Quotes from work
Metamorphoses

Ovid Original title Metamorphoseon libri (Latin)

The Metamorphoses is a Latin narrative poem by the Roman poet Ovid, considered his magnum opus. Comprising 11,995 lines, 15 books and over 250 myths, the poem chronicles the history of the world from its creation to the deification of Julius Caesar within a loose mythico-historical framework.


Ovid photo

“The cause is hidden. The effect is visible to all.”
Causa latet, vis est notissima

Variant translation: The cause is hidden; the effect is visible to all.
Book IV, 287
Metamorphoses (Transformations)
Variant: The cause is hidden, but the result is well known.

Ovid photo

“Omnia mutantur, nihil interit (everything changes, nothing perishes).”

Variant: All things change; nothing perishes.
Source: Metamorphoses

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“Video meliora, proboque, deteriora sequor.”

I see better things, and approve, but I follow worse.
Book VII, 20
Metamorphoses (Transformations)

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“A last farewell.”

Book X, 62
Metamorphoses (Transformations)

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“Plenty has made me poor.”
Inopem me copia fecit.

Book III, 466
Variant translation: Abundance makes me poor.
Metamorphoses (Transformations)

Ovid photo

“Thus all things are but altered, nothing dies.”
Omnia mutantur, nihil interit.

Book XV, 165 (as translated by John Dryden); on the transmigration of souls.
Metamorphoses (Transformations)

Ovid photo

“Time, the devourer of all things.”
Tempus edax rerum.

Book XV, 234
Metamorphoses (Transformations)

Ovid photo

“Your right arm is useful in the battle; but when it comes to thinking you need my guidance. You have force without intelligence; while mine is the care for to-morrow. You are a good fighter; but is I who help Atrides select the time of fighting. Your value is in your body only; mine, in mind. And, as much as he who directs the ship surpasses him who only rows it, as much as the general exceeds the common soldier, so much greater am I than you. For in these bodies of ours the heart is of more value than the hand; all our real living is in that.”
Tibi dextera bello utilis: ingenium est, quod eget moderamine nostro; tu vires sine mente geris, mihi cura futuri; tu pugnare potes, pugnandi tempora mecum eligit Atrides; tu tantum corpore prodes, nos animo; quantoque ratem qui temperat, anteit remigis officium, quanto dux milite maior, tantum ego te supero; nec non in corpore nostro pectora sunt potiora manu: vigor omnis in illis.

Book XIII, 361–369; translation by Frank Justus Miller https://archive.org/details/metamorphoseswit02oviduoft
Metamorphoses (Transformations)

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“Water belongs to us all. Nature did not make the sun one person's property, nor air, nor water, cool and clear.”
Usus communis aquarum est. Nec solem proprium natura nec aera fecit nec tenues undas

Book VI, 349-351; translation by Michael Simpson https://books.google.ca/books?id=hDPmwbCSSPEC
Metamorphoses (Transformations)

Ovid photo

“O impious use! to Nature's laws oppos'd,
Where bowels are in other bowels clos'd:
Where fatten'd by their fellow's fat, they thrive;
Maintain'd by murder, and by death they live.
'Tis then for nought, that Mother Earth provides
The stores of all she shows, and all she hides,
If men with fleshy morsels must be fed,
And chaw with bloody teeth the breathing bread:
What else is this, but to devour our guests,
And barb'rously renew Cyclopean feasts!
We, by destroying life, our life sustain;
And gorge th' ungodly maw with meats obscene.”

Heu quantum scelus est in viscera viscera condi ingestoque avidum pinguescere corpore corpus alteriusque animans animantis vivere leto! Scilicet in tantis opibus, quas, optima matrum, terra parit, nil te nisi tristia mandere saevo vulnera dente iuvat ritusque referre Cyclopum, nec, nisi perdideris alium, placare voracis et male morati poteris ieiunia ventris!

Book XV, 88–95 (from Wikisource)
Metamorphoses (Transformations)

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“And he turned his mind to unknown arts.”
Et ignotas animum dimittit in artes.

Book VIII, line 188
Metamorphoses (Transformations)

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“Right it is to be taught even by the enemy.”
Fas est et ab hoste doceri.

Variant translation: It is right to learn, even from the enemy.
Book IV, 428
Metamorphoses (Transformations)

Ovid photo

“For those things which were done either by our fathers, or ancestors, and in which we ourselves had no share, we can scarcely call our own.”
Nam genus et proavos et quae non fecimus ipsi, Vix ea nostra voco.

Metamorphoses (Transformations)

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“Then the omnipotent Father with his thunder made Olympus tremble, and from Ossa hurled Pelion.”
Tum pater omnipotens misso perfregit Olympum fulmine et excussit subiectae Pelion Ossae.

Tum pater omnipotens misso perfregit Olympum
fulmine et excussit subiectae Pelion Ossae.
Book I, 154
Compare: "Heav'd on Olympus tott'ring Ossa stood; On Ossa, Pelion nods with all his wood", Alexander Pope, The Odyssey of Homer, Book xi, line 387; "would have you call to mind the strength of the ancient giants, that undertook to lay the high mountain Pelion on the top of Ossa, and set among those the shady Olympus", François Rabelais, Works, book iv. chap. xxxviii.
Metamorphoses (Transformations)

Ovid photo

“O mortals, from your fellows' blood abstain,
Nor taint your bodies with a food profane:
While corn, and pulse by Nature are bestow'd,
And planted orchards bend their willing load;
While labour'd gardens wholesom herbs produce,
And teeming vines afford their gen'rous juice;
Nor tardier fruits of cruder kind are lost,
But tam'd with fire, or mellow'd by the frost;
While kine to pails distended udders bring,
And bees their hony redolent of Spring;
While Earth not only can your needs supply,
But, lavish of her store, provides for luxury;
A guiltless feast administers with ease,
And without blood is prodigal to please.”

Parcite, mortales, dapibus temerare nefandis corpora! sunt fruges, sunt deducentia ramos pondere poma suo tumidaeque in vitibus uvae, sunt herbae dulces, sunt quae mitescere flamma mollirique queant; nec vobis lacteus umor eripitur, nec mella thymi redolentia florem: prodiga divitias alimentaque mitia tellus suggerit atque epulas sine caede et sanguine praebet.

Book XV, 75–82 (from Wikisource); on vegetarianism, as the following quote
Metamorphoses (Transformations)

Ovid photo

“No species remains constant: that great renovator of matter
Nature, endlessly fashions new forms from old: there’s nothing
in the whole universe that perishes, believe me; rather
it renews and varies its substance. What we describe as birth
is no more than incipient change from a prior state, while dying
is merely to quit it. Though the parts may be transported
hither and thither, the sum of all matter is constant.”

Nec species sua cuique manet, rerumque novatrix ex aliis alias reparat natura figuras: nec perit in toto quicquam, mihi credite, mundo, sed variat faciemque novat, nascique vocatur incipere esse aliud, quam quod fuit ante, morique desinere illud idem. cum sint huc forsitan illa, haec translata illuc, summa tamen omnia constant.

Nec species sua cuique manet, rerumque novatrix
ex aliis alias reparat natura figuras:
nec perit in toto quicquam, mihi credite, mundo,
sed variat faciemque novat, nascique vocatur
incipere esse aliud, quam quod fuit ante, morique
desinere illud idem. cum sint huc forsitan illa,
haec translata illuc, summa tamen omnia constant.
Book XV, 252–258 (as translated by Peter Green)
Metamorphoses (Transformations)

Ovid photo

“Pointing to a pile of dust, that had collected, I foolishly begged to have as many anniversaries of my birth, as were represented by the dust. But I forgot to ask that the years should be accompanied by youth.”
Ego pulveris hausti ostendens cumulum, quot haberet corpora pulvis, tot mihi natales contingere vana rogavi; excidit, ut peterem iuvenes quoque protinus annos.

Book XIV, lines 136–139; translation by A. S. Kline
Metamorphoses (Transformations)

Ovid photo

“Chaos, a rough and unordered mass.”
Chaos, rudis indigestaque moles.

Book I, 7
Metamorphoses (Transformations)

Ovid photo

“My name shall never be forgotten.”
Nomenque erit indelebile nostrum.

Book XV, 876
Metamorphoses (Transformations)

Ovid photo

“The gods have their own rules.”
Sunt superis sua iura

Book IX, 500
Metamorphoses (Transformations)

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