Adagia 2401–2500

Σαρδώνιος γέλως, A sardonic laugh. Said of a pretended, bitter, or mad laugh. Both the meaning and the source of the proverb are so variously described by authors that I fear this account of a 'sardonic laugh' cannot be read without arousing laughter, but we shall brace ourselves to relate a few points. Zenodotus in his Collected Proverbs quotes Aeschylus, who reported roughly as follows in his work On Proverbs: 'There is a people who inhabit the area of Sardon, a colony of the Carthaginians; it is their custom to sacrifice to Saturn old men who have exceeded the age of seventy, and to laugh and embrace each other while doing so. For they believed it was unseemly to utter lamentations at a funeral or to shed tears. This is how a feigned laugh came to be called "sardonic."' According to the same Zenodotus, Timaeus says that it was the custom of the Sardinians for sons to set parents who had reached a great age on the edge of a precipice or a pit in which they were to be buried, and then, felling them with cudgels, to knock them headlong into it. But the parents laughed as they died, reckoning this was a happy and noble death because their children, in killing them, had lost respect for them. There are some who say that a certain herb is found on the island of the Sards, called 'Sardinian grass,' rather like wild parsley. It has a sweet taste, but after it is swallowed it twists men's mouths in a grimace of pain, so that they die apparently laughing. This is what Solinus seems to have meant, and Servius the grammarian too when he was explaining this line from the Thyrsis of Virgil: 'Now let me seem to you more bitter than Sardinian herbs.' And the commentator of Lycophron, talking about the sardonic laugh, reports something quite similar, following Servius. Latinus Drepanus says in his Panegyric: 'So we put on calm faces, and, after the manner of those who have tasted the juice of Sardinian herbs and are said to laugh in death, feigned joys as we mourned.' And there are also some who think that a 'sardonic' laugh is so called 'because it opens and uncovers the teeth,' as the laugh of those who laugh insincerely usually does. And this is the source of that joke by the parasite of Plautus who complained that young people never laughed at what he said and would not even imitate dogs and show their teeth. And there is Apuleius: 'If you laugh perhaps with distended lips.' Homer described this sort of laugh speaking of Juno in the Iliad book 15: 'She was laughing indeed with her lips, but her clouded face shone not at all.' Consistent with this is what Aristophanes writes in the Peace: '[When your allies saw] you growing angry with each other and baring your teeth.' The image is taken from dogs for whom it is a sign of anger to bare the teeth. This is a habit, they say, in horses too, whenever they are about to bite: whence in common language nowadays they call this sort of laugh a 'horse laugh.' On the other hand, others consider it was the custom among the Sardinians that they should offer to Saturn all the handsomest of their captives and all the oldest who had passed their seventieth year, and that these should laugh as they died because this seemed strong and manly. The writer Clitarchus is quoted as saying it was a solemn custom at Carthage, when great vows were made, to place a child in Saturn's hands. A bronze statue would be made of this god, with hands outstretched. Beneath it was a furnace; this was kindled from below, and so the child, made to wriggle and twist by the heat of the fire, had the appearance of one who was laughing. Finally Zenodotus names Simonides too as the source of a strange story. For he says that Talus, a figure of a man made of bronze, before he arrived in Crete, landed in Sardinia, where he put not a few mortals to death. Since these showed their teeth as they died with an appearance of laughter, they gave rise to the proverbial expression. Several add that, being prevented from leaving Sardinia for Crete, he leapt into a fire, for he had a body of bronze, then held the Sardinians close to his chest and killed them. They died as it were in his embrace, and with lips distended by the heat of the fire, like men laughing. A ridiculous tale is told of this Talus. They say that he was fashioned out of bronze by Vulcan and sent as a gift for Minos to guard the island of Crete. However he had a single blood-vessel, and this extended from the top of his head to his heels. He travelled three times each day around the island, keeping watch.
It was thus that he prevented the ship Argo from putting into a Cretan port when it was returning from Colchis with Jason. But he was deceived by Medea and perished, as some say, by the poison she gave him, which caused insanity; according to others, she promised she would make him immortal and pulled out the nail fixed in the extremity of the blood-vessel. So he died as the blood and all the humours of the body consequently flowed away. Yet again, others report that he died when shot in the heel by Poias. Dioscorides stated in book 6, speaking of poisons, that there was a species of grass which some call ranunculus in Latin and batrachion in Greek; it is called Sardoan, or Sardonian, from the region in which it grows most abundantly. When eaten or drunk, it can cause madness, and gives the appearance of a smile by compressing the lips. This, he says, is how that proverb of sinister omen about the 'sardonic laugh' was born. Pliny too mentions this herb in book 25 near the end. Strabo, in book 11 of his Geography, writes that in Cambysena, which lies along the river Alazon, a certain species of spider is found which can drive some to death from laughing and others from weeping for the loss of their loved ones. Certain authors mention besides the tarcotella, whose bite is followed by death with laughing. And does not Aristotle say, in book 3 of On the Parts of Animals, it is recorded that in fighting the piercing of the diaphragm by a thrust appeared to cause laughter and that this happens because of the heat that the wound can produce. Zeuxis the painter and Chrysippus both died from laughing, the former when he was unable to stop laughing at the old woman he had painted, and the latter when he saw an ass eating figs. Cicero says in book 7 of his Letters to Friends, writing to Fabius Gallius: 'You seem to me to be afraid that, if we have him, we may have to laugh "with a sardonic laugh,"' meaning that, if Caesar were to gain power, they would be obliged to smile on and applaud many things of which they strongly disapproved. Lucian, in the Ass, has: 'Thus they spoke, laughing sardonically,' meaning an insolent and mocking laugh. In another place the same author says: 'But Damis, laughing with a sardonic laugh, caused even more irritation.' The expression seems to be used in the same sense by Plato too in book 1 of the Republic, when he writes that Thrasymachus, whom he portrays everywhere as very bitter and arrogant, 'laughed sardonically': 'When he heard these words, he spoke with a loud and very sardonic laugh.' Homer too makes mention of this laugh in some passages in book 20 of the Odyssey. He tells how one of the suitors, namely Ctesippus, attacked Ulysses, who was sitting in his house disguised as a beggar, with the hoof of an ox snatched out of the provision basket, and how Ulysses, turning his head away in good time, deflected the blow: 'And in his heart he smiled a right grim and bitter smile ...' The commentator Eustathius here points out that one who laughs a 'sardonic laugh' laughs only with distended lips and inwardly is tormented with anger or disgust. For the ancients called it a sardonic laugh every time someone not only laughed with contempt but also jeered; the expression comes 'from the distending of the lips.' This is more or less how people laugh who are planning among themselves to kill someone, like Ulysses when he was just about to murder the suitors, and as he decided on this in his mind, he laughed a certain, somewhat bitter laugh. In Hesiod, Jupiter laughs with a similar laugh when he is enraged with Prometheus because of the theft of fire. I have appended the verses, which are in the first book of the work entitled Works and Days:
He who gathers the clouds said to him in anger:
Son of Iapetus, by far in cunning and deceit
The one most skilled among all mortals,
You rejoice to have cheated me and to have stolen the fire;
Truly this shall be a great and cruel plague both to you and to posterity,
To whom I shall give as the price for the theft of fire an evil in which all
Will rejoice, at the same time embracing it to their own destruction.
Thus spoke the father of men and gods, and laughed.
The commentators understand a laugh as fateful in this way whenever a calamity determined by the fates threatens. Such was the laugh of the suitors that Homer describes in the same book that we referred to shortly before and quoted for support in another place:
The divine Tritonia roused loud laughter,
And numbed their barely constrained wits; and they
Laughed dementedly now with alien lips.
The pieces of meat they devoured were raw and bleeding.
Meanwhile their eyes were filled with tears, and lamentation
Overwhelmed their very spirits.
I believe we should take as 'sardonic' the laugh that Homer attributes to Ajax as he is about to fight in single combat in the Iliad, book vii: 'Just so huge Ajax sprang up, the bulwark of the Achaians, / With a smile on his grim face .. .' In certain very old commentaries on Hesiod, I have found an epigram, in which the saying about the 'sardonic laugh' is quite elegantly explained. This too, as is my practice for the less learned, I have rendered roughly into Latin:
There is a certain island called Iberian Sardinia,
Where a noxious weed grows.
It is called Sardinian, looks like the wild parsley,
But when it is eaten by imprudent people
The mouth is presently twisted and shows the likeness of a laugh,
Then death lays hold straightway,
With a simulacrum of a laugh. But there are those who say
There is a barbarous tribe of Sardinians
Who abduct their age-stricken parents,
Carry them off to rocky places and there put them to death
With stones and with clubs; these wretched folk
They thereupon throw down from steep rocks.
While this goes on, they laugh with godless jokes,
And heedlessly play at parricidal games.
This phrase is thought by others to mean rather
That those who are thus put to death laugh, because
They observe the folly of their children,
And the swift and fretful changes of the world.
According to Pausanias in his Phocians the island of Sardinia breeds snakes that are harmless. Further it is entirely free of plant poisons, except that it supports one fatal one which looks like parsley and which, though it grows near springs, does not infect the water of the springs; any who eat it die laughing. And this, he says, is where Homer and others after Homer derived the adage whereby they could say 'they laugh a sardonic laugh,' for those who gave a laugh 'in no healthy manner,' that is, one that was completely senseless. So, not unreasonably, the expression 'sardonic laugh' seems to be usable for the mindless laugh which occurs whenever someone laughs stupidly as evil threatens. For we read indeed that when Caius Gracchus, canvassing for the magistracy, had been defeated, he shouted to some enemies who were laughing most insolently, that they were laughing a sardonic laugh, not knowing into what great darkness they would be plunged by the measures he had taken. This story is told by Plutarch in his lives of the Gracchi, and in his essay 'On Superstition' also: 'Note therefore on these occasions that the man who believes there are no gods laughs with a mad, sardonic laugh.' One commentator of Hesiod interprets a sardonic laugh as 'broad,' that is, a full laugh, where someone laughs with his mouth broadly distended; I think they mean the same by 'jarring laughter,' that is, a discordant laugh. This interpretation is supported indeed by the etymology of the word itself, which I showed just above is because it opens and uncovers the teeth. Finally it will not seem entirely inappropriate that the expression 'sardonic laugh' could be applied to a sad and mournful laugh such as Homer attributes, in the Iliad book vi, to Andromache, as if it were the sign of a mind foreseeing the death of Hector: 'She clasped him to her fragrant bosom, / Laughing through her tears.' Eudemus the rhetorician, in his Miscellany of Rhetorical Sayings, says several authors agree that it may be used of an insolent laugh in which someone laughs disdainfully and contemptuously; whence indeed the proverb is derived: 'You mock me from your lofty height.' The same author adds that there is a kind of stone called the 'sardonic laugh.' Suidas writes that there is even a verb derived from the proverb, so that those who laugh sardonically are said to [greek] . Now I want to stop talking about the sardonic laugh, but before I do, I shall add that this adjective 'sardonic' is found in various forms in the classical writers. In Lucian and Cicero we read [greek], in Homer[greek], in Virgil sardous, in the commentator of Lycophron [greek], in Plutarch [greek]: 'If there is such a thing as a sardonic laugh in the mind.' Stephanus showed that [greek], and [greek] were used: 'However, not all these forms come from the same word. For it is from the island of Sardo or Sardon, which formerly had the name Ichnusa, that Sardonius, Sardous, and Sardonicus are derived. It is from Sardos, a city in Illyria, that [greek] originates' - whence, I suppose, with a change of [greek] to [greek], we have [greek] - 'From Sardis, a town in Lydia, we have Sardianos and Sardianicus.' From these points a conjecture comes to mind: in the Greek epigram which I have just quoted, we should read perhaps not [greek] 'mother of Iberians,' but [greek] 'mother of Illyrians.' Salvianus used the adage in his seventh book: 'You would think the whole Roman nation was sated somehow with Sardinian grass: it is dying and it laughs.'

This line of moralizing verse is famous among the Greeks: [greek], [greek] 'Prayers of the old, advice of men, deeds of youth.' Aristophanes the grammarian recalls this adage. Hyperides quotes it from Hesiod in his speech against Autocles, because the verse is thought to be by him. The meaning is clear enough in itself, that young people should of course be employed in action, because that age excels in physical strength. Men of middle age should be admitted in counsel because in their case, although their physical energy is somewhat lessened, their increased wisdom in the practice of affairs is valuable. Old people, being religious, are accustomed to pray for the best from the gods, and moreover no longer have either useful strength or sufficient constancy of mind through the weakness of age. In Euripides' Melanippus as quoted by Stobaeus: 'It's an old saying, deeds are the province of youth, / But mature people give the best advice.' The same is implied by Pindar when he says: 'The daring needed for cruel battles goes with youth.' And Homer, in the Iliad book 16, tells us that strength is needed in battle and in deliberations ability to speak:
Battles depend upon hands, but deliberations upon words.
There it is a matter of fighting, and harsh words are of no avail.
In Homer too Nestor is foremost in councils, but useless in battle. Plutarch, in the essay entitled 'Whether an Older Man Should Engage in Public Affairs,' says: 'And the state is best preserved when the advice of the aged and the spears of the young have supremacy.' In the speech against Ctesiphon, Aeschines affirms that it was provided in Solon's laws that the oldest should be the first to speak in deliberations. And it was formerly the custom among the Athenians that the public crier, when opening a debate to the floor, should pronounce these words: 'Who wishes to address the assembly from among those who have passed their fiftieth year?'

Σιγῆς ἀκίνδυνον γέρας, The reward of silence is safety. Aristides quotes this in his defence of Pericles from some poet from Cios. Plutarch, in his 'Sayings of Romans' attributes it to Augustus Caesar, who approved some advice of Athenodorus and added: 'The value of silence is that it brings no risk.' The complete verse seems to go like this: 'The reward of silence is the absence of risk.' Horace uses it in book 3 of the Odes: 'There is a sure reward for faithful silence too.' Nobody sins by keeping silent, but often by speaking. And this noble saying of Simonides was already a proverb long before it also became well known as a proverb among the Romans: 'For to keep silent does no harm; what harms is talking.' However Valerius Maximus, in book 7 chapter 2, attributed this saying to Xenocrates. He says: 'What of Xenocrates' most praiseworthy answer? When he responded with complete silence to the abuse of certain people and someone asked him why he alone restrained his tongue, he said, "Because I have sometimes regretted speaking, but never keeping silence."'

Εὐτυχία πολύφιλος, Good fortune has many friends. Very similar to one we have noted elsewhere: Τῶν εὐτυχούντων πάντες εἰσὶ συγγενεῖς 'To those who prosper all men are akin'; the meaning is too well known to need an interpreter. On the other hand, in adversity friends are few or none at all; Pindar in the tenth Nemean, says: 'The respect of friends is lost when a man falls into misfortune, and when things go wrong few mortals are loyal enough to be companions in trouble.'

Εὐήθει δάκτυλον μὴ δείξῃς, ἴνα μὴ τὴν παλάμην κατατίῃ, You should not show your finger to a fool, lest he devour your whole hand. No licence, however small, should be given to the foolhardy. They can harm you even in the most important affairs, if you entrust the least thing to them. This one too smacks of the common herd.

Εὔχου τὸ πλησίον ἔχειν, ἐπὶ πλέον δὲ τῇ χύτρᾳ, Wish that the neighbour has something, but that the pot has more. The most important is for you yourself to possess what is necessary. The next most important is to have a wealthy neighbour, from whom you can beg. It seems to be drawn from the common dregs.

Εχει καὶ ἡ μῦια σπλῆνα, Even a fly has a spleen. Very like that other one: 'And children have the nose of a rhinoceros.' Or again: 'There is gall even in an ant.' It smacks of the dregs.

Η κάμηλος ἐπιθυμήσασα κεράτων, καὶ τὰ ὦτα προσαπώλεσεν, While the camel was coveting horns, he lost his ears as well. This is suitable for people who run after exotic things and do not protect their own. Derived from the fable of the camels, who, through a spokesman, demanded horns from Jove. The god was offended by the silly demand and deprived them of ears too. This one it seems is also from Apostolius.

Ηρακλῆς καὶ πίθηκος, Hercules and an ape. Said of those who are completely incompatible. The ape's power lies in deceit, Hercules excels in strength. Very close to 'A camel to an ant.' There is a well-known story about the brothers Perperi, whom Hercules tied together and hung up from his club. It is said they were turned into apes.

Η μένοντα ἀποθανεῖν, ἢ νικᾶν, He must stay and conquer, or he must die. Usually said when it is felt for certain either that some business must be resolved or that one must die in the attempt. A figure of speech derived from the tradition of the Spartans, who went into battle with the intention of returning home conquerors or dying in defeat. There is a famous saying pronounced by a Spartan mother as she gave her son his shield: 'With this, or on this,' meaning, in the laconic Spartan way, you must bring the shield back or you must be brought back dead on it.

Θαλάττιος δ᾽ ὢν, μήποτε χερσαῖος γένου, If you are a seaman keep away from landsmen's affairs. This adage advises us not to change our condition, not even into something better. Indeed each one should maintain the kind of life into which he either seems to have been placed by nature, or has fallen by chance. The adage was borrowed from a fable of Aesop, which goes like this. A certain crab left the sea and began to feed in a field. There by chance he was spotted by a fox, and immediately seized and eaten. And so, on the point of death, he deplored too late his folly because, when he was a sea creature, he wanted to defect and join the party of the land animals. There is a similar fable about a wolf playing the flute and then, when attacked by dogs, bewailing the fact that from a butcher he had become a flute-player. Ermolao Barbaro, writing to Pico, reversed the proverb elegantly: 'When you are a landsman, you should not look to go to sea.'

Θύννου δίκην, Like a tunny fish. People are said to be looking like a tunny when they squint or peer sideways with one eye. Aeschylus is quoted by Athenaeus in book 7: 'Casting awry his left eye upon it, like a tunny' - for Aristotle states that tunny only look with the left eye, as Athenaeus quotes him here, although just before that, quoting the same author, he has said that it sees with the right eye and is half blind in the left. Pliny says, in book 9 chapter 15, that they have weak sight in both eyes, but see more with the right. The same verse is repeated from the same author by Plutarch in his dialogue 'On Comparing Land and Sea Animals.' He adds that these fish have such poor sight in the one eye, that as they swim towards the sea they hug the right bank, and as they come back the reverse. The adage can also be applied to those who scrutinize keenly and carefully. Persius says: 'As straight as if he is setting a ruddle cord with one eye.' And Aristotle says in Problems 3 and 4 of section 31 that he thinks this happens 'because the eyes arise from the same point' [in the brain]. The result is that, when one eye is closed, the force that drove both is bestowed on one, the more keen because the more concentrated.

Κύων ἐπὶ τὸ ἲδιον ἐξέραμα, A dog to his own vomit. This fits those who fall back into the same crimes, crimes for which they have already paid the penalty. There is a passage in the Epistle of St Peter in these words: 'For them the proverb has proved true: "The dog turns back to his own vomit, and the sow is washed only to wallow in the mire."' The figure appears to be taken from dogs who swallow again what they have vomited up, and pigs who run straight from the stream to the mud. The Hebrew author of Proverbs expresses the same idea: 'Like a dog that returns to his vomit is a fool that repeats his folly.' Peter was alluding to this passage, if I am not mistaken.

Κυνὶ διδως ἄχυρα, ὄνῳ δὲ ὀστέα, You are giving chaff to the dog but bones to the ass. Said when things are distributed the wrong way. For example if someone sends a gift of a literary work to someone who is uneducated, flowers or a sword or a belt to a scholar, a book to a soldier, or hunting dogs to a bishop. Such gifts are unwelcome for the good reason that they are not suitable. Sometimes they are given in order to insult.

[greek], To scare away the prey. Aristides, in his Pericles, quotes from Plato 'And so in this way, as he himself says, he disturbed the game.' Further, there is a passage of Plato in his Lysis as follows: 'What sort of hunter would he seem to you to be if, during the hunt, he disturbed the beast and made the capture more difficult?' It seems to be said usually when someone does not conceal sufficiently what he is plotting. In this way the animal, disturbed by the turmoil, usually becomes aware of the trap and escapes.

[greek], To walk a straight path. This is said of someone who never deviates from the honest path. Aristides in his Pericles: 'To proceed in an orderly manner, and keep to the right road, as the proverb says.' Philo in his 'On Humanity': 'For the public way, which leads to justice, this he had learned.' Plautus in the Casina: 'Now I'm on the right road at last,' and a little later: 'You are leaving the highway for the bypath deliberately.' The servant-girl is telling him, after he had imprudently blurted out the truth, to go back to the lie that he had started with.

[greek], Lay it down on the spot. Aristides in the Pericles: 'Drop this talk straightway now about the chatterers, the idle, and the fainthearted, O Plato, lest perchance some other god should raise up the Trojans.' The scholiast indicates this is a proverb taken from victors who prevent the conquered opponent from escaping by any means, but demand that he offer grass on the spot, acknowledge the victor, and pay for the prize of victory. It will be used whenever we order something to be shown immediately and without delay, either proof of what someone has said, or a promise, or a sample of craft in which someone boasts of his ability. It is used in Plato too.

[greek], Close tight your doors, any who are unconsecrated. The allusion is to Orpheus, from whom this verse is quoted: [greek] I shall speak to those for whom it is lawful to hear; you, the unconsecrated crowd, / Close your doors ...' He commands that profane people should put a door on their ears, so that none of the secret words may enter. Aristides in his Pericles: 'I speak these things among those for whom it is lawful to hear, for the profane are of no account at all.' It will be appropriate to use at times when we want to indicate that we are about to speak of difficult and arcane matters. This is what Horace was thinking of when he wrote in his Odes:
I hate the vulgar crowd and hold aloof;
Take care what you say, for I, priest of the Muses,
Sing songs not heard before
To virgins and young boys.
And Ovid:
Let a propitious tongue speak which thinks no more of my labours,
For mine, I think, has forgotten how to utter auspicious words.
Before a sacrifice the public crier would order the populace to 'be favourable with your tongues,' that is, to speak words of good omen, whence faventia is also said for 'good prognostication.' Then there is Seneca, speaking of Philosophy: 'Worship her too like the gods, and her teachers like priests, and speak favourably whenever mention of sacred scriptures occurs. This word favete is not, as many think, derived from favor "good-will," but commands silence, so that a sacred rite can be carried through without being hindered by any ill-omened voice.' However, it will appear rather more witty if it is used ironically, as for example if someone who is about to recite some sophistic Scotist quibblings announces them thus: 'Close tight your doors, any who are unconsecrated.' Lucian used the expression in this way more than once.

'[greek], Cord to rope. 'You are joining' is understood, or 'You are rendering cord for rope'; said when someone repeats the same things or makes self-evident comparisons. It is related to 'You join thread with thread,' as when someone adds lie to lie, fraud to fraud, triviality to triviality.

[greek], Salt and a bean, understanding proposuerunt 'they set out' or any other word more appropriate to the context. Diogenianus informs us that it was said of those who pretended to know something that they did not know, and the proverb arises from the fact that formerly soothsayers set out salt and a bean. Because I was in some doubt whether or not this was different from the one which I noted in the first chiliad, I thought it should be repeated here, for I find it quoted in this form in some old copies of the Greek writers.

[greek] is what the Greeks say, in a proverbial metaphor, for 'to slip out,' or 'evade.' Aristophanes in the Birds: 'To be sure, among us there is no shame in evading snares.' It is derived from birds who often escape from nets or snares; for they say the perdix 'partridge' is particularly clever at escaping from the hands of the fowlers. On this subject it is well to set out here the words of Aristotle himself which are in book 9 of the Nature of Animals:
And they do not lay their eggs and incubate them in the same place, lest
anyone should notice that they have been sitting for a rather long time in the
same place. Further, when someone comes upon a nest during a hunt, the
partridge throws herself at the feet of the hunter, just as if she intended to
be caught, and in this way attracts him towards herself, making him think he
can capture her, until the chicks can escape in the interval one by one. When
this is achieved, she flies away and calls the chicks to herself.
That is what Aristotle has to say. And I shall be happy to add to this passage what Plutarch writes along just the same lines in the book he entitled 'Whether Land or Sea Animals Are Cleverer':
But another kind of cleverness is shown, along with love of their young, by
partridges. For they accustom their young, while they are still flightless, to
lie flat on their backs holding a lump of earth or some covering of straw over
their bodies, and thus covered to remain hidden, whilst they themselves draw
the hunter off somewhere else by the following deception. They attract him
towards themselves, flying in front of his feet and continually keeping a little
ahead of him, offering hope of being caught only until they draw him away
from the chicks.
From these words, I think, it is clear enough what is meant by [greek]: truly, to escape by the art of the partridge. At the same time, there is an allusion to a certain notably dishonest shopkeeper, who was given the name Partridge because he limped. Aristophanes recalls him in the Birds.

A 'threadbare present' is what Cicero, using a doubtless proverbial figure, called a mean present, the cheapest sort, such as rich people were accustomed to send often to their plebeian friends. This is what he writes to Dolabella in book 9 of his Letters to Friends: 'The little speech on behalf of Deiotarus, that you were asking for, I had with me - though I did not think I had - and so I have sent it to you. I would like you to read it as a meagre, poor example, not really worth the writing. But to an old guest and friend I wanted to send a threadbare little present, of coarse material, such as his own presents are wont to be.' Servius shows that the 'levidensa' is a poor kind of garment, of loose thin weave. At one time garments were among the principal presents given to guests. Hence in Juvenal too someone complains that he is sometimes given garments of coarse hair and bad colour: 'And ill combed by the Gallic weaver.' In like manner Marcus Tullius calls his undeveloped, unpolished speech a 'present of a threadbare garment.' This can be applied nicely to the small present or trivial service, offered quite unwillingly and thoughtlessly, to some plebeian friend. This is quite different from [greek] 'A tunic Pellene-style,' and [greek] 'Syloson's cloak.'

Marcus Tullius in book 9 of his Letters to Friends, writing to Varro, quotes a verse - from which poet I do not yet know. Even nowadays his aphorism is very commonly repeated among ordinary people. He says: 'Dolabella is coming. I think he will be my teacher: [greek] "Many pupils excel their teachers."' This can be adapted to various uses; perhaps in the plain sense, for example that it quite often happens that the pupil surpasses in learning the one from whom he learnt his letters or some skill. Or jokingly when we want to imply that someone who was a teacher of deceit is the victim of dishonesty; for example, if someone is cheated by the person to whom he had once demonstrated ways and means of deception. Or when someone of lower class and condition has more power than one who is thought to be the master not the servant.

'[greek], The pillars of Hercules. They were proverbial in former times, as the scholiast of Pindar shows, for it used to be said popularly, 'The regions beyond Gades are inaccessible.' By this they meant that beyond the pillars of Hercules there was nowhere further to go. Hercules is said to have placed these pillars there when he was seeking the cattle of Geryon, as if that point was the extreme end of the world. Pindar in the Nemeans: 'There is nowhere to go further west beyond Gades.' And in another passage: 'But if the son of Aristophanes, being fair to look upon and doing deeds that befit the fairness of his form, embarked on the highest achievement of manly prowess, he cannot easily sail further across the trackless sea beyond the pillars of Heracles, which that hero and god set up [as farfamed witnesses] of the furthest limit of voyaging.' He means that the son of Aristophanes, having joined illustrious deeds to exceptional beauty, has achieved the highest glory, which he cannot surpass. For if anyone should seek further glory, it would be as if someone should try to go beyond the pillars set up by Hercules. Again, in the third Olympian: 'Now reaching by his deeds of courage right to the extreme limits, Theron arrives from his home at the pillars of Hercules. What is beyond, to the wise as to the foolish, is inaccessible.' In an exactly similar way Gregory of Nazianzus used it in his Monodia, meaning that Basil had reached such a point of perfection that human nature was debarred from going further. Heraclides Ponticus, in his Allegories of Homer, thinks that bad interpreters of the poems of Homer should be thrust 'beyond the outermost pillars of Hercules and the inaccessible sea of Oceanus.'

A person was said proverbially to be 'crystal-gazing' if he offered nothing certain, brought no immediate gain, but only kept making promises day after day. Thus, in Terence's Phormio, when the young man, Phaedria, promises Dorio, the pimp, that he will give him money and says, 'Don't you believe me?' Dorio replies, 'Crystal-gazing!' Sannio too in the Adelphoe: 'But I am talking like a crystal-gazer.' The word is derived from soothsayers who predict what will happen. But of future things there is no certain knowledge, as is elegantly stated by Pindar:
Knowledge of future things is wrapped in darkness,
But for mortals many things will come to pass beyond their hopes.

For my part I think this expression too, used by Horace in his Art of Poetry, is to be counted as a proverb, 'A buyer of chickpeas and nuts,' meaning the most humble sort of man, someone of the lowest class: 'For people with horses, fathers, and substance take offence and do not greet with equanimity, or reward with a crown, anything the buyer of cracked chickpeas and chestnuts recommends.'

Plautus' expression in the Curculio looks like a proverb too: 'No one stops anyone from walking on the public road.' By this they mean that public property is for the use of everyone equally, and that what the public law allows is not to be imputed to anyone as a crime. Plautus gave a somewhat disgusting turn to it, namely to using the services of a prostitute selling herself in public. It seems to have been formed in imitation of the Pythagorean precept which commands us [greek] 'To walk by the public way,' or the opposite, [greek] 'Not to walk in the public highway.' Flaccus seems to me to be harking back to this when he says in his Art of poetry:
You will gain private rights on public property if
You do not linger on the banal and beaten path
Or try to translate word for word .. .

Among the proverbs which are taken from writers' allusions, I think I should not pass over in silence one from Thucydides that Lucian used in his False Prophet: 'And in the words of Thucydides "Here beginneth the war."' This can be adapted to various uses, either when we mean girding ourselves to begin some business, or when we imply that something has generated dissension and unrest has broken out. It was to the same passage in Thucydides, no doubt, that Aristophanes alluded in the Acharnians: 'And hence the beginning of the war.' And he repeats this word [greek] in this passage quite often to make it clearer that he has made the allusion for a joke.

[greek], Futile advice from futile people, and [greek] , Useless ideas of useless people. Said when someone is foiled in his hopes; related to [greek] 'A fool says foolish things.' It is said to have arisen from an actual event: Archias demanded from Demetrius a promise of five hundred talents to betray Cyprus; when the affair was discovered, he snatched a rope from those who were pitching tents and hanged himself. To be found in the Greek Collections.

[greek], You are a poor provider, after the manner of foster mothers indeed. I found this in some very ancient Collected Proverbs that some attribute to Plutarch. It can be found, however, in the Knights of Aristophanes who, in addition, explains the metaphorical sense with these lines:
You are a poor provider, after the manner of foster mothers indeed.
For you chew it and put a little in his mouth,
But you yourself gobble at least three times more food than he does.
So this will be suitable for people who give a small share of their profit to their associates; or those who administer other people's property and so divert the greatest part to their own uses, which is what the common run of guardians do nowadays too.

[greek], An Amphictyonian assembly. Said of crowded meetings of important people. Derived from the meeting of the Greeks, which was formerly very famous, called the Council of the Amphictyons. Either it was named after Amphictyon son of Deucalion, who is said, when he came to power, to have called the Greek peoples together; the authority for this is Theopompus in his Histories book 8, supported by Pausanias in his Phocians. The peoples who used to meet in this council, I may add, were twelve in number: the Ionians, Dorians, Perrhaebians, Boeotians, Magnetes, Achaeans, Phthians, Malians, Dolopians, Aeneans, Delphians, and Phocians. Or the name Amphictyons, 'surrounding peoples,' was given because they came to this council from all parts of Greece, as Anaximenes and Androtion say in Pausanias' Description of Greece in the passage I have just pointed out. Here in fact many other things worth reading on this subject are related, if anyone perchance should seek them. I think this is sufficient for the explanation of the proverb. The adage would be wittier if turned ironically to apply to an assembly of ignoramuses who think nevertheless that they are Solons.

The mime Publianus too, if I am not mistaken, is well known for an image which is certainly proverbial: 'Even a single hair has its shadow.' The smallest thing can give pleasure, the slightest fault can do harm.

[greek], Xenocrates' scrap of cheese. Said of food which lasts a long time before it is finished. However nothing prevents us from transposing it to other things too, such as clothing, a book, small change, or anything like this which someone uses so sparingly and carefully that it lasts as long as possible. The adage is derived from the astonishing frugality of the philosopher Xenocrates. It is told that he often threw out food because it had already gone rancid, and it happened not infrequently, when he wished to open a wine-jar, that he would find the wine had already turned sour. Therefore the proverb will be used appropriately of certain mean types who have this habit of keeping every sort of food until it is rotten, as if it is a crime to enjoy pure and wholesome things. The adage is recorded in Stobaeus' Collectanea.

We say 'With open breast' of anything which comes passionately, from the heart, with no pretence, as if the inmost parts of the soul were open to view. Marcus Tullius in his book On Friendship: 'In this, unless you see, as they say, an open breast, and show your own, there is no trust.' And the younger Pliny writing to Fabatus: 'The letters that you have written to me, as you say, with open breast, you command me to forget. But there are none that I remember with greater pleasure.' The phrase is an allusion to the words of Momus, who is said to have wanted to make openings in men's breasts so that what was hidden in those cavities could be examined. Persius in his fifth Satire: 'So that I may proclaim with a clear voice how firmly I have planted you in the depths of my heart, and so that these words may reveal everything that lies hidden and ineffable in my soul.' Likewise Phoebus in Naso:
Behold, look at
My face, would that with your eyes you could pierce my breast,
And understand the father's cares that are within.

'To reach the chalk mark' is said for reaching a goal, and an end. This has a proverbial quality when it is turned to something other than the human body. Marcus Tullius On Friendship: 'As you may be able to live with your equals, having been, as it were, sent off from the starting boxes with them, so you may be able with these same people, as the saying is, ad calcem ... pervenire "to reach the goal." ' And the same author On Old Age: 'Nor would I wish, having as it were run the whole course, to be called back to the starting boxes from the line.' To this kind are related the following: 'Right up to the call for applause,' that is, 'Up to the very end.' The same author in the same speech: 'Let him win approval for whatever part of the play he appears in; and it is not for the wise man to continue right up to the call for applause.' Again, in another passage: 'Those who have put these to noble use seem to me to have played through the drama of life and to have avoided collapsing in the final scene like inexperienced actors.' Yet again elsewhere in the same work: "The final act is neglected, as if it were by a careless poet.' However, I have noted this sort in another place.

'[greek], War is the father of all things. Lucian tells us in his essay How History Should he Written that this was uttered by way of a proverb: 'Better still, they are all a Thucydides, a Herodotus, a Xenophon to us. So much so that the saying would seem to be true that [greek] "War is the father of all things" since it produced so many writers at a single stroke.' It was spoken as a proverb therefore, because war is the cause of the renewal of all things, so that every thing seems to be born from it. But some may prefer to relate it to the statement of certain philosophers who said that everything is generated by strife.

[greek], The doors of Phanias. Eustathius, on the Odyssey book 24, shows that this was said of those who pretend they have accumulations of wealth which do not exist. Derived from a certain Phanias who created a false reputation for himself as having great store of wealth hidden in his house. I have mentioned 'The doors of Phanias' elsewhere in the proverb 'Phanus' front door.' Scholars will decide whether that is the same as this one or not.

'[greek], To slip through the net. Eustathius, writing on the third book of the Iliad, shows that this was used as a proverbial figure. The metaphor is based on fish which escape from the nets, or slip off the hook. For nets are called Una by the Romans too, as in Maro: Humida lina trahunt 'They drag their wet nets.' Some fish have a real innate ability to slip out of the mesh of nets, as Oppian tells us in his stylish account of the grey mullet. But since the author has not been published at all so far, it is better to give the text of the poem:
When the grey mullet is caught in the rippling mesh,
It is well aware of the skill and guile by which it may escape;
It shoots upward, striving with all its might
To rise straight up with a rapid leap,
Its whole body flashing up to the tops of the waves.
And luck favours skill, for often, jumping over the corks
To which the topmost strings are tied and the cords of the net,
The impudent fish slips away escaping its dark fate.
But if from its first upward leap it falls back again into the nets,
In anguish it makes no further effort to fight,
No more vain leaps, but learning from its trials
It ceases to torment itself and rises up no more.
He records in the same way the tricks by which many other fish escape when caught; but it would take too long to set forth all the rest. The poet Claudian's account of the torpedo 'electric ray' is amusing to know: how, when caught on the bait, it can get away by the power of the poison that it sends through the line and the rod all the way to the fisherman's hand. The poem goes like this - and why should I not set it out, since it is so neat and so witty?
If incautiously it takes a bait that hides the bronze hook
And feels the pull of the curved barbs,
It does not swim away nor try to pluck it out with vain biting;
But cunningly moves closer to the dark line and, though a prisoner,
Remembers its power and emits from its poisonous veins
A deadening shock which spreads far through the water.
The power of the poison creeps up the line and leaves the sea,
To overcome the fisherman despite his distance. The fearful horror
Rises from the deep waters and climbing up the hanging line,
Jumps over the knots of the cane rod with its mysterious coldness,
And in the very moment of victory congeals the blood in the captor's hand.
The fisherman casts away the dangerous burden
And throws away his rebel prey, returning home disarmed without his rod.
The scholiast of Aristophanes believes the expression is derived from birds. Persius' fifth Satire has a very similar figure: 'So that you do not want to thrash about or gnaw at the tight-drawn nets.'

[greek], To talk Egyptian is what astute liars were said to do. It comes from the customs of that people. Theocritus in the Syracusan Women: 'No villain wounds / Or harms, creeping up with Egyptian cunning.' On Egyptian habits we also have this witness from Aeschylus that I have noted elsewhere: 'The Egyptians are astonishing at heaping up contrivances.' This proverb is referred to by Synesius in his Eulogy of Baldness. However, [greek] is sometimes taken to mean 'to set fire to,' as in this poem: 'Burning Phoebus sets your complexion afire / With his fiery flames.'

[greek], Not one bite left; that is, not even a small amount. Eustathius, in his commentary on the third book of the Odyssey, quotes this line by Eupolis: [greek]'Not a morsel is left of my possessions.' For [greek] means in Greek what we call, in the vernacular more than in Latin, a morsel; it comes from the verb [greek], which is 'to eat greedily.'

[greek], A king or an ass. That is, either victor or vanquished. Similar to [greek] 'Either three sixes or three ones.' Eustathius, commenting on book 6 of the Odyssey, shows that the metaphor is drawn from people playing with a ball; they called the winner the king and the loser was dubbed the ass. Plato in the Theaetetus: 'Anyone who makes a mistake will sit idle, the ass, as they say in a ball game; but the one who makes no mistake and wins, let him be our king.' Julius Pollux, in book 9 of his Vocabulary, mentions four types of ball game: the first is called [greek], the second [greek] or [greek], the third [greek], and the fourth o[greek]. The last of these, the one relevant to the proverb, he describes in these terms:
But the game of Urania is played like this. One person, bending backwards,
sends the ball skywards. For the others, it was a competition to snatch it away
before it fell back to the ground, which is what Homer seems to mean when he
refers to the Phaeacians. Clearly, however, when they threw the ball against
the wall, they counted the number of bounces. The one who lost was called
the Ass and did whatever was commanded. On the other hand the winner was
the King and gave the commands.
This is what Pollux has to say. I add the passage which he quotes from Homer's Odyssey book 8, as follows:
This with a whirl he sent from his stout hand, and the stone hummed as it
flew; and down they crouched to the earth, the Phaeacians of the long oars,
men famed for their ships, beneath the rush of the stone. Past the marks of
all it flew .. .
Not unlike this form of the proverb, seemingly, is another which is in Plautus' Carthaginian: I am king, if I can entice that man to me today.' It will be appropriate to use it when we mean taking a risk which makes us winners or losers.

[greek], To plot a journey by the stars. Said of those who inquire into something that is difficult to investigate in other ways, using certain small signs and conjectures. Eustathius, expounding the fifth book of the Odyssey, tells us that it fits those who are setting out on a long and remote journey. The figure is borrowed from sailors who estimate their course on night voyages by observing the stars, just like Ulysses in Homer's Odyssey, book 5:
He sat and guided his ship skilfully with the steering oar,
Sleep never overcame his tired eyes.
But he watches the Pleiads, and late-setting Bootes,
And the Bear, which is also called the Plough .. .
Marcus Tullius alluded neatly to this in book 4 of the Academic Questions when he says the completely wise man is not led by opinions, but holds firmly to the truth, and does so led and guided by the Little Bear. This constellation, being carried round in a smaller orbit since it is closer to the pole, shows the way more surely, even if it is less bright. But the man who has not yet achieved complete wisdom and who, meanwhile, embraces at every moment what seems probable as he wanders, follows the Great Bear, which, although brighter and easier to see, is yet not such a certain indicator of the way because it follows a wider orbit and goes further away from the pole or axis of the world. These are Cicero's words:
Nor am I such that I never accept anything false, never agree, never have an
opinion. But we are asking about the wise man. I myself on the other hand am
very inclined to conjecture; for I am not a wise man, and I direct my thoughts,
not by the Little Bear - 'In whom up in the heavens the Phoenicians put their
trust as a night-time guide,' as Aratus says, and steer the more straightly
because they hold to her 'Who goes around the inner course and the short
orbit' - but by the Great Bear and the brightest northern stars, that is, by
arguments of the broader sort, not worn thin by filing down. This is why I
may make mistakes and wander rather far from the point.
I know I have mentioned this proverb elsewhere, but since I have found some passages worth knowing, it seemed right to come back to it here.

There is a verse of Persius which has the appearance of an adage: 'You could sooner tune a harp for a lanky horse-boy.' This will serve when we want to indicate that someone is too unsuited to learning a subject or doing a job. For a sambuca is a musical instrument, which is in no way appropriate for a horse-boy. However Athenaeus, in book 14, points out that there is a military device also called a sambuca which was moved up to enemy walls like a siege machine, and calories was the word for military auxiliaries who carried timbers for fortifications and firewood - grammarians assert this was the origin of their name. On the other hand, soldiers are unskilled as musicians, and auxiliaries even more so. However, there is no inconsistency if the proverb is taken to mean the sambuca as military machine, which is prepared for use, like the musical instrument, by tightening a number of cords. Auxiliaries are not at all fitted for preparing this machine, because they are unintelligent, and confined to the meanest tasks for this very reason that they are altogether untrained and untrainable in military science. So Persius strengthened the idea of the proverb, when he added alto 'lanky,' because exceptionally tall men are also branded proverbially for their foolishness - [greek] 'Big and foolish'!

People are said to be of the same flour when they are indistinguishable. 'Like as two bags of flour' means the same as 'Like as two puddles of water.' Persius in his fifth Satire: 'You keep the same old skin / Though you were of the same flour as I a while ago.' Exactly as he might say 'same flock as I am,' 'same sort as I am.' It belongs to a group which I have already mentioned: 'The same wax,' 'The same dust.' Using a similar figure, 'of the same stamp' Seneca said in book 3, letter 24: 'To these you can add this, which is of the same stamp: "The foolishness, even madness, of men is such that some are driven to death by the fear of death."'

[greek], Shooting without a target, is said of those who have no certain objectives to pursue or nothing by which they can justify the arguments for what they undertake and deliberate. Lucian in the Toxaris: 'Because in the present matter [greek] 'we have shot aimlessly,' let us once again accept a judge and refer other pairs of friends to him.' Persius in his third Satire:
Is there anything you are heading for, at which you aim your bow?
Or do you follow the crows hither and thither, with bricks or mud
Not caring where your foot may fall?

There is no doubt that this expression too from Persius belongs in the category of proverbs, 'To pluck from the lung,' meaning to remove a silly and arrogant opinion from the mind: 'While I pluck these old prejudices from your lung.' Excitement and pride are located in the lungs. Hence [greek] 'to be high spirited' in Greek. And the same occurs elsewhere in Persius: 'Something great, which an exceptionally capacious lung may breathe in.'

[greek], Whom not a hundred Egyptians would be able to lift. Used to be said of those with disgusting and unbearable habits, or those who were swollen with arrogance. It came about because most Egyptians were accustomed to earn a rather disreputable living transporting loads, whence the so-called [greek]. 'load carriers' became a proverbial joke. The adage is mentioned by Eudemus in his Miscellany of Rhetorical Sayings, and by Suidas too. But it is found in Aristophanes' Frogs, as follows: 'He threw in two wagons and two corpses, / That a hundred Egyptians would not be able to carry.' The same in the Birds: 'No Egyptian carrying bricks .. .' In a very similar figure Lucilius, quoted by Nonius: 'Whom not even bulls born in the Lucanian hills / Can pull by the yoke on their powerful backs.' And the same author elsewhere: "This one a hundred teams of mules yoked together could not drag.'

[greek], An Egyptian carrier of bricks. Suidas mentions this explicitly as a proverb. It occurs in Aristophanes' Birds, where someone asks who could have placed the horse Durius a hundred cubits high on the fortress of Pallas. The answer given is: 'The birds, and no other, no Egyptian / Brick-carrier, or stone worker.' The expression seems to be suitable for a mean man, one of the lowest sort, a sense for which 'cheap as Carians' is also used; or for someone who is besieged by troublesome business. We have just noted that the Egyptians became the subject of popular tales and jokes because they earned their living carrying loads on their backs like asses. In such work they were more experienced for this reason, I suppose, that this sort of labourer was absolutely necessary in Egypt for digging out ponds and carrying away mud and clay bricks because of the mud brought down by the Nile. There, I believe, sparrows and swallows showed them the art of building walls from mud. The proof of this is that the Hebrews, when they lived among the Egyptians, were forced to do slave labour for the Pharaoh by carrying mud and bricks. You will find something on Marian mules elsewhere.6

[greek], Teach me to eat. This was used as a proverbial figure by Aristophanes in his Frogs. It can be used opportunely whenever a person unskilled in a matter about which there is dispute tries to teach or command or even refute someone. They are the words of Bacchus to Hercules when he was making judgments about tragedies, because he was more practised in devouring bulls than in evaluating the verses of poets.

'[greek], Rhamnusius. Eudemus in his Rhetorical Sayings tells us this name used to be given as a sort of proverbial nickname to wise and moderate men. But he does not explain how it became proverbial. We may suppose therefore, either that the term comes from the customs of that people, or from the goddess Rhamnusia, who commends us to show moderation in all affairs. We have discussed this at greater length elsewhere.

[greek], Blow-me-down Myxus! Used to be said with reference to swaggerers and boasters. [greek] is an exclamation of stupefaction and wonder, and Myxus was some pretentious, pompous priest of Diana, who pretended to be astonished at everything. It is recorded by Suidas and Zenodotus.

[greek], You've got hold of the lentil by the point. Said of business which simply cannot be done, because this type of legume has no points. It is recorded by Suidas, in case anyone thinks it should not be considered.

[greek], The opportunity or 'pretext' of Patroclus. Diogenianus shows that this is customarily said of those who do not dare because of fear to lament their own misfortunes but weep for them under pretext of mourning for someone else. In the essay entitled 'On Inoffensive Selfpraise,' Plutarch says: 'And so that we do not appear to be using [greek] "Patroclus as a pretext," and actually praising ourselves through them .. . For he is talking about those who imply praise of themselves as they praise others. Derived I think from the character of Patroclus whom Aristophanes jokes about several times.

[greek], Small value even for an obol. Suidas, quoting from the Maricas of Eupolis, says that this can be used of worthless and goodfor-nothing men. But there is nothing to prevent it being used figuratively of a thing which is despised. Eudemus recalls it too. We have noted many expressions of this sort before: a penny-ha'penny man, a three-farthing man, a fourpenny-ha'penny man, a man scarcely worth two farthings. Justinian wanted to call young men just entering on the study of law 'twofarthing types,' as being of the lowest class. Those who had already made some progress he called prolytae and lytae 'discharged,' as it were.

[greek], That path has been looked at, of an undertaking which you have already tried; derived from travellers. Terence in the Phormio: 'Ah, not like that. It has been tried. That path has been looked at.'

[greek], Contracts of Phoenicians. The Phoenicians who took possession of Carthage, on first landing in that region, asked the people who inhabited Libya at that time to be allowed to enjoy the hospitality of the land for a day and a night. Having obtained this, and having been ordered after the allowed time had passed to move beyond the frontiers, they declined asserting they had made an agreement that it was their right to stay there both night and day. Clearly, they misused the ambiguity of the words to their own advantage. From this, it is agreed, was derived the proverbial expression about treacherous and cunning bargains. The authorities are Suidas and Diogenianus. What is more, Phoenician is in general a term for everyone who is greedy for profit. Hence Pindar, in the second Pythian Ode, said 'Phoenician business.' And the scholiast quotes from some comic writer: 'Straightway I become Phoenix.' And this from Sophocles: 'As a man, Phoenix began to buy and sell.' Finally Plato, in the third book of the Republic, talking of those who think that lying is proper for magistrates, says: 'There is nothing noble in this, but rather something Phoenician.'

[greek], Short as Molon. Said of little men of extremely small stature. Suidas states there were two persons called Molon, whose shortness was, I suppose, notorious; one of them was an actor, the other a thief, clearly both honourable professions.

[greek], Going back to ancient days. Said of something completely worn out, ancient; recorded by Diogenianus. It is very close to one which is tossed around nowadays, not inappropriately, in the schools of philosophy: 'In the great year of Plato.'

[greek], It is the end of worthy things. Hippocrates was secretary to Mindarus, leader of the Spartans. When the latter was killed by the Athenians, he wrote a letter to Sparta along these lines: [greek], , meaning that the cause was lost with the death of the leader. The adage is recorded by Diogenianus; the story is recounted by Xenophon in the Paralipomena book 1. The Greek words above make a senarius: 'It is the end of worthy things, Mindarus is gone.'

Plato in his dialogue entitled The Statesman says: For that has even now resulted in our experiencing what is said proverbially. What is that? By making incorrect distinctions too hastily, we have taken longer to finish. The same author alludes to the proverb in the seventh book of the Republic: 'In my haste, he said, to run over everything quickly, I am slower.' And in the Cratylus he has something similar: 'Lest it happen to us, like night wanderers on Aegina who complete their journey too late, that we too appear to reach the point in very truth later than we should.' Well known too is what St Augustine says in Against Petilianus, that it often happens to those who are in a hurry because of some disturbance 'that they put their clothes or their shoes on the wrong way,' which later causes delay. The same happens to those who try to do many things at once and achieve none of them. Plato, book 3 of the Republic, says: 'Let each one pursue one study properly, never many; for if someone tries, having tackled many, he will be frustrated in all.' In the same work, book 10, he tells us the same happens to those who rush to gain honour not by truth but by pretences and deceits: 'And do not some dishonest craftsmen do the same as certain runners, who run well from the starting point, but not at all well after the turn. At first indeed they shoot out in front rapidly, but then at the end of the race they are laughable, and drag themselves off uncrowned with their heads between their shoulders.' The adage warns us that something should be undertaken not with speed but with care, lest later it should be delayed because there was a mistake at the beginning of the task. This proverb applies to those who for the sake of economy pass by Greek literature and plunge straight into the study of philosophy, but as they foolishly economize, they run into the greatest expense. For it turns out that while these people are eager to become instant philosophers they never achieve a knowledge of philosophy, and when they think they have already reached the finishing line, they have to go back again to the starting boxes, and, as the Greeks say, begin again from scratch. In military matters, too, more was achieved by the delays of Fabius than by the hasty temerity of Marcus Minutius. For the former alone overcame Hannibal, undefeated at that time in many battles, not by force but by delaying methods. This is admirably narrated by Ennius as quoted by Marcus Tullius in his Elder Cato:
One man, by delay, restored the situation for us,
For he did not put popular reputation before salvation.

'[greek], He is living beyond the count. Used to be said of one who lived to a great age, as if he were considered to have exceeded the prescribed number of years. It is to be found, if I am not mistaken, in Lucian. Reported by Suidas.

'[greek], To be desirous of things beyond one's wallet. Said by way of a proverbial figure in Lucian's Timon: 'It is essential for the philosopher to be content with few things and to be frugal, and not "To have wants beyond his wallet."' It will be fitting for a philosopher or a poor person, but especially for a Christian, whom Jesus forbids to think of the morrow. Very close to 'Life in a tub.'

[greek], Like a virgin the first time. Said of those who have squandered their patrimony. Probably it arose because virgins are so inexperienced and ignorant of how harlots make their living that they give themselves away easily. Later, in order to receive more, they prove difficult. Likewise young people, who have recently been given allowances and before they understand what money is, spend too lavishly. And the earliest part of life, which is indeed the best, we waste in gross stupidity.

'[greek], The man looked like a ship beseeching a rock. Suidas indicates this was said of stupid, obtuse people who mistake one thing for another, the figure being derived from a ship striking a rock.

[greek] A starving man is forced to be a thief. Suidas classifies this as a proverb suited to those who are driven by extreme necessity to do something. For example, someone who confesses he has lied, may say, 'What was I to do? Either I had to lie or descend to the worst disgrace. A hungry man must steal.' Or someone greedy for fame may publish other people's work as his, because he can produce nothing outstanding of his own.

As long as he lived, he lived well. This is in Terence's Mother-in-law. Some old man indicates that it was proverbial when he asks someone whether he had brought anything other than this one aphorism. It suits those who live at ease and pleasantly, or spend freely so that they give no great pleasure to their heir. However, there is an ambiguity in the verb vivere, which is sometimes simply 'to live' and sometimes 'to enjoy life' as in Catullus: 'Let us live, Lesbia mine, and let us love.'

This is a line in Martial which has the appearance of a proverb:
Wretch with foaming mouth, do not
Touch the fuming nose of a living bear.
Allow him to be quiet, let him lick fingers and hands.
If grief and pain, or just anger compel him,
He will be a bear. You should exercise your teeth on an empty skin.
It warns us that those who can harm us are not to be tempted. In exactly the same way, Synesius wrote in his Praise of Baldness: 'To take a dog by the nose,' meaning to provoke one who would bite and will injure. Bears are particularly enraged when struck on this part of the body, so the bestiaries tell us.

Plautus in the Two Captives: 'Like mice, we are always eating someone else's food.' Said of parasites, whose delight is 'to live at another person's table.' Freedom and eating another person's food do not go together, nor are they to be found in the same place, as is neatly shown in Aesop's fable of the country mouse and the town mouse. Further, the Greeks have a proverbial word [greek] 'to scurry around like a mouse,' for those who walk up and down and wander around like mice in search of food. It was indicated as such by Hesychius.

[greek], One of three penalties. Suidas states that the proverb survived in Menander. However it derives from Theramenes, who imposed on a certain person one of three penalties, from which he might choose which he wanted. This is the source too for Aristophanes in the Triphales, as quoted by the same Suidas: 'For I was made to fear [greek] "these three things" by Theramenes.' What these three things may be, you may seek in the proverb [greek]'Three ways to die.' Alexander used this in his Goatherds. Aristides says that an oracle used to be given under seal, and if anyone opened it before the right time, one of three penalties awaited him, removal of his eyes, or of a hand, or loss of his tongue. Some say that those who were sentenced to capital punishment were offered three means, the sword, the noose, or poison.

Plautus in his Haunted House: 'You will win, as easily as a fox eats a pear.' Said of something easy to do. For it is no work at all for a well-toothed fox to eat a pear.

'[greek], With knitted brow and puffed out cheeks. Used of pompous and bombastic individuals, Suidas tells us. For it is in the brow, as we have shown elsewhere, that the seat of arrogance is found. Horace took puffed-out cheeks as a sign of anger: 'That Jupiter should not / Puff out both cheeks in anger.' St Augustine, in his Confessions, has 'cheeks bursting with typhus "arrogance."' Some people wrongly read typus 'mark of a blow' here. But it is surprising that Augustine should have been so pleased with a Greek word that, when he could have said fastus 'haughtiness,' 'arrogance' he preferred to say typhus, unless it was because it appeared to be already accepted as Latin usage. The figure is derived from frogs, which blow themselves up with anger. There is a well-known fable of Aesop about a frog which burst with arrogance. And Horace writes: 'Inflate the swelling bag with pompous utterances.'

[greek], A swine danced, or A swine revelling. Diogenianus declares this was said of those who committed some impropriety and who, when the objection is made that things have turned out better than they deserve, are all the more insolently proud of themselves. Both Suidas and Zenodotus mention it. For the Greeks [greek] 'to revel' is to disport oneself like young lovers with wreaths, songs, dances, and all the other juvenile nonsense, and to burst into other people's houses. Swine burst in too. Hence Theocritus in the Syracusan Women: 'A dense crowd all together like swine bursting in.' But it is wonderful how little those of rather rustic nature are suited to these things. There will be a place for this adage when someone who is savage and coarse by nature tries to seem witty.

There is a line in Juvenal which bears a closer resemblance to a proverb than one egg to another: 'The laws absolve ravens and harass doves.' The penalty of the laws is employed against some humble folk, from whom, because of their gentleness of character, some gain can be extracted. The greedy are forgiven. The adage comes from a maxim of Anacharsis who said this in mockery of Solon's care in writing his laws, as Plutarch relates in his life of Solon: 'He used to say that the laws are like the webs of spiders, because if anything lightweight or feeble runs into them, it sticks, but if it is something larger, it cuts through and gets away.' The same meaning is contained in what Terence says in his Phormio:
Because a net is not spread for a kite or a hawk,
Birds which are harmful, it is spread for harmless ones.
The latter are profitable, the former are a waste of labour.

Marcus Tullius to Paetus in book 9 of his Letters to Friends: 'Now his father has been accused by Marcus Antonius: it is thought he was acquitted with the use of some cobbler's blacking.' There seems to be a proverb underlying this. He means, I think, that the man was acquitted, not without scandal, by bribing the judges. For cobbler's blacking is such that it does not make an excessively black mark, nor on the other hand does it leave no blemish at all. So scandal is symbolized in the poets by blacking; Horace, for example: 'This is the juice of the black cuttle-fish, this is / Pure venom.' This juice is of a type that is to be found in many sorts of soft fish, especially cuttle-fish, according to Aristotle in book 4 of On the Parts of Animals: 'It is contained in an inner bag of skin and emitted through a tube; they squirt it out when afraid, and darken the water so that they cannot be caught.' Horace again:
But as inks when handled leave a mark and a stain,
So writers often besmirch the splendid achievements of others
With shameful verse.
Finally, what the Greeks call chalcanthum Cornelius Celsus translates roughly as sutorium atramentum 'cobbler's blacking/ which he recalls frequently among his treatments, especially in book 5. It is gathered from bronze. Whence the Greek term [greek], in other words 'flower of bronze.' Which makes me suspect that 'cobbler's blacking' means rather a stain which is removed with difficulty. For the black called 'writers' black' is more easily washed off and does not adhere to the skin. Pliny used a similar figure in one of his letters: 'Marked with a Vitellian scar.'

[greek], Deaf testimonies, so-called, are those which are given on tablets, because, if a question is addressed to them, they give no answer, so that this adage does not differ from 'Silent teachers.' This is why people are said proverbially to 'plead a case on deaf testimonies' when they quote only those who are far away or those who are dead, so that they cannot be apprehended.

In the Satire of Juvenal which begins 'What can pedigrees do?'
Look round for an auctioneer, Charippus, for your rags,
Since Pansa snatches away whatever Natta left you,
And keep quiet now, it is madness to throw away the fare after
everything else.
Domizio Calderini, by no means a bad authority among the moderns, tells us this is a proverb directed against someone who has lost a great deal and wants to throw away even what is left. The figure is derived from traders, who, if they have been able to make less profit on their voyages than they want, strive to recuperate from the goods they retail at least enough to pay off the cost of the sea transport. When Aristippus was asked by someone whether he was ubiquitous, he said with a laugh, 'Well then, I do not lose my fare,' he said, 'if indeed I am ubiquitous.' The story is told by Plutarch in his essay entitled 'Whether Virtue Can Be Taught.'

[greek], To behave like a Sicilian. Eudemus indicates this was used in antiquity for strict, harsh behaviour, and that Epicharmus indeed used it in this way. But in fact others hold it should be used rather of dishonest and crafty individuals. There is no doubt but that it arose from the character of that nation. But Athenaeus, in the first book of the Doctors at Dinner, says that the adage arose from a Sicilian called Andron who introduced the fashion of dancing and pantomiming to the flute.

'[greek], A sitting dove. Suidas records this explicitly as a proverbial expression and indicates that it was said of excessively mild and guileless people. For when doves fly off, they outstrip all others with the speed of their flight, but when they are sitting, there is nothing gentler or sweeter. Nor do they have any means of defence against kites and hawks apart from the speed of their wings. It seems to me it can also be said of those who pretend to be guileless in order to be more successful in their deceitfulness, because it is the habit of bird-catchers to put in the net a blinded dove, which flutters up and down and attracts other doves. This bird is called by the Greeks [greek], a decoy, from the verb [greek] 'to catch by decoy-birds,' that is 'to lead astray' or 'to entice into the net.' Aristophanes, talking of doves, in the Birds: [greek] 'And makes them act as decoys entangled in the net.' The reader may consider whether one should read [greek] 'enmeshed' here, because this makes sense, whereas there would be none otherwise.

[greek], A monkey with a beard. Aristophanes in the Acharnians: [greek] 'Oh monkey, what a beard!' From the scholiast I learned that this is an allusion to the saying of Archilochus: 'O monkey, what a tail you have!' Used to be said of absurd people. Regulus called Rusticus the 'Stoics' monkey' as an insult, as Pliny relates in his Letters, I think because he acted the Stoic more with his beard and his cloak than in his morals. Aristophanes again, in another passage, calls certain people [greek] 'monkeys of the people,' as it were. This animal is by nature [greek] 'a buffoon,' and seems to have been created for no other purpose, for it is of no use for eating like sheep, nor for guarding the house like dogs, nor for carrying burdens like horses. Athenaeus in book 14 tells a story about the philosopher Anacharsis, a Scythian by race, who was the only one, when skilled comedians were brought in at a banquet, not to laugh. Later, when some monkeys were brought in, he began to laugh, and when asked the reason he said, "These are funny by nature, the others are feigning it.'

'[greek], Singing for oneself. People are said to sing for themselves if they do something, not at another person's behest, but following their own will. In Plato's Banquet they order the flute-girl to pipe for herself. And a certain singer, Antigenidas I think, because his pupil was not sufficiently popular with the audience, orders him to sing for him and for the Muses. Marcus Tullius in the Brutus: 'For it is the mark of the greatest orator to be recognized as the greatest by the people. Thus while the flute-player Antigenidas may very well have said to his pupil, when he was coldly received by the audience, "Sing for me and for the Muses," to the man, my dear Brutus, who usually addresses a large crowd, I would say, "Sing for me and for the people."' St Jerome identifies the pupil of Antigenidas, if I am not mistaken, as Ismenias. And the latter is not ordered to 'sing for himself but for his teacher, so that he can judge him.

Αν ἡ λεονταὴ μὴ ἐξικηται, τὴν ἀλωπεκὴ πρόσαψον, If a lion's skin is not enough, add a fox's. When something cannot be gained by force, guile is called for. The proverb arose from a saying of Lysander. For, as Plutarch recalls in the life of Lysander, he used to ridicule those who, as if they were descendants of Hercules, thought they should wage war by frank use of force and without deceit, whereas he held that it was more the duty of a good leader, where the lion's skin would not reach, to patch it out with a fox's. This is almost the same idea as Maro alludes to as well when he says: 'Cunning or courage, which is desirable in an enemy?' The adage is recorded by Zenodotus. It is similar to something which Plutarch recalls Carbo saying in the life of Sulla. Because Sulla carried on the war not only with open force but also by cunning, he says: 'He waged war both as a fox and as a lion, for his mind was of the nature of both, but he was more strongly affected by the fox's.' In Aristophanes someone is said to be κυναλώπηξ 'a fox-dog,' because he combined the shamelessness of the dog and the cunning of the fox.

[greek], A Sicilian soldier. This was said by way of proverbial banter against a foreign mercenary soldier because in the time of Hiero the Sicilians commonly made use of foreign infantry, as Zenodotus tells us. Appropriate for a man who is willing to undertake any sort of service for love of gain. It is close to what we have said elsewhere about the Carian.

[greek], Reels for good deeds. This was customarily said whenever someone was rewarded abundantly and with interest for a benefit he had conferred on someone else. For agathides is the Greek word for glomi 'reels,' but there is an ornament of word-play in the Greek expression which cannot be rendered in Latin. Suidas records it.

Still well known popularly these days is this proverb from Plautus' Carthaginian: 'It is not easy to fly without feathers.' We find the same in the Comedy of Asses: 'Would I cheat you? Come on, please! Fly without feathers!' It comes in appropriately when we say that certain aids are missing without which some business cannot be completed. Among respectable authors we find accidere alas 'to cut off the wings' as an expression for taking away the material or the means to undertake anything, and addere alas 'to add wings.' Horace, using a similar expression, said decidere pennas 'to clip the wings':
As soon as the battle of Philippi discharged me,
Brought down with my wings clipped ...
And Cicero says in the Letters to Atticus, book 4: 'Those who had cut off my wings do not want them to grow again.' In the Academic Questions the same author said 'to cut the sinews' for taking away one's strength. This is similar to an expression we have noted elsewhere, [greek] 'To divide fire,' which Plato used in the Laws book 6 to mean the impossible: 'With the result that the maker of laws does precisely what those people do who make a game of thrashing at a fire,' that is, he wastes his labour, because fire immediately runs together again. Another expression of the same sort is found in Plato's Eryxias: 'Then I recognized that the man's mind was such that persuading him would be no different from cooking a stone.' I confess these passages could have been quoted more opportunely in other places, but they do not all come to mind on all occasions.

[greek], To give a Siphnian wave. Suidas indicates this is a proverbial expression for waving the hand towards the backside, and that it was derived from a custom of the Siphnians, who used to do it as a lewd gesture. Siphnos is an island not far from Crete, one of the Cyclades, whose name at one time was apparently Merope, and was well known for this expression. Pliny mentions it too in book 4, chapter 12. Stephanus also mentions the proverb.

Κατὰ μήλην, With a probe. Suidas shows this is a proverbial expression used when someone pursues uncertain ideas by guessing. The metaphor is derived from doctors examining an internal sore by inserting an instrument into the throat. This instrument is called a [greek], and [greek] is to probe in this way.

Γραφή τε καὶ λευκᾶρος οὐ ταὐτὸν, Leucaeus and his writings are not the same, or do not agree. Said when someone writes one thing and does or says another. This would be justly uttered in reproach of those who will not stand by agreements, for these often consist of written bonds, or against those whose lives do not match up to their published books. The Greek will make a line of verse if you add [greek] 'say.' We may suppose that Leucaeus was some dishonest scribe.

Elsewhere I have pointed out how close to proverbs are metaphors taken from war, such as 'To give the signal for war,' for 'to encourage,' 'to exhort.' Marcus Tullius, in his Philippics book 7, says 'They say I gave the signal for war.' And someone who is said to 'Sound the trumpet,' is stirring up dissension. 'To sound the retreat,' for 'to finish,' is found in Marcus Tullius Philippics book 12: 'For who can hasten to war when the senate sounds the recall and the retreat?' Quintilian, book 12 in the chapter 'What studies after the end,' says: 'Wherefore, before he comes to these snares of age, let him sound the retreat and enter port with his ship entire.' 'Let the trumpets sound,' in Martial, means 'Now let us make love together.' In Plautus we have Collatis signis depugnare 'To close standards and fight it out,' and in the same author Versis gladiis depugnare 'To fight it out at the point of our swords.' Moreover, this same expression, collatis signis, has unquestionably the appearance of a proverb when we mean a serious and precise debate about something, as Marcus Tullius does in his Letters to Atticus: 'So that [I may settle it] with Maphrago in a pitched battle.' In Juvenal 'this trumpet of discord' is 'this beginning of the war.'

Πίθων καλὸς, Pretty monkey. This will be appropriate when someone is praised falsely through flattery. In Pindar's second Pythian Ode:
The monkey is 'pretty,' always 'pretty' in the eyes of children.
The scholiast shows that this is taken from children who repeatedly say 'Pretty monkey' when they are petting a monkey. And it is apparent that pithon is a diminutive of the word καλὸς πίθων - 'little ape,' as it were. Pindar is criticizing someone indirectly, either because he put on airs when flattered by ignorant people, or because he himself was flattering Hiero, praising the unpraiseworthy. But these animals have a particular φιλαυτία 'self-love,' so that they are sensitive to praise, and take pleasure in mirrors, and enjoy allowing their young to be touched, and themselves tire their young with their embraces. For 'speaking to please' the ancients said 'to talk pleasantly,' a word which Aeschylus used in his Prometheus according to Athenaeus book 4. According to the same source, those who were more concerned to be witty than truthful were said to 'speak sweetly.'

Απαξ πυῤῥὸς καὶ δέκατον χλωρὸς, Once flushed and ten times pale. Suidas tells us this is said of those who obtain a loan, and who of necessity must in quick succession first blush with shame, then go pale with fear. They blush as they ask for the loan; they go pale while they are insolvent and fear to be taken to court or to prison.

Αεὶ γέροντι νέαν ὐπερβάλλειν κόρην, To an old man always join a young virgin. A proverbial senarius counselling that men of more advanced age should marry a girl rather than an old woman, lest, frigidity being added to frigidity, Venus languish and the marriage prove sterile. But it may be applied aptly in other ways too, whenever we want to indicate that the association of things should be adjusted in such a way that what may be diminished on the one hand may be increased on the other. So that, for example, a young companion might be associated with an old man and the gaiety of the former would limit the melancholy of old age, or contrariwise the sternness of age would temper the liveliness of youth. Or again, a chatterer might be joined to one who is too taciturn, a rash man to a timid one, a poor person to a rich one. The proverb is recalled by Diogenianus.

Αεὶ τὰ πέρυσι βελτίω, The previous year was always better. Said when present affairs are not pleasing and past ones are preferred. Diogenianus tells us this was the cry of the Athenians under Macedonian government. The figure is borrowed from farmers, who always complain to their landlords about the present year's harvest. There is a phrase of Horace that is pertinent here: 'An apologist of times past / When he was a boy.'

Τὰ θύματα οὐδὲν ἐστὶν, πλὴν γένεια καὶ κέρατα, The sacrifices are nothing but jawbones and horns. Said of lean victims. It may be applied quite aptly to food which is inedible. It is reported by Suidas.

Σκυθῶν ἐρημΐα, The wilderness of the Scythians. There is an expression in Aristophanes' Acharnians for the greatest disasters and ruin:
To perish trapped in the Scythian wilderness.
At this point the scholiast indicates that the proverb was usually used of some vast desert. It is derived from the fact that the Scythians used no fixed abodes, but travelled about in wagons, and for this reason the country abounds in wild animals. Quintus Curtius also recalls the adage in book 7 of the Deeds of Alexander. An ambassador of the Scythians speaks in these words:
I hear that Scythian deserts are mocked by the Greeks even in proverbs. We
seek out empty places devoid of human cultivation rather than cities and rich
fields. Plutarch uses the expression too in his book 'On the Contradictions of the Stoics,' as we noted in the proverb 'To be pitched head foremost.'

To break the ice is to open the way and to be the first in beginning a task. A figure derived from boatmen, who send one of their number ahead to break up the ice on a frozen river and open the way for the others.

Ζωὸς γενήσῃ, κρομμύου μόνον λαβών, If only you had taken the onion, you would be alive now. Zenodotus and Suidas declare that this used to be said about those who form a great expectation from some trifling thing. It seems to have arisen from the case of a sick man who was restored to health when the doctor offered an onion, a rather vulgar plant and not one particularly healthy for the body.

Σοφοὶ τὺραννοι τῶν σοφῶν συνουσίᾳ, The prince acquires wisdom by dealing with the wise. Zenodotus quotes this from Ajax the Locrian, adding that the same line of verse was quoted by Plato under the name of Euripides, and in fact I have found it mentioned under his name in the Republic book 8: 'Kings are wise through conversation with the wise.' I am all the more surprised that Aulus Gellius refers to the Theaetetus of Plato, unless through an error of the scribes 'Theages' has been corrupted to 'Theaetetus,' for it is also reported in the Theages. Aulus Gellius declares in book 13 that this same proverb was in both authors, in Sophocles in a play of the same name, and in Euripides, just as several other lines of verse are found in Euripides which are also to be found in Sophocles and Aeschylus. Moreover Gellius says the line that we have just quoted is 'of known antiquity,' so that you can deduce that it had become a proverb. And if only it were as welcome to the princes of our age as it is weighty and elegant, for of them you could quite well say: [greek] 'Kings become foolish through conversation with flatterers.'

Λεοντὴ επὶ κροκωτῳ, A lion's skin over a saffron dress. Said when two entirely unsuited things are brought together. It is derived from Bacchus who, in Aristophanes, goes down into Hades attired thus: he put on a charming woman's dress and over this garb he draped a lion's skin so that, if you please, he would be believed in Hades to be the fearful Hercules. Adorned in this way, he is also mocked in the Frogs by Hercules:
I can hardly restrain my laughter
Seeing the dress worn with the lion's skin.'
It will be aptly quoted against certain monks or scholastics who in public wear the insignia of their rule and in private act like soldiers, or those who are severe of face and effeminate in their ways.

What you know, you do not know. Terence, in the Eunuchus: 'You, if you are wise by heaven, what you know, you do not know.' The same author in the Heautontimorumenos: 'You will ignore what you know, if you are wise.' Donatus informs us that this is a proverb derived from the games of the dialecticians, in which riddles like this are propounded: I do and do not, I am a friend and not a friend, I hear and do not hear.' We mentioned this type right at the beginning of this work pointing out that all figures of this sort which are formed by linking opposites belong to the family of proverbs. Such is this one from Plautus: 'Where I am, I am not.' This, on the face of it, as they say, seems to be a riddle. But its meaning is: T am not where my mind is.' So by this proverb we signify a promise to keep silence, when someone keeps back and hides what he knows as if he does not know.

'Having no hearing or touch,' was said proverbially of a person who was caught red-handed, and was the object of protests from everyone. In the preface of his declamation about reconciling a mother and a daughter (for why should I not call this a declamation, when he himself indicates at one point explicitly that this material was put together by himself as an exercise?) Jerome says: 'Because I tried to convict crime I have myself been made out a criminal. It is like the popular proverb: "As all the world disputes it and denies it, I believe it too that I have no ears, and do not touch them."' that is, I must keep silence and what I hear and touch must be as if I do not know.' This may come from Aristophanes' Thesmophoriazusae: 'I neither hear nor see.'