XXIX THE PHAEDO OF PLATO AUTHOR UNKNOWN

If Plato did not write me, there were two Platos; I carry in me all the flowers of Socratic talk. But Panaetius concluded me to be spurious; yes, he who concluded that the soul was mortal, would conclude me spurious as well.

XXX CLEOMBROTUS OF AMBRACIA CALLIMACHUS

Saying, "Farewell, O Sun," Cleombrotus of Ambracia leaped off a high wall to Hades, having seen no evil worthy of death, but only having read that one writing of Plato's on the soul.

XXXI THE DEAD SCHOLAR CALLIMACHUS

One told me of thy fate, Heraclitus, and wrung me to tears, and I remembered how often both of us let the sun sink as we talked; but thou, methinks, O friend from Halicarnassus, art ashes long and long ago; yet thy nightingale-notes live, whereon Hades the ravisher of all things shall not lay his hand.

XXXII ALEXANDRIANISM CALLIMACHUS

I hate the cyclic poem, nor do I delight in a road that carries many hither and thither; I detest, too, one who ever goes girt with lovers, and I drink not from the fountain; I loathe everything popular.

XXXIII SPECIES AETERNITATIS PTOLEMAEUS

I know that I am mortal, and ephemeral; but when I scan the multitudinous circling spirals of the stars, no longer do I touch earth with my feet, but sit with Zeus himself, and take my fill of the ambrosial food of gods.

XXXIV THE PASTORAL POETS ARTEMIDORUS

The pastoral Muses, once scattered, now are all a single flock in a single fold.

XXXV ON A RELIEF OF EROS AND ANTEROS AUTHOR UNKNOWN

Nemesis fashioned a winged Love contrary to winged Love, warding off bow with bow, that he may be done by as he did; and, bold and fearless before, he sheds tears, having tasted of the bitter arrows, and spits thrice into his low-girt bosom. Ah, most wonderful! one will burn with fire: Love has set Love aflame.

XXXVI ON A LOVE BREAKING THE THUNDERBOLT AUTHOR UNKNOWN

Lo, how winged Love breaks the winged thunderbolt, showing that he is a fire more potent than fire.

XXXVII ON A LOVE PLOUGHING MOSCHUS

Laying down his torch and bow, soft Love took the rod of an ox-driver, and wore a wallet over his shoulder; and coupling patient-necked bulls under his yoke, sowed the wheat-bearing furrow of Demeter; and spoke, looking up, to Zeus himself, "Fill thou the corn-lands, lest I put thee, bull of Europa, under my plough."

XXXVIII ON A PAN PIPING ARABIUS

One might surely have clearly heard Pan piping, so did the sculptor mingle breath with the form; but in despair at the sight of flying, unstaying Echo, he renounced the pipe's unavailing sound.

XXXIX ON A STATUE OF THE ARMED VENUS AUTHOR UNKNOWN

Pallas said, seeing Cytherea armed, "O Cyprian, wilt thou that we go so to judgment?" and she, laughing softly, "why should I lift a shield in contest? if I conquer when naked, how will it be when I take arms?"

XL ON THE CNIDIAN VENUS OF PRAXITELES AUTHOR UNKNOWN

The Cyprian said when she saw the Cyprian of Cnidus, "Alas where did Praxiteles see me naked?"

XLI ON A SLEEPING ARIADNE AUTHOR UNKNOWN

Strangers, touch not the marble Ariadne, lest she even start up on the quest of Theseus.

XLII ON A NIOBE BY PRAXITELES AUTHOR UNKNOWN

From life the gods made me a stone; and from stone again Praxiteles wrought me into life.

XLIII ON A PICTURE OF A FAUN AGATHIAS

Untouched, O young Satyr, does thy reed utter a sound, or why leaning sideways dost thou put thine ear to the pipe? He laughs and is silent; yet haply had he spoken a word, but was held in forgetfulness by delight? for the wax did not hinder, but of his own will he welcomed silence, with his whole mind turned intent on the pipe.

XLIV ON THE HEIFER OF MYRON AUTHOR UNKNOWN

Ah thou wert not quick enough, Myron, in thy casting; but the bronze grew solid before thou hadst cast in a soul.

XLV ON A SLEEPING SATYR PLATO

This Satyr Diodorus engraved not, but laid to rest; your touch will wake him; the silver is asleep.

XLVI THE LIMIT OF ART PARRHASIUS

Even though incredible to the hearer, I say this; for I affirm that the clear limits of this art have been found under my hand, and the mark is fixed fast that cannot be exceeded. But nothing among mortals is faultless.



CHAPTER V

RELIGION

I WORSHIP IN SPRING (1) THEAETETUS

Now at her fruitful birth-tide the fair green field flowers out in blowing roses; now on the boughs of the colonnaded cypresses the cicala, mad with music, lulls the binder of sheaves; and the careful mother-swallow, having fashioned houses under the eaves, gives harbourage to her brood in the mud-plastered cells: and the sea slumbers, with zephyr-wooing calm spread clear over the broad ship- tracks, not breaking in squalls on the stern-posts, not vomiting foam upon the beaches. O sailor, burn by the altars the glittering round of a mullet or a cuttle-fish, or a vocal scarus, to Priapus, ruler of ocean and giver of anchorage; and so go fearlessly on thy seafaring to the bounds of the Ionian Sea.

II WORSHIP IN SPRING (2) AGATHIAS

Ocean lies purple in calm; for no gale whitens the fretted waves with its ruffling breath, and no longer is the sea shattered round the rocks and sucked back again down towards the deep. West winds breathe, and the swallow titters over the straw-glued chamber that she has built. Be of good cheer, O skilled in seafaring, whether thou sail to the Syrtis or the Sicilian shingle: only by the altars of Priapus of the Anchorage burn a scarus or ruddy wrasse.

III ZEUS OF THE FAIR WIND AUTHOR UNKNOWN

Let one call from the stern on Zeus the Fair Wind for guide on his road, shaking out sail against the forestays; whether he runs to the Dark Eddies, where Poseidon rolls his curling wave along the sands, or whether he searches the backward passage down the Aegean sea-plain, let him lay honey-cakes by this image, and so go his way; here Philon, son of Antipater, set up the ever-gracious god for pledge of fair and fortunate voyaging.

IV THE SACRED CITY MACEDONIUS

Beneath flowering Tmolus, by the stream of Maeonian Hermus, am I, Sardis, capital city of the Lydians. I was the first who bore witness for Zeus; for I would not betray the hidden child of our Rhea. I too was nurse of Bromius, and saw him amid the thunder-flash shining with broader radiance; and first on our slopes the golden-haired god pressed the harvest of wine out of the breasts of the grape. All grace has been given me, and many a time has many an age found me envied by the happiest cities.

V HERMES OF THE WAYS AUTHOR UNKNOWN

Go and rest your limbs here for a little under the juniper, O wayfarers, by Hermes, Guardian of the Way, not in crowds, but those of you whose knees are tired with heavy toil and thirst after traversing a long road; for there a breeze and a shady seat and the fountain under the rock will lull your toil-wearied limbs; and having so escaped the midday breath of the autumnal dogstar, as is right, honour Hermes of the Ways.

VI BELOW CYLLENE NICIAS

I who inherit the tossing mountain-forests of steep Cyllene, stand here guarding the pleasant playing fields, Hermes, to whom boys often offer marjoram and hyacinth and fresh garlands of violets.

VII PAN OF THE SEA-CLIFF ARCHIAS

Me, Pan, the fishermen placed upon this holy cliff, Pan of the seashore, the watcher here over the fair anchorages of the harbour; and I take care now of the baskets and again of the trawlers off this shore. But sail thou by, O stranger, and in requital of this good service of theirs I will send behind thee a gentle south wind.

VIII THE SPIRIT OF THE SEA ARCHIAS

Small to see, I, Priapus, inhabit this spit of shore, not much bigger than a sea-gull, sharp-headed, footless, such an one as upon lonely beaches might be carved by the sons of toiling fishermen. But if any basket-finder or angler call me to succour, I rush fleeter than the blast: likewise I see the creatures that run under water; and truly the form of godhead is known from deeds, not from shape.

IX THE GUARDIAN OF THE CHASE SATYRUS

Whether thou goest on the hill with lime smeared over thy fowler's reed, or whether thou killest hares, call on Pan; Pan shows the dog the prints of the furry foot, Pan raises the stiff-jointed lime-twigs.

X THE HUNTER GOD LEONIDAS OF TARENTUM

Fair fall thy chase, O hunter of hares, and thou fowler who comest pursuing the winged people beneath this double hill; and cry thou to me, Pan, the guardian of the wood from my cliff; I join the chase with both dogs and reeds.

XI FORTUNA PARVULORUM PERSES

Even me the little god of small things if thou call upon in due season thou shalt find; but ask not for great things; since whatsoever a god of the commons can give to a labouring man, of this I, Tycho, have control.

XII THE PRAYERS OF THE SAINTS ADDAEUS

If thou pass by the hero (and he is called Philopregmon) who lies by the cross-roads in front of Potidaea, tell him to what work thou leadest thy feet; straightway will he, being by thee, make thy business easy.

XIII SAVED BY FAITH LEONIDAS OF TARENTUM

They call me the little one, and say I cannot go straight and fearless on a prosperous voyage like ships that sail out to sea; and I deny it not; I am a little boat, but to the sea all is equal; fortune, not size, makes the difference. Let another have the advantage in rudders; for some put their confidence in this and some in that, but may my salvation be of God.

XIV THE SERVICE OF GOD AUTHOR UNKNOWN

Me Chelidon, priestess of Zeus, who knew well in old age how to make offering on the altars of the immortals, happy in my children, free from grief, the tomb holds; for with no shadow in their eyes the gods saw my piety.

XV BEATI MUNDO CORDE AUTHOR UNKNOWN

He who enters the incense-filled temple must be holy; and holiness is to have a pure mind.

XVI THE WATER OF PURITY AUTHOR UNKNOWN

Hallowed in soul, O stranger, come even into the precinct of a pure god, touching thyself with the virgin water; for the good a few drops are set; but a wicked man the whole ocean cannot wash in its waters.

XVII THE GREAT MYSTERIES CRINAGORAS

Though thy life be fixed in one seat, and thou sailest not the sea nor treadest the roads on dry land, yet by all means go to Attica that thou mayest see those great nights of the worship of Demeter; whereby thou shalt possess thy soul without care among the living, and lighter when thou must go to the place that awaiteth all.



CHAPTER VI

NATURE

I THE GARDEN GOD AUTHOR UNKNOWN

Call me not him who comes from Libanus, O stranger, who delights in the talk of young men love-making by night; I am small and a rustic, born of a neighbour nymph, and all my business is labour of the garden; whence four garlands at the hands of the four Seasons crown me from the beloved fruitful threshing-floor.

II PAN'S PIPING ALCAEUS OF MESSENE

Breathe music, O Pan that goest on the mountains, with thy sweet lips, breathe delight into thy pastoral reed, pouring song from the musical pipe, and make the melody sound in tune with the choral words; and about thee to the pulse of the rhythm let the inspired foot of these water-nymphs keep falling free.

III THE ROADSIDE POOL LEONIDAS OF TARENTUM

Drink not here, traveller, from this warm pool in the brook, full of mud stirred by the sheep at pasture; but go a very little way over the ridge where the heifers are grazing; for there by yonder pastoral stone-pine thou wilt find bubbling through the fountained rock a spring colder than northern snow.

IV THE MEADOW AT NOON AUTHOR UNKNOWN

Here fling thyself down on the grassy meadow, O traveller, and rest thy relaxed limbs from painful weariness; since here also, as thou listenest to the cicalas' tune, the stone-pine trembling in the wafts of west wind will lull thee, and the shepherd on the mountains piping at noon nigh the spring under a copse of leafy plane: so escaping the ardours of the autumnal dogstar thou wilt cross the height to-morrow; trust this good counsel that Pan gives thee.

V BENEATH THE PINE PLATO

Sit down by this high-foliaged voiceful pine that rustles her branches beneath the western breezes, and beside my chattering waters Pan's pipe shall bring drowsiness down on thy enchanted eyelids.

VI WOOD-MUSIC AUTHOR UNKNOWN

Come and sit under my stone-pine that murmurs so honey-sweet as it bends to the soft western breeze; and lo this honey-dropping fountain, where I bring sweet sleep playing on my lonely reeds.

VII THE PLANE-TREE ON HYMETTUS HERMOCREON

Sit down, stranger, as thou passest by, under this shady plane, whose leaves flutter in the soft breath of the west wind, where Nicagoras consecrated me, the renowned Hermes son of Maia, protector of his orchard-close and cattle.

VIII THE GARDEN OF PAN PLATO

Let the shaggy cliff of the Dryads be silent, and the springs welling from the rock, and the many-mingled bleating of the ewes; for Pan himself makes music on his melodious pipe, running his supple lip over the jointed reeds; and around him stand up to dance with glad feet the water-nymphs and the nymphs of the oakwood.

IX THE FOUNTAIN OF LOVE MARIANUS

Here beneath the plane-trees, overborne by soft sleep, Love slumbered, giving his torch to the Nymphs' keeping; and the Nymphs said one to another, "Why do we delay? and would that with this we might have quenched the fire in the heart of mortals." But now, the torch having kindled even the waters, the amorous Nymphs pour hot water thence into the bathing pool.

X ON THE LAWN COMETAS

Dear Pan, abide here, drawing the pipe over thy lips, for thou wilt find Echo on these sunny greens.

XI THE SINGING STONE AUTHOR UNKNOWN

Remember me the singing stone, thou who passest by Nisaea; for when Alcathous was building his bastions, then Phoebus lifted on his shoulder a stone for the house, and laid down on me his Delphic harp; thenceforth I am lyre-voiced; strike me lightly with a little pebble, and carry away witness of my boast.

XII THE WOODLAND WELL AUTHOR UNKNOWN

I the ever-flowing Clear Fount gush forth for by-passing wayfarers from the neighbouring dell; and everywhere I am bordered well with planes and soft-bloomed laurels, and make coolness and shade to lie in. Therefore pass me not by in summer; rest by me in quiet, ridding thee of thirst and weariness.

XIII ASLEEP IN THE WOOD THEOCRITUS

Thou sleepest on the leaf-strewn floor, Daphnis, resting thy weary body; and the hunting-snakes are freshly set on the hills; and Pan pursues thee, and Priapus who binds the yellow ivy on his lovely head, passing side by side into the cave; but flee thou, flee, shaking off the dropping drowsiness of slumber.

XIV THE ORCHARD-CORNER ANYTE

I, Hermes, stand here by the windy orchard in the cross-ways nigh the grey sea-shore, giving rest on the way to wearied men; and the fountain wells forth cold stainless water.

XV PASTORAL SOLITUDE SATYRUS

Tongueless Echo along this pastoral slope makes answering music to the birds with repeating voice.

XVI TO A BLACKBIRD SINGING MARCUS ARGENTARIUS

No longer now warble on the oak, no longer sing, O blackbird, sitting on the topmost spray; this tree is thine enemy; hasten where the vine rises in clustering shade of silvered leaves; on her bough rest the sole of thy foot, around her sing and pour the shrill music of thy mouth; for the oak carries mistletoe baleful to birds, and she the grape-cluster; and the Wine-god cherishes singers.

XVII UNDER THE OAK ANTIPHILUS

Lofty-hung boughs of the tall oak, a shadowy height over men that take shelter from the fierce heat, fair-foliaged, closer-roofing than tiles, houses of wood-pigeons, houses of crickets, O noontide branches, protect me likewise who lie beneath your tresses, fleeing from the sun's rays.

XVIII THE RELEASE OF THE OX ADDAEUS

The labouring ox, outworn with old age and labour of the furrow, Alcon did not lead to the butchering knife, reverencing it for its works; and astray in the deep meadow grass it rejoices with lowings over freedom from the plough.

XIX THE SWALLOW AND THE GRASSHOPPER EVENUS

Attic maid, honey-fed, chatterer, snatchest thou and bearest the chattering cricket for feast to thy unfledged young, thou chatterer the chatterer, thou winged the winged, thou summer guest the summer guest, and wilt not quickly throw it away? for it is not right nor just that singers should perish by singers' mouths.

XX THE COMPLAINT OF THE CICALA AUTHOR UNKNOWN

Why in merciless chase, shepherds, do you tear me the solitude- haunting cricket from the dewy sprays, me the roadside nightingale of the Nymphs, who at midday talk shrilly in the hills and the shady dells? Lo, here is the thrust and the blackbird, lo here such flocks of starlings, plunderers of the cornfield's riches; it is allowed to seize the ravagers of your fruits: destroy them: why grudge me my leaves and fresh dew?

XXI THE LAMENT OF THE SWALLOW PAMPHILUS

Why all day long, hapless maiden daughter of Pandion, soundest thou wailingly through thy twittering mouth? has longing come on thee for thy maidenhead, that Tereus of Thrace ravished from thee by dreadful violence?

XXII THE SHEPHERD OF THE NYMPHS MYRINUS

Thyrsis the reveller, the shepherd of the Nymphs' sheep, Thyrsis who pipes on the reed like Pan, having drunk at noon, sleeps under the shady pine, and Love himself has taken his crook and watches the flocks.

XXIII THE SHRINE BY THE SEA (1) MNASALCAS

Let us stand by the low shore of the spray-scattering deep, looking on the precinct of Cypris of the Sea, and the fountain overshadowed with poplars, from which the shrill kingfishers draw water with their bills.

XXIV THE SHRINE BY THE SEA (2) ANYTE

This is the Cyprians ground, since it was her pleasure ever to look from land on the shining sea, that she may give fulfilment of their voyage to sailors; and around the deep trembles, gazing on her bright image.

XXV THE LIGHTHOUSE AUTHOR UNKNOWN

No longer dreading the rayless night-mist, sail towards me confidently, O seafarers; for all wanderers I light my far-shining torch, memorial of the labours of the Asclepiadae.

XXVI SPRING ON THE COAST (1) LEONIDAS OF TARENTUM

Now is the season of sailing; for already the chattering swallow is come, and the gracious west wind; the meadows flower, and the sea, tossed up with waves and rough blasts, has sunk to silence. Weigh thine anchors and unloose thine hawsers, O mariner, and sail with all thy canvas set: this I Priapus of the harbour bid thee, O man, that thou mayest sail forth to all thy trafficking.

XXVII SPRING ON THE COAST (2) ANTIPATER OF SIDON

Now is the season for a ship to run through the gurgling water, and no longer does the sea gloom, fretted with gusty squalls, and now the swallow plasters her round houses under the eaves, and the soft leafage laughs in the meadows. Therefore wind up your soaked cables, O sailors, and weight your hidden anchors from the harbours, and stretch the forestays to carry your well-woven sails. This I the son of Bromius bid you, Priapus of the anchorage.

XXVIII GREEN SUMMER NICAENETUS

I do not wish to feast down in the city, Philotherus, but in the country, delighting myself with the breath of the west wind; sufficient couch for me is a strewing of boughs under my side, for at hand is a bed of native willow and osier, the ancient garland of the Carians; but let wine be brought, and the delightful lyre of the Muses, that drinking at our will we may sing the renowned bride of Zeus, lady of our island.

XXIX PALACE GARDENS ARABIUS

I am filled with waters and gardens and groves and vineyards, and the joyousness of the bordering sea; and fisherman and farmer from different sides stretch forth to me the pleasant gifts of sea and land: and them who abide in me either a bird singing or the sweet cry of the ferrymen lulls to rest.



CHAPTER VII

THE FAMILY

I THE HOUSE OF THE RIGHTEOUS MACEDONIUS

Righteousness has raised this house from the first foundation even to the lofty roof; for Macedonius fashioned not his wealth by heaping up from the possessions of others with plundering sword, nor has any poor man here wept over his vain and profitless toil, being robbed of his most just hire; and as rest from labour is kept inviolate by the just man, so let the works of pious mortals endure.

II THE GIRL'S CUP PAULUS SILENTIARIUS

Aniceteia wets her golden lip in me; but may I give her also the draught of bridal.

III THE FLOWER UNBLOWN PHILODEMUS

Not yet is thy summer unfolded from the bud, nor does the purple come upon thy grape that throws out the first shoots of its maiden graces; but already the young Loves are whetting their fleet arrows, Lysidice, and the hidden fire is smouldering. Flee we, wretched lovers, ere yet the shaft is on the string; I prophesy a mighty burning soon.

IV A ROSE IN WINTER CRINAGORAS

Roses were now bloomed in spring, but now in midwinter we have opened our crimson cups, smiling in delight on this thy birthday morning, that brings thee so nigh the bridal bed: better for us to be wreathed on the brows of so fair a woman than wait for the spring sun.

V GOODBYE TO CHILDHOOD AUTHOR UNKNOWN

Her tambourines and pretty ball, and the net that confined her hair, and her dolls and dolls' dresses, Timareta dedicates before her marriage to Artemis of Limnae, a maiden to a maiden, as is fit; do thou, daughter of Leto, laying thine hand over the girl Timareta, preserve her purely in her purity.

VI THE WIFE'S PRAYER ANTIPATER OF THESSALONICA

Cythera of Bithynia dedicated me, the marble image of thy form, O Cyprian, having vowed it: but do thou impart in return thy great grace for this little one, as is thy wont; and concord with her husband satisfies her.

VII BRIDEGROOM AND BRIDE JOANNES BARBUCALLUS

To Persuasion and the Paphian, Hermophiles the neatherd, bridegroom of flower-chapleted Eurynome, dedicates a cream-cheese and combs from his hives; but accept for her the cheese, for me the honey.

VIII THE BRIDE'S VIGIL AGATHIAS

Never grow mould, O lamp, nor call up the rain, lest thou stop my bridegroom in his coming; always thou art jealous of the Cyprian; yes and when she betrothed Hero to Leander—O my heart, leave the rest alone. Thou art the Fire-God's, and I believe that by vexing the Cyprian thou flatterest thy master's pangs.

IX HEAVEN ON EARTH THEOCRITUS

This is not the common Cyprian; revere the goddess, and name her the Heavenly, the dedication of holy Chrysogone in the house of Amphicles, with whom she had children and life together; and ever it was better with them year by year, who began with thy worship, O mistress; for mortals who serve the gods are the better off themselves.

X WEARY PARTING MELEAGER

Fair-freighted sea-faring ships that sail the Strait of Helle, taking the good north wind in your sails, if haply on the island shores of Cos you see Phanion gazing on the sparkling sea, carry this message: Fair bride, thy desire beings me, not a sailor but a wayfarer on my feet. For if you say this, carrying good news, straitway will Zeus of the Fair Weather likewise breathe into your canvas.

XI MOTHERHOOD CALLIMACHUS

Again, O Ilithyia, come thou at Lycaenis' call, Lady of Birth, even thus with happy issue of travail; whose offering now this is for a girl; but afterwards may thy fragrant temple hold another for a boy.

XII PAST PERIL CALLIMACHUS

Thou knowest, Asclepius, that thou hast received payment of the debt that Aceson owed, having vowed it for his wife Demodice; yet if it be forgotten, and thou demand thy wages, this tablet says it will give testimony.

XIII FATHER AND MOTHER PHAEDIMUS

Artemis, to thee the son of Cichesias dedicates his shoes, and Themostodice the strait folds of her gown, because thou didst graciously hold thy two hands over her in childbed, coming, O our Lady, without thy bow. And do thou, O Artemis, grant yet to Leon to see his infant child a sturdy-limbed boy.

XIV HOUSEHOLD HAPPINESS AGATHIAS

Callirhoe dedicates to the Paphian garlands, to Pallas a tress of hair, to Artemis her girdle; for she found a wooer to her heart, and was given a stainless prime, and bore male children.

XV GRACIOUS CHILDREN THEAETETUS

Be happy, children; whose family are you? and what gracious name is given to so pretty things as you?—I am Nicanor, and my father is Aepioretus, and my mother Hegeso, and I am a Macedonian born.—And I am Phila, and this is my brother; and we both stand here fulfilling a vow of our parents.

XVI THE UNBROKEN HOME AUTHOR UNKNOWN

Androtion built me, a burying-place for himself and his children and wife, but as yet I am the tomb of no one; so likewise may I remain for a long time; and if it must be, let me take to myself the eldest first.

XVII THE BROKEN HOME BIANOR

I wept the doom of my Theionoe, but borne up by hopes of her child I wailed in lighter grief; and now a jealous fate has bereft me of the child also; alas, babe, I am cozened even of thee, all that was left me. Persephone, hear thou this at a father's lamentation; lay the babe on the bosom of its mother who is gone.

XVIII SUNDERING ANTIPATER OF SIDON

Surely, methinks, when thou hadst set thy footprint, Aretemias, from the boat upon Cocytus' shore, carrying in thy young hand thy baby just dead, the fair Dorian women had compassion in Hades, inquiring of thy fate; and thou, fretting thy cheeks with tears, didst utter that woful word: O friends, having travailed of two children, I left one for my husband Euphron, and the other I bring to the dead.

XIX NUNC DIMITTIS JOANNES BARBUCALLUS

Gazing upon my husband as my last thread was spun, I praised the gods of death, and I praised the gods of marriage, those that I left my husband alive, and these that he was even such an one; but may he remain, a father for our children.

XX LEFT ALONE AUTHOR UNKNOWN

Marathonis laid Nicopolis in this stone, wetting the marble coffin with tears, but all to no avail; for what is there more than sorrow for a man alone upon earth when his wife is gone?

XXI EARTH'S FELICITY CARPHYLLIDES

Find no fault as thou passest by my monument, O wayfarer; not even in death have I aught worthy of lamentation. I have left children's children; I had joy of one wife, who grew old along with me; I made marriage for three sons whose sons I often lulled asleep on my breast, and never moaned over the sickness or the death of any: who, shedding tears without sorrow over me, sent me to slumber the sweet sleep in the country of the holy.



CHAPTER VIII

BEAUTY

I SUMMER NOON MELEAGER

I saw Alexis at noon walking on the way, when summer was just cutting the tresses of the cornfields; and double rays burned me; these of Love from the boy's eyes, and those from the sun. But those night allayed again, while these in dreams the phantom of a form kindled yet higher; and Sleep, the releaser of toil for others, brought toil upon me, fashioning the image of beauty in my soul, a breathing fire.

II IN THE FIELD-PATH RHIANUS

Surely, O Cleonicus, the lovely Graces met thee going along the narrow field-path, and clasped thee close with their rose-like hands, O boy, and thou wert made all grace. Hail to thee from afar; but it is not safe, O my dear, for the dry asphodel stalk to move too near the fire.

III THE NEW LOVE MELEAGER

The Cyprian denies that she bore Love, seeing Antiochus among the youths, another Desire; but O you who are young, cherish the new Longing; for assuredly this boy is found a Love stronger than Love.

IV CONTRA MUNDUM CALLIMACHUS

Pour in and say again, "Diocles"; nor does Achelous touch the cups consecrated to him; fair is the boy, O Achelous, exceeding fair; and if any one says no, let me be alone in my judgment of beauty.

V THE FLOWER OF COS MELEAGER

Praxiteles the sculptor made a Parian image of Love, moulding the Cyprian's son; but now Love, the most beautiful of all the gods, imaging himself, has fashioned a breathing statue, Praxiteles, that the one among mortals and the other in heaven may have all love-charms in control, and at once on earth and among the immortals they may bear the sceptres of Desire. Most happy the sacred city of the Meropes, which nurtured as prince of her youth the god-born new Love.

VI THE SUN OF TYRE MELEAGER

Delicate, so help me Love, are the fosterlings of Tyre; but Myiscus blazes out and quenches them all as the sun the stars.

VII THE LOADSTAR MELEAGER

On thee, Myiscus, the cables of my life are fastened; in thee is the very breath of my soul, what is left of it; for by thine eyes, O boy, that speak even to the deaf, and by thy shining brow, if thou ever dost cast a clouded glance on me, I gaze on winter, and if thou lookest joyously, sweet spring bursts into bloom.

VIII LAUREL AND HYACINTH MELEAGER

O pastoral pipes, no longer sing of Daphnis on the mountains, to pleasure Pan the lord of the goats; neither do you, O lyre interpretess of Phoebus, any more chant Hyacinthus chapleted with maiden laurel; for time was when Daphnis was delightful to the mountain-nymphs, and Hyacinthus to thee; but now let Dion hold the sceptre of Desire.

IX THE QUEST OF PAN GLAUCUS

Nymphs, tell me true when I inquire if Daphnis passing by rested his white kids here.—Yes, yes, piping Pan, and carved in the bark of yonder poplar a letter to say to thee, "Pan, Pan, come to Malea, to the Psophidian mount; I will be there."—Farewell, Nymphs, I go.

X THE AUTUMN BOWER MNASALCAS

Vine, that hastenest so to drop thy leaves to earth, fearest thou then the evening setting of the Pleiad? abide for sweet sleep to fall on Antileon beneath thee, giving all grace to beauty till then.

XI AN ASH IN THE FIRE MELEAGER

Now grey dawn is sweet; but sleepless in the doorway Damis swoons out all that is left of his breath, unhappy, having but seen Heraclitus; for he stood under the beams of his eyes as wax cast among the embers: but arise, I pray thee, luckless Damis; even myself I wear Love's wound and shed tears over thy tears.



CHAPTER IX

FATE AND CHANGE

I THE FLOWER OF YOUTH MARCUS ARGENTARIUS

Sweet-breathed Isias, though thy sleep be tenfold spice, awake and take this garland in thy dear hands, which, blooming now, thou wilt see withering at daybreak, the likeness of a maiden's prime.

II THE MAIDEN'S POSY RUFINUS

I send thee, Rhodocleia, this garland, which myself have twined of fair flowers beneath my hands; here is lily and rose-chalice and moist anemone, and soft narcissus and dark-glowing violet; garlanding thyself with these, cease to be high-minded; even as the garland thou also dost flower and fall.

III WITHERED BLOSSOMS STRATO

If thou boast in thy beauty, know that the rose too blooms, but quickly being withered, is cast on the dunghill; for blossom and beauty have the same time allotted to them, and both together envious time withers away.

IV ROSE AND THORN AUTHOR UNKNOWN

The rose is at her prime a little while; which once past, thou wilt find when thou seekest no rose, but a thorn.

V THE BIRD OF TIME THYMOCLES

Thou remembered haply, thou rememberest when I said to thee that holy word, "Opportunity is the fairest, opportunity the lightest-footed of things; opportunity may not be overtaken by the swiftest bird in air." Now lo! all thy flowers are shed on the ground.

VI THE END OF DESIRE SECUNDUS

I who once was Lais, an arrow in all men's hearts, no longer Lais, am plainly to all the Nemesis of years. Ay, by the Cyprian (and what is the Cyprian now to me but an oath to swear by?) not Lais herself knows Lais now.

VII HOARDED BEAUTY STRATO

If beauty grows old, impart thou of it before it be gone; and if it abides, why fear to give away what thou dost keep?

VIII DUST AND ASHES ASCLEPIADES

Thou hoardest thy maidenhood; and to what profit? for when thou art gone to Hades thou wilt not find a lover, O girl. Among the living are the Cyprian's pleasures; but in Acheron, O maiden, we shall lie bones and dust.

IX TO-MORROW MACEDONIUS

"To-morrow I will look on thee"—but that never comes for us, while the accustomed putting-off ever grows and grows. This is all thy grace to my longing; and to others thou bearest other gifts, despising my faithful service. "I will see thee at evening." And what is the evening of a woman's life? old age, full of a million wrinkles.

X THE CASKET OF PANDORA MACEDONIUS

I laugh as I look on the jar of Pandora, nor do I blame the woman, but the wings of the Blessings themselves; for they flutter through the sky over the abodes of all the earth, while they ought to have descended on the ground. But the woman behind the lid, with cheeks grown pallid, has lost the splendour of the beauties that she had, and now our life has missed both ways, because she grows old in it, and the jar is empty.

XI COMING WINTER ANTIPATER OF SIDON

Now is autumn, Epicles, and out of the belt of Bootes the clear splendour of Arcturus has risen; now the grape-clusters take thought of the sickle, and men thatch their cottages against winter; but thou hast neither warm fleecy cloak nor garment indoors, and thou wilt be shrivelled up with cold and curse the star.

XII NEMESIS MELEAGER

Thou saidst, by the Cyprian, what not even a god might, O greatly- daring spirit; Theron did not appear fair to thee; to thee Theron did not appear fair; nay, thou wouldst have it so: and thou wilt not quake even before the flaming thunderbolt of Zeus. Wherefore lo! indignant Nemesis hath set thee forth to see, who wert once so voluble, for an example of rashness of tongue.

XIII THE BLOODY WELL APOLLONIDES

I the Clear Fount (for the Nymphs gave this surname to me beyond all other springs) since a robber slew men who were resting beside me and washed his bloodstained hand in my holy waters, have turned that sweet flow backward, and no longer gush out for wayfarers; for who any more will call me the Clear?

XIV A STORY OF THE SEA ANTIPATER OF THESSALONICA

Once on a time when a ship was shattered at sea, two men fell at strife fighting for one plank. Antagoras struck away Pisistratus; one could not blame him, for it was for his life; but Justice took cognisance. The other swam ashore; but him a dog-fish seized; surely the Avenger of the Fates rests not even in the watery deep.

XV EMPTY HANDS CALLIMACHUS

I know that my hands are empty of wealth; but by the Graces, O Menippus, tell me not my own dream; it hurts me to hear evermore this bitter word: yes, my dear, this is the most unloving thing of all I have borne from thee.

XVI LIGHT LOVE MARCUS ARGENTARIUS

Thou wert loved when rich, Sosicrates, but being poor thou art loved no longer; what magic has hunger! And she who before called thee spice and darling Adonis, Menophila, now inquires thy name. Who and whence of men art thou? where is thy city? Surely thou art dull in learning this saying, that none is friend to him who has nothing.

XVII FORTUNE'S PLAYTHING AUTHOR UNKNOWN

Not of good-will has Fortune advanced thee; but that she may show her omnipotence, even down to thee.

XVIII TIME THE CONQUEROR PLATO

Time carries all things; length of days knows how to change name and shape and nature and fortune.

XIX MEMNON AND ACHILLES ASCLEPIODOTUS

Know, O Thetis of the sea, that Memnon yet lives and cries aloud, warmed by his mother's torch, in Egypt beneath Libyan brows, where the running Nile severs fair-portalled Thebes; but Achilles, the insatiate of battle, utters no voice either on the Trojan plain or in Thessaly.

XX CORINTH ANTIPATER OF SIDON

Where is thine admired beauty, Dorian Corinth, where thy crown of towers? where thy treasures of old, where the temples of the immortals, where the halls and where the wives of the Sisyphids, and the tens of thousands of thy people that were? for not even a trace, O most distressful one, is left of thee, and war has swept up together and clean devoured all; only we, the unravaged sea-nymphs, maidens of Ocean, abide, halcyons wailing for thy woes.

XXI DELOS ANTIPATER OF THESSALONICA

Would I were yet blown about by ever-shifting gales, rather than fixed for wandering Leto's childbed; I had not so bemoaned my desolation. Ah miserable me, how many Greek ships sail by me, desert Delos, once so worshipful: late, but terrible, is Hera's vengeance laid on me thus for Leto's sake.

XXII TROY AGATHIAS

If thou art a Spartan born, O stranger, deride me not, for not to me only has Fortune accomplished this; and if of Asia, mourn not, for every city has bowed to the Dardanian sceptre of the Aeneadae. And though the jealous sword of enemies has emptied out Gods' precincts and walls and inhabitants, I am queen again; but do thou, O my child, fearless Rome, lay the yoke of thy law over Greece.

XXIII MYCENAE (1) ALPHEUS

Few of the native places of the heroes are in our eyes, and those yet left rise little above the plain; and such art thou, O hapless Mycenae, as I marked thee in passing by, more desolate than any hill- pasture, a thing that goatherds point at; and an old man said, "Here stood the Cyclopean city rich in gold."

XXIV MYCENAE (2) POMPEIUS

Though I am but drifted desolate dust where once was Mycenae, though I am more obscure to see than any chance rock, he who looks on the famed city of Ilus, whose walls I trod down and emptied all the house of Priam, will know thence how great my former strength was; and if old age has done me outrage, I am content with Homer's testimony.

XXV AMPHIPOLIS ANTIPATER OF THESSALONICA

City built upon Strymon and the broad Hellespont, grave of Edonian Phyllis, Amphipolis, yet there remain left to thee the traces of the temple of her of Aethopion and Brauron, and the water of the river so often fought around; but thee, once the high strife of the sons of Aegeus, we see like a torn rag of sea-purple on either shore.

XXVI SPARTA AUTHOR UNKNOWN

O Lacedaemon, once unsubdued and untrodden, thou seest shadeless the smoke of Olenian camp-fires on the Eurotas, and the birds building their nests on the ground wail for thee, and the wolves to do not hear any sheep.

XXVII BERYTUS AUTHOR UNKNOWN

Formerly the dead left their city living; but we living hold the city's funeral.

XXVIII SED TERRAE GRAVIORA LEONIDAS OF TARENTUM

Me, a hull that had measured such spaces of sea, fire consumed on the land that cut her pines to make me. Ocean brought me safe to shore; but I found her who bore me more treacherous than the sea.

XXIX YOUTH AND RICHES AUTHOR UNKNOWN

I was young, but poor; now in old age I am rich, alas, alone of all men pitiable in both, who then could enjoy when I had nothing, and now have when I cannot enjoy.

XXX THE VINE'S REVENGE EVENUS

Though thou devour me down to the root, yet still will I bear so much fruit as will serve to pour libation on thee, O goat, when thou art sacrificed.

XXXI REVERSAL PLATO

A man finding gold left a halter; but he who had left the gold, not finding it, knotted the halter he found.

XXXII TENANTS AT WILL AUTHOR UNKNOWN

I was once the field of Achaemenides, now I am Menippus', and again I shall pass from another to another; for the former thought once that he owned me, and the latter thinks so now in his turn; and I belong to no man at all, but to Fortune.

XXXIII PARTING COMPANY AUTHOR UNKNOWN

Hope, and thou Fortune, a long farewell; I have found the haven; there is nothing more between me and you; make your sport of those who come after me.

XXXIV FORTUNE'S MASTER PALLADAS

No more is Hope or Fortune my concern, nor for what remains do I reck of your deceit; I have reached harbour. I am a poor man, but living in Freedom's company I turn my face away from wealth the scorner of poverty.

XXXV BREAK OF DAY JULIUS POLYAENUS

Hope evermore steals away life's period, till the last morning cuts short all those many businesses.



CHAPTER X

THE HUMAN COMEDY

I PROLOGUE STRATO

Seek not on my pages Priam at the altars nor Medea's and Niobe's woes, nor Itys in the hidden chambers, and the nightingales among the leaves; for of all these things former poets wrote abundantly; but mingling with the blithe Graces, sweet Love and the Wine-god; and grave looks become not them.

II FLOWER O' THE ROSE DIONYSIUS

You with the roses, you are fair as a rose; but what sell you? yourself, or your roses, or both together?

III LOST DRINK NICARCHUS

At the Hermaea, Aphrodisius, while lifting six gallons of wine for us, stumbled and dealt us great woe. "From wine also perished the Centaur," and ah that we had too! but now it perished from us.

IV THE VINTAGE-REVEL LEONIDAS OF TARENTUM

To the must-drinking Satyrs and to Bacchus, planter of the vine, Heronax consecrated the first handfuls of his plantation, these three casks from three vineyards, filled with the first flow of the wine; from which we, having poured such libation as is meet to crimson Bacchus and the Satyrs, will drink deeper than they.

V SNOW IN SUMMER SIMONIDES

With this once the sharp North Wind rushing from Thrace covered the flanks of Olympus, and nipped the spirits of thinly-clad men; then it was buried alive, clad in Pierian earth. Let a share of it be mingled for me; for it is not seemly to bear a tepid draught to a friend.

VI A JUG OF WINE AUTHOR UNKNOWN

Round-bellied, deftly-turned, one eared, long-throated, straight- necked, bubbling in thy narrow mouth, blithe handmaiden of Bacchus and the Muses and Cytherea, sweet of laughter, delightful ministress of social banquets, why when I am sober art thou in liquor, and when I am drunk, art sober again? Thou wrongest the good-fellowship of drinking.

VII THE EMPTY JAR ERATOSTHENES

Xenophon the wine-bibber dedicates an empty jar to thee, Bacchus; receive it graciously, for it is all he has.

VIII ANGELORUM CHORI MARCUS ARGENTARIUS

I hold revel, regarding the golden choir of the stars at evening, nor do I spurn the dances of others; but garlanding my hair with flowers that drop their petals over me, I waken the melodious harp into passion with musical hands; and doing thus I lead a well-ordered life, for the order of the heavens too has its Lyre and Crown.

IX SUMMER SAILING ANTIPHILUS

Mine be a mattress on the poop, and the awnings over it surrounding with the blows of the spray, and the fire forcing its way out of the hearth-stones, and a pot upon them with empty turmoil of bubbles; and let me see the boy dressing the meat, and my table be a ship's plank covered with a cloth; and a game of pitch and toss, and the boatswain's whistle: the other day I had such fortune, for I love common life.

X L'ALLEGRO JULIANUS AEGYPTIUS

All the ways of life are pleasant; in the market-place are goodly companionships, and at home griefs are hidden; the country brings pleasure, seafaring wealth, foreign lands knowledge. Marriages make a united house, and the unmarried life is never anxious; a child is a bulwark to his father; the childless are far from fears; youth knows the gift of courage, white hairs of wisdom: therefore, taking courage, live, and beget a family.

XI DUM VIVIMUS VIVAMUS AUTHOR UNKNOWN

Six hours fit labour best: and those that follow, shown forth in letters, say to mortals, "Live."

XII HOPE AND EXPERIENCE AUTHOR UNKNOWN

Whoso has married once and again seeks a second wedding, is a shipwrecked man who sails twice through a difficult gulf.

XIII THE MARRIED MAN PALLADAS

If you boast high that you are not obedient to your wife's commands, you talk idly, for you are not sprung of oak or rock, as the saying is; and, as is the hard case with most or all of us, you too are in woman's rule. But if you say, "I am not struck with a slipper, nor my wife being unchaste have I to bear it and shut my eyes," I reply that your bondage is lighter, in that you have sold yourself to a reasonable and not to too hard a mistress.

XIV AN UNGROUNDED SCANDAL LUCILIUS

Some say, Nicylla, that you dye your hair; which is as black as can be bought in the market.

XV THE POPULAR SINGER NICARCHUS

The night-raven's song is deadly; but when Demophilus sings, the very night-raven dies.

XVI THE FAULTLESS DANCER PALLADAS

Snub-nosed Memphis danced Daphnis and Niobe; Daphne like a stock, Niobe like a stone.

XVII THE FORTUNATE PAINTER LUCILIUS

Eutychus the portrait-painter got twenty sons, and never got one likeness, even among his children.

XVIII SLOW AND SURE NICARCHUS

Charmus ran for the three miles in Arcadia with five others; surprising to say, he actually came in seventh. When there were only six, perhaps you will say, how seventh? A friend of his went along in his great-coat crying, "Keep it up, Charmus!" and so he arrives seventh; and if only he had had five more friends, Zoilus, he would have come in twelfth.

XIX MARCUS THE RUNNER LUCILIUS

Marcus once saw midnight out in the armed men's race, so that the race-course was all locked up, as the police all thought that he was one of the stone men in armour who stand there in honour of victors. Very well, it was opened next day, and then Marcus turned up, still short of the goal by the whole course.

XX HERMOGENES LUCILIUS

Little Hermogenes, when he lets anything fall on the ground, has to drag it down to him with a hook at the end of a pole.

XXI PHANTASMS OF THE LIVING LUCILIUS

Lean Gaius yesterday breathed his very last breath, and left nothing at all for burial, but having passed down into Hades just as he was in life, flutters there the thinnest of the anatomies under earth; and his kinsfolk lifted an empty bier on their shoulders, inscribing above it, "This is Gaius' funeral."

XXII A LABOUR OF HERCULES LUCILIUS

Tiny Macron was found asleep one summer day by a mouse, who pulled him by his tiny foot into its hole; but in the hole he strangled the mouse with his naked hands and cried, "Father Zeus, thou hast a second Heracles."

XXIII EROTION LUCILIUS

Small Erotion while playing was carried aloft by a gnat, and cried, "What can I do, Father Zeus, if thou dost claim me?"

XXIV ARTEMIDORA LUCILIUS

Fanning thin Artemidora in her sleep, Demetrius blew her clean out of the house.

XXV THE ATOMIC THEORY LUCILIUS

Epicurus wrote that the whole universe consisted of atoms, thinking, Alcimus, that the atom was the least of things. But if Diophantus had lived then, he would have written, "consisted of Diophantus," who is much more minute than even the atoms, or would have written that all other things indeed consist of atoms, but the atoms themselves of him.

XXVI CHAEREMON LUCILIUS

Borne up by a slight breeze, Chaeremon floated through the clear air, far lighter than chaff, and probably would have gone spinning off through ether, but that he caught his feet in a spider's web, and dangled there on his back; there he hung five nights and days, and on the sixth came down by a strand of the web.

XXVII GOD AND THE DOCTOR NICARCHUS

Marcus the doctor called yesterday on the marble Zeus; though marble, and though Zeus, his funeral is to-day.

XXVIII THE PHYSICIAN AND THE ASTROLOGER NICARCHUS

Diophantus the asrologer said that Hermogenes the physician had only nine months to live; and he laughing replied, "what Cronus may do in nine months, do you consider; but I can make short work with you." He spoke, and reaching out, just touched him, and Diophantus, while forbidding another to hope, gasped out his own life.

XXIX A DEADLY DREAM LUCILIUS

Diophantus, having seen Hermogenes the physician in sleep, never awoke again, though he wore an amulet.

XXX SIMON THE OCULIST NICARCHUS

If you have an enemy, Dionysius, call not down upon him Isis nor Harpocrates, nor whatever god strikes men blind, but Simon; and you will know what God and what Simon can do.

XXXI SCIENTIFIC SURGERY NICARCHUS

Agclaus killed Acestorides while operating; for, "Poor man," he said, "he would have been lame for life."

XXXII THE WISE PROPHET LUCILIUS

All the astrologers as from one mouth prophesied to my father that his brother would reach a great old age; Hermocleides alone said he was fated to die early; and he said so, when we were mourning over his corpse in-doors.

XXXIII SOOTHSAYING NICARCHUS

Some one came inquiring of the prophet Olympicus whether he should sail to Rhodes, and how he should have a safe voyage; and the prophet replied, "First have a new ship, and set sail not in winter but in summer; for if you do this you will travel there and back safely, unless a pirate captures you at sea."

XXXIV THE ASTROLOGER'S FORECAST AGATHIAS

Calligenes the farmer, when he had cast his seed into the land, came to the house of Aristophenes the astrologer, and asked him to tell whether he would have a prosperous summer and abundant plenty of corn. And he, taking the counters and ranging them closely on the board, and crooking his fingers, uttered his reply to Calligenes: "If the cornfield gets sufficient rain, and does not breed a crop of flowering weeds, and frost does not crack the furrows, nor hail flay the heads of the springing blades, and the pricket does not devour the crop, and it sees no other injury of weather or soil, I prophesy you a capital summer, and you will cut the ears successfully: only fear the locusts."

XXXV A SCHOOL OF RHETORIC AUTHOR UNKNOWN

All hail, seven pupils of Aristides the rhetorician, four walls and three benches.

XXXVI CROSS PURPOSES NICARCHUS

A deaf man went to law with a deaf man, and the judge was a long way deafer than both. The one claimed that the other owed him five months' rent; and he replied that he had ground his corn by night; then the judge, looking down on them, said, "Why quarrel? she is your mother; keep her between you."

XXXVII THE PATENT STOVE NICARCHUS

You have bought a brass hot-water urn, Heliodorus, that is chillier than the north wind about Thrace; do not blow, do not labour, you but raise smoke in vain; it is a brass wine-cooler you have bought against summer.

XXXVIII THE WOODEN HORSE LUCILIUS

You have a Thessalian horse, Erasistratus, but the drugs of all Thessaly cannot make him go; the real wooden horse, that if Trojans and Greeks had all pulled together, would never have entered at the Scaean gate; set it up as an offering to some god, if you take my advice, and make gruel for your little children with its barley.

XXXIX A MYSTERIOUS DISAPPEARANCE LUCILIUS

Antiochus once set eyes on Lysimachus' cushion, and Lysimachus never set eyes on his cushion again.

XL CINYRAS THE CILICIAN DEMODOCUS

All Cilicians are bad men; among the Cilicians there is one good man, Cinyras, and Cinyras is a Cilician.

XLI A GENERATION OF VIPERS AUTHOR UNKNOWN

Keep clear of a cobra, a toad, a viper, and the Laodiceans; also of a mad dog, and of the Laodiceans once again.

XLII THE LIFEBOAT NICARCHUS

Philo had a boat, the Salvation, but not Zeus himself, I believe, can be safe in her; for she was salvation in name only, and those who got on board her used either to go aground or to go underground.

XLIII THE MISER AND THE MOUSE LUCILIUS

Asclepiades the miser saw a mouse in his house, and said, "What do you want with me, my very dear mouse?" and the mouse, smiling sweetly, replied, "Do not be afraid, my friend; we do not ask board from you, only lodging."

XLIV THE FRUITS OF PHILOSOPHY LUCIAN

We saw at dinner the great wisdom of that sturdy beggar the Cynic with the long beard; for at first he abstained from lupines and radishes, saying that Virtue ought not to be a slave to the belly; but when he saw a snowy womb dressed with sharp sauce before his eyes, which at once stole away his sagacious intellect, he unexpectedly asked for it, and ate of it heartily, observing that an entree could not harm Virtue.

XLV VEGETARIANISM AUTHOR UNKNOWN

You were not alone in keeping your hands off live things; we do so too; who touches live food, Pythagoras? but we eat what has been boiled and roasted and pickled, and there is no life in it then.

XLVI NICON'S NOSE NICARCHUS

I see Nicon's hooked nose, Menippus; it is evident he is not far off now; oh, he will be here, let us just wait; for at the most his nose is not, I fancy, five stadia off him. Nay, here it is, you see, stepping forward; if we stand on a high mound we shall catch sight of him in person.

XLVII WHO SO PALE AND WAN, FOND LOVER ASCLEPIADES

Drink, Asclepiades; why these tears? what ails thee? not of thee only has the cruel Cyprian made her prey, nor for thee only bitter Love whetted the arrows of his bow; why while yet alive liest thou in the dust?

XLVIII THE WORLD'S REVENGE LUCIAN

In a company where all were drunk, Acindynus must needs be sober; and so he seemed himself the one drunk man there.

XLIX EPILOGUE PHILODEMUS

I was in love once; who has not been? I have revelled; who is uninitiated in revels? nay, I was mad; at whose prompting but a god's? Let them go; for now the silver hair is fast replacing the black, a messenger of wisdom that comes with age. We too played when the time of playing was; and now that it is no longer, we will turn to worthier thoughts.



CHAPTER XI

DEATH

I THE SPAN OF LIFE MACEDONIUS

Earth and Birth-Goddess, thou who didst bear me and thou who coverest, farewell; I have accomplished the course between you, and I go, not discerning whither I shall travel; for I know not either whose or who I am, or whence I came to you.

II DUSTY DEATH AUTHOR UNKNOWN

Pay no offering of ointments or garlands on my stony tomb, nor make the fire blaze up; the expense is in vain. While I live be kind to me if thou wilt; but drenching my ashes with wine thou wilt make mire, and the dead man will not drink.

III A CITIZEN OF THE REPUBLIC LEONIDAS OF TARENTUM

A little dust of earth suffices me; let another lie richly, weighed down by his extravagant tombstone, that grim weight over the dead, who will know me here in death as Alcander son of Calliteles.

IV BENE MERENTI AUTHOR UNKNOWN

Dear Earth, take old Amyntichus to thy bosom, remembering his many labours on thee; for ever he planted in thee the olive-stock, and often made thee fair with vine-cuttings, and filled thee full of corn, and, drawing channels of water along, made thee rich with herbs and plenteous in fruit: do thou in return lie softly over his grey temples and flower into tresses of spring herbage.

V PEACE IN THE END DIONYSIUS

A gentler old age and no dulling disease quenched thee, and thou didst fall asleep in the slumber to which all must come, O Eratosthenes, after pondering over high matters; nor did Cyrene where thou sawest the light receive thee within the tomb of thy fathers, O son of Aglaus; yet dear even in a foreign land art thou buried here, by the edge of the beach of Proteus.

VI THE WITHERED VINE LEONIDAS OF TARENTUM

Even as a vine on her dry pole I support myself now on a staff, and death calls me to Hades. Be not obstinately deaf, O Gorgus; what is it the sweeter for thee if for three or four summers yet thou shalt warm thyself beneath the sun? So saying the aged man quietly put his life aside, and removed his house to the greater company.

VII ACCOMPLISHMENT THEAETETUS

Crantor was delightful to men and yet more delightful to the Muses, and did not live far into age: O earth, didst thou enfold the sacred man in death, or does he still live in gladness there?

VIII LOCA PASTORUM DESERTA AUTHOR UNKNOWN

Naiads and chill cattle-pastures, tell to the bees when they come on their springtide way, that old Leucippus perished on a winter's night, setting snares for scampering hares, and no longer is the tending of the hives dear to him; but the pastoral dells mourn sore for him who dwelt with the mountain peak for neighbour.

IX THE OLD SHEPHERD LEONIDAS OF TARENTUM

Shepherds who pass over this ridge of hill pasturing your goats and fleecy sheep, pay to Clitagoras, in Earth's name, a small but kindly grace, for the sake of Persephone under ground; let sheep bleat by me, and the shepherd on an unhewn stone pipe softly to them as they feed, and in early spring let the countryman pluck the meadow flower to engarland my tomb with a garland, and let one make milk drip from a fruitful ewe, holding up her milking-udder, to wet the base of my tomb: there are returns for favours to dead men, there are, even among the departed.

X THE DEAD FOWLER MNASALCAS

Even here shall the holy bird rest his swift wing, sitting on this murmuring plane, since Poemander the Malian is dead and comes no more with birdlime smeared on his fowling reeds.

XI THE ANT BY THE THRESHING FLOOR ANTIPATER OF SIDON

Here to thee by the threshing floor, O toiling worker ant, I rear a memorial to thee of a thirsty clod, that even in death the ear- nurturing furrow of Demeter may lull thee as thou liest in thy rustic cell.

XII THE TAME PARTRIDGE SIMMIAS

No more along the shady woodland copse, O hunter partridge, dost thou send thy clear cry from thy mouth as thou decoyest thy speckled kinsfolk in their forest feeding-ground; for thou art gone on the final road of Acheron.

XIII THE SILENT SINGING-BIRD TYMNES

O bird beloved of the Graces, O rivalling the halcyons in likeness of thy note, thou art snatched away, dear warbler, and thy ways and thy sweet breath are held in the silent paths of night.

XIV THE FIELDS OF PERSEPHONE ARISTODICUS

No longer in the wealthy house of Alcis, O shrill grasshopper, shall the sun behold thee singing; for now thou art flown to the meadows of Clymenus and the dewy flowers of golden Persephone.

XV THE DISCONSOLATE SHEPHERD THEOCRITUS

Ah thou poor Thyrsis, what profit is it if thou shalt waste away the apples of thy two eyes with tears in thy mourning? the kid is gone, the pretty young thing, is gone to Hades; for a savage wolf crunched her in his jaws; and the dogs bay; what profit is it, when of that lost one not a bone nor a cinder is left?

XVI LAMPO THE HOUND ANTIPATER OF SIDON

Thirst slew hunter Lampo, Midas' dog, though he toiled hard for his life; for he dug with his paws in the moist flat, but the slow water made no haste out of her blind spring, and he fell in despair; then the water gushed out. Ah surely, Nymphs, you laid on Lampo your wrath for the slain deer.

XVII STORM ON THE HILLS DIOTIMUS

Unherded at evenfall the oxen came to the farmyard from the hill, snowed on with heavy snow; alas, and Therimachus sleeps the long sleep beside an oak, stretched there by fire from heaven.

XVIII A WET NIGHT ANTIPATER OF SIDON

I know not whether I shall complain of Dionysus or blame the rain of Zeus, but both are treacherous for feet. For the tomb holds Polyxenus, who returning once to the country from a feast, tumbled over the slippery slopes, and lies far from Aeolic Smyrna: but let one full of wine fear a rainy footpath in the dark.

XIX FAR FROM HOME TYMNES

Let not this be of too much moment to thee, O Philaenis, that thou hast not found thine allotted earth by the Nile, but this tomb holds thee in Eleutherne; for to comers from all places there is an equal way to Hades.

XX DEATH AT SEA SIMONIDES

Strange dust covers thy body, and the lot of death took thee, O Cleisthenes, wandering in the Euxine sea; and thou didst fail of sweet and dear home-coming, nor ever didst reach sea-girt Chios.

XXI AT THE WORLD'S END CRINAGORAS

Alas, why wander we, trusting in vain hopes and forgetting baneful death? this Seleucus was perfect in his words and ways, but, having enjoyed his youth but a little, among the utmost Iberians, so far away from Lesbos, he lies a stranger on unmapped shores.

XXII IN LIMINE PORTUS ANTIPHILUS

Already almost in touch of my native land, "To-morrow," I said, "the wind that has set so long against me will abate"; not yet had the speech died on my lip, and the sea was even as Hades, and that light word broke me down. Beware of every speech with to-morrow in it; not even small things escape the Nemesis that avenges the tongue.

XXIII DROWNED IN HARBOUR ANTIPATER OF THESSALONICA

Not even when at anchor trust the baleful sea, O sailor, nor even if dry land hold thy cables; for Ion fell into the harbour, and at the plunge wine tied his quick sailor's hands. Beware of revelling on ship-board; the sea is enemy to Iacchus; this law the Tyrrhenians ordained.

XXIV IN SOUND OF THE SEA ANTIPATER OF THESSALONICA

Even in death shall the implacable sea vex me, Lysis hidden beneath a lonely rock, ever sounding harshly by my ear and alongside of my deaf tomb. Why, O fellow-men, have you made my dwelling by this that reft me of breath, me whom not trading in my merchant-ship but sailing in a little rowing-boat, it brought to shipwreck? and I who sought my living out of the sea, out of the sea likewise drew my death.

XXV THE EMPTY HOUSE ANTIPATER OF THESSALONICA

Hapless Nicanor, doomed by the grey sea, thou liest then naked on a strange beach, or haply by the rocks, and those wealthy halls are perished from thee, and lost is the hope of all Tyre; nor did aught of thy treasures save thee; alas, pitiable one! thou didst perish, and all thy labour was for the fishes and the sea.

XXVI THE SINKING OF THE PLEIAD AUTOMEDON

O man, be sparing of life, neither go on sea-faring beyond the time; even so the life of man is not long. Miserable Cleonicus, yet thou didst hasten to come to fair Thasos, a merchantman out of hollow Syria, O merchant Cleonicus; but hard on the sinking of the Pleiad as thou journeyedst over the sea, as the Pleiad sank, so didst thou.

XXVII A RESTLESS GRAVE ARCHIAS

Not even in death shall I Theris, tossed shipwrecked upon land by the waves, forget the sleepless shores; for beneath the spray-beaten reefs, nigh the disastrous main, I found a grave at the hands of strangers, and for ever do I wretchedly hear roaring even among the dead the hated thunder of the sea.

XXVIII TELLURIS AMOR CRINAGORAS

O happy shepherd, would that even I had shepherded on the mountain along this white grassy hill, making the bleating folk move after the leader rams, rather than have dipped a ship's steering-rudders in the bitter brine: so I sank under the depths, and the east wind that swallowed me down cast me up again on this shore.

XXIX A GRAVE BY THE SEA ASCLEPIADES

Keep eight cubits away from me, O rough sea, and billow and roar with all thy might; but if thou pullest down the grave of Eumares, thou wilt find nothing of value, but only bones and dust.

XXX AN EMPTY TOMB CALLIMACHUS

Would that swift ships had never been, for we should not have bewailed Sopolis son of Diocleides; but now somewhere in the sea he drifts dead, and instead of him we pass by a name on an empty tomb.

XXXI THE DAYS OF THE HALCYONS APOLLONIDES

And when shall thy swirling passage be free from fear, say, O sea, if even in the days of the halcyons we must weep, of the halcyons for whom Ocean evermore stills his windless wave, that one might think dry land less trustworthy? but even when thou callest thyself a gentle nurse and harmless to women in labour, thou didst drown Aristomenes with his freight.

XXXII A WINTER VOYAGE AUTHOR UNKNOWN

Thee too, son of Cleanor, desire after thy native land destroyed, trusting to the wintry gust of the South; for the unsecured season entangled thee, and the wet waves washed away thy lovely youth.

XXXIII THE DEAD CHILD AUTHOR UNKNOWN

Not yet were thy tresses cut, nor had the monthly courses of the moon driven a three years' space, O poor Cleodicus, when thy mother Nicasis, clasping thy coffin, wailed long over thy lamented grave, and thy father Pericleitus; but an unknown Acheron thou shalt flower out the youth that never, never returns.

XXXIV THE LITTLE SISTER LEONIDAS OF TARENTUM

This girl passed to Hades untimely, in her seventh year, before her many playmates, poor thing, pining for her baby brother, who at twenty months old tasted of loveless Death. Alas, ill-fated Peristeris, how near at hand God has set the sorest griefs to men.

XXXV PERSEPHONE'S PLAYTHING AUTHOR UNKNOWN

Hades inexorable and inflexible, why hast thou thus reft infant Callaeschrus of life? Surely the child will be a plaything in the palace of Persephone, but at home he has left bitter sorrows.

XXXVI CHILDLESS AMONG WOMEN LEONIDAS OF TARENTUM

Ah wretched Anticles, and wretched I who have laid on the pyre in the flower of youth my only son, thee, child, who didst perish at eighteen years; and I weep, bewailing an orphaned old age: fain would I go to the shadowy house of Hades; neither is morn sweet to me, nor the beam of the swift sun. Ah wretched Anticles, struck down by fate, be thou healer of my sorrow, taking me with thee out of life.

XXXVII FATE'S PERSISTENCY PHILIPPUS

I Philaenion who gave birth but for the pyre, I the woeful mother, I who had seen the threefold grave of my children, anchored my trust on another's pangs; for I surely hoped that he at least would live, whom I had not borne. So I, who once had fair children, brought up an adopted son; but God would not let me have even a second mother's grace; for being called ours he perished, and now I am become a woe to the rest of mothers too.

XXXVIII ANTE DIEM BIANOR

Ever insatiate Charon, why hast thou wantonly taken young Attalus? was he not thine, even if he had died old?

XXXIX UNFORGOTTEN SIMONIDES

Protomachus said, as his father held him in his hands when he was breathing away his lovely youth, "O son of Timenor, thou wilt never forget thy dear son, nor cease to long for his valour and his wisdom."

XL THE BRIDECHAMBER ANTIPATER OF SIDON

Already the saffron-strewn bride-bed was spread within the golden wedding-chamber for the bride of Pitane, Cleinareta, and her guardians Demo and Nicippus hoped to light the torch-flame held at stretch of arm and lifted in both hands, when sickness snatched her away yet a maiden, and drew her to the sea of Lethe; and her sorrowing companions knocked not on the bridal doors, but on their own smitten breasts in the clamour of death.

XLI BRIDEGROOM DEATH MELEAGER

Not marriage but Death for bridegroom did Clearista receive when she loosed the knot of her maidenhood: for but now at even the flutes sounded at the bride's portal, and the doors of the wedding-chamber were clashed; and at morn they cried the wail, and Hymenaeus put to silence changed into a voice of lamentation; and the same pine-brands flashed their torchlight before the bride-bed, and lit the dead on her downward way.

XLII THE YOUNG WIFE JULIANUS AEGYTPIUS

In season the bride-chamber held thee, out of season the grave took thee, O Anastasia, flower of the blithe Graces; for thee a father, for thee a husband pours bitter tears; for thee haply even the ferryman of the dead weeps; for not a whole year didst thou accomplish beside thine husband, but at sixteen years old, alas! the tomb holds thee.

XLIII SANCTISSIMA CONIUNX CRINAGORAS

Unhappy, by what first word, by what second shall I name thee? unhappy! this word is true in every ill. Thou art gone, O gracious wife, who didst carry off the palm in bloom of beauty and in bearing of soul; Prote wert thou truly called, for all else comes second to those inimitable graces of thine.

XLIV SUNDERED HANDS DAMAGETUS

This last word, O famous city of Phocaea, Theano spoke as she went down into the unharvested night: "Woe's me unhappy; Apellichus, husband, what length, what length of sea dost thou cross on thine own ship! but nigh me stands my doom; would God I had but died with my hand clasped in thy dear hand."

XLV UNDIVIDED APOLLONIDES

Heliodorus went first, and Diogeneia the wife, not an hour's space after, followed her dear husband; and both, even as they dwelt together, are buried under this slab, rejoicing in their common tomb even as in a bride-chamber.

XLVI FIRST LOVE MELEAGER

Tears I give to thee even below with earth between us, Heliodora, such relic of love as may pass to Hades, tears sorely wept; and on thy much-wailed tomb I pour the libation of my longing, the memorial of my affection. Piteously, piteously, I Meleager make lamentation for thee, my dear, even among the dead, an idle gift to Acheron. Woe's me, where is my cherished flower? Hades plucked her, plucked her and marred the freshly-blown blossom with his dust. But I beseech thee, Earth, that nurturest all, gently to clasp her, the all-lamented, O mother, to thy breast.

XLVII FIRST FRIENDSHIP AUTHOR UNKNOWN

Ah blessed one, dearest companion of the immortal Muses, fare thou well even in the house of Hades, Callimachus.

XLVIII STREWINGS FOR GRAVES AUTHOR UNKNOWN

May flowers grow thick on thy newly-built tomb, not the dry bramble, not the evil weed, but violets and margerain and wet narcissus, Vibius, and around thee may all be roses.

XLIX DIMITTE MORTUOS PAULUS SILENTIARIUS

My name—Why this?—and my country—And to what end this?—and I am of illustrious race—Yea, if thou hadst been of the obscurest?—Having lived nobly I left life—If ignobly?—and I lie here now—Who art thou that sayest this, and to whom?

L MORS IMMORTALIS AUTHOR UNKNOWN

I died, but I await thee; and thou too shalt await some one else: one Death receives all mortals alike.

LI THE LIGHT OF THE DEAD PLATO

Morning Star that once didst shine among the living, now deceased thou shinest the Evening Star among the dead.



CHAPTER XII

LIFE

I THE JOY OF YOUTH RUFINUS

Let us bathe, Prodice, and garland ourselves, and drain unmixed wine, lifting larger cups; little is our life of gladness, then old age will stop the rest, and death is the end.

II THE USE OF LIFE NICARCHUS

Must I not die? what matters it to me whether I depart to Hades gouty or fleet of foot? for many will carry me; let me become lame, for hardly on their account need I ever cease from revelling.

III VAIN RICHES ANTIPHANES

Thou reckonest, poor wretch; but advancing time breeds white old age even as it does interest; and neither having drunk, nor bound a flower on thy brows, nor ever known myrrh nor a delicate darling, thou shalt be dead, leaving thy great treasury in its wealth, out of those many coins carrying with thee but the one.

IV MINIMUM CREDULA POSTERO PALLADAS

All human must pay the debt of death, nor is there any mortal who knows whether he shall be alive to-morrow; learning this clearly, O man, make thee merry, keeping the wine-god close by thee for oblivion of death, and take thy pleasure with the Paphian while thou drawest thy ephemeral life; but all else give to Fortune's control.

V DONEC HODIE AUTHOR UNKNOWN

Drink and be merry; for what is to-morrow or what the future? no man knows. Run not, labour not; as thou canst, give, share, consume, be mortal-minded; to be alive and not to be alive are no way at all apart. All life is such, only the turn of the scale; if thou art beforehand, it is thine; and if thou diest, all is another's, and thou hast nothing.

VI REQUIESCE ANIMA MIMNERMUS

Be young, dear my soul: soon will others be men, and I being dead shall be dark earth.

VII ONE EVENT MARCUS ARGENTARIUS

Five feet shalt thou possess as thou liest dead, nor shalt see the pleasant things of life nor the beams of the sun; then joyfully lift and drain the unmixed cup of wine, O Cincius, holding a lovely wife in thine arms; and if philosophy say that thy mind is immortal, know that Cleanthes and Zeno went down to deep Hades.

VIII THE PASSING OF YOUTH APOLLONIDES

Thou slumberest, O comrade; but the cup itself cries to thee, "Awake; do not make thy pleasure in the rehearsal of death." Spare not, Diodorus, slipping greedily into wine, drink deep, even to the tottering of the knee. Time shall be when we shall not drink, long and long; nay come, make haste; prudence already lays her hand on our temples.

IX THE HIGHWAY TO DEATH ANTIPATER OF SIDON

Men skilled in the stars call me brief-fated; I am, but I care not, O Seleucus. There is one descent for all to Hades; and if ours comes quicker, the sooner shall we look on Minos. Let us drink; for surely wine is a horse for the high-road, when foot-passengers take a by-path to Death.

X BEFORE THE DELUGE STRATO

Drink now and love, Damocrates, since not for ever shall we drink nor for ever hold fast our delight; let us crown our heads with garlands and perfume ourselves, before others bring these offerings to our graves. Now rather let my bones drink wine inside me; when they are dead, let Deucalion's deluge sweep them away.

XI FLEETING DAWN ASCLEPIADES

Let us drink an unmixed draught of wine; dawn is an hand-breadth; are we waiting to see the bed-time lamp once again? Let us drink merrily; after no long time yet, O luckless one, we shall sleep through the long night.

XII OUTRE-TOMBE JULIANUS AEGYPTUS

Often I sang this, and even out of the grave will I cry it: "Drink, before you put on this raiment of dust."

XIII EARTH TO EARTH ZONAS

Give me the sweet cup wrought of the earth from which I was born, and under which I shall lie dead.

XIV THE COFFIN-MAKER AUTHOR UNKNOWN

I would have liked to be rich as Croesus of old was rich, and to be king of great Asia; but when I look on Nicanor the coffin-maker, and know for what he is making these flute-cases of his, sprinkling my flour and wetting it with my jug of wine, I sell all Asia for ointments and garlands.

XV RETURNING SPRING PHILODEMUS

Now is rose-time and peas are in season, and the heads of early cabbage, O Sosylus, and the milky maena, and fresh-curdled cheese, and the soft-springing leaves of curled lettuces; and do we neither pace the foreland nor climb to the outlook, as always, O Sosylus, we did before? for Antagoras and Bacchius too frolicked yesterday, and now to-day we bear them forth for burial.

XVI A LIFE'S WANDERING AUTHOR UNKNOWN

Know ye the flowery fields of the Cappadocian nation? thence I was born of good parents: since I left them I have wandered to the sunset and the dawn; my name was Glaphyrus, and like my mind. I lived out my sixtieth year in perfect freedom; I know both the favour of Fortune and the bitterness of life.

XVII ECCE MYSTERIUM BIANOR

This man, inconsiderable, mean, yes, a slave, this man is loved, and is lord of another's soul.

XVIII THE SHADOW OF LIFE THEOGNIS

Fools and children are mankind to weep the dead, and not the flower of youth perishing.

XIX THE SHADOW OF DEATH AUTHOR UNKNOWN

Those who have left the sweet light I bewail no longer, but those who live ever in expectation of death.

XX PARTA QUIES PALLADAS

Expectation of death is woful grief, and this is the gain of a mortal when he perishes; weep not then for him who departs from life, for after death there is no other accident.

XXI THE CLOSED ACCOUNT PHILETAS

I weep not for thee, O dearest of friends; for thou knewest many fair things; and again God dealt thee thy lot of ill.

XXII THE VOYAGE OF LIFE PALLADAS

Life is a dangerous voyage; for tempest-tossed in it we often strike rocks more pitiably than shipwrecked men; and having Chance as pilot of life, we sail doubtfully as on the sea, some on a fair voyage, and others contrariwise; yet all alike we put into the one anchorage under earth.

XXIII DAILY BIRTH PALLADAS

Day by day we are born as night retires, no more possessing aught of our former life, estranged from our course of yesterday, and beginning to-day the life that remains. Do not then call thyself, old man, abundant in years; for to-day thou hast no share in what is gone.

XXIV THE LIMIT OF VISION AUTHOR UNKNOWN

Now we flourish as before others did, and soon others will, whose children we shall never see.

XXV THE BREATH OF LIFE PALLADAS

Breathing thin air into our nostrils we live and look on the torch of the sun, all we who live what is called life; and are as organs, receiving our spirits from quickening airs. If one then chokes that little breath with his hand, he robs us of life, and brings us down to Hades. Thus being nothing we wax high in hardihood, feeding on air from a little breath.

XXVI TWO ETERNITIES LEONIDAS OF TARENTUM

Infinite, O man, was the foretime until thou camest to thy dawn, and what remains is infinite on through Hades: what share is left for life but the bigness of a pinprick, and tinier than a pinprick if such there be? Little is thy life and afflicted; for not even so it is sweet, but more loathed than hateful death.

XXVII THE LORD OF LANDS AMMIANUS

Though thou pass beyond thy landmarks even to the pillars of Heracles, the share of earth that is equal to all men awaits thee, and thou shalt lie even as Irus, having nothing more than thine obolus, mouldering into a land that at last is not thine.

XXVIII THE PRICE OF RICHES PALLADAS

Thou art rich, and what of it in the end? as thou departest, dost thou drag thy riches with thee, pulling them into the coffin? Thou gatherest riches at expense of time, and thou canst not heap up more exceeding measures of life.

XXIX THE DARKNESS OF DAWN AMMIANUS

Morning by morning passes; then, while we heed not, suddenly the Dark One will be come, and, some by decaying, and some by parching, and some by swelling, will lead us all to the one pit.

XXX NIL EXPEDIT PALLADAS

Naked I came on earth, and naked I depart under earth, and why do I vainly labour, seeing the naked end?

XXXI THE WAY OF THE WORLD LUCIAN

Mortal is what belongs to mortals, and all things pass by us; and if not, yet we pass by them.

XXXII THE SUM OF KNOWLEDGE AUTHOR UNKNOWN

I was not, I came to be; I was, I am not: that is all; and who shall say more, will lie: I shall not be.

XXXIII NIHILISM GLYCON

All is laughter, and all is dust, and all is nothing; for out of unreason is all that is.

XXXIV NEPENTHE AUTHOR UNKNOWN

How was I born? whence am I? why did I come? to go again: how can I learn anything, knowing nothing? Being nothing, I was born; again I shall be as I was before; nothing and nothing-worth is the human race. But come, serve to me the joyous fountain of Bacchus; for this is the drug counter-charming ills.

XXXV THE SLAUGHTER-HOUSE PALLADAS

We all are watched and fed for Death as a herd of swine butchered wantonly.

XXXVI LACRIMAE RERUM PALLADAS

Weeping I was born and having wept I die, and I found all my living amid many tears. O tearful, weak, pitiable race of men, dragged under earth and mouldering away!

XXXVII THE WORLD'S WORTH AESOPUS

How might one escape thee, O life, without dying? for thy sorrows are numberless, and neither escape nor endurance is easy. For sweet indeed are thy beautiful things of nature, earth, sea, stars, the orbs of moon and sun; but all else is fears and pains, and though one have a good thing befal him, there succeeds it an answering Nemesis.

XXXVIII PIS-ALLER THEOGNIS

Of all things not to be born into the world is best, nor to see the beams of the keen sun; but being born, as swiftly as may be to pass the gates of Hades, and lie under a heavy heap of earth.

XXXIX THE SORROW OF LIFE POSIDIPPUS

What path of life may one hold? In the market-place are strifes and hard dealings, in the house cares; in the country labour enough, and at sea terror; and abroad, if thou hast aught, fear, and if thou art in poverty, vexation. Art married? thou wilt not be without anxieties; unmarried? thy life is yet lonelier. Children are troubles; a childless life is a crippled one. Youth is foolish, and grey hairs again feeble. In the end then the choice is of one of these two, either never to be born, or, as soon as born, to die.

XL THE JOY OF LIFE METRODORUS

Hold every path of life. In the market-place are honours and prudent dealings, in the house rest; in the country the charm of nature, and at sea gain; and abroad, if thou hast aught, glory, and if thou art in poverty, thou alone knowest it. Art married? so will thine household be best; unmarried? thy life is yet lighter. Children are darlings; a childless life is an unanxious one: youth is strong, and grey hairs again reverend. The choice is not then of one of the two, either never to be born or to die; for all things are good in life.

XLI QUIETISM PALLADAS

Why vainly, O man, dost thou labour and disturb everything when thou art slave to the lot of thy birth? Yield thyself to it, strive not with Heaven, and, accepting thy fortune, be content with rest.

XLII EQUANIMITY PALLADAS

If that which bears all things bears thee, bear thou and be borne; and if thou art indignant and vexest thyself, even so that which bears all things bears thee.

XLIII THE RULES OF THE GAME PALLADAS

All life is a stage and a game: either learn to play it, laying by seriousness, or bear its pains.

XLIV THE ONE HOPE PAULUS SILENTIARIUS

It is not living that has essential delight, but throwing away out of the breast cares that silver the temples. I would have wealth sufficient for me, and the excess of maddening care for gold ever eats away the spirit; thus among men thou wilt find often death better than life, as poverty than wealth. Knowing this, do thou make straight the paths of thine heart, looking to our one hope, Wisdom.

XLV AMOR MYSTICUS MARIANUS

Where is that backward-bent bow of thine, and the reeds that leap from thy hand and stick fast in mid-heart? where are thy wings? where they grievous torch? and why carriest thou three crowns in thy hands, and wearest another on thy head? I spring not from the common Cyprian, O stranger, I am not from earth, the offspring of wild joy; but I light the torch of learning in pure human minds, and lead the soul upwards into heaven. And I twine crowns of the four virtues; whereof carrying these, one from each, I crown myself with the first, the crown of Wisdom.

XLVI THE LAST WORD PALLADAS

Thou talkest much, O man, and thou art laid in earth after a little: keep silence, and while thou yet livest, meditate on death.



BIOGRAPHICAL INDEX OF EPIGRAMMATISTS

Greek literature from its earliest historical beginnings to its final extinction in the Middle Ages falls naturally under five periods. These are:—(1) Greece before the Persian warbs; (2) the ascendancy of Athens; (3) the Alexandrian monarchies; (4) Greece under Rome; (5) the Byzantine empire of the East. The authors of epigrams included in this selection are spread over all these periods through a space of about fifteen centuries.

I. Period of the lyric poets and of the complete political development of Greece, from the earliest time to the repulse of the Persian invasion, B.C. 480.

MIMNERMUS of Smyrna fl. B.C. 634-600, and was the contemporary of Solon. He is spoken of as the "inventor of elegy", and was apparently the first to employ the elegiac metre in threnes and love-poems. Only a few fragments, about eighty lines in all, of his poetry survive.

ERINNA of Rhodes, the contemporary of Sappho according to ancient tradition, fl. 600 B.C., and died very young. There are three epigrams in the Palatine Anthology under her name, probably genuine: see Bergk, /Lyr. Gr./ iii. p. 141. Besides the fragments given by Bergk, detached phrases of hers are probably preserved in /Anth. Pal./ vii. 12 and 13, and in the description by Christodorus of her statue in the gymnasium at Constantinople, /Anth. Pal./ ii. 108-110. She was included in the /Garland/ of Meleager, who speaks, l. 12, of the "sweet maiden-fleshed crocus of Erinna."