For though every department of liberal erudition, and philosophy most of all, has been my delight from my earliest manhood, yet this prepossession of mine grows upon me day by day, partly, I suppose, because my age is ripening for the reception of wisdom, partly because the times are evil, so that there is nothing else that can ease my mind of its annoyances.
nam etsi a prima aetate me omnis ars et doctrina liberalis, et maxime philosophia delectavit, tamen hoc studium quotidie ingravescit, credo et aetatis maturitate ad prudentiam, et his temporum vitiis, ut nulla res alia levare animum molestiis possit.
"A peculiar anthologic maze, an amusing literary chaos, a farrago of quotations, a mere olla podrida of quaintness, a pot pourri of pleasant delites, a florilegium of elegant extracts, a tangled fardel of old-world flowers of thought, a faggot of odd fancies, quips, facetiae, loosely tied" (Holbrook Jackson, Anatomy of Bibliomania) by a "laudator temporis acti," a "praiser of time past" (Horace, Ars Poetica 173).
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Saturday, February 04, 2023
The Consolation of Philosophy
Cicero, Letters to His Friends 4.4.4 (tr. W. Glynn Williams):