Meditations - Emperor of Rome Marcus Aurelius (read novels website .TXT) 📗

THIS being neither a critical edition of the text nor an emended edition of Casaubon's translation, it has not been thought necessary to add full notes. Casaubon's own notes have been omitted, because for the most part they are discursive, and not necessary to an understanding of what is written. In those which here follow, certain emendations of his are mentioned, which he proposes in his notes, and follows in the translation. In addition, one or two corrections are made where he has mistaken the Greek, and the translation might be misleading. Those which do not come under these two heads will explain themselves.

The text itself has been prepared by a comparison of the editions of 1634 and 1635. It should be borne in mind that Casaubon's is often rather a paraphrase than a close translation; and it did not seem worth while to notice every variation or amplification of the original. In the original editions all that Casauhon conceives as understood, but not expressed, is enclosed in square brackets. These brackets are here omitted, as they interfere with the comfort of the reader; and so have some of the alternative renderings suggested by the translator. In a few cases, Latin words in the text have been replaced by English.

Numbers in brackets refer to the Teubner text of Stich, but the divisions of the text are left unaltered. For some of the references identified I am indebted to Mr. G. H. Rendall's Marcus Aurelius.

BOOK II "Both to frequent" (4). Gr. to mh, C. conjectures to me. The text is probably right: "I did not frequent public lectures, and I was taught at home."

VI Idiots.... philosophers (9). The reading is doubtful, but the meaning seems to be: "simple and unlearned men"

XII "Claudius Maximus" (15). The reading of the Palatine MS. (now lost) was paraklhsiz Maximon, which C. supposes to conceal the letters kl as an abbreviation of Claudius.

XIII "Patient hearing... He would not" (16). C. translates his conjectural reading epimonon ollan. on proapsth Stich suggests a reading with much the same sense: .....epimonon all antoi "Strict and rigid dealing" (16). C. translates tonvn (Pal. MS.) as though from tonoz, in the sense of "strain." "rigour." The reading of other MSS. tonvn is preferable.

XIII "Congiaries" (13). dianomais, "doles."

XIV "Cajeta" (17). The passage is certainly corrupt. C. spies a reference to Chryses praying by the sea-shore in the Illiad, and supposes M. Aurelius to have done the like. None of the emendations suggested is satisfactory. At § XV. Book II. is usually reckoned to begin. BOOK II III. "Do, soul" (6). If the received reading be right, it must be sarcastic; but there are several variants which show how unsatisfactory it is. C. translates "en gar o bioz ekasty so par eanty", which I do not understand. The sense required is: "Do not violence to thyself, for thou hast not long to use self-respect. Life is not (v. 1. so long for each, and this life for thee is all but done."

X. "honour and credit do proceed" (12). The verb has dropt out of the text, but C. has supplied one of the required meaning.

XI. "Consider," etc. (52). This verb is not in the Greek, which means: "(And reason also shows) how man, etc."

BOOK IV XV. "Agathos" (18): This is probably not a proper name, but the text seems to be unsound. The meaning may be "the good man ought"

XVI. oikonomian (16) is a "practical benefit," a secondary end. XXXIX. "For herein lieth all...." (~3). C. translates his conjecture olan for ola.

BOOK V XIV. katorqwseiz (15): Acts of "rightness" or "straightness." XXIII. "Roarer" (28): Gr. "tragedian." Ed. 1 has whoremonger,' ed. 2 corrects to "harlot," but omits to alter' the word at its second occurrence.

XXV. "Thou hast... them" (33): A quotation from Homer, Odyssey, iv. 690.

XXVII. "One of the poets" (33): Hesiod, Op. et Dies, 197.

XXIX and XXX. (36). The Greek appears to contain quotations from sources not known, and the translation is a paraphrase. (One or two alterations are here made on the authority of the second edition.) BOOK VI XIII. "Affected and qualified" (i4): exis, the power of cohesion shown in things inanimate; fusiz, power of growth seen in plants and the like.

XVII. "Wonder at them" (18): i.e. mankind.

XXXVII. "Chrysippus" (42): C. refers to a passage of Plutarch De Communibus Notitiis (c. xiv.), where Chrysippus is represented as saying that a coarse phrase may be vile in itself, yet have due place in a comedy as contributing to a certain effect.

XL. "Man or men..." There is no hiatus in the Greek, which means: "Whatever (is beneficial) for a man is so for other men also."

XLII. There is no hiatus in the Greek.

BOOK VII IX. C. translates his conjecture mh for h. The Greek means "straight, or rectified," with a play on the literal and metaphorical meaning of ortoz.

XIV. endaimonia. contains the word daimwn in composition. XXII. The text is corrupt, but the words "or if it be but few" should be "that is little enough."

XXIII. "Plato": Republic, vi. p. 486 A.

XXV. "It will," etc. Euripides, Belerophon, frag. 287 (Nauck).

"Lives," etc. Euripides, Hypsipyle, frag. 757 (Nauck). "As long," etc. Aristophanes, Acharne, 66 i.

"Plato" Apology, p. 28 B.

"For thus" Apology, p. 28 F.

XXVI. "But, O noble sir," etc. Plato, Gorgias, 512 D. XXVII. "And as for those parts," etc. A quotation from Euripides, Chryssipus, frag. 839 (Nauck).

"With meats," etc. From Euripides, Supplices, 1110. XXXIII. "They both," i.e. life and wrestling.

"Says he" (63): Plato, quoted by Epictetus, Arr. i. 28, 2 and 22.

XXXVII. "How know we," etc. The Greek means: "how know we whether Telauges were not nobler in character than Sophocles?" The allusion is unknown.

XXVII. "Frost" The word is written by Casaubon as a proper name, "Pagus.'

"The hardihood of Socrates was famous"; see Plato, Siymposium, p. 220.

BOOK X XXII. The Greek means, "paltry breath bearing up corpses, so that the tale of Dead Man's Land is clearer."

XXII. "The poet" (21): Euripides, frag. 898 (Nauck); compare Aeschylus, Danaides, frag. 44.

XXIV. "Plato" (23): Theaetetus, p. 174 D.

XXXIV. "The poet" (34): Homer, Iliad, vi. 147.

XXXIV. "Wood": A translation of ulh, "matter."

XXXVIII. "Rhetoric" (38): Rather "the gift of speech"; or perhaps the "decree" of the reasoning faculty.

BOOK XI V. "Cithaeron" (6): Oedipus utters this cry after discovering that he has fulfilled his awful doom, he was exposed on Cithaeron as an infant to die, and the cry implies that he wishes he had died there. Sophocles, Oedipus Tyrannus, 1391.

V. "New Comedy...," etc. C. has here strayed from the Greek rather widely. Translate: "and understand to what end the New Comedy was adopted, which by small degrees degenerated into a mere show of skill in mimicry." C. writes Comedia Vetus, Media, Nova. XII. "Phocion" (13): When about to be put to death he charged his son to bear no malice against the Athenians.

XXVIII. "My heart," etc. (31): From Homer, Odyssey ix. 413. "They will" From Hesiod, Opera et Dies, 184.

"Epictetus" Arr. i. II, 37.

XXX. "Cut down grapes" (35): Correct "ears of corn." "Epictetus"(36): Arr. 3, 22, 105.

This Glossary includes all proper names (excepting a few which are insignificant or unknown) and all obsolete or obscure words. ADRIANUS, or Hadrian (76-138 A. D.), 14th Roman Emperor.

Agrippa, M. Vipsanius (63-12 B.C.), a distinguished soldier under Augustus.

Alexander the Great, King of Macedonia, and Conqueror of the East, 356-323 B.C.

Antisthenes of Athens, founder of the sect of Cynic philosophers, and an opponent of Plato, 5th century B.C Antoninus Pius, 15th Roman Emperor, 138-161 AD. one of the best princes that ever mounted a throne.

Apathia: the Stoic ideal was calmness in all circumstance an insensibility to pain, and absence of all exaltation at, pleasure or good fortune.

Apelles, a famous painter of antiquity.

Apollonius of Alexandria, called Dyscolus, or the 'ill-tempered,' a great grammarian.

Aposteme, tumour, excrescence.

Archimedes of Syracuse 287-212 B.C., the most famous mathematician of antiquity.

Athos, a mountain promontory at the N. of the Aegean Sea.

Augustus, first Roman Emperor (ruled 31 B.C.-14 AD.).

Avoid, void.

BACCHIUS: there Were several persons of this name, and the one meant is perhaps the musician.

Brutus (1) the liberator of the Roman people from their kings, and (2) the murderer of Caesar.

Both names were household words.

Caesar, Caius, Julius, the Dictator and Conqueror.

Caieta, a town in Latium.

Camillus, a famous dictator in the early days of the Roman Republic.

Carnuntum, a town on the Danube in Upper Pannonia.

Cato, called of Utica, a Stoic who died by his own hand after the battle of Thapsus, 46 B.C. His name was proverbial for virtue and courage.

Cautelous, cautious.

Cecrops, first legendary King of Athens.

Charax, perhaps the priestly historian of that name, whose date is unknown, except that it must be later than Nero.

Chirurgeon, surgeon.

Chrysippus, 280-207 B.C., a Stoic philosopher, and the founder of Stoicism as a systematic philosophy.

Circus, the Circus Maximus at Rome, where games were held. There were four companies who contracted to provide horses, drivers, etc. These were called Factiones, and each had its distinguishing colour: russata (red), albata (white), veneta (blue), prasina (green). There was high rivalry between them, and riots and bloodshed not infrequently.

Cithaeron, a mountain range N. of Attica.

Comedy, ancient; a term applied to the Attic comedy of Aristophanes and his time, which criticised persons and politics, like a modern comic journal, such as Punck. See New Comedy.

Compendious, short.

Conceit, opinion.

Contentation, contentment.

Crates, a Cynic philosopher of the 4th century B.C.

Croesus, King of Lydia, proverbial for wealth; he reigned 560-546 B.C.

Cynics, a school of philosophers, founded by Antisthenes. Their texts were a kind of caricature of Socraticism. Nothing was good but virtue, nothing bad but vice. The Cynics repudiated all civil and social claims, and attempted to return to what they called a state of nature. Many of them were very disgusting in their manners.

DEMETRIUS of Phalerum, an Athenian orator, statesman, philosopher, and poet. Born 345 B.C.

Democritus of Abdera (460-361 B.C.), celebrated as the 'laughing philosopher,' whose constant thought was 'What fools these mortals be.' He invented the Atomic Theory.

Dio of Syracuse, a disciple of Plato, and afterwards tyrant of Syracuse. Murdered 353 B.C.

Diogenes, the Cynic, born about 412 B.C., renowned for his rudeness and hardihood.

Diognetus, a painter.

Dispense with, put up with.

Dogmata, pithy sayings, or philosophical rules of life.

EMPEDOCLES of Agrigentum, fl. 5th century B.C., a philosopher, who first laid down that there were "four elements." He believed in the transmigration of souls, and the indestructibility of matter.

Epictetus, a famous Stoic philosopher. He was of Phrygia, at first a slave, then freedman, lame, poor, and contented. The work called Encheiridion was compiled by a pupil from his discourses.

Epicureans, a sect of philosophers founded by Epicurus, who "combined the physics of Democritus," i.e. the atomic theory, "with the ethics of Aristippus."

They proposed to live for happiness, but the word did not