TITLE:FROM THE PAST WITH WISDOM PALETTE:0223 0779 099b 09a9 3 WITTICISMS OF CLASSICAL ANTIQUITY 2Quotes collected and translated by Peto "No lotion can rejuvenate an old face." 2Arkhilokhos (670-620 BC) "People believe that gods are like them. Ethiopians think gods are black and curly-haired, Thracians think gods are blue-eyed and red-haired." 2Xenophanes (580-485 BC) "To pray the figures is like to talk with the wall." 2Herakleitos (544-483 BC) "To get married or not to get married - you regret anyway." 2Sokrates (469-399 BC) about his wife Xanthippe. "Always the same!" 2Xanthippe (469-399 BC) about her husband Sokrates. "Sometimes it's good to do nothing." 2Hippokrates (460-377 BC) "Actually there are nothing but atoms and emptiness in the world." 2Demokritos (460-370 BC) "I'm going to show them that I'm alive." 2Alkibiades (450-404 BC) after he was sentenced to death. "You shouldn't drink wine, if you want to keep your sense." 2Platon (427-347 BC) "I wish every tree would bear fruit like that." 2Diogenes (412-323 BC) about a hanged woman. "Athenians have invented two things: farming and law. Farming feeds them, but law is used by nobody." 2Aristoteles (384-322 BC) "That stupid youngster can't threaten us." 2Demosthenes (384-322 BC) about Alexandros. "Macedonia is too small to you." 2Philippos II (382-336 BC) to his son Alexandros. "My father conquers everything before me. He doesn't leave anything to me." 2Alexandros (356-323 BC) as a child. "One more this kind of victory, and I'll be lost." 2Pyrrhos (319-272 BC) after the battle of Ausculum. "Don't confuse my circles!" 2Arkhimedes (287-212 BC) before he was killed and his circles were confused. "I want to set Romans free of fear, because they don't let an old man die in peace." 2Hannibal (247-183 BC) before his suicide. "Otherwise I assess that Carthage must be destroyed." 2Marcus Porcius Cato (234-149 BC) after every speech which he gave. "You seem to have very cold bathrooms for your guests." 2Iugurtha (160-104 BC) in Roman prison. "Although the lion is away, it's horrible to be in his cave." 2Gaius Marius (156-86 BC) in Sulla's Rome. "Now I have given more death sentences than I can remember." 2Lucius Cornelius Sulla Felix (138-78 BC) "You must sail; nobody forces you to live." 2Gnaeus Pompeius Magnus (106-48 BC) "Thanks to your mother, you can't answer who your father is." 2Marcus Tullius Cicero (106-43 BC) to Quintus Caecilius Metellus Nepos. "Brutus is going to wait, until my old skin has worn down." 2Gaius Iulius Caesar (100-44 BC) about the forewarnings. "How can my kind of military commander be more indecisive than a woman?" 2Marcus Antonius (82-30 BC) about Kleopatra. "Nothing has been harder than this short time I must have been without you." 2Kleopatra (69-30 BC) at the grave of Marcus Antonius. "The play is over, applaud!" 2Gaius Iulius Caesar Octavianus alias Augustus (63 BC-14 AD) in his deathbed. "A good shepherd shears his sheep, he doesn't skin them." 2Tiberius Claudius Nero (42 BC-37 AD) to the provincial governors. "Live like I teach! Don't live like I live!" 2Lucius Annaeus Seneca (4 BC-65 AD) "Money doesn't stink." 2Titus Flavius Vespasianus (9-79 AD) "Let them hate, if they only fear." 2Gaius Iulius Caesar Germanicus alias Caligula (12-41 AD) about his subjects. "What an artist passes away!" 2Nero Claudius Caesar Drusus Germanicus (37-68 AD) before his suicide. "If I was as young as Alexandros, I'd conquer as much as he did." 2Marcus Ulpius Traianus (53-117 AD) "Finns are miraculously wild and terribly poor." 2Publius Cornelius Tacitus (55-116 AD) "It's difficult to be without writing satirically." 2Decimus Iunius Iuvenalis (55-130 AD) "We have leaned against the falling wall." 2Publius Aelius Hadrianus (76-138 AD) about his successor Lucius Verus. "Now, when we've got the whole empire, we've lost everything of our own." 2Titus Aurelius Antoninus Pius (86-161 AD) to his wife Faustina. "Both Alexandros and his muledriver have got the same destiny after their death." 2Marcus Aurelius Antoninus (121-180 AD) "Remember the soldiers, despise the others!" 2Lucius Septimius Severus (146-211 AD) "If they don't ask me anything, they don't trust me. If they don't trust me, they suspect me. If they suspect me, they're afraid of me. If they're afraid of me, they hate me." 2Marcus Aurelius Severus Antoninus alias Caracalla (176-217 AD) "If you saw how good cabbage I used to grow, you wouldn't talk me about that kind of troublesome jobs." 2Gaius Aurelius Valerius Diocletianus (243-316 AD) after his retirement. "They are not evil. They commit sin, because they don't understand. We have to take pity on them, not to hate them." 2Flavius Claudius Iulianus Apostata (332-363 AD) about Christians. "Inside me there's a voice who shouts: hurry to Rome!" 2Alaric (370-410 AD) before he sacked Rome. "Why do we work for the lousy Caesar, when we could have the whole Italy?" 2Odovacar (433-493 AD) before he dethroned the last Roman emperor Romulus 2Augustulus and finished Classical Antiquity. 3EPILOGUE: TODAY'S MEMORY OF CLASSICAL ANTIQUITY "Sorry, I can't speak Latin." 2Dan Quayle (1946-? AD) in Latin America.