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@xy, member from Sept. 25, 2023

Favourite quotes (21448)

“Because they didn't know better, they called it "civilization," when it was part of their slavery.”
Idque apud imperitos humanitas vocabatur, cum pars servitutis esset.

Tacitus book Agricola

Book 1, paragraph 21 http://www.slate.com/id/2180061/nav/tap3/ Variant translation: Step by step they were led to things which dispose to vice, the lounge, the bath, the elegant banquet. All this in their ignorance they called civilisation, when it was but a part of their servitude. As translated by Alfred John Church and William Jackson Brodribb http://www.fordham.edu/halsall/ancient/tacitus-agricola.asp Agricola (98)

“For I deem it to be the chief function of history to rescue merit from oblivion, and to hold up before evil words and evil deeds the terror of the reprobation of posterity.”

Tacitus book Annals

Book III, 65 https://books.google.com/books?id=rPwLAAAAYAAJ&pg=PA247&lpg=PA247&dq=%22rescue+merit+from+oblivion%22+tacitus&source=bl&ots=uZvo03YXoQ&sig=WCpqNyg6Qyg-5xCJP4iiibym6pc&hl=en&sa=X&ved=0ahUKEwjln4Xl9YbVAhWMHD4KHbHBCc8Q6AEIJDAA#v=onepage&q=%22rescue%20merit%20from%20oblivion%22%20tacitus&f=false Annals (117)

“Their shields are black, their bodies dyed. They choose dark nights for battle, and, by the dread and gloomy aspect of their death-like host, strike terror into the foe, who can never confront their strange and almost infernal appearance.”

Tacitus book Germania

Source: Germania (98), Chapter 43

“So true is it that all transactions of preeminent importance are wrapt in doubt and obscurity; while some hold for certain facts the most precarious hearsays, others turn facts into falsehood; and both are exaggerated by posterity.”

Tacitus book Annals

Book III, 19
Annals (117)
Variant: So obscure are the greatest events, as some take for granted any hearsay, whatever its source, others turn truth into falsehood, and both errors find encouragement with posterity.

“Lust of absolute power is more burning than all the passions”
cupido dominandi cunctis adfectibus flagrantior est

Tacitus book Annals

Book XV, 53
Annals (117)

“The soldiers have the plunder of a city that is stormed, the generals of one which capitulates.”
Expugnatae urbis praedam ad militem, deditae ad duces pertinere.

Tacitus book Histories

Book III, 19; Church-Brodribb translation
Histories (100-110)

“Think of your forefathers and posterity.”
Et maiores vestros et posteros cogitate.

Tacitus book Agricola

Source: Agricola (98), Chapter 32

“The desire for safety stands against every great and noble enterprise.”
nisi impunitatis cupido retinuisset, magnis semper conatibus adversa.

Tacitus book Annals

Book XV, 50, in his account of Subrius Flavus’ passing thought of assassinating Nero while the emperor sang on stage.
Variant translation: "but desire of escape, foe to all great enterprises, held him back."
Annals (117)

“No honour was left for the gods, when Augustus chose to be himself worshipped with temples and statues, like those of the deities, and with flamens and priests.”
Nihil deorum honoribus relictum, cum se templis et effigie numinum per flamines et sacerdotes coli vellet.

Tacitus book Annals

Book I, 10; Church-Brodribb translation
Annals (117)

“The gods are on the side of the stronger.”
Deos fortioribus adesse.

Tacitus book Histories

Book IV, 17
Histories (100-110)

“The Germans themselves I should regard as aboriginal, and not mixed at all with other races through immigration or intercourse. For in former times, it was not by land but on shipboard that those who sought to emigrate would arrive; and the boundless and, so to speak, hostile ocean beyond us, is seldom entered by a sail from our world.”

Tacitus book Germania

Source: Germania (98), Chapter 2

“The busts of twenty most illustrious families were borne in the procession, with the names of Manlius, Quinctius, and others of equal rank. But Cassius and Brutus outshone them all, from the very fact that their likenesses were not to be seen.”
Viginti clarissimarum familiarum imagines antelatae sunt, Manlii, Quinctii aliaque eiusdem nobilitatis nomina. sed praefulgebant Cassius atque Brutus eo ipso quod effigies eorum non visebantur.

Tacitus book Annals

Book III, 76; Church-Brodribb translation According to Lippincott's Monthly Magazine https://play.google.com/books/reader?id=P8pGAQAAMAAJ&printsec=frontcover&output=reader&hl=en&pg=GBS.PA872|: This line is the origin of Lord John Russell's phrase "Conspicuous by its absence"; of which Russell said "It is not an original expression of mine, but is taken from one of the greatest historians of antiquity". Similar phrases also are found in the tragedy Tiberius of Joseph Chénier and in Les Hommes Illustres of Charles Perrault. Annals (117)

“They even say that an altar dedicated to Ulysses, with the addition of the name of his father, Laertes, was formerly discovered on the same spot, and that certain monuments and tombs with Greek inscriptions, still exist on the borders of Germany and Rhaetia.”

Tacitus book Germania

Source: Germania (98), Chapter 3

“However the marriage is there severe.”
Quanquam severa illic matrimonia

Tacitus book Germania

Start of chapter 18
This is in the sense that the matrimonial bond was strictly observed by the Germanic peoples, this being compared favorably against licentiousness in Rome. Tacitus appears to hold the fairly strict monogamy (with some exceptions among nobles who marry again) between Germanic husbands and wives, and the chastity among the unmarried to be worthy of the highest praise. (Ch. 18).
Germania (98)

“Thou wast indeed fortunate, Agricola, not only in the splendour of thy life, but in the opportune moment of thy death.”
Tu vero felix, Agricola, non vitae tantum claritate, sed etiam opportunitate mortis.

Tacitus book Agricola

http://www.unrv.com/tacitus/tacitus-agricola-12.php
Source: Agricola (98), Chapter 45

“Once killing starts, it is difficult to draw the line.”

Tacitus book Histories

Book I, 39
Histories (100-110)

“He had not even adopted Tiberius as his successor out of affection or any regard to the State, but, having thoroughly seen his arrogant and savage temper, he had sought glory for himself by a contrast of extreme wickedness.”
Ne Tiberium quidem caritate aut rei publicae cura successorem adscitum, sed quoniam adrogantiam saevitiamque eius introspexerit, comparatione deterrima sibi gloriam quaesivisse.

Tacitus book Annals

Book I, 10; Church-Brodribb translation
Annals (117)

“He upbraided Macro, in no obscure and indirect terms, "with forsaking the setting sun and turning to the rising."”

Tacitus book Annals

Book VI, 52, referring to Tiberius
Annals (117)

“There is a division of duties between the army and its generals. Eagerness for battle becomes the soldiers, but generals serve the cause by forethought, by counsel, by delay oftener than by temerity. As I promoted your victory to the utmost of my power by my sword and by my personal exertions, so now I must help you by prudence and by counsel, the qualities which belong peculiarly to a general.”
Divisa inter exercitum ducesque munia: militibus cupidinem pugnandi convenire, duces providendo, consultando, cunctatione saepius quam temeritate prodesse. ut pro virili portione armis ac manu victoriam iuverit, ratione et consilio, propriis ducis artibus, profuturum.

Tacitus book Histories

Book III, 20; Church-Brodribb translation
Histories (100-110)

“Good habits are here more effectual than good laws elsewhere.”
…ibi boni mores valent quam alibi bonae leges. [http://www.fordham.edu/halsall/source/tacitus-germ-latin.html#19]

Tacitus book Germania

End of chapter 19, http://www.unrv.com/tacitus/tacitus-germania-5.php Germania (98)