Maxioms by Marcus Valerius Martial
You ask for lively epigrams, and propose lifeless subjects. What
can I do, Caecilianus? You expect Hyblaen or Hymethian read more
You ask for lively epigrams, and propose lifeless subjects. What
can I do, Caecilianus? You expect Hyblaen or Hymethian honey to
be produced, and yet offer the Attic bee nothing but Corsican
thyme?
If you wish, Faustinus, a bath of boiling water to be reduced in
temperature,--a bath, such as scarcely Julianus read more
If you wish, Faustinus, a bath of boiling water to be reduced in
temperature,--a bath, such as scarcely Julianus could enter,--ask
the rhetorician Sabinaeus to bathe himself in it. He would
freeze the warm baths of Nero.
The swan murmurs sweet strains with a flattering tongue, itself
the singer of its own dirge.
The swan murmurs sweet strains with a flattering tongue, itself
the singer of its own dirge.
The swifter hand doth the swift words outrun:
Before the tongue hath spoke the hand hath done.
The swifter hand doth the swift words outrun:
Before the tongue hath spoke the hand hath done.
Since your legs, Phoebus, resemble the horns of the moon, you
might bathe your feet in a cornucopia.
Since your legs, Phoebus, resemble the horns of the moon, you
might bathe your feet in a cornucopia.
