{"id":75,"date":"2017-06-24T20:36:23","date_gmt":"2017-06-24T20:36:23","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/courses.lumenlearning.com\/suny-geneseo-humanities1-1\/chapter\/satires-xiii-xiv\/"},"modified":"2017-06-24T20:36:23","modified_gmt":"2017-06-24T20:36:23","slug":"satires-xiii-xiv","status":"web-only","type":"chapter","link":"https:\/\/courses.lumenlearning.com\/suny-geneseo-humanities1-1\/chapter\/satires-xiii-xiv\/","title":{"raw":"Satires XIII & XIV","rendered":"Satires XIII & XIV"},"content":{"raw":"Satire XIII: Mock Consolation<\/strong> \u00a0 SatXIII:1-70 Why So Surprised, Calvinus?\n\n\u00a0\n\nSetting a bad example won\u2019t make the perpetrator feel pleased.\n\nThat\u2019s the first manner in which life takes its revenge, that no\n\nOne who\u2019s guilty absolves themselves, in their own judgement,\n\nThough he be a praetor who\u2019s corrupt influence rigged a vote.\n\nSo why should anyone be surprised, Calvinus, at recent events,\n\nThe wicked crime, a matter of trust betrayed? It\u2019s not as though\n\nYou\u2019re a person of such slender means the weight of this modest\n\nLoss will sink you, nor is your experience something that\u2019s rarely\n\nKnown: it\u2019s the kind of bad luck familiar to many a person, banal\n\nThese days, a card that\u2019s plucked from fortune\u2019s outspread hand.\n\nPut an end to your excessive grief. One\u2019s indignation should not\n\nBurn more fiercely than fitting, nor be greater than one\u2019s injury;\n\nYet you can scarcely endure the slightest, the least, the tiniest\n\nParticle of hurt, you\u2019re all in a blaze, with your innards seething,\n\nBecause your friend won\u2019t return that sacred sum of money you\n\nEntrusted to him. Why should that surprise someone with sixty\n\nYears behind him, a man who was born in Fonteius\u2019 consulship?\n\nHave you gained not an ounce of profit from all your experience?\n\nSurely those precepts are fine which the sacred books of wisdom\n\nOffer; the wisdom to overcome fate, and yet we also consider\n\nThose people fortunate, who have learned from life\u2019s teachings\n\nTo endure unpleasant things, and to bow and not resist the yoke.\n\nWhat day is so full of good luck it fails to produce theft, fraud,\n\nAnd betrayal, and the benefits gained by other sorts of crime,\n\nThe wealth that\u2019s gained through the sword or the poison chest?\n\nThe good are rare: count them, there are scarcely as many as\n\nThere were gates to Thebes, or mouths draining the rich Nile.\n\nIt\u2019s the ninth century of Rome now, an era even worse than\n\nThe age of iron, and Nature herself can find no name for its\n\nWickedness, she has no baser metal left to provide a label.\n\nWhat\u2019s the point of invoking the aid of men and gods, with\n\nThe clamour Faesidius\u2019 noisy crew makes, cheering him on,\n\nFor a handout? Say, old man, for whom a lad\u2019s gold charm\u2019s\n\nMore fitting, don\u2019t you know the lure of other people\u2019s cash?\n\nDon\u2019t you know how your simplicity moves the crowd to\n\nLaughter, when you demand no one perjure himself, when\n\nYou seek divinity in lofty temples, on blood-stained altars?\n\nThe natives once lived that way, until Saturn was forced to\n\nForsake his crown, and grabbed the rustic sickle as he fled;\n\nBack then, when Juno was but a child, and Jupiter lived as\n\nA private individual in the caverns of Cretan Mount Ida;\n\nThere were no heavenly banquets then above the clouds\n\nNo Ganymede, no Hebe, Hercules\u2019 wife, as cupbearers,\n\nNo Vulcan, once the nectar was poured, wiping his arms,\n\nBlack with soot from his Liparean forge and workshop.\n\nEach god dined alone, nor was there the crowd of gods\n\nThat exists today; the heavens being content with only\n\nA handful of deities, and weighing more lightly on Atlas\u2019\n\nShoulders; grim Pluto had not yet drawn his lot, winning\n\nHis kingdom in the depths, wedding Sicilian Proserpine;\n\nNo Ixion\u2019s wheel, no Furies, no Sisyphean rock, or dark\n\nVultures for Tityos; just happy shades, no infernal rulers.\n\nIn that age wickedness was greeted with astonishment.\n\nThey thought it a primal sin, one punishable by death,\n\nIf a young man refused to defend his elders, or a boy\n\nTo defend anyone with a beard, even if his own home\n\nDid possess more berries, or a larger heap of acorns;\n\nSo revered was even four years seniority, and the first\n\nSigns of a beard were the equivalent of sacred old age.\n\nThese days if a friend fails to renege on your agreement,\n\nAnd returns your purse to you with all its rusting metal,\n\nIt\u2019s a marvel of fidelity, a portent fit for the prophetic\n\nEtruscan books, or the sacrifice of a garlanded lamb.\n\nIf I come across an outstandingly honest man, I rank\n\nIt with some monstrous embryo, or a fish turned up,\n\nAmazingly, by the plough, or a pregnant mule; as\n\nStunned as if it rained stones, or as if a hive of bees\n\nHad swarmed in a great cluster on the roof of a shrine,\n\nOr as if a swift-flowing eddying river of milk, with its\n\nWhirling vortices, had rushed precipitously to the sea.\n\n\u00a0\n\nSatXIII:71-119 How They Seek To Justify Themselves!\n\n\u00a0\n\nYou complain about a hundred gold pieces gone astray,\n\nIn his sacrilegious act of fraud? Why not that secret hoard\n\nOf two thousand lost thus by another, or yet another\u2019s still\n\nGreater sum, that an angle of his vast treasury scarce holds?\n\nIt\u2019s so simple, and easy, to ignore those divine witnesses,\n\nIf there\u2019s no mortal in the know. See how loud he is in his\n\nDenials, and the self-possession displayed on his lying face.\n\nHe swears by the sun\u2019s rays and the Tarpeian lightning bolt,\n\nAnd Mars\u2019 lance and the arrows of Apollo, Cirrha\u2019s prophet,\n\nAnd by the shafts and quiver of Diana, the virgin huntress,\n\nAnd by your trident Neptune, father of the Aegean, and he\u2019ll\n\nAdd Hercules\u2019 bow, and Minerva\u2019s spear, for good measure,\n\nWhatever weapons happen to exist in the heavenly armoury.\n\nAnd if indeed, he\u2019s a father, he\u2019ll say, with a tear: \u2018Or may I\n\nDevour my son\u2019s brain boiled, doused with Egyptian vinegar!\u2019\n\nThere are those who attribute everything to acts of fortune,\n\nWho believe that the world goes on its way without guidance,\n\nAnd that nature brings on the succession of days and years;\n\nWho will therefore touch any altar you like without concern,\n\nOthers believe the gods exist, yet still commit perjury, saying\n\nTo themselves; \u2018Isis may choose to do what she wishes with\n\nMy body; let her strike me blind with an angry shake of her\n\nRattle, so long as, sightless, I keep the cash I\u2019ll deny receiving.\n\nLung disease, or festering abscesses, or even the loss of a leg\n\nAre worth it. Though Ladas, the runner, were poor, he should\n\nStill have no hesitation, unless he\u2019s mad or dying, in praying\n\nFor the rich man\u2019s gout; for what does the glory of swiftness\n\nBring after all, or thirsting for that wreath of Olympian olive?\n\nThough the gods\u2019 anger is great, it\u2019s slow indeed to take effect.\n\nHow long might it take before they trouble me? I may even\n\nFind the powers that be are indulgent; ready to forgive all this.\n\nThe same crimes are committed but with very different results:\n\nOne man\u2019s prize for his sins is crucifixion, another\u2019s is a crown.\u2019\n\nHis heart trembling in terror at his vile trespass, this is how he\n\nCalms himself. When you summon him to the sacred shrine,\n\nHe\u2019s ahead of you, drags you there, ready to vex you further;\n\nWhen the cause is ill, given endless audacity, such confidence\n\nAppear highly convincing. He\u2019s acting out a farce, like that\n\nFugitive jester in Catullus\u2019s witty mime, while you, wretched\n\nFool are roaring, loudly enough, it would seem, to out-do Stentor,\n\nJust as Mars roars in Homer\u2019s Iliad<\/em>: \u2018Jupiter, can you hear all this,\n\nYet not utter a word: surely you must speak out, though your lips\n\nBe made of marble or bronze? Why else do we unwrap the incense\n\nSo piously, or the sliced calf\u2019s liver, or the pieces of white pork-fat\n\nTo add to the glowing coals? As far as I can see there\u2019s not a jot of\n\nDifference between your statue and one of big-mouthed Vagellius.\u2019\n\n\u00a0\n\nSatXIII:120-173 Your Loss Is Nothing New\n\n\u00a0\n\nAlternatively, accept this solace, worthy of being offered even\n\nBy one who\u2019s not read the Cynics; or the dogmas of the Stoics,\n\nDistinguishable from the Cynics by their shirts; or delighted\n\nWith Epicurus, happy with the plants in his miniscule garden.\n\nDifficult illnesses should be cared for by the greatest of doctors:\n\nBut even one of Philippus\u2019 students would do to take your pulse.\n\nIf there\u2019s no more detestable crime you can point to in the whole\n\nOf the world than this, I\u2019ll be silent, I won\u2019t stop you beating\n\nYour chest with your fists, or smacking your face with the flat\n\nOf your hand. After all, after a loss you close the doors; cash\n\nIs mourned, throughout the house, with a louder moaning and\n\nWailing than a death; no one feigns grief in such a matter, or\n\nRemains content with merely ripping the hems of his clothes,\n\nOr simply making his eyes sore with his simulated weeping;\n\nWhen it\u2019s money that\u2019s gone astray we grieve with real tears.\n\nHowever, if every court you see is full of similar complaints,\n\nIf when a document\u2019s been pored over ten times by the other\n\nParty, the signature is later declared false, and the whole thing\n\nWorthless, condemned by one\u2019s very handwriting, one\u2019s seal,\n\nThat prince of sardonyx stones, kept secure in an ivory chest,\n\nWhy do you, O precious creature, think your case should be\n\nJudged extraordinary? What? Are you the child of a white hen,\n\nWhile we are common chicks hatched from misfortune\u2019s eggs?\n\nIt\u2019s a minor thing you\u2019ve experienced, it calls for modest anger,\n\nOne you\u2019ve cast your eyes on more serious crimes. Compare\n\nThe hired thief, or the deliberate fire that\u2019s started with matches,\n\nThe front door revealing the first effect of the flames; Compare\n\nThose who steal huge venerable rusted chalices from the ancient\n\nTemples, given us by nations, or crowns once dedicated by kings;\n\nIf those valuables are lacking, some lesser vandal appears who\u2019ll\n\nSacrilegiously scrape the gold from Hercules\u2019 thigh or Neptune\u2019s\n\nFace, or go stripping the thin gold leaf from the statue of Castor;\n\nCompare the manufacturers and dealers in poison, the parricide\n\nWho deserves to be thrown in the sea in an ox-skin, along with\n\nThe ill-fated ape, an innocent, but nevertheless sewn in as well.\n\nThat\u2019s but a part of the wickedness Gallicus, Prefect of the City,\n\nHears all day, from the morning star\u2019s setting to that of the sun!\n\nA single courtroom is sufficient if you want to understand the\n\nBehaviour of humankind; spend a few days there, then dare to\n\nCall yourself unfortunate, once you\u2019re far away from the place.\n\nWhat\u2019s so surprising about goitre in the Alps, or about a breast\n\nIn Meroe, beside the Ethiopian Nile, bigger than its fat baby?\n\nWho gapes now at those blue-eyed Germans with their yellow\n\nHair, with their greasy curls all twisted into their pointed braids?\n\nImagine a Pygmy warrior in miniature armour who suddenly\n\nRuns towards a raucous cloud of Thracian birds and is grabbed\n\nBy a savage crane in an instant, and carried off through the air\n\nIn its curved beak, no match for his enemy. If you saw that here,\n\nAmong the crowd, then you might shake with laughter; but there,\n\nWhere the whole army\u2019s no more than a foot tall, no one laughs.\n\n\u00a0\n\nSatXIII:174-249 Forget About Revenge\n\n\u00a0\n\n\u2018Is the perjurer to suffer no punishment then for his irreligious\n\nFraud?\u2019 Well imagine he\u2019d been dragged away in the heaviest\n\nOf chains, and executed at once based on your judgement (what\n\nMore could you want?); nevertheless your loss remains, that\n\nMoney of yours will never be returned, but the blood that has\n\nBeen shed from the headless corpse will grant invidious solace.\n\n\u2018Yet vengeance is fine, it\u2019s more gratifying than life itself!\u2019\n\nSo the uneducated claim, whose tempers you see flaring for\n\nThe slightest reason, sometimes for no earthly reason at all.\n\nThat\u2019s not what Chrysippus the Stoic says, nor the gentle mind\n\nOf Thales, or old Socrates who lived below sweet Hymettus,\n\nHe who would never have inflicted on his accusers one drop\n\nOf the hemlock he was obliged to drink, in his cruel prison.\n\nIndeed vengeance is always a delight to the weak and petty\n\nAnd small-minded. You can see that straight away, since\n\nNo one enjoys vengeance more than a woman. Yet why\n\nBelieve the guilty have escaped, when conscience dwells on\n\nTheir vile deeds, terrifies them, strikes with its silent whip,\n\nWielding its invisible lash, there, in the tortured mind?\n\nA fierce punishment it is indeed, to bear in your breast that\n\nHostile witness, night and day, a punishment more savage\n\nThan anything Rhadamanthus, or stern Caedicius contrived.\n\nThe Pythian prophetess told a Spartan, who asked about\n\nHis keeping money entrusted to him, retaining it legally\n\nBy swearing a false oath, that he\u2019d not go unpunished.\n\nHe had truly wished to know Apollo\u2019s thoughts on the\n\nMatter, and whether the god would sanction the crime!\n\nHe returned the money, through fear, not principle, yet\n\nEvery word from the shrine was true and worthy of that\n\nTemple, as was witnessed by his death, and those of his\n\nChildren, his household, and kin however far removed.\n\nSuch was the punishment suffered solely for thinking of\n\nDoing wrong. Since, he who merely contemplates some\n\nSecret wickedness in his mind, incurs the same guilt\n\nAs if he had done the deed. Think, if he really does it!\n\nPerpetual anxiety is his, which even affects his eating,\n\nHis throat parched as in sickness, and the stubborn\n\nFood sticking in his gullet. The wretched man spits\n\nOut his Setian wine, and the choicest ageing Alban\n\nVintages displease; offer him finest Falernian; as if\n\nIt were sour, dense wrinkles will furrow his brow.\n\nAt night perhaps his conscience allows him a brief\n\nRespite; after tossing all over the bed, his limbs lie\n\nQuiet; when at once he\u2019ll see the temple, the altar\n\nHe\u2019s insulted and you, his victim, in dream, a sight\n\nTo make him sweat profoundly; your image, ghostly,\n\nLarger than life, scaring him, driving him to confess.\n\nSuch are men who turn pale and quake at every flash\n\nOf lightning, who faint at the first rumble of thunder\n\nIn the sky, as if the fire falls to earth not by chance or\n\nThe tempest\u2019s frenzy, but in anger, as if in judgement.\n\nIf they\u2019re unharmed, they dread the next thunderstorm\n\nWith greater anxiety, as if the lull were a postponement.\n\nMoreover if they once start to feel feverish, sharp pains\n\nIn the side keeping them awake, they believe their bodily\n\nAfflictions sent by a higher power: and consider them\n\nThe gods\u2019 spears and missiles. They don\u2019t dare pledge\n\nA bleating beast to the little shrine or promise the Lares\n\nA cockerel\u2019s crest; what respite from illness can the guilty\n\nHope for? What sacrificial victim isn\u2019t worthier of life?\n\nThey\u2019re full of resolution when they commit the crime;\n\nOnly after the evil\u2019s done do they begin to acquire a sense\n\nOf right and wrong. Yet their nature, fixed and incapable\n\nOf change, will still return to the paths it has condemned.\n\nWho ever set a limit to their own sins? When does a blush\n\nOf shame, once banished, reappear on some hardened brow?\n\nWho have you ever seen who remains content with but one\n\nOffence? Your miscreant will set his foot in the snare, he\u2019ll\n\nSuffer the hook in some dark prison, or he\u2019ll join a crowd of\n\nNotorious exiles, on some rugged rock in the Aegean Sea.\n\nYou\u2019ll revel in the bitter punishment meted out to the one\n\nYou hate, and eventually you\u2019ll cheerfully admit the gods\n\nAre not as dull-witted as Claudius, nor as blind as Tiresias.\n\n\u00a0\nSatire XIV: Bad Parenting<\/strong> \u00a0 SatXIV:1-58 Try Setting A Good Example\n\n\u00a0\n\nThere is much, Fuscinus, that\u2019s displayed, and passed on,\n\nTo children by their parents, which merits condemnation,\n\nAnd tarnishes the brightness of things with its lasting stain.\n\nIf the old man ruins himself gambling, his heir while still\n\nA child plays too, his little cup armed with the same dice.\n\nNor can his relatives expect much from some young man,\n\nIf, taught by his wastrel father\u2019s long-practised gluttony,\n\nHe\u2019s learnt how to peel truffles, marinade mushrooms,\n\nAnd drown fig-peckers, beccaficos<\/em>, in the right manner,\n\nAs they swim in the resulting sauce. You may flank him\n\nWith a thousand bearded tutors to left and right, but such\n\nA lad when his seventh year is past, or even before he\n\nHas all his new teeth, will always wish to dine in lavish\n\nStyle, nor fall short of the highest standard of cuisine.\n\nWhat effect will a man have on his son, if he delights in\n\nThe clank of chains, thrilled by branding, convicts, gaols?\n\nIs Rutilus, when he enjoys the savage sound of a flogging,\n\nAnd thinks the lash sings sweeter than any Siren; when\n\nHe\u2019s a Polyphemus, an Antiphates, to his fearful home,\n\nOnly happy, if the torturer\u2019s been called, and someone\u2019s\n\nFeeling the hot iron, for a pair of towels; is he teaching\n\nMildness of spirit; or how to rise above minor errors;\n\nOr that he recognises the minds and bodies of slaves\n\nAre of the same substance, the same elements as ours?\n\nIn your naivety do you expect Larga\u2019s daughter not to\n\nCommit adultery, she who couldn\u2019t name her mother\u2019s\n\nLovers quickly enough, at such speed, that she wouldn\u2019t\n\nNeed thirty breaths to do it? She was mother\u2019s accomplice\n\nWhen a child, now she drafts billet-doux<\/em> at her dictation,\n\nAnd sends them via the same sodomites to her own lover.\n\nIt\u2019s nature\u2019s law: bad examples at home corrupt us sooner\n\nAnd more swiftly, because they lodge in our minds with\n\nGreater authority. Some young man or other perhaps may\n\nResist this influence, if Prometheus has fashioned his heart\n\nWith generous skill, forming it from some superior clay,\n\nThe rest, long-exposed to the old sinful round, are dragged\n\nAlong in their father\u2019s footsteps, on that path to be shunned.\n\nSo refrain, lest those born of us should imitate our crimes,\n\nThe reality is that all of us can be taught to copy behaviour\n\nThat is shameful and perverse; some Catiline will conspire,\n\nIn every nation, you\u2019ll find those opposed to freedom under\n\nEvery sky, but no Brutus, no Cato, his uncle, to defend it.\n\nLet no foul sights or language touch a father\u2019s threshold.\n\nKeep far off, far away, you girls the pimps supply, those\n\nSongs too sung by the parasite who parties all night long.\n\nA child deserves the utmost respect. So if you\u2019re planning\n\nOn something vile, have some regard for his tender years,\n\nAnd your little son may deter you from doing wrong.\n\nIf later on he does something to stir the censor\u2019s wrath,\n\nIf he proves himself like you not only in form and looks\n\nBut your true son in his behaviour too, sinning more\n\nProfoundly, while following closely in your footsteps,\n\nNo doubt you\u2019ll castigate him, attack with bitter words,\n\nAnd after that choose to make an alteration to your will.\n\nBut where\u2019s the justification for such stern parental looks,\n\nSuch outspokenness? Despite your age, you\u2019ve done worse,\n\nYour forehead, empty of brains, in need of a cupping glass.\n\n\u00a0\n\nSatXIV:59-106 Think of Your Children\u2019s Well-Being\n\n\u00a0\n\nThere\u2019s no rest for your household when a guest\u2019s expected.\n\n\u2018Sweep the marble floor, rub the columns till they shine,\n\nBrush away that dead spider up there, and all its web;\n\nYou, wipe the plain silver, and you, the ornate vases.\u2019\n\nThe master\u2019s voice rages, as he stands there holding his rod.\n\nYou\u2019re anxious and wretched, lest your friend should arrive\n\nAnd be offended by the sight of a foul dog-mess in the hall,\n\nOr a portico splashed with mud, though a little slave-boy,\n\nWith half a bucket of sawdust, can soon put that to rights,\n\nYet you make no effort to ensure your son is witness to\n\nA home that\u2019s pure, and without a flaw, beyond reproach!\n\nIt\u2019s fine to produce one more citizen for people and country,\n\nSo long as he\u2019s an asset to that country, capable of farming,\n\nCapable of achieving something, in peace and war alike.\n\nWhat matters most are the virtues you instil, the morality\n\nYou teach him. The stork feeds its young on lizards and\n\nSnakes, it finds in the wild: and once they acquire wings\n\nThe chicks will seek out those same creatures themselves.\n\nThe vulture flies to its young bringing pieces of carrion,\n\nMorsels from dead cattle or dogs, or from crucifixions:\n\nSo that\u2019s a vulture\u2019s food when full-grown it feeds itself,\n\nWhen it\u2019s already building its own nest high in some tree.\n\nWhile the noble eagle that\u2019s Jove\u2019s companion hunts for\n\nDeer and hare in the glades, and carry the prey from there\n\nTo its eyrie: and when its offspring too reach maturity\n\nAnd leave the nest, hunger prompts them to swoop on\n\nThe prey they tasted first after breaking free of the egg.\n\nCaetronius loved building, and would raise the roofs of\n\nHis villas high along Caieta\u2019s curving shore, or the far\n\nSlopes of Tivoli, or alternatively the hills of Praeneste,\n\nOutdoing the Temples of Fortune and Hercules, with his\n\nMarble transported from Greece or more distant places,\n\nJust as Posides, Claudius\u2019 eunuch, tried to top the Capitol.\n\nWith such edifices. In that way, Caetronius shrank his\n\nAssets, frittered away his fortune, and yet there was still\n\nPlenty left. All of that his son too foolishly squandered,\n\nIn constructing newer villas, out of even rarer marble.\n\nThen there are those that, blessed with a father who\n\nReveres the Sabbath, worship only the clouds in the sky\n\nAnd its spirit, who draw no distinction between the pork\n\nFrom which their father had to abstain, and human flesh,\n\nAnd who swiftly rid themselves of even their foreskins.\n\nIt\u2019s their custom to ignore the laws of Rome, the Judaic\n\nCode being that which they study, adhere to, and revere;\n\nThe Pentateuch, the mystic scroll handed down by Moses:\n\nNor do they reveal the way to anyone but a fellow-believer;\n\nLeading only the circumcised, when asked, to the fountain.\n\nIt\u2019s the father that\u2019s to blame, treating every seventh day\n\nAs a day of idleness, separate from the rest of daily life.\n\n\u00a0\n\nSatXIV:107-188 The Avaricious Are The Worst\n\n\u00a0\n\nOur other vices, though, the young imitate by choice, it\u2019s\n\nAvarice that they\u2019re commanded to indulge in regardless.\n\nIt\u2019s indeed a deceptive vice, with the form and pretence\n\nOf virtue, with its dour character, severe look and dress.\n\nThe avaricious, indeed, are praised as if for their frugality,\n\nEconomical people who keep a firmer hold of their wealth\n\nThan if their fortune were guarded by that dragon of the\n\nHesperides, or the one in Colchis. Added to which, people\n\nConsider that those of whom I speak are famously skilful\n\nIn acquisition; those, indeed, who forge larger inheritances\n\nFrom their ever-glowing furnace, on their assiduous anvils.\n\nWhoever admires wealth, and considers that no one who\u2019s\n\nPoor could ever be happy, will exhort his sons to start out\n\nAlong that road, and devote themselves to that same sect.\n\nThere are various elements to the vice: he\u2019ll imbue them\n\nWith these from the start, force them to practise every last\n\nStinginess; soon he\u2019ll teach them insatiable desire for gain.\n\nHe\u2019ll punish his slaves\u2019 bellies with inadequate provisions,\n\nAnd starve himself; indeed he can\u2019t even bring himself to\n\nConsume those last blue-green slices of his mouldy bread;\n\nAs early as mid-September he\u2019ll take to storing a portion\n\nOf yesterday\u2019s mincemeat; and in summer he\u2019ll set aside\n\nHis beans for another meal, sealed up with a little piece\n\nOf dried mackerel, or half a rotting catfish; and he\u2019ll count\n\nThe sections of chopped leek before putting them away.\n\nA beggar from under a bridge would refuse his invitation.\n\nYet why go through such torment just to heap up wealth,\n\nShow your patent obsession, with such manifest lunacy,\n\nAnd live the life of the poor, simply in order to die rich?\n\nMeanwhile, with your purse\u2019s swollen mouth bulging,\n\nYour desire for cash will grow as your money grows,\n\nYou\u2019ll buy another villa, one rural estate\u2019s not enough;\n\nYou\u2019ll love extending the boundary, and the neighbour\u2019s\n\nCornfield seems bigger and better; you\u2019ll buy it, and the\n\nVineyards, and the hill-slope pale with its mass of olives.\n\nIf the owner won\u2019t accept a single offer you make, well\n\nThen, you\u2019ll drive lean bullocks and starving mules with\n\nNecks weary from the yoke, into his green corn at night,\n\nAnd they won\u2019t return to their yard till the whole of his\n\nNew crop, as if scythed, has filled their empty bellies.\n\nYou can scarcely count the number of people who make\n\nComplaints of this kind, how many ravaged fields are sold,\n\nBut what of the gossip, and the blaring noise of scandal?\n\n\u2018Where\u2019s the harm,\u2019 men say, \u2018lupin seed for me, rather\n\nThan have the neighbours all around singing my praises,\n\nWhile I reap a handful of grain from a miniscule estate.\u2019\n\nThat will spare you from disease and infirmity I suppose,\n\nYou\u2019ll be free of anxiety and care, will you; granted a long\n\nLife, and better luck, from the very moment you acquire\n\nSole possession of a tract of agricultural land as large as\n\nThat ploughed by the Roman people, under King Tatius!\n\nLater yet, when, broken by age, fights with fierce Pyrrhus,\n\nOr the Molossian blades, the veterans of the Punic Wars,\n\nWere granted a bare couple of acres for their many wounds,\n\nNone of them thought that return for their blood and toil,\n\nWas less than they deserved, nor the country ungrateful\n\nOr short on loyalty. Those few clods of earth satisfied\n\nThe father himself and his crowded cottage, his pregnant\n\nWife lying there, four children playing about, one child\n\nA slave\u2019s and three of his own; as long as an ample meal,\n\nLarge pots of steaming porridge, awaited their big brothers,\n\nWhen they would return home, from the ditch or furrow.\n\nNowadays that patch of ground\u2019s insufficient for a garden.\n\nGreed is usually the root of crime: no fault of the human\n\nMind causes more poison to be mixed, or a more frequent\n\nRampaging about with a blade than the uncontrolled desire\n\nFor extravagant wealth. For the man who wants to be rich,\n\nWants to be rich now; but what reverence for the law, what\n\nFear or shame can you expect from a greedy man in a hurry?\n\n\u2018Rest content with your huts in the hills, lads,\u2019 is what some\n\nAged sire of the Hercini, Vestini, or Marsi would say long\n\nAgo, \u2018Let\u2019s seek bread enough for our table, from the plough:\n\nThat\u2019s what our divinities approve of, our gods of the fields,\n\nThrough whose power and assistance, after the welcome gift\n\nOf ears of corn, men lost their taste for the fruit of the ancient\n\nOak. They have no wish to do what is forbidden, who feel no\n\nShame in wearing great rawhide boots in the frost, or skins\n\nReversed against the east wind: this new and foreign purple\n\nCloth, of every kind, is what leads to wickedness and crime.\u2019\n\n\u00a0\n\nSatXIV:189-255 Your Children Will Outdo You\n\n\u00a0\n\nThose were the precepts old men taught the young; but now\n\nOnce autumn\u2019s done, the father wakes his slumbering son\n\nIn the middle of the night, shouting: \u2018Grab your wax tablets,\n\nBoy, scribble, stay awake, prepare your cases, study the civil\n\nLaws of our ancestors, or seek the centurion\u2019s swagger stick,\n\nMake sure, the commander Laelius notes your uncombed head,\n\nYour hairy nostrils, and admires the breadth of your shoulders;\n\nDemolish the huts of the Moors, and the forts of the Brigantes,\n\nSo your sixtieth year might bring you the Eagle that makes you\n\nWealthy; or if you shrink from enduring the long labour of a\n\nMilitary career, if the sound of cornets and trumpets loosen\n\nYour anxious bowels, buy what you can sell for half again,\n\nAnd don\u2019t let yourself become fastidious about those goods\n\nThat have to be stored on the right bank of the Tiber, or\n\nThink to start drawing a distinction between perfumes\n\nAnd hides: profit always smells fine whatever its source.\n\nAlways remember to keep these words on your lips: fit\n\nFor the gods, fit even for Jove himself were he a poet:\n\n\u201cNo one will ask how you made it, but make it you must.\u201d\u2019\n\nHere\u2019s what I\u2019d like to say to any father threatening to give\n\nSuch advice: \u2018Tell me, O mindless fool, who asked you to\n\nHasten the process? I\u2019ll answer for the pupil bettering his\n\nTeacher. Relax, don\u2019t worry: you\u2019ll be outdone as surely\n\nAs Telamon outdid Ajax, or as Achilles exceeded Peleus.\n\nThe young need a gentle touch; the evils of adult sinfulness\n\nHave not yet pierced their marrow. Soon enough, when your\n\nSon\u2019s started shaving, taken the razor\u2019s curved edge to his\n\nBeard, he\u2019ll bear false witness, he\u2019ll perjure himself for a\n\nHandful of coins, though clasping the foot of Ceres\u2019 altar.\n\nIf his wife, you daughter-in-law, crosses your threshold\n\nWith a dowry: it\u2019s fatal: consider her dead and buried.\n\nShe\u2019ll be strangled in her sleep! He\u2019ll find a quicker path\n\nTo the possessions you seek to acquire on land and sea;\n\nMajor crime after all takes little effort. \u2018I never taught him\n\nThat,\u2019 you\u2019ll say, then, \u2018I never told him to behave that way!\u2019\n\nYet the reason for his wicked thoughts, their source, is you.\n\nFor anyone who has taught his children love of vast wealth,\n\nAnd produced avaricious sons by giving them foolish advice\n\nHas granted them full licence, wholly abandoned the reins\n\nOf the chariot; call it back if you will, there\u2019s no stopping it,\n\nScorning you in its flight, it leaves the turning posts behind.\n\nNo one believes in offending only to the extent permitted:\n\nThey\u2019ll allow themselves a great deal more leeway than that.\n\nWhen you tell your son the man\u2019s a fool, who gives presents\n\nTo a friend, or helps a poor relation and sets him on his feet,\n\nYou\u2019re teaching him to rob, to cheat, to pursue wealth by\n\nEvery form of crime. Your love of cash is as great as the\n\nHeartfelt love of the Decii for their country, or, if Greece\n\nSpeaks true, Menoeceus\u2019 devotion to his city of Thebes.\n\nSo you\u2019ll see that fire, whose sparks you yourself kindled,\n\nBurning far and wide, and razing everything in its wake.\n\nYou\u2019ll be spared no wretchedness. The cub you\u2019ve reared,\n\nA roaring lion in a cage, will destroy its trembling teacher.\n\nHis astrologer has read your horoscope, but it\u2019s a bore to\n\nAwait the spindle\u2019s slow unwinding: you\u2019ll die before the\n\nThread is broken. You\u2019re already in the way, thwarting his\n\nWishes, already your long stag-like old age torments him.\n\nFind that doctor, Archigenes, straight away, and buy one\n\nOf King Mithridates\u2019 antidotes, if you\u2019d still seek to enjoy\n\nAnother fig, to cull a few more roses. You\u2019ll need the drug\n\nFathers, as well as kings, had best swallow before they eat.\n\n\u00a0\n\nSatXIV:256-302 The Risks You Take\n\n\u00a0\n\nIt\u2019s a famous show I\u2019m giving, whose equal you\u2019ll not see\n\nOn any stage, any platform of our distinguished praetor\u2019s,\n\nJust take a look at how people risk their lives to swell their\n\nFortunes, for a huge bag of gold in their brass-bound chest,\n\nFor the money deposited in Castor\u2019s Temple, under guard,\n\nEver since Mars the Avenger lost his helmet, and failed to\n\nKeep tight hold of his assets. So forget holiday theatricals,\n\nCybele\u2019s Ludi Megalenses<\/em>,\u00a0 the Cerealia<\/em>, and the Florialia<\/em>:\n\nHuman affairs are bound to offer us far more entertainment.\n\nWhat delights the mind more? Bodies hurled through the air,\n\nBy some acrobat, who\u2019s an expert in walking the tightrope,\n\nOr you, who haunt the deck of that Cilician ketch you\u2019re\n\nStuck with, forever tossed by the northerlies and southerlies,\n\nA cheap and desperate trader in smelly sacks, so thrilled to\n\nImport sweet raisin-wine from the shores of Jupiter\u2019s ancient\n\nCrete, along with the wine-jars, his compatriots? Yet he who\n\nPlants his feet on the tightrope with wavering step, garners\n\nHimself a living from that occupation, in order to keep off\n\nThe hunger and cold: while you take foolish risks, merely\n\nFor a thousand talents and a hundred villas. Look at the sea\n\nAnd the harbours full of great vessels: most of the human\n\nRace is ocean-bound. Fleets will go wherever the hope of\n\nProfit summons them, not merely crossing from Crete to\n\nRhodes, but sailing North African waters, leaving Gibraltar\n\nFar behind, hearing the setting sun hiss in the western deeps.\n\nAnd the great prize for your efforts, having seen the Ocean\n\nMonsters, and the children of the waves, is to return home\n\nAgain with a full purse, proud of your swollen bags of loot.\n\nMore than one kind of madness hounds men\u2019s minds. Orestes,\n\nClasping his sister, was terrified by the Furies\u2019 fires and faces,\n\nAjax attacking a bullock thinks it is Agamemnon bellowing\n\nOr Odysseus. The man who loads his ship to the gunwales\n\nWith goods, with only a plank between him and the waves,\n\nMay forgo his tunic or cloak, but surely needs a minder,\n\nIf the only reason for all that risk and effort, is a pile of\n\nClipped silver coins, with their legends and tiny portraits.\n\nClouds lower, the thunder rumbles, still: \u2018Cast off,\u2019 he cries,\n\nThe owner of that load of grain and pepper just purchased,\n\n\u2018They\u2019re no threat, the darkened sky, those black streaks of\n\nCloud; it\u2019s summer lightning.\u2019 Unhappy man, this very night\n\nPerhaps, he\u2019ll go overboard, the timbers shattered, whelmed\n\nAnd engulfed by the waves, his belt clasped in his left hand\n\nOr teeth. And he for whose dreams all the gold whirled down\n\nBy the Tagus, or the Pactolus in its reddened sand, would\n\nNot suffice, must now, a shipwrecked wretch, be satisfied\n\nWith a handful of rags to cover his freezing flanks, a few\n\nScraps of food, and the pennies he can beg as a survivor;\n\nHolding a daub of the wreck, maintaining himself by alms.\n\n\u00a0\n\nSatXIV:303-331 It\u2019s Never Enough\n\n\u00a0\n\nWhat\u2019s acquired with so much effort is kept safe with even\n\nMore care and anxiety: guarding great wealth\u2019s a sad affair.\n\nLicinus, the millionaire, sets out his fire-buckets, commands\n\nHis team of slaves to keep watch all night, terrified for his\n\nAmber, and his statues, pillars of Phrygian marble, ivory,\n\nAnd tortoiseshell plaques. The pot Diogenes, the naked Cynic\n\nSlept in never caught fire; break it, it was still there tomorrow,\n\nPatched with lead, or another shelter would appear. Viewing\n\nThat earthenware jar with its inhabitant, Alexander saw how\n\nMuch happier the great philosopher was, lacking desires,\n\nThan he who claimed the whole world for his own, fated\n\nTo suffer dangers as great as his victories would prove.\n\nIf all were wise you\u2019d have no power, Fortune: it is we, we\n\nWho make you a goddess. Yet if you were to ask for my\n\nAdvice, I\u2019d tell you what measure of wealth suffices, just\n\nAs much as you need to stave off hunger, thirst and cold,\n\nAs much as you needed, Epicurus, in your little garden,\n\nAs much as Socrates kept in his house, in ancient times;\n\nNature says nothing different, wisdom nothing different.\n\nDoes it seem I\u2019m constraining you to follow only those\n\nFine examples? Then, add something from our Roman\n\nTradition, settle for what Otho\u2019s laws ordained as needed,\n\nTo join the fourteen rows of knights, or if that still makes\n\nYou frown, triple it, and make it twelve thousand in gold.\n\nIf by doing that I\u2019ve still not filled your lap, if you want\n\nMore, not the riches of Croesus, nor the Persian lands,\n\nCould ever satisfy your desire, nor the wealth of Narcissus,\n\nThat freedman to whom Claudius granted all, and whose\n\nOrders he obeyed, in executing his empress, Messalina.","rendered":"

Satire XIII: Mock Consolation<\/strong> \u00a0 SatXIII:1-70 Why So Surprised, Calvinus?<\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/p>\n

Setting a bad example won\u2019t make the perpetrator feel pleased.<\/p>\n

That\u2019s the first manner in which life takes its revenge, that no<\/p>\n

One who\u2019s guilty absolves themselves, in their own judgement,<\/p>\n

Though he be a praetor who\u2019s corrupt influence rigged a vote.<\/p>\n

So why should anyone be surprised, Calvinus, at recent events,<\/p>\n

The wicked crime, a matter of trust betrayed? It\u2019s not as though<\/p>\n

You\u2019re a person of such slender means the weight of this modest<\/p>\n

Loss will sink you, nor is your experience something that\u2019s rarely<\/p>\n

Known: it\u2019s the kind of bad luck familiar to many a person, banal<\/p>\n

These days, a card that\u2019s plucked from fortune\u2019s outspread hand.<\/p>\n

Put an end to your excessive grief. One\u2019s indignation should not<\/p>\n

Burn more fiercely than fitting, nor be greater than one\u2019s injury;<\/p>\n

Yet you can scarcely endure the slightest, the least, the tiniest<\/p>\n

Particle of hurt, you\u2019re all in a blaze, with your innards seething,<\/p>\n

Because your friend won\u2019t return that sacred sum of money you<\/p>\n

Entrusted to him. Why should that surprise someone with sixty<\/p>\n

Years behind him, a man who was born in Fonteius\u2019 consulship?<\/p>\n

Have you gained not an ounce of profit from all your experience?<\/p>\n

Surely those precepts are fine which the sacred books of wisdom<\/p>\n

Offer; the wisdom to overcome fate, and yet we also consider<\/p>\n

Those people fortunate, who have learned from life\u2019s teachings<\/p>\n

To endure unpleasant things, and to bow and not resist the yoke.<\/p>\n

What day is so full of good luck it fails to produce theft, fraud,<\/p>\n

And betrayal, and the benefits gained by other sorts of crime,<\/p>\n

The wealth that\u2019s gained through the sword or the poison chest?<\/p>\n

The good are rare: count them, there are scarcely as many as<\/p>\n

There were gates to Thebes, or mouths draining the rich Nile.<\/p>\n

It\u2019s the ninth century of Rome now, an era even worse than<\/p>\n

The age of iron, and Nature herself can find no name for its<\/p>\n

Wickedness, she has no baser metal left to provide a label.<\/p>\n

What\u2019s the point of invoking the aid of men and gods, with<\/p>\n

The clamour Faesidius\u2019 noisy crew makes, cheering him on,<\/p>\n

For a handout? Say, old man, for whom a lad\u2019s gold charm\u2019s<\/p>\n

More fitting, don\u2019t you know the lure of other people\u2019s cash?<\/p>\n

Don\u2019t you know how your simplicity moves the crowd to<\/p>\n

Laughter, when you demand no one perjure himself, when<\/p>\n

You seek divinity in lofty temples, on blood-stained altars?<\/p>\n

The natives once lived that way, until Saturn was forced to<\/p>\n

Forsake his crown, and grabbed the rustic sickle as he fled;<\/p>\n

Back then, when Juno was but a child, and Jupiter lived as<\/p>\n

A private individual in the caverns of Cretan Mount Ida;<\/p>\n

There were no heavenly banquets then above the clouds<\/p>\n

No Ganymede, no Hebe, Hercules\u2019 wife, as cupbearers,<\/p>\n

No Vulcan, once the nectar was poured, wiping his arms,<\/p>\n

Black with soot from his Liparean forge and workshop.<\/p>\n

Each god dined alone, nor was there the crowd of gods<\/p>\n

That exists today; the heavens being content with only<\/p>\n

A handful of deities, and weighing more lightly on Atlas\u2019<\/p>\n

Shoulders; grim Pluto had not yet drawn his lot, winning<\/p>\n

His kingdom in the depths, wedding Sicilian Proserpine;<\/p>\n

No Ixion\u2019s wheel, no Furies, no Sisyphean rock, or dark<\/p>\n

Vultures for Tityos; just happy shades, no infernal rulers.<\/p>\n

In that age wickedness was greeted with astonishment.<\/p>\n

They thought it a primal sin, one punishable by death,<\/p>\n

If a young man refused to defend his elders, or a boy<\/p>\n

To defend anyone with a beard, even if his own home<\/p>\n

Did possess more berries, or a larger heap of acorns;<\/p>\n

So revered was even four years seniority, and the first<\/p>\n

Signs of a beard were the equivalent of sacred old age.<\/p>\n

These days if a friend fails to renege on your agreement,<\/p>\n

And returns your purse to you with all its rusting metal,<\/p>\n

It\u2019s a marvel of fidelity, a portent fit for the prophetic<\/p>\n

Etruscan books, or the sacrifice of a garlanded lamb.<\/p>\n

If I come across an outstandingly honest man, I rank<\/p>\n

It with some monstrous embryo, or a fish turned up,<\/p>\n

Amazingly, by the plough, or a pregnant mule; as<\/p>\n

Stunned as if it rained stones, or as if a hive of bees<\/p>\n

Had swarmed in a great cluster on the roof of a shrine,<\/p>\n

Or as if a swift-flowing eddying river of milk, with its<\/p>\n

Whirling vortices, had rushed precipitously to the sea.<\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/p>\n

SatXIII:71-119 How They Seek To Justify Themselves!<\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/p>\n

You complain about a hundred gold pieces gone astray,<\/p>\n

In his sacrilegious act of fraud? Why not that secret hoard<\/p>\n

Of two thousand lost thus by another, or yet another\u2019s still<\/p>\n

Greater sum, that an angle of his vast treasury scarce holds?<\/p>\n

It\u2019s so simple, and easy, to ignore those divine witnesses,<\/p>\n

If there\u2019s no mortal in the know. See how loud he is in his<\/p>\n

Denials, and the self-possession displayed on his lying face.<\/p>\n

He swears by the sun\u2019s rays and the Tarpeian lightning bolt,<\/p>\n

And Mars\u2019 lance and the arrows of Apollo, Cirrha\u2019s prophet,<\/p>\n

And by the shafts and quiver of Diana, the virgin huntress,<\/p>\n

And by your trident Neptune, father of the Aegean, and he\u2019ll<\/p>\n

Add Hercules\u2019 bow, and Minerva\u2019s spear, for good measure,<\/p>\n

Whatever weapons happen to exist in the heavenly armoury.<\/p>\n

And if indeed, he\u2019s a father, he\u2019ll say, with a tear: \u2018Or may I<\/p>\n

Devour my son\u2019s brain boiled, doused with Egyptian vinegar!\u2019<\/p>\n

There are those who attribute everything to acts of fortune,<\/p>\n

Who believe that the world goes on its way without guidance,<\/p>\n

And that nature brings on the succession of days and years;<\/p>\n

Who will therefore touch any altar you like without concern,<\/p>\n

Others believe the gods exist, yet still commit perjury, saying<\/p>\n

To themselves; \u2018Isis may choose to do what she wishes with<\/p>\n

My body; let her strike me blind with an angry shake of her<\/p>\n

Rattle, so long as, sightless, I keep the cash I\u2019ll deny receiving.<\/p>\n

Lung disease, or festering abscesses, or even the loss of a leg<\/p>\n

Are worth it. Though Ladas, the runner, were poor, he should<\/p>\n

Still have no hesitation, unless he\u2019s mad or dying, in praying<\/p>\n

For the rich man\u2019s gout; for what does the glory of swiftness<\/p>\n

Bring after all, or thirsting for that wreath of Olympian olive?<\/p>\n

Though the gods\u2019 anger is great, it\u2019s slow indeed to take effect.<\/p>\n

How long might it take before they trouble me? I may even<\/p>\n

Find the powers that be are indulgent; ready to forgive all this.<\/p>\n

The same crimes are committed but with very different results:<\/p>\n

One man\u2019s prize for his sins is crucifixion, another\u2019s is a crown.\u2019<\/p>\n

His heart trembling in terror at his vile trespass, this is how he<\/p>\n

Calms himself. When you summon him to the sacred shrine,<\/p>\n

He\u2019s ahead of you, drags you there, ready to vex you further;<\/p>\n

When the cause is ill, given endless audacity, such confidence<\/p>\n

Appear highly convincing. He\u2019s acting out a farce, like that<\/p>\n

Fugitive jester in Catullus\u2019s witty mime, while you, wretched<\/p>\n

Fool are roaring, loudly enough, it would seem, to out-do Stentor,<\/p>\n

Just as Mars roars in Homer\u2019s Iliad<\/em>: \u2018Jupiter, can you hear all this,<\/p>\n

Yet not utter a word: surely you must speak out, though your lips<\/p>\n

Be made of marble or bronze? Why else do we unwrap the incense<\/p>\n

So piously, or the sliced calf\u2019s liver, or the pieces of white pork-fat<\/p>\n

To add to the glowing coals? As far as I can see there\u2019s not a jot of<\/p>\n

Difference between your statue and one of big-mouthed Vagellius.\u2019<\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/p>\n

SatXIII:120-173 Your Loss Is Nothing New<\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/p>\n

Alternatively, accept this solace, worthy of being offered even<\/p>\n

By one who\u2019s not read the Cynics; or the dogmas of the Stoics,<\/p>\n

Distinguishable from the Cynics by their shirts; or delighted<\/p>\n

With Epicurus, happy with the plants in his miniscule garden.<\/p>\n

Difficult illnesses should be cared for by the greatest of doctors:<\/p>\n

But even one of Philippus\u2019 students would do to take your pulse.<\/p>\n

If there\u2019s no more detestable crime you can point to in the whole<\/p>\n

Of the world than this, I\u2019ll be silent, I won\u2019t stop you beating<\/p>\n

Your chest with your fists, or smacking your face with the flat<\/p>\n

Of your hand. After all, after a loss you close the doors; cash<\/p>\n

Is mourned, throughout the house, with a louder moaning and<\/p>\n

Wailing than a death; no one feigns grief in such a matter, or<\/p>\n

Remains content with merely ripping the hems of his clothes,<\/p>\n

Or simply making his eyes sore with his simulated weeping;<\/p>\n

When it\u2019s money that\u2019s gone astray we grieve with real tears.<\/p>\n

However, if every court you see is full of similar complaints,<\/p>\n

If when a document\u2019s been pored over ten times by the other<\/p>\n

Party, the signature is later declared false, and the whole thing<\/p>\n

Worthless, condemned by one\u2019s very handwriting, one\u2019s seal,<\/p>\n

That prince of sardonyx stones, kept secure in an ivory chest,<\/p>\n

Why do you, O precious creature, think your case should be<\/p>\n

Judged extraordinary? What? Are you the child of a white hen,<\/p>\n

While we are common chicks hatched from misfortune\u2019s eggs?<\/p>\n

It\u2019s a minor thing you\u2019ve experienced, it calls for modest anger,<\/p>\n

One you\u2019ve cast your eyes on more serious crimes. Compare<\/p>\n

The hired thief, or the deliberate fire that\u2019s started with matches,<\/p>\n

The front door revealing the first effect of the flames; Compare<\/p>\n

Those who steal huge venerable rusted chalices from the ancient<\/p>\n

Temples, given us by nations, or crowns once dedicated by kings;<\/p>\n

If those valuables are lacking, some lesser vandal appears who\u2019ll<\/p>\n

Sacrilegiously scrape the gold from Hercules\u2019 thigh or Neptune\u2019s<\/p>\n

Face, or go stripping the thin gold leaf from the statue of Castor;<\/p>\n

Compare the manufacturers and dealers in poison, the parricide<\/p>\n

Who deserves to be thrown in the sea in an ox-skin, along with<\/p>\n

The ill-fated ape, an innocent, but nevertheless sewn in as well.<\/p>\n

That\u2019s but a part of the wickedness Gallicus, Prefect of the City,<\/p>\n

Hears all day, from the morning star\u2019s setting to that of the sun!<\/p>\n

A single courtroom is sufficient if you want to understand the<\/p>\n

Behaviour of humankind; spend a few days there, then dare to<\/p>\n

Call yourself unfortunate, once you\u2019re far away from the place.<\/p>\n

What\u2019s so surprising about goitre in the Alps, or about a breast<\/p>\n

In Meroe, beside the Ethiopian Nile, bigger than its fat baby?<\/p>\n

Who gapes now at those blue-eyed Germans with their yellow<\/p>\n

Hair, with their greasy curls all twisted into their pointed braids?<\/p>\n

Imagine a Pygmy warrior in miniature armour who suddenly<\/p>\n

Runs towards a raucous cloud of Thracian birds and is grabbed<\/p>\n

By a savage crane in an instant, and carried off through the air<\/p>\n

In its curved beak, no match for his enemy. If you saw that here,<\/p>\n

Among the crowd, then you might shake with laughter; but there,<\/p>\n

Where the whole army\u2019s no more than a foot tall, no one laughs.<\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/p>\n

SatXIII:174-249 Forget About Revenge<\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u2018Is the perjurer to suffer no punishment then for his irreligious<\/p>\n

Fraud?\u2019 Well imagine he\u2019d been dragged away in the heaviest<\/p>\n

Of chains, and executed at once based on your judgement (what<\/p>\n

More could you want?); nevertheless your loss remains, that<\/p>\n

Money of yours will never be returned, but the blood that has<\/p>\n

Been shed from the headless corpse will grant invidious solace.<\/p>\n

\u2018Yet vengeance is fine, it\u2019s more gratifying than life itself!\u2019<\/p>\n

So the uneducated claim, whose tempers you see flaring for<\/p>\n

The slightest reason, sometimes for no earthly reason at all.<\/p>\n

That\u2019s not what Chrysippus the Stoic says, nor the gentle mind<\/p>\n

Of Thales, or old Socrates who lived below sweet Hymettus,<\/p>\n

He who would never have inflicted on his accusers one drop<\/p>\n

Of the hemlock he was obliged to drink, in his cruel prison.<\/p>\n

Indeed vengeance is always a delight to the weak and petty<\/p>\n

And small-minded. You can see that straight away, since<\/p>\n

No one enjoys vengeance more than a woman. Yet why<\/p>\n

Believe the guilty have escaped, when conscience dwells on<\/p>\n

Their vile deeds, terrifies them, strikes with its silent whip,<\/p>\n

Wielding its invisible lash, there, in the tortured mind?<\/p>\n

A fierce punishment it is indeed, to bear in your breast that<\/p>\n

Hostile witness, night and day, a punishment more savage<\/p>\n

Than anything Rhadamanthus, or stern Caedicius contrived.<\/p>\n

The Pythian prophetess told a Spartan, who asked about<\/p>\n

His keeping money entrusted to him, retaining it legally<\/p>\n

By swearing a false oath, that he\u2019d not go unpunished.<\/p>\n

He had truly wished to know Apollo\u2019s thoughts on the<\/p>\n

Matter, and whether the god would sanction the crime!<\/p>\n

He returned the money, through fear, not principle, yet<\/p>\n

Every word from the shrine was true and worthy of that<\/p>\n

Temple, as was witnessed by his death, and those of his<\/p>\n

Children, his household, and kin however far removed.<\/p>\n

Such was the punishment suffered solely for thinking of<\/p>\n

Doing wrong. Since, he who merely contemplates some<\/p>\n

Secret wickedness in his mind, incurs the same guilt<\/p>\n

As if he had done the deed. Think, if he really does it!<\/p>\n

Perpetual anxiety is his, which even affects his eating,<\/p>\n

His throat parched as in sickness, and the stubborn<\/p>\n

Food sticking in his gullet. The wretched man spits<\/p>\n

Out his Setian wine, and the choicest ageing Alban<\/p>\n

Vintages displease; offer him finest Falernian; as if<\/p>\n

It were sour, dense wrinkles will furrow his brow.<\/p>\n

At night perhaps his conscience allows him a brief<\/p>\n

Respite; after tossing all over the bed, his limbs lie<\/p>\n

Quiet; when at once he\u2019ll see the temple, the altar<\/p>\n

He\u2019s insulted and you, his victim, in dream, a sight<\/p>\n

To make him sweat profoundly; your image, ghostly,<\/p>\n

Larger than life, scaring him, driving him to confess.<\/p>\n

Such are men who turn pale and quake at every flash<\/p>\n

Of lightning, who faint at the first rumble of thunder<\/p>\n

In the sky, as if the fire falls to earth not by chance or<\/p>\n

The tempest\u2019s frenzy, but in anger, as if in judgement.<\/p>\n

If they\u2019re unharmed, they dread the next thunderstorm<\/p>\n

With greater anxiety, as if the lull were a postponement.<\/p>\n

Moreover if they once start to feel feverish, sharp pains<\/p>\n

In the side keeping them awake, they believe their bodily<\/p>\n

Afflictions sent by a higher power: and consider them<\/p>\n

The gods\u2019 spears and missiles. They don\u2019t dare pledge<\/p>\n

A bleating beast to the little shrine or promise the Lares<\/p>\n

A cockerel\u2019s crest; what respite from illness can the guilty<\/p>\n

Hope for? What sacrificial victim isn\u2019t worthier of life?<\/p>\n

They\u2019re full of resolution when they commit the crime;<\/p>\n

Only after the evil\u2019s done do they begin to acquire a sense<\/p>\n

Of right and wrong. Yet their nature, fixed and incapable<\/p>\n

Of change, will still return to the paths it has condemned.<\/p>\n

Who ever set a limit to their own sins? When does a blush<\/p>\n

Of shame, once banished, reappear on some hardened brow?<\/p>\n

Who have you ever seen who remains content with but one<\/p>\n

Offence? Your miscreant will set his foot in the snare, he\u2019ll<\/p>\n

Suffer the hook in some dark prison, or he\u2019ll join a crowd of<\/p>\n

Notorious exiles, on some rugged rock in the Aegean Sea.<\/p>\n

You\u2019ll revel in the bitter punishment meted out to the one<\/p>\n

You hate, and eventually you\u2019ll cheerfully admit the gods<\/p>\n

Are not as dull-witted as Claudius, nor as blind as Tiresias.<\/p>\n

\u00a0
\nSatire XIV: Bad Parenting<\/strong> \u00a0 SatXIV:1-58 Try Setting A Good Example<\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/p>\n

There is much, Fuscinus, that\u2019s displayed, and passed on,<\/p>\n

To children by their parents, which merits condemnation,<\/p>\n

And tarnishes the brightness of things with its lasting stain.<\/p>\n

If the old man ruins himself gambling, his heir while still<\/p>\n

A child plays too, his little cup armed with the same dice.<\/p>\n

Nor can his relatives expect much from some young man,<\/p>\n

If, taught by his wastrel father\u2019s long-practised gluttony,<\/p>\n

He\u2019s learnt how to peel truffles, marinade mushrooms,<\/p>\n

And drown fig-peckers, beccaficos<\/em>, in the right manner,<\/p>\n

As they swim in the resulting sauce. You may flank him<\/p>\n

With a thousand bearded tutors to left and right, but such<\/p>\n

A lad when his seventh year is past, or even before he<\/p>\n

Has all his new teeth, will always wish to dine in lavish<\/p>\n

Style, nor fall short of the highest standard of cuisine.<\/p>\n

What effect will a man have on his son, if he delights in<\/p>\n

The clank of chains, thrilled by branding, convicts, gaols?<\/p>\n

Is Rutilus, when he enjoys the savage sound of a flogging,<\/p>\n

And thinks the lash sings sweeter than any Siren; when<\/p>\n

He\u2019s a Polyphemus, an Antiphates, to his fearful home,<\/p>\n

Only happy, if the torturer\u2019s been called, and someone\u2019s<\/p>\n

Feeling the hot iron, for a pair of towels; is he teaching<\/p>\n

Mildness of spirit; or how to rise above minor errors;<\/p>\n

Or that he recognises the minds and bodies of slaves<\/p>\n

Are of the same substance, the same elements as ours?<\/p>\n

In your naivety do you expect Larga\u2019s daughter not to<\/p>\n

Commit adultery, she who couldn\u2019t name her mother\u2019s<\/p>\n

Lovers quickly enough, at such speed, that she wouldn\u2019t<\/p>\n

Need thirty breaths to do it? She was mother\u2019s accomplice<\/p>\n

When a child, now she drafts billet-doux<\/em> at her dictation,<\/p>\n

And sends them via the same sodomites to her own lover.<\/p>\n

It\u2019s nature\u2019s law: bad examples at home corrupt us sooner<\/p>\n

And more swiftly, because they lodge in our minds with<\/p>\n

Greater authority. Some young man or other perhaps may<\/p>\n

Resist this influence, if Prometheus has fashioned his heart<\/p>\n

With generous skill, forming it from some superior clay,<\/p>\n

The rest, long-exposed to the old sinful round, are dragged<\/p>\n

Along in their father\u2019s footsteps, on that path to be shunned.<\/p>\n

So refrain, lest those born of us should imitate our crimes,<\/p>\n

The reality is that all of us can be taught to copy behaviour<\/p>\n

That is shameful and perverse; some Catiline will conspire,<\/p>\n

In every nation, you\u2019ll find those opposed to freedom under<\/p>\n

Every sky, but no Brutus, no Cato, his uncle, to defend it.<\/p>\n

Let no foul sights or language touch a father\u2019s threshold.<\/p>\n

Keep far off, far away, you girls the pimps supply, those<\/p>\n

Songs too sung by the parasite who parties all night long.<\/p>\n

A child deserves the utmost respect. So if you\u2019re planning<\/p>\n

On something vile, have some regard for his tender years,<\/p>\n

And your little son may deter you from doing wrong.<\/p>\n

If later on he does something to stir the censor\u2019s wrath,<\/p>\n

If he proves himself like you not only in form and looks<\/p>\n

But your true son in his behaviour too, sinning more<\/p>\n

Profoundly, while following closely in your footsteps,<\/p>\n

No doubt you\u2019ll castigate him, attack with bitter words,<\/p>\n

And after that choose to make an alteration to your will.<\/p>\n

But where\u2019s the justification for such stern parental looks,<\/p>\n

Such outspokenness? Despite your age, you\u2019ve done worse,<\/p>\n

Your forehead, empty of brains, in need of a cupping glass.<\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/p>\n

SatXIV:59-106 Think of Your Children\u2019s Well-Being<\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/p>\n

There\u2019s no rest for your household when a guest\u2019s expected.<\/p>\n

\u2018Sweep the marble floor, rub the columns till they shine,<\/p>\n

Brush away that dead spider up there, and all its web;<\/p>\n

You, wipe the plain silver, and you, the ornate vases.\u2019<\/p>\n

The master\u2019s voice rages, as he stands there holding his rod.<\/p>\n

You\u2019re anxious and wretched, lest your friend should arrive<\/p>\n

And be offended by the sight of a foul dog-mess in the hall,<\/p>\n

Or a portico splashed with mud, though a little slave-boy,<\/p>\n

With half a bucket of sawdust, can soon put that to rights,<\/p>\n

Yet you make no effort to ensure your son is witness to<\/p>\n

A home that\u2019s pure, and without a flaw, beyond reproach!<\/p>\n

It\u2019s fine to produce one more citizen for people and country,<\/p>\n

So long as he\u2019s an asset to that country, capable of farming,<\/p>\n

Capable of achieving something, in peace and war alike.<\/p>\n

What matters most are the virtues you instil, the morality<\/p>\n

You teach him. The stork feeds its young on lizards and<\/p>\n

Snakes, it finds in the wild: and once they acquire wings<\/p>\n

The chicks will seek out those same creatures themselves.<\/p>\n

The vulture flies to its young bringing pieces of carrion,<\/p>\n

Morsels from dead cattle or dogs, or from crucifixions:<\/p>\n

So that\u2019s a vulture\u2019s food when full-grown it feeds itself,<\/p>\n

When it\u2019s already building its own nest high in some tree.<\/p>\n

While the noble eagle that\u2019s Jove\u2019s companion hunts for<\/p>\n

Deer and hare in the glades, and carry the prey from there<\/p>\n

To its eyrie: and when its offspring too reach maturity<\/p>\n

And leave the nest, hunger prompts them to swoop on<\/p>\n

The prey they tasted first after breaking free of the egg.<\/p>\n

Caetronius loved building, and would raise the roofs of<\/p>\n

His villas high along Caieta\u2019s curving shore, or the far<\/p>\n

Slopes of Tivoli, or alternatively the hills of Praeneste,<\/p>\n

Outdoing the Temples of Fortune and Hercules, with his<\/p>\n

Marble transported from Greece or more distant places,<\/p>\n

Just as Posides, Claudius\u2019 eunuch, tried to top the Capitol.<\/p>\n

With such edifices. In that way, Caetronius shrank his<\/p>\n

Assets, frittered away his fortune, and yet there was still<\/p>\n

Plenty left. All of that his son too foolishly squandered,<\/p>\n

In constructing newer villas, out of even rarer marble.<\/p>\n

Then there are those that, blessed with a father who<\/p>\n

Reveres the Sabbath, worship only the clouds in the sky<\/p>\n

And its spirit, who draw no distinction between the pork<\/p>\n

From which their father had to abstain, and human flesh,<\/p>\n

And who swiftly rid themselves of even their foreskins.<\/p>\n

It\u2019s their custom to ignore the laws of Rome, the Judaic<\/p>\n

Code being that which they study, adhere to, and revere;<\/p>\n

The Pentateuch, the mystic scroll handed down by Moses:<\/p>\n

Nor do they reveal the way to anyone but a fellow-believer;<\/p>\n

Leading only the circumcised, when asked, to the fountain.<\/p>\n

It\u2019s the father that\u2019s to blame, treating every seventh day<\/p>\n

As a day of idleness, separate from the rest of daily life.<\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/p>\n

SatXIV:107-188 The Avaricious Are The Worst<\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/p>\n

Our other vices, though, the young imitate by choice, it\u2019s<\/p>\n

Avarice that they\u2019re commanded to indulge in regardless.<\/p>\n

It\u2019s indeed a deceptive vice, with the form and pretence<\/p>\n

Of virtue, with its dour character, severe look and dress.<\/p>\n

The avaricious, indeed, are praised as if for their frugality,<\/p>\n

Economical people who keep a firmer hold of their wealth<\/p>\n

Than if their fortune were guarded by that dragon of the<\/p>\n

Hesperides, or the one in Colchis. Added to which, people<\/p>\n

Consider that those of whom I speak are famously skilful<\/p>\n

In acquisition; those, indeed, who forge larger inheritances<\/p>\n

From their ever-glowing furnace, on their assiduous anvils.<\/p>\n

Whoever admires wealth, and considers that no one who\u2019s<\/p>\n

Poor could ever be happy, will exhort his sons to start out<\/p>\n

Along that road, and devote themselves to that same sect.<\/p>\n

There are various elements to the vice: he\u2019ll imbue them<\/p>\n

With these from the start, force them to practise every last<\/p>\n

Stinginess; soon he\u2019ll teach them insatiable desire for gain.<\/p>\n

He\u2019ll punish his slaves\u2019 bellies with inadequate provisions,<\/p>\n

And starve himself; indeed he can\u2019t even bring himself to<\/p>\n

Consume those last blue-green slices of his mouldy bread;<\/p>\n

As early as mid-September he\u2019ll take to storing a portion<\/p>\n

Of yesterday\u2019s mincemeat; and in summer he\u2019ll set aside<\/p>\n

His beans for another meal, sealed up with a little piece<\/p>\n

Of dried mackerel, or half a rotting catfish; and he\u2019ll count<\/p>\n

The sections of chopped leek before putting them away.<\/p>\n

A beggar from under a bridge would refuse his invitation.<\/p>\n

Yet why go through such torment just to heap up wealth,<\/p>\n

Show your patent obsession, with such manifest lunacy,<\/p>\n

And live the life of the poor, simply in order to die rich?<\/p>\n

Meanwhile, with your purse\u2019s swollen mouth bulging,<\/p>\n

Your desire for cash will grow as your money grows,<\/p>\n

You\u2019ll buy another villa, one rural estate\u2019s not enough;<\/p>\n

You\u2019ll love extending the boundary, and the neighbour\u2019s<\/p>\n

Cornfield seems bigger and better; you\u2019ll buy it, and the<\/p>\n

Vineyards, and the hill-slope pale with its mass of olives.<\/p>\n

If the owner won\u2019t accept a single offer you make, well<\/p>\n

Then, you\u2019ll drive lean bullocks and starving mules with<\/p>\n

Necks weary from the yoke, into his green corn at night,<\/p>\n

And they won\u2019t return to their yard till the whole of his<\/p>\n

New crop, as if scythed, has filled their empty bellies.<\/p>\n

You can scarcely count the number of people who make<\/p>\n

Complaints of this kind, how many ravaged fields are sold,<\/p>\n

But what of the gossip, and the blaring noise of scandal?<\/p>\n

\u2018Where\u2019s the harm,\u2019 men say, \u2018lupin seed for me, rather<\/p>\n

Than have the neighbours all around singing my praises,<\/p>\n

While I reap a handful of grain from a miniscule estate.\u2019<\/p>\n

That will spare you from disease and infirmity I suppose,<\/p>\n

You\u2019ll be free of anxiety and care, will you; granted a long<\/p>\n

Life, and better luck, from the very moment you acquire<\/p>\n

Sole possession of a tract of agricultural land as large as<\/p>\n

That ploughed by the Roman people, under King Tatius!<\/p>\n

Later yet, when, broken by age, fights with fierce Pyrrhus,<\/p>\n

Or the Molossian blades, the veterans of the Punic Wars,<\/p>\n

Were granted a bare couple of acres for their many wounds,<\/p>\n

None of them thought that return for their blood and toil,<\/p>\n

Was less than they deserved, nor the country ungrateful<\/p>\n

Or short on loyalty. Those few clods of earth satisfied<\/p>\n

The father himself and his crowded cottage, his pregnant<\/p>\n

Wife lying there, four children playing about, one child<\/p>\n

A slave\u2019s and three of his own; as long as an ample meal,<\/p>\n

Large pots of steaming porridge, awaited their big brothers,<\/p>\n

When they would return home, from the ditch or furrow.<\/p>\n

Nowadays that patch of ground\u2019s insufficient for a garden.<\/p>\n

Greed is usually the root of crime: no fault of the human<\/p>\n

Mind causes more poison to be mixed, or a more frequent<\/p>\n

Rampaging about with a blade than the uncontrolled desire<\/p>\n

For extravagant wealth. For the man who wants to be rich,<\/p>\n

Wants to be rich now; but what reverence for the law, what<\/p>\n

Fear or shame can you expect from a greedy man in a hurry?<\/p>\n

\u2018Rest content with your huts in the hills, lads,\u2019 is what some<\/p>\n

Aged sire of the Hercini, Vestini, or Marsi would say long<\/p>\n

Ago, \u2018Let\u2019s seek bread enough for our table, from the plough:<\/p>\n

That\u2019s what our divinities approve of, our gods of the fields,<\/p>\n

Through whose power and assistance, after the welcome gift<\/p>\n

Of ears of corn, men lost their taste for the fruit of the ancient<\/p>\n

Oak. They have no wish to do what is forbidden, who feel no<\/p>\n

Shame in wearing great rawhide boots in the frost, or skins<\/p>\n

Reversed against the east wind: this new and foreign purple<\/p>\n

Cloth, of every kind, is what leads to wickedness and crime.\u2019<\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/p>\n

SatXIV:189-255 Your Children Will Outdo You<\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/p>\n

Those were the precepts old men taught the young; but now<\/p>\n

Once autumn\u2019s done, the father wakes his slumbering son<\/p>\n

In the middle of the night, shouting: \u2018Grab your wax tablets,<\/p>\n

Boy, scribble, stay awake, prepare your cases, study the civil<\/p>\n

Laws of our ancestors, or seek the centurion\u2019s swagger stick,<\/p>\n

Make sure, the commander Laelius notes your uncombed head,<\/p>\n

Your hairy nostrils, and admires the breadth of your shoulders;<\/p>\n

Demolish the huts of the Moors, and the forts of the Brigantes,<\/p>\n

So your sixtieth year might bring you the Eagle that makes you<\/p>\n

Wealthy; or if you shrink from enduring the long labour of a<\/p>\n

Military career, if the sound of cornets and trumpets loosen<\/p>\n

Your anxious bowels, buy what you can sell for half again,<\/p>\n

And don\u2019t let yourself become fastidious about those goods<\/p>\n

That have to be stored on the right bank of the Tiber, or<\/p>\n

Think to start drawing a distinction between perfumes<\/p>\n

And hides: profit always smells fine whatever its source.<\/p>\n

Always remember to keep these words on your lips: fit<\/p>\n

For the gods, fit even for Jove himself were he a poet:<\/p>\n

\u201cNo one will ask how you made it, but make it you must.\u201d\u2019<\/p>\n

Here\u2019s what I\u2019d like to say to any father threatening to give<\/p>\n

Such advice: \u2018Tell me, O mindless fool, who asked you to<\/p>\n

Hasten the process? I\u2019ll answer for the pupil bettering his<\/p>\n

Teacher. Relax, don\u2019t worry: you\u2019ll be outdone as surely<\/p>\n

As Telamon outdid Ajax, or as Achilles exceeded Peleus.<\/p>\n

The young need a gentle touch; the evils of adult sinfulness<\/p>\n

Have not yet pierced their marrow. Soon enough, when your<\/p>\n

Son\u2019s started shaving, taken the razor\u2019s curved edge to his<\/p>\n

Beard, he\u2019ll bear false witness, he\u2019ll perjure himself for a<\/p>\n

Handful of coins, though clasping the foot of Ceres\u2019 altar.<\/p>\n

If his wife, you daughter-in-law, crosses your threshold<\/p>\n

With a dowry: it\u2019s fatal: consider her dead and buried.<\/p>\n

She\u2019ll be strangled in her sleep! He\u2019ll find a quicker path<\/p>\n

To the possessions you seek to acquire on land and sea;<\/p>\n

Major crime after all takes little effort. \u2018I never taught him<\/p>\n

That,\u2019 you\u2019ll say, then, \u2018I never told him to behave that way!\u2019<\/p>\n

Yet the reason for his wicked thoughts, their source, is you.<\/p>\n

For anyone who has taught his children love of vast wealth,<\/p>\n

And produced avaricious sons by giving them foolish advice<\/p>\n

Has granted them full licence, wholly abandoned the reins<\/p>\n

Of the chariot; call it back if you will, there\u2019s no stopping it,<\/p>\n

Scorning you in its flight, it leaves the turning posts behind.<\/p>\n

No one believes in offending only to the extent permitted:<\/p>\n

They\u2019ll allow themselves a great deal more leeway than that.<\/p>\n

When you tell your son the man\u2019s a fool, who gives presents<\/p>\n

To a friend, or helps a poor relation and sets him on his feet,<\/p>\n

You\u2019re teaching him to rob, to cheat, to pursue wealth by<\/p>\n

Every form of crime. Your love of cash is as great as the<\/p>\n

Heartfelt love of the Decii for their country, or, if Greece<\/p>\n

Speaks true, Menoeceus\u2019 devotion to his city of Thebes.<\/p>\n

So you\u2019ll see that fire, whose sparks you yourself kindled,<\/p>\n

Burning far and wide, and razing everything in its wake.<\/p>\n

You\u2019ll be spared no wretchedness. The cub you\u2019ve reared,<\/p>\n

A roaring lion in a cage, will destroy its trembling teacher.<\/p>\n

His astrologer has read your horoscope, but it\u2019s a bore to<\/p>\n

Await the spindle\u2019s slow unwinding: you\u2019ll die before the<\/p>\n

Thread is broken. You\u2019re already in the way, thwarting his<\/p>\n

Wishes, already your long stag-like old age torments him.<\/p>\n

Find that doctor, Archigenes, straight away, and buy one<\/p>\n

Of King Mithridates\u2019 antidotes, if you\u2019d still seek to enjoy<\/p>\n

Another fig, to cull a few more roses. You\u2019ll need the drug<\/p>\n

Fathers, as well as kings, had best swallow before they eat.<\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/p>\n

SatXIV:256-302 The Risks You Take<\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/p>\n

It\u2019s a famous show I\u2019m giving, whose equal you\u2019ll not see<\/p>\n

On any stage, any platform of our distinguished praetor\u2019s,<\/p>\n

Just take a look at how people risk their lives to swell their<\/p>\n

Fortunes, for a huge bag of gold in their brass-bound chest,<\/p>\n

For the money deposited in Castor\u2019s Temple, under guard,<\/p>\n

Ever since Mars the Avenger lost his helmet, and failed to<\/p>\n

Keep tight hold of his assets. So forget holiday theatricals,<\/p>\n

Cybele\u2019s Ludi Megalenses<\/em>,\u00a0 the Cerealia<\/em>, and the Florialia<\/em>:<\/p>\n

Human affairs are bound to offer us far more entertainment.<\/p>\n

What delights the mind more? Bodies hurled through the air,<\/p>\n

By some acrobat, who\u2019s an expert in walking the tightrope,<\/p>\n

Or you, who haunt the deck of that Cilician ketch you\u2019re<\/p>\n

Stuck with, forever tossed by the northerlies and southerlies,<\/p>\n

A cheap and desperate trader in smelly sacks, so thrilled to<\/p>\n

Import sweet raisin-wine from the shores of Jupiter\u2019s ancient<\/p>\n

Crete, along with the wine-jars, his compatriots? Yet he who<\/p>\n

Plants his feet on the tightrope with wavering step, garners<\/p>\n

Himself a living from that occupation, in order to keep off<\/p>\n

The hunger and cold: while you take foolish risks, merely<\/p>\n

For a thousand talents and a hundred villas. Look at the sea<\/p>\n

And the harbours full of great vessels: most of the human<\/p>\n

Race is ocean-bound. Fleets will go wherever the hope of<\/p>\n

Profit summons them, not merely crossing from Crete to<\/p>\n

Rhodes, but sailing North African waters, leaving Gibraltar<\/p>\n

Far behind, hearing the setting sun hiss in the western deeps.<\/p>\n

And the great prize for your efforts, having seen the Ocean<\/p>\n

Monsters, and the children of the waves, is to return home<\/p>\n

Again with a full purse, proud of your swollen bags of loot.<\/p>\n

More than one kind of madness hounds men\u2019s minds. Orestes,<\/p>\n

Clasping his sister, was terrified by the Furies\u2019 fires and faces,<\/p>\n

Ajax attacking a bullock thinks it is Agamemnon bellowing<\/p>\n

Or Odysseus. The man who loads his ship to the gunwales<\/p>\n

With goods, with only a plank between him and the waves,<\/p>\n

May forgo his tunic or cloak, but surely needs a minder,<\/p>\n

If the only reason for all that risk and effort, is a pile of<\/p>\n

Clipped silver coins, with their legends and tiny portraits.<\/p>\n

Clouds lower, the thunder rumbles, still: \u2018Cast off,\u2019 he cries,<\/p>\n

The owner of that load of grain and pepper just purchased,<\/p>\n

\u2018They\u2019re no threat, the darkened sky, those black streaks of<\/p>\n

Cloud; it\u2019s summer lightning.\u2019 Unhappy man, this very night<\/p>\n

Perhaps, he\u2019ll go overboard, the timbers shattered, whelmed<\/p>\n

And engulfed by the waves, his belt clasped in his left hand<\/p>\n

Or teeth. And he for whose dreams all the gold whirled down<\/p>\n

By the Tagus, or the Pactolus in its reddened sand, would<\/p>\n

Not suffice, must now, a shipwrecked wretch, be satisfied<\/p>\n

With a handful of rags to cover his freezing flanks, a few<\/p>\n

Scraps of food, and the pennies he can beg as a survivor;<\/p>\n

Holding a daub of the wreck, maintaining himself by alms.<\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/p>\n

SatXIV:303-331 It\u2019s Never Enough<\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/p>\n

What\u2019s acquired with so much effort is kept safe with even<\/p>\n

More care and anxiety: guarding great wealth\u2019s a sad affair.<\/p>\n

Licinus, the millionaire, sets out his fire-buckets, commands<\/p>\n

His team of slaves to keep watch all night, terrified for his<\/p>\n

Amber, and his statues, pillars of Phrygian marble, ivory,<\/p>\n

And tortoiseshell plaques. The pot Diogenes, the naked Cynic<\/p>\n

Slept in never caught fire; break it, it was still there tomorrow,<\/p>\n

Patched with lead, or another shelter would appear. Viewing<\/p>\n

That earthenware jar with its inhabitant, Alexander saw how<\/p>\n

Much happier the great philosopher was, lacking desires,<\/p>\n

Than he who claimed the whole world for his own, fated<\/p>\n

To suffer dangers as great as his victories would prove.<\/p>\n

If all were wise you\u2019d have no power, Fortune: it is we, we<\/p>\n

Who make you a goddess. Yet if you were to ask for my<\/p>\n

Advice, I\u2019d tell you what measure of wealth suffices, just<\/p>\n

As much as you need to stave off hunger, thirst and cold,<\/p>\n

As much as you needed, Epicurus, in your little garden,<\/p>\n

As much as Socrates kept in his house, in ancient times;<\/p>\n

Nature says nothing different, wisdom nothing different.<\/p>\n

Does it seem I\u2019m constraining you to follow only those<\/p>\n

Fine examples? Then, add something from our Roman<\/p>\n

Tradition, settle for what Otho\u2019s laws ordained as needed,<\/p>\n

To join the fourteen rows of knights, or if that still makes<\/p>\n

You frown, triple it, and make it twelve thousand in gold.<\/p>\n

If by doing that I\u2019ve still not filled your lap, if you want<\/p>\n

More, not the riches of Croesus, nor the Persian lands,<\/p>\n

Could ever satisfy your desire, nor the wealth of Narcissus,<\/p>\n

That freedman to whom Claudius granted all, and whose<\/p>\n

Orders he obeyed, in executing his empress, Messalina.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":19,"menu_order":7,"template":"","meta":{"_candela_citation":"[]","CANDELA_OUTCOMES_GUID":"","pb_show_title":"on","pb_short_title":"","pb_subtitle":"","pb_authors":[],"pb_section_license":""},"chapter-type":[],"contributor":[],"license":[],"class_list":["post-75","chapter","type-chapter","status-web-only","hentry"],"part":68,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/courses.lumenlearning.com\/suny-geneseo-humanities1-1\/wp-json\/pressbooks\/v2\/chapters\/75","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/courses.lumenlearning.com\/suny-geneseo-humanities1-1\/wp-json\/pressbooks\/v2\/chapters"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/courses.lumenlearning.com\/suny-geneseo-humanities1-1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/chapter"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/courses.lumenlearning.com\/suny-geneseo-humanities1-1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/19"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/courses.lumenlearning.com\/suny-geneseo-humanities1-1\/wp-json\/pressbooks\/v2\/chapters\/75\/revisions"}],"part":[{"href":"https:\/\/courses.lumenlearning.com\/suny-geneseo-humanities1-1\/wp-json\/pressbooks\/v2\/parts\/68"}],"metadata":[{"href":"https:\/\/courses.lumenlearning.com\/suny-geneseo-humanities1-1\/wp-json\/pressbooks\/v2\/chapters\/75\/metadata\/"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/courses.lumenlearning.com\/suny-geneseo-humanities1-1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=75"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"chapter-type","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/courses.lumenlearning.com\/suny-geneseo-humanities1-1\/wp-json\/pressbooks\/v2\/chapter-type?post=75"},{"taxonomy":"contributor","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/courses.lumenlearning.com\/suny-geneseo-humanities1-1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/contributor?post=75"},{"taxonomy":"license","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/courses.lumenlearning.com\/suny-geneseo-humanities1-1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/license?post=75"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}