No More Learning

Therefore refrain[943] from all that merits reprobation. _One_ powerful
motive, at least, there is to this--lest our children copy our crimes.
For we are all of us too quick at learning to imitate base and depraved
examples; and you may find a Catiline in every people and under every
sky; but nowhere a Brutus,[944] or Brutus' uncle!

Let nothing shocking to eyes or ears approach those doors that close
upon your child. Away! far, far away,[945] the pander's wenches, and
the songs of the parasite[946] that riots the livelong night! The
greatest reverence[947] is due to a child! If you are contemplating a
disgraceful act, despise not your child's tender years, but let your
infant son act as a check upon your purpose of sinning. For if, at some
future time, he shall have done any thing to deserve the censor's[948]
wrath, and show himself like you, not in person only and in face,
but also the true son of your morals, and one who, by following your
footsteps, adds deeper guilt to your crimes--then, forsooth! you will
reprove and chastise him with clamorous bitterness, and then set about
altering your will. Yet how dare you assume the front severe,[949] and
license of a parent's speech; you, who yourself, though old, do worse
than this; and the exhausted cupping-glass[950] is long ago looking out
for your brainless head?

If a friend is coming to pay you a visit, your whole household is in a
bustle. "Sweep the floor, display the pillars in all their brilliancy,
let the dry spider come down with all her web; let one clean[951] the
silver, another polish the embossed[952] plate--" the master's voice
thunders out, as he stands over the work, and brandishes his whip.

You are alarmed then, wretched man, lest your entrance-hall, befouled
by dogs, should offend the eye of your friend who is coming, or your
corridor be spattered with mud; and yet one little slave could clean
all this with half a bushel of saw-dust. And yet, will you not bestir
yourself that your own son may see your house immaculate and free from
foul spot or crime? It deserves our gratitude that you have presented a
citizen to your country and people,[953] if you take care that he prove
useful to the state--of service to her lands; useful in transacting the
affairs both of war and peace. For it will be a matter of the highest
moment in what pursuits and moral discipline you train him.

The stork feeds her young on snakes[954] and lizards which she has
discovered in the trackless fields. They too, when fledged, go in quest
of the same animals. The vulture, quitting the cattle, and dogs, and
gibbets, hastens to her callow brood, and bears to them a portion of
the carcass. Therefore this is the food of the vulture too when grown
up, and able to feed itself and build a nest in a tree of its own.

Whereas the ministers of Jove,[955] and birds of noble blood, hunt in
the forest for the hare[956] or kid. Hence is derived the quarry for
their nest: hence too, when their progeny, now matured, have poised
themselves on their own wings, when hunger pinches they swoop to that
booty, which first they tasted when they broke the shell.

Centronius had a passion for building; and now on the embayed
shore of Caieta,[957] now on the highest peak of Tibur,[958] or
on Præneste's[959] hills, he reared the tall roofs of his villas,
of Grecian[960] and far-fetched marbles; surpassing the temple of
Fortune[961] and of Hercules as much as Posides[962] the eunuch
outvied our Capitol. While, therefore, he is thus magnificently lodged,
Centronius lessened his estate and impaired his wealth. And yet the sum
of the portion that he left was no mean one: but all this his senseless
son ran through by raising new mansions of marble more costly than his
sire's.

Some whose lot it is to have a father that reveres sabbaths, worship
nothing save clouds and the divinity of heaven; and think that flesh
of swine, from which their sire abstained, differs in naught from
that of man. Soon, too, they submit to circumcision. But, trained to
look with scorn upon the laws of Rome, they study and observe and
reverence all those Jewish statutes that Moses in his mystic volume
handed down: never to show the road except to one that worships the
same sacred rites--to conduct to the spring they are in quest of, the
circumcised[963] alone. But their father is to blame for this; to whom
each seventh[964] day was a day of sloth, and kept aloof from all share
of life's daily duties.

All other vices, however, young men copy of their own free choice.
Avarice is the only one that even against their will they are
constrained to put in practice. For this vice deceives men under
the guise and semblance[965] of virtue. Since it is grave in
bearing--austere in look and dress. And without doubt, the miser is
praised "a frugal[966] character," "a sparing man," and one that
knows how to guard his own,[967] more securely than if the serpent of
the Hesperides[968] or of Pontus had the keeping of them. Besides,
the multitude considers the man of whom we are speaking, a splendid
carver[969] of his own fortune. Since it is by such artificers as
these that estates are increased. But still, increase they do by all
means, fair or foul, and swell in bulk from the ceaseless anvil and
ever-glowing forge.

The father, therefore, considers misers as men of happy minds,[970]
since he admires wealth, and thinks no instance can be found of a
_poor_ man that is also _happy_; and therefore exhorts his sons to
follow the same track, and apply themselves earnestly to the doctrines
of the same sect. There are certain first elements[971] of all vices.
These he instills into them in regular order, and constrains them to
become adepts in the most paltry lucre. Presently he inculcates an
insatiable thirst for gain. While he is famishing himself, he pinches
his servants'[972] stomachs with the scantiest allowance. [973] For
he never endures to consume the whole of the blue fragments of
mouldy[974] bread, but saves, even in the middle of September,[975]
the mince[976] of yesterday;[977] and puts by till to-morrow's dinner
the summer bean,[978] with a piece of stockfish and half a stinking
shad:[979] and, after he has counted them, locks up the shreds of
chopped leek. [980] A beggar from a bridge[981] would decline an
invitation to such a meal as this! But to what end is money scraped
together at the expense of such self-torture? Since it is undoubted
madness,[982] palpable insanity, to _live_ a beggar's life, simply that
you may _die_ rich.

Meanwhile, though the sack swells, full to the very brim, the love of
money grows[983] as fast as the money itself grows. And he that has the
less, the less he covets. Therefore you are looking out for a second
villa, since one estate is not enough for you, and it is your fancy to
extend[984] your territories; and your neighbor's corn-land seems to
you more spacious and fertile than your own; therefore you treat for
the purchase of this too, with all its woods and its hill that whitens
with its dense olive-grove. But if their owner will not be prevailed
upon to part with them at any price, then at night, your lean oxen
and cattle with weary necks, half-starved, will be turned into his
corn-fields while still green, and not quit it for their own homes
before the whole crop[985] has found its way into their ruthless[986]
stomachs--so closely cropped that you would fancy it had been mown. You
could hardly tell how many have to complain of similar treatment, and
how many estates wrongs like this have brought to the hammer. "But what
says the world? What the trumpet of slanderous fame? --"

"What harm does this do me? "[987] he says; "I had rather have a lupin's
pod, than that the whole village neighborhood[988] should praise me, if
I am at the same time to reap the scanty crops of a diminutive estate. "

You will then, forsooth, be free from all disease[989] and all
infirmity, and escape sorrow and care; and a lengthened span of life
will hereafter be your lot with happier destiny, if you individually
own as much arable land as the whole Roman people used to plow under
king Tatius. And after that, to men broken down with years, that had
seen the hard service of the Punic wars, and faced the fierce Pyrrhus
and the Molossian swords, scarce two acres[990] a man were bestowed at
length as compensation for countless wounds. Yet that reward for all
their blood and toil never appeared to any less than their deserts--or
did their country's faith appear scant or thankless. Such a little
glebe as this used to satisfy the father himself and all his cottage
troop: where lay his pregnant wife, and four children played--one a
little slave,[991] the other three free-born. But for their grown-up
brothers[992] when they returned from the trench or furrow, there was
another and more copious supper prepared, and the big pots smoked with
vegetables. Such a plot of ground in our days is not enough for a
garden.

It is from this source commonly arise the motives to crime. Nor has any
vice of the mind of man mingled more poisons or oftener dealt[993] the
assassin's knife, than the fierce lust for wealth unlimited. For he
that covets to grow rich,[994] would also grow rich speedily. But what
respect for laws, what fear or shame is ever found in the breast of
the miser hasting to be rich? "Live contented with these cottages, my
lads, and these hills of ours! " So said, in days of yore, the Marsian
and Hernican and Vestine sire--"Let us earn our bread, sufficient for
our tables, with the plow. Of this the rustic deities[995] approve; by
whose aid and intervention, since the boon of the kindly corn-blade, it
is man's fortune to loathe the oaks he fed upon before. Naught that is
forbidden will he desire to do who is not ashamed of wearing the high
country boots[996] in frosty weather, and keeps off the east winds by
inverted skins. The foreign purple, unknown to us before, leads on to
crime and impiety of every kind. "

Such were the precepts that these fine old fellows gave to their
children! But now, after the close of autumn, even at midnight[997] the
father with loud voice rouses his drowsy son:

"Come, boy, get your tablets and write! Come, wake up! Draw
indictments! get up the rubricated statutes[998] of our fathers--or
else draw up a petition for a centurion's post. But be sure Lælius
observe your hair untouched by a comb, and your nostrils well covered
with hair,[999] and your good brawny shoulders. Sack the Numidian's
hovels,[1000] and the forts of the Brigantes,[1001] that your sixtieth
year may bestow on you the eagle that will make you rich. Or, if you
shrink from enduring the long-protracted labors of the camp, and
the sound of bugles and trumpets makes your heart faint, then buy
something that you may dispose of for more than half as much again as
it cost you; and never let disgust at any trade that must be banished
beyond the other bank of Tiber, enter your head, nor think that any
difference can be drawn between perfumes or leather. The smell of gain
is good[1002] from any thing whatever! Let this sentiment of the
poet[1003] be forever on your tongue--worthy of the gods, and even
great Jove himself! --'No one asks how you _get_ it, but _have_ it you
must. ' This maxim old crones impress on boys before they can run alone.
This all girls learn before their A B C. "

Any parent whatever inculcating such lessons as these I would thus
address: Tell me, most empty-headed of men! who bids you be in such
a hurry? I engage your pupil shall better your instruction. Don't be
alarmed! You will be outdone; just as Ajax outstripped Telamon, and
Achilles excelled Peleus. [1004] Spare their tender years! [1005] The
bane of vice matured has not yet filled the marrow of their bones! As
soon as he begins to trim a beard, and apply the long razor's edge,
he will be a false witness--will sell his perjuries at a trifling
sum, laying his hand[1006] on Ceres' altar and foot. Look upon your
daughter-in-law as already buried, if she has entered your family with
a dowry that must entail death on her. [1007] With what a gripe will
she be strangled in her sleep! For all that you suppose must be gotten
by sea and land, a shorter road[1008] will bestow on him! Atrocious
crime involves no labor! "I never recommended this," you will hereafter
say, "nor counseled such an act. " Yet the cause and source of this
depravity of heart rests at your doors; for he that inculcated a love
for great wealth, and by his sinister lessons trained up his sons to
avarice,[1009] _does_ give full license, and gives the free rein[1010]
to the chariot's course; then if you try to check it, it can not be
restrained, but, laughing you to scorn, is hurried on, and leaves even
the goal far behind. No one holds it enough to sin just so much as you
allow him, but men grant themselves a more enlarged indulgence.

When you say to your son, "The man is a fool that gives any thing
to his friend,[1011] or relieves the burden[1012] of his neighbor's
poverty," you are, in fact, teaching him to rob and cheat, and get
riches by any crime, of which as great a love exists in you as was that
of their country in the breast of the Decii;[1013] as much, if Greece
speaks truth, as Menæceus[1014] loved Thebes! in whose furrows[1015]
legions with their bucklers spring from the serpent's teeth, and at
once engage in horrid war, as though a trumpeter had arisen along with
them. Therefore you will see that fire[1016] of which you yourself
supplied the sparks, raging far and wide, and spreading universal
destruction. Nor will you yourself escape, poor wretch! but with loud
roar the lion-pupil[1017] in his den will mangle his trembling master.

Your horoscope is well known to the astrologers. [1018] Yes! but it is
a tedious business to wait for the slow-spinning[1019] distaffs. You
will be cut off long before your thread[1020] is spun out. You are long
ago standing in his way, and are a drag upon his wishes. Long since
your slow and stag-like[1021] age is irksome to the youth. Send for
Archigenes[1022] at once! and buy what Mithridates[1023] compounded,
if you would pluck another fig, or handle this year's roses. You must
possess yourself of that drug which every father, and every king,
should swallow before every meal.

I now present to you an especial gratification, to which you can find
no match on any stage, or on the platform of the sumptuous prætor.
If you only become spectator at what risk to life the additions to
fortune are procured, the ample store in the brass-bound[1024] chest,
the gold to be deposited in watchful Castor's[1025] temple; since Mars
the avenger has lost helmet and all, and could not even protect his
own property. You may give up, therefore, the games of Flora,[1026] of
Ceres,[1027] and of Cybele,[1028] such far superior sport is the real
business of life!

Do bodies projected from the petaurum,[1029] or they that come down
the tight-rope, furnish better entertainment than you, who take up
your constant abode in your Corycian[1030] bark, ever to be tossed up
and down by Corus and by Auster? the desperate merchant of vile and
stinking wares! You, who delight in importing the rich[1031] raisin
from the shores of ancient Crete, and wine-flasks[1032]--Jove's own
fellow-countrymen! Yet he that plants his foot with hazardous tread
by that perilous barter earns his bread, and makes the rope ward off
both cold and hunger. _You_ run _your_ desperate risk, for a thousand
talents and a hundred villas. Behold the harbor! the sea swarming
with tall ships! more than one half the world is now at sea. Wherever
the hope of gain invites, a fleet will come; nor only bound over the
Carpathian and Gætulian seas, but leaving Calpe[1033] far behind, hear
Phœbus hissing in the Herculean main. A noble recompense indeed for
all this toil! that you return home thence with well-stretched purse;
and exulting in your swelled money-bags,[1034] brag of having seen
Ocean's monsters,[1035] and young mermen!

A different madness distracts different minds. One, while in his
sister's arms, is terrified at the features and torches of the
Eumenides. [1036] Another, when he lashes the bull[1037], believes
it is Agamemnon or Ulysses roars. What though he spare his tunic or
his cloak, that man requires a keeper,[1038] who loads his ship with
a cargo up to the very bulwarks, and has but a plank[1039] between
himself and the wave. While the motive cause to all this hardship and
this fearful risk, is silver cut up into petty legends and minute
portraits. Clouds and lightning oppose his voyage. "All hands unmoor! "
exclaims the owner of the corn and pepper he has bought up. "This
lowering sky, that bank of sable clouds portends no ill! It is but
summer lightning! "

Unhappy wretch! perchance that selfsame night he will be borne down,
overwhelmed with shivering timbers and the surge, and clutch his
purse with his left hand and his teeth. And he, to whose covetous
desires[1040] but lately not all the gold sufficed which Tagus[1041] or
Pactolus[1042] rolls down in its ruddy sand, must now be content with a
few rags to cover his nakedness, and a scanty morsel, while as a "poor
shipwrecked mariner" he begs for pence, and maintains himself by his
painting of the storm. [1043]

Yet, what is earned by hardships great as these, involves still greater
care and fear to keep. Wretched, indeed, is the guardianship[1044] of a
large fortune.

Licinus,[1045] rolling in wealth, bids his whole regiment of slaves
mount guard with leathern buckets[1046] all in rows; in dread alarm
for his amber, and his statues, and his Phrygian marble,[1047] and his
ivory, and massive tortoise-shell.

The tub of the naked Cynic[1048] does not catch fire! If you smash it,
another home will be built by to-morrow, or else the same will stand,
if soldered with a little lead. Alexander felt, when he saw in that tub
its great inhabitant, how much more really happy was he who coveted
nothing, than he who aimed at gaining to himself the whole world;
doomed to suffer perils equivalent to the exploits he achieved.

Had we but foresight, thou, Fortune, wouldst have no divinity. [1049]
It is _we_ that make thee a goddess! Yet if any one were to consult me
what proportion of income is sufficient, I will tell you. Just as much
as thirst and hunger[1050] and cold require; as much as satisfied you,
Epicurus,[1051] in your little garden! as much as the home of Socrates
contained before. Nature never gives one lesson, and philosophy
another. Do I seem to bind you down to too strict examples? Then throw
in something to suit our present manners. Make up the sum[1052] which
Otho's law thinks worthy of the Fourteen Rows.

If this make you contract your brows, and put out your lip, then take
two knights' estate, make it the three Four-hundred! [1053] If I have
not yet filled your lap, but still it gapes for more, then neither
Crœsus' wealth nor the realms of Persia will ever satisfy you. No! nor
even Narcissus'[1054] wealth! on whom Claudius Cæsar lavished all, and
whose behest he obeyed, when bidden even to kill his wife.

FOOTNOTES:

[922] _Fuscinus. _ Nothing is known of him.

"Fuscinus, those ill deeds that sully fame,
And lay such blots upon an honest name,
In blood once tainted, like a current run
From the lewd father to the lewder son. " Dryden.

[923] _Alea_, i. , 89. Cf. Propert. , IV. , viii. , 45, "Me quoque per
talos Venerem quærente secundos, Semper _damnosi_ subsiluere Canes. "
The Romans used four dice in throwing, which were thrown on a table
with a rim (alveolus or abacus), out of a dice-box made of horn,
box-wood, or ivory. This fritillus was a kind of _cup_, narrower at
the top than below. When made in the form of a tower, with graduated
intervals, it was called pyrgus, turricula, or phimus.

[924] _Ludit. _

"Repeats in miniature the darling vice;
Shakes the low box, and cogs the little dice. " Gifford.

[925] _Tubera. _ Cf. v. , 116, _seq. _ Mart. , Ep. xiii. , 50.

[926] _Boletum. _ Cf. v. , 147. Mart. , Ep. xiii. , 48.

[927] _Ficedulas. _ Mr. Metcalfe translates "snipes. " Cf. Mart. , Ep.
xiii.
, 49, "Cum me ficus alat, cum pascar dulcibus uvis, Cur potius
nomen non dedit uva mihi? "

[928] _Gula_, i. , 140.

[929] _Septimus. _ Plin. , vii. , 16, "Editis infantibus primores
dentes septimo gignuntur mense: iidem anno septimo decidunt, aliique
sufficiuntur. "

[930] _Barbatos. _ Pers. , iv. , 1, "Barbatum hoc crede magistrum dicere
sorbitio tollit quem dira cicutæ. " Cic. , Fin. , iv. , "Barba sylvosa et
pulchre alita, quamvis res ipsa sit exterior et fortuita, inter hominis
eruditi insignia recensetur. "

[931] _Rutilus. _ Used probably indefinitely, as in Sat. xi. , 2, "Si
Rutilus, demens. " Rutilus was a surname of the Marcian, Virginian, and
Nantian clans.

[932] _Servorum. _ Gifford quotes an apposite passage from Macrobius,
i. , 2, "Tibi autem unde in servos tantum et tam immane fastidium? Quasi
non ex iisdem tibi constent et alantur elementis, eumdemque spiritum ab
eodem principe carpant! "

[933] _Sirena. _ Cf. ix. , 150.

[934] _Antiphates_, king of the cannibal Læstrygones. Hom. , Odys. , x. ,
114, _seq. _ Ovid, Met. , xiv. , 233, _seq. _

[935] _Tortore. _ vi. , 480, "Sunt quæ tortoribus annua præstent. "

"Knows no delight, save when the torturer's hand
Stamps for low theft the agonizing brand. " Gifford.

[936] _Ergastula. _ Cf. ad viii. , 180. Put here, as in vi. , 151, for the
slaves themselves. As 15 freemen were said to constitute a _state_, and
15 slaves a _familia_, so "_quindecim vincti_" form one Ergastulum. It
properly means the Bridewell, where they were set to "travaux forcis. "
Liv. , ii. , 23; vii. , 4. The country prisons were generally under-ground
dungeons. Branding on the forehead was a common punishment. Thieves
had the word "Fur" burnt in; hence called "literati homines," "homines
trium literarum. " Plaut. , Aul. , II. , iv. , 46. Cicero calls one
"compunctum notis, stigmatiam," Off. , ii. , 7. So "Inscripti vultus,"
Plin. , xviii. , 3. "Inscripti," Martial, Ep. viii, 79. Cf. Plin. ,
Paneg. , 35. Sat. x. , 183. Plaut. , Cas. , II. , vi. , 49.

[937] _Largæ. _ Cf. vi. , 239, "Scilicet expectas ut tradat mater
honestos atque alios mores quam quos habet? " x. , 220, "Promptius
expediam quot amaverit Hippia mæchos. "

[938] _Dictante. _ vi. , 223, "Illa docet missis a corruptore tabellis,
nil rude, nil simplex rescribere. "

[939] _Exempla. _ From Cic, Ep. , iv. , 3, "Quod exemplo fit, id etiam
jure fieri putant. "

[940] _Exempla domestica. _

"Thus Nature bids our home's examples win
The passive mind to imitative sin,
And vice, unquestion'd, makes its easy way,
Sanction'd by those our earliest thoughts obey. " Badham.

[941] _Luto. _ Callim. , fr. 133, εἴ σε Προμηθεὺς ἔπλασε καὶ πηλοῦ μὴ 'ξ
ἑτέρου γέγονας. Ovid, Met, i. , 80, "Sive recens tellus seductaque nuper
ab alto æthere cognati retinebat semina cœli; Quam satus Iapeto mixtam
fluvialibus undis finxit in effigiem moderantûm cuncta Deorum. " Cf.
Sat. vi. , 13, "Compositive luto nullos habuere parentes. "

[942] _Orbita_, from orbis; "the track of a wheel. " So by the same
metaphor the "_routine_," or course of life.

[943] _Abstineas. _

"O cease from sin! should other reasons fail
Lest our own frailties make our children frail. " Badham.

[944] _Brutus_ was the son of Servilia, the sister of Cato of Utica
(cf. x. , 319). So Sen. , Ep. 97, "Omne tempus Clodios, non omne Catones
fert. "

[945] _Procul hinc. _ The formula at religious solemnities. Cf. ii. ,
89. Ov. , Met. , vii. , 255, "Hinc procul Æsonidem, procul hinc jubet ire
ministros, et monet arcanis oculos removere profanos. "

[946] _Parasiti. _ Cf. i. , 139.

[947] _Reverentia. _

"His child's unsullied purity demands
The deepest reverence at a parent's hands. " Badham.

[948] _Censoris. _ Henninius' reading and punctuation is followed here.

"Oh yet reflect! For should he e'er provoke,
In riper age, the Law's avenging stroke
(Since not alone in person and in face,
But morals, he will prove your son, and trace,
Nay pass your vicious footsteps), you will rail,
And name another heir, should threatening fail! " Gifford.

[949] _Cerebro. _ Plin. , ix. , 37, "Cerebrum est velut arx sensuum: hic
mentis est regimen. "

[950] _Cucurbita. _ Properly a kind of gourd, κολοκύνθη thence from its
shape, and perhaps too from its _use_, applied to a cupping-glass.
These were made of horn, brass, and afterward of glass. The Greeks,
from the same cause, called it σικύα, or κύαθος (cf. Schol. ad Arist. ,
Lys. , 444). It is called _ventosa_ from the rarefication of the air in
the operation, and was applied to relieve the head. Hence _cucurbitæ
caput_ is used for a fool. Cf. Appul. , Met. , I, "Nos cucurbitæ caput
non habemus, ut pro te moriamur! "

[951] _Lavet. _ Browne says, "Who washes silver plate? " and prefers the
reading "leve. " "But might not his _patellæ_ be of silver? " iii. , 261,
"Domus intereà secura _patellas_ jam _lavat_. "

[952] _Aspera. _ Cf. i. , 76, "Argentum vetus et stantem extrà pocula
caprum. " v. , 38, "Inæquales beryllo phialas. " Virg. , Æn. , ix. , 266,
"Argento perfecta atque _aspera_ signis pocula. " Ovid. , Met. , v. ,
81, "Altis exstantem signis cratera. " xii. , 235, "Signis exstantibus
_asper_ Antiquus crater. " xiii. , 700, "Hactenus antiquo signis
fulgentibus ære, Summus inaurato crater erat asper acantho. "

"'Sweep the dry cobwebs down! ' the master cries,
Whips in his hand, and fury in his eyes:
'Let not a spot the clouded columns stain,
Scour you the figured silver; you the plain! '" Gifford.

[953] _Patriæ populoque_, an ancient formula. Cf. Liv. , v. , 41. So
Horace joins them, "Hoc fonte derivata clades in patriam populumque
fluxit," iii. , Od. vi. , 20 (vid. Orell. in loc. ). Ovid, Met. , xv. , 572,
"Seu lætum est, patriæ lætum, populoque Quirini. "

"Thy grateful land shall say 'tis nobly done,
If thou bring'st up to public use thy son;
Fit for the various tasks allotted men,
A warlike chief, a prudent citizen.