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Clouds

Perseus Greek · Perseus Greek · 715 sections

1. 1289b

   You say well. What then? Is it possible that you consider the sea to be greater now than formerly?

2. 1291b

   No, by Jupiter, but equal; for it is not fitting that it should be greater.

3. 1292b

   And how then, you wretch does this become no way greater, though the rivers flow into it, while you

4. 1295

   seek to increase your money? Will you not take yourself off from my house? Bring me the goad.

5. 1297b

   I call you to witness these things.

6. 1298

   Go! Why do you delay? Won’t you march, Mr. Blood-horse?

7. 1299

   Is not this an insult, pray?

8. 1299b

   Will you move quickly? Pricks him behind with the goad. I’ll lay on you, goading you behind, you outrigger? Do you fly? Amynias runs off. I thought I should stir you, together with your wheels and your two-horse chariots.

9. 1303

   What a thing it is to love evil courses! For this old man, having loved them,

10. 1305

    wishes to withhold the money that he borrowed. And he will certainly meet with something today, which will perhaps cause this sophist

11. 1310

    to suddenly receive some misfortune, in return for the knaveries he has begun.

12. 1311

    For I think that he will presently find what has been long boiling up, that his son is skilful to speak opinions

13. 1315

    opposed to justice, so as to overcome all with whomsoever he holds converse, even if he advance most villainous doctrines;

14. 1320

    and perhaps, perhaps his father will wish that he were even speechless.

15. 1321

    (running out of the house pursued by his son). Hollo! Hollo! O neighbours, and kinsfolk, and fellow-tribesmen, defend me, by all means, who am being beaten! Ah me, unhappy man, for my head and jaw! Wretch! Do you beat your father?

16. 1325b

    Yes, father.

17. 1326

    You see him owning that he beats me.

18. 1326b

    Certainly.

19. 1327

    O wretch, and parricide, and house-breaker!

20. 1328

    Say the same things of me again, and more. Do you know that I take pleasure in being much abused?

21. 1330

    You blackguard!

22. 1330b

    Sprinkle me with roses in abundance.

23. 1331

    Do you beat your father?

24. 1331b

    And will prove too, by Jupiter! that I beat you with justice.

25. 1332b

    O thou most rascally! Why, how can it be just to beat a father?

26. 1334

    I will demonstrate it, and will overcome you in argument.

27. 1335

    Will you overcome me in this?

28. 1335b

    Yea, by much and easily. But choose which of the two Causes you wish to speak.

29. 1337

    Of what two Causes?

30. 1337b

    The better, or the worse?

31. 1338

    Marry, I did get you taught to speak against justice, by Jupiter, my friend, if you are

32. 1340

    going to persuade me of this, that it is just and honourable for a father to be beaten by his sons!

33. 1342

    I think I shall certainly persuade you; so that, when you have heard, not even you yourself will say anything against it.

34. 1344

    Well, now, I am willing to hear what you have to say.

35. 1345

    It is your business, old man, to consider in what way you shall conquer the man; for if he were not relying upon something, he would not be so licentious. But he is emboldened by something; the boldness of the man

36. 1350

    is evident.

37. 1351

    Now you ought to tell to the Chorus from what the contention first arose. And this you must do by all means.

38. 1353

    Well, now, I will tell you from what we first began to rail at one another. After we had feasted, as you know,

39. 1355

    I first bade him take a lyre, and sing a song of Simonides, The Shearing of the Ram. But he immediately said it was old-fashioned to play on the lyre and sing while drinking, like a woman grinding parched barley.

40. 1359

    For ought you not then immediately to be beaten and trampled on, bidding me sing, just as if you were entertaining cicadae?

41. 1361

    He expressed, however, such opinions then too within, as he does now; and he asserted that Simonides was a bad poet. I bore it at first, with difficulty indeed, yet nevertheless I bore it. And then I bade him at least take a myrtle-wreath

42. 1365

    and recite to me some portion of Aeschylus; and then he immediately said, Shall I consider Aeschylus the first among the poets, full of empty sound, unpolished, bombastic, using rugged words? And hereupon you can’t think how my heart panted. But, nevertheless, I restrained my passion, and said, At least recite some passage

43. 1370

    of the more modern poets, of whatever kind these clever things be. And he immediately sang a passage of Euripides, how a brother, O averter of ill! Debauched his uterine sister. And I bore it no longer, but immediately assailed him with many abusive reproaches. And then, after that, as was natural,

44. 1375

    we hurled word upon word. Then he springs upon me; and then he was wounding me, and beating me, and throttling me.

45. 1377

    Were you not therefore justly beaten, who do not praise Euripides, the wisest of poets?

46. 1379

    He the wisest! Oh, what shall I call you? But I shall be beaten again.

47. 1379c

    Yes, by Jupiter, with justice.

48. 1380

    Why, how with justice? Who, O shameless fellow, reared you, understanding all your wishes, when you lisped what you meant? If you said bryn, I, understanding it, used to give you to drink. And when you asked for mamman, I used to come to you with bread. And you used no sooner to say caccan, than I used to take and

49. 1385

    carry you out of doors, and hold you before me.

50. 1386

    But you now, throttling me who was bawling and crying out because I wanted to ease myself, had not the heart to carry me forth out of doors, you wretch; but I did it there while I was being throttled.

51. 1391

    I fancy the hearts of the youths are panting to hear what he will say. For if, after having done such things, he shall persuade him by speaking,

52. 1395

    I would not take the hide of the old folks, even at the price of a chick-pea.

53. 1397

    It is thy business, thou author and upheaver of new words, to seek some means of persuasion, so that you shall seem to speak justly.

54. 1399

    How pleasant it is to be acquainted with new and clever things,

55. 1400

    and to be able to despise the established laws! For I, when I applied my mind to horsemanship alone, used not to be able to utter three words before I made a mistake; but now, since he himself has made me cease from these pursuits, and I am acquainted with subtle thoughts, and arguments, and speculations,

56. 1405

    I think I shall demonstrate that it is just to chastise one’s father.

57. 1406

    Ride, then, by Jupiter! Since it is better for me to keep a team of four horses than to be killed with a beating.

58. 1408

    I will pass over to that part of my discourse where you interrupted me; and first I will ask you this: Did you beat me when I was a boy?

59. 1410

    I did, through good-will and concern for you.

60. 1410b

    Pray tell me, is it not just that I also should be well inclined toward you in the same way, and beat you, since this is to be well inclined-to give a beating? For why ought your body to be exempt from blows and mine not? And yet I too was born free.

61. 1415

    The boys weep, and do you not think it is right that a father should weep? You will say that it is ordained by law that this should be the lot of boys. But I would reply, that old men are boys twice over, and that it is the more reasonable that the old should weep than the young, inasmuch as it is less just that they should err.

62. 1420

    It is nowhere ordained by law that a father should suffer this.

63. 1421

    Was it not then a man like you and me, who first proposed this law, and by speaking persuaded the ancients? Why then is it less lawful for me also in turn to propose henceforth a new law for the sons, that they should beat their fathers in turn?

64. 1425

    But as many blows as we received before the law was made, we remit: and we concede to them our having been thrashed without return. Observe the cocks and these other animals, how they punish their fathers; and yet, in what do they differ from us, except that they do not write decrees?

65. 1430

    Why then, since you imitate the cocks in all things, do you not both eat dung and sleep on a perch?

66. 1432

    It is not the same thing, my friend; nor would it appear so to Socrates.

67. 1433

    Therefore do not beat me; otherwise you will one day blame yourself.

68. 1434

    Why, how?

69. 1434b

    Since I am justly entitled to chastise you; and you to chastise your son, if you should have one.

70. 1435b

    But if I should not have one, I shall have wept for nothing, and you will die laughing at me.

71. 1437

    To me, indeed, O comrades, he seems to speak justly; and I think we ought to concede to them what is fitting. For it is proper that we should weep, if we do not act justly.

72. 1440

    Consider still another maxim.

73. 1440b

    No; for I shall perish if I do.

74. 1441

    And yet perhaps you will not be vexed at suffering what you now suffer.

75. 1442

    How, pray? For inform me what good you will do me by this.

76. 1443

    I will beat my mother, just as I have you.

77. 1443b

    What do you say? What do you say? This other, again, is a greater wickedness.

78. 1444b

    But what if, having the worst Cause,

79. 1445

    I shall conquer you in arguing, proving that it is right to beat one’s mother?

80. 1447

    Most assuredly, if you do this, nothing will hinder you from casting yourself

81. 1450

    and your Worse Cause into the pit along with Socrates.

82. 1452

    These evils have I suffered through you, O Clouds! Having intrusted all my affairs to you.

83. 1454

    Nay, rather, you are yourself the cause of these things, having turned yourself to wicked courses.

84. 1456

    Why, pray, did you not tell me this, then, but excited with hopes a rustic and aged man?

85. 1458

    We always do this to him whom we perceive to be a lover of wicked courses,

86. 1460

    until we precipitate him into misfortune, so that he may learn to fear the gods.

87. 1462

    Ah me ! it is severe, O Clouds! But it is just; for I ought not to have withheld the money which I borrowed. Now, therefore, come with me, my dearest son,

88. 1465

    that you may destroy the blackguard Chaerephon and Socrates, who deceived you and me.

89. 1467

    I will not injure my teachers.

90. 1468

    Yes, yes, reverence Paternal Jove.

91. 1469

    Paternal Jove quoth’a! How antiquated you are! Why, is there any Jove?

92. 1470b

    There is.

93. 1470c

    There is not, no; for Vortex reigns having expelled Jupiter.

94. 1472

    He has not expelled him; but I fancied this, on account of this Vortex here. Ah me, unhappy man! When I even took you who are of earthenware for a god.

95. 1475

    Here rave and babble to yourself.

96. 1476

    Ah me, what madness! How mad, then, I was when I ejected the gods on account of Socrates! But O dear Hermes, by no means be wroth with me, nor destroy me; but pardon me,

97. 1480

    since I have gone crazy through prating. And become my adviser, whether I shall bring an action and prosecute them, or whatever you think. You advise me rightly, not permitting me to get up a lawsuit, but as soon as possible to set fire to the house

98. 1485

    of the prating fellows. Come hither, come hither, Xanthias! Come forth with a ladder and with a mattock and then mount upon the thinking-shop and dig down the roof, if you love your master, until you tumble the house upon them.

99. 1490

    But let some one bring me a lighted torch and I’ll make some of them this day suffer punishment, even if they be ever so much impostors.

100. 1493

     (from within). Hollo! Hollo!

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Perseus Greek. CTS URN tlg0019.tlg003.perseus-eng2. Via the Perseus Digital Library / Open Greek and Latin TEI corpora. Licence: Available under a Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 International License. Source.