Wealth or Wisdom? You Can Lose Possessions…(More Seasonal Advice)

From the fragments of Theognetus, another poet so forgotten that he has no home on Wikipedia. But Athenaeus preserves a fragment (3.63)

“Theognetus is responding to these kinds of people when he writes in the Phantom or the Money-Lover:

‘Man, you’re killing me! You are packed full of little speeches
From the Stoa Poikile and you’re sick.
“Wealth is not any man’s possession, it is frost.
Wisdom is truly yours, it is ice, No one ever
Lost wisdom once he found it.” Fuck me!
What kind of a philosopher has god housed me with?
You learned your letters in reverse, wretch.
Your books have turned your life upside down.
You have philosophized nonsense to heaven and earth.
They don’t give a shit about your words.’

πρὸς οὓς καὶ Θεόγνητος ἐν Φάσματι ἢ Φιλαργύρῳ φησὶν ἐκ τούτων (IV 549 M)·

ἄνθρωπ’, ἀπολεῖς με. τῶν γὰρ ἐκ τῆς ποικίλης
στοᾶς λογαρίων ἀναπεπλησμένος νοσεῖς·
‘ἀλλότριόν ἐσθ’ ὁ πλοῦτος ἀνθρώπῳ, πάχνη·
σοφία δ’ ἴδιον, κρύσταλλος. οὐθεὶς πώποτε
ταύτην λαβὼν ἀπώλεσ’.’ ὦ τάλας ἐγώ,
οἵῳ μ’ ὁ δαίμων φιλοσόφῳ συνῴκισεν.
ἐπαρίστερ’ ἔμαθες, ὦ πόνηρε, γράμματα·
ἀντέστροφέν σου τὸν βίον τὰ βιβλία·
πεφιλοσόφηκας γῇ τε κοὐρανῷ λαλῶν,
οἷς οὐθέν ἐστιν ἐπιμελὲς τῶν λόγων.’