Laudator Temporis Acti

Homer, Odyssey 13.353-354 (tr. A.T. Murray):

Glad then was the much-enduring, goodly Odysseus,
rejoicing in his own land, and he kissed the earth, the giver of grain.

γήθησέν τ᾽ ἄρ᾽ ἔπειτα πολύτλας δῖος Ὀδυσσεύς,
χαίρων ᾗ γαίῃ, κύσε δὲ ζείδωρον ἄρουραν.

Arie Hoekstra on line 354:

κύσε: as he did at v 463 (which has the same formula) and Agamemnon did on his return (Od. iv 522). Both ζείδωρος (probably from *ζεϝέδωρος) ἄρουρα and its complementary formula φυσίζοος αἶα (cf. Bechtel, Lexilogus, I48) are probably highly archaic. For ζειαί, Triticum monococcum (and/or bicoccum?), see S. West on iv 41; on the problem of ζ (as compared with γ in Sanskrit yáva- 'barley') see M. Leroy in Mélanges Chantraine, op. cit. (xiv 199 n.), 106-17. ἄρουρα, lit. 'arable land', already in Mycenaean, PY Eq 213 (Ventris-Chadwick, Documents, no. 154), cf. also Ruijgh, Élément, 111 and 122-3.

Illustration by Jan Styka (1858-1925):

My 3rd great-grandfather, John B. Wagner, served in the pro-Confederate Missouri State Guard, 8th Division (under Brigadier General James Spencer Rains), 10th Cavalry Regiment (under Colonel William Hugh Erwin), from September 1, 1861, to April 22, 1862. It is therefore likely (though not certain) that he fought with his regiment in the Battle of Morristown, Cass County, Missouri, on September 17, 1861. Here are two accounts of the battle by participants, one (John Berry) on the Confederate side, the other (Thomas Moonlight) on the Union side.

"The Battle of Morristown in Cass County Was Sixty-Five Years Ago," Cass County Democrat (June 10, 1926), p. 9 (excerpt, cols. 2-3), rpt. in Missouri Historical Review 21.2 (January, 1927) 284-285 (I quote from the newspaper):

On September 17, 1861, one hundred and twenty-one Confederate troops were encamped just a short distance northeast of the main part of Morristown. The soldiers were under the command of Colonel Will Hugh Irwin and for the most part were untrained and poorly equipped.... [T]he location of the camp ... was not far from the town's main thoroughfare. Colonel Irwin and his company of men were there for the purpose of recruiting a regiment of soldiers to join the army of General Sterling Price who was then fighting at Lexington, Mo. Colonel Irwin was a Cass county citizen, making his home on a farm near the present town of Peculiar.

A member of Colonel Irwin's company of men at that time was John Ed. Berry, then just nineteen years old. Mr. Berry is now eighty-four years old and lives in Harrisonville. To watch him in action one would set him down as being twenty years younger, for he did not show fatigue after recently conducting a party of sight-seers over the old battle-ground, and telling how the handful of Confederate soldiers escaped after being surprised by two regiments, or some 1,500 Union soldiers, under the command of General Lane.

The night of September 16 was quiet, with no one stirring except those on guard duty. Just at the break of day, however, the pickets rushed to the sleeping camp and notified the officers that hordes of Federal soldiers were approaching the camp from the east. There was no time to prepare for defense, for the camp was unprotected and its occupants outnumbered ten to one, so the Confederate soldiers deployed along the brushy stream ... and soon were surrounded by the enemy.

There was a saloon located near the first bend in the stream, and it was here that Mr. Berry was ensconced, having a plain view of all that took place. While the Union soldiers were deploying, a column of cavalry headed by Colonel Johnson, rushed down Morristown's main street, while a body of infantrymen was stationed northeast of the Confederate camp. There was no disciplined order of battle, for the Confederates, using the dry stream as a trench and its rocky ledges as a parapet, were firing whenever there was a good target, Colonel Johnson being killed almost in front of Mr. Berry. The battle lasted until 8:30 o'clock that morning, with the Union soldiers getting decidedly the worst of the engagement. Not only were the Confederates outnumbered, but the enemy used two pieces of field artillery, which were not of much effect under the circumstances although a barn across the stream, south, which is yet standing, can show evidence of artillery fire.

Seeing that the Confederate forces would be annihilated if the battle continued, the officers ordered a retreat, which was accomplished, although Union soldiers had the southern soldiers pocketed. Being thoroughly familiar with the terrain, Colonel Irwin selected Mr. Berry to lead the retreat. This was successfully accomplished by following the stream east, during which they could see and hear the Union soldiers but could not be seen. The escape was miraculous, and after leaving the battle scene, the soldiers made their way to Harrisonville. As near as Mr. Berry can remember, one hundred and nineteen Union soldiers were killed and a great many wounded, while none of the Confederate forces lost their lives, although several were wounded and five were taken prisoners. The Union forces, after destroying the camp, left Morristown about 2 o'clock in the afternoon. The prisoners were taken toward Paola, Kans., and were executed just after the Kansas line was passed. The Union soldiers were stationed at Paola on recruiting duty and had marched to Morristown to drive out the Confederate soldiers, the march, about thirty-five miles, being made at night. Mr. Berry did not receive a scratch in the skirmish, and as far as he knows, there are now only four Confederate survivors of this battle. Besides himself, there are Jim Beegles of East Lynne, Mo., Tom Dolan of Rocky Ford, Colo., and Robert White of Kansas City, Mo.

Mr Beegles was not far from Mr. Berry when the former was wounded by a bullet piercing his right side. After the retreat to Harrisonville Mr. Berry and Hale Beegles, a brother of Jim Beegles, went back and after some difficulty, located the injured man. Jim Beegles recovered and for years has lived in East Lynne, in this county. He still possesses the bullet which went clear through his side.

Following are the names of some the Confederate soldiers who took part in the battle: John Ed. Berry, Jim Beegles, Tom Dolan, Robert White, yet living; Captain Will Dolan, Frank Dolan, Eph Jones, Captain Robert Adams, Captain A. S. Bradley, Walter Adams, Sam Oldham, George Nowell, Green Williams, William Stark, Dan Stark, Hale Beegles, Ed. Dunn, John Dunn, ———— McGruder, Reliford Hook, John Hammond, "Doc" Peterson and John L.L. Stephens. Captain Bradley was the father of Mack Bradley, now a prominent farmer of this county, and had been doing recruiting in Everett, a village northwest of Archie, this county. There may be other Confederate survivors of this skirmish, but their names are not known.

There were other skirmishes in and near this scene. That part of Cass county was undeveloped then, many of the present fine farms being nothing but timberland. A relic of the Morristown battle was recently unearthed near the spot where the saloon stood. It was a demijohn, full of bullet holes.

Details of the battle of Morristown have hitherto been unpublished. We have consulted several histories of Cass county in which the affair was mentioned, and they indicate that the Union forces did not know that the southern soldiers were encamped at Morristown, but Mr. Berry is certain they did.

There may be inaccuracies in the above account of the skirmish, but we have been faithful to what we saw and was told us. Over half a century has elapsed since that stormy period, but we believe that Mr. Berry told us of the fray as he remembered it.

One incident of the battle he recalls very distinctly. A Yankee bugler was blowing some signal quite lustily, when Green Williams, a Confederate soldier stationed not far from Mr. Berry, raised up and said, "I'll stop that dam' music." He fired and the "music" stopped.

Kip Lindberg and Matt Matthews, "'The Eagle of the 11th Kansas': Wartime Reminiscences of Colonel Thomas Moonlight," Arkansas Historical Quarterly 62.1 (Spring, 2003) 1-41 (at 10-12):

My next skirmish was at Butler, a town in Missouri that was captured by Col. Johnson's 5th Kansas²⁴ about the 12th of the month [September, 1861]. Nothing of special interest occurred in the way of a fight as the rebels ran at our approach, several, however, were killed where they were found in their houses afterwards or in the brush. On the 17^th two columns left West Point, a small place right on the Missouri & Kansas line. This command left in the afternoon and marched as if going into Kansas, but as soon as darkness came on the head of the column was changed towards Missouri. During the night the command was divided into two wings, each numbering about 300 men- one moving under Col. Johnson and the other under Col. Montgomery; the latter was to march straight on Morristown from the westward and strike the rebel command there at daybreak. Col. Johnson was to march northward through fields, fences and whatever came in his way and strike the enemy on the northeast side in conjunction with Col. Montgomery. I accompanied, with one howitzer, the command of Col. Johnson.

A more dashing and brilliant march was never made, a distance of about 30 miles was made most rapidly without incident. Col. Johnson was a little too fast and Col. Montgomery a little too slow, the former getting to Morristown at early day break, and the latter about an hour after day. The enemy were encamped in Morristown and numbered about 500 under command of Col. Irwin,²⁵ all Missourians, and as completely did Col. Johnson take them by surprise that not a picket or even a sentinel killed until the bullets from our sharps rifles went whistling through their tents. Had Col. J[ohnson]. behaved and conducted the attack with as much judgement as he had exhibited of gallantry, the enemy would not [have] escaped.

My last conversation with Col. Johnson was within one hundred yards of the rebel camp, where we were hidden from view by the timber. He asked me for my opinion as to the mode of attack. I urged the dismounting of the men and the summoning in of the howitzer, by hand, double cannistered [sic], right into camp and play into the tents until they cried "Hold enough!"²⁶ The Colonel would not hear to dismounting but ordered 2 companies to charge into camp, while with the balance, including my howitzer, he would sweep along the street from the eastward and cut off their retreat southward. Supposing, I humanely believe, that Col. Montgomery, who had only about half the distance to travel, would immediately on the sound of his guns close from the westward and completely hem in the enemy. "Man proposes but God disposes," [and] as I said before Montgomery was slow, and sick.

Ere we could make the little circuit as to get on the street, the rebels (or at least the most of them) had run from camp, crossed the street, [and] hid themselves in a ravine behind some brick buildings. As we came dashing along the street we received a crossfire from at least 400 rifles, at a not greater distance than ten steps. Col. Johnson was ahead of the chief bugler and received almost the entire fire. I came next and just saved myself and my men by seizing the bridle of the lead horse of the piece and dashing them round against the brick walls. Several of our men were killed and wounded at that moment, and but for the cowardice of the enemy not one of us would have escaped. We were huddled together, cavalry and artillery, in the street, and I trembled for the result until we changed our position; it became my duty to attend to this, as after the fall of Col. Johnson I was next in command, and none had seen him fall but myself, as it was still quite early in the morning. I immediately swung the command out of the street on to clear ground, opened on the ravine and houses with case shot²⁷ and sharps rifles, and in less than ten minutes the crack of a rebel rifle could not be heard.

We captured the entire camp and garrison equipage of the enemy, as well as horses, mules, wagons, rations & a number of arms; the loss of such property was of immense damage to the enemy as they could not possibly replace there equipage in the country, besides the demoralizing effect such a defeat had on a newly organized regiment, as was the case with this one. About 40 killed and wounded on our side, among the list of killed was the gallant Col. Johnson, with whom a braver soldier, a truer man and upright Christian never offered up his life a sacrifice on the alter [sic] of this country. After the wounded had been collected together Col. Montgomery's command came into town, which was thoroughly plundered and afterwards burnt.²⁸ Morristown was a den of rebels and a rendezvous for all the bushwhackers who ranged on Kansas soil, and the destroying of it saved Kansas in a manner from their depredations during that fall and winter.

²⁴ Col. Hampton P. Johnson, of Leavenworth, Kansas, was a Methodist minister and veteran of the Mexican War, having served under the command of his friend, James H. Lane. H.D. Fisher, The Gun and the Gospel: Early Kansas and Chaplain Fisher, 4th ed. (Kansas City: Hudson-Kimberly, 1902).

²⁵ Col. Hugh Erwin, commanding the Tenth Cavalry Regiment, Eighth Division, Missouri State Guard.

²⁶ Moonlight was proposing to advance the howitzer a short distance by hand, rather than by horse, in hopes that the movement could be more quietly accomplished. "Double canistered" is simply loading two tin cylinders of lead balls at once to double the blast effect.

²⁷ A hollow iron shell, filled with lead balls and a small bursting charge, which could be timed to explode at any distance from the cannon by means of a fuse. It was invented by Henry Shrapnel, a British artillery officer whose name became synonymous with explosive fragments.

²⁸ Because of their protective cover, pro-Confederate casualties were minimal, with only a single man known wounded. The Leavenworth Daily Conservative stated, however, "Twelve prisoners were taken, of whom five were subsequently shot." Witnesses reported the murdered men were first made to dig their own graves. Henry E. Palmer, "The Black-Flag Character of the War on the Border," Transactions of the Kansas State Historical Society 9 (1909-1910), 456.

Morristown no longer exists. Its location can be seen on this map, west of Harrisonville on the railroad line: Related post: John B. Wagner.

Gilbert Highet (1906-1978), Explorations (New York: Oxford University Press, 1971), pp. 97-98:

I am not a professional linguist, but I have learned and can read eight languages besides English. I have failed with two—Russian and Hebrew: Russian because it is too complex for me to learn it from a handbook without a teacher, and Hebrew because I have a block about the alphabet and the vowel points; but I'll master them both yet! And I still remember the excitement with which, at the age of eleven, I started learning French and Latin and ancient Greek. (Of course, that is the age when foreign languages should be instilled into the young: eleven at latest; ten or nine would be even better. At that period the young mind is flexible and the young character is pretty docile. It is perfectly ridiculous to postpone the study of languages to the high school age, when the mind begins to lose its concentration and the emotions are constantly interfering with its activities.)

Pindar, Nemean Odes 3.40-42 (tr. Richmond Lattimore):

The splendor running in the blood has much weight.
A man can learn and yet see darkly, blow one way, then another, walking ever
on uncertain feet, his mind unfinished and fed with scraps of a thousand virtues.

συγγενεῖ δέ τις εὐδοξίᾳ μέγα βρίθει.
ὃς δὲ διδάκτ᾿ ἔχει, ψεφεννὸς ἀνὴρ
    ἄλλοτ᾿ ἄλλα πνέων οὔ ποτ᾿ ἀτρεκεῖ
κατέβα ποδί, μυριᾶν δ᾿ ἀρετᾶν ἀτελεῖ νόῳ γεύεται.

The same (tr. Anthony Verity):

It is by inborn distinction that a man gains authority,
while he who has only been taught is a man of shadows;
he veers hither and thither, and never enters the arena with a confident step,
trying out thousands of exploits in his futile mind.

The same (tr. C.M. Bowra):

A man has much weight if glory belongs to his breed,
But whoso needs to be taught,
His spirit blows here and there in the dark,
Nor ever enters he the lists with sure foot,
Though countless the glories his futile fancy savours.

The same (tr. Anne Pippin Burnett):

Fame inborn gives weight to a man, but
one who needs teaching pants blindly after
this and that, his foot never sure
as he foolishly samples ten-thousand exploits.

Stephen Instone ad loc.:

40-2 The conclusion to be drawn from 28-39 turns out to be one of Pindar's favourite sayings, namely that success in physical struggle depends on the natural ability one has inherited rather than on any taught skills (cf. O. 2.86-8, O. 9.100-4). It is not surprising that Pindar should be drawn to this belief, since (a) many of the successful athletes for whom he wrote were themselves descendants of successful athletes (though not, it seems, Aristocleidas, since nothing is said in N. 3 about previous victories in his family), (b) success in the games requires good physique rather than brain.

The way the contrast is expressed has been tailored to the context: 'carries great weight' (βρίθει 40) suits a heavily-built pancratiast; 'with a sure foot' (ἀτρεκεῖ ποδί 42) suggests the pancratiast's need to resist being thrown; and the implied consequence of having inborn ability, namely that it will enable you to see through to the end what you set out to achieve, is clearly relevant to the victor: he has devoted himself single-mindedly to the pancration event and met with success. Lines 70-1 below resume the theme: achievement comes from putting yourself to a proper test.

41 a faint man ψεφεννὸς, not found elsewhere, is equivalent to σκοτεινός ('dark') or ἀμαυρός ('dim').

blowing now this way now that ἄλλοτ᾿ ἄλλα πνέων, lit. 'breathing different things at different times'. The man is like an inconstant, erratic wind; cf. Hes. Theog. 872-80 ('Winds blow differently at different times, and wreck ships and destroy sailors', 875-6).

The man who dabbles in lessons in this and that, with no inborn talent for any single activity, is a feeble person: he can never achieve anything or reach his goal; cf. N. 4.39-41 (on the futility of being envious): 'With envious eyes he rolls in the dark his empty thought and it falls to the ground'; P. 11.30 'The man who breathes on the ground roars unnoticed' (i.e. he who lives in obscurity may make a loud noise, but it will be futile).

See llja Leonard Pfeijffer, Three Aeginetan Odes of Pindar (Leiden: Brill, 1999 = Mnemosyne: Supplementum, 197), pp. 324-334.

Gilbert Highet (1906-1978), Explorations (New York: Oxford University Press, 1971), pp. 95-96:

I think of a jolly old philosopher named John Alexander Smith. (I spent an unforgettable year reading Aristotle's Metaphysics in a seminar with him and H.H. Joachim.) He was not a dry logic-chopper or a gloomy metaphysical brooder, but a sharp, bold, critical thinker, with some delightful personal eccentricities, such as having a huge library of whodunits, and grading each of them alpha, beta, gamma, or delta after reading it. After he grew to man's estate, he learned a new language every year of his life. He always taught himself, and he always used the same method. Choosing his language, he got hold of a translation of the Bible in it, and started to read, beginning either with the Book of Genesis, or with one of the Gospels, since he knew these books pretty well by heart. By the time he had finished one book of Scripture, he had a grasp of the general pattern of the language. After finishing one of the Testaments, he could read fluently. When he had finished the entire Bible, he could read and write the new language and could make a shot at talking it when necessary.

Leofranc Holford-Strevens, Aulus Gellius: An Antonine Scholar and his Achievement, rev. ed. (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2003), pp. 252-263 (material in square brackets added):

In 1.1 Plutarch [fragment 7] relates how Pythagoras calculated Heracles' human height: since the running track at Olympia was 600 of his feet in length, and those in other cities, though also reckoned at 600 feet, were shorter than the Olympic prototype, Heracles' foot was longer than common mortals' feet in proportion as the Olympic stade exceeded others; but since there was a settled ratio between length of foot and height of body, he was also taller than other people in the proportion just established. Read in the light of Vitruvius 3.1.2, 7 (foot : stature :: 1 : 6),⁹ this makes Heracles' height 6 x 320-45 mm = 1.9227 m [= 6 ft, 3.7 in], striking but not superhuman,¹⁰ which suits well with the ancients' unquestioning belief in the heroes' historicity, if supernatural tales were discounted;¹¹ even if we infer from Varro, p. 86 Salvadore at NA 3.10.10 that Heracles was seven Olympic feet = 2.24315 m tall, that would not be quite incredible.

⁹ But see Gros 18.

¹¹ Apollod. Bibl. 2.4- 9 makes Heracles six foot tall, Herodorus (FGrH 31 F 19) seven; cf. Sol. 1.88 with Salmasius i.42^bB-D. He is μορφὰν βραχύϲ beside Antaeus at Pi. I. 3-4. 71, an ode in praise of an ill-favoured victor; the two-cubit footprint by the Dniester, Hdt. 4. 82, would imply a height of 18 feet; Luc. VH 1.7 is a joke, but giants are easily fantasized by persons ignorant of the cube-square law. For the competing conceptions of heroes as human and superhuman in stature see S(amson) Eitrem, SO 8 (1929), 53-6, Von der Mühll 12-13 (cf. NA 3.10.11 on Orestes with Ch. 16 n. 100). Six Olympic feet are 4.89 cm more than the six Byzantine feet allotted Jesus Christ by Epiphanius Monachus, De uita B. Virg. 15 (PG 120.204 c); only 5.25 feet Nicephorus Callistus, Eccl. hist. 1.40 = PG 145.748 c. At BAV Reg. lat. 572, fo. 67^r (s. xii in.) lines of 128 mm and 96 mm (so I measure them, despite Rosalind Hill, edn. of Gesta Francorum, 103) purportedly represent 1/15th of Christ's height and 1/9th of his breadth respectively; see too Rykwert 84, 86 (ill.), 418-19 n. 35.

¹¹ Veyne 52-3.

I'm especially interested in Epiphanius Monachus' statement (Holford-Strevens, n. 10) that Jesus Christ was six feet tall—my grandmother used to insist that Jesus was the only person in history who was exactly six feet tall. Others might have been a hair more or less than six feet, she said, but only Jesus was exactly that height.

Related post: How Tall Was Jesus?

[Plutarch,] On Desire and Grief 2 (tr. F.H. Sandbach):

Theophrastus, on the contrary, said that the soul's lodging in the body was an expensive one; that for a short tenancy it paid a heavy price in its pains and fears, desires and jealousies; and that its involvement with these emotions in the body gave it a better case to take to court, since it could accuse the body of mayhem for all it had been caused to forget, of forcible seizure for its detention, and of outrage for the ill-fame and vituperation it suffers through being undeservedly held responsible for the evils that befall the body.

Θεόφραστος δὲ τοὐναντίον ἔφη τῷ σώματι πολλοῦ τὴν ψυχὴν ἐνοικεῖν, ὀλίγου χρόνου βαρεῖς μισθοὺς ὑποτελοῦσαν, τὰς λύπας, τοὺς φόβους, τὰς ἐπιθυμίας, τὰς ζηλοτυπίας, αἷς συμφερομένη περὶ τὸ σῶμα δικαιότερον ἂν αὐτῷ δικάζοιτο πηρώσεως ὧν ἐπιλέλησται, καὶ βιαίων ἐφ' οἷς κατέχεται, καὶ ὕβρεως ὧν ἀδοξεῖ καὶ λοιδορεῖται, τῶν ἐκείνου κακῶν ἀναδεχομένη τὰς αἰτίας οὐ προσηκόντως.

Euripides, Orestes 823-824 (tr. David Kovacs):

This is the elaborately dressed godlessness of knaves,
and the mad behavior of fools.

τόδ᾽ αὖ κακούργων ἀσέβεια ποικίλα
κακοφρόνων τ᾽ ἀνδρῶν παράνοια.

Homer, Iliad 8.228-235 (Agamemnon speaking; tr. Richmond Lattimore):

Shame, you Argives, poor nonentities splendid to look on.
Where are our high words gone, when we said that we were the bravest?
those words you spoke before all in hollow vaunting at Lemnos
when you were filled with abundant meat of the high-horned oxen
and drank from the great bowls filled to the brim with wine, how each man
could stand up against a hundred or even two hundred Trojans
in the fighting; now we together cannot match one of them,
Hektor, who must presently kindle our ships with the hot fire.

αἰδὼς Ἀργεῖοι, κάκ᾽ ἐλέγχεα, εἶδος ἀγητοί·
πῇ ἔβαν εὐχωλαί, ὅτε δὴ φάμεν εἶναι ἄριστοι,
ἃς ὁπότ᾽ ἐν Λήμνῳ κενεαυχέες ἠγοράασθε,        230
ἔσθοντες κρέα πολλὰ βοῶν ὀρθοκραιράων
πίνοντες κρητῆρας ἐπιστεφέας οἴνοιο,
Τρώων ἄνθ᾽ ἑκατόν τε διηκοσίων τε ἕκαστος
στήσεσθ᾽ ἐν πολέμῳ· νῦν δ᾽ οὐδ᾽ ἑνὸς ἄξιοί εἰμεν
Ἕκτορος, ὃς τάχα νῆας ἐνιπρήσει πυρὶ κηλέῳ.        235

Hermann Hesse (1877-1962), Magister Ludi: The Glass Bead Game, tr. Clara and Richard Winston (1969; rpt. New York: Bantam Books, 1978), p. 151 (Father Jacobus speaking):

Studying history, my friend, is no joke and no irresponsible game. To study history one must know in advance that one is attempting something fundamentally impossible, yet necessary and highly important. To study history means submitting to chaos and nevertheless retaining faith in order and meaning. It is a very serious task, young man, and possibly a tragic one.

Donald Davidson (1893-1968), "Late Answer: A Civil War Seminar," Poems 1922-1961 (Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press, 1966), pp. 52-55 (at 54-55):

We, too, have names that blaze on mouldering stone
And I have seen men's tears fall where they slept
And heard a shouting while I wept,
A century off yet louder in my ear
Than all that's so much magnified and near.

Gilbert Highet (1906-1978), Explorations (New York: Oxford University Press, 1971), pp. 93-94:

Friends sometimes ask me why I like learning new languages. I always feel like asking them why they do not like learning new languages, but I never do. For one thing, it would be too much like asking a tone-deaf man why he does not care for Debussy. For another, I know that many of them are actually afraid, and it would be embarrassing to expose their fear. They are timid about sounding like fools or small children while they are learning, and they are reluctant to remold their thinking and their habits of speech. I sympathize with this. Every human being has some inhibitions about learning certain new activities: skiing or dancing, diving or acting, public speaking or private thinking, all repel some of us. Then again, some people of a conservative bent believe subconsciously that there is only one language, their own; and that all others are silly monkey-talk not worth learning. They will not make the effort, any more than they would learn to bark and mew because they had a dog and a cat. This reluctance often appears when two language-groups live together on unsympathetic terms. Not many Peruvians of Spanish descent learn Quechua, the language of the conquered. Not many Englishmen learn Welsh: it was a special diplomatic effort for the present Prince of Wales to master the tongue of his princedom. Not many Jews in old Poland could speak Polish, and very few Poles knew Yiddish. I remember a British officer in Germany who, after some persuasion, though sticking in his big hooves and laying back his long hairy ears, started to learn German. When he was told that Please and Thank you were Bitte schön and Danke schön, he asked exactly what the phrases meant. 'What! what!' he grumbled when he heard. 'Pretty please and Pretty thanks? Silly bloody language, I'm damned if I learn another word of it!'

Friedrich Nietzsche (1844-1900), Morgenröte, Book 4, § 306 (tr. R.J. Hollingdale, Daybreak):

Greek ideal.—What did the Greeks admire in Odysseus? Above all, his capacity for lying, and for cunning and terrible retribution; his being equal to contingencies; when need be, appearing nobler than the noblest; the ability to be whatever he chose; heroic perseverence [sic, read perseverance]; having all means at his command; possession of intellect—his intellect is the admiration of the gods, they smile when they think of it—: all this is the Greek ideal! The most remarkable thing about it is that the antithesis of appearance and being is not felt at all and is thus of no significance morally. Have there ever been such consummate actors!

Griechisches Ideal.— Was bewunderten die Griechen an Odysseus? Vor Allem die Fähigkeit zur Lüge und zur listigen und furchtbaren Wiedervergeltung; den Umständen gewachsen sein; wenn es gilt, edler erscheinen als der Edelste; sein können, was man will; heldenhafte Beharrlichkeit; sich alle Mittel zu Gebote stellen; Geist haben—sein Geist ist die Bewunderung der Götter, sie lächeln, wenn sie daran denken—: diess Alles ist griechisches Ideal! Das Merkwürdigste daran ist, dass hier der Gegensatz von Scheinen und Sein gar nicht gefühlt und also auch nicht sittlich angerechnet wird. Gab es je so gründliche Schauspieler!

Homer, Odyssey 13.242-247 (on Ithaca; tr. Peter Green):

It’s rough terrain, not fit for the driving of horses,
Yet not wholly worthless, even if lacking broad plains.
Grain grows there abundantly, wine too is a product,
there’s always rain and dew to keep it fertile, it’s good
pasture for goats and cattle, there’s also fine ground cover
of every sort, together with all-year watering-places.

ἦ τοι μὲν τρηχεῖα καὶ οὐχ ἱππήλατός ἐστιν,
οὐδὲ λίην λυπρή, ἀτὰρ οὐδ᾽ εὐρεῖα τέτυκται.
ἐν μὲν γάρ οἱ σῖτος ἀθέσφατος, ἐν δέ τε οἶνος
γίγνεται· αἰεὶ δ᾽ ὄμβρος ἔχει τεθαλυῖά τ᾽ ἐέρση·        245
αἰγίβοτος δ᾽ ἀγαθὴ καὶ βούβοτος· ἔστι μὲν ὕλη
παντοίη, ἐν δ᾽ ἀρδμοὶ ἐπηετανοὶ παρέασι.

A.M. Bowie ad loc.:

242 ἦ τοι μέν: this combination of particles is used of strong expressions of opinion (GP 389).

243 λυπρή ‘poor’, from λύπη ‘pain, poor condition’, is a hapax in Homer, like βούβοτος (246), but the presence of two such words is not a strong argument for deletion of the lines: cf. 14.10n. for a similar collocation of hapaxes in one passage. τέτυκται: the perfect of τεύχομαι regularly means no more than ‘be’ (GH ii.6; cf. 14.138, 234).

244 ἀθέσφατος ‘unlimited’; lit. ‘that which has not been stated or decided by a god’, and so ‘something that does not fit in a given order’ (Fraenkel 1923: 281–2).

W.B. Stanford ad loc.:

Jonathan Swift (1667-1745), "Ode to the King. On his Irish Expedition and the Success of his Arms in General," lines 119-129 (from Stanza VII):

That Restless Tyrant, who of late
Is grown so impudently Great,        120
That Tennis-Ball of Fate;
This Gilded Meteor which flyes
As if it meant to touch the Skies;
For all its boasted height,
For all its Plagiary Light,        125
Took its first Growth and Birth
From the worst Excrements of Earth;
Stay but a little while and down again 'twill come,
And end as it began, in Vapour, Stink, and Scum.

Swift meant Louis XIV, but I can think of some modern political figures who fit the bill equally well.

Donald Davidson (1893-1968), "Lee in the Mountains," Poems 1922-1961 (Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press, 1966), pp. 43-46 (at 45):

And nothing else than this? Was it for this
That on an April day we stacked our arms
Obedient to a soldier's trust? To lie
Ground by heels of little men,
Forever maimed, defeated, lost, impugned?

The Adams-Jefferson Letters: The Complete Correspondence Between Thomas Jefferson and Abigail and John Adams. Edited by Lester J. Cappon (1959; rpt. Chapel Hill: The University of North Carolina Press, 1987), p. 255 (Adams to Jefferson, May 11, 1794):

If I had Your Plantation and your Labourers I should be tempted to follow your Example and get out of the Fumum et Opes Strepitumque Romae ["the smoke, the wealth, the din of Rome"] which I abominate.

The editor doesn't identify the source of the quotation, which is Horace, Odes 3.29.12.

For the sentiment see also p. 176 (Adams to Jefferson, March 1, 1787):

If it lay in my Power, I would take a Vow, to retire to my little Turnip yard, and never again quit it.

and p. 228 (Abigail Adams to Jefferson, February 26, 1788):

I have lived long enough, and seen enough of the world, to check expectations, and to bring my mind to my circumstances, and retiring to our own little farm feeding my poultry and improveing my garden has more charms for my fancy, than residing at the court of Saint James's where I seldom meet with characters so innofensive as my Hens and chickings, or minds so well improved as my garden.

Homer, Odyssey 13.79-80 (tr. A.T. Murray):

Sweet sleep fell upon his eyelids,
an unawakening sleep, most sweet, and most like to death.

καὶ τῷ νήδυμος ὕπνος ἐπὶ βλεφάροισιν ἔπιπτε,
νήγρετος, ἥδιστος, θανάτῳ ἄγχιστα ἐοικώς.

W.B. Stanford ad loc.: Related post: Sleep and Death.

Aristotle, Nicomachean Ethics 5.5.3 (1132 b 27) = Hesiod, fragment 286, line 2 Merkelbach and West (tr. W.D. Ross):

Should a man suffer what he did, right justice would be done.

εἴ κε πάθοι τά τ᾽ ἔρεξε, δίκη κ᾽ ἰθεῖα γένοιτο.

Donald Davidson (1893-1968), "The Thankless Muse and Her Fugitive Poets," Sewanee Review 66.2 (Spring, 1958) 201-228 (at 211; on Herbert Sanborn, professor of philosophy at Vanderbilt University):

One could not but be awed and obedient when Dr. Sanborn strode vigorously to his desk, cloaked in all the Olympian majesty of Leipzig and Heidelberg, and, without a book or note before him, delivered a perfectly ordered lecture, freely sprinkled with quotations from the original Sanskrit, Greek, Latin, German, French, or Italian, which of course he would not insult us by translating.