennt man dann wohl auch "Objectivität"!

"Your Honour," said an Attorney, rising, "what is the present status of this case -- as far as it has gone?"

"I have given a judgment for the residuary legatee under the will," said the Court, "put the costs upon the contestants, decided all questions relating to fees and other charges; and, in short, the estate in litigation has been settled, with all controversies, disputes, misunderstandings, and differences of opinion thereunto appertaining."

"Ah, yes, I see," said the Attorney, thoughtfully, "we are making progress -- we are getting on famously."

"Progress?" echoed the Judge -- "progress? Why, sir, the matter is concluded!"

"Exactly, exactly; it had to be concluded in order to give relevancy to the motion that I am about to make. Your Honour, I move that the judgment of the Court be set aside and the case reopened."

"Upon what ground, sir?" the Judge asked in surprise.

"Upon the ground," said the Attorney, "that after paying all fees and expenses of litigation and all charges against the estate there will still be something left."

"There may have been an error," said His Honour, thoughtfully -- "the Court may have underestimated the value of the estate. The motion is taken under advisement."

Oh, the Roman was a rogue,
  He erat was, you bettum;
He ran his automobilis
  And smoked his cigarettum;
He wore a diamond studibus
  And elegant cravattum,
A maxima cum laude shirt,
  And a stylish hattum!

He loved the luscious hic-haec-hoc,
  And bet on games and equi;
At times he won, at others, though,
  He got it in the necqui;
He winked (quo usque tandem?)
  At puellas on the Forum,
And sometimes even made
  Those goo-goo oculorum!

He frequently was seen
  At combats gladiatorial,
And ate enough to feed
  Ten boarders at Memorial;
He often went on sprees
  And said, on starting homus,
"Hic labor -- opus est,
  Oh, where's my hic--hic--domus?"

Although he lived in Rome --
  Of all the arts the middle --
He was (excuse the phrase)
  A horrid individ'l;
Ah! what a diff'rent thing
  Was the homo (dative, hominy)
Of far-away B.C.
  From us of Anno Domini.

In II of the translations, Propertius makes Calliope bid him to refrain from writing epic poetry, and to sing only of love. Mr. Pound mistakes the verb canes, "thou shalt sing," for the noun canes (in the nominative plural masculine) and translates by "dogs." Looking around then for something to tack this to, he fixes upon nocturnae (genitive singular feminine) and gives us "night dogs"! I allow myself an exclamation point.

My world is wholly formed of words -- so much of a philologist I have become! Each one dreams the dream of life in his own way. I have dreamed it in my library; and when the hour shall come in which I must leave this world, may it please God to take me from my ladder -- from before my shelves of books!

Il n'y a pour moi dans le monde que des mots, tant je suis philologue! Chacun fait à sa manière le rêve de sa vie. J'ai fait ce rêve dans ma bibliothèque, et, quand mon heure sera venue de quitter ce monde, Dieu veuille me prendre sur mon échelle, devant mes tablettes chargées de livres!

Wear not, then, one mood only in thyself; think not that thy word, and thine alone, must be right. For if any man thinks that he alone is wise, -- that in speech, or in mind, he hath no peer, -- such a soul, when laid open, is ever found empty.

No, though a man be wise, 'tis no shame for him to learn many things, and to bend in season. Seest thou, beside the wintry torrent's course, how the trees that yield to it save every twig, while the stiff-necked perish root and branch? And even thus he who keeps the sheet of his sail taut, and never slackens it, upsets his boat, and finishes his voyage with keel uppermost.

I would live all my life in nonchalance and insouciance
Were it not for making a living, which is rather a nouciance.

• Homer's Iliad
  
• Homer's Odyssey
  
• Sappho
  
• Herodotus
  
• Petronius
  
• Plutarch's Lives
  

Factum est autem in diebus illis, exiit edictum a Caesare Augusto ut describeretur universus orbis. Haec descriptio prima facta est praeside Syriae Cyrino: et ibant omnes ut profiterentur singuli in suam civitatem. Ascendit autem et Ioseph a Galilaea de civitate Nazareth, in Iudaeam civitatem David, quae vocatur Bethlehem: eo quod esset de domo et familia David, ut profiteretur cum Maria desponsata sibi uxore praegnate. Factum est autem cum essent ibi impleti sunt dies ut pareret. Et peperit filium suum primogenitum, et pannis eum involvit, et reclinavit eum in praesepio: quia non erat eis locus in diversorio.

Et pastores erant in regione eadem vigilantes et custodientes vigilias noctis supra gregem suum. Et ecce angelus Domini stetit iuxta illos, et claritas Dei circumfulsit illos, et timuerunt timore magno. Et dixit illis angelus: Nolite timere: ecce enim evangelizo vobis gaudium magnum, quod erit omni populo: quia natus est vobis hodie Salvator, qui est Christus Dominus, in civitate David. Et hoc vobis signum: Invenietis infantem pannis involutum, et positum in praesepio. Et subito facta est cum angelo multitudo militiae caelestis laudantium Deum, et dicentium:

Gloria in altissimis Deo,
Et in terra pax in hominibus bonae voluntatis.

Qualities too far above average often make a man unsuitable for society. One doesn't go to the market with ingots; one goes there with cash or change.

Des qualités trop supérieures rendent souvent un homme moins propre à la société. On ne va pas au marché avec des lingots; on y va avec de l'argent ou de la petite monnaie.

Physical infirmities and the calamities of human nature made society necessary. Society added to nature's ills. The drawbacks of society brought the need for government, and government adds to society's ills. There you have the history of human nature.

Les fléaux physiques et les calamités de la nature humaine ont rendu la société nécessaire. La société a ajouté aux malheurs de la nature. Les inconvénients de la société ont amené la nécessité du gouvernement, et le gouvernement ajoute aux malheurs de la société. Voilà l'histoire de la nature humaine.

It was a holiday party. It was not a Christmas party. There is a separation of church and state. We have a lot of students that go to Hampton Academy Junior High that have different religions. We have to be sensitive to that.

The Word of God, born once in the flesh (such is his kindness and his goodness), is always willing to be born spiritually in those who desire him.

In the foreground is that strange figure which is as familiar to us as the figures among whom we have been brought up, the gigantic body, the huge massy face, seamed with the scars of disease, the brown coat, the black worsted stockings, the grey wig with the scorched foretop, the dirty hands, the nails bitten and pared to the quick.

Everything about him, his coat, his wig, his figure, his face, his scrofula, his St. Vitus's dance, his rolling walk, his blinking eye, the outward signs which too clearly marked his approbation of his dinner, his insatiable appetite for fish-sauce and veal-pie with plums, his inextinguishable thirst for tea, his trick of touching the posts as he walked, his mysterious practice of treasuring up scraps of orange-peel, his morning slumbers, his midnight disputations, his contortions, his mutterings, his gruntings, his puffings, his vigorous, acute, and ready eloquence, his sarcastic wit, his vehemence, his insolence, his fits of tempestuous rage, his queer inmates, old Mr. Levett and blind Mrs. Williams, the cat Hodge and the negro Frank, all are as familiar to us as the objects by which we have been surrounded from childhood.

• "The most imposing sets are legal encyclopedia." (plural)
  
• "A legal encyclopedia arrays significant legal topics in alphabetical order..." (singular)
  
• "The most imposing are the national legal encyclopedia." (plural)
  
• "Only a fool cites to legal encyclopedia as pervasive authority." (plural)
  
• "But for all their faults, legal encyclopedia have virtues." (plural)
  
• "Perhaps best for the legal researcher, the modern legal encyclopedia places one into a research universe." (singular)
  
• "Both the major legal encyclopedia are now published under the West Group." (plural)
  

No furniture is as charming as books.

In the pathway of the sun,
In the footsteps of the breeze,
Where the world and sky are one,
He shall ride the silver seas,
He shall cut the glittering wave.
I shall sit at home, and rock;
Rise, to heed a neighbor's knock;
Brew my tea, and snip my thread;
Bleach the linen for my bed.
They will call him brave.

This letter I send to you from the Trojan shore. A patched-up engine of war holds me, wife. The crooked writing, the line that wavers rather often, are due to the fact that my elbow was pressing against Demophoon. Don't fear that the ink was made from my blood. His leg, not mine, produced this liquid. To be sure, I'm hidden in a big horse (Epeus recently made it, weaving its frame from oak). We chose by lot selected bodies of men and placed them in here. Would that the bodies selected were less hard than these! Not otherwise do Sardinian fishes, a scaly tribe, hide crammed together in the confines of a pot. The crest of Thoas' helmet is tickling the nose of poor me. Thessander's whole quiver of arrows is pinching my side. The Trojans from this place and that rolled the horse into the middle of the city. I was always a bad sailor, alas, as you well know. Now the Trojans are testing the sides of the horse with their spears. I'm afraid the spears will any minute now stick in my breeches! Farewell, Penelope. If the kindly Fates carry me out of here, I'll travel on foot from now on.

Hanc tibi Troiano chartam de litore mitto:
  machina me belli sutilis, uxor, habet.
Quod prave scribo, quod linea saepius errat,
  urgebat cubitus Demophoonta meus:
neve atramentum timeas de sanguine factum,
  hunc laticem illius, non mea, crura dabant.
Scilicet in magno (nuper fabricavit Epeus
  intexens costas ilice) condor equo:
corpora lecta virum sortiti immisimus illuc;
  lecta utinam minus his corpora dura forent!
Haud secus angustae conferti in finibus ollae
  Sardinii pisces, squamea turba, latent.
Titillat nasum misero mihi crista Thoantis,
  Thessandri pungit tota pharetra latus:
hinc illinc mediam volverunt Troes in urbem;
  pessimus, heu, semper (scis bene) nauta fui;
nunc etiam missis tentant hastilibus alvum:
  haesura in bracis iam puto iamque meis!
Penelope, valeas; hinc me si fata benigna
  protulerint, ibo tempus in omne pedes.

French and African writers met in Harar to celebrate the 19th century French poet Arthur Rimbaud, who spent more than a decade of his life in the eastern Ethiopian town after turning his back on writing .... There are few remaining traces of Rimbaud in the town, and many of the town's residents confuse the poet with the American film character "Rambo".

There are more lunatics than wise men, and even within the wise man there is more lunacy than wisdom.

Il y a plus de fous que de sages, et dans le sage même il y a plus de folie que de sagesse.

There are some foolish notions that are well tricked out, just as there are some fools who are very well dressed.

Il y a des sottises bien habillées, comme il y a des sots très bien vêtus.

And if thy right eye offend thee, pluck it out, and cast it from thee: for it is profitable for thee that one of thy members should perish, and not that thy whole body should be cast into hell.

And we ourselves assembled here to-day, who are still most of us in the vigour of life, have carried the work of improvement further, and have richly endowed our city with all things, so that she is sufficient for herself both in peace and war.

When several villages are united in a single complete community, large enough to be nearly or quite self-sufficing, the state comes into existence, originating in the bare needs of life, and continuing in existence for the sake of a good life. And therefore, if the earlier forms of society are natural, so is the state, for it is the end of them, and the nature of a thing is its end. For what each thing is when fully developed, we call its nature, whether we are speaking of a man, a horse, or a family. Besides, the final cause and end of a thing is the best, and to be self-sufficing is the end and the best.

I hate quotation. Tell me what you know.

I am better off than he is -- for he knows nothing, and thinks that he knows. I neither know nor think that I know.

To him who has once tasted the reckless independence, the haughty self-reliance, the sense of irresponsible freedom, which the forest life engenders, civilization thenceforth seems flat and stale. Its pleasures are insipid, its pursuits wearisome, its conventialities, duties, and mutual dependence alike tedious and disgusting. The entrapped wanderer grows fierce and restless, and pants for breathing-room. His path, it is true, was choked with difficulties, but his body and soul were hardened to meet them; it was beset with dangers, but these were the very spice of his life, gladdening his heart with exulting self-confidence, and sending the blood through his veins with a livelier current. The wilderness, rough, harsh, and inexorable, has charms more potent in their seductive influence than all the lures of luxury and sloth. And often he on whom it has cast its magic finds no heart to dissolve the spell, and remains a wanderer and an Ishmaelite to the hour of his death.

A precious, mouldering pleasure 't is
To meet an antique book,
In just the dress his century wore;
A privilege, I think,

His venerable hand to take,
And warming in our own,
A passage back, or two, to make
To times when he was young.

His quaint opinions to inspect,
His knowledge to unfold
On what concerns our mutual mind,
The literature of old;

What interested scholars most,
What competitions ran
When Plato was a certainty,
And Sophocles a man;

When Sappho was a living girl,
And Beatrice wore
The gown that Dante deified.
Facts, centuries before,

He traverses familiar,
As one should come to town
And tell you all your dreams were true;
He lived where dreams were sown.

His presence is enchantment,
You beg him not to go;
Old volumes shake their vellum heads
And tantalize, just so.

Evil men sometimes perform good deeds. One might say that they want to see if it's true that it's as pleasurable as honest folk claim it is.

Les méchants font quelquefois de bonnes actions. On dirait qu'ils veulent voir s'il est vrai que cela fasse autant de plaisir que le prétendent les honnêtes gens.

O Sapientia, quae ex ore Altissimi prodisti, attingens a fine usque ad finem, fortiter suaviter disponensque omnia: veni docendum nos viam prudentiae.

O Wisdom, which camest out of the mouth of the most High, and reachest from one end to another, mightily and sweetly ordering all things: Come and teach us the way of prudence.

She might, so noble from head
To great shapely knees
The long flowing line,
Have walked to the altar
Through the holy images
At Pallas Athene's side,
Or been fit spoil for a Centaur
Drunk with the unmixed wine.

I was free, and thought to enjoy an empty bed: but though I arranged my peace, Amor betrayed me. Why does such human beauty linger on Earth? Jupiter I forgive you your rapes of old. Yellow is her hair, and slender are her hands, her whole figure is sublime, and her walk as noble as Jupiter's sister, or Pallas Athene, going to Dulichian altars, her breasts covered by the Gorgon's snaky locks.

She is lovely as Ischomache, the Lapith's demi-goddess, sweet plunder for the Centaurs amidst the marriage feast, or Hecate by the sacred waters of Boebeis, lying down, a virgin goddess, it is said, by Mercury's side. And you Goddesses, yield, whom shepherd Paris saw once, laying your clothes aside for him, on the slopes of Ida's mountain! I wish that the years might never touch that beauty, yet that she might live the ages of the Sibyl of Cumae.

Liber eram et vacuo meditabar vivere lecto;
  at me composita pace fefellit Amor.
cur haec in terris facies humana moratur?
  Iuppiter, ignosco pristina furta tua.
fulva coma est longaeque manus, et maxima toto
  corpore, et incedit vel Iove digna soror,
aut cum Dulichias Pallas spatiatur ad aras,
  Gorgonis anguiferae pectus operta comis;
qualis et Ischomache Lapithae genus heroine,
  Centauris medio grata rapina mero;
†Mercurio satis† fertur Boebeidos undis
  virgineum Brimo composuisse latus.
cedite iam, divae, quas pastor viderat olim
  Idaeis tunicas ponere verticibus!
hanc utinam faciem nolit mutare senectus,
  etsi Cumaeae saecula vatis aget!

A man can be himself only so long as he is alone; and if he does not love solitude, he will not love freedom; for it is only when he is alone that he is really free.

---

The less necessity there is for you to come into contact with mankind in general, in the relations whether of business or of personal intimacy, the better off you are.

---

As a general rule, it may be said that a man's sociability stands very nearly in inverse ratio to his intellectual value: to say that "so and so" is very unsociable, is almost tantamount to saying that he is a man of great capacity.

---

Though the world contains many things which are thoroughly bad, the worst thing in it is society.

---

From long experience of men, we cease to expect much from them; we find that, on the whole, people do not gain by a nearer acquaintance; and that -- apart from a few rare and fortunate exceptions -- we have come across none but defective specimens of human nature which it is advisable to leave in peace.

---

Rascals are always sociable -- more's the pity! and the chief sign that a man has any nobility in his character is the little pleasure he takes in others' company. He prefers solitude more and more, and, in course of time, comes to see that, with few exceptions, the world offers no choice beyond solitude on one side and vulgarity on the other.

I could happily while away my days in a public library, never changing my clothes, eating out of a brown paper bag, bathing irregularly, and, in short, being a homeless man, except that I'd like a modest little home to return to after the library closed at night.

Running for Senator with clumsy pace,
He stooped so low to win the foremost place
That Fortune, tempted by a mark so droll,
Sprang in and kicked him to the winning pole.

We need be careful how we deal with those about us, when every death carries to some small circle of survivors, thoughts of so much omitted, so little done -- of so many things forgotten, and so many more which might have been repaired! There is no remorse so deep, as that which is unavailing; if we would be spared its tortures, let us remember this, in time.

We, who are supposed to be the besiegers, are really the besieged.

Over the heather the wet wind blows,
I've lice in my tunic and a cold in my nose.

The rain comes pattering out of the sky,
I'm a Wall soldier, I don't know why.

The mist creeps over the hard grey stone,
My girl's in Tungria; I sleep alone.

Aulus goes hanging around her place,
I don't like his manners, I don't like his face.

Piso's a Christian, he worships a fish;
There'd be no kissing if he had his wish.

She gave me a ring but I diced it away;
I want my girl and I want my pay.

When I'm a veteran with only one eye
I shall do nothing but look at the sky.

Stetit puella
rufa tunica;
siquis eam tetigit,
tunica crepuit.
Eia!

Stetit puella
tamquam rosula:
facie splenduit,
et os eius floruit.
Eia!

There stood a girl, in red she was gowned,
Her dress if you touched it made a
Swishing sound.
Eia!

Like a little rose-tree there she stood --
Her cheeks blown roses
And her mouth a bud.
Eia!

Then, from the other point of view of the good, see what a punishment ever goes with the wicked. You have learnt a little while past that all that exists is one, and that the good itself is one; it follows therefrom that all that exists must appear to be good. In this way, therefore, all that falls away from the good, ceases also to exist, wherefore evil men cease to be what they were. The form of their human bodies still proves that they have been men; wherefore they must have lost their human nature when they turned to evil-doing. But as goodness alone can lead men forward beyond their humanity, so evil of necessity will thrust down below the honourable estate of humanity those whom it casts down from their first position. The result is that you cannot hold him to be a man who has been, so to say, transformed by his vices.

If a violent man and a robber burns with greed of other men's possessions, you say he is like a wolf. Another fierce man is always working his restless tongue at lawsuits, and you will compare him to a hound. Does another delight to spring upon men from ambushes with hidden guile? He is as a fox. Does one man roar and not restrain his rage? He would be reckoned as having the heart of a lion. Does another flee and tremble in terror where there is no cause of fear? He would be held to be as deer. If another is dull and lazy, does he not live the life of an ass? One whose aims are inconstant and ever changed at his whims, is in no wise different from the birds. If another is in a slough of foul and filthy lusts, he is kept down by the lusts of an unclean swine. Thus then a man who loses his goodness, ceases to be a man, and since he cannot change his condition for that of a god, he turns into a beast.

---

Vide autem ex adversa parte bonorum quae improbos poena comitetur; omne namque quod sit unum esse ipsumque unum bonum esse paulo ante didicisti; cui consequens est ut omne quod sit id etiam bonum esse uideatur. Hoc igitur modo quicquid a bono deficit esse desistit. Quo fit ut mali desinant esse quod fuerant. -- Sed fuisse homines adhuc ipsa humani corporis reliqua species ostentat -- Quare versi in malitiam humanam quoque amisere naturam. Sed cum ultra homines quemque provehere sola probitas possit, necesse est ut quos ab humana condicione deiecit infra homines meritum detrudat improbitas; evenit igitur ut quem transformatum vitiis videas hominem aestimare non possis.

Avaritia fervet alienarum opum violentus ereptor: Lupis similem dixeris. Ferox atque inquies linguam litigiis exercet: Cani comparabis. Insidiator occultus subripuisse fraudibus gaudet: Vulpeculis exaequetur. Irae intemperans fremit: Leonis animum gestare credatur. Pavidus ac fugax non metuenda formidat: Cervis similis habeatur. Segnis ac stupidus torpet: Asinum vivit. Levis atque inconstans studia permutat: Nihil avibus differt. Foedis immundisque libidinibus immergitur: Sordidae suis voluptate detinetur. Ita fit ut qui probitate deserta homo esse desierit, cum in divinam condicionem transire non possit, vertatur in beluam.

Lugete, o Veneres Cupidinesque,
et quantum est hominum venustiorum:
passer mortuus est meae puellae
passer, deliciae meae puellae,
quem plus illa oculis suis amabat.
nam mellitus erat suamque norat
ipsam tam bene quam puella matrem,
nec sese a gremio illius movebat,
sed circumsiliens modo huc modo illuc
ad solam dominam usque pipiabat.
qui nunc it per iter tenebricosum
illuc, unde negant redire quemquam.
at vobis male sit, malae tenebrae
Orci, quae omnia bella devoratis:
tam bellum mihi passerem abstulistis.
o factum male! o miselle passer!
tua nunc opera meae puellae
flendo turgiduli rubent ocelli.

Mourn, ye Graces and Loves, and all you whom the Graces love. My lady's sparrow is dead, the sparrow my lady's pet, whom she loved more than her very eyes; for honey-sweet he was, and knew his mistress as well as a girl knows her own mother. Nor would he stir from her lap, but hopping now here, now there, would still chirp to his mistress alone. Now he goes along the dark road, thither whence they say no one returns. But curse upon you, cursed shades of Orcus, which devour all pretty things! My pretty sparrow, you have taken away. Ah, cruel! Ah, poor little bird! All because of you my lady's darling eyes are heavy and red with weeping.

O pertest, most self-satisfied
  Of aught that breathes or moves,
See where you sit, with head aside,
  To chirp your vulgar loves:
Or raking in the uncleanly street
  You bolt your ugly meal,
Undaunted by the approaching feet,
  The heedless splashing wheel.

Old poets in your praise were stirred --
  I fear you must forget --
Catullus loved you, shameless bird,
  You were his lady's pet.
You heard her dainty breathing, perched
  Beside her when she slept;
You died: -- her pretty cheeks were smirched; --
  And 'twas for you she wept.

The imperious Bustard strides no more
  Across the grassy waste;
The gallant Ruff deserts the shore
  He trampled into paste;
The Oriole falls, a flaming sprite,
  Before the unsparing gun;
Whilst thou by some diviner right
  Dost wanton in the sun.

When prey is scarce, when tempests fret
  And freeze the stiffening loam,
The worm has tunnelled deeper yet,
  The beetle sits at home,
You shake your chilly limbs, and puff
  Your crest in mild surprise,
And peep, a ball of downy fluff,
  With bright and beaded eyes.

No secret raptures thrill your throat
  On fragrant moonlit nights;
You never had the mind to note
  Indignities or slights;
The soul that craves, but rarely finds
  The vague, the high, the true,
The weaknesses of noble minds, --
  They never troubled you.

Your selfish purpose never swerves
  From its appointed end;
Your sturdy bonhomie deserves
  Success, but ne'er a friend.
Where sweetness languishes, and grace,
  You multiply and thrive; --
It proves you, of the feathered race,
  The fittest to survive.

Contentment and equality
  Are pleasing names enough;
But we prefer, we know not why,
  A more ethereal stuff.
Ignoble welfare, -- doubtful good --
  We see with clouded eyes;
We did not make the world, -- yet would
  To God 'twere otherwise!

Death devours all lovely things;
Lesbia with her sparrow
Shares the darkness, -- presently
Every bed is narrow.

Unremembered as old rain
Dries the sheer libation,
And the little petulant hand
Is an annotation.

After all, my erstwhile dear,
My no longer cherished,
Need we say it was not love,
Now that love is perished?

... So, praise the gods, Catullus is away!
And let me tend you this advice, my dear:
Take any lover that you will, or may,
Except a poet. All of them are queer.

It's just the same -- a quarrel or a kiss
Is but a tune to play upon his pipe.
He's always hymning that or wailing this;
Myself, I much prefer the business type.

That thing he wrote, the time the sparrow died --
(Oh, most unpleasant -- gloomy, tedious words!)
I called it sweet, and made believe I cried;
The stupid fool! I've always hated birds ...

• Eiichi Goto, name of a computer scientist. The term goto is a keyword in some computer languages.
  
• Wlodzimierz Stozek, name of a mathematician. The Polish word for cone (a geometrical solid) is stozek.
  

Who prop, thou ask'st in these bad days, my mind? --
He much, the old man, who, clearest-souled of men,
Saw The Wide Prospect, and the Asian Fen,
And Tmolus hill, and Smyrna bay, though blind.

Much he, whose friendship I not long since won,
That halting slave, who in Nicopolis
Taught Arrian, when Vespasian's brutal son
Cleared Rome of what most shamed him. But be his

My special thanks, whose even-balanced soul,
From first youth tested up to extreme old age,
Business could not make dull, nor passion wild;

Who saw life steadily, and saw it whole;
The mellow glory of the Attic stage,
Singer of sweet Colonus, and its child.

• Homer, whose Iliad takes place in Troy, a city of Asia Minor. According to tradition, he was a native of Smyrna and also blind.
  
• Epictetus, a philosopher and former slave, exiled from Rome in 89 by Vespasian's son Domitian. His pupil Arrian collected his lectures. Epictetus was lame, whence the adjective "halting."
  
• Sophocles, who was born at Colonus and lived a long life. One of his tragedies is entitled Oedipus at Colonus.

The modern world seems invincible. Like the extinct dinosaurs.

On an olive-crested steep
  Hanging o'er the dusty road,
  Lieth in his last abode,
Wrapped in everlasting sleep,

He who in the days of yore
  Sang of pastures, sang of farms,
  Sang of heroes and their arms,
Sang of passion, sang of war.

When the lark at dawning tells,
  Herald like, the coming day,
  And along the dusty way
Comes the sound of tinkling bells,

Rising to the tomb aloft,
  While some modern Corydon
  Drives his bleating cattle on
From the stable to the croft:

Then the soul of Virgil seems
To awaken from its dreams,
To sing again the melodies
Of which he often tells, --
  The music of the birds,
  The lowing of the herds,
The tinkling of the bells.

ossa eius Neapolim translata sunt tumuloque condita qui est via Puteolana intra lapidem secundum, in quo distichon fecit tale:

Mantua me genuit, Calabri rapuere, tenet nunc
  Parthenope. cecini pascua, rura, duces.

His ashes were taken to Naples and laid to rest on the Via Puteolana less than two miles from the city, in a tomb for which he himself composed this couplet:

Mantua gave me the light, Calabria slew me; now holds me
  Parthenope; I have sung shepherds, the country, and wars.

Ad Maronis mausoleum
Ductus, fudit super eum
  Piae rorem lacrimae:
'Quem te' inquit 'reddidissem,
Si te vivum invenissem,
  Poetarum maxime!'

Brought to the tomb of Vergil, he shed over it the dew of a reverent tear: he said, "What would I have made of thee, greatest of poets, if I had found thee alive!"

No one knows more inner turmoil or is so susceptible to the romance of wrong-doing than the law-abiding person.

Children are arrogant, scornful, prone to anger, jealous, nosy, selfish, lazy, fickle, timid, intemperate, they say what is false and hide what is true; they laugh and cry at the drop of a hat; they have excessive joys and bitter sorrows arising from very insignificant causes; they are totally unwilling to undergo pain, and enjoy inflicting it on others: they are already adults.

Les enfants sont hautains, dédaigneux, colères, envieux, curieux, intéressés, paresseux, volages, timides, intempérants, menteurs, dissimulés; ils rient et pleurent facilement; ils ont des joies immodérées et des afflictions amères sur de très petits sujets; ils ne veulent point souffrir de mal, et aiment à en faire: ils sont déjà des hommes.

When St. Gelasius is restored, the Institute of Christ the King Sovereign Priest, headquartered in Italy, will use it to celebrate the Tridentine mass, which is spoken in Latin. The services will be a stark contrast to the guitar music, drumming and sacred dance many churches use to reach out to their communities.

"I believe it gives people a sense of the mystery of God," said Monsignor Michael Schmitz. "They try to pray, and the Latin and chants and the beautiful music and the vestments -- all the details of the Latin mass gives them the feeling that God is greater than our human heart can think of."

My mind opened naturally and joyously to a conception of antiquity. Greece, ancient Greece, exercised a mysterious fascination over me. In my fancy the pagan gods and goddesses still walked on earth and talked face to face with men, and in my heart I secretly built shrines to those I loved best. I knew and loved the whole tribe of nymphs and heroes and demigods--no, not quite all, for the cruelty and greed of Medea and Jason were too monstrous to be forgiven, and I used to wonder why the gods permitted them to do wrong and then punished them for their wickedness. And the mystery is still unsolved. I often wonder how

   God can dumbness keep
   While Sin creeps grinning through His house of Time.
   [Sidney Lanier, Acknowledgment, III]

It was the Iliad that made Greece my paradise. I was familiar with the story of Troy before I read it in the original, and consequently I had little difficulty in making the Greek words surrender their treasures after I had passed the borderland of grammar. Great poetry, whether written in Greek or in English, needs no other interpreter than a responsive heart. Would that the host of those who make the great works of the poets odious by their analysis, impositions and laborious comments might learn this simple truth! It is not necessary that one should be able to define every word and give it its principal parts and its grammatical position in the sentence in order to understand and appreciate a fine poem. I know my learned professors have found greater riches in the Iliad than I shall ever find; but I am not avaricious. I am content that others should be wiser than I. But with all their wide and comprehensive knowledge, they cannot measure their enjoyment of that splendid epic, nor can I. When I read the finest passages of the Iliad, I am conscious of a soul-sense that lifts me above the narrow, cramping circumstances of my life. My physical limitations are forgotten -- my world lies upward, the length and the breadth and the sweep of the heavens are mine!

My admiration for the Aeneid is not so great, but it is none the less real. I read it as much as possible without the help of notes or dictionary, and I always like to translate the episodes that please me especially. The word-painting of Virgil is wonderful sometimes; but his gods and men move through the scenes of passion and strife and pity and love like the graceful figures in an Elizabethan mask, whereas in the Iliad they give three leaps and go on singing. Virgil is serene and lovely like a marble Apollo in the moonlight; Homer is a beautiful, animated youth in the full sunlight with the wind in his hair.

How easy it is to fly on paper wings! From "Greek Heroes" to the Iliad was no day's journey, nor was it altogether pleasant. One could have traveled round the word many times while I trudged my weary way through the labyrinthine mazes of grammars and dictionaries, or fell into those dreadful pitfalls called examinations, set by schools and colleges for the confusion of those who seek after knowledge. I suppose this sort of Pilgrim's Progress was justified by the end; but it seemed interminable to me, in spite of the pleasant surprises that met me now and then at a turn in the road.

He left the land of youth, he left the young,
The smiling gods of Greece; he passed the isle
Where Jason loitered, and where Sappho sung,
He sought the secret-founted wave of Nile,
And of their old world, dead a weary while,
Heard the priests murmur in their mystic tongue,
And through the fanes went voyaging, among
Dark tribes that worshipped Cat and Crocodile.

He learned the tales of death Divine and birth,
Strange loves of Hawk and Serpent, Sky and Earth,
The marriage, and the slaying of the Sun.
The shrines of gods and beasts he wandered through,
And mocked not at their godhead, for he knew
Behind all creeds the Spirit that is One.

Sicily is a populous and distant country; over which, even if we are victorious, we shall hardly be able to maintain our dominion. And how foolish it is to select for attack a land which no conquest can secure, while he who fails to conquer will not be where he was before!

God is near you, he is with you, he is within you. This is what I mean, Lucilius: a holy spirit dwells within us, one who marks our good and bad deeds, and is our guardian. As we treat this spirit, so are we treated by it. Indeed, no man can be good without the help of God. Can one rise superior to fortune unless God helps him to rise? He it is that gives noble and upright counsel. In each good man "a god doth dwell, but what god know we not."

prope est a te deus, tecum est, intus est. ita dico, Lucili: sacer intra nos spiritus sedet, malorum bonorumque nostrorum observator et custos; hic prout a nobis tractatus est, ita nos ipse tractat. bonus vero vir sine deo nemo est: an potest aliquis supra fortunam nisi ab illo adiutus exsurgere? ille dat consilia magnifica et erecta. in unoquoque virorum bonorum '(quis deus incertum est) habitat deus' [Verg. Aen. 8.352].

Not only Aristotle but the whole of Greek antiquity thinks differently from us about hatred and envy, and judges with Hesiod, who in one place calls one Eris evil -- namely, the one that leads men into hostile fights of annihilation against one another -- while praising another Eris as good -- the one that, as jealousy, hatred, and envy, spurs men to activity: not to the activity of fights of annihilation, but to the activity of fights which are contests. The Greek is envious, and he does not consider this quality a blemish but the gift of a beneficent godhead. What a gulf of ethical judgment lies between us and him!

Und nicht Aristoteles allein, sondern das gesammte griechische Alterthum denkt anders über Groll und Neid als wir und urtheilt wie Hesiod, der einmal eine Eris als böse bezeichnet, diejenige nämlich, welche die Menschen zum feindseligen Vernichtungskampfe gegen einander führt, und dann wieder eine andre Eris als gute preist, die als Eifersucht Groll Nied die Menschen zur That reizt, aber nicht zur That des Vernichtungskampfes, sondern zur That des Wettkampfes. Der Grieche ist neidisch und empfindet diese Eigenschaft nicht als Makel, sondern als Wirkung einer wohlthätigen Gottheit: welche Kluft des ethischen Urtheils zwischen uns und ihm!

Ah, Lucian, we have need of you, of your sense and of your mockery! Here, where faith is sick and superstition is waking afresh; where gods come rarely, and spectres appear at five shillings an interview; where science is popular, and philosophy cries aloud in the market-place, and clamour does duty for government, and Thais and Lais are names of power -- here, Lucian, is room and scope for you.

• INDC Journal: Macroglossius lunarius abundantia fectum comedo, for "Long-tongued Poo Eating Moonbat."
  
• Roger L. Simon: Anchormanus Pomposis, for "Pompous Anchorman."
  

I did not even know the name of Dostoevski just a few weeks ago -- uneducated person that I am, not reading any journals. An accidental reach of the arm in a bookstore brought to my attention L'esprit souterrain [Notes from Underground], a work just translated into French. (It was a similar accident with Schopenhauer in my 21st year and with Stendhal in my 35th.) The instinct of kinship (or how should I name it?) spoke up immediately; my joy was extraordinary.

A statement which I found in Athenodorus is true: "Then know that you are free from all desires when you come to the point that you ask God for nothing except what you could ask for openly." For now how great is the folly of men! They whisper the most shameful prayers to the gods; if someone tries to listen, they fall silent, and they tell to God what they don't want a fellow human to know. Therefore consider whether this advice might not be profitably given: live with men as though God were watching, speak with God as though men were listening.

verum est quod apud Athenodorum inveni: 'tunc scito esse te omnibus cupiditatibus solutum, cum eo perveneris ut nihil deum roges nisi quod rogare possis palam'. nunc enim quanta dementia est hominum! turpissima vota dis insusurrant; si quis admoverit aurem, conticiscent, et quod scire hominem nolunt deo narrant. vide ergo ne hoc praecipi salubriter possit: sic vive cum hominibus tamquam deus videat, sic loquere cum deo tamquam homines audiant.

So talking, we reached the spot where he was to sit and listen to the prayers. There was a row of openings with lids like well-covers, and a chair of gold by each. Zeus took his seat at the first, lifted off the lid and inclined his ear. From every quarter of Earth were coming the most various and contradictory petitions; for I too bent down my head and listened. Here are specimens. 'O Zeus, that I might be king!' 'O Zeus, that my onions and garlic might thrive!' 'Ye Gods, a speedy death for my father!' Or again, 'Would that I might succeed to my wife's property!' 'Grant that my plot against my brother be not detected.' 'Let me win my suit.' 'Give me an Olympic garland.' Of those at sea, one prayed for a north, another for a south wind; the farmer asked for rain, the fuller for sun. Zeus listened, and gave each prayer careful consideration, but without promising to grant them all;

    Our Father this bestowed, and that withheld. [Iliad 16.250]

Righteous prayers he allowed to come up through the hole, received and laid them down at his right, while he sent the unholy ones packing with a downward puff of breath, that Heaven might not be defiled by their entrance. In one case I saw him puzzled; two men praying for opposite things and promising the same sacrifices, he could not tell which of them to favour, and experienced a truly Academic suspense of judgement, showing a reserve and equilibrium worthy of Pyrrho himself.

For a Lacedaemonian he was not a bad speaker.

I would have you day by day fix your eyes upon the greatness of Athens, until you become filled with the love of her; and when you are impressed by the spectacle of her glory, reflect that this empire has been acquired by men who knew their duty and had the courage to do it, who in the hour of conflict had the fear of dishonour always present to them, and who, if ever they failed in an enterprise, would not allow their virtues to be lost to their country, but freely gave their lives to her as the fairest offering which they could present at her feast.

We know that no friendship between man and man, no league between city and city, can ever be permanent unless the friends or allies have a good opinion of each other's honesty, and are similar in general character. For the diversity in men's minds makes the difference in their actions.

For the leaders on either side used specious names, the one party professing to uphold the constitutional equality of the many, the other the wisdom of an aristocracy, while they made the public interests, to which in name they were devoted, in reality their prize. Striving in every way to overcome each other, they committed the most monstrous crimes; yet even these were surpassed by the magnitude of their revenges which they pursued to the very utmost, neither party observing any definite limits either of justice or public expediency, but both alike making the caprice of the moment their law. Either by the help of an unrighteous sentence, or grasping power with the strong hand, they were eager to satiate the impatience of party-spirit. Neither faction cared for religion; but any fair pretence which succeeded in effecting some odious purpose was greatly lauded. And the citizens who were of neither party fell a prey to both.

An attitude of perfidious antagonism everywhere prevailed; for there was no word binding enough, nor oath terrible enough to reconcile enemies. Each man was strong only in the conviction that nothing was secure; he must look to his own safety, and could not afford to trust others. Inferior intellects generally succeeded best.

So little trouble do men take in the search after truth; so readily do they accept whatever comes first to hand.