§84.7Concoquamus illa; alioqui in memoriam ibunt, non in ingenium.
Let us digest those things; otherwise they will go into the memory, not into the intellect.
Adsentiamur illis fideliter et nostra faciamus, ut unum quiddam fiat ex multis, sicut unus numerus fit ex singulis, cum minores summas et dissidentes conputatio una comprendit.
Let us assent to them faithfully and make them our own, so that some one thing may be made out of many, just as one number is made from individual ones when a single calculation encompasses smaller and differing sums.
Hoc faciat animus noster: omnia, quibus est adiutus, abscondat, ipsum tantum ostendat, quod effecit.
Let our mind do this: let it conceal all the things by which it has been helped, and let it show only that which it has itself produced.
§84.8Etiam si cuius in te comparebit similitudo, quem admiratio tibi altius fixerit, similem esse te volo quomodo filium, non quomodo imaginem; imago res mortua est.
Even if there shall appear in you a likeness of someone whom admiration has fixed deeper in you, I want you to be like him as a son is, not as an image; an image is a dead thing.
"Quid ergo? Non intellegetur, cuius imiteris orationem, cuius argumentationem, cuius sententias?" Puto aliquando ne intellegi quidem posse, si imago vera sit; haec enim omnibus, quae ex quo velut exemplari traxit, formam suam inpressit, ut in unitatem illa conpetant.
"What then? Will it not be understood whose speech you are imitating, whose argumentation, whose maxims?" I think that sometimes it cannot even be understood, if it is a true likeness; for this likeness impresses its own form upon all the things which it has drawn from what one might call a model, so that they combine into a unity.
Non vides, quam multorum vocibus chorus constet?
Do you not see of how many voices a chorus consists?
§84.9Unus tamen ex omnibus redditur; aliqua illic acuta est, aliqua gravis, aliqua media.
Yet one voice is rendered from them all; some voice there is treble, some is bass, some is tenor.
Accedunt viris feminae, interponuntur tibiae.
To the men women are added, and flutes are interspersed.
§84.10Singulorum illic latent voces, omnium apparent.
There the voices of individuals are concealed, but the voice of all is apparent.
De choro dico, quem veteres philosophi noverant; in commissionibus nostris plus cantorum est quam in theatris olim spectatorum fuit.
I am speaking of the chorus which the ancient philosophers knew; in our public contests there are more singers than there were once spectators in theatres.
Cum omnes vias ordo canentium inplevit et cavea aeneatoribus cincta est et ex pulpito omne tibiarum genus organorumque consonuit, fit concentus ex dissonis.
When the row of singers has filled all the passageways, and the auditorium is surrounded by brass-blowers, and every kind of flutes and instruments has sounded together from the stage, a harmony is made out of discordant sounds.
Talem animum nostrum esse volo; multae in illo artes, multa praecepta sint, multarum aetatum exempla, sed in unum conspirata.
I want our mind to be such; let there be in it many arts, many precepts, examples of many ages, but all breathed together into one.
" §84.11Quomodo," inquis, "hoc effici poterit?" Adsidua intentione; si nihil egerimus nisi ratione suadente.
"How," you say, "will this be able to be accomplished?" By constant attention; if we do nothing except when reason persuades us.
Hanc si audire volueris, dicet tibi: relinque ista iamdudum, ad quae discurritur.
If you are willing to hear her, she will say to you: abandon long ago those things to which people run.
Relinque divitias, aut periculum possidendum aut onus.
Abandon riches, either a danger to be possessed or a burden.
Relinque corporis atque animi voluptates; molliunt et enervant.
Abandon the pleasures of body and mind; they soften and enervate.
Relinque ambitum; tumida res est, vana, ventosa, nullum habet terminum, tam sollicita est, ne quem ante se videat, quam ne quem post se.
Abandon ambition; it is a puffed-up thing, empty, windy, having no limit, as anxious lest it see anyone ahead of itself as lest it see anyone behind itself.
Laborat invidia et quidem duplici; vides autem, quam miser sit, si is cui invidetur et invidet.
It suffers from envy, and indeed a double envy; and you see, moreover, how wretched he is, if he who is envied also envies.
§84.12Intueris illas potentium domos, illa tumultuosa rixa salutantium limina? Multum habent contumeliarum, ut intres, plus, cum intraveris.
Do you look at those houses of the powerful, those thresholds tumultuous with the brawling of visitors offering salutations? They have much of insults so that you may enter, and more when you have entered.
Praeteri istos gradus divitum et magno adgestu suspensa vestibula; non in praerupto tantum istic stabis, sed in lubrico.
Pass by those steps of the rich and the vestibules suspended on a great mound; you will stand there not only on a precipice, but on slippery ground.
Huc potius te ad sapientiam derige tranquillissimasque res eius et simul amplissimas pete.
Direct yourself here instead, toward wisdom, and seek her most tranquil and at the same time most magnificent things.
§84.13Quaecumque videntur eminere in rebus humanis, quamvis pusilla sint et comparatione humillimorum extent, per difficiles tamen et arduos tramites adeuntur.
Whatever things seem to be eminent in human affairs, although they are very small and stand out only by comparison with the lowest, are nevertheless approached through difficult and steep paths.
Confragosa in fastigium dignitatis via est; at si conscendere hunc verticem libet, cui se fortuna summisit, omnia quidem sub te, quae pro excelsissimis habentur, aspicies, sed tamen venies ad summa per planum.
The way to the summit of dignity is rough; but if you wish to ascend this peak, to which fortune has submitted itself, you will indeed look down upon all things under you which are held to be most lofty, and yet you will come to the highest things along a level path.
VALE.
FAREWELL.