INFINITA: Martial, Epigram 2.20

Friday, March 11, 2011

Martial, Epigram 2.20

Marcus Valerius Martialis
1st-2nd c. AD (over 1,900 years ago)
Trans. RMBullard
Latin (Silver Age)

Carmina Paulus emit, recitat sua carmina Paulus.
(Paulus buys poems: Paulus recites his own poems;)

nam quod emas possis iure vocare tuum.
(you see, whatever you buy, you can call your own by right;)

Orwell, 1984: At those moments...Big Brother seemed to tower up, an invincible, fearless protector, standing like a rock against the hordes of Asia, and Goldstein, in spite of his isolation, his helplessness, and the doubt that hung about his very existence, seemed like some sinister enchanter, capable by the mere power of his voice of wrecking the structure of civilization.

in arena non domum noli aedificare: Never build your home on sand.

omnia recte sunt quae bene finiuntur: Everything's fine so long as it ends well

aut Caesar aut nullus (Either you're a Caesar or a nobody)

Man, Quintilian is a monster to translate!

Vote Democratic or Green!!!

εν αρχηι ην 'ο λογος (In the beginning, there was the Word).

[Archimedes]: Grant me but just a lever and the right fulcrum, and I shall move the world.

-Ah Persian, the sweet Italian of the East

-Herbert Hoover (1928 acceptance speech for Republican presidential nomination): We in America today are nearer to the final triumph over poverty than ever before in the history of any land. The poorhouse is vanishing from among us...We shall soon with the help of God be in sight of the day when poverty will be banished from this nation."

-Herbert Hoover (March 1930 press conference): The hobos...are better fed than they have ever been. One hobo in New York got ten meals in one day...many persons left their jobs for the more profitable one of selling apples.

-Tempus fugit, sed vita ambulat. (Time flies, but life walks)

-A man once told me that we Americans are actually very smart, only in a stupid way.

-sententias, quas mens numquam cognovit, cor sentat. (The heart feels things the mind can never understand)

[1932 article in Current History, courtesy of Robert McElvaine:] We still pray to be given each day our daily bread. Yet there is too much bread, too much wheat and corn, meat and oil and almost every other commodity required by man for his subsistence and material happiness. We are not able to purchase the abundance that modern methods of agriculture, mining and manufacture make available in such bountiful quantities. Why is mankind being asked to go hungry and cold and poverty stricken in the midst of plenty?

Ah, seems like Libya has a modern-day Jugurtha on its hands...

πονος γαρ 'ως λεγουσιν ευκλειας πατηρ : As they say, toil is the father of fame.

[Emperor Caligula]: And now senate and people, I am proud to introduce to you my colleague and your new consul of Rome...Incitatus!

[Emperor Nero, before he orders his slave to kill him]: Oh what an artist the world is a losing!

[Franklin Delano Roosevelt, 1920, courtesy of Robert McElvaine]: Herbert Hoover is truly a wonder, and I wish we could make him President. There couldn't be a better one. -

'οι γαρ πονοι τικτουσι την ευανδριαν: hard work begets good character

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Friday, March 11, 2011

Martial, Epigram 2.20