Laudator Temporis Acti

Horace, Epistles 1.1.41-42 (tr. H. Rushton Fairclough):

To flee vice is the beginning of virtue, and to have got rid of folly is the beginning of wisdom.

virtus est vitium fugere et sapientia prima
stultitia caruisse.

Roland Mayer ad loc.:

41 prima goes with uirtus ἀπὸ κοινοῦ; cf. Quint. IO 8.3.41 prima uirtus est uitio carere; it is stressed in order to encourage us to get that far at least, if no further (cf. 32). uirtus combined with sapientia will be found in Ulysses (2.17).

uitium fugere recalls a Platonic doctrine (Theaet. 176B), variously taken up by later writers (e.g., Cic. Off. 1.114 nec tam est enitendum, ut bona, quae nobis data non sint, sequamur quam ut uitia fugiamus; see Fortescue on Boethius, Consol. 1.4.26, p. 18). Quintilian praised this sententia for its vigorous expression; he reckoned that the prose formulation would have been either uirtus est fuga uitiorum or uirtutis est uitium fugere (IO 9.3.10).

42 stultitia )( sanus 8; it is ignorance of moral behaviour (Dodds on Plat. Gorg. 477B7 άμαθία).

caruisse 'to have got free of' (OLD 3). The perf. infin. may indicate that all have a measure of stultitia that has to be eradicated; it might, however, be regarded as a metrical convenience (17.5n.).