To Apollinaris [Sidonius's son].
I thoroughly approve, rejoice, and admire that out of love for purity you shun the company of dissolute men — especially those who think nothing of propriety or holiness in pursuing and talking about shameful things, and who fancy themselves supremely witty for violating public decency with their foul language. Understand that the standard-bearer of this sort of degradation in our homeland is the man I call Gnatho [a parasite's name from Roman comedy; Sidonius avoids naming the real person].
He is a cesspool of fabricated stories, a manufacturer of slander, a multiplier of ill-rumor — talkative but never clever, ridiculous but never genuinely funny, arrogant but never consistent, nosy but never perceptive, and clumsy in his affected humor, which makes him more boorish, not less. He praises the present, criticizes the past, and scorns the future. When he wants a favor, he pesters you to get it; if refused, he disparages you for refusing; if granted, he resents you for giving; if delayed, he whines about the delay; if returned, he brags about the return. But when he is the one asked, he pretends to be ready, hides when sought, sells what he gives, publishes what should stay private, misrepresents what is settled, and denies what he owes.
A hater of fasts and a devotee of banquets, his admiration is reserved not for those who live well but for those who feed him well. Yet for all that, he is himself the most miserly of men — sustained not so much by good bread as by other people's bread, eating at home only what he has snatched from the platters amid a hail of slaps. His frugality is not exactly praiseworthy either: he fasts only when he is not invited. Yet with parasitic nimbleness, he makes excuses if invited, spies if passed over, protests if shut out, exults if admitted, and patiently waits if beaten.
When he sits down to eat, if the food comes slowly, he launches into theft; if he is full too soon, into tears; if thirsty, into complaints; if drunk, into vomiting; if bored, into insults; if provoked, into frenzy — exactly like a sewer, which grows more foul the more it is stirred.
"But," you say, "his face redeems his soul — he is a handsome, elegant man whose appearance makes up for his character." On the contrary: he is more repulsive and deformed than a half-cremated corpse that has rolled off a collapsing pyre, one that even the disgusted undertaker refuses to put back on the flames. His eyes are lightless, rolling tears through darkness like the pools of the Styx. His ears are enormous, their double openings ringed with ulcerous skin and warty nodes. His nose is wide at the nostrils and narrow at the bridge — as open to horror as it is closed to smell. His mouth is leaden-lipped, beastly in its gape, purulent in its gums, and boxwood-yellow in its teeth, fouled by the pestilential breath rising from its rotting molars.
He carries a forehead that wrinkles its skin and stretches its eyebrows in the most revolting manner. He maintains a beard that, though whitening with age, has turned black with disease. His entire face is so pale, as though perpetually shadowed by ghostly apparitions. I say nothing of the rest of his bulk — bound by gout, dissolved by fat. I say nothing of his gouty hands wrapped in oily poultice-rags like boxing gloves. I say nothing of the goat-stink of his armpits, whose acrid fumes poison the nostrils of all who sit near him.
I say nothing of his hanging breasts — disgusting even on a man's chest merely to protrude, but in his case drooping like a nursing mother's. I say nothing of the pendulous folds of his sagging belly, which provide an even more shameful covering for his already shameful parts.
But what is worse than his body is his tongue. Though he itches with obscene gossip, he is especially dangerous to the secrets of his patrons — praising them in good times and betraying them in bad. When opportunity calls for the exposure of private matters, this Spartacus of ours breaks open every lock and unseals every seal. What he cannot assault with the siege-engines of open hostility, he attacks through the tunnels of secret betrayal.
Therefore, you will do as I wish if you never associate with such people — especially those whose prostituted, theatrical speech is restrained by no shame. For those whose uncontrolled tongues are polluted by the dregs of obscene wit inevitably have the most sordid consciences to match. It is easier to find a man who speaks seriously yet lives obscenely than to find one who is simultaneously vile in speech and virtuous in conduct. Farewell.
EPISTULA XIII
Sidonius Apollinari suo salutem.
1. Unice probo gaudeo admiror, quod castitatis affectu contubernia fugis impudicorum, praesertim quibus nihil pensi, nihil sancti est in appetendis garriendisque turpitudinibus quique quod verbis inverecundis aurium publicarum reverentiam incestant, granditer sibi videntur facetiari. cuius vilitatis esse signiferum Gnathonem patriae nostrae vel maxumum intellege.
2. est enim hic gurges de sutoribus fabularum, de concinnatoribus criminum, de sinistrarum opinionum duplicatoribus, loquax ipse nec dicax ridiculusque nec laetus arrogansque nec constans curiosusque nec perspicax atque indecenter affectato lepore plus rusticus; tempora praesentia colens, praeterita carpens, futura fastidiens; beneficii, si rogaturus est, inportunus petendi derogator negati, aemulator accepti callidus reformandi, querulus flagitati garrulus restituti; at si rogandus, simulator parati dissimulator petiti, venditor praestiti publicator occulti, calumniator morati infitiator soluti;
3. osor ieiuniorum, sectator epularum; laudabilem proferens non de bene vivente sed de bene pascente sententiam; inter haec tamen ipse avarissimus quemque non pascit tam panis bonus quam panis alienus, hoc solum comedens domi, si quid e raptis inter alaparum procellas praemisit obsoniis. sed nec est sane praedicabilis viri in totum silendi frugalitas: ieiunat, quotiens non vocatur; sed sic quoque levitate parasitica, si invitetur excusans; si vitetur, explorans; si excludatur exprobrans; si admittatur, exultans; si verberetur, exspectans.
4. cum discubuerit, fertur actutum, si tarde comedat, in rapinas; si cito saturetur, in lacrimas; si sitiat, in querelas; si inebrietur, in vomicas; si fatiget, in contumelias; si fatigetur, in furias; faeculentiae omnino par cloacali, quae quo plus commota, plus fetida est. ita vivens paucis voluptati, nullis amori, omnibus risui, vesicarum ruptor fractorque ferularum, bibendi avidus, avidior detrahendi, rabido pariter ore spirans caenum, spumans vinum, loquens venenum, facit ambigi putidior, temulentior an facinorosior existimetur.
5. sed dicis: 'animi probra vultus colorat et deprecatur ineptias mentis qualitas corporis; elegans videlicet homo pervenustusque cuiusque sit spectabilis persona visentibus.' enimvero ille sordidior est atque deformior cadavere rogali, quod facibus admotis semicombustum moxque sidente strue torrium devolutum reddere pyrae iam fastidiosus pollinctor exhorret. praeter hoc lumina gerit idem lumine carentia, quae Stygiae vice paludis volvunt lacrimas per tenebras.
6. gerit et aures immanitate barrinas, quarum fistulam biforem pellis ulcerosa circumvenit saxeis nodis et tofosis umore verrucis per marginem curvum protuberantibus. portat et nasum, qui cum sit amplus in foraminibus et strictus in spina, sic patescit horrori, quod angustatur olfactui. praetendit os etiam labris plumbeum rictu ferinum, gingivis purulentum dentibus buxeum, quod spurcat frequenter exhalatus e concavo molarium computrescentum mephiticus odor, quem supercumulat esculenta ructatio de dapibus hesternis et redundantum sentina cenarum.
7. promit et frontem, quae foedissimo gestu cutem plicat supercilia distendit. nutrit et barbam, quae iam senectute canescens fit tamen morbo nigra Syllano. tota denique est misero facies ita pallida, veluti per horas umbris maestificata larvalibus. taceo reliquam sui molem vinctam podagra pinguedine solutam. taceo cerebrum crebra vibice peraratum, quod parum amplius tegi constat capillis quam cicatricibus. taceo pro brevitate cervicis occipiti supinato scapularum adhaerere confinia.
8. taceo, quia decidit honor umeris, decor brachiis, robur lacertis. taceo chiragricas manus unctis cataplasmatum pannis tamquam caestibus involutas. taceo, quod alarum specubus hircosis atque acescentibus latera captiva vallatus nares circumsedentum ventilata duplicis Ampsancti peste funestat. taceo fractas pondere arvinae iacere mammas quasque foedum esset in pectore virili vel prominere, has ut ubera materna cecidisse. taceo ventris inflexi pendulos casses parti genitalium, quia debili, bis pudendae turpibus rugis turpius praebere velamen.
9. iam quid hic tergum spinamque commemorem? de cuius licet internodiorum fomitibus erumpens aream pectoris texat curvatura costarum, tota nihilominus haec ossium ramosa compago sub uno velut exundantis abdominis pelago latet. taceo lumborum corpulentiam cluniumque, cui crassitudini comparata censetur alvus exilis. taceo femur aridum ac pandum, genua vasta poplites delicatos, crura cornea vitreos talos, parvos digitos pedes grandes. cumque distortis horreat ita liniamentis perque multiplicem pestilentiam exsanguis semivivusque nec portatus sedeat, nec sustentatus incedat, verbis tamen est ille quam membris execrabilior.
10. nam quamquam pruritu laborat sermonis inhonesti, tamen patronorum est praecipue cavendus arcanis, quorum est laudator in prosperis, delator in dubiis; et si ad occulta familiarium publicanda temporis ratio sollicitet, mox per hunc Spartacum quaecumque sunt clausa franguntur quaeque obserata reserantur; ita, quod quas domorum nequiverit machinis apertae simultatis impetere, cuniculis clandestinae proditionis impugnat. hoc fabricatu Daedalus noster amicitiarum culmen aedificat, qui sicut sodalibus velut Theseus inter secunda sociatur, sic ab his postmodum velut Proteus inter adversa dilabitur.
11. igitur ex voto meo feceris, si talium sodalitati ne congressu quidem primore sociere, maxume illorum, quorum sermonibus prostitutis ac theatralibus nullas habenas, nulla praemittit repagula pudor. nam quibus citra honestatis nitorem iactitabundis loquacis faece petulantiae lingua polluitur infrenis, his conscientia quoque sordidatissima est. denique facilius obtingit, ut quispiam seria loquens vivat obscene, quam valeat ostendi qui pariter existat improbus dictis et probus moribus. vale.
◆
To Apollinaris [Sidonius's son].
I thoroughly approve, rejoice, and admire that out of love for purity you shun the company of dissolute men — especially those who think nothing of propriety or holiness in pursuing and talking about shameful things, and who fancy themselves supremely witty for violating public decency with their foul language. Understand that the standard-bearer of this sort of degradation in our homeland is the man I call Gnatho [a parasite's name from Roman comedy; Sidonius avoids naming the real person].
He is a cesspool of fabricated stories, a manufacturer of slander, a multiplier of ill-rumor — talkative but never clever, ridiculous but never genuinely funny, arrogant but never consistent, nosy but never perceptive, and clumsy in his affected humor, which makes him more boorish, not less. He praises the present, criticizes the past, and scorns the future. When he wants a favor, he pesters you to get it; if refused, he disparages you for refusing; if granted, he resents you for giving; if delayed, he whines about the delay; if returned, he brags about the return. But when he is the one asked, he pretends to be ready, hides when sought, sells what he gives, publishes what should stay private, misrepresents what is settled, and denies what he owes.
A hater of fasts and a devotee of banquets, his admiration is reserved not for those who live well but for those who feed him well. Yet for all that, he is himself the most miserly of men — sustained not so much by good bread as by other people's bread, eating at home only what he has snatched from the platters amid a hail of slaps. His frugality is not exactly praiseworthy either: he fasts only when he is not invited. Yet with parasitic nimbleness, he makes excuses if invited, spies if passed over, protests if shut out, exults if admitted, and patiently waits if beaten.
When he sits down to eat, if the food comes slowly, he launches into theft; if he is full too soon, into tears; if thirsty, into complaints; if drunk, into vomiting; if bored, into insults; if provoked, into frenzy — exactly like a sewer, which grows more foul the more it is stirred.
"But," you say, "his face redeems his soul — he is a handsome, elegant man whose appearance makes up for his character." On the contrary: he is more repulsive and deformed than a half-cremated corpse that has rolled off a collapsing pyre, one that even the disgusted undertaker refuses to put back on the flames. His eyes are lightless, rolling tears through darkness like the pools of the Styx. His ears are enormous, their double openings ringed with ulcerous skin and warty nodes. His nose is wide at the nostrils and narrow at the bridge — as open to horror as it is closed to smell. His mouth is leaden-lipped, beastly in its gape, purulent in its gums, and boxwood-yellow in its teeth, fouled by the pestilential breath rising from its rotting molars.
He carries a forehead that wrinkles its skin and stretches its eyebrows in the most revolting manner. He maintains a beard that, though whitening with age, has turned black with disease. His entire face is so pale, as though perpetually shadowed by ghostly apparitions. I say nothing of the rest of his bulk — bound by gout, dissolved by fat. I say nothing of his gouty hands wrapped in oily poultice-rags like boxing gloves. I say nothing of the goat-stink of his armpits, whose acrid fumes poison the nostrils of all who sit near him.
I say nothing of his hanging breasts — disgusting even on a man's chest merely to protrude, but in his case drooping like a nursing mother's. I say nothing of the pendulous folds of his sagging belly, which provide an even more shameful covering for his already shameful parts.
But what is worse than his body is his tongue. Though he itches with obscene gossip, he is especially dangerous to the secrets of his patrons — praising them in good times and betraying them in bad. When opportunity calls for the exposure of private matters, this Spartacus of ours breaks open every lock and unseals every seal. What he cannot assault with the siege-engines of open hostility, he attacks through the tunnels of secret betrayal.
Therefore, you will do as I wish if you never associate with such people — especially those whose prostituted, theatrical speech is restrained by no shame. For those whose uncontrolled tongues are polluted by the dregs of obscene wit inevitably have the most sordid consciences to match. It is easier to find a man who speaks seriously yet lives obscenely than to find one who is simultaneously vile in speech and virtuous in conduct. Farewell.
Modern English rendering for readability. See the 19th-century translation or original Latin/Greek for scholarly use.