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Persius

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Our life is our own to-day, to-morrow you will be dust, a shade, and a tale that is told. Live mindful of death; the hour flies.

Aulus Persius Flaccus (3462) was a Roman satirical poet and moralist.

Quotes

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The Satires

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Translations are taken from G. G. Ramsay's revised edition of Juvenal and Persius in the Loeb Classical Library (1940)

  • Magister artis ingenique largitor
    venter.
    • That master of arts, that dispenser of genius, the Belly.
    • Prologue, line 10.
  • Quis leget haec?
    • Who’ll read that sort of thing?
    • Satire I, line 2 (translated by W. S. Merwin).
  • Nec te quaesiveris extra.
    • Don’t consult anyone’s opinions but your own.
    • Satire I, line 7.
  • Usque adeone
    scire tuum nihil est, nisi te scire hoc sciat alter?
    • Is all your knowledge to go so utterly for nothing unless other people know that you possess it?
    • Satire I, line 26.
  • At pulchrum est digito monstrari et dicier "hic est".
    • O but it is a fine thing to have a finger pointed at one, and to hear people say, "That's the man!"
    • Satire I, line 28.
  • Nec nocte paratum,
    plorabit qui me volet incurvasse querella.
    • The man who wishes to bend me with his tale of woe must shed true tears – not tears that have been got ready overnight.
    • Satire I, line 90.
  • Virtutem videant intabescantque relicta.
    • Let them recognize virtue and rot for having lost it.
    • Satire III, line 38.
      • Alternate translation (by William Gifford):—
        "In all her charms, set Virtue in their eye,
        And let them see their loss, despair, and—die!"
  • Ut nemo in sese tentat descendere! nemo!
    Sed praecedenti spectatur mantica tergo.
    • None, none descends into himself, to find
      The secret imperfections of his mind.
    • Satire IV, line 23 (translated by John Dryden).
  • Tecum habita: noris quam sit tibi curta supellex.
    • Live with yourself: get to know how poorly furnished you are.
    • Satire IV, line 52.
  • Cum lux altera venit,
    iam cras hesternum consumpsimus; ecce aliud cras
    egerit hos annos et semper paulum erit ultra.
    • But when to-morrow comes, yesterday's morrow will have been already spent: and lo! a fresh morrow will be for ever making away with our years, each just beyond our grasp.
    • Satire V, line 67.
  • Nostrum est
    quod vivis, cinis et manes et fabula fies.
    vive memor leti, fugit hora.
    • Our life is our own to-day, to-morrow you will be dust, a shade, and a tale that is told. Live mindful of death; the hour flies.
    • Satire V, line 151.


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