
“It is a sad fate for a man to die too well known to everybody else, and still unknown to himself.”
Illi mors gravis incubat
Qui notus nimis omnibus
Ignotus moritur sibi
Thyestes, lines 401-403; (Chorus).
Alternate translation: Death weighs on him who is known to all, but dies unknown to himself. (The Philisophical Life by James Miller).
Tragedies
Illi mors gravis incubat Qui notus nimis omnibus Ignotus moritur sibi
“It is a sad fate for a man to die too well known to everybody else, and still unknown to himself.”
“In no other type of warfare does the advantage lie so heavily with the aggressor.”
Memorandum to President Roosevelt (July, 1944).
Brighter than a Thousand Suns: A Personal History of the Atomic Scientists by Robert Jungk (Page 351).
The Tragic Sense of Life (1913), VI : In the Depths of the Abyss
Context: In the most secret chamber of the spirit of him who believes himself convinced that death puts an end to his personal consciousness, his memory, for ever, and all unknown to him perhaps, there lurks a shadow, a vague shadow, a shadow of uncertainty, and while he says within himself, "Well, let us live this life that passes away, for there is no other!" the silence of this secret chamber speaks to him and murmurs, "Who knows!... " These voices are like the humming of a mosquito when the south-west wind roars through the trees in the wood; we cannot distinguish this faint humming, yet nevertheless, merged in the clamor of the storm, it reaches the ear.
The Tragic Sense of Life (1913), X : Religion, the Mythology of the Beyond and the Apocatastasis
dies slowly…
Muere lentamente quien no viaja, quien no lee,
quien no oye música,
quien no encuentra gracia en sí mismo.
Muere lentamente
quien destruye su amor propio,
quien no se deja ayudar...
Poem "Muere lentamente" (Dying Slowly), wrongly attributed to Pablo Neruda. See "Fake Pablo Neruda Poem Spreads on Internet" http://www.laht.com/article.asp?ArticleId=325275&CategoryId=14094 by Ana Mendoza, Latin American Herald Tribune (12 January 2009).
Misattributed
Source: Selected Poems
The Psychology of the Unconscious (1943)
“Ask counsel of him who rules himself well.”
The Notebooks of Leonardo da Vinci (1883), XIX Philosophical Maxims. Morals. Polemics and Speculations.
Falsehood in Wartime (1928), Introduction