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
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 disordered element of nature be defined by scientific and unchangeable reason. For if, using nature alone, you so perfect your harmony, what might you not become, having also received reason? What gardeners do, therefore, this I myself have resolved to accomplish; for they, with whatever plants show their beauty, are both more industrious and careful in their arrangement. And I myself, admiring your natural unity, which has sprouted together from the same root, and is not grafted or introduced from outside, attempt to join you yet more, so that not only your stem might be joined together but also the whole up to the very top. Of the connection of brothers, then, nature right from birth has hinted at many starting points; for having embraced them in the same womb, she brought them forth from the same birth-pangs. For nomadic Scythians are alienated from the civilized race, and islanders are not at all related to mainlanders, and the different dwellings of the climates render the dispositions of the inhabitants alien. But from Greece or its colony Ionia or the cities everywhere, you will not find much difference in their dispositions; for both the sameness of the environment and the commonality of governments has contracted the multitude of customs to a small difference; and gradually contracting the commonalities of names, cities into demes, and tribes into kinship, and in this way you will also bring together the other things and the souls. Then indeed, bringing it to a head at the beginning and the same starting point of birth, will you not preserve the form itself as equal and undifferentiated? For it is absurd for Libyans to be of one mind with each other because they have received one dwelling, Libya, but for brothers to be of different minds, just as some fruits, having flowed forth from the same seed-vessels of their origin, and for grafted plants to partake of the same quality as the original root, but for those who have shared the same root to be of a different nature and immediately divided. But I wonder how the many among men, being in this state, are not ashamed, and this, seeing their matter—the disordered and undefined—often formed into the same appearance as their brothers, but having their souls oppositely divided and of different minds. And soul indeed adorns nature, and nature, bodies, and the things being adorned often remain unchanged, but that which primarily adorns, as if ignorant of its own principles, is altered. The fiction of the Molionidae is a philosophical argument introducing the indivisibility of souls. And indeed the paired organs of a single nature happen to be exact examples of the unchangeableness of two or more: eyes, nostrils, eyebrows, the other things and in addition to these, hands and feet. For of the two eyes the size is equal and the color similar, and in the same way the ears have been formed together with the temples, and the wings of the nostrils are opened, and the elbows are joined, and the feet are divided, so that what nature has given to the paired bodies, this the mind might give to the same souls. And indeed we are accustomed to laugh whenever we see one of someone's eyes as greyish-blue, and the other as light-blue or black. And if for someone one of the eyebrows sits somewhere up high, but the other extends over the eyelid, we consider this among portents, and we call those who are so half-breeds. And what else than this might we call brothers who are at odds? But let us consider the argument in this way also: The natural principle forms bodies from seeds, but the intellectual principle introduces the souls to them from without, and the one, as from the same starting point, creates a similar disposition for the things being formed, varying it on rare occasion, but the other is so much more ignorant than nature that to two similar bodies it fitted unsuitable
πρὸς ἀλλήλους ὑμῶν κοινωνία μὴ ἐξ ἔθους ἐστὶ καὶ τῆς τῶν πολλῶν ὑπολήψεως, ἀλλ' ἐπιστήμην ἔχοι τὸν λόγον, καὶ τὸ τῆς φύσεως
πεπλανημένον καὶ ἄτακτον τῷ ἐπιστη μονικῷ καὶ ἀμεταθέτῳ λόγῳ ὁρίζοιτο. εἰ γὰρ μόνῃ τῇ φύσει χρώμενοι οὕτως ἀκριβοῦτε τὸ σύμπνουν,
τί οὐκ ἂν γένοισθε καὶ τὸν λόγον προσ ειληφότες; ὃ τοίνυν οἱ φυτηκόμοι ποιοῦσι, τοῦτο καὶ αὐτὸς τελεῖν ἔγνωκα· ἐκεῖνοί τε
γάρ, ὅσα τῶν φυτῶν τὴν ὥραν ἐνδείκνυται, περὶ ταῦτα καὶ μᾶλλον φιλεργοῦσί τε καὶ διατίθενται. καὶ αὐτὸς δὲ τὴν ὑμετέραν ἀγασθεὶς
συμφυΐαν ὁμόθεν ἐκ τῆς αὐτῆς ῥίζης ἀναβλαστήσασαν, ἀλλ' οὐκ ἐγκεκεντρισμένην οὐδὲ ἐπείσακτον, ἔτι γε μᾶλλον συνάπτειν ἐπιχειρῶ,
ὅπως μὴ τὸ στέλεχος μόνον ὑμῶν συνημμένον εἴη ἀλλὰ καὶ τὸ σύμπαν ἐς κορυφήν. Τῆς τοίνυν τῶν ἀδελφῶν συναφῆς ἡ φύσις εὐθὺς
ἐκ γενέσεως πολλὰς τὰς ἀφορμὰς παρῃνίξατο· τοῖς γὰρ αὐτοῖς ἐγκολπωσαμένη χωρίοις ἀπὸ τῶν αὐτῶν ὠδίνων ἐξήνεγκε. Σκύθαι μὲν
γὰρ νομάδες τοῦ πολιτικοῦ γένους ἀπηλλοτρίωνται, καὶ τοῖς ἠπειρώταις οἱ νησιῶται οὐ πάνυ προσήκουσιν, αἵ τε διάφοροι τῶν κλιμάτων
οἰκήσεις ἀλλοτρίας τῶν οἰκητόρων τὰς γνώμας ἀποδιδόασιν. ἀπὸ δέ γε τῆς Ἑλλάδος ἢ τῆς ἀποίκου Ἰωνίας ἢ τῶν ἑκασταχοῦ πόλεων
οὐ πάνυ τι τὸ παραλλάττον εὑρήσεις ταῖς γνώμαις· ἥ τε γὰρ ταὐτότης τοῦ περιέχοντος καὶ ἡ τῶν πολιτευμάτων κοινότης εἰς βραχεῖαν
διαφορὰν τὸ πλῆθος συνέστειλε τῶν ἠθῶν· καὶ κατ' ὀλίγον συστέλλων τὰς τῶν ὀνομάτων κοινότητας τὰς μὲν πόλεις εἰς δήμους, τὰς
δὲ φυλὰς εἰς συγγένειαν καὶ τἆλλα οὕτως συναιρήσεις καὶ τὰς ψυχάς· εἶτα δὴ κορυφώσας εἰς τὴν ἀρχὴν καὶ τὴν αὐτὴν τῆς γενέσεως
ἀφορμὴν ἆρ' οὐχὶ καὶ τὴν ἰδέαν διασώσεις ἴσην καὶ ἀδιάφορον; ἄτοπον γὰρ τοὺς μὲν Λίβυας πρὸς ἀλλήλους ὁμοφρονεῖν ὅτι μίαν
οἴκησιν τὴν Λιβύην εἰλήχασιν, ἀδελφοὺς δὲ ἑτερογνωμονεῖν, ὥσπερ ἔνια τῶν καρπῶν ἐκ τῶν αὐτῶν περικαρπίων τῆς γενέσεως ἀπορρεύσαντα,
καὶ τὰ μὲν ἐνοφθαλμιζό μενα τῶν φυτῶν τῆς αὐτῆς τῷ πρωτορρίζῳ μεταλαγχάνειν ποιότητος, τοὺς δὲ τῆς αὐτῆς κεκοινωνηκότας ῥίζης
ἑτεροφυεῖς εἶναι καὶ διῃρῆσθαι εὐθύς. Θαυμάζω δὲ ὅπως οἱ πολλοὶ τῶν ἀνθρώπων οὕτως ἔχοντες οὐκ αἰσ χύνονται, καὶ ταῦτα τὴν
μὲν ὕλην ὁρῶντες ἐς τὴν αὐτὴν πολλάκις μορ φωθεῖσαν ἰδέαν τοῖς ἀδελφοῖς, τὸ ἄτακτον καὶ ἀόριστον, τὰς δὲ ψυχὰς ἀντιδιῃρημένας
καὶ ἑτερογνώμονας ἔχοντες. καὶ ψυχὴ μὲν φύσιν κοσμεῖ, φύσις δὲ σώματα, καὶ τὰ μὲν κοσμούμενα μένει πολλάκις ἀπαράλλακτα, τὸ
δὲ πρώτως κοσμοῦν ὥσπερ τοὺς οἰκείους λόγους ἀγνοῆσαν παρήλλακ ται. τοῖς Μολιονίδαις τὸ πλάσμα φιλόσοφος λόγος ἐστὶ τὸ ἀδιαίρετον
εἰσηγούμενος τῶν ψυχῶν· τὰ δέ γε διττὰ τῆς τοῦ ἑνὸς φύσεως ὄργανα τῆς τῶν δυεῖν ἢ πλειόνων ἀπαραλλαξίας ἀκριβῆ τυγχάνουσι
παραδείγματα, ὀφθαλμοί, ῥῖνες, ὀφρύες, τἆλλα καὶ τὰ ἐπὶ τούτοις χεῖρες καὶ πόδες· τοῖν τε γὰρ ὀφθαλμοῖν ἶσον τὸ μέγεθος καὶ
τὸ χρῶμα ὅμοιον, κατὰ ταὐτὸ δὲ καὶ τὰ ὦτα τοῖς κροτάφοις συμπέπλασται καὶ τὰ πτερύγια τῶν ῥινῶν ἀνεῴγασι καὶ οἱ ἀγκῶνες συνήρθρωνται
καὶ αἱ βάσεις διῄρηνται, ἵνα, ὅπερ ἡ φύσις τοῖς διττοῖς ἀποδέδωκε σώμασι, τοῦτο ἡ γνώμη ταῖς αὐταῖς ἀποδοίη ψυχαῖς. καὶ μέντοι
καὶ γελᾶν εἰώθαμεν ὅταν τῳ τὸν μὲν τῶν ὀφθαλμῶν ἴδωμεν χαροπόν, ὑπόγλαυκον δὲ τὸν ἄλλον ἢ μέλανα· κἂν εἴ τῳ ἡ μὲν τῶν ὀφρύων
ἄνω που κάθηται, ἡ δ' ἐπὶ τὸ βλέφαρον τέταται, μετὰ τῶν τεράτων τοῦτο τιθέαμεν καὶ ἡμιγενεῖς τοὺς οὕτως ἔχοντας ὀνομάζομεν.
καὶ τοὺς διεστηκότας δὲ τῶν ἀδελφῶν τί ἂν ἄλλο ἢ τοῦτο καλέσαιμεν; Θεωρήσωμεν δὲ καὶ οὕτως τὸν λόγον· πλάττει μὲν ἀπὸ τῶν
σπερμάτων ὁ φυσικὸς λόγος τὰ σώματα, εἰσάγει δὲ τούτοις τὰς ψυχὰς ὁ νοερὸς ἔξωθεν, καὶ ὁ μὲν ὡς ἀπὸ τῆς αὐτῆς ἀφορμῆς τὴν
ὁμοίαν διάθεσιν τοῖς πλαττομένοις δημιουργεῖ παραλλάττων κατὰ τὸ σπάνιον, ὁ δὲ οὕτως ἐστὶ τῆς φύσεως ἀμαθέστερος ὅτι δυσὶν
ὁμοίοις σώμασιν ἀκαταλλήλους προσήρμοσε τὰς
