§12.pr.1ventum est ad partem operis destinati longe gravissimam.
We have come to by far the most difficult part of the projected work.
cuius equidem onus si tantum opinione prima concipere potuissem, quanto me premi ferens sentio, maturius consuluissem vires meas.
Indeed, if I had been able to conceive its burden in my first estimation as great as I now feel myself pressed down in bearing it, I should have consulted my strength more seasonably.
sed initio pudor omittendi, quae promiseram, tenuit; mox, quanquam per singulas prope partes labor cresceret, ne perderem, quae iam effecta erant, per omnes difficultates animo me sustentavi.
But at first, the shame of abandoning what I had promised held me back; soon, although the labor grew with almost every single part, lest I should lose what had already been completed, I sustained myself in spirit through all difficulties.
§12.pr.2quare nunc quoque, licet maior quam unquam moles premat, tamen prospicienti finem mihi constitutum est vel deficere potius quam desperare.
Therefore now also, although a greater mass than ever presses upon me, yet looking forward to the end, I am resolved rather to fail than to despair.
fefellit autem quod initium a parvis ceperamus.
Moreover, the fact that we had made our beginning from small things deceived me.
mox velut aura sollicitante provecti longius, dum tamen nota illa et plerisque artium scriptoribus tractata praecipimus, nec adhuc a litore procul videbamur et multos circa velut iisdem se ventis credere ausos habebamus.
Soon, carried further as if by an enticing breeze, as long as we were teaching those well-known matters treated by most writers on the arts, we did not yet seem far from the shore, and we had many around us who had dared, as it were, to trust themselves to the same winds.
§12.pr.3iam cum eloquendi rationem novissime repertam paucissimisque temptatam ingressi sumus, rarus, qui tam procul a portu recessisset, reperiebatur.
Now, when we entered upon the theory of eloquence recently discovered and attempted by very few, rarely was anyone found who had receded so far from the harbor.
postquam vero nobis ille, quem instituebamus, orator a dicendi magistris dimissus aut suo iam impetu fertur aut maiora sibi auxilia ex ipsis sapientiae penetralibus petit, quam in altum simus ablati sentire coepimus.
But after that orator whom we were training, dismissed by the masters of speaking, either is now carried by his own impulse or seeks greater aids for himself from the very innermost shrines of wisdom, we began to feel how far into the deep we have been carried away.
§12.pr.4nunc caelum undique et undique pontus.
Now there is sky on all sides, and on all sides the sea.
unum modo in illa immensa vastitate cernere videmur M. Tullium, qui tamen ipse, quamvis tanta atque ita instructa nave hoc mare ingressus, contrahit vela inhibetque remos et de ipso demum genere dicendi, quo sit usurus perfectus orator, satis habet dicere.
In that immense vastness we seem to discern only Marcus Tullius, who, however, although he entered this sea with so great and so well-equipped a vessel, contracts his sails and checks his oars, and is content to speak only of that very style of speaking which the perfect orator is to use.
at nostra temeritas etiam mores ei conabitur dare et adsignabit officia.
But our temerity will attempt to give him morals also and will assign his duties.
ita nec antecedentem consequi possumus, et longius eundum est, ut res feret.
Thus we can neither overtake our predecessor, and we must go further, as the situation will require.
probabilis tamen cupiditas honestorum et velut tutioris audentiae est temptare, quibus paratior venia est.
Yet the desire for noble things is commendable, and it is a matter of a safer daring, as it were, to attempt things for which pardon is more readily available.