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Pliny the Younger 23. letter 9.6

Pliny the Younger 23. letter 9.6

C. PLINIUS CALVISIO SUO S.

Omne hoc tempus inter pugillares ac libellos iucundissima quiete transmisi. "Quem ad modum" inquis "in urbe potuisti?" Circenses erant, quo genere spectaculi ne levissime quidem teneor. Nihil novum, nihil varium, nihil quod non semel spectasse sufficiat. Quo magis miror tot milia virorum tam pueriliter identidem cupere currentes equos, insistentes curribus homines videre. Si tamen aut velocitate equorum aut hominum arte traherentur, esset ratio non nulla; nunc favent panno, pannum amant, et, si in ipso cursu medioque certamine hic color illuc, ille huc transferatur, studium favorque transibit, et repente agitatores illos, equos illos, quos procul noscitant, quorum clamitant nomina, relinquent. Tanta gratia, tanta auctoritas in una vilissima tunica, mitto apud vulgus, quod vilius tunica, sed apud quosdam graves homines; quos ego cum recordor, in re inani frigida, assidua, tam insatiabiliter desidere, capio aliquam voluptatem, quod hac voluptate non capior. Ac per hos dies libentissime otium meum in litteris colloco, quos alii otiosissimis occupationibus perdunt. Vale.


Pliny the Younger 23. letter 9.6 Pliny the Younger 23. letter 9.6 Plinius de Jongere 23. letter 9.6

C. PLINIUS CALVISIO SUO S. C. PLINIUS HIS CALVISIO S.

Omne hoc tempus inter pugillares ac libellos iucundissima quiete transmisi. "Quem ad modum" inquis "in urbe potuisti?" Circenses erant, quo genere spectaculi ne levissime quidem teneor. Nihil novum, nihil varium, nihil quod non semel spectasse sufficiat.  Quo magis miror tot milia virorum tam pueriliter identidem cupere currentes equos, insistentes curribus homines videre. Si tamen aut velocitate equorum aut hominum arte traherentur, esset ratio non nulla; nunc favent panno, pannum amant, et, si in ipso cursu medioque certamine hic color illuc, ille huc transferatur, studium favorque transibit, et repente agitatores illos, equos illos, quos procul noscitant, quorum clamitant nomina, relinquent. Tanta gratia, tanta auctoritas in una vilissima tunica, mitto apud vulgus, quod vilius tunica, sed apud quosdam graves homines; quos ego cum recordor, in re inani frigida, assidua, tam insatiabiliter desidere, capio aliquam voluptatem, quod hac voluptate non capior. Ac per hos dies libentissime otium meum in litteris colloco, quos alii otiosissimis occupationibus perdunt. Vale. All this time I passed between notebooks and notebooks with a very pleasant quiet. "How, you say, could you be in the city?" They were circuses, by which kind of spectacle I am not bound even the slightest. Nothing new, nothing different, nothing that you haven't once viewed will be enough. Which makes me wonder that so many thousand men, so boyishly, repeatedly longed for horses to run, and to see men standing in their chariots. If, however, they were drawn either by the speed of their horses or by the art of men, there would be no reason not; they now favor cloth, they love cloth; and if in the course of the race, and in the midst of the contest, this color is transferred thither, the other is transferred hither, and the desire to dislike will pass away; So great grace, so great authority, in one very cheap tunic, I send among the common people, that the tunic is cheaper, but with some serious men; and when I think of them, in the cold, incessant, and insatiable desire of such a vain thing, I take some pleasure, which I am not caught by this pleasure. And these days I place my leisure most gladly in letters, which others ruin by very idle occupations. Farewell.