Noctes Atticae

Of ignoble subjects, called by the Greeks a)/docoi, or

unexpected,

NOT only the sophists of old, but the philosophers as well, took up ignoble subjects, [*](See Pease, Things without Honor, Class. Phil. xxi. pp. 27 ff. An example is Erasmus' Praise of Folly.) or if you prefer, unexpected ones, a)/docoi u(poqe/seis, as the Greeks call them; and our friend Favorinus took a great deal of pleasure in descending to such subjects, [*](Frag. 65, Marres.) either thinking them suitable for stimulating his thoughts or exercising his cleverness or overcoming difficulties by practice. For example, when he attempted to praise Thersites and pronounced a eulogy upon the quartan ague, [*](See note 1, p. 252.) he said many clever and ingenious things on both topics, which he has left written in his works.

But in his eulogy of fever he even produced Plato as a witness, declaring that the philosopher wrote [*](Tim. 10, p. 86 A.) that one who after suffering from quartan ague got well and recovered his full strength, would afterwards enjoy surer and more constant health. And in that same eulogy he made this quip, which, of a truth, is not ungraceful:

The following lines,

have met with the approval of many generations of men: [*](Hesiod, Works and Days, 825.)

1. Sometimes a day is like a stepmother,
2. And sometimes like a mother.

v3.p.253

The meaning of the verses is that a man cannot fare well every day, but fares well on one day and ill on another. Since it is true,

that in human affairs things are in turn, now good, now bad, how much more fortunate is this fever which has an interval of two days, [*](Owing to the Roman method of inclusive reckoning, the quartan ague, occurring on every fourth day, had an interval of two days; see Class Phil. viii. 1 ff.) since it has only one stepmother, but two mothers!

How many and what varieties of meaning the particle quin has, and that it is often obscure in the earlier literature.

THE particle quin, which the grammarians call a conjunction, seems to connect sentences in various ways and with divers meanings. For it seems to have one meaning when we say, as if chiding or questioning or exhorting, quin venis?

Why don't you come?

Why don't you read?

Why don't you flee?

there is no doubt but that (quin) Marcus Tullius is the most eloquent of all men,

Isocrates did not plead causes, not but that he thought it useful and honourable so to do.

these I describe last, not but that they are good and valiant peoples.

He did not consider it enough to have slandered him privately, without openly defaming his character.

I have noted, besides, that Quadrigarius in the eighth book of his Annals has used that particle in a very obscure manner. I quote his exact words: [*](Frag. 70, Peter2.)

He came to Rome; he barely succeeds in having a triumph voted.

It lacked little but that (quin) they should leave their camp and yield to the enemy.

He came to Rome; he with difficulty brought it about that a triumph should be voted

It almost happened that they left their camp and yielded to the enemy.

Only one who has learned that this particle of which we are speaking is a compound and formed of two parts, and that it does not merely have the function of a connective but has a definite meaning of its own, [*](quin is formed from qui, the ablative of the interrogative and relative stem qui-, and -ne, not. It is used in both dependent and independent sentences. See Lane, Lat. Gr.2 1980 ff.) will ever understand its variations in meaning. But because an explanation of these would require a long dissertation, he who has leisure may find it in the Commentaries of Publius Nigidius which he entitled Grammatical. [*](Frag. 52, Swoboda.)

Neat sayings selected from the Mimes of Publilius.

PUBLILIUS wrote mimes. He was thought worthy of being rated about equal to Laberius. But the scurrility and the arrogance of Laberius so offended Gaius Caesar, that he declared that he was better pleased with the mimes of Publilius than with those of Laberius. Many sayings of this Publilius are current, which are neat and well adapted to the use of ordinary conversation. Among these are the following, consisting of a single line each, which I have indeed taken pleasure in quoting: [*](Meyer, vv. 362, 55, 176, 106, 104, 193, 221, 178, 264, 245, 645, 383, 416, 469. In one instance it has seemed necessary to use two lines in the English version.)

1. Bad is the plan which cannot bear a change.
2. He gains by giving who has given to worth.
3. Endure and don't deplore what can't be helped. [*](Cf. What can't be cured must be endured.)
4. Who's given too much, will want more than's allowed. [*](Cf. Give an inch, he'll take an ell.)
5. A witty colmrade at vour side,
6. To walk's as easy as to ride.
7. Frugality is misery in disguise.
8. Heirs' tears are laughter underneath a mask.
9. Patience too oft provoked is turned to rage.
10. He wrongly Neptune blames, who suffers shipwreck twice.
11. Regard a friend as one who may be foe.
12. By bearing old wrongs new ones you provoke.
13. With danger ever danger's overcome.
14. 'Mid too much wrangling truth is often lost.
15. Who courteously declines, grants half your suit.

That Carneades the Academic purged his stomach with hellebore when about to write against the dogmas of Zeno the Stoic; and of the nature and curative powers of white and black hellebore.

WHEN Carneades, the Academic philosopher, was about to write against the books of the Stoic Zeno, he cleansed the upper part of his body with white hellebore, in order that none of the corrupt humours of his stomach might rise to the abode of his mind and weaken the power and vigour of his intellect; with such care and such preparation did this man of surpassing talent set about refuting what Zeno had written. When I had read of this in Grecian history, I inquired what was meant by the term

white hellebore.

Then I learned that there are two kinds of hellebore distinguished by a difference in colour, white and black; but that those colours are distinguished neither in the seed of the hellebore nor in its plant, but in the root; further, that with white hellebore the stomach and upper belly [*](The small intestine, see note on xvii. 11. 2.) are purged by vomiting; by the black the so-called lower belly is loosened, [*](The large intestine.) and the effect of both is to remove the noxious humours in which the causes of diseases are situated. But that there is danger lest, when every avenue of the body is opened, along with the causes of disease the juices on which the principle of life depends should also pass away, and the man should perish from exhaustion because of the destruction of the entire foundation of natural nourishment.

But Plinius Secundus, in his work On Natural History, wrote [*](xxv. 52.) that hellebore could be taken with the greatest safety in the island of Anticyra. [*](There were three places of this name, all celebrated for their hellebore, which was regarded as a cure for insanity. One was in Locris, on the Corinthian Gulf; the second was on the Maliac Gulf at the foot of Mt. Oeta. The third, usually considered the most important, was a town of Phocis on the Corinthian Gulf. See Thes. Ling. Lat. s.v., where Plin. N. H. xxv. 52 is assigned to the last-named, in spite of iasula. Baumgarten-Crasius, Suetonius, refer the reference in Calig. xxix to an island, which they do not, locate. In Hor. Ars. Poet. 300, tribus Anticyris may refer to three Anticyras, but is more probably used in a general sense.) That for this reason Livius Drusus, the former tribune of the commons, when he was suffering from the so-called

election

I have read besides that the Gauls, when hunting, dip their arrows in hellebore, because the wild animals that are struck and killed by arrows thus treated become tenderer for eating; but because of the contagion of the hellebore they are said to cut out a large piece of flesh around the wounds made by the arrows.

That Pontic ducks have a power which is able to expel poisons; and also of the skill of Mithridates in preparing antidotes.

IT is said that the ducks of Pontus commonly live by eating poisons. It was also written by Lenaeus, [*](See Suet. De G. amm. xv. (ii, p. 418, L.C.L.).) the freedman of Pompey the Great, that Mithridates, the famous king of Pontus, was skilled in medicine and in antidotes of that kind, and that he was accustomed to mix the blood of these ducks with drugs that have the power of expelling poisons, and that the blood was the very most powerful agency

Mithridatian.