Greek Anthology Books 10-12

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§ 10.1 BOOK X: THE HORTATORY AND ADMONITORY EPIGRAMS LEONIDAS It is the season for sailing; already the chattering swallow has come, and the pleasant Zephyr, and the meadows bloom, and the sea with its boiling waves lashed by the rough winds has sunk to silence. Weigh the anchors and loose the hawsers, mariner, and sail with every stitch of canvas set. This, O man, I, Priapus, the god of the harbour, bid thee do that thou mayst sail for all kinds of merchandise.
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§ 10.2 ANTIPATER OF SIDON It is the season for the ship to travel tearing through the waves; no longer does the sea toss, furrowed by dreadful fret. Already the swallow is building her round houses under the roof, and the tender leaves of the meadows smile. Therefore, ye sailors, coil your wet hawsers and drag the anchors from their nests in the harbour. Haul up your wellwoven sails. This is the bidding of me, Priapus of the harbour, the son of Bromius.
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§ 10.3 Anonymous The way down to Hades is straight, whether you start from Athens or whether you betake yourself there, when dead, from Meroe. Let it not vex thee to die far from thy country. One fair wind to Hades blows from all lands.
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§ 10.4 MARCUS ARGENTARIUS Loose the long hawsers from your well-moored ships, and spreading your easily-hoisted sails set to sea, merchant captain. For the storms have taken flight and tenderly laughing Zephyr now makes the blue wave gentle as a girl. Already the swallow, fond parent, is building with its lisping lips its chamber out of mud and straw, and flowers spring up in the land; therefore listen to Priapus and undertake any kind of navigation.
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§ 10.5 THYILLUS Already the swallows build their mud houses, already on the flood Zephyr is bosomed in the soft sails. Already the meadows shed flowers over their green leaves, and the rough strait closes its lips in silence. Wind up your hawsers and stow the anchors on shipboard, and give all your canvas to the sheets. This is the advice that Priapus of the harbour writes for you who sail the seas seeking merchandise.
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§ 10.6 SATYRUS Already the moist breath of Zephyr, who giveth birth to the grass, falls gently on the flowery meads. The daughters of Cecrops call, the becalmed sea smiles, untroubled by the cold winds. Be of good heart, ye sailors, loose your hawsers and spread out the delicate folds of your ships' wings. Go to trade trusting in gracious Priapus, go obedient to the harbour god.
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§ 10.7 ARCHIAS Stranger, I, Priapus, was set up on this sea-beaten rock to guard the Thracian strait, by the sailors, whom I had often rushed to help when they called upon me, bringing from astern the sweet Zephyr. Therefore, as is meet and right, thou shalt never see my altar lacking the fat of beasts or crowns in the spring, but ever smoking with incense and alight. Yet not ever a hecatomb is so pleasing to the gods as due honour.
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§ 10.8 ARCHIAS Little am I to look on, Priapus, who dwell on this spur by the beach, companion of the gulls, denizens of land and sea, with a peaked head and no feet, just such as the sons of toiling fishermen would carve on the desert shore. But if any netsman or rod-fisher call on me for help, I hie me to him quicker than the wind. I see, too, the creatures that move under the water, and indeed the character of us gods is known rather from our actions than from our shapes.
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§ 10.9 Anonymous Ye fishermen who pulled your little boat ashore here (Go hang out your nets to dry) having had a haul of many sea-swimming gurnard (?) and scarus, not without thrissa, honour me with slender firstfruits of a copious catch, the little Priapus under the lentisc bush, the sea-blue god, the revealer of the fish your prey, established in this grove.
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§ 10.10 ARCHIAS THE YOUNGER The fishermen dedicated me. Pan, here on this holy cliff, Pan of the shore, the guardian of this secure haven. Sometimes I care for the weels, and sometimes for the fishers who draw their seine on this beach. But, stranger, sail past, and in return for this beneficence I will send a gentle south-west wind at thy back.
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§ 10.11 SATYRUS Whether thou walkest over the hills with birdlime spread on the reeds to which the birds resort, or whether thou killest hares, call on Pan. Pan shows the hound the track of velvet-paw, and Pan guides higher and higher, unbent, the jointed reeden rod.
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§ 10.12 Anonymous Come and rest your limbs awhile, travellers, here road — not a mixed crowds but those of you whose knees ache from heavy toil and who thirst after accomplishing a long day's journey. There is a breeze and a shady seat, and the fountain under the rock will still the weariness that weighs on your limbs. Escaping the midday breath of Autumn's dog -star, honour Hermes of the wayside as is meet.
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§ 10.13 SATYRUS How lovely are the laurels and the spring that gushes at their feet, while the dense grove gives shade, luxuriant, traversed by Zephyrs, a protection to wayfarers from thirst and toil and the burning sun!
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§ 10.14 AGATHIAS SCHOLASTICUS The deep lies becalmed and blue; for no gale whitens the waves, ruffling them to a ripple, and no longer do the seas break round the rocks, retiring again to be absorbed in the depth. The Zephyrs blow and the swallow twitters round the strawglued chamber she has built. Take courage, thou sailor of experience, whether thou journeyest to the Syrtis or to the beach of Sicily. Only by the altar of Priapus of the harbour burn a scarus or ruddy gurnards.
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§ 10.15 PAULUS SILENTIARIUS Now the heart-entrancing spring in all the beauty of her meadows opens the closed folds of her bosom to the Zephyrs; now the ship slides down the wooden rollers, pulled from the beach into the deep. Go forth fearlessly, ye sailors, your sails strutting with the wind, to the gentle task of loading the merchandise ye gain by barter. I, Priapus, am faithful to ships, since I boast that Thetis was the hostess of my father Bromius.
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§ 10.16 THEAETETUS SCHOLASTICUS Already the fair-foliaged field, at her fruitful birth-tide, is aflower with roses bursting from their buds; already on the branches of the alleyed cypresses the cicada, mad for music, soothes the sheaf-binder, and the swallow, loving parent, has made her house under the eaves and shelters her brood in the mud-plastered chamber. The sea sleeps, the calm dear to the Zephyrs spreads tranquilly over the expanse that bears the ships. No longer do the waters rage against the high-built poops, or belch forth spray on the shore. Mariner, roast first by his altar to Priapus, the lord of the deep and the giver of good havens, a slice of a cuttle-fish or of lustred red mullet, or a vocal scarus, and then go fearlessly on thy voyage to the bounds of the Ionian Sea.
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§ 10.17 ANTIPHILUS Blest god of the harbour, accompany with gentle breeze the departing sails of Archelaus through the undisturbed water as far as the open sea, and thou who rulest over the extreme point of the beach, save him on his voyage as far as the Pythian shrine. From thence, if all we singers are dear to Phoebus, I will sail trusting in the fair western gale.
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§ 10.18 MARCUS ARGENTARIUS Gobrys, let Dionysus and Aphrodite, who loves dalliance, delight thee, and the sweet Muses too with their letters. Their wisdom thou hast plucked; but enter now on her loves and drain his dear bowls.
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§ 10.19 APOLLONIDES Shear on this day, Gaius, the first sweet harvest of thy cheeks and the young curls on thy chin. Thy father Lucius will take in his hand what he had prayed to see, the down of thee who shalt grow to look on many suns. Others give golden presents, but I joyful verses; for indeed the Muse is not the inferior of wealth.
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§ 10.20 ADDAEUS If you see a beauty, strike while the iron is hot. Say what you mean, testiculos manibus totis attrecta. But if you say “I reverence you and will be like a brother,” shame will close your road to accomplishment.
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§ 10.21 PHILODEMUS Cypris of the Calm, lover of bridegrooms; Cypris, ally of the just; Cypris, mother of the tempest-footed Loves; save me, Cypris, a man but half torn away from my saffron bridal chamber, and chilled now to the soul by the snows of Gaul. Save me, Cypris, thy peaceful servant, who utters no vain words to any, tossed as I am now on thy deep blue sea! Cypris, who lovest to bring ships to port, who lovest the solemn rites of wedlock, save me now, my queen, and bring me to the haven of my Naias.
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§ 10.22 BIANOR Fowler in search of reeds, move not with naked feet in the forest paths of Egypt, but fly far from the grey-eyed snakes; and hastening on thy way to shoot the birds of the air, beware of being poisoned by the earth.
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§ 10.23 AUTOMEDON Nicetes, like the breeze, when a ship has little sail up, begins with gentle rhetoric, but when he blows strongly and all sails are let out, he stiffens the canvas and races across the middle of the ocean, like a ship of vast burden, till he reaches the end of his discourse in the unruffled harbour.
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§ 10.24 CRINAGORAS Holy spirit of the mighty Earth -shaker, be gracious to others, too, who cross the Aegean brine. For to me, driven swiftly by the Thracian breeze, gently hast thou granted the harbour I was fain to reach.
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§ 10.25 ANTIPATER OF THESSALONICA Phoebus, guardian of the Cephallenians' harbour, dwelling on the beach of Panormus that faces rough Ithaca, grant that I may sail to the Asian land through favouring waves in the wake of Piso's long ship. And attune my doughty emperor to be kind to him and kind to my verses.
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§ 10.26 LUCIAN Enjoy thy possessions as if about to die, and use thy goods sparingly as if about to live. That man is wise who understands both these commandments, and hath applied a measure both to thrift and unthrift.
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§ 10.27 LUCIAN If thou doest any foul thing it may perchance be hidden from men, but from the gods it shall not be hidden, even if thou but thinkest of it.
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§ 10.28 LUCIAN For men who are fortunate all life is short, but for those who fall into misfortune one night is infinite time.
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§ 10.29 LUCIAN It is not Love that wrongs the race of men, but Love is an excuse for the souls of the dissolute.
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§ 10.30 Anonymous Swift gratitude is sweetest; if it delays, all gratitude is empty and should not even be called gratitude.
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§ 10.31 LUCIAN All that belongs to mortals is mortal and all things pass us by; or if not we pass them by.
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§ 10.32 [PALLADAS] There's many a slip'twixt the cup and the lip.
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§ 10.33 Anonymous It is good to speak ever well of all; but to speak ill is a shame, even if men merit what we say.
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§ 10.34 PALLADAS If concern avail aught, take thought and let things concern thee; but if God is concerned for thee, what does it concern thee? Without God thou shalt neither take thought nor be unconcerned; but that aught concern thee is the concern of God.
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§ 10.35 LUCIAN If thou art fortunate thou art dear to men and dear to gods, and readily they hear thy prayers; but if thou meetest with ill-fortune thou hast no longer any friend, but everything goes against thee, changing with the gusts of fortune.
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§ 10.36 LUCIAN Nothing more noxious hath Nature produced among men than the man who simulates pure friendship; for we are no longer on our guard against him as an enemy, but love him as a friend, and thus suffer more injury.
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§ 10.37 LUCIAN Slow-footed counsel is much the best, for swift counsel ever drags repentance behind it.
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§ 10.38 DIONYSIUS A time to love, and a time to wed, and a time to rest.
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§ 10.39 Anonymous A good friend, Heliodorus, is a great treasure to him who knows also how to keep him.
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§ 10.40 Anonymous Never give up the friend you have and seek another, listening to the words of worthless men.
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§ 10.41 LUCIAN The wealth of the soul is the only true wealth; the rest has more trouble than the possessions are worth. Him one may rightly call lord of many possessions and wealthy who is able to use his riches. But if a man wears himself out over accounts, ever eager to heap wealth on wealth, his labour shall be like that of the bee in its many-celled honeycomb, for others shall gather the honey in his old age.
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§ 10.42 LUCIAN Let a seal be set on the tongue concerning words that should not be spoken; for it is better to guard speech than to guard wealth.
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§ 10.43 Anonymous Six hours are most suitable for labour and the four that follow when set forth in letters, say to men “Live.”
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§ 10.44 PALLADAS If a friend receives a present he at once writes beginning “Lord brother” but if he gets nothing he only says “Brother.” For these words are to be bought and sold. I at least wish no “Lord,” for I have nothing to give.
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§ 10.45 PALLADAS If thou rememberest, O man, how thy father sowed thee, thou shalt cease from thy proud thoughts. But dreaming Plato hath engendered pride in thee, calling thee immortal and a “heavenly plant.” “Of dust thou art made. Why dost thou think proudly?” So one might speak, clothing the fact in more grandiloquent fiction; but if thou seekest the truth, thou art sprung from incontinent lust and a filthy drop.
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§ 10.46 PALLADAS Silence is men's chief learning. The sage Pythagoras himself is my witness. He, knowing himself how to speak, taught others to be silent, having discovered this potent drug to ensure tranquillity.
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§ 10.47 PALLADAS Eat and drink and keep silence in mourning; for we should not, as Homer said, mourn the dead with our belly. Yes, and he shows us Niobe, who buried her twelve dead children all together, taking thought for food.
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§ 10.48 PALLADAS It is a proverb, that no woman who has been a slave should ever become a mistress. I will tell you something similar. “Let no man who has been an advocate ever become a judge, not even if he be a greater orator than Isocrates. For how can a man who has served for hire in a fashion no more respectable than a whore judge a case otherwise than dirtily.?”
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§ 10.49 PALLADAS They say that even ants and gnats have bile. So, while the most insignificant beasts have bile, do you bid me have no bile and lie exposed to the attacks of all the world, not even wronging by mere words those who wrong me by deeds? I have for the rest of my life to stop up my mouth with a rush — and not even breathe.
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§ 10.50 PALLADAS I deny that Circe, as Homer says, changed those who visited her from men into pigs or wolves. No I she was a cunning courtesan, and made them who took her bait poorest of the poor. Stripping them of their human sense, she now, when they could gain nothing for themselves, reared them in her house like senseless animals. But Ulysses, having his wits about him and avoiding the folly of youth, possessed a counter-charm to enchantment, his own nature, not Hermes, emplanting reason in him.
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§ 10.51 PALLADAS Envy, says Pindar, is better than pity. Those who are envied lead a splendid life, while our pity is for the excessively unfortunate. I would be neither too fortunate nor too badly off; for the mean is best, since the height of fortune is apt to bring danger, while the depth of misery exposes to insult.
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§ 10.52 PALLADAS Well didst thou say it, right well, Menander, and like a true nursling of the Muses and Graces, that Opportunity is a god; for often a thought that occurs opportunely of itself finds something better than much reflection.
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§ 10.53 PALLADAS That we see murderers blest by fortune does not surprise me much. It is the gift of Zeus. For he would have killed his father, whom he hated, had Cronos chanced to be mortal. Now, instead of killing him, he punishes him in the same place as the Titans, casting him bound like a robber into the pit.
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§ 10.54 PALLADAS Consumption is not the only cause of death, but extreme obesity often has the same result. Dionysius, tyrant of the Pontic Heraclea, testifies to this, for it is what befel him.
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§ 10.55 PALLADAS If you boast that you don't in any way obey your wife's orders, you are talking nonsense: for you are not made of tree or stone, as the saying is, and you suffer what most or all of us suffer, you are ruled by a woman. But if you say, “She does not smack me with her slipper, nor have I an unchaste wife whom I must put up with and shut my eyes,” I say your servitude is milder than that of others, as you have sold yourself to a chaste and not very severe mistress.
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§ 10.56 PALLADAS There is no manifest sign of chastity: this I tell husbands who are made fools of. Neither are ill looks quite free from suspicion, nor is every pretty woman naturally vicious. For a woman may refuse to yield to those who are ready to pay a high price owing to her beauty, and we see many who are not good-looking never satisfied with amorous intercourse, and giving large presents to those who possess them. Nor if a woman is always frowning and is never seen to laugh, and avoids showing herself to men, is this behaviour a pledge of chastity. On the contrary, the most grave of them may turn out to be whores in secret, and the merry ones who are amiable to everyone may be virtuous, if any woman is entirely virtuous. Is age, then, a criterion? But not even old age has peace from the goad of Aphrodite. We trust then to oaths and her religious awe. But after her oath she can go and seek out twelve newer gods.
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§ 10.57 PALLADAS May God look with hatred on the belly and its food; for it is owing to them that chastity breaks down.
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§ 10.58 PALLADAS Naked I alighted on the earth and naked shall I go beneath it. Why do I toil in vain, seeing the end is nakedness?
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§ 10.59 PALLADAS The expectation of death is a trouble full of pain, and a mortal, when he dies, gains freedom from this. Weep not then for him who departs from life, for there is no suffering beyond death.
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§ 10.60 PALLADAS You are wealthy. And what is the end of it? When you depart do you trail your riches after you as you are being pulled to your tomb? You gather wealth spending time, but you cannot pile up a heavier measure of life.
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§ 10.61 PALLADAS Avoid the rich; they are shameless, domestic tyrants, hating poverty, the mother of temperance.
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§ 10.62 PALLADAS Fortune knows neither reason nor law, but rules men despotically, carried along without reason by her own current. She is rather inclined to favour the wicked, and hates the just, as if making a display of her unreasoning force.
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§ 10.63 PALLADAS A poor man has never lived, and does not even die, for when he seemed to be alive the unfortunate wretch was like a corpse. But for those who enjoy great prosperity and much wealth death is the ruin of life.
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§ 10.64 AGATHIAS SCHOLASTICUS On a former Magistrate Where, I ask, is that vast insolence? And where have they suddenly departed, the crowds of flatterers who used to walk by your side? Now you are gone to exile far from the city, and Fortune has made those whom you formerly pitied judges to condemn you. Great thanks to thee. Fortune, performer of glorious deeds, for that thou ever mockest all alike, and we have that to amuse us.
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§ 10.65 PALLADAS Life is a perilous voyage; for often we are tempesttossed in it and are in a worse case than shipwrecked men. With Fortune at Life's helm we sail uncertainly as on the open sea, some on a fair voyage, others the reverse: but all alike reach one harbour under the earth.
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§ 10.66 AGATHIAS SCHOLASTICUS When a man rises from poverty to wealth and office, he no longer recognizes what he once was. For he repudiates his former friendships, and in his folly learns not how playful slippery fortune is. You were once a miserable pauper, and now you who used to “beg for a pittance ” refuse it to others. My friend, everything that is man's passes away, and if you will not believe it, you will go begging again and testify to it yourself.
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§ 10.67 MACEDONIUS THE CONSUL Memory and Oblivion, all hail! Memory I say in the case of good things, and Oblivion in the case of evil.
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§ 10.68 AGATHIAS It is good to have a mind that hates sexual intercourse, but if you must, let not the love of males ever disturb you. It is a small evil to love women, for gracious Nature gave them the gift of amorous dalliance. Look at the race of beasts; not one of them dishonours the laws of intercourse, for the female couples with the male. But wretched men introduce a strange union between each other.
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§ 10.69 AGATHIAS Why fear death, the mother of rest, death that puts an end to sickness and the pains of poverty? It happens but once to mortals, and no man ever saw it come twice. But diseases are many and various, coming first to this man, then to that, and ever changing.
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§ 10.70 MACEDONIUS THE CONSUL If the Hopes, the companions of Fortune, make sport of human life, delaying to grant every favour, I am their plaything if I am human, and being mortal, I well know I am human. But being the sport of long-deferred hopes, I am willing and pleased to be deceived, and would not in judging myself be as severe as Aristotle, for I bear in mind Anacreon's advice that we should not let care abide with us.
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§ 10.71 MACEDONIUS THE CONSUL I smile when I look on the picture of Pandora's jar, and do not find it was the woman's fault, but is due to the Goods having wings. For as they flutter to Olympus after visiting every region of the world, they ought to fall on the earth too. The woman after taking off the lid grew pale-faced, and has lost the splendour of her former charm. Our present life has suffered two losses; woman is grown old and the jar has nothing in it.
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§ 10.72 PALLADAS All life is a stage and a play: either learn to play laying your gravity aside, or bear with life's pains.
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§ 10.73 PALLADAS If the gale of Fortune bear thee, bear with it and be borne; but if thou rebellest and tormentest thyself, even so the gale bears thee.
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§ 10.74 PAULUS SILENTIARIUS Neither be lifted up by the strong blast of opulent fortune, nor let care bend thy freedom. For all thy life is shaken by inconstant breezes and is constantly dragged this way and that; but virtue is the steadfast and constant support on which alone thou canst travel boldly over the waves of life.
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§ 10.75 PALLADAS We live — all who live as this life is — and gaze on the flame of the sun, breathing through our nostrils delicate air; we are organs which receive health as a gift from the life-creating breezes. But if anyone with his hand presses tightly a little of our breath, he robs us of our life and brings us down to Hades. So being nothing we are fed with vanity, pasturing on air drawn from a breath of wind.
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§ 10.76 PAULUS SILENTIARIUS There is no natural pleasure in life itself, but in casting off from our mind anxieties that whiten the temples. I wish for sufficient wealth, but mad lust for gold is a superfluous care that ever devours the heart. Therefore among men thou shalt often find poverty better than wealth, and death than life. Knowing this, make straight the ways of thy heart, looking to one hope, even to wisdom.
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§ 10.77 PALLADAS Why dost thou labour in vain, O man, and disturb everything, being, as thou art, the slave of the lot that fell to thee at birth? Resign thyself to this, and struggle not against Fate, but content with thy fortune, love tranquillity. Yet strive thou rather, even against Fate, to lead thy delighted spirit to mirth.
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§ 10.78 PALLADAS Cast away complaint and be not troubled, for how brief is the time thou dwellest here compared with all the life that follows this! Ere thou breedest worms and art cast into the tomb torment not thy soul, as if it were damned while thou still livest.
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§ 10.79 PALLADAS We are born day by day when night departs, retaining nothing of our former life, estranged from the doings of yesterday and beginning today the remainder of our life. Do not then, old man, say thy years are too many, for today thou hast no part in those that have gone by.
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§ 10.80 PALLADAS The life of men is the plaything of Fortune, a wretched life and a vagrant, tossed between riches and poverty. Some whom she had cast down she casteth on high again like a ball, and others she brings down from the clouds to Hades.
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§ 10.81 PALLADAS Alas for the brevity of life's pleasure! Mourn the swiftness of time. We sit and we sleep, toiling or taking our delight, and time is advancing, advancing against us wretched men, bringing to each the end of life.
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§ 10.82 PALLADAS Is it not true that we are dead and only seem to live, we Greeks/ fallen into misfortune, fancying that a dream is life? Or are we alive and is life dead?
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§ 10.83 PALLADAS Even wisdom to the wealthy is a difficulty, a trouble, a necessity....
urn:cts:greekLit:tlg7000.tlg001:10.84
§ 10.84 PALLADAS In tears I was born and after tears I die, finding the whole of life a place of many tears. O race of men tearful, weak, pitiful, scarce seen on earth and straight dissolved!
urn:cts:greekLit:tlg7000.tlg001:10.85
§ 10.85 PALLADAS We are all kept and fed for death, like a herd of swine to be slain without reason.
urn:cts:greekLit:tlg7000.tlg001:10.86
§ 10.86 PALLADAS I too rear, not sumptuously, but still I rear children, a wife, a slave, poultry and a dog — for no flatterer sets foot in my house.
urn:cts:greekLit:tlg7000.tlg001:10.87
§ 10.87 PALLADAS If we do not laugh at life the runaway, and Fortune the strumpet shifting with the current, we cause ourselves constant pain seeing the unworthy luckier than ourselves.
urn:cts:greekLit:tlg7000.tlg001:10.88
§ 10.88 PALLADAS The body is an affliction of the soul, it is Hell, Fate, a burden, a necessity, a strong chain and a tormenting punishment. But when the soul issues from the body as from the bonds of death, it flies to the immortal God.
urn:cts:greekLit:tlg7000.tlg001:10.89
§ 10.89 PALLADAS If Rumour be a goddess, she too as well as the other gods is wroth with the Greeks and cozens them with deceptive words. Rumour, if any evil befall thee, at once is proved to be true, and often the rapidity of events anticipates her.
urn:cts:greekLit:tlg7000.tlg001:10.90
§ 10.90 PALLADAS Alas for the extreme malice of envy! A man hates the fortunate whom God loves. So senselessly are we led astray by envy; so ready are we to be the slaves of folly. We Greeks are men reduced to ashes, having the buried hopes of the dead; for today everything is turned upside down.
urn:cts:greekLit:tlg7000.tlg001:10.91
§ 10.91 PALLADAS He who detests a man whom God loves, is guilty of the greatest folly, for he manifestly takes up arms against God himself, being gifted by envy with excessive spite. One should rather love him whom God loves.
urn:cts:greekLit:tlg7000.tlg001:10.92
§ 10.92 PALLADAS To a Magistrate Since thou givest judgments and art a subtle speaker, I bring thee too this grave epigram of my nightingale worthy of one who speaks freely; for he who sings of thee pours forth the praises of Justice.
urn:cts:greekLit:tlg7000.tlg001:10.93
§ 10.93 PALLADAS It is better to endure even straitened Fortune rather than the arrogance of the wealthy.
urn:cts:greekLit:tlg7000.tlg001:10.94
§ 10.94 PALLADAS I think God is a philosopher too, as he does not wax wroth at once with blasphemy, but with the advance of time increases the punishment of wicked and miserable men.
urn:cts:greekLit:tlg7000.tlg001:10.95
§ 10.95 PALLADAS I hate the man who is double-minded, kind in words, but a foe in his conduct.
urn:cts:greekLit:tlg7000.tlg001:10.96
§ 10.96 PALLADAS When I think over things, observing the inopportune changes of life and the fickle current of unfair Fortune, how she makes the poor rich and deprives its possessors of wealth, then blinded in my own mind by the error I hate everything owing to the obscurity of all. For how shall I get the better of Fortune, who keeps on appearing in life from no one knows where, behaving like a harlot.
urn:cts:greekLit:tlg7000.tlg001:10.97
§ 10.97 PALLADAS Having lived a pound of years with toiling Grammar I am sent to Hell to be senator of the dead.
urn:cts:greekLit:tlg7000.tlg001:10.98
§ 10.98 PALLADAS Every uneducated man is wisest if he remains silent, hiding his speech like a disgraceful disease.
urn:cts:greekLit:tlg7000.tlg001:10.99
§ 10.99 PALLADAS I often, Sextus, weighed on the balance your kindness and insolence, and finding your kindness much the lightest and your abusive speech ever sinking the scale, I abandoned your friendship, unable to support any longer your most dishonouring insults.
urn:cts:greekLit:tlg7000.tlg001:10.100
§ 10.100 ANTIPHANES Brief would be the whole span of life that we wretched men live, even if grey old age awaited us all, and briefer yet is the space of our prime. Therefore, while the season is ours, let all be in plenty, song, love, carousal. Henceforth is the winter of heavy eld. Thou wouldst give ten minae to be a man, but no! such fetters shall be set on thy manhood.

Via ToposText (topostext.org), a project of the Aikaterini Laskaridis Foundation created by Brady Kiesling. Translated by William Roger Paton (1857-1921). Composed ca. 900 CE. Licence: public domain. Source.