Oratoria minora
these things the phalanx-commander more courageous, the leader of the company stronger, the hoplite more ready for the needs of the moment, the one i
This gathering is a symbol of peace, O wise and beloved audience of mine, and, to speak with God, a most accurate stamp of coming peace. But it also h
of the barrier, may he himself also now make peace in our affairs and crush the opposing powers and find a way and a means for the desperate, he who b
through whom corruption has stolen into our souls. But neither are you free from the things of envy for upon your breast and your belly you have walk
None of you is without a share of lily-beds and rose-gardens, nor of other fragrance, what graces would one not enjoy when spring has arrived? But sin
virtues, but these they practiced and pursued, and all, having made the body lean through fasting and having released the soul from the bonds of natur
the heaven, how great, how ever-moving in its revolution, how wonderful in its nature? and the sun, how it is the source of the light here, how it is
is tested by countless signs, but Egypt is punished by darkness and you, the new Israel, have been freed from the clay and the brick-making thence al
has entrusted the rule of all. And having reviewed in his mind everyone, both soldiers and citizens, senators and governors, and all who had gained a
Rejoice and exult at my proclamation which God has shown to be splendid and most illustrious as never another. 6 {1To those who think the philosopher
so as to move the world, not to mention lead it up to heaven, but I am within the great circuit, for these reasons I have not wished to run in the sta
of actions, but you do not act in the proper way, nor do you emulate those ancient orators, Pericles, Cimon, Demosthenes and the others who have under
the pleasure of a matter drawing forth laughter, and the philosopher alone. But here it is the opposite in the case of your creation for you are the
testifying to the sweetness in a philosophical man. And Plato often rebukes Dion for the sullenness and smilelessness of his soul but is not the phil
A second matter is both adorned and set in order. This is the philosophy I too have emulated and if you examine it in one respect, you will count me
are divided into an aristocracy, to be of lesser concern, because it is necessary to adorn the inner nature, while these things superficially beautify
achievements. Aristotle also divided his entire force into cavalry and infantry. and of the infantry, he positioned the light-armed to throw stones an
to judge their customs worthy of comparison to philosophy) those things lift one up above the ether on a whole wing, but this they sink in the sea, ju
dividing and heaping up solids. But I also frequently showed you the images in mirrors and measured their sizes for you optically, having taken their
To those who envied him for the most esteemed honor Neither will an occasion for envy be left for you, nor for me a cause for honor and advancement f
ordained by God. But of the others, some excelled in these things, others in those, and no one in everything, or if anyone did, it was not as I have (
I am called for there are those who give me this name. If, then, I embark on the matter as if it were not permitted or unskillfully, show me this ver
they have imitated my manner for themselves. But look up also to the heavens at night, when all is clear, and see how not all the stars are of equal h
oversights, and the other things of which the tragic daemons are providers for all things are abundant, as if dripping from some spring of evils. The
a more grievous and troublesome evil. How very pleasing to them is the banquet hall. For as if shut up and squeezed together in some narrow place with
he was showing the strength of his words for a prize set before him, but for a matter from which it was not possible to profit from buffoonery and ins
We have known you as one who counterfeits its laws and has not understood even a trace of true wisdom. But O huckster, I have now suddenly changed my
being torn away from the laws as if from your own limbs, and clinging to other limbs whose form you did not know nor whose use you had studied? How th
and thus, having harmonized them with the rules of dialectic, you thence winged your way to theology. But you, as if having passed over the vale of th
For such a thing had happened to these men, and Herodotus indeed mentions the story right at the beginning of the first of the Muses. And if you shoul
sitting on the floor, knowing not even as much as mules. But I fear lest one of those standing by, taking hold of your cloak, might say, Friend, how
He forces the nonsense into truth. Do not, therefore, speak with the man, do not touch him, do not share a table, neither of salt nor of other things,
Taking a Megarian jar firmly in his two hands and raising it with both and fitting it to his lips, he drinks without taking a breath just like the oxe
they judge matters by their own life, but not by the rule of truth. For since these men have hated indifference, and they live like bees arranged unde
as you are writing, standing by your life. But we too shall write against our persecutors. For just as the seemliness of hair pleased you, so the unke
sitting and with his fingers harnessing and re-harnessing horses in the shadows but there, one fighting against contrary winds and quickly backing wa
Geometry, having taken its beginning from bodies, ended in the mind, though its nature is not so. For perception does not know how to beget mind, but
he has set down some introductions to the subject, then, as if out of necessity, he turned his argument to what he wanted. And he has not chosen in an
It is interwoven with its arguments and divided by its complexities and turned back upon itself. But if such styles have been assigned to perfect orat
he puts to sleep. But the others have leaped out from here and there, from the dormouse-holes and from the caves, one a palm-breadth tall, another but
changing the parts, preserves the same idea of the sound. But you must also take care for the art concerning the arrangement of the argument and do n
mysteries, and there they were taught the equality of geometry, and when they needed to philosophize, they went to Egypt, and having chosen to study a
but drawing them upon yourselves whence someone might indict you for sacrilege for having most shamelessly plagiarized things dedicated to divine men
and you are zealous but you render the account for your studies just as one of the necessary debts which some are required to pay even unwillingly. A
The birth-pangs of Plato and Aristotle are a bringing forth, by whom I am both born and fashioned. Do you see how from every side the argument has pro
you render to me. And while I seem to neglect other things, your affair is my pursuit and care whence, staying awake far into the nights, as soon as
to have the contemplation concerning these things, but from our wisdom to know the type and the truth, and to break the letter as if it were a shell,
having done no wrong thus you are elegant and sophistic, or rather powerful men and tyrants, and you dance upon a gentle character. But you are still
to the philosophers the technical matters, to learn the introductions, the proofs, the matters concerning demonstrations, how one reminds, how one pro
they might fit a diatonic melody and arrange the strings for it, do they not play a prelude for it and practice beforehand, not just once, but as many
should I enumerate poets and orators, who treated ancient genealogies with myths, from the very foundation basing their own discourse on myth? How the
quality and draws as much as its appetite desired but if it sees the liquid of the water corrupted, it leaves this spring, and goes to another and se
27 Encomium on the Flea They say ‘the gnat as an elephant.’ And so that our discourse may proceed along its path, let us attempt the flea as a leopard
its begetter for it is precisely black, like an eastern Ethiopian having changed his skin color from sun-burning, and it immediately reveals the heat
grieving. For it has appointed two masters of all things for itself, the sun for its birth, and man for its growth for from the one it has come into
lest it produce apoplexy, nature has cut the skull into various sutures but it also divided the entire bone of the suture with certain small holes, t
the awns guard, so also do the hairs of the louse ward off every attack. And even if the hunt should get close to the skin, it, just as they say spong
So indeed this creature has received its natural power in all the parts of its body. Now, the other beasts, being ambushed from behind, are by nature
from every side, equality bestows youth on nature. For men, when they grow old, and especially those who are graceful and tall in body, are filled wit
He was being plotted against by those revolting within him because of the absence of the regulator and shield-bearer of health and adversary of diseas
This is clear from the fact that it is possible to live without it and be well in the other senses, but the inactivity of these begets sickness and de
shouting like a Bacchant and acclaiming the son of Zeus and Semele. And from where did this good thing come to you, he says, O blessed one? Did you
let your communion with one another not be from habit and the opinion of the many, but let its principle be knowledge, and let the wandering and disor
souls? Far from it. But the body does not work against the spermatic logos (for this reason it is formed according to what that logos wishes), but the
working for just as the most drinkable of waters and the most temperate of airs dispose bodies well and generate a similar disposition, so also the c
But let the one who fails take pride that his brother happens to be better than he. Agesilaus happened to be the first among the Lacedaemonians even b
Let us summarize, by virtue, by reason, and by ancestral goods, using these three things for the best ends, you will be left behind in no part of eter
All things are mixed. But she fails in her plan, as the hero draws his sword against her, whence she almost breathed her last for her form is changed
by reason for see how the limbs have been fitted to nature. or rather, I shall marvel at the artist even from the stone for he did not place the var
being brought up, was he not turned away? Was not the compassionate one pricked to the heart over you? For this reason he shall be un-sacrificed and u
Nothing that exists is above Olympus. and so that I might make the last things of my discourse first, heaven is indeed adorned with stars, but these a
they have been hollowed out spontaneously, he will find how he might live luxuriously. For if he should go under the shade of a tree, immediately soft
pleasing, but all things were full of all things- the first tabernacle, the mercy-seat, the veil, the temple, the side-scenes, the vestibules, the out
discerning that man is an animal, which he did not know, and whatever else belongs to this, lest I make a further example of the foolish, or of the on
Intently and from every side examining subtleties, I was investigating the extensions, the releases, the intonations, the transitions, the displacemen
he has come, nor has he arrived to gather spiritual fruits, but only for the sake of this man whom you see reading with pleasure. For just as one who
Who will relate your magadis upon the breast and the songs and warblings upon your tongue, that all-harmonious melody, the pleasure that knows no sati
and himself, but what kind the others are, I do not know. For I see a form above human nature, and a look in one way cherubic, in another leonine, in
an ineffable sympathy and in turn feels a contrary passion, as the cosmos happens to be one living being, and how Plato, having posited the elements a
I have not heard of him rising up against anyone nor boasting for the whole time, but just as they say that the very learned accuse themselves of a te
to know what sort of thing your grandfather had become in life and what command of language he had. But I shall praise you, not by bringing in falseho
to revel. But whenever your bond was loosened and you shed the swaddling clothes, you did not know what to do with yourself, looking more cheerful, sm
To those who envied him for the most esteemed honor Neither will an occasion for envy be left for you, nor for me a cause for honor and advancement; for the emperors are well-disposed to me, and I in turn am advantageous and useful to them in times of need, but you are always ill-disposed to me, and I am of no advantage to you, for there is nothing I could do to heal your sick souls. For if I create fine speeches, you are envious of this very beauty, or if I show my character, in which I am benevolent and gracious to all, because I am such and not the opposite, you show me a look and a soul full of envy; and if I have received goodwill from the emperors, this is for you the chief point of your malevolence. I would gladly learn from you which you would rather choose: if, having changed my mind, I myself should become a useless burden on the earth, or if, while remaining of this disposition, my crowns of victory should become fewer. But whether this or that should be curtailed for me, you would again be hostile to the other; for there are times when I fall short in one of the two parts, for I am not always crowned with the prizes of excellence for my speeches, but even then you are consumed with envy and burst apart. But I am amazed at you, that though you have often done or suffered these things towards me, and gained nothing more from your malevolence than folly, you have not been brought to your senses for the future, but as if thinking to trip me up or stand in my way, and not rather tripping yourselves up, you attempt the same things; and there is never a time when, having clashed with me, you have not suffered more than you have inflicted. And I for my part neither compete against you nor choose to wrestle with you, but I either stand still or walk my appointed path, inclining neither way with my feet or with my eyes. But you, coming up behind me, croak like all-tongued ravens, to use Pindar’s phrase, but you do not even slightly disturb my hearing, like some field-mice attacking an eagle; and I for my part rise and wing my way higher, while for you the mouse-holes are again your usual refuge. And you are no less foolish than you are malevolent; for though you ought to compete with your equals and contend altogether with your peers, you, like bad dogs, do not chase the hare, though accustomed to this, but having given up even on the familiar and attainable things, which you cannot reach by nature, you leap upon these. For if honors were not a matter of judgment and vote nor of measured recompense, but everything, like hailstones, were cast down from above randomly and as it chanced, and then the better things had befallen me by the irrationality of chance, your envy would have had some reason. But since all things are numbered and made precise by the rulers and, just as for the first man the names for the beasts were established according to the logic of their nature, so also in our case dignities are assigned according to the measure of our disposition, why do you not rather accept the good repute of the judgment, but instead you irrationally disparage what is done with reason? For consider: before the rewards there were also toils and labors, some in words, others in deeds. And to speak comprehensively, it was necessary to run, I have run more than you; boxing was proposed and I was a better boxer than the others; there was the discus throw and I threw it higher than you; I threw the javelin and shot the arrow as none of you all did; I competed in the pentathlon and the pancratium. Shall I also speak of the things hidden from the many? I led the phalanx, I rode out, all my actions were lawful and nothing against the rule and the straight path, I also made use of my own resources since there was occasion for these too, I wrote what the man from Paeania says and I served as an ambassador, and not these things but not those, or this more and the rest less, but I also spoke in public as much as was fitting and more augustly than the Pylian old man, and I announced and reported no less than if I were a prophet and for this purpose
Πρὸς τοὺς βασκήναντας αὐτῷ τῆς τοῦ ὑπερτίμου τιμῆς Οὔθ' ὑμῖν βασκανίας περιλελείψεται ἀφορμή, οὔτ' ἐμοὶ τιμῆς ὑπόθεσις καὶ
αὐξήσεως· ἐμοί τε γὰρ οἱ βασιλεῖς εὖνοι, κἀγὼ δὲ ἐκείνοις ἐν καιροῖς λυσιτελής τε καὶ χρήσιμος, ὑμεῖς τέ μοι δύσνοι ἀεί, κἀγὼ
πρὸς ὑμᾶς ἀλυσιτελής, οὐ γὰρ ἔσθ' ὅ τι ποιήσας νοσούσας ὑμῶν ἰάσομαι τὰς ψυχάς. εἴτε γὰρ λόγους δημιουργήσω καλούς, αὐτὸ δὴ
τοῦτο βάσκανοι τῶν καλῶν, εἴτε τὸ ἦθος ἐνδείξομαι, ὃ δὴ πρὸς πάντας εἰμὶ εὐμενής τε καὶ ἵλεως, ὅτι τοιοῦτος ἀλλὰ μὴ τοὐναντίον,
φθόνου μοι μεστὴν καὶ τὴν ὄψιν καὶ τὴν ψυχὴν δείκνυτε· εἰ δὲ καὶ εὔνοά μοι τὰ παρὰ τῶν βασιλέων γεγένηται, τοῦτο δὴ τὸ κεφάλαιον
τῆς κακοηθείας ὑμῖν. ἡδέως δ' ἂν πυθοίμην ὑμῶν πότερον μᾶλλον αἱρήσεσθε, εἰ ἀλλοιωθεὶς αὐτὸς τὴν γνώμην ἄχθος ἀρούρης ἐτώσιον
ἔσομαι, ἢ ἔχειν μὲν οὕτως τῆς ἕξεως, ἐλάττους δέ μοι οἱ στέφανοι γίγνοιντο. ἀλλ' εἴτε τοῦτο εἴτ' ἐκεῖνο κολο βωθείη μοι, δυσμενῶς
αὖθις θατέρῳ ἕξετε· ἔστι γὰρ ὅτε παρὰ θάτερον τοῖν μεροῖν γίνομαι, οὐ γὰρ πάντοτε τοῖς ἀριστείοις στεφάνοις ἀναδοῦμαι τῶν
λόγων, ὑμεῖς δὲ καὶ τότε τῷ φθόνῳ τηκόμενοι διαρρήγνυσθε. Θαυμάζω δὲ ὑμῶν ὅτι πολλάκις ταῦτα πεποιηκότες ἢ πεπονθότες ἐμοί,
καὶ μηδὲν πλέον σχόντες τῆς κακοηθείας ἢ ἀβελτηρίας, οὐ πρὸς τὸ μέλλον ἐσωφρονίσθητε, ἀλλ' ὥσπερ ἐμὲ ἀναποδίζειν οἰόμενοι
ἢ ἐμποδὼν ἵστασθαι, ἀλλ' οὐ σφᾶς ἑαυτοὺς συμποδίζειν, τοῖς αὐτοῖς ἐπιβάλλετε· οὐκ ἔστι δὲ ὁπότε προσκεκρουκότες ἐμοὶ μὴ πεπόνθατε
μᾶλλον ἢ πε ποιήκατε. Κἀγὼ μὲν οὔτε ἀνταγωνίζομαι πρὸς ὑμᾶς οὔτε ἀντιπαλαίειν αἱροῦμαι, ἀλλ' ἢ ἀτρέμας ἵσταμαι ἢ βαδίζω τὴν
τεταγμένην, οὐδετέρωσε ἐπινεύων οὔτε τοῖν ποδοῖν οὔτε τοῖν ὀφθαλμοῖν. ὑμεῖς δὲ κατόπιν ἐμοῦ ἐπιόντες κεκράγατε μὲν ὁπόσα πάγγλωσσοι
κόρακες, τὸ τοῦ Πινδάρου φάναι, ἐμοὶ δὲ οὐδὲ τὴν ἀκοὴν βραχὺ κατασείετε ὥσπερ τινὲς ἀρουραῖοι μύες ἀετοῦ καθαπτόμενοι· κἀγὼ
μὲν ἐπὶ μεῖζον αἴρομαι καὶ πτερύσσομαι, ὑμῖν δὲ αὖθις αἱ μυωξίαι ἡ συνήθης καταφυγή. ἐστὲ δὲ εὐήθεις οὐδὲν ἧττον ἢ κακοήθεις·
δέον γὰρ τοῖς ἰσοπάλοις ἀνταγωνίζεσθαι καὶ τοῖς ἴσοις ὅλως ἀνθαμιλλᾶσθαι, ὑμεῖς ὥσπερ κακοὶ κύνες τὸν μὲν λαγωὸν οὐ μεταδιώκετε,
εἰθισμένοι τοῦτο, ἀλλὰ καὶ τῶν ἠθάδων καὶ προσεχῶν ἀπογνόντες, ὧν οὐκ ἐφικνεῖσθε τῇ φύσει, κατὰ τούτων ἐνάλλεσθε. Εἰ μὲν γὰρ
οὐ κρίσις καὶ ψῆφος οὐδὲ ἀντίδοσις ἔμμετρος αἱ τιμαί, ἀλλὰ πάντα, ὥσπερ αἱ χάλαζαι, καταρριπτεῖται ἄνωθεν εἰκῇ καὶ ὡς ἔτυχεν,
εἶτα δὴ ἐμοὶ κατὰ τύχης ἀλογίαν τὰ κρείττω συνεπεπτώκει, εἶχεν ἂν ὑμῖν λόγον ἡ βασκανία. ἐπεὶ δὲ πάντα τοῖς κρατοῦσιν ἠρίθμηται
καὶ ἠκρίβωται καί, ὥσπερ τῷ πρώτῳ ἀνθρώπῳ ἐπὶ τοῖς θηρίοις τὰ ὀνόματα τέθειται κατὰ λόγον τῆς φύσεως, οὕτω δὴ καὶ ἐφ' ἡμῖν
τὰ ἀξιώματα ῥιπτεῖται κατὰ τὸ μέτρον τῆς ἕξεως, τί μὴ μᾶλλον τὸ εὐδόκιμον τῆς κρίσεως ἀποδέχεσθε, ἀλλὰ τὸ σὺν λόγῳ ὑμεῖς ἀλογίστως
κακίζετε; λογίσασθε γάρ· ἦσαν πρὸ τῶν ἀντιδόσεων καὶ πόνοι καὶ κάματοι, τὰ μὲν ἐν λόγοις, τὰ δὲ ἐν πράγμασι. καὶ ἵνα συγκαλύψας
ἐρῶ, ἔδει δραμεῖν, ὑμῶν πλέον δεδράμηκα, πυγμὴ προὔκειτο καὶ πυκτικώτερος τῶν ἄλλων ἐγώ, δίσκου βολὴ καὶ ἀνέρριψα ὑμῶν ὑψηλότερον,
ἠκόντισα καὶ ἐτόξευσα ὁπόσον οὐδεὶς τῶν πάντων ὑμῶν, τὸν πένταθλον διηγωνισάμην καὶ τὸ παγκράτιον. εἴπω καὶ τὰ λανθάνοντα
τοῖς πολλοῖς; προὔστην τῆς φάλαγ γος, ἐξιππασάμην, ἔννομά μοι πάντα καὶ οὐδὲν παρὰ τὸν κανόνα καὶ τὸ εὐθές, ἐχρησάμην καὶ
τοῖς οἰκείοις ἐπειδὴ καὶ τούτων καιρός, ἔγραψα ὅ φησιν ὁ Παιανιεὺς καὶ ἐπρέσβευσα, καὶ οὐχὶ ταῦτα μέν, ἐκεῖνα δ' οὔ, ἢ τοῦτο
μὲν πλέον, ἧττον δὲ τὸ λοιπόν, ἀλλὰ καὶ ἐδημηγόρησα ὁπόσα εἰκὸς καὶ σεμνότερον τοῦ Πυλίου γέροντος, καὶ προήγγειλα καὶ ἐξήγγειλα
οὐδὲν ἔλαττον ἢ εἰ προφήτης ἦν καὶ ἐπὶ τούτῳ
