Quintilian: DECLAMATIONES MAIORES

Children must either support their parents in destitution or be bound. A certain man had two sons, a frugal one and a luxurious (prodigal) one. Having set out abroad, they were captured by pirates.

luxuriosus languere coepit. ambo de redemptione scripserunt. pater universis bonis in <n>ummum redactis profectus est.

The profligate began to languish. Both wrote about the redemption. The father, after all his goods had been reduced into coin, set out.

dixerunt illi praedones non attulisse illum nisi unius pretium, et eligeret utrum vellet. aegrum redemit. qui, dum revertitur, mortuus est.

The pirates said to him that he had brought only the price for one, and that he should choose whichever he wished. He ransomed the sick one, who died while he was returning.

alter ruptis vinculis fugit. alimenta poscitur. contradicit.

the other, with the bonds broken, fled. provisions are demanded of him. he refuses.

[1] Quamvis, iudices, in tanta malorum continuatione iam poteram nihil ex accidentium meorum novitate mirari, nullumque mihi reliquerint inpatientiae genus adversa, quae de solaciis remediisque creverunt, confiteor tamen hoc solum me prospicere nullo metu, nulla tristium recordatione potuisse, ut post piratas, orbitatem, famem hinc quoque calamitatibus nostris pondus accederet, quod reversus est filius meus. vivebam miser, ut hunc viderem, solaque superstitis expectatione suspensus avidissimam moriendi cupiditatem contentiosa mendicitate fallebam. pudet persuasionis!

[1] Although, judges, in so great a continuation of evils I could by now marvel at nothing from the novelty of my accidents, and the adversities, which have grown out of solaces and remedies, have left to me no kind of impatience, I confess nevertheless that this alone I could not foresee without fear, without any recollection of sad things: that after pirates, bereavement, hunger, there should be added from here also a weight to our calamities—namely, that my son has returned. I lived, a wretch, in order that I might see him, and, suspended solely by the expectation of the survivor, I was beguiling the most avid desire of dying by contentious mendicancy. I am ashamed of the persuasion!

redisse se iuvenis adfirmat, ut vindicaretur morte fratris, ut patris orbitate gauderet, nec intellegit maiorem se factis meis auctoritatem hac indignatione conferre; nunc magis sentio, quantum facinus fuerit aegrum non redimere: queritur se relictum, qui potuit evadere. utcumque igitur, iudices, poteram redemptionis illius reddere de praesenti iuvenis impietate rationem, et mihi crudelitas ista praestabat, ut filium viderer elegisse meliorem, non utor tamen occasionis huius invidia, nec quicquid miserae pietatis inpatientia feci, querela malo defendere. ego vero tunc non mores liberorum mentesque tractavi, nec mihi in illa tristissima condicione succurrit de conparatione consilium.

The young man affirms that he returned, in order that the death of his brother might be vindicated, in order that he might rejoice in his father’s bereavement, nor does he understand that by this indignation he confers greater authority upon my deeds; now I feel more how great a crime it was not to ransom the ailing man: he complains that he was left, who could have escaped. However, therefore, judges, I could render an account of that ransom from the present impiety of the youth, and that cruelty afforded me this, that I might seem to have chosen the better son; nevertheless I do not use the odium of this occasion, nor do I prefer to defend by complaint whatever I did through the impatience of wretched piety. But indeed then I did not consider the characters and minds of my children, nor in that most sorrowful condition did a counsel of comparison occur to me.

sola, quid facerem, necessitas, sola iuvenum meorum adversa suaserunt. ex duobus liberis neutrum magis amat, qui redimit aegrum.

Only—what was I to do?—necessity, only the adversities of my sons, persuaded me. Out of two children, he who redeems the sick one loves neither the more.

[2] Illud plane, iudices, ultra omnem malorum meorum fateor esse tristitiam, quod hac asperitate iuvenis, hoc inopiae squalorisque despectu famam optimi fratris incessit. hominem, qui piraticum carcerem, qui praedonum vincla discusserat, decuerat, ne voluisset aliter reverti. ex quo se nobis tanto virium labore restituit, poterat eius quoque admirationem mereri, qui pretio paulo ante cessisset.

[2] That, plainly, judges, I confess to be beyond all the sadness of my misfortunes: that by this harshness of the young man, by this disdain for poverty and squalor, he assailed the fame of his excellent brother. The man who had shattered the pirate prison, who had broken the bonds of brigands, it would have been fitting that he should not have wished to return otherwise. Since he restored himself to us with so great an exertion of strength, he could have merited even the admiration of him who a little before had yielded to a price.

dii immortales, quam laudem, quem gloriae favorem inpleverat, si pasceret patrem, <qui> redemerat fratrem!

Immortal gods, what praise, what favor of glory would he have won, if he were feeding his father—he who had ransomed his brother!

Relaturus vobis, iudices, ordinem hic malorum meorum <et> eventum, quem nemo tam crudelis, nemo tam saevus audiet, ut me non pascat, hunc ante omnia, qui se queritur in fratris comparatione damnatum, secreti doloris indignatione convenio. quid agis, impotens, superbe? tu nescis, utrum fuerim redempturus ex duobus sanis, ex duobus aegris?

About to relate to you, judges, here the sequence of my misfortunes and the outcome, which no one so cruel, no one so savage will hear as not to feed me, this man before all, who complains that he has been condemned in comparison with his brother, I confront with the indignation of a secret grief. What are you doing, intemperate, haughty man? Do you not know whether I would have been going to redeem out of two sound men, out of two sick?

habui enim, iudices, filios diversissima mentium corporumque qualitate compositos, et, sicut mox probavit saeva captivitas, in totam dissimilitudinem vitae quoque genere diductos.

for I had, judges, sons composed with the most diverse quality of minds and bodies, and, as cruel captivity soon proved, led apart into total dissimilarity also in the very genre of life.

[3] hic namque robustus ac patiens, non molliri prosperis facile, non accidentibus frangi, et quem de voluptatium gaudiorumque contemptu scires parem quandoque fortuitis; traxerat ex firmitate mentis magnam protinus et in membra constantiam. ille vero pariter in laetitiam metusque resolutus, alienus a curis, sollicitudinibus impar, delicatus, impatiens, et iam similis aegro. sed apud patris affectus haec ipsa liberos dissimilitudo iungebat, et erat quaedam in inaequalitate caritatis aequalitas, quod hunc ~serie~ laudatumque semper, illum iam quadam miseratione diligerem.

[3] for this one was robust and patient, not easily mollified by prosperities, not broken by accidents, and one whom, from his contempt of voluptuities and joys, you would know to be at times a peer to fortuities; he had drawn from the firmness of mind a great constancy straightway even into his limbs. the other, however, equally dissolved into joy and fear, alien to cares, unequal to solicitudes, delicate, impatient, and already like a sick man. but in a father’s affections this very dissimilarity of the children joined them, and there was a certain equality in the inequality of love, inasmuch as I always, ~with severity~, praised this one, that one I now cherished with a certain miseration.

quid profuit individua pietas? erat etiam me nolente manifestum, utrius magis colloquiis, magis laetarer aspectu. velit nolit, iudices, ipsa quoque querela iuvenis, quid de patris fateatur animo, probat: irasci quod non sit fratri praelatus aegro, impatientia est hominis, qui magis ametur.

What did my undivided piety profit? It was manifest, even I being unwilling, which of the two I rejoiced more in for his colloquies, more in at the sight. Willing or unwilling, judges, the youth’s very complaint also proves what it avows about the father’s mind: to be angry because he has not been preferred before his sick brother is the impatience of a man who is more loved.

accipite, iudices, maiorem pietatis aequae probationem: filium nec peregre dimissurus elegi; iunxi fratrum artavique comitatum, et utroque patris latere nudato visus sum mihi magis habiturus utrumque mecum, si pariter essent. hanc apud me iuvenum aequalitatem etiam in calamitatibus fortuna servavit: uterque captus est, ambo de redemptione scripserunt. dissimules licet, iterum tamen et inter adversa persuasionem carioris invenio: in captivitate communi, puto, minus speravit ille de patre, qui languere coepit.

Receive, judges, a greater proof of equitable piety: I chose that I would not send a son away abroad; I joined the brothers and curtailed their company, and, with both a father’s sides laid bare, I seemed to myself likely to have both of them more with me, if they were together. Fortune preserved with me this equality of the youths even in calamities: each was captured, both wrote about redemption. Dissemble as you will, yet again even amid adversities I find an indication of which is the dearer: in the common captivity, I think, he hoped less concerning his father—the one who began to languish.

[4] Tu mihi nunc, impotentissime iuvenis, tu, quaeso, responde, quid aliud facere debuerit pater duos redempturus. cunctas facultates in pretia collegi; rus, servulos, penates et omnia viliora properantius, festinatione perdentis addixi, et, ultra quam non potest excogitare summus adfectus, nihil senectuti meae, nihil dubiis casibus (pro inconsulta pietas!) nihil neque illis reservavi, quos redemissem. quantum, iudices, ad piratas tulerim, scire potestis ex hac fame: fuerit pretium licet exiguum parvumque, dum totum.

[4] You now, most intemperate young man, you, I beg, answer: what else ought a father, about to redeem two, to have done? I gathered all my means into the price; the country-estate, the little slaves, the Penates, and all the cheaper things I assigned at auction the more hurriedly, with the haste of one ruining himself; and, beyond what even the highest affection could devise, I reserved nothing for my old age, nothing for doubtful contingencies (oh unconsidered piety!), nothing even for those whom I was redeeming. How much, judges, I carried to the pirates you can know from this hunger: let the price have been scant and small, so long as it was the whole.

fingite quamlibet divitem, quamlibet pauperem patrem: nemo umquam plus pro liberis dedit, quam qui sibi nihil reliquit.

Imagine a father however wealthy, however poor: no one ever gave more for his children than he who left nothing for himself.

Utrumne igitur, iudices, nemo mortalium habet pretium plurium liberorum, an piraticae feritatis ingenium est in captivorum taxatione solos aestimare redimentes? dii immortales, quam arrogans me pirata, quam superbus excepit! 'parum,' inquit, 'attulisti, senex; languet alter.' quid ego a diis hominibusque merui, quod mihi non redditurus utrumque non ipse potius elegit?

Whether then, judges, has no mortal the price for several children, or is it the disposition of piratical ferocity, in the taxation of captives, to appraise only the redeemers? Immortal gods, how arrogant the pirate received me, how superbus! ‘Too little,’ he says, ‘you have brought, old man; the other is languishing.’ What have I deserved from gods and men, that, not going to return both to me, he did not himself rather choose which?

saevus et humani doloris artifex negavit a me duos posse redimi, deinde, ut hoc tristius, ut difficilius esset, redditurum se dixit, utrum maluissem. vides, iuvenis, quamtum pietati meae testimonium reddiderit ipsa crudelitas: condicio non ponitur nisi duos redempturo.

the savage and artificer of human sorrow denied that two could be redeemed by me; then, so that this might be sadder, more difficult, he said that he would give back whichever I had preferred. you see, young man, how great a testimony to my piety the cruelty itself has rendered: such a condition is not imposed except upon one who was going to ransom two.

Expectatis, certum habeo, iudices, ut in tristissimae necessitatis positus abrupto ad aegrum continuo properaverim. quis non putet audita condicione vincula me statim detraxisse languenti? oderitis licet confessionem meam, deliberavi.

You expect, I am sure, judges, that, placed under a most mournful necessity, with an abrupt break I immediately hastened to the sick man. Who would not think, the condition once heard, that I straightway took off the chains from the languishing one? You may hate my confession; I deliberated.

tenuit inter illos inexplicabiles doloris aestus, quam longum tenuit pietas misera consilium, et, quod numquam satis manibus filii, numquam satis excusabo conscientiae meae, non statim mihi ille deficiens unicus fuit.

I was held amid those inextricable surges of grief, as long as wretched piety held its counsel, and—a thing which I shall never enough appease to the Manes of my son, never enough excuse to my conscience—that failing only son was not at once the one for me.

[5] dissimules licet, orbitas, ego mihi plurimum morbis, plurimum videor adiecisse languori cunctationis mora, et sensit infelix, quid in electionis huius necessitate fuerim neutro languente facturus. tandem, quod solum habebat ambitus genus, desperatione praevaluit: accepi, fateor, illum, qui solutus quoque non sequebatur, quem non gaudium redemptionis, non laetitia praelati, non hortantis erexit patris amplexus. si esset in rebus humanis ulla clementia, merueram etiam de piratis, ut mihi duo redderentur.

[5] Although you may dissemble, Bereavement, I am sure I myself added very much to his diseases—very much to his languor—by the delay of procrastination; and the unhappy one perceived what, under the necessity of this choice, I would have been about to do, if neither were ailing. At last, since canvassing had only this one kind, he prevailed by desperation: I accepted, I confess, him who, even when released, did not follow, whom neither the joy of redemption, nor the gladness of being preferred, nor the embrace of a father encouraging, could raise up. If there were any clemency in human affairs, I had deserved even from the pirates, that two be returned to me.

Utinam, iudices, iuvenis illius vita praestaret, ut videretur non periculi miseratione sed caritate praelatus! me infelicem, quod bonam habeo causam! explicuit iustitiam comparationis, qui decessit etiam redemptus, et in perituro filio nihil aliud electum est.

Would that, judges, the life of that youth were of avail, so that he might seem preferred not by commiseration of peril but by charity! Wretched me, that I have a good case! He who died, even though redeemed, has unfolded the justice of the comparison, and in the son who was perishing nothing else was chosen.

in quo fui miser famae periculo! filius meus languore defunctus est; tamen pater occiderat aegrum, si reliquisset. videram continuo, iudices, in carcere illo, quantum promitteret constantia hominis, quem non captivitas, non expectatio patris, non fratris fregisset infirmitas, nec inmerito cuncta de fortissimo iuvene speravi, si fuisset ad omnes conatus explicato languente liberior.

in what peril to my reputation I was wretched! my son was carried off by languor; yet the father would have slain the sick one, if he had left him. I had seen straightway, judges, in that prison, how much the constancy of the man promised, whom neither captivity, nor the expectation of his father, nor the infirmity of his brother had broken; nor undeservedly did I hope everything from a most brave youth, if he had been freer for all endeavors, with the languishing one settled.

tandem miseros fortuna respexit, et, puto, contra praedonum commota feritatem ipsa consensit, ut nobis quem negaverant, non abstulissent.

At last fortune looked back upon the wretched, and, I think, moved against the savagery of the pirates, she herself consented that they should not take away from us him whom they had denied.

[6] non quidem mihi, iudices, arrogo temporis illius providentiam; nihil me fateor fecisse consilio. potest tamen utriusque iuvenis exitus necessitatibus meis adsignare rationem: periit quem redemi, reversus est quem reliqui.

[6] I do not, judges, arrogate to myself the providence of that time; I confess I did nothing by counsel. Yet the outcome of each youth can assign a rationale to my necessities: he perished whom I redeemed, he returned whom I left behind.

Invenisse te putas, iuvenis, patrem cibos et alimenta poscentem? quaerebam pretium tuum. testor clementiam mitissimae civitatis: hae preces, hic rogantis ambitus fuit: 'miseremini, date stipes, indulgete, conferte!

Do you think you have found, young man, a father asking for food and aliment? i was seeking your price. i call to witness the clemency of a most gentle city: these were the prayers, this was the canvassing of the petitioner: 'have mercy, give alms, be indulgent, contribute!

repetendus est ille, qui redimi maluit fratrem.' sed et hac te decebat reversum proclamare voce: 'erige vultus, pater, attolle tristitiam: vindicati de saevissimis praedonibus sumus; duos redemisti'.

he must be sought again, who preferred to have his brother ransomed.' but it also befitted you, returned, to proclaim with this voice: 'raise your face, father, lift up your sadness: we have been avenged upon the most savage brigands; you have ransomed two'.

Alimenta posco -- poteram non adicere filium pater, sed mendicus hominem, sed iuvenem senex. quis enim magis ex ipsis rerum naturae sacris venerandisque primordiis descendit affectus? quid etiam <non> inter liberos ac parentes tam commune, tam publicum, quam ut alicuius famem proximus quisque depellat?

I ask for alimenta -- I could refrain from adding “son” and “father,” but [speak as] beggar to man, and old man to youth. For what affection descends more from the sacred and venerable primordial beginnings of the nature of things? What moreover <non> among children and parents is so common, so public, as that each nearest should drive away someone’s hunger?

voluit nos ille mortalitatis artifex deus in commune succurrere et per mutuas auxiliorum vices in altero quemque, quod pro se timeret, asserere. nondum hoc caritas est, nec personis impensa reverentia, sed similium accidentium providi metus et communium fortuitorum religiosus horror. in aliena fame sui quisque miseretur.

That god, the artificer of mortality, wished us to succor in common and, through the mutual turns of aids, that each should assert in another what he would fear for himself. This is not yet charity, nor reverence expended upon persons, but the provident fear of similar accidents and a religious horror of common fortuities. In another’s hunger each one pities himself.

sic cibos obsidio partitur, sic inopiam pariter navigantium frequenter unius alimenta paverunt. hinc et ille venit affectus, quod ignotis cadaveribus humum <in>gerimus, et insepultum quodlibet corpus nulla festinatio tam rapida transcurrit, ut non quantulocumque veneretur aggestu.

thus a siege portions out foods, thus too the want of those sailing together has often been fed by the provisions of one. from this also comes that affect, that upon unknown corpses we heap earth, and no haste, however rapid, passes by any unburied body so quickly that it does not honor it with however small a heap.

[7] Parentibus vero liberi non praestatis alimenta, sed redditis. quanto, dii deaeque, breviora, quanto minora pro tot infantiae, tot pueritiae sumptibus, tam variis vel abstinentissimae iuventutis impendiis! si mehercules hoc quoque officii genus natura permitteret, bene pro deficientibus aliquid et vita vestra dependeret, iterumque ex illa, quam traxistis, anima portio brevis in suum rediret auctorem.

[7] To your parents, indeed, you children do not furnish sustenance, but render it back. How much, gods and goddesses, briefer, how much smaller, in return for so many expenses of infancy, so many of boyhood, so various expenditures even of the most abstemious youth! If, by Hercules, nature permitted this kind of duty also, it would be well that even your life should pay out something on behalf of the failing, and again a brief portion from that soul, which you drew, should return to its own author.

vultis scire, quantus nomini nostro debeatur affectus, quanta veneratio? non est beneficium quod pascitis, sed est facinus quod negatis.

Do you wish to know how great an affection is owed to our name, how great a veneration? It is no benefaction, what you feed; but it is a crime, what you deny.

Liberi parentes alant. pudet sacrorum nominum, pudet religionis humanae: hoc ergo lex erit? quid imprecer homini, qui primus fecit, ut pietate<m> iuberemus!

Let children support their parents. shame on the sacred names, shame on human religion: will this then be a law? what curse should I call down upon the man who first contrived that we should command piet< m >!

liberi parentes alant. o crudele factum, o numquam tristior fames! ita pascit ille, qui cogitur?

Let children sustain their parents. O cruel deed, O never sadder famine! Does he thus feed, who is forced?

'non meruisti,' inquit, 'accipere.' discede, pietas, quiesce paulisper, infirmitas. ~remuneranda sit. primum lex severissima est, ut fortius alimenta poscantur.

'You have not merited,' he says, 'to receive.' Withdraw, piety; be quiet for a little while, infirmity. ~let it be remunerated. In the first place the law is most severe, that maintenance be demanded more forcefully.

perdiderunt pulchritudinem sanctitatemque naturae, qui putant illis parentibus iura succurrere, quibus apud liberos salva est de mutua caritate reverentia; collisis prospexere pignoribus, et inter tam venerabiles affectus hoc quoque dignum providentia fuit, ut aliquid et odia praestarent. quereris, irasceris, et ideo iuberis. expectandum est videlicet, ut liberorum parentumque concordiam perferant totius merita vitae, et ut pietas, natura, sanguis accipiant cotidie tamquam amicitiae nexum, et, nisi vos promeruerimus obsequiis, adulatione, patientia, natales ortus et pignora prima perierunt?

they have lost the beauty and sanctity of nature, who think that laws come to the succor of those parents for whom, with their children, the reverence from mutual charity remains intact; they made provision for when the pledges clash, and among such venerable affections it was also worthy of providence that even hatreds should furnish something. you complain, you grow angry, and for that very reason you are ordered. evidently it is to be expected that the merits of an entire life should carry through the concord of children and parents, and that piety, nature, and blood should receive daily as though the nexus of friendship; and, unless we shall have earned you by services, by adulation, by patience, have birth, origin, and the first pledges perished?

[8] Si vultis, iudices, ut huic nomini salva sit in omni personarum diversitate veneratio: bonum patrem filius alat, lex malum. non faciam hanc rerum naturae, non faciam contumeliam legi, ut excusem vel pessimum patrem, ut sacro nomini temptem gratiam petere de venia. sim licet crudelis ac saevus, filium tamen diutius amavi.

[8] If you wish, judges, that to this name reverence be kept safe in every diversity of persons: let the son sustain the good father, the law the bad. I will not do this to the nature of things, I will not do a contumely to the law, so as to excuse even the worst father, so as to attempt to seek grace for the sacred name by pardon. Granted I be cruel and savage, yet I have loved my son for a longer time.

clauserim paternos penates, de testamento, de spe successionis expulerim, oneraverim vinculis manus, foedaverim membra verberibus; persolvi gratia non potest nec malo patri. arrogans, impotens sum? nolo cotidie mereri, quicquid mihi deberi coepit primo die.

I may have shut the paternal household Penates, I may have driven him out of the testament, out of the hope of succession, I may have burdened his hands with chains, I may have defiled his limbs with blows; gratitude cannot be paid in full, not even to a bad father. Am I arrogant, impotent? I am unwilling to have to merit every day whatever began to be owed to me on the first day.

'facilis, mitis, indulgens' vocabula sunt ista minoris affectus; propter haec aleretur amicus, pasceretur extraneus. vestrum quin immo crimen est, quod interdum aliud sumus, et, unde manifestum est diversitatem nostram venire de moribus liberorum, non invenias asperum patrem nisi iam peccantis aetatis. quid ais?

‘easy, mild, indulgent’—those are words of a lesser affection; on account of these a friend would be nourished, a stranger would be fed. Nay rather, it is your crime that at times we are different; and, whence it is manifest that our diversity comes from the morals of our children, you do not find a harsh father except when the age is already sinning. What do you say?

rigidus, immitis sum? ideo pasce tantum, pasce, non ultra. malo pro reverentia nominis nostri quicquid praestatis inviti, et cum alitur pater, quem quereris indignum, accipere mihi videntur omnes parentes.

Am I rigid, harsh? Therefore feed only, feed, no further. I prefer, out of reverence for our name, whatever you render unwillingly; and when the father is supported, whom you complain is unworthy, it seems to me that all parents thereby receive.

si vis, affectum debes, sin minus, necessitate servitutem, patientiam. non tamquam pater alitur, qui tamquam bonus amatur.

If you wish, you owe affection; if not, then, by necessity, servitude and patience. It is not as a father that one is maintained; it is as a good man that one is loved.

[9] Sepone, iuvenis, differ querelas; tunc irasceris, tunc obicies mihi, cum prosperitatium, cum secundorum officia deposcam. non talis ad tua genua provolvor, ut aestimandus sim. nulli malus est pater, cum esse coepit infelix: aspicis collapsum et ex omni calamitatium genere miserum et, ultra quod accidentium mensura non exit, in orbitate mendicum.

[9] Set aside, young man, defer your complaints; then be angry, then object against me, when I demand the offices of prosperity, of favorable circumstances. I do not so prostrate myself at your knees as to be an object for estimation. No father is bad to anyone, once he has begun to be unfortunate: you behold one collapsed and wretched from every genus of calamities, and, at the utmost point beyond which the measure of accidents does not pass, a beggar in bereavement.

riget squalidi capitis concreta canities, vigor pristini vultus vacuis luminibus intabuit, et per obstantium crinium inluviem tenuis arentium iactus oculorum. haeret adstricta nudatis ossibus cutis, et, in fame sua homine consumpto, iam membra sine corpore. iterum bonus sum, in pristinam religionem de calamitatium honore restituor.

the clotted hoariness of the squalid head stands rigid, the vigor of the former countenance has melted away with the lights vacant, and, through the filth of the obstructing hair, there is a thin cast of the drying eyes. the skin, drawn tight, clings to the bared bones, and, the man consumed by his own famine, there are now limbs without a body. again I am good, I am restored into my former religion by the honor of calamities.

adeone non habent haec ipsa supplicia poenas, quod posco, quod rogo, quod mendicus sum filii mei? et quanta, dii deaeque, non possunt pro nobis impetrare leges! quanto plura sunt, quae negantur, cum praestant inviti!

Do these very torments then not have their penalties—namely, that I demand, that I ask, that I am a beggar of my son? And how many things, gods and goddesses, the laws cannot impetrate for us! How much more numerous are the things that are denied, when they grant unwillingly!

non exigo, ut tuis manibus porrigas cibos, ut consoleris, ut foveas; proice, quod rapiam, abice, quod colligam. genus ultionis est pascere nec misereri.

I do not demand that you extend food with your hands, that you console, that you cherish; cast forth what I may snatch, cast away what I may gather. It is a kind of vengeance to feed and not to pity.

Si tamen, iudices, fas est impietatis huius ullas accipere causas, et filium, qui non alit, putatis reddere posse rationem, aestimate per fidem, quod sit facinus illud, cuius ultionem debeat exigere aliquis de fame patris. 'captum me,' inquit, 'non redemisti.' quis non putet queri de filio patrem? quemquamne dicentem feram: 'nihil tibi debeo, quia mihi vitae lucisque beneficium semel praestitisti, quia hunc spiritum, hoc corpus non ex indulgentia tua rursus accepi'?

If, however, judges, it is permissible to accept any causes for this impiety, and you think that a son who does not nourish can render an account, assess in good faith what sort of deed-crime that is, whose vengeance someone ought to exact on account of a father’s hunger. “Me, taken captive,” he says, “you did not ransom.” Who would not think a father is complaining about a son? Shall I endure anyone saying: “I owe you nothing, because you once furnished me the beneficium of life and light, because I did not receive again this breath, this body by your indulgence”?

[10] iniquissima magnorum condicio meritorum est, si, quicquid non fuerit adiectum, de prioribus perit, et pessimo exemplo gratiam praeteritis auferunt reliqua cessantia. non redemi? non tamen ideo minus est, quod in hunc te divinorum humanorumque conspectum de nostra protulimus anima.

[10] Most inequitable is the condition of great deserts, if whatever has not been added makes the former services perish, and, by the worst precedent, the remaining defaults strip the past of gratitude. I did not ransom you? Yet it is not on that account any less, that into this sight of things divine and human we brought you forth from our own soul.

maria terrasque, infatigabiles siderum cursus et cta sacro fulgore lucentia nos, ut fruereris, ostendimus; has, quas subtrahis manus, haec verba, quae negant, de meo spiritu, de meis visceribus hausisti. gaude potius, exulta, quod tibi patris asperitas praestat boni filii iactationem; solus habet, quod imputet patri, qui queritur et pascit.

the seas and the lands, the indefatigable courses of the stars and the heavens shining with sacred radiance we have shown to you, that you might enjoy them; these hands, which you withdraw, these words, which refuse, you have drawn from my spirit, from my viscera. rejoice rather, exult, that a father’s asperity affords you the vaunt of a good son; he alone has what he may impute to his father, who complains and yet feeds.

Quam multa, iudices, huic querelae respondere poteram, propter quae filium salva pietate non redemissem! quis non acciperet excusationem, si dicerem: 'impediit quamvis properantem senectus, inopia, languor. pretium non tam festinanter inveni.

How many things, judges, I could respond to this complaint, on account of which, with piety preserved, I would not have redeemed my son! Who would not accept an excuse, if I were to say: 'old age, indigence, languor impeded me, although hastening. I did not find the price so hastily.

explicare non potui navigationem iuvenibus quoque fratribusque difficilem; solus ac senex non illa, qua speraveram, prosperitate direxi. per quos metus, per quae peregrinationis incerta properavi!' remove, iuvenis, indignationem; nihil plus pro filio factum est, quem recepi. non fortunam tibi debeo sed affectum, non exitum sed voluntatem.

I was not able to carry out the navigation, difficult even for young men and for brothers; alone and an old man, I did not steer it with that prosperity which I had hoped. Through what fears, through what uncertainties of peregrination I hastened!' remove, young man, your indignation; nothing more has been done for the son than that I received him. I owe you not fortune but affection, not the outcome but the will.

pro duobus pretia contraxi, pro duobus maria conscendi, pro duobus genua tenui. rogo, uter magis amaretur, si mihi piratae duos reddidissent?

for two I contracted prices, for two I boarded the seas, for two I clasped the knees. I ask, which of the two would be more loved, if the pirates had given back two to me?

[11] Age tu nunc, iuvenis, ad faciendam inopiae patris invidiam, si videtur, exclama: 'famem obtendis, ad quam luxuria prodigarumque voluptatium continuatione venisti. exhausisti senex census in pretia meretricum.' quamquam et huic iubetur necessitati pietas vestra succurrere, et lex, quae inopem, quae patrem nominare contenta est, filium non remisit ad causas. quid vero, si in educationem, in discursus, in pretia vacuatus sum?

[11] Come now, young man, to fasten odium upon your father’s poverty, if it seems good, cry out: 'you plead hunger, to which you have come by luxury and by the continuation of prodigal pleasures. You, old man, have exhausted your means in the prices of prostitutes.' Although even to this necessity your piety is bidden to succor, and the law, which is content to name "the needy," that is, "the father," has not let the son off with pretexts. But what, indeed, if I have been drained on education, on excursions, on prices?

excedit omnem scelerum comparationem patrem mendicum facere nec pascere.

it exceeds every comparison of crimes to make a father a beggar and not to feed him.

Temptat, iudices, hoc, quod non est redemptus, ampliare alia iuvenis invidia: 'fratrem,' inquit, 'mihi praetulisti.' fateamur paulisper hoc crimen, agnoscamus hoc nefas: impudentissime generis humani, tu non feres, ut frater tuus vel magis ametur? vides enim, praelatus est tibi nescio quis affectus, possident caritatis tuae locum pignora de minoribus sumpta nominibus; ille nempe, cuius aeque spiritus de visceribus his trahebat ortum, qui patrem vel solus impleret. pessimus est mortalium, qui amari fratrem suum sine sui caritate putat.

He attempts, judges, to amplify this—that he was not redeemed—by another, youthful envy: “you,” he says, “have preferred my brother to me.” Let us for a little while confess this crime, let us acknowledge this impiety: most impudent of the human race, will you not endure that your brother be loved even more? For you see, some affection, I know not what, has been preferred to you; the pledges occupying the place of your charity, taken from lesser names; that very one, whose spirit equally drew its origin from these bowels, who would even by himself fulfill a father. He is the worst of mortals who thinks his brother is loved without love for himself.

tu custodies, utrum frequentius osculer, utrum stringam magis artiore complexu? non est hoc <caritatis> impatientia, nec circa patris adfectus sacra de pietatis contentione rixa; eum tantum fratrem putes amari magis, quem non ames.

Will you keep watch over whether I kiss more frequently, whether I clasp more with a tighter embrace? This is not an impatience of <charity>, nor a quarrel about a father’s sacred affections arising from a contention of piety; you would only suppose that brother to be loved more whom you do not love.

Falleris, iuvenis, longeque te ab intellectu rerum naturae seposuit prava persuasio, qui putas ex paternis affectibus filio perire quicquid in altero de necessitate praeponderat.

You are mistaken, young man, and a depraved persuasion has sequestered you far from the understanding of the nature of things, you who suppose that, from paternal affections, there perishes to the son whatever in the other of necessity preponderates.

[12] par est in omnes liberos eademque pietas, sed habet in aliquo plerumque proprias indulgentiae causas, et salva caritatis aequalitate est quiddam, per quod tacito mentis instinctu singulos rursus tamquam unicos amemus: hunc primus nascendi locus, illum gratiorem propior fecit infantia; alium laetior vultus et blandior osculis amplexibusque facies; quosdam magis severitas probitasque commendat; in quibusdam diliguntur impatientius calamitates, et damna corporum debilitatesque membrorum notabilius miseratione complectimur. salva est tamen universitas, cum, quicquid in alio cessare creditur, in altero restituit alter affectus. securus sis: non intercidunt ista, non pereunt, sed invicem vincunt, praevalent, cedunt.

[12] equal and the same piety is due toward all children, but in some one there are for the most part proper causes of indulgence; and with the equality of charity intact there is a certain something, by which, by the tacit instinct of the mind, we love individuals in turn as if they were unique: this one the primacy of being born made so, that one a nearer infancy rendered more agreeable; another a happier countenance and a face more coaxing with kisses and embraces; certain ones are more commended by severity and probity; in some, calamities are loved more impatiently, and the losses of bodies and the weaknesses of the members we more notably enfold with commiseration. nevertheless the totality stands safe, since whatever is believed to fall short in one, in another a different affection restores. be secure: these things do not fall away, do not perish, but in turn conquer, prevail, yield.

filio non potest praeferri nisi <miser> filius.

to a son nothing can be preferred, unless a son.

Blandiar, iudices, paulisper calamitatibus meis, et sic agam, tamquam apud piratas invenerim utrumque sanum. attuli sine dubio pretium duorum, sed utrumque praedo non reddit: offert electionem. suadete, quid faciam; quid dicitis?

Permit me, judges, to coax for a little while with my calamities, and let me plead thus, as though I had found both safe among pirates. I undoubtedly brought the price of two, but the brigand does not give back both: he offers a choice. Advise me, what should I do; what do you say?

ita pietas est abire, discedere, irasci scilicet, queri et invidiam facere piratis? vos interrogo, liberi, vos, parentes: non ergo facinus est ideo neutrum redimere, quia utrumque non possis? egregia pietas aequare liberos iustitia desperationis, et ex hoc, quod succurrere non contingit duobus, orbitatem facere totam!

So, is piety to go away, to depart, to be angry of course, to complain, and to arouse odium against the pirates? I ask you, children, you, parents: is it not then a crime for that reason to ransom neither, because you cannot ransom both? Splendid piety, to equalize the children by a justice of desperation, and from this—that it does not befall to succor two—to make bereavement total!

tu vero, senectus, accipe quicquid datur, accipe quicquid offertur, dum hoc saltem feritati libet, antequam inpatientia tam saeva crudescat immanitas. interim multa possunt afferre casus: sperare licet, <fili>, repeteris, sperare <licet>, pater, fortassis evadat. quaecumque explicari coacervatione non possunt, per partes vicesque servantur, et facilius est divisa subtrahere, quorum magnitudo laborat in solido.

But you, old age, accept whatever is given, accept whatever is offered, while at least this pleases the ferocity, before inhumanity grows so savage through impatience. Meanwhile contingencies can bring many things: it is permitted to hope, <son>, you will be reclaimed; to hope <it is permitted>, father, perhaps he will escape. Whatever cannot be unfolded by coacervation are preserved by parts and in turns, and it is easier to subtract them when divided—those whose magnitude is burdensome in the solid.

[13] Quantum intellego, iudices, filius, cui profuturum non erat, ut eligerem, hoc solum ferre non potest, quod redemptus est frater. quis hanc, iudices, impudentiam ferat? obicit mihi, quod ullum de liberis meis potuerim facere discrimen, deinde queritur non se potius electum, et, cum fratri praeter eiusdem nominis par ac simile consortium reverentia quoque languoris accesserit, indignatur apud affectus patris non eam praevaluisse partem, in qua tantum filius erat.

[13] As far as I understand, judges, the son, to whom it would not have been of profit that I should choose, cannot bear this one thing: that the brother was ransomed. Who, judges, would endure this impudence? He objects to me that I could have made any discrimination among my children; then he complains that he himself was not rather elected; and, when to his brother, besides an equal and similar consortium of the same name, there has also been added the reverence of languor, he is indignant that, in a father’s affections, that part did not prevail in which he was only a son.

non invenio, iudices, quemadmodum effugere potuerim criminis huius invidiam, si hunc potius recepissem. patri, cui utrumque pirata reddere nolebat, redimendus fuit aut aeger aut neuter.

I do not find, judges, how I could have escaped the invidiousness of this charge, if I had taken this one back instead. For the father, to whom the pirate was unwilling to return either of them, either the ailing one had to be ransomed, or neither.

'Quid, quod,' inquit, 'etiam luxuriosum praetulisti?' parce, iuvenis, maledictis, parce conviciis; reliquistis haec nomina. domi erunt ista vitia, domi erunt istae virtutes, sed, dum fueritis reversi, interim nihil aliud estis quam fratres, quam liberi mei, duo captivi, ambo miseri, et diversitas vestra de calamitatium societate consumpta est. vides, quam nefas sit alterum ex vobis mihi esse viliorem; piratarum non interest, uter eligatur.

'What of the fact that,' he says, 'you even preferred the luxurious one?' spare, young man, the maledictions, spare the invectives; you have left those names behind. At home those vices will be, at home those virtues will be, but, until you shall have returned, in the meantime you are nothing else than brothers, than my children, two captives, both miserable, and your difference has been consumed by the fellowship of calamities. You see how impious it would be that one of you should be of lower value to me; it is no concern of the pirates which one is chosen.

dic nunc: 'luxuriosum redemisti.'

say now: 'you ransomed the luxurious one.'

Comparatione vestra, iuvenis, <si> circa patrimonium honoresve contenderes, et ego proclamabo: vicisses. sed ventum est illuc, ubi non probitas, non mores aestimantur, et de corporibus sola taxatio est. unde tristes toleraret casus, ferret sordes vinculorum, piraticam famem iuvenis, quem torquere solebat nostra frugalitas?

By your comparison, young man, if you were contending about patrimony or honors, I too will proclaim: you would have won. But we have come to that point where probity and morals are not evaluated, and there is only an appraisal of bodies. Whence would he endure sad misfortunes, bear the filth of chains, the pirates’ hunger—a young man whom our frugality used to torment?

unde et in illa solitudine carceris dur<ar>et animus convictibus semper comitatibusque laetatus? expecta tu, quem decet honesta patientia, laudabilis labor, qui tibi difficultatium reddis ipse rationem. tu differris, luxuriosus relinquitur.

Whence also would the spirit endure in that solitude of prison, one that had always rejoiced in convivial gatherings and companionships? Do you wait, you for whom honorable patience and praiseworthy labor are fitting, you who yourself render to yourself a reckoning of difficulties. You are deferred; the luxurious man is left behind.

Quid ais? praetuli illum, de quo soli tibi querebar, quem cum vellem castigare, reprehendere, te solebam laudare, mirari?

What do you say? Did I prefer that man, about whom I was complaining to you alone, whom, when I wished to castigate, to reprehend, I was wont to laud you, to marvel at you?

[14] exaggera, quantum voles, vitia fratris, luxuriosum, perditum voca, dum scias te sic magis probare non animum fuisse patris, sed de calamitate rationem. ille eligit, qui recipit ante meliorem. sed parce, quaeso, iuvenis, adversorum interpretationi.

[14] Exaggerate, as much as you will, the faults of your brother; call him luxurious, ruined—only know that thus you are proving rather, not that the father’s disposition was such, but a reckoning drawn from calamity. He is the one who chooses, who receives the better one beforehand. But spare, I beg, young man, the interpretation of adversities.

non est electio alterum recipere, cum pretium attuleris duorum; discrimen illud <inter vos> non ego sed pirata commentus est. quicquid [inter vos] in alterutro fecero, affectus est, quo duos amo, et homo, apud quem filius sola praevaluit gratia calamitatis, non fratrem tibi praetuli, sed quod in te fratri praetulissem. consilium hoc putas fuisse patris?

it is no election to receive the other, when you have brought the price of two; that discrimination <between you> was devised not by me but by the pirate. whatever I shall have done [between you] in either, it is affection, whereby I love two; and as a man with whom the son prevailed solely by the grace of calamity, I did not prefer your brother to you, but that which, were it in you, I would have preferred to your brother. do you think this was the father’s counsel?

fortunae est, qua capti pariter estis, qua decubuit alter, qua non convaluit redemptus. cum propter duos venerim, quod altero mihi pirata cessit, idem est ac si mihi neutrum reddidisset.

it is Fortune’s doing, by which you were captured equally, by which the other fell, by which the ransomed did not convalesce. since I came for two, the pirate’s having yielded one to me is the same as if he had restored neither to me.

Sed quousque facti mei dissimulabo rationem? Aeger electus est. responde[te] nunc, si videtur: 'luxuriosus, perditus fuit.' parcamus, quaeso, memoriae, revereamur suprema cineris; paeniteret me fortasse, si viveret.

But how long shall I dissemble the rationale of my deed? The sick man was elected. Answer now, if it seems good: 'he was dissolute, ruined.' Let us spare, I beg, the memory; let us revere the last rites of his ashes; perhaps I should repent, if he were alive.

iterum ac saepius, iudices, necesse est ipsa criminis mei voce defendar: aegrum redemi. non habent profecto, non habent discrimen liberi nisi de calamitate, et inter homines, quos natura pietatis aequavit, differentiam nisi de dolore non explices. non cum usu nunc vestro, non cum moribus loquor: ille anhelat, illius sunt lassa suspiria, ad illum serius veni.

Again and more often, judges, it is necessary that I defend myself by the very voice of my crime: I redeemed a sick man. Children assuredly, assuredly have no distinction save in calamity, and among men whom nature has made equal in piety, you would not set forth any difference except in pain. I am not speaking now in accord with your usage, not with your mores: that man is gasping, his are the weary sighs; to him I came too late.

excogitasti rursus, fortuna, quod supercresceret caritati, quod posset sacris nominibus accedere; hic solus maior affectus est quam filios amare: filii misereri.

you have devised again, fortune, something that would surpass charity, that could accede to sacred names; this alone is a greater affection than to love sons: to pity a son.

[15] Me quidem, iudices, si quis interroget, condicio illa non fuit vera, non simplex, habuitque piraticae feritatis ingenium: aegrum mihi non licuit relinquere, licuit eligere. an fas fuisse credis, ut iuxta moriturum tu reddereris, et homines eius immanitatis, ut possent liberos cum patre partiri, paterentur eum sibi relinqui, quem periturum ex hoc probabant, quod illum pater non eligebat? temptata est misera pietas, et placuit hoc quoque addi calamitatibus nostris, ut onerarer pudore condicionis partes non habentis.

[15] As for me, judges, if anyone should ask, that condition was not true, not simple, and it had the character of piratical ferocity: it was not permitted for me to leave the sick man; it was permitted to choose. Do you think it was right that you be handed back alongside one who was on the point of dying, and that men of such savageness, so that they could divide the children with the father, would allow to be left to them the one whom they concluded would perish from this very fact, that the father was not choosing him? Wretched pietas was put to the test, and it pleased them that this too be added to our calamities: that I be burdened with the shame of a condition that had no real alternatives.

cum in comparatione sani aeger offertur, ideo ponitur, ut eligatur.

when, in comparison with the sound man, the sick man is offered, for that reason he is put forward, in order that he may be chosen.

Superest, nisi fallor, iudices, ut, cum sibi praelatum fratrem queratur, aestimetis, utri tunc magis debuerit pietas nostra succurrere. est quidem, iudices, humanae infirmitatis ista natura, ut ex omnibus accidentibus gravissimum putet quisque quod patitur; et, cum aliena cogitationibus, nostra dolore tractentur, necesse est apud impatientiam sua[m] vel minora praevaleant. languor est tamen, languor, cui merito cesserint cunctae calamitates, in cuius comparatione consolari se potest genus omne miserorum.

It remains, unless I am mistaken, judges, that, since he complains that his brother was preferred to himself, you assess to which of the two our piety ought then rather to have come to the rescue. Indeed, judges, such is the nature of human infirmity, that out of all accidents each person thinks that what he suffers is the most grievous; and, since others’ affairs are dealt with by thoughts, ours by pain, it is necessary that, with impatience, one’s own—even the lesser—prevail. Yet it is languor, languor, to which all calamities have deservedly yielded; in comparison with it, the entire genus of the wretched can console itself.

stringat licet manus saeva captivitas, profunda carceris nocte membra claudantur, datur tamen collidere catenas, artus extrahere nexibus, et habet aliquid aequanimitatis cum poena sua posse rixari. saeviunt regna tormentis, bella vulneribus, sed levius adficit quicquid viribus feras, et, cum in plenum adhuc sanguinem adversa ceciderunt, repugnantis roboris colluctatione vincuntur. quos cruciatus compares, quem dolorem, cum penitus visceribus immissa tabes cotidie aliquid ex homine praemittit in mortem, cum cibos, haustus et omnia blandimenta vitae fames fastidit et poscit?

Though savage captivity may tighten the hands, though the limbs be shut in by the deep night of the prison, yet it is granted to clash the chains, to drag the limbs out of their bonds, and there is something of equanimity in being able to wrangle with one’s own penalty. Realms rage with torments, wars with wounds; but whatever you bear with your strength afflicts more lightly, and when adversities have fallen upon blood still full, they are overcome by the grappling of resisting vigor. What torments can you compare, what pain, when a rot thrust deep into the entrails every day sends something from the man ahead into death, when hunger both scorns and demands foods, draughts, and all the blandishments of life?

desiderare assidentium officia, dehinc ferre non posse; gravari quos appetieris attactus; per totum cubile corpus velut super ardentes exagitare flammas; lux fatigatis luminibus gravis, vox sola de gemitu. cum ex duobus capitivis languet alter, una est inaequalitas patris eligere sanum.

to desire the services of those sitting by, then thereafter to be unable to bear them; to be weighed down by the touches which you have sought; to drive the body over the whole couch as if upon blazing flames; the light heavy to wearied eyes, the only voice from a groan. When out of two captives one languishes, there is one inequality in a father: to choose the sound one.

[16] Retuli, iudices, usque adhuc in penatibus suis, iuxta parentes propinquosque languentem. o carcer, o morbi, quem vos non ficitis aegrum? et non ille carcer, quem severitas legum, quem potestatum iustitia commenta est.

[16] I have related, judges, thus far, that he was languishing in his own household, beside his parents and kinsmen. o prison, o diseases, whom do you not make sick? and not that prison which the severity of the laws, which the justice of the authorities has contrived.

non possunt humani metus, humanarum cogitationum ingenia satis habundeque concipere quae vidi. iacet sub immensae rupis abrupto tristis et ultra naturalem <modum> profundae caliginis nocte[m] mersus piraticis artibus specus, quem tota circumfusi vastitas maris et undique minantibus scopulis illisa tempestas terrore ruiturae molis everberat. Horrent cuncta crucibus, squalent circumiecta naufragiis, nullus nisi in supplicia mortesque prospectus, et ad infelicium captivorum metum praemissus de simili exitu dolor.

Human fears, the ingenuities of human cogitations, cannot sufficiently and abundantly conceive what I saw. Beneath the abrupt of an immense cliff there lies a cavern, grim, and plunged in a night of darkness deeper beyond the natural <measure>, a lair for piratical arts; the vastness of the sea poured around it on every side, and a tempest dashed against crags that menace from all quarters, batter it with the terror of a mass about to collapse. All things bristle with crosses, the surroundings are squalid with shipwrecks, there is no prospect save toward torments and deaths, and—sent ahead to the fear of the ill-fated captives—grief at a like outcome.

spiritus solus intus, quem vinctorum trahunt redduntque gemitus, quem tot contulere languentes. hoc erat, ubi iacebat aeger, illud tot annorum, ex quo coepit pirata grassari, idem cubile. corpus, quod gravaretur assidentium sedulas manus, iacet inter vincula, quibus instrinxerat adhuc recentem pirata captivum, et quamvis tenuata de nexibus membra labantur, rursus in modum stringentium tenent, quae nullo suspensa nisu velut victo homine sederunt.

the only breath within, which the groans of the fettered drag in and give back, to which so many languishers have contributed. this was, where the sick man lay, that same couch of so many years, from when the pirate began to prowl. the body, which would have been weighed down by the sedulous hands of those sitting by, lies among the bonds with which the pirate had bound the still recent captive; and although the limbs, thinned, slip from their bindings, yet again they hold in the manner of things that tighten, those which, suspended by no exertion, have settled as upon a man overcome.

qualis erat ille sub ferro, cuius exsangues manus vix levia velamenta transferrent? quis inter complorationes gemitusque somnus, quem vix silentia sollicita praestarent? ad quae colloquia tristitia respiraret?

What was he like under the iron, whose bloodless hands could scarcely shift light coverings? What sleep amid wailings and groans, which anxious silences could scarcely provide? In what colloquies might sadness breathe again?

undique pares similesque miseri, et veteribus capitivis adiectus cotidie novus aliquis impatiens. compara, si videtur, huic aegro captivitatem tantum tuam: tu quereris, quod cibos pirata non praestet; ille remittit oblatos.

On all sides, equal and similar wretches, and to the veteran captives there is each day added some new one, impatient. Compare, if it seems good, only your captivity to this sick man’s: you complain that the pirate does not furnish food; he sends back the food offered.

[17] te nuda humus, nudum cubile frangit; ille ad singulos ardentis corporis motus vi sua supra vincla versatur, et quocumque membra lassata dolore transtulerit, in supplicium redit renovata patientia. breviter saevissimi languoris definienda mensura est: non potest ex illo sanari nec quem redemerit pater.

[17] the naked earth, the naked couch, breaks you; that man, at each movement of his burning body, by its own force is tossed above his bonds, and wherever he has shifted his limbs wearied by pain, he returns into torment, his endurance renewed. briefly, the measure of the most savage languor must be defined: no one can be healed from it, not even one whom a father has ransomed.

Insta nunc, si videtur, ac subinde, iuvenis, interroga, cur aegrum potius elegerim, reddi a me posse rationem, cur hoc fecerim, putas? ego vero non possem, nec si te redemissem. quid enim, si respondere iubeas orbitatem, cur in exequias totos egerat census, quid sibi velit ille funebrium longus ordo pomparum, cur super flagrantes iaceant rogos, cur ardenti non divellantur amplexu?

Insist now, if it seems good, and repeatedly, young man, ask why I chose rather the sick man; do you think I could render a rationale why I did this? I indeed could not, not even if I had redeemed you. For what then, if you should bid Bereavement to answer, why it had expended its whole estate on the obsequies, what that long order of funeral pomps means, why they lie upon the blazing pyres, why they are not torn away from the burning embrace?

et ego dico, proclamo, fateor: error istud, dementiae furor est, cum feceris. 'hoc est ergo,' inquit, 'quod de te praecipue queror: moriturum mihi praetulisti.' quaeso, iuvenis, ne nobis putes tantum inesse feritatis, ut illum potuerimus aestimare moriturum. vis non sperem victurum filium, quem tunc primum aspicio, complector aegrum, quem pirata non recusat sibi relinqui?

and I say, I proclaim, I confess: that is an error, it is a frenzy of dementia, when you have done it. ‘This is then,’ he says, ‘what I chiefly complain of in you: you preferred to me one who was about to die.’ I beg, young man, do not think there is in us so much ferity that we could have judged him as about to die. Do you wish me not to hope that the son will live, whom then for the first time I behold, to embrace the sick man, whom even a pirate does not refuse to be left to himself?

si persuasionem patris interroges, quicquid est, quo[d] miser torquetur, afficitur, non languorem credo, sed impatientiam, desiderium, dolorem. hominis, qui apud piratas languet, unum remedium putes, ut redimatur, sed non est, quaeso, iuvenis, quod hoc patrocinium de tam calamitosa pietate concipiam, ut dicam: victurum putavi.

if you ask the father’s persuasion, whatever it is by which the wretch is tormented, he is affected—not, I believe, by languor, but by impatience, desire, pain. For a man who languishes among pirates you might think there is one remedy: that he be ransomed; but it is not, I pray, young man, that I should devise this advocacy out of so calamitous a piety, so as to say: ‘I thought he would live.’

[18] exaggero quin immo invidiam criminis mei: redemi, fateor, illum, qui dilationes, qui moras ferre non poterat, in quo mihi pirata vendebat brevia oscula, paucos dies. si mehercules uterque fuisset aeger, illum redemissem, qui prior languere coepisset. si duos pariter naufragia raperent, illi porrigerem manum, quem iam membrorum contentione lassatum fluctus hauriret.

[18] I exaggerate, nay rather indeed, the odium of my crime: I ransomed, I confess, that man who could not bear deferrals, who could not endure delays, in whom the pirate was selling to me brief kisses—just a few days. By Hercules, if both had been sick, I would have ransomed the one who had begun to languish first. If shipwrecks were snatching two at the same time, to him I would reach out my hand whom the waves were already swallowing, wearied by the strife of his limbs.

si vulneribus confectos remisisset acies, properantius ei clauderem plagas, per quas animam largior sanguis egereret. ignoscite, dii pariter atque homines: non possum de liberis, possum eligere de miseris. gratias quin immo fortunae, gratias ago, quod adhuc aeger sentit, intellegit.

if the battle-line had sent back those worn out by wounds, I would more promptly close for him the gashes through which more lavish blood was driving out his life. pardon me, gods and men alike: I cannot choose among my children; I can choose among the wretched. thanks—nay rather, thanks—to Fortune, I give thanks, that the ailing man still feels, still understands.

alioquin cadaver acceperam et pretia duorum pro funere tantum supremisque persolveram. nescis. quantum pudori, quantum adiciat affectibus meis inter tam impares aequata condicio.

otherwise I would have received a corpse and would have paid the price of two only for the funeral and the last rites. you do not know. how much to my modesty, how much to my affections, an equalized condition among such unequal persons adds.

aeger, qui tantundem est piratis, plus est patri. velis tamen nolis, infelix senectus, fatendum est quod merito, quod summa pietate factum est, quam difficile fecerimus. quae tunc mihi cogitationes, quis temporis illius animus fuit, cum inter duos liberos incerta miser electione discurrerem!

the sick man, who is just as much to the pirates, is more to the father. whether you will or not, unhappy old age, it must be confessed how difficult it was to do that which was done deservedly, with the highest piety. what thoughts were mine then, what spirit had that time, when I, wretched, was running to and fro between my two children with an uncertain choice!

hunc diutius osculabar; illum putabam desperatione moriturum. lacrimas ad languentem gemitusque transtuleram: et tu mihi videbaris futurus aeger. quotiens catenas tuas soluturus invasi!

I was kissing this one longer; I thought that the other would die from desperation. I had transferred my tears and my groans to the languishing one: and you seemed to me about to be ailing. How often, intending to loosen your chains, I rushed in!

sed mihi commendabat relictum quod <in> te praetulissem. quam frequenter iam laxata misero vincula rursus imposui, dum mihi tua potius sanitas placet! dissimulare non possum condicionis illius secretas difficultates: redimi debebat aeger, ego te volebam.

but the one left behind commended himself to me, because I had preferred you. how frequently I, the bonds already loosened from the wretch, re-imposed them again, while your health pleased me rather! I cannot dissemble the secret difficulties of that condition: the sick man had to be redeemed, I wanted you.

[19] Ponere vos, iudices, velut in illa necessitatis meae praesentia volo. ecce infelix ad primum aspectum patris conatus assurgere illas squalentes sordibus manus paululum tamquam amplexus daturus erexit, nec usque in cervices meas spiritu iam deficiente perlatas in suum miser iterum cubile deiecit. totus ille circa nos carceris populus obticuit, et, ne colloquiis nostris terribilis catenarum stridor obstreperet, lassatos artus in sua tenuere patientia.

[19] I wish to place you, judges, as though in that presence of my necessity. Behold, the unhappy man, at the first sight of his father, having tried to rise, lifted those hands, squalid with filth, a little, as though about to give an embrace, and, not raised so far as to reach my neck, with his breath now failing, he cast them back down onto his own wretched pallet again. The whole populace of the prison around us fell silent, and, lest the terrible stridor of chains should drown out our colloquies, they held their wearied limbs in their own patience.

ego serius, gravis hinc, si videtur, incipiam: 'luxuriose, meruisti'? ignorat profecto paterni doloris aestus, quisquis solacium putat, ut de languente filio queratur, ut moribus mentique maledicat. abite, virtutes, ignosce, probitas, <potior> est ex liberis ille, qui moritur. mihi vero fateor hinc aliqua languente filio venisse solacia, quod vixit infelix quemadmodum voluit, quod fuit hilaris ac laeta brevis aetas.

I, later and grave in this, if it seems, will begin: “Luxurious one, you merited it?” He surely is ignorant of the surges of paternal grief, whoever thinks it a solace to complain about a languishing son, to curse his morals and mind. Begone, virtues; forgive me, probity—preferable among one’s children is he who dies. For my part, I confess that from this some solaces came, with my son languishing: that he lived, unhappy, as he willed; that he was cheerful, and his brief age was happy.

crede, iuvenis: et pro te iam maluissem, ut luxuriosus esses, cui tu tempori, cui dolori rigorem ultionis, frontem castigantis iniungis! impatientissima res est perdere filium, cui videaris irasci. corruptum me precibus putatis ambituque lacrimarum?

Believe, young man: and for your sake I would by now have preferred that you were luxurious-living; upon what time, upon what sorrow do you impose the rigor of vengeance, the brow of a castigator! It is the most intolerable thing to lose a son at whom you seem to be angry. Do you think me corrupted by prayers and by the canvassing of tears?

hoc vicit aeger, quod non rogabat. assidebam misero; demittebat oculos, interroganti responsum de lacrimis tantum gemituque reddebat.

In this the sick man prevailed, that he did not ask. I sat beside the wretched man; he would lower his eyes, and to my questioning he rendered a response only of tears and a groan.

[20] agebat me deliberante iam victum, cum repente miseras manus velut recidentis amplexus posuit in sinu meo, et cum lassa suspiria per ardentis anhelitus egesta saepe visceribus, cum diu collatis uterque singultibus miscuissemus lapsas sine voce lacrimas, tandem spiritu vix in paucissima verba collecto 'tibi quidem', inquit, 'gratias ago, pater, quod redempturus utrumque venisti; non adeo tamen sensus meos languor hebetavit, ut exitum condicionis huius ignorem. ego luxuriosus, ego perditus; nunc vero super infamiam nominis huius emorior. utinam hoc saltem misero fata praestarent, ut residuum laborantis animae in tuo poneremus amplexu; sed si mora est longior properantibus expectare pereuntem, ite superstites, ite felices, has tantum reliquias commendate piratis, ne mersus profundo, proiectus in fluctus exitum faciam hominis, ad quem non venerit pater.

[20] he was moving me, as I deliberated, already overcome, when suddenly he placed his miserable hands, like the embrace of one collapsing, in my lap, and, as weary sighs, often expelled from his vitals through burning pantings, and when for a long time, our sobs having been brought together, we two had mingled tears fallen without voice, at length, his breath scarcely gathered into the very fewest words, he said: 'To you indeed I give thanks, father, that you have come to ransom us both; yet languor has not so dulled my senses that I am ignorant of the outcome of this condition. I—a luxurious man, I—a ruined man; now indeed, over and above the infamy of this name, I am dying. Would that the Fates at least would grant this to a wretch, that we might place what remains of my laboring soul in your embrace; but if for those in haste it is too long a delay to wait for one perishing, go, you survivors, go, you happy ones, only commend these remains to the pirates, lest, plunged in the deep, cast forth into the waves, I make an end as a man to whom a father has not come.'

unde enim sperare possum, ut revertaris, ut facis . . .' tunc super abrupta verba tota defectione conticuit, strictisque vitalibus circa dolorem suum membra riguerunt. exclamavi, fateor: 'quid agis, infelix? cur desperatione conlaberis?

'whence indeed can I hope, that you will revert, as you are doing . . .' then, upon the broken-off words, he fell utterly silent with a total fainting, and with his vital breath constricted around his pain his limbs grew rigid. I cried out, I confess: 'What are you doing, unfortunate one? Why do you collapse in desperation?'

attolle paulisper oculos, confirma, dura; te frater elegit.' visa est per hanc vocem meam peracta condicio: continuo pirata detraxit catenas, vincla laxavit. vultis elegisse me negem, vultis in lucem diemque productus carceri suo reddatur aeger? ego vero non habui verba, quibus me deliberare, quibus nolle contenderem.

raise your eyes a little, be firm, endure; your brother has chosen you.' It seemed that through this utterance of mine the condition was carried through: immediately the pirate dragged off the chains, loosened the bonds. Do you wish that I deny that I have chosen? Do you wish that, brought into the light and the day, the sick man be returned to his own prison? I, for my part, had no words with which I might contend that I must deliberate, with which I might contend that I was unwilling.

vultis scire, quid pater, quid pirata praestiterit? ego duos redemi, sed alterum accepi.

Do you wish to know what the father, what the pirate has rendered? I redeemed two, but I received only one.

'Ut scias,' inquit, 'aegrum redimi non debuisse, defunctus est.' crudelissime generis humani, qui nos putas pretium tuum perdidisse, audi, quam multa nobis in morituro filio pirata reddiderit: frater tuus ille inter vincula catenasque deficiens respiravit aliquid in toro tandemque liberas vinculis manus per totius lectuli spatia iactavit; post impias carceris sordes illum cum ferali veste squalorem exuit paulisper aeger, vidit propinquos, allocutus est amicos, mandavit, exegit, et quamvis suprema sorte conlabens prius tamen luce caeli libera satiatus est.

'That you may know,' he says, 'that a sick man ought not to have been ransomed, he has died.' Most cruel of the human race, you who think that we have lost your price, hear how many things the pirate rendered back to us in our dying son: that brother of yours, failing amid bonds and chains, drew some breath upon the couch, and at last tossed his hands, free from chains, through the whole space of the little bed; after the impious filth of the prison, he, sick as he was, together with the funereal garment put off his squalor for a little while, he saw his kinsfolk, he addressed his friends, he gave charges, he exacted them, and although collapsing under his final lot, nevertheless first he was satisfied with the free light of heaven.

[21] contulit mihi grande, velit nolit, fortuna in orbitate solacium: filium, qui relictus mea fuit moriturus invidia, non occidi, sed perdidi. quid ais, iuvenis? ita, si moriturum filium redimere non debui, non sufficit haec tibi de me poena, quod ille decessit?

[21] Fortune, whether she will or not, has conferred on me a great solace in bereavement: the son who, left by me, was going to die to my discredit, I did not kill, but lost. What say you, young man? Yes—if I ought not to have redeemed a son who was going to die, does not this penalty from me suffice you, that he departed?

irasci patri tunc fortasse fas esset, si viveret frater; tunc alimenta quaerenti respondere posses: 'posce praelatum.' quantum intellego, qui de mendicitate patris vindicaris, aegri es redempti, iuvenis, inimicus, nescis, quid sit invidiam facere, patri; melior erat tua causa, si mei miserereris.

to be angry at your father then perhaps would be permissible, if your brother were alive; then to one seeking support (aliments) you could answer: “demand it of the one preferred.” As far as I understand, you—who take vengeance on account of your father’s beggary—are an enemy of the redeemed sick man, young man; you do not know what it is to inflict invidia upon a father; your case would be better, if you pitied me.

At quanto, dii deaeque, alius fuit ille infelicissimi iuvenis affectus! nuntio enim te audiente et tota civitate teste proclamo: tibi gratias agebat ille, dum moreretur. credo mehercules hoc miserum dolore consumptum, quod sibi videbatur pretium suum mihi perdidisse.

But how much, gods and goddesses, different was that most unlucky young man’s affect! For I announce—while you are listening, and with the whole city as witness—I proclaim: he was giving thanks to you as he was dying. By Hercules, I believe this poor man was consumed by grief at this: that it seemed to him he had lost his price—his worth—with me.

non aliter igitur quam si te praesente deficeret 'per illud,' inquit, 'frater optime, natalium nostrorum sacrum venerandumque consortium, per socias peregrinationes, per adversa communia, per hoc, quod et tu languere potuisti, si te vel tua quandoque virtus vel satietas secura praedonum piratico carcere emiserit, commendo tibi senem, quem facimus uterque mendicum. testor immortalia numina et infernarum sedum deos: pascerem patrem, si te redemisset.'

not otherwise, therefore, than as if, with you present, he were failing: 'by this,' he says, 'best brother, the sacred and venerable consortium of our natals, by our companion peregrinations, by our common adversities, by this fact that you too could have languished—if either your own virtue some day, or a satiety secure to the robbers, should release you from the piratical prison, I commend to you the old man, whom we both are making a beggar. I call to witness the immortal numina and the gods of the infernal seats: I would feed my father, if he had ransomed you.'

'Ego tamen,' inquit, 'mihi debeo, quod reversus sum.' non quidem quicquam velim, iuvenis, de virtutum tuarum admiratione dectractum; audias tamen necesse est in hac <im>pietate verum. evasisse te putas? ingrate, dimissus es! mea pietas istud, mea fecit electio.

"I, however," he said, "owe it to myself that I have returned." I would not indeed wish, young man, that anything be detracted from the admiration of your virtues; yet it is necessary that you hear the truth in this <im>pietate. Do you think you have escaped? Ingrate, you were dismissed! my piety did that, my election did it.

unde enim evenit, quicquid ante captivitas tua praestare non potuit? iacta, quantum voles, effractum carcerem, ruptas catenas; vis scire, quid neglegentes fecerit securosque piratas? acceperant pretium duorum.

For how, indeed, did it come about, that which your captivity could not previously provide? Vaunt, as much as you will, the broken prison, the snapped chains; do you wish to know what made the pirates negligent and care-free? They had received the price of two.

[22] Intellegit, iudices, et ipse iuvenis non esse se calamitatium nostrarum iustitiae parem, [et] sic agit, tamquam alere non debeat, itaque transfert in hoc defensionem, ut posse se neget. quid dicitis, iudices? feretis hoc dicentem iuvenem corpore atque aetate robustum?

[22] He understands, judges, that he himself, the young man, is not equal to the justice of our calamities, [and] he thus acts, as though he ought not to maintain, he therefore transfers his defense onto this: that he denies he is able. What say you, judges? Will you tolerate a young man, robust in body and in age, saying this?

non habes opes, sed membra, sed vires. nam neque ego laborem nec difficiles posco conatus: contentus sum, iuvenis, ut velis. cibos me poscere putas?

You do not have opulence, but limbs, but vigor. For I demand neither labor nor difficult endeavors: I am content, young man, that you be willing. Do you think I am demanding food?

humeros, quibus incumbam, manus, quas eliso pectori apponam, sinus, in quos egeram exhaustarum reliquias lacrimarum, ut sepelias, ut haec cum miseri illius membris ossa conponas. non alimenta quaero, sed filium. quid, quod nec grave longumque supremae pietatis exigimus officium?

shoulders, on which I may lean; hands, which I may set upon my crushed breast; a bosom, into which I had poured the remnants of exhausted tears—so that you may bury, so that you may compose these bones with the limbs of that miserable one. I do not seek aliment, but a son. What of this, that we demand a last office of piety which is neither heavy nor long?

non diu viverem, etiamsi me duo pasceretis. securus sis: brevi te gemitus mei liberabunt, assiduis planctibus everberata vitalia. quid me remittis ad turbam?

I would not live long, even if you two were feeding me. Be assured: soon my groans will free you, my vitals lashed by assiduous beatings of lamentation. Why do you send me back to the crowd?

Quid facis rursus omnibus gravem? consumpsi fletus, clementiam civitatis exhausi. non alit populus hominem, quem pascere filius debet.

What are you doing, again burdensome to everyone? I have consumed my tears, I have exhausted the clemency of the city. The populace does not nourish a man whom his son ought to feed.

quid sibi vult haec aliena calamitatibus nostris, aliena virtutibus tuis, iuvenis, asperitas? abstulisti mihi malorum quoque meorum verecundiam: quicquid faciebam, mendicitas est, ex quo reversus es.

What does this harshness, alien to our calamities, alien to your virtues, young man, mean? You have taken from me even the modesty regarding my misfortunes: whatever I do is mendicancy, ever since you returned.

Durat in suscepto rigore iuvenis, et ad misericordiam non memoria fratris, non patris contemplatione deflectitur.

The youth endures in the assumed rigor, and is deflected toward mercy neither by the memory of his brother nor by the contemplation of his father.

[23] exclamaret alius hoc loco: 'ex, tuam fidem!' dignus quidem eras, impotentissime generis humani, quem in tormenta mea doloremque redeuntem vincla rursus ac poena carceris exciperet; et insultes huic confessioni licet, alligare non possum. quid mihi miseras ultiones, quid triste monstratis auxilium? faceret hoc pater, qui redimere noluisset.

[23] another would exclaim at this point: 'Law, your good faith!' indeed you were worthy, most unbridled of the human race, that, returning into my torments and pain, bonds again and the penalty of prison should receive you; and though you may insult this confession, I cannot bind you. why do you show me wretched revenges, why a grimly-sad assistance? let a father do this, one who would have been unwilling to redeem.

Age nunc, vivacissima senectus, redeamus ad preces; quod solum ius paternae pietatis agnoscit, hic quoque rogemus. per ego te, iuvenis, illos meos, de quibus nunc quereris, annos, per expertos tibi notosque humanorum accidentium casus, per infelicis illius manes, cui nec hoc saltem contigit, ut te reverso, te praesente moreretur, pasce nunc, quod te redimere volui, pasce, quod fratrem tuum redemi. non ego lassitudinem tuam posco, numquam otium meum, nec, ut ipse securus quietusque transigam diem, tuas operibus manus, tuum laboribus assigno sudorem.

Come now, most vivacious old age, let us return to prayers; that sole right which paternal pietas acknowledges, let us plead here as well. I adjure you, young man, by those my years about which you now complain, by the cases of human accidents experienced and well known to you, by the manes of that unhappy one, to whom not even this at least befell—that, you having returned, you being present, she might die—sustain yourself now by that with which I wished to redeem you; sustain yourself by that with which I redeemed your brother. I do not ask for your weariness, still less for my leisure; nor, in order that I myself may pass the day secure and quiet, do I assign your hands to works, your sweat to labors.

iungamus mutuae pietatis officia par flebile, par omnibus aetatibus nominibusque reverendum. est. nobis negotium cum civitate mitissima.

Let us join the offices of mutual piety, equally lamentable, equally to be reverenced by all ages and names. It is. Our business is with a most clement city.

quanto libentius dabunt, cum viderint pariter unaque miseros mutua sustentatione conexos! et ego quidem rogabo, qui soleo, sed in tuos sinus populus congerat stipes. quicquid preces, quicquid impetraverint lacrimae meae, accipe, tuere, dispensa.

How much more willingly will they give, when they see the wretched equally and together bound by mutual sustentation! And I indeed will ask, as I am wont, but let the people heap alms into your lap. Whatever prayers, whatever my tears shall have obtained, receive, guard, dispense.

pro tua fama, pro tua sum pietate sollicitus. ego mendicabo, tu pasces.

For your reputation, for your piety, I am solicitous. I will beg, you will feed.