Delphi Complete Works of Juvena

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by Decimus Iunius Iuvenalis Juvenal


  languida uel praegnas et circumducitur uxor.

  hic petit absenti nota iam callidus arte

  ostendens uacuam et clausam pro coniuge sellam.

  ‘Galla mea est’ inquit, ‘citius dimitte. moraris? 125

  profer, Galla, caput. noli uexare, quiescet.’

  [117] If then the great officers of state reckon up at the end of the year how much the dole brings in, how much it adds to their income, what shall we dependants do who, out of the self-same dole, have to find ourselves in coats and shoes, in the bread and fire of our homes? A mob of litters comes in quest of the hundred farthings; here is a husband going the round, followed by a sickly or pregnant wife; another, by a clever and well-known trick, claims for a wife that is not there, pointing, in her stead, to a closed and empty chair: “My Galla’s in there,” says he; “let us off quick, will you not?” “Galla, put out your head!” “Don’t disturb her, she’s asleep!”

  ipse dies pulchro distinguitur ordine rerum:

  sportula, deinde forum iurisque peritus Apollo

  atque triumphales, inter quas ausus habere

  nescio quis titulos Aegyptius atque Arabarches, 130

  cuius ad effigiem non tantum meiiere fas est.

  uestibulis abeunt ueteres lassique clientes

  uotaque deponunt, quamquam longissima cenae

  spes homini; caulis miseris atque ignis emendus.

  optima siluarum interea pelagique uorabit 135

  rex horum uacuisque toris tantum ipse iacebit.

  nam de tot pulchris et latis orbibus et tam

  antiquis una comedunt patrimonia mensa.

  nullus iam parasitus erit. sed quis ferat istas

  luxuriae sordes? quanta est gula quae sibi totos 140

  ponit apros, animal propter conuiuia natum!

  poena tamen praesens, cum tu deponis amictus

  turgidus et crudum pauonem in balnea portas.

  hinc subitae mortes atque intestata senectus.

  it noua nec tristis per cunctas fabula cenas; 145

  ducitur iratis plaudendum funus amicis.

  [127] The day itself is marked out by a fine round of business. First comes the dole; then the courts, and Apollo learned in the law, and those triumphal statues among which some Egyptian Arabarch or other has dared to set up his titles; against whose statue more than one kind of nuisance may be committed! Wearied and hopeless, the old clients leave the door, though the last hope that a man relinquishes is that of a dinner; the poor wretches must buy their cabbage and their fuel. Meanwhile their lordly patron will be devouring the choicest products of wood and sea, lying alone upon an empty couch; for off those huge and splendid antique dinner-tables he will consume a whole patrimony at a single meal. Ere long no parasites will be left! Who can bear to see luxury so mean? What a huge gullet to have a whole boar — an animal created for conviviality — served up to it! But you will soon pay for it, my friend, when you take off your clothes, and with distended stomach carry your peacock into the bath undigested! Hence a sudden death, and an intestate old age; the new and merry tale runs the round of every dinner-table, and the corpse is carried forth to burial amid the cheers of enraged friends!

  nil erit ulterius quod nostris moribus addat

  posteritas, eadem facient cupientque minores,

  omne in praecipiti uitium stetit. utere uelis,

  totos pande sinus. dices hic forsitan ‘unde 150

  ingenium par materiae? unde illa priorum

  scribendi quodcumque animo flagrante liberet

  simplicitas? “cuius non audeo dicere nomen?

  quid refert dictis ignoscat Mucius an non?”

  pone Tigillinum, taeda lucebis in illa 155

  qua stantes ardent qui fixo gutture fumant,

  et latum media sulcum deducit harena.’

  [147] To these ways of ours Posterity will have nothing to add; our grandchildren will do the same things, and desire the same things, that we do. All vice is at its acme; up with your sails and shake out every stitch of canvas! Here perhaps you will say, “Where find the talent to match the theme? Where find that freedom of our forefathers to write whatever the burning soul desired? ‘What man is there that I dare not name? What matters it whether Mucius forgives my words or no?’” But just describe Tigellinus and you will blaze amid those faggots in which men, with their throats tightly gripped, stand and burn and smoke, and you trace a broad furrow through the middle of the arena.

  qui dedit ergo tribus patruis aconita, uehatur

  pensilibus plumis atque illinc despiciat nos?

  ‘cum ueniet contra, digito compesce labellum: 160

  accusator erit qui uerbum dixerit “hic est.”

  securus licet Aenean Rutulumque ferocem

  committas, nulli grauis est percussus Achilles

  aut multum quaesitus Hylas urnamque secutus:

  ense uelut stricto quotiens Lucilius ardens 165

  infremuit, rubet auditor cui frigida mens est

  criminibus, tacita sudant praecordia culpa.

  inde ira et lacrimae. tecum prius ergo uoluta

  haec animo ante tubas: galeatum sero duelli

  paenitet.’ experiar quid concedatur in illos 170

  quorum Flaminia tegitur cinis atque Latina.

  [158] What? Is a man who has administered aconite to half a dozen uncles to ride by and look down upon me from his swaying cushions? “Yes; and when he comes near you, put your finger to your lip: he who but says the word, ‘That’s the man!’ will be counted an informer. You may set Aeneas and the brave Rutulian a-fighting with an easy mind; it will hurt no one’s feelings to hear how Achilles was slain, or how Hylas was searched for when he tumbled after his pitcher. But when Lucilius roars and rages as if with sword in hand, the hearer, whose soul was cold with crime, grows red; he sweats with the secret consciousness of sin. Hence wrath and tears. So turn these things over in your mind before the trumpet sounds; the helmet once donned, it is too late to repent you of the battle.” Then I will try what I may say of those worthies whose ashes lie under the Flaminian and Latin roads.

  Satire 2. Moralists without Morals

  Vltra Sauromatas fugere hinc libet et glacialem

  Oceanum, quotiens aliquid de moribus audent

  qui Curios simulant et Bacchanalia uiuunt.

  indocti primum, quamquam plena omnia gypso

  Chrysippi inuenias; nam perfectissimus horum, 5

  si quis Aristotelen similem uel Pittacon emit

  et iubet archet pluteum seruare Cleanthas.

  frontis nulla fides; quis enim non uicus abundat

  tristibus obscenis? castigas turpia, cum sis

  inter Socraticos notissima fossa cinaedos? 10

  hispida membra quidem et durae per bracchia saetae

  promittunt atrocem animum, sed podice leui

  caeduntur tumidae medico ridente mariscae.

  rarus sermo illis et magna libido tacendi

  atque supercilio breuior coma. uerius ergo 15

  et magis ingenue Peribomius; hunc ego fatis

  inputo, qui uultu morbum incessuque fatetur.

  horum simplicitas miserabilis, his furor ipse

  dat ueniam; sed peiiores, qui talia uerbis

  Herculis inuadunt et de uirtute locuti 20

  clunem agitant. ‘ego te ceuentem, Sexte, uerebor?’

  infamis Varillus ait, ‘quo deterior te?’

  loripedem rectus derideat, Aethiopem albus.

  quis tulerit Gracchos de seditione querentes?

  quis caelum terris non misceat et mare caelo 25

  si fur displiceat Verri, homicida Miloni,

  Clodius accuset moechos, Catilina Cethegum,

  in tabulam Sullae si dicant discipuli tres?

  qualis erat nuper tragico pollutus adulter

  concubitu, qui tunc leges reuocabat amaras 30

  omnibus atque ipsis Veneri Martique timendas,

  cum tot abortiuis fecundam Iulia uuluam

  solueret et patruo similes effundere
t offas.

  nonne igitur iure ac merito uitia ultima fictos

  contemnunt Scauros et castigata remordent? 35

  [1] I would fain flee to Sarmatia and the frozen Sea when people who ape the Curii and live like Bacchanals dare talk about morals. In the first place, they are unlearned persons, though you may find their houses crammed with plaster casts of Chrysippus; for their greatest hero is the man who has bought a likeness of Aristotle or Pittacus, or bids his shelves preserve an original portrait of Cleanthes. Men’s faces are not to be trusted; does not every street abound in gloomy-visaged debauchees? And do you rebuke foul practices, when you are yourself the most notorious of the Socratic reprobates? A hairy body, and arms stiff with bristles, give promise of a manly soul: but the doctor grins when he cuts into the growths on your shaved buttocks. Men of your kidney talk little; they glory in taciturnity, and cut their hair shorter than their eyebrows. Peribomius himself is more open and more honest; his face, his walk, betray his distemper, and I charge Destiny with his failings. Such men excite your pity by their frankness; the very fury of their passions wins them pardon. Far worse are those who denounce evil ways in the language of a Hercules; and after discoursing upon virtue, prepare to practise vice. “Am I to respect you, Sextus,” quoth the ill-famed Varillus, “when you do as I do? How am I worse than yourself? “ Let the straight-legged man laugh at the club-footed, the white man at the blackamoor: but who could endure the Gracchi railing at sedition? Who will not confound heaven with earth, and sea with sky, if Verves denounce thieves, or Milo cut-throats? If Clodius condemn adulterers, or Catiline upbraid Cethegus; or if Sulla’s three disciples inveigh against proscriptions? Such a man was that adulterer who, after lately defiling himself by a union of the tragic style, revived the stern laws that were to be a terror to all men — ay, even to Mars and Venus — at the moment when Julia was relieving her fertile womb and giving birth to abortions that displayed the similitude of her uncle. Is it not then right and proper that the very worst of sinners should despise your pretended Scauri, and bite back when bitten?

  non tulit ex illis toruum Laronia quendam

  clamantem totiens ‘ubi nunc, lex Iulia, dormis?’

  atque ita subridens: ‘felicia tempora, quae te

  moribus opponunt. habeat iam Roma pudorem:

  tertius e caelo cecidit Cato. sed tamen unde 40

  haec emis, hirsuto spirant opobalsama collo

  quae tibi? ne pudeat dominum monstrare tabernae.

  quod si uexantur leges ac iura, citari

  ante omnis debet Scantinia. respice primum

  et scrutare uiros, faciunt nam plura; sed illos 45

  defendit numerus iunctaeque umbone phalanges.

  magna inter molles concordia. non erit ullum

  exemplum in nostro tam detestabile sexu.

  Tedia non lambit Cluuiam nec Flora Catullam:

  Hispo subit iuuenes et morbo pallet utroque. 50

  [36] Laronia could not contain herself when one of these sour-faced worthies cried out, “What of your Julian Law? Has it gone to sleep?” To which she answered smilingly,” O happy times to have you for a censor of our morals! Once more may Rome regain her modesty; a third Cato has come down to us from the skies! But tell me, where did you buy that balsam juice that exhales from your hairy neck? Don’t be ashamed to point out to me the shopman! If laws and statutes are to be raked up, you should cite first of all the Scantinian : inquire first into the things that are done by men; men do more wicked things than we do, but they are protected by their numbers, and the tight-locked shields of their phalanx. Male effeminates agree wondrously well among themselves; never in our sex will you find such loathsome examples of evil.

  numquid nos agimus causas, ciuilia iura

  nouimus aut ullo strepitu fora uestra mouemus?

  luctantur paucae, comedunt coloephia paucae.

  uos lanam trahitis calathisque peracta refertis

  uellera, uos tenui praegnantem stamine fusum 55

  Penelope melius, leuius torquetis Arachne,

  horrida quale facit residens in codice paelex.

  notum est cur solo tabulas inpleuerit Hister

  liberto, dederit uiuus cur multa puellae.

  diues erit magno quae dormit tertia lecto. 60

  tu nube atque tace: donant arcana cylindros.

  de nobis post haec tristis sententia fertur?

  dat ueniam coruis, uexat censura columbas.’

  [51] “Do we women ever plead in the courts? Are we learned in the Law? Do your court-houses ever ring with our bawling? Some few of us are wrestlers; some of us eat meat-rations: you men spin wool and bring back your tale of work in baskets when it is done; you twirl round the spindle big with fine thread more deftly than Penelope, more delicately than Arachne, doing work such as an unkempt drab squatting on a log would do. Everybody knows why Hister left all his property to his freedman, why in his life-time he gave so many presents to his young wife; the woman who sleeps third in a big bed will want for nothing. So when you take a husband, keep your mouth shut; precious stones will be the reward of a well-kept secret. After this, what condemnation can be pronounced on women? Our censor absolves the crow and passes judgment on the pigeon!”

  fugerunt trepidi uera ac manifesta canentem

  Stoicidae; quid enim falsi Laronia? sed quid 65

  non facient alii, cum tu multicia sumas,

  Cretice, et hanc uestem populo mirante perores

  in Proculas et Pollittas? est moecha Fabulla;

  damnetur, si uis, etiam Carfinia: talem

  non sumet damnata togam. ‘sed Iulius ardet, 70

  aestuo.’ nudus agas: minus est insania turpis.

  en habitum quo te leges ac iura ferentem

  uulneribus crudis populus modo uictor et illud

  montanum positis audiret uulgus aratris.

  quid non proclames, in corpore iudicis ista 75

  si uideas? quaero an deceant multicia testem.

  acer et indomitus libertatisque magister,

  Cretice, perluces. dedit hanc contagio labem

  et dabit in plures, sicut grex totus in agris

  unius scabie cadit et porrigine porci 80

  uuaque conspecta liuorem ducit ab uua.

  [64] While Laronia was uttering these plain truths, the would-be Stoics made off in confusion: for what word of untruth had she spoken? Yet what will not other men do when you, Creticus, dress yourself in garments of gauze, and while everyone is marvelling at your attire, launch out against the Proculae and the Pollittae? Fabulla is an adulteress; condemn Carfinia of the same crime if you please; but however guilty, they would never wear such a gown as yours. “O but,” you say, “these July days are so sweltering!” Then why not plead without clothes? Such madness would be less disgraceful. A pretty garb yours in which to propose or expound laws to our countrymen flushed with victory, and with their wounds yet unhealed; and to those mountain rustics who had laid down their ploughs to listen to you? What would you not exclaim if you saw a judge dressed like that? Would a robe of gauze sit becomingly on a witness? You, Creticus, you, the keen, unbending champion of human liberty, to be clothed in a transparency! This plague has come upon us by infection, and it will spread still further, just as in the fields the scab of one sheep, or the mange of one pig, destroys an entire herd; just as one bunch of grapes takes on its sickly colour from the aspect of its neighbour.

  foedius hoc aliquid quandoque audebis amictu;

  nemo repente fuit turpissimus. accipient te

  paulatim qui longa domi redimicula sumunt

  frontibus et toto posuere monilia collo 85

  atque bonam tenerae placant abdomine porcae

  et magno cratere deam. sed more sinistro

  exagitata procul non intrat femina limen:

  solis ara deae maribus patet. ‘ite, profanae,’

  clamatur, ‘nullo gemit hic tibicina cornu.’ 90

  talia secreta coluerunt orgia taeda

  Cecropiam soliti Baptae lassar
e Cotyton.

  ille supercilium madida fuligine tinctum

  obliqua producit acu pingitque trementis

  attollens oculos; uitreo bibit ille priapo 95

  reticulumque comis auratum ingentibus implet

  caerulea indutus scutulata aut galbina rasa

  et per Iunonem domini iurante ministro;

  ille tenet speculum, pathici gestamen Othonis,

  Actoris Aurunci spolium, quo se ille uidebat 100

  armatum, cum iam tolli uexilla iuberet.

  res memoranda nouis annalibus atque recenti

  historia, speculum ciuilis sarcina belli.

  nimirum summi ducis est occidere Galbam

  et curare cutem, summi constantia ciuis 105

  Bebriaci campis solium adfectare Palati

  et pressum in faciem digitis extendere panem,

  quod nec in Assyrio pharetrata Sameramis orbe

  maesta nec Actiaca fecit Cleopatra carina.

  hic nullus uerbis pudor aut reuerentia mensae, 110

  hic turpis Cybeles et fracta uoce loquendi

  libertas et crine senex fanaticus albo

  sacrorum antistes, rarum ac memorabile magni

  gutturis exemplum conducendusque magister.

  quid tamen expectant, Phrygio quos tempus erat 115

  iam more superuacuam cultris abrumpere carnem?

  [82] Some day you will venture on something more shameful than this dress; no one reaches the depths of turpitude all at once. In due time you will be welcomed by those who in their homes put fillets round their brows, swathe themselves with necklaces, and propitiate the Bona Dea with the stomach of a porker and a huge bowl of wine, though by an evil usage the Goddess warns off all women from the door; none but males may approach her altar. “Away with you! profane women” is the cry; “no booming horn, no she-minstrels here!” Such were the secret torchlight orgies with which the Baptae wearied the Cecropian Cotytto. One prolongs his eyebrows with some damp soot on the edge of a needle, and lifts up his blinking eyes to be painted; another drinks out of an obscenely-shaped glass, and ties up his long locks in a gilded net; he is clothed in blue checks, or smooth-faced green; the attendant swears by Juno like his master. Another holds in his hand a mirror like that carried by the effeminate Otho: a trophy of the Auruncan Actor, in which he gazed at his own image in full armour when he was just ready to give the order to advance — a thing notable and novel in the annals of our time, a mirror among the kit of Civil War! It needed, in truth, a mighty general to slay Galba, and keep his own skin shaved; it needed a citizen of highest courage to ape the splendours of the Palace on the field of Bebriacum, and plaster his face with dough! Never did the quiver-bearing Samiramis the like in her Assyrian realm, nor the despairing Cleopatra on board her ship at Actium. No decency of language is there here: no regard for the manners of the table. You will hear all the foul talk and squeaking tones of Cybele; a grey-haired frenzied old man presides over the rites; he is a rare and notable master of the art of gluttony, and should be hired to teach it. But why wait any longer when it were time in Phrygian fashion to lop off the superfluous flesh?

 

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