Everything is Greek, when it is more shameful to be ignorant of
Latin.
[Lat., Omnia Graece!
read more

Everything is Greek, when it is more shameful to be ignorant of
Latin.
[Lat., Omnia Graece!
Cum sit turpe magis nostris nescire Latine.]

Small Latin, and less Greek.

Small Latin, and less Greek.

I love the language, that soft bastard Latin,
Which melts like kisses from a female mouth.

I love the language, that soft bastard Latin,
Which melts like kisses from a female mouth.

. . . Philologists, who chase
A painting syllable through time and space
Start it at home, read more

. . . Philologists, who chase
A painting syllable through time and space
Start it at home, and hunt it in the dark,
To Gaul, to Greece, and into Noah's Ark.

But to the purpose--for we cite our faults
That they may hold excused our lawless lives;
And read more

But to the purpose--for we cite our faults
That they may hold excused our lawless lives;
And partly, seeing you are beautified
With goodly shape, and by your own report
A linguist, and a man of such perfection
As we do in our quality much want--

Egad, I think the interpreter is the hardest to be understood of
the two!

Egad, I think the interpreter is the hardest to be understood of
the two!

He plays o' th' viol-de-gamboys, and speaks three or four
languages word for word without book, and hath all read more

He plays o' th' viol-de-gamboys, and speaks three or four
languages word for word without book, and hath all the good gifts
of nature.

Besides 'tis known he could speak Greek
As naturally as pigs squeak;
That Latin was no more read more

Besides 'tis known he could speak Greek
As naturally as pigs squeak;
That Latin was no more difficile
That to a blackbird 'tis to whistle.

But those that understood him smiled at one another and shook
their heads; but for mine own part, if read more

But those that understood him smiled at one another and shook
their heads; but for mine own part, if was Greek to me.