Laudator Temporis Acti

George Crabbe (1754-1832), Tales of the Hall, Book V (Ruth), lines 23-58:

Full twenty volumes—I would not exceed
The modest truth—were there for me to read;
These a long shelf contain'd, and they were found        25
Books truly speaking, volumes fairly bound;
The rest—for some of other kinds remained,
And these a board beneath the shelf contained—
Had their deficiencies in part; they lack'd
One side or both, or were no longer back'd;        30
But now became degraded from their place,
And were but pamphlets of a bulkier race.
Yet had we pamphlets, an inviting store,
From sixpence downwards—nay, a part were more;
Learning abundance, and the various kinds        35
For relaxation—food for different minds;
A piece of Wingate—thanks for all we have—
What we of figures needed, fully gave;
Culpepper, new in numbers, cost but thrice
The ancient volume's unassuming price,        40
But told what planet o'er each herb had power,
And how to take it in the lucky hour.
History we had—wars, treasons, treaties, crimes,
From Julius Caesar to the present times;
Questions and answers, teaching what to ask        45
And what reply—a kind, laborious task;
A scholar's book it was, who, giving, swore
It held the whole he wish'd to know, and more.
And we had poets, hymns and songs divine;
The most we read not, but allowed them fine.        50
Our tracts were many, on the boldest themes—
We had our metaphysics, spirits, dreams,
Visions and warnings, and portentous sights
Seen, though but dimly, in the doleful nights,
When the good wife her wintry vigil keeps,        55
And thinks alone of him at sea, and weeps.
Add to all these our works in single sheets,
That our Cassandras sing about the streets.

37-38: Edmund Wingate, Arithmetique Made Easie (1630). "Editions continued to appear until 1760" according to Oxford Dictionary of National Biography (ODNB).

39-42 Nicholas Culpeper, The English Physitian, or, An Astrologo-Physical Discourse on the Vulgar Herbs of This Nation, Being a Compleat Method of Physick, Whereby a Man May Preserve His Body in Health, or Cure Himself, Being Sick (1652), with "over one hundred subsequent editions" (ODNB).


John Frederick Peto (1854-1907), Old Companions
Related posts:

• Gabriel Oak's Library
• A Monster Bookcase
• A Rational Collocation of Authors
• The Contents of Richard Mutimer's Bookcase
• A Farmer's Bookshelf

George Gissing (1857-1903), The Unclassed, chapter 6 (An Advertisement):

You will think it strange, but I don't so much long for the modern Italy, for the beautiful scenery and climate, not even for the Italy of Raphael, or of Dante. I think most of classical Italy. I am no scholar, but I love the Latin writers, and can forget myself for hours, working through Livy or Tacitus. I want to see the ruins of Rome; I want to see the Tiber, the Clitumnus, the Aufidus, the Alban Hills, Lake Trasimenus,——a thousand places! It is strange how those old times have taken hold upon me. The mere names in Roman history make my blood warm.——And there is so little chance that I shall ever be able to go there; so little chance.

Max Beerbohm (1872-1956), And Even Now (New York: E.P. Dutton & Company, 1921), p. 315:

Strange, when you come to think of it, that of all the countless folk who have lived before our time on this planet not one is known in history or in legend as having died of laughter.

Lucian, The Long-Lived 25 (tr. A.M. Harmon):

Philemon, the comic poet, was ninety-seven like Cratinus, and was lying on a couch resting. When he saw a donkey eating the figs that had been prepared for his own consumption, he burst into a fit of laughter; calling his servant and telling him, along with a great and hearty laugh, to give the donkey also a sup of wine, he choked with his laughter and died.

καὶ Φιλήμων δὲ ὁ κωμικός, ὁμοίως τῷ Κρατίνῳ ἑπτὰ καὶ ἐνενήκοντα ἔτη βιούς, κατέκειτο μὲν ἐπὶ κλίνης ἠρεμῶν, θεασάμενος δὲ ὄνον τὰ παρεσκευασμένα αὐτῷ σῦκα κατεσθίοντα ὥρμησε μὲν εἰς γέλωτα, καλέσας δὲ τὸν οἰκέτην καὶ σὺν πολλῷ καὶ ἀθρόῳ γέλωτι εἰπὼν προσδοῦναι τῷ ὄνῳ ἀκράτου ῥοφεῖν ἀποπνιγεὶς ὑπὸ τοῦ γέλωτος ἀπέθανεν.

---

Dear Michael Gilleland,

There is a list of examples of death by laughter, mostly drawn from Aulus Gellius, in the Officinae epitome (1560) of Johannes Ravisius Textor (Jean Tixier de Ravisi), which besides Philemon also includes the comic poet Philippides, who laughed himself to death after unexpectedly winning a contest. In the same volume can be found useful lists of classical figures who died by drowning, by falling off a horse, trampled by horses, bitten by snakes, stung by bees, mauled by lions, dogs or wild beasts, struck by lightning, crucified, hanged, of hunger and thirst, burned to death, by falling off a ladder, swallowed by the earth, by poisoning, during copulation, of excessive eating and drinking, crushed by a falling rock or collapsing wall, strangled or smothered, pierced by arrows, infested by lice, in prison, in the latrine, by flaying, suffocated by smoke or steam, in childbirth, beheaded, of a fever, of the plague, of apoplexy, by bleeding to death, of gout, of dysentery, etc.

Yours sincerely,

Alistair Ian Blyth

---

Jane Seeber adds:

Beerbohm also neglects Sir Thomas Urquhart, said to have died laughing on hearing that Charles II had reclaimed the throne. I'm currently reading John Willcock's entertaining and erudite biography, Sir Thomas Urquhart of Cromartie, Knight (1899). Despite this story being generally regarded as a legend, he argues in favour of it.

"There seems at first, a certain grotesqueness in such a fatal exuberance of joy in connexion with such an event as Charles II. regaining the crown which his father had lost, and of which in another generation all of his blood were to be deprived. But we have to keep in mind that Sir Thomas was not alone in his folly, if folly it were; for a great wave of exultation swept over the three kingdoms at that time. Our author had, like many of his fellow-Royalists, staked and lost everything he possessed in the defence of the House of Stuart, and one can have little difficulty in understanding how the announcement of the triumph of the cause, which was so dear to him, should have agitated him profoundly."

Willcock has a long footnote on the subject, referencing Rabelais' treatment of the death of Philemon and Lucian as a source for Rabelais. The footnote can be found here, as part of the Project Gutenberg text.

Oliver Goldsmith (1730-1774), The Vicar of Wakefield, chapter XX (George Primrose, the Vicar's son, speaking):

When I came to Louvain, I was resolved not to go sneaking to the lower professors, but openly tendered my talents to the principal himself. I went, had admittance, and offered him my service as a master of the Greek language, which I had been told was a desideratum in his university. The principal seemed at first to doubt of my abilities; but of these I offered to convince him by turning a part of any Greek author he should fix upon into Latin. Finding me perfectly earnest in my proposal, he addressed me thus: You see me, young man; I never learned Greek and I don't find that I have ever missed it. I have had a doctor's cap and gown without Greek; I have ten thousand florins a-year without Greek; I eat heartily without Greek; and in short, continued he, as I don’t know Greek, I do not believe there is any good in it.

Greek Anthology 9.142 (anonymous, tr. W.R. Paton):

We do worship to horned Pan, the walker on the crags, the leader of the Nymphs, who dwelleth in this house of rock, praying him to look with favour on all us who came to this constant fountain and quenched our thirst.

Κρημνοβάταν, δίκερων, Νυμφῶν ἡγήτορα Πᾶνα
  ἁζόμεθ', ὃς πετρίνου τοῦδε κέκηδε δόμου,
ἵλαον ἔμμεναι ἄμμιν, ὅσοι λίβα τήνδε μολόντες
  ἀενάου πόματος, δίψαν ἀπωσάμεθα.

The Greek text is also from Paton, who doesn't note the crux in line 2. See the critical apparatus in Anthologia Graeca Epigrammatum Palatina cum Planudea, ed. Hugo Stadtmueller, Vol. III, Part I (Leipzig: B.G. Teubner, 1906), pp. 111-112:

τόνδε κέκευθε δόμον P Pl; λέλογχε Br., γέγηθε Jac., τέτευχε Emperius, Ellis (τέθεικε et κατέσχε olim ci.); κέκευθε ῥόον Herw.; (πετρίνῳ) τῷδε κέκ. δόμῳ Tucker, Harb. (ὃν πετρίνος τῇδε κέκευθε δόμος malim); tentavi πετρίνου τοῦδε κέκηδε δόμου, eadem proposuerat Ludwich

Some vocabulary, from Liddell-Scott-Jones:

κρημνοβάτης: climber of steeps
δικέρως: two-horned
λιβάς: anything that drips or trickles, esp. spring, fount, stream
ἀέναος: ever-flowing
πόμα = πῶμα: drink, draught
ἀπωθέω: thrust away, push back

Henry David Thoreau, Journals (March 12, 1853):

It is essential that a man confine himself to pursuits—a scholar, for instance, to studies—which lie next to and conduce to his life, which do not go against the grain, either of his will or his imagination. The scholar finds in his experience some studies to be most fertile and radiant with light, others dry, barren, and dark. If he is wise, he will not persevere in the last, as a plant in a cellar will strive toward the light. He will confine the observations of his mind as closely as possible to the experience or life of his senses. His thought must live with and be inspired with the life of the body. The deathbed scenes and observations even of the best and wisest afford but a sorry picture of our humanity. Some men endeavor to live a constrained life, to subject their whole lives to their wills, as he who said he would give a sign if he were conscious after his head was cut off,—but he gave no sign. Dwell as near as possible to the channel in which your life flows. A man may associate with such companions, he may pursue such employments, as will darken the day for him. Men choose darkness rather than light.

John Drinkwater (1882-1937), "The Vagabond," in his Poems, 1908-1919 (Boston: Houghton Mifflin Company, 1919), p. 66:

I know the pools where the grayling rise,
   I know the trees where the filberts fall,
I know the woods where the red fox lies,
   The twisted elms where the brown owls call.
And I've seldom a shilling to call my own,
   And there's never a girl I'd marry,
I thank the Lord I'm a rolling stone
   With never a care to carry.

I talk to the stars as they come and go
   On every night from July to June,
I'm free of the speech of the winds that blow,
   And I know what weather will sing what tune.
I sow no seed and I pay no rent,
   And I thank no man for his bounties,
But I've a treasure that's never spent,
   I'm lord of a dozen counties.

[William Oldisworth (1680-1734),] The Odes of Horace in Latin and English; With a Translation of Dr. Bentley's Notes. To which are added Notes upon Notes; Done in the Bentleian Stile and Manner, Part III (London: Bernard Lintott, 1712), p. 19 (on Ode 1.15.21-22):

Here the Dr. musters together about a Dozen of Quotations to prove that Excidium or exitium may be followed by a Genitive Case, as if this were some extraordinary Discovery. From such Atchievements as these Men attain the Titles of Acurate, Illustrious, Learned, Accute, the Star of Criticism, the North-Pole of Erudition, and the like; now in order to enable the Reader to follow such Steps, and attain the same Character, I shall here subjoin a Receipt to make a Great Critick. Take two or more Words out of Horace, Virgil, or any other Author; put these together in a Phrase; then lay them by a-drying upon the Alphabet; then take the Indexes of Statius, Juvenal, Tibullus, and as many other Authors as you think fit, not less in Number than six. Sift them well, and take out of them all the Excidiums or Exitiums, (if that be your Word) together with the Genitive Cases that follow; then bruse the whole together. Let it stand a while 'till it comes to a consistency; then spread it upon Paper, and without any Inward Application, it will infallibly make you a Person of a sound Judgment, of Great Erudition, and of Immense Reading.

Bentley, in his note on Horace, Odes 1.15.21-22, wasn't merely trying to prove that excidium or exitium may be followed by a noun in the genitive case. He was trying to solve a real problem, viz., which of the following readings found in manuscripts of Horace was best:

• exitium tuae gentis
• excidium tuae gentis
• exitium tuae genti
• excidium tuae genti

He concluded that exitium tuae gentis should be read.

See Oldisworth p. 18 and Q. Horatius Flaccus, ex Recensione et cum Notis atque Emendationibus Richardi Bentleii, 3rd ed. (Berlin: Weidmann, 1869), vol. I, p. 44.

Conversation between André Gide and Roger Martin du Gard, in Simon Leys, The Hall of Uselessness: Collected Essays (© 2011; rpt. New York: New York Review Books, 2013), p. 156:

Gide: You read too many modern things, things without any value; you should discipline yourself, and read every day some pages by a great classic: Montaigne, Goethe, La Bruyère, any one of them. It would enable you to distance yourself from daily events, from transitory facts, it would enlarge your perspective...

Martin: Yes, I often tried, but this...does not provide me with material for observation and for notation, as much as modern information does.

Gide: Yes, right, I see: you are unable to actualise the ideas of the great authors of the past; for you, their thoughts remain remote; with me, the reverse is true. If after having swallowed the prose of the daily paper, I open again my Diderot, it is the latter that I find timely.”¹⁸⁰

Note 180 on p. 540:

PD 2, p. 531.

PD is Maria van Rysselberghe, Cahiers de la Petite Dame (Paris: Gallimard, 1973), whence the conversation in French:

Écoutez, il faut que je vous dise à vous-même ce que je confiais à la Petite Dame ce matin: vous lisez beaucoup trop de choses modernes, sans valeur; vous devriez vous astreindre à lire chaque jour un grand auteur classique: Montaigne, Goethe, La Bruyère; n'importe lequel. Ça établit une distance avec le quotidien, le passager, ça élargit les points de vue. Je vous assure, vous en retireriez le plus grand profit.—Oui, je sais bien, je crois que vous avez raison, j'ai essayé souvent mais ça ne m'alimente pas ou peu, ça ne fournit pas de matière à remarques, à annotations, comme l'élément moderne.—Oui, c'est ça, je vois bien, dit Gide, vous n'arrivez pas à actualiser la pensée des grands auteurs, elle vous paraît lointaine; pour moi, c'est tout le contraire. Quand après avoir avalé la prose des journaux, je rouvre un Diderot, c'est ça qui me paraît actuel, c'est là que je cherche confirmation de ce qui vaut.

Iris Origo (1902-1988), Images and Shadows (London: John Murray, 1970), pp. 146-148:

At the age of twelve, however, a piece of great good fortune befell me. Bernard Berenson, to whom I shall always be grateful, advised my mother to let me receive a classical education and even supplied her with the name of the brilliant tutor with whom I worked for the next three years, Professor Solone Monti. It was with him that I spent the happiest hours of my girlhood—perhaps the happiest I have ever known.

My first impression as I entered his study was of a haze of smoke, so thick that I could hardly see across the little square room, lined with cheap deal bookshelves, to the desk behind which sat a dark, stocky little man, with dandruff on his collar, and with such thick lenses to his spectacles that they seemed more suited to a windscreen than a human eye.

"Mind those books, signorina," was his greeting, as I stumbled over a pile near the door, "they are meant to be read, not trodden on."

I would have liked to ask why, in that case, great piles of them covered the floors, except that, looking about me, it was plain that there was no other place for them to be, every inch of the walls and tables being already filled.

"Wait a minute, the lexicon can go on to the floor too. Now sit here and we will take a journey to Greece and Rome. You know no Latin? And of course no Greek?"

I shook my head.

"And you have not yet read Dante?"

"No."

"And Carducci and Pascoli are just names to you?"

I muttered something about Valentino vestito di nuovo.

"Yes, yes, I dare say," impatiently, "but it's the other Pascoli I mean, the great classical scholar. Well, we shall have a long way to travel—and we'll pick a great many flowers on the way." Then suddenly, explosively, taking off his glasses and gazing straight into my round, startled face, "But you like poetry, in the languages you know? You have read Keats, Shelley, Milton—perhaps some Goethe—perhaps Corneille? You read poetry for pleasure?"

"Yes, oh yes!"

"Then we'll begin. Listen, signorina. All you need to do today is listen."

And he took up Pascoli's Epos—his anthology of Latin epic verse, of which the preface and the notes are still so vividly evocative that (in the words of another great classical scholar, Valgimigli, who had been Pascoli's pupil) 'it was like a fluttering of wings'.

"This is how Pascoli describes the scene—for people like you who cannot yet read Greek:

"Da una parta la pianura scintillante di fuochi, con un cielo sereno di stelle (i Troiani erano all'aperto, in faccia alla loro grande citta, e mille fuochi ardevano, e a ogni fuoco erano cinquanta guerrieri, e i cavalli stavano presso i fuochi, stritolando fra i denti l'orzo bianco e la spelta, e attendevano l'aurora); dall'altra il mare, tutto rumori o bisbigli. Giunti alle capanne e alle navi dei Mirmidoni, giunti a quella capanna, udirono un canto. Era Achille, che accompagnandosi sulla cetra predata, cantava le glorie dei guerrieri."*

Monti put the book down.

"No, you needn't try to make an intelligent comment. I saw that you were listening. Now, this is what one of your English poets, Tennyson, made of it:

"So many a fire between the ships and stream
Of Xanthus blazed before the towers of Troy,
A thousand on the plain, and close by each
Sat fifty in the blaze of burning fire;
And eating hoary grain and pulse the steeds
Fixt by their cars, waited the golden dawn."

He closed the book, took off his spectacles and wiped them.

"That is the world you will see if you learn Greek—even if you get no further than Homer. Do you want to go there? Yes?"—for I was speechless—"I see you do. Well, here is a Greek grammar. Learn the alphabet and the declensions for next time, so that we can start reading at once. You know German, don't you? And what a declension is? Well then, be off with you. Oh, and get a lexicon, too; a small one will do, Homer's vocabulary is very limited—and a Latin dictionary. And here's a Latin grammar; you'd better learn those declensions, too, when you can. We'll start at the beginning on Thursday."

Before I had shut the door behind me, he was immersed in his own book again.

* Pascoli: Introduction to Epos, pp. xvii-xviii.

On one side, the plain shimmering with fires, with a serene, starry sky (the Trojans were in the open, before the great city, and a thousand fires were blazing and by each fire sat fifty warriors, and their horses stood close to the fires, champing the white spelt and oats between their teeth, and waiting for the dawn); on the other side the sea, murmuring and sighing. And when they reached the hut and ships of the Myrmidons, they heard a song. It was Achilles who, as he strummed on the strings of his stolen harp, was extolling his warriors' deeds.

Franco Ferrarotti, Leggere, Leggersi (Rome: Donzelli, 1998), pp. 12-13 (tr. Eric Thomson):

I confess unashamedly that I love books with a love that is sensual, physical. I love their dust. It penetrates everywhere. It causes itching of the lining of the nose and flows like powder under avid fingertips. I love to slowly caress the rough paper, that of the old editions, grainy, like 'cheese paper'. I hate glossy paper that smacks of the entertainment magazine for gentlemen sitting resignedly in the dentist's waiting-room.

I approach the book as I would a delicious meal. I walk around it. I sniff it. I love cutting the pages. It is a sort of first, furtive reading, a peek on the sly, here and there. The impatience of a pleasure deferred. I know it's a pleasure that is suspect in the eyes of ardent feminists. It suggests penetration, invasion of a territory that is not one's own. But reading means leaving one's self to return enriched, shaken, perhaps for ever torn from tranquil and stagnant torpor, awakened from the sleepwalking of everyday life.

I don't care for the books of the present day. I can scarcely abide their pages ready cut and geometrically aligned by the trimmer. Beyond these preferences, the truth is I love all books of every format, in octavo or pocket-sized, of every size and thickness, glossy, coloured, dressed-up like chocolates to win a lasting place in the shop-window, like seasoned prostitutes to catch the distracted eye of the occasional passer-by, not to look out of place next to toys and the gadgets of a world desperately seeking emotions it does not deserve and will not have. I love all books without distinction, bound and gold-tooled as well as the humble paperback, rich and poor. They are the friends to whom I owe everything.

The Italian:

Confesso senza pudore di amare i libri di un amore sensuale, fisico. Adoro la loro polvere. Si insinua ovunque. Provoca il prurito alle mucose nasali e scorre come cipria sotto le avidi falangette. Amo accarezzarne lentamente la carta ruvida, quella delle vecchie edizioni, granulosa, come «carta da formaggio». Detesto la carta patinata che sa di rivista di intrattenimento per signori che aspettano rassegnati nell'anticamera del dentista.

Mi avvicino al libro come a un pasto prelibato. Gli giro intorno. Lo annuso. Adoro tagliarne i fogli. È una sorta di prima, furtiva lettura, uno sbirciare di straforo, qua e là. L'impazienza di un piacere differito. So che è un piacere sospetto agli occhi delle femministe ardenti. Sa di penetrazione, di invasione di un territorio che non è proprio. Ma leggere vuol dire uscire da sé solo per rientrarvi, tornare dentro di sé arricchiti, scossi, forse per sempre strappati al torpore quieto e stagnante, svegliati dal sonnambulismo del quotidiano.

Non mi vanno i libri di oggi. Supporto male le loro pagine già ritagliate e geometricamente allineate col taglierino. Al di là di queste preferenze, amo in realtà tutti i libri di ogni formato, in ottavo o tascabili, di ogni spessore e dimensione, patinati, colorati, agghindati come cioccolatini per conquistarsi un posto e resistere in vetrina, attrarre come invecchiate prostitute l'occhio distrato del passante occasionale, non sfigurare accanto ai giocattoli e agli aggeggi di un mondo alla disperata ricerca di emozioni che non si merita e che non avrà. Amo tutti i libri senza distinzioni, rilegati con fregi in oro e in umile brossura, ricchi e poveri. Sono gli amici cui devo tutto.

Hat tip: Eric Thomson.

Thomas Gray (1716-1771), letter to Richard West (May 8, 1742):

You see, by what I sent you, that I converse as usual, with none but the dead; they are my old friends, and almost make me long to be with them. You will not wonder therefore, that I, who live only in times past, am able to tell you no news of the present. I have finished the Peloponnesian War much to my honour, and a tight conflict it was, I promise you. I have drank and sung with Anacreon for the last fortnight, and am now feeding sheep with Theocritus. Besides, to quit my figure (because it is foolish), I have run over Pliny's Epistles and Martial ἐκ παρέργου; not to mention Petrarch, who, by the way, is sometimes very tender and natural.

Simon Leys, The Hall of Uselessness: Collected Essays (© 2011; rpt. New York: New York Review Books, 2013), p. 463:

I dream of an ideal university that would deliver no degrees, nor give access to any specific occupation, nor award any professional qualifications. The students would be motivated by one thing only: a strong personal desire for knowledge—the acquisition of knowledge would be their only reward.

Hubert Schrade, German Romantic Painting, tr. Maria Pelikan (New York: H.N. Abrams, 1977), p. 80 (on Caspar David Friedrich):

In 1821 Vasily Andreyevich Zhukovsky, a Russian admirer of Friedrich's, suggested that they travel to Switzerland together. "You want to have me along with you," Friedrich replied, "but the I that appeals to you will not be along! I must be alone and must know that I am alone in order to see and experience nature completely. I must be able to give myself to that which is all around me, must be one with my clouds and rocks, in order to be myself. I need solitude for my dialogue with nature. Once I lived a whole week in the Uttewalder Grund, among rocks and pines, and during that time I did not see a single living human being. It is true, I wouldn't suggest this method to anyone—it was beginning to be too much even for me. A darkness enters the soul that one cannot seem to prevent. But that must prove to you that my company can't be agreeable to anyone."

Im Jahre 1821 schlug der von dem Künstler begeisterte Russe W.A. Joukowski Friedrich vor, mit ihm zusammen in die Schweiz zu fahren. »Sie wollen mich mit sich haben«, antwortete Friedrich, »aber das Ich, das Ihnen gefällt, wird nicht mit Ihnen sein! Ich muß allein bleiben und wissen, daß ich allein bin, um die Natur vollständig zu schauen und zu fühlen; ich muß mich dem hingeben, was mich umgibt, mich vereinigen mit meinen Wolken und Felsen, um das zu sein, was ich bin. Die Einsamkeit brauche ich für das Gespräch mit der Natur. Einmal wohnte ich eine ganze Woche im Uttewalder Grund zwischen Felsen und Tannen, und in dieser ganzen Zeit traf ich keinen einzigen lebenden Menschen; es ist wahr, diese Methode rate ich niemandem—auch für mich war das schon zuviel: unwillkürlich tritt Düsterkeit in die Seele. Aber gerade das muß Ihnen beweisen, daß meine Gesellschaft niemandem angenehm sein kann.«

Caspar David Friedrich (1774–1840),
Uttewalder Grund,
in Lentos Kunstmuseum, Linz, Austria.

Gustave Flaubert (1821-1880), letter to Louise Colet (August 13, 1846), tr. Francis Steegmuller:

To be stupid, selfish, and have good health are three requirements for happiness, though if stupidity is lacking, all is lost.

Être bête, égoïste et avoir une bonne santé, voilà les trois conditions voulues pour être heureux. Mais si la première vous manque, tout est perdu.

Donald Russell, in Christopher Stray, ed., Oxford Classics: Teaching and Learning 1800-2000 (London: Duckworth, 2007), p. 229:

The only official dealings I had with 'language and literature' were in preparing for prizes like the Hertford and Ireland. It is good to win something, of course, and good to come second, as I usually did; but the value of it, for me, lay in the excuse thereby provided for taking time off from a syllabus in parts uncongenial—I recall the Athenian Tribute Lists with quite peculiar distaste, and they were very fashionable, as Benjamin D. Meritt was in town—and luxuriating in a warm bath of Greek and Latin: Herodas or Apuleius, Plato or Plutarch, Statius or Prudentius. Desultory and unsystematic as all this was—there was a premium on jackdaw learning and the butterfly mind—it did, I think, encourage independence and exploration, and I certainly enjoyed it.

Hat tip: Eric Thomson.

Simon Leys, The Hall of Uselessness: Collected Essays (© 2011; rpt. New York: New York Review Books, 2013), p. 202:

[F]orgive this abundance of quotations, it is not pedantry—simply, the fact is that, for the last fifteen years, I have been frequenting books more than people; furthermore, why should we attempt clumsily to reinvent what good writers have better said before us?

Thomas Stanley (1625-1678), "E Catalectis Vet[erum] Poet[arum]," in Thomas Stanley: His Original Lyrics, Complete, in Their Collated Readings of 1647, 1651, 1657. With an Introduction, Textual Notes, a List of Editions, an Appendix of Translations, and a Portrait, ed. L.I. Guiney (Hull: J.R. Tutin), p. 81:

A small well-gotten stock, and country seat
I have, yet my content makes both seem great.
My quiet soul to fears is not inur'd,
And from the sins of idleness secur'd.
Others may seek the camp, others the town,
And fool themselves with pleasure or renown;
Let me, unminded in the common crowd,
Live, master of the time that I'm allow'd!

I can't find the original in Scaliger's Catalecta Veterum Poetarum, but I didn't look very closely.

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Update from Ian Jackson:

G.M. Crump's Clarendon Press edition (1962) of The Poems and Translations of Thomas Stanley notes (p.388):

Source: Catalepton VIII (Virgil), 'Villula, quae Sironis eras, et pauper agelle'.
  Scaliger's edition of P. Virgilii Maronis Appendix, &c., was published in 1552, 1573, 1575, 1595, and 1617. Stanley may have been working with one of these. Stanley's title also suggests, however, Andrea Torresano's Aldine Press edition, Diversorum Veterum Poetarum in Priapum lusus, Venice, 1517 and 1534.

Arrian, Discourses of Epictetus 2.17.1 (tr. W.A. Oldfather):

What is the first business of one who practises philosophy? To get rid of thinking that one knows; for it is impossible to get a man to begin to learn that which he thinks he knows.

τί πρῶτόν ἐστιν ἔργον τοῦ φιλοσοφοῦντος; ἀποβαλεῖν οἴησιν· ἀμήχανον γάρ, ἅ τις εἰδέναι οἴεται, ταῦτα ἄρξασθαι μανθάνειν.

Louis Block (1848-1901?), A Still Life of Antiquarian Books, sold for £2,990 at Christie's sale 5937 (April 7, 1998; London, King Street; British Watercolours; lot 139):


Louis Block (1848-1901?), 'In a Library We Are Surrounded by Friends', sold for £3,600 at Bonham's auction 14300 (June 6, 2006; London, New Bond Street; Fine British and Continental Watercolours and Drawings; lot 117):


Louis Block (1848-1901?), The Bibliophile's Desk, sold for £1,680 at Bonham's auction 15800 (June 17, 2008; London, Knightsbridge; British, Continental and Old Master Paintings; lot 96):


If you click on The Bibliophile's Desk, you can see an edition of Lucan. Enough detail is provided to identify it as M. Annaei Lucani Pharsalia: sive de bello civili inter Caesarem & Pompeium libri decem (Londini: ex officina Jacobi Tonson, & Johannis Watts, 1719).

Information about Louis Block is hard to find. See the entry "BLOCK, L." in Benezit Dictionary of Artists. Oxford Art Online. Oxford University Press (accessed July 30, 2013 at http://proxy.bostonathenaeum.org:2219/subscriber/article/benezit/B00020994):

L. Block exhibited from 1879 at the Royal Academy, the Suffolk Street galleries with the Royal Society of British Artists and the New Water-Colour Society, all in London.

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Ian Jackson writes:

Did you notice, in the same painting that shows the 1719 Tonson Lucan, that the open manuscript prints lines 552-3 from Book Two of Gay's Trivia?

Volumes on shelter'd stalls expanded lie
And various science lures the learned eye

Labels: books in art