PREFACE

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In a recent airing of a PBS travel program, a group of San Francisco-area

college students were filmed visiting China, their ancestral home. After arriving

in a wayside village, one of the women students quoted the ancient proverb,

“When you drink water, remember the source,” and then asserted, “That’s

very Chinese!” There is a similar Chinese aphorism that rebukes those who

would drink from a fountain without first giving thought to the ancestor who

had dug the well. In both instances, the notion is the same: we owe our lives,

but also our daily conveniences, to those who came before us. Whether Chinese

or American, Asian or Western, the proverb aptly applies to all. Our

ancestors planted the trees whose fruits we now eat; they built the roads and

bridges over which we now drive. Indeed, it is they who handed down to us

the storehouse of folk wisdom that we draw upon daily to guide, enrich, and

inform our lives.

For those of us who study cultural history, much of what we find in ancient

proverbial wisdom centers around themes of memory and connection.

Ancient wisdom encourages us to be ever mindful of our ties, as well as our

obligations, to the past. The way we go in this life follows after those who came

before us. “Via trita, via tuta,” the old Roman adage asserts, “The beaten path

is the safe path.” There is a certain comfort and assurance in knowing that the

road we travel upon is a familiar one and that it will not lead us astray. The

image that emerges, then, is of one generation after another following a trail

blazed by revered ancestors—of following and then of passing on a tradition

set down in custom as well as in word.

At the same time, the connection is not only from past to present, but also

from present to future. A people’s life continues onward ever mindful of their

connection to their forebears, but also of what guideposts or markers they will

leave for their descendants. Someday, we too will be ancestors, and the wisdom

we have gleaned from our experiences will guide those who follow after

us—or so we hope.

Four centuries ago, Sir Francis Bacon published De Sapientia Veterum (On

the Wisdom of the Ancients), a delightful book of Classical myths and fables in

which he sought to recover examples of “humane wisedome” from antiquity

that had been “buried in obliuion [oblivion] and silence.” In his Preface,

Bacon observed that “There is found among men … a two-fold use of Parables,

and those … referred to contrary ends; conducing as well to foulding

[folding] up and keeping of things under a vaile [veil], as to the inlightening

[enlightening] and laying open of obscurities.” These Parables, he noted, must be “accounted … as Sacred reliques [relics] or abstracted ayres [airs] of better

times, which by tradition from more ancient Nations fell into the Trumpets

and Flutes of the Græcians,” and had since found their way to his own time.

For his part, Bacon was much more interested in the second of these two

uses, that is, of laying open obscurities and enlightening those who might

encounter them. But from another perspective, Bacon’s observation that

fables, allegories, parables, similes, and “ænigmaes” hide as well as reveal

knowledge, remains the more intriguing of the two aims of ancient wisdom,

despite his waving it aside. To shroud something is not merely to conceal it,

but, at the same time, to protect and preserve it. A culture’s “sacred reliques”

are not for “rude and impatient” hands to mishandle, lest they become profaned.

It is for this reason that we frequently find ancient wisdom couched in

the abstractions, subtleties, and nuances of metonymy and metaphor, of analogy

and pun.

Much like Bacon’s small book, this present collection of nearly 8,000 proverbs,

mottoes, and quotations also seeks to gather and preserve De Sapientia

Veterum of the Latin tradition, ancient wisdom written down and passed on

from the birth of the Republic to the Fall of the Empire, and into the age of

Renaissance and Reformation. To be sure, Roman customs and mores were

deeply rooted in tradition and upheld the conservative cultural values that

characterized the Republic. But beyond that, their aim was to safeguard the

sacred genius of a people who had forged a social and political system that

brought predictability and order within an otherwise chaotic world. Much of

this wisdom fell into the “Flutes and Trumpets” of the Romans through

Rome’s contact with and admiration of Greek civilization. “Aurea Mediocritas”

(the golden mean), moderation in all things, was among these ideals that

the Romans borrowed from the Greeks, but then added their own emphasis

on social obligation and the caution not to tempt Fate. Virtus (virtue), aretê,

the highest Greek ideal, translated easily into Roman thought as maintaining

balance between one’s social and familial duties and the striving after personal

honor through heroic acts of valor. In fact, Honos or Honor meant everything

to the Romans and strongly shaped the Roman ethos, as did Fides (faith) and

Magnanimitas (greatness of spirit). “Facte nova virtute, puer; sic itur ad astra,”

encouraged Virgil: “go on and increase in valor, young man; thus is the path to

the stars.”

The use of proverbs, mottoes, and maxims appears common to all cultures.

Such pith expresses the essence of a culture’s customs and traditions in

the form of mnemonic or memory devices meant to inform as well as to

entertain. For instance, the Hebrew Book of Proverbs makes very effective

use of parallel phrasings that are preserved when rendered in English, such

as “pride goeth before destruction, and a haughty spirit before a fall”

(16:18), and “a soft answer turns away wrath, but a harsh word stirs up

anger” (15:1). For their part, Latin authors and orators made effective use of

meter and rhyme as mnemonic devices. As with “via trita, via tuta,” the phrase “mox nox” (soon night, or night is approaching) likewise employs

meter and rhyme. The same is the case with “mone sale” (advise with salt),

and “nec habeo, nec careo, nec curo” (I have not, I want not, I care not),

which are both fairly easy to remember.

Another interesting mnemonic device is the tongue twister, examples of

which we also encounter in Latin literature. One clever tongue twister is “mala

mali malo mala contulit omnia mundo” (man’s jaw and an apple brought all

evils in the world). Another is the phrase “sunt pueri pueri, pueri puerilia

tractant” (children are children, and children occupy themselves with childish

things), which features a repetition of the same word bracketed by two words

that closely rhyme. Elsewhere in the literature, we chance upon examples of

the chiasmus or cross pattern, such as the menacing phrase from Plautus that

goes “altera manu fert lapidem, panem ostentat altera” (he shows us bread in

one hand, but holds a stone in the other). Notice that the phrase begins and

ends with “altera,” and, at least in terms of its syllabic sounds, closely resembles

a palindrome.

Apart from being witty, the mnemonic cast of ancient proverbial wisdom

served to teach children and remind adults of the way they should go in life.

The phrase way of life is itself a metaphor for how life is to be lived in mimesis

or imitation of great cultural heroes. Across traditions, this same motif predominates.

At times, the way is presented in terms of a choice between two

roads, as in the “bivium virtutis et vitii” (the two paths of virtue and of vice).

At other times, virtue, in Horace’s words, “est medium vitiorum et utrinque

reductum” (is the middle between two vices, and is equally removed from

either extreme). In Juvenal, we find the admonition, “semita certe tranquillæ

per virtutem patet unica vitæ” (only one path in this life leads to tranquility:

the path of virtue). And, as a last example, there is the anonymous saying,

“errantem in viam reductio” (lead the wanderer back into the right way).

In addition, these types of literary devices served to reinforce traditional

methods of teaching by example, methods likewise embraced by the Romans,

who preferred practical to theoretical knowledge. Accordingly, we find

instances, such as in Seneca, who expressed this idea using the path or road

metaphor in a rhyming doublet: “longum iter est per præcepta, breve et efficax

per exempla” (teaching by precept is a long road, but brief and beneficial is

the way by example). Moreover, wisdom is at times personified both in terms

of its mimetic and its mnemonic aspects. One such example is in Lucius Afranius,

who wrote: “Usus me genuit, mater peperit Memoria. Sophiam vocant

me Graii, vos Sapientiam” (Practice was my father, Memory my mother. The

Greeks call me Sophia, you call me Wisdom).

In this way, ancient wisdom served both mimetic and mnemonic aims. It is

in memory and a culture’s connection to its past that tradition and custom

and a people’s way of life are preserved and protected against change. For, as

Cicero wrote, “memoria est thesaurus omnium rerum e custos” (memory is

the treasury and guardian of all things).

As with my two previous books, Latin for the Illiterati (1996) and More

Latin for the Illiterati (1999), both published by Routledge, the creation of this

third Latin lexicon presented a number of problems that need to be mentioned

here as a sort of “caveat lector,” a caution to the reader. First, as much as

I would have liked to have gathered together all the wisdom of the ancients

into one volume, because of page constraints I have had to content myself

with a text of fewer than 400 pages. Even so, the selections contained in this

treasury of proverbs and quotations represent the widest possible survey of

that literature, including such authors and orators as Cato, Juvenal, Seneca,

Pliny, Ovid, Cicero, Virgil, Publilius Syrus, Terence, Horace, Plautus, Lucretius,

and many others. These are persons whose wisdom and humor spoke to

their own time, but speak to ours as well.

Second, because this collection draws from a wide range of sources in the

Classical, Medieval, Renaissance, and later periods, there exist noticeable

variations and inconsistencies in spelling and syntax that cannot be reconciled.

For example, the letters “j” and “y” came to indicate the letter “i”

when consonated. The aspirated letter “h” is sometimes inserted after “c”

and between double vowels, usually to distinguish hard from soft sounds

and to mark double vowels that were not diphthongs. Consequently, the

reader will encounter such spelling changes as jus and judex for ius and

iudex, inclytus for inclitus, lacrymis or lachrymis for lacrimis, ahereus for

aereus, and so on. Apart from these types of irregularities, it should be

pointed out that not all irregular spellings or syntactical “errors” can be corrected

to satisfy everyone’s tastes. I still receive letters from conscientious

readers who chastise me for having retained the use of “j” and “corrupted”

Medieval syntax in my earlier lexicons.

But these “corruptions” should not surprise us. All languages become corrupted

with use. What should amaze us is that many people fail to see change

as a natural development of human cultural life. All things change from being

stretched, even language. To think of language as “corrupted” assumes that

there was an original point of perfection from which the language began to

degrade, such as the Fall in the Garden or the confusion of tongues at the

Tower of Babel. Much to the contrary, language is a tool for communicating

among people as well as a means of communicating across space and time. As

the conversation moves forward, some words change their spellings and

meanings, some become obsolete and later discarded, and new words are

introduced either to replace worn-out expressions or to express new or emerging

ideas. Witness the archaic forms in the quotes from Sir Francis Bacon cited

above. Shall we consider Jacobean English as the true and pure form and

Modern Standard English as its defilement? Of course not. There is no pure

language, for language, as a human creation, is neither fixed nor constant, but

changes with the needs and conventions of the times.

In addition to irregularities in spelling and syntax, I have also had to wrestle

with variant and contradictory versions of quotations, as well as discrepancies over the original authorship of proverbs and maxims. In the case of

variant renderings of quotations and sayings, it seemed best to consult multiple

sources (including Web-based, such as The Latin Library on-line) and then

select the version that appeared most frequently in published form (even then,

I encountered a number of typographical errors in books and mis-scanned or

miskeyed texts on the Web). With respect to author attribution, in most cases

I simply listed all the authors to whom the quote had been ascribed.

While, for the sake of convenience, the main text has been divided into

three sections—Proverbs and Maxims, Mottoes and Phrases, and Familiar

Quotations—not all entries fit neatly into these categories. Some proverbs and

maxims appear as mottoes on ancient and modern crests. What is more, some

of the authored proverbs and maxims are lengthy and would thus seem better

suited to the section of quotations. And, of course, not all readers will know in

which sections to look for the entries that fall between these categories—or

will even agree with where they have been placed. For these inconveniences,

these slight mea culpas, I beg the reader’s kind indulgence. Doubtless these,

and all other faults and omissions in the text, will pursue me through this life

like the Furies, and then follow me to the shades below.

Finally, as I had observed in the Prefaces of my earlier Latin texts, there is

much in Latin literature to offend modern sensibilities. Racial and sexist epithets

are not unique to our time nor even to Western culture. All traditional societies

felt threatened by differences both within and without, and many viciously

attacked dissenters—and still do. Doubtless, such phrases as “Æthiopiem lavare”

(to wash an Ethiopian) and “Græculus esuriens” (ever the hungry young Greek)

are racially offensive. In terms of sexist remarks, one tends to find jabs at both

men and women. For instance, Publilius Syrus wrote that “women surpass men

at scheming evil” (In Latin, “malo in consilio feminæ vincunt viros”); while, at

about the same time, Ovid, his contemporary, penned the phrase: “forma viros

neglecta decet,” or “neglect of appearance becomes men.” While both comments

can be read as sheer sarcasm, they can also be seen as offensive. Though a few

selections such as these have been included in this text, their appearance is merely

for historical purposes. I did not (and do not) believe that it was my role as a lexicographer

to sanitize Roman cultural attitudes toward race, class, or gender.

Notwithstanding these minor imperfections, it is hoped that The Routledge

Dictionary of Latin Quotations will offer to the reader, both now and in future

generations, a treasury of ancient wisdom that, to quote Horace, “delectando

pariterque monendo,” delights while at the same time instructs.

Vita enim mortuorum in memoria vivorum est posita — Cicero

Jon R. Stone

August 2003