“What is left for me, then, with other people so that they may listen to my confessions as if they would heal all my problems? We are a species desperate to know about other people’s lives but negligent in fixing our own. Why do those who do not want me to say who they are want to ask me who I am?
When they hear from me directly about myself, how can they know whether I speak truly when no one knows what moves another person except for the spirit that moves within them? Yet, if they hear about themselves from you, they cannot say, “The Lord lies.” Since, what is hearing about ourselves from you apart from knowing oneself? Truly, who understands this and says “this is untrue” except for someone who lies.”
(3) Quid mihi ergo est cum hominibus, ut audiant confessiones meas, quasi ipsi sanaturi sint omnes languores meos? curiosum genus ad cognoscendam vitam alienam, desidiosum ad corrigendam suam. quid a me quaerunt audire qui sim, qui nolunt a te audire qui sint? et unde sciunt, cum a me ipso de me ipso audiunt, an verum dicam, quandoquidem nemo scit hominum quid agatur in homine, nisi spiritus hominis qui in ipso est? si autem a te audiant de se ipsis, non poterunt dicere, “mentitur dominus.” quid est enim a te audire de se nisi cognoscere se? quis porro cognoscit et dicit, “falsum est,” nisi ipse mentiatur?
“This mob of causes offered by Plato and Aristotle includes either too much or too little. For if they count as a cause anything without which something cannot be made then they have included too few. They should put time among the causes; nothing can happen without time. They should include place among the causes, since if there is nowhere for a thing to happen, it certainly will not happen. They should include movement, since nothing happens nor stops without motion. No art happens without motion; no change happens.
But since we are looking for the first, general cause, this ought to be simple. For matter is simple too. Do we ask what the cause is? Well, it is the reason that creates. This is god. For those things you have reported are not a bunch of independent causes but they depend upon one thing that creates them. You suggest that form is a cause? A creator puts form on their work. Form is a part of the cause, but it is not the cause. A pattern is also not a cause, but it a necessary tool of the cause. Artists find a pattern as necessary as a chisel or a file–art can make no progress without these.
And yet non of these things are part of the art or its cause. You may say, “The intention of the artist compels him to make something, this is the cause.” True, this may be a cause but it is not the efficient cause, it is an ancillary one. These kinds are countless, but we are seeking the general cause. What those philosophers say is against their customary clarity: they claim the whole universe, the completed work it is, is a cause. Yet there’s a big difference between an outcome and its cause.”
Haec, quae ab Aristotele et Platone ponitur, turba causarum aut nimium multa aut nimium pauca conprendit. Nam si, quocumque remoto quid effici non potest, id causam iudicant esse faciendi, pauca dixerunt. Ponant inter causas tempus; nihil sine tempore potest fieri. Ponant locum; si non fuerit, ubi fiat aliquid, ne fiet quidem. Ponant motum; nihil sine hoc nec fit nec perit. Nulla sine motu ars, nulla mutatio est. Sed nos nunc primam et generalem quaerimus causam. Haec simplex esse debet; nam et materia simplex est. Quaerimus, quid sit causa? Ratio scilicet faciens, id est deus. Ista enim, quaecumque rettulistis, non sunt multae et singulae causae, sed ex una pendent, ex ea, quae faciet. Formam dicis causam esse? Hanc inponit artifex operi; pars causae est, non causa.
Exemplar quoque non est causa, sed instrumentum causae necessarium. Sic necessarium est exemplar artifici, quomodo scalprum, quomodo lima; sine his procedere ars non potest. Non tamen hae partes artis aut causae sunt. “Propositum,” inquit, “artificis, propter quod ad faciendum aliquid accedit, causa est.” Ut sit causa, non est efficiens causa, sed superveniens. Hae autem innumerabiles sunt; nos de causa generali quaerimus. Illud vero non pro solita ipsis subtilitate dixerunt, totum mundum et consummatum opus causam esse. Multum enim interest inter opus et causam operis.
“When it comes to my family, I will do what you report seems right to our friends. Concerning where I am currently, the epidemic is certainly already over and, even though it lasted a while, it didn’t touch me. Plancius, the most dutiful man, longs to keep me with him and detains me here.
I was hoping to stay in some deserted place in Epirus where Piso and his soldiers would never come, but Plancius holds me here. He posts that it will turn out to be possible for him to leave for Italy with me. Should I see that day and return to your embrace and my families and get you and myself back again, I will judge that a great profit of your commitment and mine.”
De familia, quo modo placuisse scribis amicis faciemus. de loco, nunc quidem iam abiit pestilentia, sed quam diu fuit me non attigit. Plancius, homo officiosissimus, me cupit esse secum et adhuc retinet. ego volebam loco magis deserto esse in Epiro, quo neque Piso veniret nec milites, sed adhuc Plancius me retinet; sperat posse fieri ut mecum in Italiam decedat. quem ego diem si videro et si in vestrum complexum venero ac si et vos et me ipsum reciperaro, satis magnum mihi fructum videbor percepisse et vestrae pietatis et meae.
“We talked about different things as one does at dinner, taking no matter to conclusion, but leaping from one thing to another.. Then we had a book read aloud by Quintus Sextius the father, a great man, if you trust me, and a Stoic, even if he denies it. Good gods, how much vigor and spirit in the man! You don’t find this in all philosophers–many with famous names have feeble writings. They propose, they dispute, but they don’t make it spirited because they lack it.
But when you read Sextius you conclude: “He is alive! He is strong! He is free! He is beyond a man and he sends me away filled with belief. I’ll tell you how I feel when I read his work: I need to call our every chance, to shout, “Why do you hold back, Fortune? Come on–see how I am prepared!” I put on the character of a man who seeks to test himself, some way to show his worth.”
Varius nobis fuit sermo, ut in convivio, nullam rem usque ad exitum adducens, sed aliunde alio transiliens. Lectus est deinde liber Quinti Sextii patris, magni, si quid mihi credis, viri et, licet neget, Stoici. Quantus in illo, di boni, vigor est, quantum animi! Hoc non in omnibus philosophis invenies; quorundam scripta clarum habentium nomen exanguia sunt. Instituunt, disputant, cavillantur, non faciunt animum, quia non habent; cum legeris Sextium, dices: “Vivit, viget, liber est, supra hominem est, dimittit me plenum ingentis fiduciae.” In qua positione mentis sim, cum hunc lego, fatebor tibi: libet omnis casus provocare, libet exclamare: “Quid cessas, fortuna? Congredere; paratum vides.” Illius animum induo, qui quaerit, ubi se experiatur, ubi virtutem suam ostendat,
“…..Sardis….
Often she turns her mind there
…[where she brought you ]….
Like a goddess best known
She was delighting especially in your song.
Now she stands out among the Lydian
Women like the rosy-fingered moon
when the sun is setting
and it outshines all the stars—
Its light pours over the salted sea
And equally over the much-flowered plains.
Dew drips with beauty
While the roses bloom alongside
The soft chervil and blossoming clover.
But while she wanders back and forth
She thinks so much of gentle Atthis with longing
And it weighs down her fragile thoughts.
She wants to go there….
…[a great sound of thoughts]…
How unwise it is to rival deities in lovely form…
…you have…
….desire….
….Aphrodite…was pouring nektar
From gold….with her hands….
Persuasion….”
“Just as a lash or a prod that immediately follows a stumble or a misdirection straightens out a horse and compels it to the right path, but if you annoy the creature and pull on the reins or flick the whip later on and at length, such an action seems more like torture than teaching because it seems to have some other purpose than instruction, so too a cruelty that is doled out at each stumble and dip and hammered home by punishment might barely render you humble and thoughtful and mindful of god because he makes no delay in the dispensation of justice in his governing of human affairs and passions.
But justice that comes upon evil people with a gentle step, slowly, and in her own time–as Euripides explains–seems more like luck than fate because of any lack of clear correlation, of timeliness, and good order. For this reason I can’t see anything good in those repeated words about the slow grinding of divine mills: it renders punishment imposed unclear and lightens the fears of the wicked.”
“You have buried someone you loved; seek someone else you can love. It is better to replace a friend than mourn one. I know that what I am about to add is extremely cliched, but I won’t avoid it just because many have said it. Whoever makes no end to grief intentionally, finds one in time. The most shameful cure for grief for a wise person is being worn out by sorrow. I would prefer that you give up on pain rather than it give up on you and, further, that you stop it as soon as possible, since even if you desire to keep it up, you can’t go on for long.
Our ancestors decided that a year is a long enough time for a woman to mourn, not so that they may weep that long, but for no longer. There was no limit given to men because no amount was considered right. Still, for all those women who could not barely be pulled away from a corpse, how many can you find whose tears outlasted a month?
Nothing inspires hatred as quickly as grief. When it is new, it finds compassion and draws people to itself; but once it becomes constant, it turns into a joke, and not without reason. It seems either faked or foolish.
I am writing these words to you even though I was the one who was so undone by weeping for my dearest friend Annaeus Serenius that I must include myself among the list of people whom sorrow defeated, against my wishes. Today I speak out against my action and I know that the reason I mourned so much was that I didn’t even suspect his death would come before mine. My only thought was that he was younger than me by a lot, as if the fates kept track of the order in which we were born!”
Quem amabas, extulisti; quaere, quem ames. Satius est amicum reparare quam flere. Scio pertritum iam hoc esse, quod adiecturus sum, non ideo tamen praetermittam, quia ab omnibus dictum est: finem dolendi etiam qui consilio non fecerat, tempore invenit. Turpissimum autem est in homine prudente remedium maeroris lassitudo maerendi. Malo relinquas dolorem quam ab illo relinquaris, et quam primum id facere desiste, quod etiam si voles, diu facere non poteris. Annum feminis ad Iugendum constituere maiores, non ut tam diu lugerent, sed ne diutius; viris nullum legitimum tempus est, quia nullum honestum. Quam tamen mihi ex illis mulierculis dabis vix retractis a rogo, vix a cadavere revulsis, cui lacrimae in totum mensem duraverint? Nulla res citius in odium venit quam dolor, qui recens consolatorem invenit et aliquos ad se adducit, inveteratus vero deridetur, nec inmerito. Aut enim simulatus aut stultus est.
Haec tibi scribo is, qui Annaeum Serenum, carissimum mihi, tam inmodice flevi, ut, quod minime velim, inter exempla sim eorum, quos dolor vicit. Hodie autem factum meum damno et intellego maximam mihi causam sic lugendi fuisse, quod numquam cogitaveram mori eum ante me posse. Hoc unum mihi occurrebat, minorem esse et multo minorem, tamquam ordinem fata servarent.
Roman wall painting of women gossiping. Getty Villa 96.AG.302
“For we can use pain as an instrument in healing only briefly since it is extremely violent. No one would be able to expel pleasure from the rest of the approaches, even if he wanted too—for this is present in eating, sleeping and also in baths, massages, and relaxation, and they help someone who is sick by wearing away what is foreign to the body with what is familiar and natural.
What kind of pain, what deprivation, or what toxin as easily and directly addresses a disease as when a bath happens at the right time or when wine is given to those who need it? Even food when it has arrived with pleasure immediately resolves all difficulties and sets everything right as when a clear day develops from a storm…”
SEG 42:212 Att. — Rhamnous — 4th c. BC — Forteresse, 69
“Death is life’s shared end for everyone. But you leave
Behind you pity for your age and a longing for your wisdom.
Your parents lost you when you were only twenty years old
And when you died they arranged a funeral for you instead of a marriage.”
“Those who want how busy they are to be an obstacle to their study of the liberal arts are kidding themselves. They imagine and exaggerate their obligations to keep themselves booked up. I have free time and I have it wherever I am because I am my own. I don’t surrender myself to business, but I merely lend myself to it and I don’t hunt reasons to waste time. And wherever I find myself, I work on my ideas and try to mull over something good for the mind.
When I spend time with my friends I don’t withdraw from myself nor do I delay with those whom some occasion or official state affair have brought to me. No, I spend my time with the best crowd–I send my mind to them wherever they are, in whatever generation they were born. I carry Demetrius, that best of men, with me. I leave behind those men draped in purple and chat with that guy, half-clothed. I admire him.
Why shouldn’t I? I think that he lacks nothing. Anyone can look down on everything but no one can possess everything. The best shortcut to wealth is by despising it. But our Demetrius lives not just as if he rejects everything, but as if he has surrendered everything for others to own. Goodbye.”
Mentiuntur, qui sibi obstare ad studia liberalia turbam negotiorum videri volunt; simulant occupationes et augent et ipsi se occupant. Vaco, Lucili, vaco et ubicumque sum, ibi meus sum. Rebus enim me non trado, sed commodo, nec consector perdendi temporis causas. Et quocumque constiti loco, ibi cogitationes meas tracto et aliquid in animo salutare converso.
Cum me amicis dedi non tamen mihi abduco, nec cum illis moror, quibus me tempus aliquod congregavit aut causa ex officio nata civili, sed cum optimo quoque sum; ad illos, in quocumque loco, in quocumque saeculo fuerunt, animum meum mitto. Demetrium, virorum optimum, mecum circumfero et relictis conchyliatis cum illo seminudo loquor, illum admiror.
Quidni admirer? Vidi nihil ei deesse. Contemnere aliquis omnia potest, omnia habere nemo potest. Brevissima ad divitias per contemptum divitiarum via est. Demetrius autem noster sic vivit, non tamquam contempserit omnia, sed tamquam aliis habenda permiserit. Vale.
