Letter 114

[1] You ask why in certain periods a corrupt style of speech has arisen, and how the talents of men have come to incline toward particular vices, so that at one time an inflated kind of exposition flourished, and at another a broken style drawn out in the manner of a song; why at one time bold ideas, going beyond belief, found favor, and at another abrupt and suggestive epigrams, in which more had to be understood than was actually heard; why there was an age that exercised the privilege of metaphor without any shame. The answer is that thing you commonly hear, which among the Greeks has passed into a proverb: as a man's life was, so was his speech. [2] Now just as each individual's manner of acting resembles his manner of speaking, so the style of speech sometimes imitates public morals, when the discipline of the community has decayed and has surrendered itself to indulgence. Wantonness of public speech is evidence of public luxury, provided it has not occurred in just one person or another but has been approved and accepted. [3] A man's natural ability cannot have one complexion and his soul another. If the soul is sound, if it is well-composed, serious, restrained, the ability too is dry and sober; once the soul is corrupted, the ability is also infected. Do you not see that, if the soul has grown languid, the limbs are dragged and the feet move sluggishly? That if the soul is effeminate, the softness shows even in the very gait? That if the soul is keen and fierce, the step quickens? That if it rages, or what is like raging, is angry, the body's motion is disordered, and the man does not so much walk as rush along? How much more, do you suppose, does this happen to one's ability, which is wholly mingled with the soul, is shaped by it, obeys it, and seeks its law from it? [4] How Maecenas lived is too well known to need telling now: how he walked, how delicate he was, how he longed to be conspicuous, how unwilling he was that his vices should stay hidden. What then? Is his speech not just as loose as he himself was ungirt? Are his words not as conspicuous as his dress, his retinue, his house, his wife? He would have been a man of great talent had he pursued it by a straighter road, had he not avoided being understood, had he not let himself dissolve even in his speech. And so you will find an eloquence like that of a drunken man, entangled and wandering and full of license. [Maecenas on his own attire.] [5] What is more disgraceful than "a stream and woods with their long-tressed bank"? See how "they plough the channel with skiffs, and, turning back the shallows, send the gardens away." Or this: someone "wrinkles up at a woman's wink and coos with his lips and begins to sigh, as the lords of the grove rave with weary neck." "An incurable faction: they rummage at the feasts, assail the houses with the flagon, and by hope they exact death." "A Genius scarcely a witness to his own festival." "The thin threads of a taper and the crackling meal." "A mother or a wife clothes the hearth." [6] Will it not occur to you at once, when you read these things, that this is the man who always walked through the city with his tunic loose (for even when he was discharging the duties of the absent Caesar, the watchword was sought from a man with his belt undone); that this is the man who at the tribunal, on the rostra, in every public assembly appeared with his head muffled in his cloak, with both ears left sticking out, exactly as runaway slaves of a rich man usually appear in a mime; that this is the man who, precisely when civil wars were raging, when the city was anxious and under arms, had this for his escort in public, two eunuchs, yet more manly than he was himself; that this is the man who married a wife a thousand times, though he had but one? [7] These words, so disgracefully constructed, so carelessly tossed off, so contrary to everyone's usage, show that his morals too were no less novel and depraved and peculiar. He is credited with the highest praise for clemency: he spared the sword, he abstained from bloodshed, and he showed what power he had in no other way than by his license. But this very praise of his he ruined by those monstrous affectations of his style; for it becomes clear that he was soft, not gentle. [8] These winding turns of his composition, these inverted words, these strange ideas—often great, indeed, but unnerved as they come out—will make it plain to anyone that his head was turned by excessive good fortune. This is a fault that sometimes belongs to the man, sometimes to the times. [9] When good fortune has spread luxury far and wide, attention is first paid more carefully to grooming the body; then trouble is taken over furniture; then care is lavished upon the very houses, so that they sprawl out to the spaciousness of a country estate, so that the walls gleam with marble imported across the seas, so that the ceilings are picked out with gold, so that the brilliance of the floors answers to that of the coffered ceilings; then this extravagance is transferred to dinners, and there approval is sought through novelty and through reversing the customary order, so that the dishes that usually conclude a dinner are served first, and what used to be given to guests as they arrived is given to them as they leave. [10] When the mind has grown accustomed to disdain what is according to custom, and the usual seems to it mean, then in speech too it seeks what is new, and now recalls and brings forward ancient and obsolete words, now coins unfamiliar ones and twists them, now—a thing that has lately become common—a bold and frequent metaphor is taken for elegance. [11] There are those who cut their thoughts short and hope to win favor by this, if the sentence is left hanging and makes the hearer suspect a hidden meaning; there are those who hold thoughts back and draw them out; there are those who do not quite reach the point of fault (for one must do this in attempting anything grand) but who love the fault itself. And so, wherever you see that corrupt speech gives pleasure, there will be no doubt that morals too have strayed from what is right. Just as luxury in banquets and in dress are signs of a diseased community, so license in speech, provided it is widespread, shows that the minds from which the words come have also collapsed. [12] You ought not, in fact, to be surprised that corrupt things are welcomed not only by the meaner crowd but also by this more refined throng; for these men differ from one another in their togas, not in their judgment. You may be more surprised at this, that not only are faulty things praised, but the very faults. For this has always happened: no talent has pleased without being granted some indulgence. Name me any man of great reputation you like: I will tell you what his age forgave him, what it knowingly overlooked in him. I will name you many whom their vices did not harm, and some whom they actually helped. I will name you, I say, men of the greatest fame and set among the things we admire, men whom anyone who corrects, destroys; for their vices are so mingled with their virtues that they would drag the virtues along with them. [13] Add to this that speech has no fixed rule: the usage of the community, which has never long stood in the same place, keeps changing it. Many seek their words from another age: they talk in the language of the Twelve Tables; Gracchus and Crassus and Curio are too refined and too modern for them, and they go all the way back to Appius and Coruncanius. Others, on the contrary, while they want nothing but the worn and the commonplace, fall into squalor. [14] Each is corrupt in its own way, just as much, by Hercules, as the man who is willing to use only splendid and resonant and poetic words, and avoids what is necessary and in common use. I would say the one sins as much as the other: the one grooms himself more than is proper, the other neglects himself more than is proper; the one plucks even the hairs from his legs, the other not even from his armpits. [15] Let us pass to composition. How many kinds of fault can I show you in this department? Some approve a broken and rough style; they deliberately disrupt anything that has flowed out too smoothly; they want no joining to be without a jolt; they think it manly and strong to strike the ear with unevenness. With some it is not composition but melody, so much does it caress and slip along softly. [16] What shall I say of the style in which words are deferred and, long awaited, scarcely come back to the clausula at the end? What of that style, slow at its close, like Cicero's, sloping down and softly holding back, and answering, just as it usually does, to its own rhythm and meter? The fault lies not only in [...] but also in the kind of one's epigrams, if they are either trivial and childish, or shameless and bolder than is permitted while modesty remains intact, if they are flowery and too sweet, if they trail off into nothing and produce no effect beyond mere sound. [17] These vices are introduced by some one man, the man under whom eloquence then stands; the rest imitate him and pass the habit from one to another. Thus, when Sallust was in his prime, clipped epigrams and words falling before they were expected and obscure brevity passed for elegance. Lucius Arruntius, a man of rare frugality, who wrote a history of the Punic War, was a Sallustian and strove after that style. There is a phrase in Sallust, "he made an army with silver," that is, procured it with money. Arruntius began to love this; he put it on every page. In one place he says, "they made flight for our men"; in another, "Hiero, king of the Syracusans, made war"; and in another, "which things, when heard, made the people of Panhormus surrender to the Romans." [18] I wanted to give you a taste: the whole book is woven together with such things. What was rare in Sallust is frequent in this man and almost continuous, and not without reason; for Sallust used to stumble upon these things, but this man went hunting for them. You see, however, what follows when a fault becomes a model for someone. [19] Sallust said "in wintering waters." Arruntius, in the first book of his Punic War, says "suddenly the storm wintered," and in another place, when he wanted to say that the year had been cold, he says "the whole year wintered," and in another place "thence he sent sixty light transports, besides the soldiers and the necessary sailors, with the north wind wintering." He does not stop stuffing this word into every passage. In a certain place Sallust says, "amid civil arms he seeks reputations for fairness and goodness." Arruntius could not restrain himself from putting, right in the first book, that there were huge "reputations" concerning Regulus. [20] These, then, and faults of this kind, which imitation has stamped on someone, are not signs of luxury or of a corrupt mind; for the things from which you may judge someone's true disposition ought to be peculiar to him and born of himself: an angry man's speech is angry, an over-excited man's is too agitated, a delicate man's is tender and flowing. [21] You see this in those who follow such men—who either pluck out their beard or thin it, who shave their lips closer and scrape them while keeping and letting grow the rest of the hair, who put on cloaks of a disreputable color, who wear a see-through toga, who refuse to do anything that might pass unnoticed by men's eyes: they provoke other people and turn their gaze upon themselves; they are willing even to be reproached, so long as they are looked at. Such is the speech of Maecenas and of all the others who go astray not by chance but knowingly and willingly. [22] This springs from a great evil of the soul: just as in wine the tongue does not stumble until the mind has yielded to the burden and tipped over or betrayed itself, so this intoxication of speech—for what else is it?—troubles no one unless the soul is faltering. Therefore let the soul be cared for: from it come our thoughts, from it our words, from it our bearing, our expression, our gait. When it is sound and strong, the speech too is robust, brave, manly; if it has collapsed, the rest follow it into ruin. [23] Our king is the soul; while it is unharmed, the rest remain at their duty, obey, comply: when it has wavered a little, they at once hesitate. But when it has yielded to pleasure, its arts and actions too grow slack, and every effort proceeds from a languid and fluid source. [24] Since I have used this comparison, I will keep at it. Our soul is at one time a king, at another a tyrant: a king when it looks to what is honorable, when it cares for the welfare of the body entrusted to it and commands it nothing base, nothing sordid; but when it is uncontrolled, greedy, self-indulgent, it passes into a detestable and dreadful name and becomes a tyrant. Then uncontrolled passions seize it and press upon it; at the start, to be sure, it rejoices, as a populace usually does—pointlessly filled with a largess that will harm it, and handling what it cannot swallow down. [25] But when the disease eats away its strength more and more, and indulgence descends into the marrow and the sinews, then it is glad at the sight of those very things by which, through excessive greed, it has rendered itself useless; in place of its own pleasures it has the spectacle of others', a purveyor and witness of lusts whose enjoyment it has stripped from itself by gorging itself. Nor is it so pleasing to such a soul to abound in delights as it is bitter that it cannot pass all that array down through gullet and belly, that it cannot roll about with the whole crowd of catamites and women, and it grieves that a great part of its happiness lies idle, shut out by the narrow limits of the body. [26] For is it not madness, my Lucilius, that none of us reflects that he is mortal, that none reflects that he is weak? Nay rather, that none of us reflects that he is a single individual? Look at our kitchens and the cooks scurrying among so many fires: do you think it is for a single belly that food is prepared with so great a commotion? Look at our wine-cellars and our storehouses full of the vintages of many ages: do you think it is for a single belly that the wines of so many consuls and regions are shut away? Look at how many places the earth is turned over, how many thousands of tenant-farmers plough and dig: do you think it is for a single belly that crops are sown both in Sicily and in Africa? [27] We shall be sound and shall crave moderate things if each of us counts himself for one, and at the same time measures his body, and knows that it can hold neither much nor for long. But nothing will profit you so much toward moderation in all things as the frequent thought of how brief our life is, and how uncertain: whatever you do, look toward death. Farewell.

You have been asking me why, during certain periods, a degenerate style of speech comes to the fore, and how it is that men’s wits have gone downhill into certain vices—in such a way that exposition at one time has taken on a kind of puffed-up strength, and at another has become mincing and modulated like the music of a concert piece. You wonder why sometimes bold ideas—bolder than one could believe—have been held in favour, and why at other times one meets with phrases that are disconnected and full of innuendo, into which one must read more meaning than was intended to meet the ear. Or why there have been epochs which maintained the right to a shameless use of metaphor. For answer, here is a phrase which you are wont to notice in the popular speech—one which the Greeks have made into a proverb: “Man’s speech is just like his life.” Exactly as each individual man’s actions seem to speak, so people’s style of speaking often reproduces the general character of the time, if the morale of the public has relaxed and has given itself over to effeminacy. Wantonness in speech is proof of public luxury, if it is popular and fashionable, and not confined to one or two individual instances. A man’s ability cannot possibly be of one sort and his soul of another. If his soul be wholesome, well-ordered, serious, and restrained, his ability also is sound and sober. Conversely, when the one degenerates, the other is also contaminated. Do you not see that if a man’s soul has become sluggish, his limbs drag and his feet move indolently? If it is womanish, that one can detect the effeminacy by his very gait? That a keen and confident soul quickens the step? That madness in the soul, or anger (which resembles madness), hastens our bodily movements from walking to rushing? And how much more do you think that this affects one’s ability, which is entirely interwoven with the soul,—being moulded thereby, obeying its commands, and deriving therefrom its laws! How Maecenas lived is too well-known for present comment. We know how he walked, how effeminate he was, and how he desired to display himself; also, how unwilling he was that his vices should escape notice. What, then? Does not the looseness of his speech match his ungirt attire? Are his habits, his attendants, his house, his wife, any less clearly marked than his words? He would have been a man of great powers, had he set himself to his task by a straight path, had he not shrunk from making himself understood, had he not been so loose in his style of speech also. You will therefore see that his eloquence was that of an intoxicated man—twisting, turning, unlimited in its slackness. What is more unbecoming than the words: “A stream and a bank covered with long-tressed woods”? And see how “men plough the channel with boats and, turning up the shallows, leave gardens behind them.” Or, “He curls his lady-locks, and bills and coos, and starts a-sighing, like a forest lord who offers prayers with down-bent neck.” Or, “An unregenerate crew, they search out people at feasts, and assail households with the wine-cup, and, by hope, exact death.” Or, “A Genius could hardly bear witness to his own festival”; or “threads of tiny tapers and crackling meal”; “mothers or wives clothing the hearth.” Can you not at once imagine, on reading through these words, that this was the man who always paraded through the city with a flowing tunic? For even if he was discharging the absent emperor’s duties, he was always in undress when they asked him for the countersign. Or that this was the man who, as judge on the bench, or as an orator, or at any public function, appeared with his cloak wrapped about his head, leaving only the ears exposed, like the millionaire’s runaway slaves in the farce? Or that this was the man who, at the very time when the state was embroiled in civil strife, when the city was in difficulties and under martial law, was attended in public by two eunuchs—both of them more men than himself? Or that this was the man who had but one wife, and yet was married countless times? These words of his, put together so faultily, thrown off so carelessly, and arranged in such marked contrast to the usual practice, declare that the character of their writer was equally unusual, unsound, and eccentric. To be sure, we bestow upon him the highest praise for his humanity; he was sparing with the sword and refrained from bloodshed; and he made a show of his power only in the course of his loose living; but he spoiled, by such preposterous finickiness of style, this genuine praise, which was his due. For it is evident that he was not really gentle, but effeminate, as is proved by his misleading word-order, his inverted expressions, and the surprising thoughts which frequently contain something great, but in finding expression have become nerveless. One would say that his head was turned by too great success. This fault is due sometimes to the man, and sometimes to his epoch. When prosperity has spread luxury far and wide, men begin by paying closer attention to their personal appearance. Then they go crazy over furniture. Next, they devote attention to their houses—how to take up more space with them, as if they were country-houses, how to make the walls glitter with marble that has been imported over seas, how to adorn a roof with gold, so that it may match the brightness of the inlaid floors. After that, they transfer their exquisite taste to the dinner-table, attempting to court approval by novelty and by departures from the customary order of dishes, so that the courses which we are accustomed to serve at the end of the meal may be served first, and so that the departing guests may partake of the kind of food which in former days was set before them on their arrival. When the mind has acquired the habit of scorning the usual things of life, and regarding as mean that which was once customary, it begins to hunt for novelties in speech also; now it summons and displays obsolete and old-fashioned words; now it coins even unknown words or misshapes them; and now a bold and frequent metaphorical usage is made a special feature of style, according to the fashion which has just become prevalent. Some cut the thoughts short, hoping to make a good impression by leaving the meaning in doubt and causing the hearer to suspect his own lack of wit. Some dwell upon them and lengthen them out. Others, too, approach just short of a fault—for a man must really do this if he hopes to attain an imposing effect—but actually love the fault for its own sake. In short, whenever you notice that a degenerate style pleases the critics, you may be sure that character also has deviated from the right standard. Just as luxurious banquets and elaborate dress are indications of disease in the state, similarly a lax style, if it be popular, shows that the mind (which is the source of the word) has lost its balance. Indeed you ought not to wonder that corrupt speech is welcomed not merely by the more squalid mob but also by our more cultured throng; for it is only in their dress and not in their judgments that they differ. You may rather wonder that not only the effects of vices, but even vices themselves, meet with approval. For it has ever been thus: no man’s ability has ever been approved without something being pardoned. Show me any man, however famous; I can tell you what it was that his age forgave in him, and what it was that his age purposely overlooked. I can show you many men whose vices have caused them no harm, and not a few who have been even helped by these vices. Yes, I will show you persons of the highest reputation, set up as models for our admiration; and yet if you seek to correct their errors, you destroy them; for vices are so intertwined with virtues that they drag the virtues along with them. Moreover, style has no fixed laws; it is changed by the usage of the people, never the same for any length of time. Many orators hark back to earlier epochs for their vocabulary, speaking in the language of the Twelve Tables. Gracchus, Crassus, and Curio, in their eyes, are too refined and too modern; so back to Appius and Coruncanius! Conversely, certain men, in their endeavour to maintain nothing but well-worn and common usages, fall into a humdrum style. These two classes, each in its own way, are degenerate; and it is no less degenerate to use no words except those which are conspicuous, high-sounding, and poetical, avoiding what is familiar and in ordinary usage. One is, I believe, as faulty as the other: the one class are unreasonably elaborate, the other are unreasonably negligent; the former depilate the leg, the latter not even the armpit. Let us now turn to the arrangement of words. In this department, what countless varieties of fault I can show you! Some are all for abruptness and unevenness of style, purposely disarranging anything which seems to have a smooth flow of language. They would have jolts in all their transitions; they regard as strong and manly whatever makes an uneven impression on the ear. With some others it is not so much an “arrangement” of words as it is a setting to music; so wheedling and soft is their gliding style. And what shall I say of that arrangement in which words are put off and, after being long waited for, just manage to come in at the end of a period? Or again of that softly-concluding style, Cicero-fashion, with a gradual and gently poised descent always the same and always with the customary arrangement of the rhythm! Nor is the fault only in the style of the sentences, if they are either petty and childish, or debasing, with more daring than modesty should allow, or if they are flowery and cloying, or if they end in emptiness, accomplishing mere sound and nothing more. Some individual makes these vices fashionable—some person who controls the eloquence of the day; the rest follow his lead and communicate the habit to each other. Thus when Sallust was in his glory, phrases were lopped off, words came to a close unexpectedly, and obscure conciseness was equivalent to elegance. L. Arruntius, a man of rare simplicity, author of a historical work on the Punic War, was a member and a strong supporter of the Sallust school. There is a phrase in Sallust: exercitum argento fecit, meaning thereby that he recruited an army by means of money. Arruntius began to like this idea; he therefore inserted the verb facio all through his book. Hence, in one passage, fugam nostris fecere; in another, Hiero, rex Syracusanorum, bellum fecit; and in another, quae audita Panhormitanos dedere Romanis fecere. I merely desired to give you a taste; his whole book is interwoven with such stuff as this. What Sallust reserved for occasional use, Arruntius makes into a frequent and almost continual habit—and there was a reason: for Sallust used the words as they occurred to his mind, while the other writer went afield in search of them. So you see the results of copying another man’s vices. Again, Sallust said: aquis hiemantibus. Arruntius, in his first book on the Punic War, uses the words: repente hiemavit tempestas. And elsewhere, wishing to describe an exceptionally cold year, he says: totus hiemavit annus. And in another passage: inde sexaginta onerarias leves praeter militem et necessarios nautarum hiemante aquilone misit; and he continues to bolster many passages with this metaphor. In a certain place, Sallust gives the words: inter arma civilia aequi bonique famas petit; and Arruntius cannot restrain himself from mentioning at once, in the first book, that there were extensive “reminders” concerning Regulus. These and similar faults, which imitation stamps upon one’s style, are not necessarily indications of loose standards or of debased mind; for they are bound to be personal and peculiar to the writer, enabling one to judge thereby of a particular author’s temperament; just as an angry man will talk in an angry way, an excitable man in a flurried way, and an effeminate man in a style that is soft and unresisting. You note this tendency in those who pluck out, or thin out, their beards, or who closely shear and shave the upper lip while preserving the rest of the hair and allowing it to grow, or in those who wear cloaks of outlandish colours, who wear transparent togas, and who never deign to do anything which will escape general notice; they endeavour to excite and attract men’s attention, and they put up even with censure, provided that they can advertise themselves. That is the style of Maecenas and all the others who stray from the path, not by hazard, but consciously and voluntarily. This is the result of great evil in the soul. As in the case of drink, the tongue does not trip until the mind is overcome beneath its load and gives way or betrays itself; so that intoxication of style—for what else than this can I call it?—never gives trouble to anyone unless the soul begins to totter. Therefore, I say, take care of the soul; for from the soul issue our thoughts, from the soul our words, from the soul our dispositions, our expressions, and our very gait. When the soul is sound and strong, the style too is vigorous, energetic, manly; but if the soul lose its balance, down comes all the rest in ruins. If but the king be safe, your swarm will live Harmonious; if he die, the bees revolt. The soul is our king. If it be safe, the other functions remain on duty and serve with obedience; but the slightest lack of equilibrium in the soul causes them to waver along with it. And when the soul has yielded to pleasure, its functions and actions grow weak, and any undertaking comes from a nerveless and unsteady source. To persist in my use of this simile—our soul is at one time a king, at another a tyrant. The king, in that he respects things honourable, watches over the welfare of the body which is entrusted to his charge, and gives that body no base, no ignoble commands. But an uncontrolled, passionate, and effeminate soul changes kingship into that most dread and detestable quality—tyranny; then it becomes a prey to the uncontrolled emotions, which dog its steps, elated at first, to be sure, like a populace idly sated with a largess which will ultimately be its undoing, and spoiling what it cannot consume. But when the disease has gradually eaten away the strength, and luxurious habits have penetrated the marrow and the sinews, such a soul exults at the sight of limbs which, through its overindulgence, it has made useless; instead of its own pleasures, it views those of others; it becomes the go-between and witness of the passions which, as the result of self-gratification, it can no longer feel. Abundance of delights is not so pleasing a thing to that soul as it is bitter, because it cannot send all the dainties of yore down through the over-worked throat and stomach, because it can no longer whirl in the maze of eunuchs and mistresses, and it is melancholy because a great part of its happiness is shut off, through the limitations of the body. Now is it not madness, Lucilius, for none of us to reflect that he is mortal? Or frail? Or again that he is but one individual? Look at our kitchens, and the cooks, who bustle about over so many fires; is it, think you, for a single belly that all this bustle and preparation of food takes place? Look at the old brands of wine and store-houses filled with the vintages of many ages; is it, think you, a single belly that is to receive the stored wine, sealed with the names of so many consuls, and gathered from so many vineyards? Look, and mark in how many regions men plough the earth, and how many thousands of farmers are tilling and digging; is it, think you, for a single belly that crops are planted in Sicily and Africa? We should be sensible, and our wants more reasonable, if each of us were to take stock of himself, and to measure his bodily needs also, and understand how little he can consume, and for how short a time! But nothing will give you so much help toward moderation as the frequent thought that life is short and uncertain here below; whatever you are doing, have regard to death. Farewell.

[1] Quare quibusdam temporibus provenerit corrupti generis oratio quaeris et quomodo in quaedam vitia inclinatio ingeniorum facta sit, ut aliquando inflata explicatio vigeret, aliquando infracta et in morem cantici ducta; quare alias sensus audaces et fidem egressi placuerint, alias abruptae sententiae et suspiciosae, in quibus plus intellegendum esset quam audiendum; quare aliqua aetas fuerit quae translationis iure uteretur inverecunde. Hoc quod audire vulgo soles, quod apud Graecos in proverbium cessit: talis hominibus fuit oratio qualis vita. [2] Quemadmodum autem uniuscuiusque actio ~dicendi~ similis est, sic genus dicendi aliquando imitatur publicos mores, si disciplina civitatis laboravit et se in delicias dedit. Argumentum est luxuriae publicae orationis lascivia, si modo non in uno aut in altero fuit, sed adprobata est et recepta. [3] Non potest alius esse ingenio, alius animo color. Si ille sanus est, si compositus, gravis, temperans, ingenium quoque siccum ac sobrium est: illo vitiato hoc quoque adflatur. Non vides, si animus elanguit, trahi membra et pigre moveri pedes? si ille effeminatus est, in ipso incessu apparere mollitiam? si ille acer est et ferox, concitari gradum? si furit aut, quod furori simile est, irascitur, turbatum esse corporis motum nec ire sed ferri? Quanto hoc magis accidere ingenio putas, quod totum animo permixtum est, ab illo fingitur, illi paret, inde legem petit? [4] Quomodo Maecenas vixerit notius est quam ut narrari nunc debeat quomodo ambulaverit, quam delicatus fuerit, quam cupierit videri, quam vitia sua latere noluerit. Quid ergo? non oratio eius aeque soluta est quam ipse discinctus? non tam insignita illius verba sunt quam cultus, quam comitatus, quam domus, quam uxor? Magni vir ingenii fuerat si illud egisset via rectiore, si non vitasset intellegi, si non etiam in oratione difflueret. Videbis itaque eloquentiam ebrii hominis involutam et errantem et licentiae plenam. [Maecenas de cultu suo.] [5] Quid turpius 'amne silvisque ripa comantibus'? Vide ut 'alveum lyntribus arent versoque vado remittant hortos'. Quid? si quis 'feminae cinno crispat et labris columbatur incipitque suspirans, ut cervice lassa fanantur nemoris tyranni'. 'Inremediabilis factio rimantur epulis lagonaque temptant domos et spe mortem exigunt.' 'Genium festo vix suo testem.' 'Tenuisve cerei fila et crepacem molam.' 'Focum mater aut uxor investiunt.' [6] Non statim cum haec legeris hoc tibi occurret, hunc esse qui solutis tunicis in urbe semper incesserit (nam etiam cum absentis Caesaris partibus fungeretur, signum a discincto petebatur); hunc esse qui <in> tribunali, in rostris, in omni publico coetu sic apparuerit ut pallio velaretur caput exclusis utrimque auribus, non aliter quam in mimo fugitivi divitis solent; hunc esse cui tunc maxime civilibus bellis strepentibus et sollicita urbe et armata comitatus hic fuerit in publico, spadones duo, magis tamen viri quam ipse; hunc esse qui uxorem milliens duxit, cum unam habuerit? [7] Haec verba tam inprobe structa, tam neglegenter abiecta, tam contra consuetudinem omnium posita ostendunt mores quoque non minus novos et pravos et singulares fuisse. Maxima laus illi tribuitur mansuetudinis: pepercit gladio, sanguine abstinuit, nec ulla alia re quid posset quam licentia ostendit. Hanc ipsam laudem suam corrupit istis orationis portentosissimae delicis; apparet enim mollem fuisse, non mitem. [8] Hoc istae ambages compositionis, hoc verba transversa, hoc sensus miri, magni quidem saepe sed enervati dum exeunt, cuivis manifestum facient: motum illi felicitate nimia caput. Quod vitium hominis esse interdum, interdum temporis solet. [9] Ubi luxuriam late felicitas fudit, cultus primum corporum esse diligentior incipit; deinde supellectili laboratur; deinde in ipsas domos inpenditur cura ut in laxitatem ruris excurrant, ut parietes advectis trans maria marmoribus fulgeant, ut tecta varientur auro, ut lacunaribus pavimentorum respondeat nitor; deinde ad cenas lautitia transfertur et illic commendatio ex novitate et soliti ordinis commutatione captatur, ut ea quae includere solent cenam prima ponantur, ut quae advenientibus dabantur exeuntibus dentur. [10] Cum adsuevit animus fastidire quae ex more sunt et illi pro sordidis solita sunt, etiam in oratione quod novum est quaerit et modo antiqua verba atque exoleta revocat ac profert, modo fingit ~et ignota ac~ deflectit, modo, id quod nuper increbruit, pro cultu habetur audax translatio ac frequens. [11] Sunt qui sensus praecidant et hoc gratiam sperent, si sententia pependerit et audienti suspicionem sui fecerit; sunt qui illos detineant et porrigant; sunt qui non usque ad vitium accedant (necesse est enim hoc facere aliquid grande temptanti) sed qui ipsum vitium ament. Itaque ubicumque videris orationem corruptam placere, ibi mores quoque a recto descivisse non erit dubium. Quomodo conviviorum luxuria, quomodo vestium aegrae civitatis indicia sunt, sic orationis licentia, si modo frequens est, ostendit animos quoque a quibus verba exeunt procidisse. [12] Mirari quidem non debes corrupta excipi non tantum a corona sordidiore sed ab hac quoque turba cultiore; togis enim inter se isti, non iudicis distant. Hoc magis mirari potes, quod non tantum vitiosa sed vitia laudentur. Nam illud semper factum est: nullum sine venia placuit ingenium. Da mihi quemcumque vis magni nominis virum: dicam quid illi aetas sua ignoverit, quid in illo sciens dissimulaverit. Multos tibi dabo quibus vitia non nocuerint, quosdam quibus profuerint. Dabo, inquam, maximae famae et inter admiranda propositos, quos si quis corrigit, delet; sic enim vitia virtutibus inmixta sunt ut illas secum tractura sint. [13] Adice nunc quod oratio certam regulam non habet: consuetudo illam civitatis, quae numquam in eodem diu stetit, versat. Multi ex alieno saeculo petunt verba, duodecim tabulas loquuntur; Gracchus illis et Crassus et Curio nimis culti et recentes sunt, ad Appium usque et Coruncanium redeunt. Quidam contra, dum nihil nisi tritum et usitatum volunt, in sordes incidunt. [14] Utrumque diverso genere corruptum est, tam mehercules quam nolle nisi splendidis uti ac sonantibus et poeticis, necessaria atque in usu posita vitare. Tam hunc dicam peccare quam illum: alter se plus iusto colit, alter plus iusto neglegit; ille et crura, hic ne alas quidem vellit. [15] Ad compositionem transeamus. Quot genera tibi in hac dabo quibus peccetur? Quidam praefractam et asperam probant; disturbant de industria si quid placidius effluxit; nolunt sine salebra esse iuncturam; virilem putant et fortem quae aurem inaequalitate percutiat. Quorundam non est compositio, modulatio est; adeo blanditur et molliter labitur. [16] Quid de illa loquar in qua verba differuntur et diu expectata vix ad clausulas redeunt? Quid illa in exitu lenta, qualis Ciceronis est, devexa et molliter detinens nec aliter quam solet ad morem suum pedemque respondens? Non tantum * * * in genere sententiarum vitium est, si aut pusillae sunt et pueriles aut inprobae et plus ausae quam pudore salvo licet, si floridae sunt et nimis dulces, si in vanum exeunt et sine effectu nihil amplius quam sonant. [17] Haec vitia unus aliquis inducit, sub quo tunc eloquentia est, ceteri imitantur et alter alteri tradunt. Sic Sallustio vigente anputatae sententiae et verba ante expectatum cadentia et obscura brevitas fuere pro cultu. L. Arruntius, vir rarae frugalitatis, qui historias belli Punici scripsit, fuit Sallustianus et in illud genus nitens. Est apud Sallustium 'exercitum argento fecit', id est, pecunia paravit. Hoc Arruntius amare coepit; posuit illud omnibus paginis. Dicit quodam loco 'fugam nostris fecere', alio loco 'Hiero rex Syracusanorum bellum fecit', et alio loco 'quae audita Panhormitanos dedere Romanis fecere'. [18] Gustum tibi dare volui: totus his contexitur liber. Quae apud Sallustium rara fuerunt apud hunc crebra sunt et paene continua, nec sine causa; ille enim in haec incidebat, at hic illa quaerebat. Vides autem quid sequatur ubi alicui vitium pro exemplo est. [19] Dixit Sallustius 'aquis hiemantibus'. Arruntius in primo libro belli Punici ait 'repente hiemavit tempestas', et alio loco cum dicere vellet frigidum annum fuisse ait 'totus hiemavit annus', et alio loco 'inde sexaginta onerarias leves praeter militem et necessarios nautarum hiemante aquilone misit'. Non desinit omnibus locis hoc verbum infulcire. Quodam loco dicit Sallustius 'dum inter arma civilia aequi bonique famas petit'. Arruntius non temperavit quominus primo statim libro poneret ingentes esse 'famas' de Regulo. [20] Haec ergo et eiusmodi vitia, quae alicui inpressit imitatio, non sunt indicia luxuriae nec animi corrupti; propria enim esse debent et ex ipso nata ex quibus tu aestimes alicuius adfectus: iracundi hominis iracunda oratio est, commoti nimis incitata, delicati tenera et fluxa. [21] Quod vides istos sequi qui aut vellunt barbam aut intervellunt, qui labra pressius tondent et adradunt servata et summissa cetera parte, qui lacernas coloris inprobi sumunt, qui perlucentem togam, qui nolunt facere quicquam quod hominum oculis transire liceat: inritant illos et in se avertunt, volunt vel reprehendi dum conspici. Talis est oratio Maecenatis omniumque aliorum qui non casu errant sed scientes volentesque. [22] Hoc a magno animi malo oritur: quomodo in vino non ante lingua titubat quam mens cessit oneri et inclinata vel prodita est, ita ista orationis quid aliud quam ebrietas nulli molesta est nisi animus labat. Ideo ille curetur: ab illo sensus, ab illo verba exeunt, ab illo nobis est habitus, vultus, incessus. Illo sano ac valente oratio quoque robusta, fortis, virilis est: si ille procubuit, et cetera ruinam sequuntur. [23] Rex noster est animus; hoc incolumi cetera manent in officio, parent, obtemperant: cum ille paulum vacillavit, simul dubitant. Cum vero cessit voluptati, artes quoque eius actusque marcent et omnis ex languido fluidoque conatus est. [24] Quoniam hac similitudine usus sum, perseverabo. Animus noster modo rex est, modo tyrannus: rex cum honesta intuetur, salutem commissi sibi corporis curat et illi nihil imperat turpe, nihil sordidum; ubi vero inpotens, cupidus, delicatus est, transit in nomen detestabile ac dirum et fit tyrannus. Tunc illum excipiunt adfectus inpotentes et instant; qui initio quidem gaudet, ut solet populus largitione nocitura frustra plenus et quae non potest haurire contrectans; [25] cum vero magis ac magis vires morbus exedit et in medullas nervosque descendere deliciae, conspectu eorum quibus se nimia aviditate inutilem reddidit laetus, pro suis voluptatibus habet alienarum spectaculum, sumministrator libidinum testisque, quarum usum sibi ingerendo abstulit. Nec illi tam gratum est abundare iucundis quam acerbum quod non omnem illum apparatum per gulam ventremque transmittit, quod non cum omni exoletorum feminarumque turba convolutatur, maeretque quod magna pars suae felicitatis exclusa corporis angustiis cessat. [26] Numquid enim, mi Lucili, <non> in hoc furor est, quod nemo nostrum mortalem se cogitat, quod nemo inbecillum? immo quod nemo nostrum unum esse se cogitat? Aspice culinas nostras et concursantis inter tot ignes cocos: unum videri putas ventrem cui tanto tumultu comparatur cibus? Aspice veteraria nostra et plena multorum saeculorum vindemiis horrea: unum putas videri ventrem cui tot consulum regionumque vina cluduntur? Aspice quot locis terra vertatur, quot millia colonorum arent, fodiant: unum videri putas ventrem cui et in Sicilia et in Africa seritur? [27] Sani erimus et modica concupiscemus si unusquisque se numeret, metiatur simul corpus, sciat quam nec multum capere nec diu possit. Nihil tamen aeque tibi profuerit ad temperantiam omnium rerum quam frequens cogitatio brevis aevi et huius incerti: quidquid facies, respice ad mortem. Vale.