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
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. For not because it has been made smaller in bodily bulk has it for this reason also been deprived of the power found in the mightiest creatures; for nature, in fact, knows how to interchange in some cases the innate powers with the sizes of animals, and for that which it diminished in bulk it clearly magnified its vigor, while for that to which it added an abundance of flesh, it lessened its strength. And the first of the greatest philosophers make this clear; for that which has advanced in bulk, they diminish in power, just as they render more vigorous that which is contracted into itself. Therefore we are not doing some sophistic thing by making the flea a subject of praise, like those who chose to praise bumble-bees or salt, but rather something rhetorical and artful, proposing to speak about great things and making our speeches equal to their subjects. This, then, is the first and most beautiful thing we have to say about the creature: that, just like the most fragrant of plants (I mean roses and hyacinths and myrtles), it rises up together with the spring, having chosen the most beautiful of the seasons. And it is not born from another substance, like gnats and clothes-moths and mosquitoes and the rest, of which some are born from mud, and others from the decay of the dead, but the species proceeds unto itself, and in them are found by nature both that which begets and that which is begotten; for the one has departed, having left behind the seed, and the other grows from it. For among these too, as some have recorded, are spermatic channels and a life-giving nature and power; and the female bears the mating of the male, and when the bodies are gone the principle of generation has not perished with them, but is brought to life in the fitting parts of the universe and appears. And just as the sun, moving obliquely and turning, contributes something to the other greatest and most admired substances, so indeed is it accustomed to bring this species into being as it positions itself straightaway at the equinox. For as soon as the sun in its movement touched the equinoctial point, the creature, as if on cue, being at once formed and brought to life, leaped, skipping for its master the sun, both the cause and the adorner of its own life; it truly dances in chorus with it, and as if exulting in its begetter, it both skips and leaps upon things, celebrating the spring and made brilliant by the season. Therefore, just as the wise men of old named as lunar those creatures that change along with the waxings and wanings of the moon, so indeed let us also posit this a solar creature. For there is one beginning of all things, that ineffable and unnamable whatever-it-is; but this remains far off and unproceeding from its own unity, while as many things as have subsisted after it, different things have been established as origins for different substances. And some are brought forth throughout the year, others in each of the seasons, these in winter, those in summer, and for others autumn is the beginning of life; but the most graceful of the seasons, the spring, begets the flea; the more powerful season, the more vigorous creature. For during this season the sun becomes more northerly and more brilliant and sets the measure of the day against that of the night, and the earth proceeds to the birth-pangs of its own offspring. And the rose rises from its own buds, while the lily is split by the sun’s rays and reveals both its apparent and its hidden beauty; amidst which the flea also, like a spontaneous fruit of the earth, is brought to fruit and given forth. But to look at, it is not at all very graceful; for it does not pride itself on perceptible beauties and, scorning the eyes, it refers its strength to the mind. And it has imitated the circle of the zodiac, in its small form having no moderate power. and it shows also by its color
27 Ἐγκώμιον εἰς τὴν ψύλλαν Τὸν κώνωπα φασὶν ὡς ἐλέφαντα. καὶ ἵνα γε καθ' ὁδὸν ἡμῖν ὁ λόγος προΐῃ, τῇ ψύλλῃ ὡς παρδάλει ἐπιχειρήσωμεν.
οὐ γὰρ ἐπειδὴ κατὰ τὸν σωματικὸν ὄγκον ἠλάττωται διὰ ταῦτα καὶ τῆς ἐν τοῖς κρατίστοις δυνάμεως ἀπεστέρηται· ἡ γάρ τοι φύσις
ἐναλλάττειν οἶδεν ἐπ' ἐνίων τοῖς τῶν ζῴων μεγέθεσι τὰς συμφύτους δυνάμεις, καὶ ᾧ μὲν τὸν ὄγκον ἠλάττω σε τὸν τόνον σαφῶς ἐμεγέθυνεν,
ᾧ δὲ σαρκῶν περιουσίαν προσέπλασε τὴν ἰσχὺν τούτῳ ἐσμίκρυνε. δηλοῦσι δὲ τοῦτο καὶ οἱ πρῶτοι τῶν μάλιστα φιλοσοφησάντων· τὸ
γὰρ εἰς ὄγκον προβὰν ἐλαττοῦσι κατὰ τὴν δύναμιν, ὥσπερ τὸ εἰς ἑαυτὸ συστραφὲν εὐτονώτερον ἀπεργάζονται. οὐ τοίνυν σοφιστικόν
τι πρᾶγμα ποιοῦμεν εὐφημίας ὑπόθεσιν τὴν ψύλλαν ποιούμε νοι, ὥσπερ οἱ τοὺς βομβυλίους ἢ τοὺς ἅλας ἐπαινεῖν προελόμενοι, ἀλλὰ
ῥητορικόν τε καὶ τεχνικὸν περὶ μεγάλων τε λέγειν προθέμενοι καὶ τοὺς λόγους ταῖς ὑποθέσεσιν ἴσους ποιούμενοι. Τοῦτο τοίνυν
πρῶτον περὶ τοῦ ζῴου κάλλιστον εἰπεῖν ἔχομεν ὅτι, ὥσπερ τὰ εὐωδέστερα τῶν φυτῶν (ῥόδα φημὶ καὶ ὑακίνθους καὶ μυρρίνας), συνανατέλλει
τῷ ἔαρι, τῶν ὡρῶν τὴν καλλίστην ἀπολεξάμενον. γεννᾶται δὲ οὐκ ἐξ ἑτέρας οὐσίας, ὥσπερ σκνίπες καὶ κηροδύται καὶ κώνωπες καὶ
τἆλλα, ὧν τὰ μὲν τῆς ἰλύος, τὰ δὲ τῆς τῶν κεκμηκότων ἀπογεννᾶται σήψεως, ἀλλὰ πρὸς ἑαυτὸ τὸ γένος χωρεῖ καὶ τὸ γεννῆσαν ἐν
τούτοις καὶ τὸ γεννώμενον πέφυκε· τὸ μὲν γὰρ ἀπελήλυθε τὸ σπέρμα καταλιπόν, τὸ δ' ἐκεῖθεν φύεται. εἰσὶ γὰρ καὶ παρὰ τούτοις,
ὥσπερ τινὲς ἱστορήκασι, σπερματικοὶ πόροι καὶ φύσις ζωογόνος καὶ δύναμις· καὶ τὴν ὀχείαν ἡ θήλεια φέρει τοῦ ἄρρενος, καὶ σωμάτων
ἀποιχομένων οὐ συναπόλωλεν ὁ τῆς γονῆς λόγος, ἀλλὰ τοῖς καθήκουσι μέρεσι τοῦ παντὸς ζῳογονεῖται καὶ φαίνεται. Καὶ ὥσπερ τοῖς
ἄλλοις τῶν μεγίστων καὶ θαυμαζομένων οὐσιῶν συμβάλλεταί τι λοξούμενος ὁ ἥλιος καὶ τρεπόμενος, οὕτω δή τι καὶ τὸ γένος τοῦτο
οὐσιοῦν εἴωθε πρὸς τὴν ἰσημερίαν εὐθὺς καθιστάμενος. ὁμοῦ τε γὰρ ἐκεῖνος τοῦ ἰσημερινοῦ σημείου κινούμενος ἥψατο, καὶ τὸ ζῷον
κατὰ σύνθημα μορφωθὲν ὁμοῦ καὶ ζωωθὲν ἥλατο, ἐπὶ τῷ δεσπότῃ σκιρτῆσαν ἡλίῳ καὶ τῆς ἑαυτοῦ ζωῆς αἰτίῳ τε καὶ κοσμήτορι· συγχορεύει
γοῦν ἀτεχνῶς ἐκείνῳ καὶ οἷον ἐπιγαννύμενον τῷ γεννήτορι σκιρτᾷ τε καὶ ἐφάλλεται, τῇ ὥρᾳ ἐνεαρίζον καὶ λαμπρυνόμενον. ὥσπερ
οὖν οἱ πάλαι σοφοὶ τὰ συντρεπόμενα τῶν ζῴων ταῖς τῆς σελήνης αὐξήσεσι καὶ μειώσεσι σεληνιακὰ κατωνόμασαν, οὕτω δὴ καὶ τοῦτο
θῶμεν ἡμεῖς ζῷον ἡλιακόν. Μία μὲν γὰρ τῶν πάντων ἀρχή, τὸ ἀπόρρητον ὅ τι ποτέ ἐστιν ἐκεῖνο καὶ ἀνονόμαστον· ἀλλὰ τοῦτο πόρρω
καὶ τῆς ἑαυτοῦ ἑνότητος ἀνεκφοίτη τον, ὅσα δὲ μετ' ἐκεῖνο ὑφέστηκεν ἕτερα ἑτέροις οὐσιῶν καθέστηκεν ἀρχηγά. καὶ τὰ μὲν δι'
ἔτους, τὰ δὲ ταῖς καθέκαστα τῶν ὡρῶν ἀποτίκτε ται, ταῦτα χειμῶνος, ἐκεῖνα θέρους, τοῖς δὲ ἀρχὴ ζωῆς τὸ μετόπωρον· ἡ δὲ τῶν
ὡρῶν χαριεστάτη, τὸ ἔαρ, τὴν ψύλλαν γεννᾷ, ἡ δυναμικωτέρα τὸ εὐτονώτερον. κατὰ ταύτην γὰρ ὁ ἥλιος βορειότερός τε καὶ λαμπρότερος
γίνεται καὶ ἀντικαθίστησι τὸ μέτρον τῆς ἡμέρας τῷ τῆς νυκτός, καὶ πρὸς ὠδῖνας ἡ γῆ τῶν οἰκείων γεννημάτων χωρεῖ. καὶ τὸ μὲν
ῥόδον τῶν οἰκείων καλύκων ὑπανατέλλει, τὸ δὲ κρίνον σχίζεται ταῖς ἀκτῖσι καὶ ὑπεμφαίνει καὶ τὸ φαινόμενον κάλλος καὶ τὸ κρυπτόμενον·
ἐφ' οἷς καὶ ἡ ψύλλα ὥσπερ αὐτόματος ὀπώρα τῆς γῆς καρπογονεῖται καὶ ἀναδίδοται. Ἀλλ' ἰδεῖν μέν ἐστιν οὐ πάνυ τι χαριέστατον·
οὐ γὰρ αἰσθητοῖς κομᾷ κάλλεσι καὶ τῶν ὀφθαλμῶν καταφρονοῦν ἀναφέρει τὴν ἰσχὺν πρὸς τὸν νοῦν. καὶ τὸν κύκλον τοῦ ζῳάρχου μεμίμηται,
ἐν ὀλίγῳ τῷ εἴδει οὐ μετρίαν ἔχον τὴν δύναμιν. δείκνυσι δὲ καὶ τῷ χρώματι
