A fly sat on a wagon buzzing at the mule:
“You’re going so slow: why don’t you want to go faster”
Be careful or I will sink my sting in your neck!”
The mule answered, “Your words are not my master;
I fear this fool who sits at the front of my cart:
He holds me back with flicking whip
And pulls at my face with dripping reins as I start!
So screw off with your arrogant show!
I know where I need to dawdle and when I need to run.”
With this story it is therefore right to mock,
Whoever without action offers empty talk.”
Musca in temone sedit et mulam increpans
“Quam tarde es” inquit “non vis citius progredi?
Vide ne dolone collum conpungam tibi.”
Respondit illa: “Verbis non moveor tuis;
sed istum timeo sella qui prima sedens
cursum flagello temperat lento meum,
et ora frenis continet spumantibus.
quapropter aufer frivolam insolentiam;
nam et ubi tricandum et ubi sit currendum scio.”
Hac derideri fabula merito potest
qui sine virtute vanas exercet minas.
“This story allows us a chance to make a few overarching comments about the birth of the practice of criticism. And this also permits us to evaluate the nature of the recensions which were reportedly made in that period. For I don’t think that anyone will be surprised today that the Greeks of the time—who were by chance more men of genius than of learning,—even though they were completely estranged from the polymathy to which kings eventually provided ample time, that they were already starting to turn their attention to that art which is the collected sum of the various disciplines of literature and antiquity.
Indeed, all the foundations which would guide the ancients to the art of criticism already existed at that time. Among them I would put in first place the ancient method of preserving songs by only the use of memory; in the second, the errors and frauds perpetrated in ascribing authorship; and in the third, the many kinds of easy mistakes made by untrained hands in preparing the first manuscripts.
But even if this last case would precipitate a need for this art after many generations, anyone who is familiar with the Greeks will easily see that their genius would not have been able of declining so severely or so eagerly to such nitpicking concerns if their writings were only corrupted in the way that most books are. Let it stand as the singular fate of the monuments of Homer and his peers that in some sense they forced philology to be born—and that they did so even before the word for Critic or Grammarian was commonly spoken.”
Haec narratio nobis occasionem offert in universum dicendi nonnulla de ortu studii critici, ex quibus existimare liceat de conditione earum recensionorum, quae hoc saeculo offeruntur factae esse. Nunc enim nemo, puto, mirabitur, Graecos iam tum, quum prosperrima sorte sua ingeniosiores essent quam doctiores, et ab illa [corrupt text] cui reges deinde otium praebuerunt alienissimi, animum paullatim applicuisse ad eam artem, quae tota collecta est ex multiplici doctrina litterarum et antiquitatis. Etenim quae causae maxime perduxerunt veteres ad criticam artem, iam tum eaedem exstiterant omnes. In quibus primo loco posuerim modum illum conservandorum olim Carminum ope unius memoriae, proximo errores et fraudes in prodendis auctoribus eorum, tertio varios facillimosque lapsus rudium manuum in primis exemplaribus parandis. Sed etsi haec postrema causa eius- modi est, ut post aliquot saecula istius artis desiderium necessario fuisset allatura, tamen qui Graecos norit, facile intelliget, ad tam minutulas curas ingenium eorum nec tam mature-nec tanto studio potuisse descendere, si sola omni scripturae communia menda libros corrupissent. Maneat igitur, singularem fortunam Homericorum et supparum monumentorum extudisse quodammodo philologam criticen, idque etiam antea, quam nomen Critici aut Grammatici vulgo auditum esset.
D Scholia to the Iliad (5.385)
“Aristarchus believed it best to make sense of those things that were presented more fantastically by Homer according to the poet’s authority, that we not be overwhelmed by anything outside of the things presented by Homer.”
“Because I think to best to make sense of Homer through Homer, I usually show by example how he may interpret himself, sometimes in juxtaposition, sometimes in other ways.”
“The art of grammar is the experience-derived knowledge of how things are said, for the most part, by poets and prose authors. It has six components. First, reading out loud and by meter; second, interpretation according to customary compositional practice; third, a helpful translation of words and their meanings; fourth, an investigation of etymology; fifth, a categorization of morphologies; and sixth—which is the most beautiful portion of the art—the critical judgment of the compositions.”
“One could easily count the number of people who are able to understand all of Thucydides, and even these people need to rely on a commentary from time to time.”
Tzetzes, Introduction to the Scholia to Lykophron’s Alexandra
“I, Lykophron’s thick book, abounding in songs,
Was once obscure, possessing unseeable visions.
But now by means of Hermeian craft Isaac Tzetzes
Has set me free, once he loosed my well-woven restraints.”
“This sickness used to just afflict the Greeks, to discover the number of oars Odysseus possessed, whether the Iliad was written before the Odyssey, whether the poems belong to the same author, and other matters like this which, if you keep them to yourself, cannot please your private mind; but if you publish them, you seem less learned than annoying.”
Graecorum iste morbus fuit quaerere, quem numerum Ulixes remigum habuisset, prior scripta esset Ilias an Odyssia, praeterea an eiusdem essent auctoris, alia deinceps huius notae, quae sive contineas, nihil tacitam conscientiam iuvant sive proferas, non doctior videaris sed molestior.
Seneca, Moral Epistle 108
“But some error comes thanks to our teachers who instruct us how to argue but not how to live; some error too comes from students, who bring themselves to teachers not for the nourishing of the soul, but the cultivation of our wit. Thus what was philosophy has been turned into philology.”
Sed aliquid praecipientium vitio peccatur, qui nos docent disputare, non vivere, aliquid discentium, qui propositum adferunt ad praeceptores suos non animum excolendi, sed ingenium. Itaque quae philosophia fuit, facta philologia est.
Valerius Maximus, Memorable Deeds and Sayings, 7.6 ext 1
“Our time won’t last while I relate the native examples, since our empire finds its safety and growth not so much from strength of bodies as from vigor of our minds. Therefore, let Roman intelligence for the most part be put aside under silent admiration—instead we will turn to similar examples from foreign peoples.
Socrates, some kind of an earth-bound oracle of human wisdom, believed that nothing more should be sought from the immortal gods beyond asking them for good. This is because only they know what is helpful for each individual and we often pray for that which it would be better if we did not have. Indeed, would that the mortal mind be enveloped in the darkest shadows, since it so often spreads the blindest prayers into wide open error!
You seek riches which were the death of many! You desire honors which have ruined more than a few. You contemplate those very reigns that are often known to end in misery. You have reached your hand to glorious marriages which sometimes make homes shine while they shake others to the ground. So stop drooling stupidly over future causes of your troubles as if they are the most fortunate matters and entrust yourself entirely to divine will since those who are in the habit of easily giving good things can also choose them appropriately”
Tempus deficiet domestica narrantem, quoniam imperium nostrum non tam robore corporum quam animorum vigore incrementum ac tutelam sui comprehendit. maiore itaque ex parte Romana prudentia in admiratione tacita reponatur, alienigenisque huius generis exemplis detur aditus.
Socrates, humanae sapientiae quasi quoddam terrestre oraculum, nihil ultra petendum a dis immortalibus arbitrabatur quam ut bona tribuerent, quia ii demum scirent quid unicuique esset utile, nos autem plerumque id votis expeteremus quod non impetrasse melius foret: etenim densissimis tenebris involuta mortalium mens, in quam late patentem errorem caecas precationes tuas spargis! divitias appetis, quae multis exitio fuerunt; honores concupiscis, qui complures pessum dederunt; regna tecum ipsa volvis, quorum exitus saepenumero miserabiles cernuntur; splendidis coniugiis inicis manus: at haec ut aliquando illustrant, ita nonnumquam funditus domos evertunt. desine igitur stulta futuris malorum tuorum causis quasi felicissimis rebus inhiare, teque totam caelestium arbitrio permitte, quia qui tribuere bona ex facili solent, etiam eligere aptissime possunt.
Aeneas Sylvius Piccolomini, de Puerorum Educatione:
“‘Ordinary words’ are those which are worn out by common use, and we can use these safely. Cicero said that those words which were formerly hard are softened by use – in his own time, people needed no great store of boldness to say ‘urbane’ nor, in Quintillian’s lifetime, to say ‘piratical.’ Who among the ancients would have said, ‘scandal’ or ‘Hell’? But reading the Gospel has given us these. That saying of Horace has been proven,
‘Many words which have now fallen out of use will be reborn, and those which now occupy a place of honor will fall if it should be so decreed by common use, in whose power lie the judgment, law, and norm of speaking.’
‘Invented’ words are those which someone coins for himself, as we find in Horace ‘he enemies cities,’ that is to say, ‘he makes cities enemies.’ He seems also to have invented a word in another place, ‘he retarded the wings of flying fate,’ which means he delayed them. Servius says that it was formerly the custom of priests to be ‘emasculated’ so that they could no longer have sex. This word is formed from ‘ex masculo.’ But it is not for just anyone to invent new words. As Horace says,
‘It has been and always will be allowed to pull out a name with present fame. As the forests with their leaves fall away into the next year, and the first words fall, so the old use of words perishes and in the manner of youth, possess a certain bloom and vigor when they are new.’
The task is to be delegated to those who have already made a great name for themselves in speaking and writing, like Terence, who first wrote ‘obsequium’ and Messala, who invented ‘reatus,’ and Augustus, who thought up ‘munerarii.’ Those who are endowed with a more middling intellect will need, not to invent new words, but to use the old ones. Yet in all words, whether they be new or ancient, ours or foreign, direct or metaphorical, there will be no honor or praise unless they are well suited to the subject.”
‘Usitata’ sunt verba, quae communi teruntur usu et his tutius uti possumus. Cicero dicit, quae primo dura fuerunt, usu molliri, nec tempore suo satis audacter ‘urbanum’ dicebant, nec vivo Quintiliano ‘piraticam;’ at haec hodie trita sunt. Quis antiquorum vel ‘scandalum’ vel ‘gehennam’ dixisset? Sed ista nobis evangelica lectio tradidit. Hinc illud Horatii verum traditur:
Multa renascentur, quae iam ceciderunt, cadentque
Quae nunc sunt in honore vocabula, si volet usus
Quem penes arbitrium est et ius et norma loquendi.
‘Ficta’ vocabula sunt, quae sibi quisque noviter fingit, ut apud Horatium, ‘inimicat urbes,’ hoc est, ‘inimicas facit.’ Idem quoque verbum fingere videtur alio loco, ‘volucrisque fati tardavit alas,’ hoc est ‘distulit.’ Servius ait quibusdam herbis olim sacerdotes ‘emasculari’ fuisse moris, ut amplius coire non possent. Verbum est ‘ex masculo’ fictum. Sed non licet omnibus nova fingere verba. Quod enim ait Flaccus:
Licuit semperque licebit
Signatum praesente nota producere nomen.
Ut silvae foliis pronos mutantur in annos,
Prima cadunt: ita verborum vetus interit usus
Et iuvenum ritu florent modo nata vigentque.
Ad eos referendum est, qui iam orando atque scribendo magnum sibi nomen fecerunt, sicut Terentius, qui primus dixit ‘obsequium’ et ‘reatus’ inventor Messala, ac ‘munerarii’ excogitator Augustus. Qui mediocri sunt ingenio non invenire vocabula, sed inventis uti debebunt. In omnibus autem verbis, sive nova sint sive antiqua, sive nostra sive aliena, sive propria sive translata, nullus honos fuerit nullaque laus, nisi bene rebus accomodentur. Cumque duo sunt tantundem significantia, eo uti praestat, quod melius sonet et facilius intelligatur, ut ‘beatitudinem’ quam ‘beatitem’ potius dicas.
47.
“This is Rufus’ tablet: nothing could be more true. Where is Rufus himself? In the cathedral. What’s he doing? The same thing as on the tablet.” *
Haec Rufi tabula est: nil verius. Ipse ubi Rufus?
In cathedra. Quid agit? Hoc, quod et in tabula.
48.
“Rufus said, ‘I recall’ in his poem. The verse doesn’t – no, rather, Rufus doesn’t have a heart [cor].”**
Reminisco Rufus dixit in versu suo.
Cor ergo versus, immo Rufus non habet.
49.
“He wrote ‘I recall’ [reminisco] and thinks that he can speak Latin. He would read heart [cor] where co is written – if he had a heart.”
Qui Reminisco putat se dicere posse Latine;
Hic, ubi CO scriptum est, legeret COR, si COR haberet.
50.
“Rufus the professor was once invited to a wedding with (as it happens) a crowded party. In order to show everyone that he was learned, he pronounced this wish for the connubial consummation: ‘give birth to children of the masculine, feminine, and neuter gender.’”
Rufus vocatus rhetor olim ad nuptias
Celebri (ut fit) convivio,
Grammaticae ut artis se peritum ostenderet,
Haec vota dixit nuptiis:
Et masculini, et feminini gignite,
Generisque neutri filios.
*That is, Rufus is silent.
** These ‘cor’ epigrams make fun of Rufus’ solecism in writing ‘reminisco’ in place of the standard deponent form ‘reminiscor’.
“This is the mortal condition—we are born to face these chance occurrences and others like them so that we ought not even trust death when it comes to a human. We find, among other examples, so soul of Hermotimos the Clazomenian which was in the habit of wandering with his body left behind and after a long journey to announce what they could not know unless they were present. Meanwhile, the body remained half-alive until it was cremated by some enemies called the Cantharidae who, ultimately, stole from the returning body as if taking away a sheath.
We also know of Aristeas of Procennesus whose soul was seen alighting from his mouth in the image of a crow—along with the excessive fiction that accompanies this tale. I also approach the story of Epimenides of Knossos in a similar way: when he was a boy and tired out by heat and a journey he went to sleep in a cave and slumbered for 57 years. Upon waking, he wondering and the shape of things and the change as if it were just the next day. Even though old age overcame him in the same number of days as years slept, he still lived to 157 years old.
The gender of women seems to be especially susceptible to this ill because of the disruption of the womb—which, if corrected can restore proper breathing. That work famous among the Greeks of Heraclides pertains to this subject as well—he tells the story of a woman returned to life after being dead for seven days.”
haec est conditio mortalium: ad has et eiusmodi occasiones fortunae gignimur, ut de homine ne morti quidem debeat credi. reperimus inter exempla Hermotimi Clazomenii animam relicto corpore errare solitam vagamque e longinquo multa adnuntiare quae nisi a praesente nosci non possent, corpore interim semianimi, donec cremato eo inimici qui Cantharidae vocabantur remeanti animae veluti vaginam ademerint; Aristeae etiam visam evolantem ex ore in Proconneso corvi effigie, cum magna quae sequitur hanc fabulositate. quam equidem et in Gnosio Epimenide simili modo accipio, puerum aestu et itinere fessum in specu septem et quinquaginta dormisse annis, rerum faciem mutationemque mirantem velut postero die experrectum, hinc pari numero dierum senio ingruente, ut tamen in septimum et quinquagesimum atque centesimum vitae duraret annum. feminarum sexus huic malo videtur maxime opportunus conversione volvae, quae si corrigatur, spiritus restituitur. huc pertinet nobile illud apud Graecos volumen Hexaclidis septem diebus feminae exanimis ad vitam revocatae.
“Cato – in my opinion the perfect Stoic – believes those things which hardly receive popular approval, and is part of that school of thought which makes no effort to cultivate the flower of oratory and avoids drawing out an argument, but rather achieves its end by using little, pointed syllogisms. But there is nothing so hard to believe that it cannot be rendered probable by speaking; nothing so horrible, so tasteless, which would not shine and even be ennobled by a bit of oratory. Since this is my belief, I have acted even more boldly than Cato, of whom I speak. While Cato – in that peculiarly Stoic way – spurned oratorical ornamentation when speaking even of the greatness of the soul, on self-control, on death, on every praise of virtue, on the immortal gods, on the dearness of the fatherland, I have playfully rendered all of these doctrines into commonplaces, though the Stoics can barely prove them in their schools.
Because their doctrines are rather wondrous, and certainly contrary to universal belief (they are even called paradoxes by the Stoics themselves), I wanted to try to see whether they might be brought out into the light (that is, into the forum) and, so to speak, to see whether they might be proven, or whether school speech differs fundamentally from popular speech. I was all the more pleased in writing these out, because the beliefs which they call paradoxes seemed to me to be Socratic, and by far the most true.”
Johann Michael Rottmayr, The Suicide of Cato. (1692)
Cato autem, perfectus mea sententia Stoicus, et ea sentit, quae non sane probantur in volgus, et in ea est haeresi, quae nullum sequitur florem orationis neque dilatat argumentum, minutis interrogatiunculis quasi punctis, quod proposuit, efficit. Sed nihil est tam incredibile, quod non dicendo fiat probabile, nihil tam horridum, tam incultum, quod non splendescat oratione et tamquam excolatur. Quod cum ita putarem, feci etiam audacius quam ille ipse, de quo loquor. Cato enim dumtaxat de magnitudine animi, de continentia, de morte, de omni laude virtutis, de dis inmortalibus, de caritate patriae Stoice solet oratoriis ornamentis adhibitis dicere, ego tibi illa ipsa, quae vix in gymnasiis et in otio Stoici probant, ludens conieci in communes locos. Quae quia sunt admirabilia contraque opinionem omnium [ab ipsis etiam paradoxa appellantur], temptare volui possentne proferri in lucem [id est in forum], et ita dici, ut probarentur, an alia quaedam esset erudita, alia popularis oratio, eoque hos locos scripsi libentius, quod mihi ista paradoxa quae appellant maxime videntur esse Socratica longeque verissima.
“Fabius Rullianus who served as consul five times and had exemplified every feature of virtue and life, was not reluctant to go as legate to his own son Fabius Gurges in carrying out a dangerous and difficult war. Indeed, he went to war as nearly only a mind without a body since he was readier for a rest in bed than the work of battles. But because he considered it a great pleasure to follow a son’s triumph on horse when he had carried him as a little boy in his own triumphs, he seemed to be not a simple follower in that glorious parade but its author.”
Fabius Rullianus, quinque consulatibus summa cum gloria peractis omnibusque et virtutis et vitae <e>meritis stipendiis, legatus ire Fabio Gurgiti filio ad bellum difficile et periculosum conficiendum gravatus non est, paene ipso per se dumtaxat animo sine corpore militaturus, utpote propter ultimam senectutem lectuli otio quam labori proeliorum habilior. idem triumphantem equo insidens sequi, quem ipse parvulum triumphis suis gestaverat, in maxima voluptate posuit, nec accessio gloriosae illius pompae sed auctor spectatus est.
Giovanni Boccaccio, Genealogia Deorum Gentilium 1.3
“It is to be understood that there is not one simple meaning to these fictions; rather, this may be called polisenum, that is to say ‘of many meanings.’ The first sense may be considered through the outer surface of the fiction, and this is called the literal sense. Other senses are those which are signified through the surface, and these are said to be allegorical.
To make my point clearer, I will provide an example. Perseus, by a figment of the poetic imagination, was the son of Zeus who killed the Gorgon and then, victorious, flew away into the air. While this is read literally, the historical sense is offered up to us. If one were to search for the moral sense of the tale, it is a depiction of wisdom’s victory over vice and the approach to real virtue. But if we wanted to take the tale allegorically, it signifies the elevation of a pious mind to the celestial heights after it has spurned all worldly pleasures. Further, an anagogical interpretation would have it that the story represents the ascent of Christ to God the Father after overcoming the ruler of this world.
Even though these approaches may be called by different names, they can all be called allegory, as it often happens. The word allegory is derived from the Greek allon, which means alienum or diversum (different or diverse), and on that account, however many interpretations may be diverse in the historical or literal modes, they may all rightly be called allegory. Yet, I hardly have a mind to explain the stories which I present according to all of their particular senses or interpretations, since I imagine that it is enough to explicate one of many different senses, though on occasion perhaps more senses will be brought to the fore.”
sciendum est his fictionibus non esse tantum unicum intellectum, quin imo dici potest potius polisenum, hoc est moltiplicium sensum. Nam sensus primus habetur per corticem, et hic licteralis vocatus est; alii per significata per corticem, et hi allegorici nuncupantur.
Et ut quid velim facilius assummatur, ponemus exemplum. Perseus Iovis filius figmento poetico occidit Gorgonem, et victor evolavit in ethera. Hoc dum legitur per licteram hystorialis sensus prestatur. Si moralis ex hac lictera queritur intellectus, victoria ostenditur prudentis in vicium, et ad virtutem accessio. Allegorice autem si velimus assummere, pie mentis spretis mundanis deliciis ad celestia elevatio designatur. Preterea posset et anagogice dici per fabulam Christi ascensum ad patrem mundi principe superato figurari.
Qui tamen sensus etsi variis nuncupentur nominibus, possunt tamen omnes allegorici appellari, quod ut plurimum fit. Nam allegoria dicitur ab allon, quod alienum latine significat, sive diversum, et ideo quot diversi ab hystoriali seu licterali sint sensu, allegorici possunt, ut dictum est, merito vocitari. Verumtamen non est animus michi secundum omnes sensus enucleare fabulas que sequuntur, cum satis arbitrer unum ex pluribus explicasse, esto aliquando apponentur fortasse plures.
Giovanni Boccaccio, Genealogia Deorum Gentilium 1.3:
“Just as all people do not have the same appearance, so too are their judgments dissimilar. Achilles preferred war to peace, Aegisthus preferred idleness to war, and Plato pursued philosophy while neglecting everything else; Phidias sculpted statues with his chisel, and Apelles painted pictures with his brush. So, let me make no mention of other pursuits, a poet is delighted to veil the truth with fabrications. Macrobius, writing in his Dream of Scipio, seems to demonstrate the reason for the delight of the poetic art when he says,
I have already spoken about the other gods and about the spirit. Poets turn themselves to the fabulous not in vain and not so that they might offer delight, but because they know that an open exposition of everything everywhere is opposed to nature, which withdraws understanding of itself away from the vulgar senses of humans with a varied covering; so too she wished that her secrets should be handled by the knowledgeable through fables. Thus are the very mysteries of the fables are hidden away as in mines, but the nature of such things does not simply reveal herself naked to people who have attained even to this level; she reserves herself for the highest scholars who work with wisdom as a guide, who are conscious of the real secrets; everyone else must simply be content with less.
Thus writes Macrobius. Though much more could easily be said on the topic, it seems to me that this is a sufficient response.”
uti non equa facies omnibus, sic nec animorum iudicia. Achilles arma preposuit ocio, Egisthus desidiam armis, Plato phylosophiam omissis ceteris secutus est, statuas celte sculpere Phydias, Apelles pinnaculo ymagines pingere. Sic ut reliqua hominum studia sinam, poeta delectatus est tegere fabulis veritatem, cuius delectionis Macrobius super Somnio Scipionis scribens satis apte causam videtur ostendere dum dicit: De diis autem dixi ceteris, et de anima non frustra se, nec ut oblectent ad fabulosa convertunt, sed quia sciunt inimicam esse nature apertam undique expositionem sui, que sicut vulgaribus hominum sensibus intellectum sui vario rerum tegmine operimento subtraxit, ita a prudentibus arcana sua voluit per fabulosa tractari. Sic ipsa misteria fabularum cuniculis operiuntur, ne vel hoc adeptis nudam rerum talium natura se prebeat, sed summatibus tantum viris sapientia interprete, veri archani consciis contenti sunt reliqui. Hec Macrobius, quibus etsi multo plura dici possent, satis responsum arbitror exquirentibus.
