Vulgar words in Complete Works of Plutarch — Volume 3: Essays and Miscellanies (Page 1)
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~ ~ ~ Sentence 9 ~ ~ ~
Yet you may remember, replied Theon, how you told them that Colotes himself, compared with the rhetoric of those two gentlemen, would appear the complaisantest man alive; for when they have raked together the lewdest terms of ignominy the tongue of man ever used, as buffooneries, trollings, arrogancies, whorings, assassinations, whining counterfeits, black-guards, and blockheads, they faintly throw them in the faces of Aristotle, Socrates, Pythagoras, Protagoras, Theophrastus, Heraclides, Hipparchus, and which not, even of the best and most celebrated authorities.
~ ~ ~ Sentence 167 ~ ~ ~
Yea, he advises such princes as are lovers of the Muses rather to entertain themselves at their feasts either with some narration of military adventures or with the importune scurrilities of drolls and buffoons, than to engage in disputes about music or in questions of poetry.
~ ~ ~ Sentence 255 ~ ~ ~
May not a man then--as Callicratidas once said of the Athenian admiral Conon, that he whored the sea as well say of Epicurus that he basely and covertly forces and ravishes Fame, by not enjoying her publicly but ruffling and debauching her in a corner?
~ ~ ~ Sentence 622 ~ ~ ~
Some of the philosophers, such as Diagoras the Melian, Theodorus the Cyrenean, and Euemerus the Tegeatan, did deny unanimously that there were any gods; and Callimachus the Cyrenean discovered his mind concerning Euemerus in these Iambic verses, thus writing:-- To th' ante-mural temple flock apace, Where he that long ago composed of brass Great Jupiter, Thrasonic old bald pate, Now scribbles impious books,--a boastful ass!
~ ~ ~ Sentence 1,558 ~ ~ ~
And I replied: Yes, sir, there are, and such as with a grave scoff tell us that philosophy, like the matron of the house, should never be heard at a merry entertainment; and commend the custom of the Persians, who never let their wives appear, but drink, dance, and wanton with their whores.
~ ~ ~ Sentence 1,804 ~ ~ ~
Others are brought in, not for necessity, but pleasure; such are songs, shows, mimics, and buffoons; which, when present, delight indeed, but when absent, are not eagerly desired; nor is the entertainment looked upon as mean because such things are wanting.
~ ~ ~ Sentence 2,527 ~ ~ ~
Thus when Demosthenes had told Philocrates that the gold he got by treachery was spent upon whores and fish, he upbraids him as a gluttonous and lascivious fellow.
~ ~ ~ Sentence 2,585 ~ ~ ~
They have reason for that, said Lamprias, because a hare is so like an ass which they detest; for in its color, ears, and the sparkling of its eyes, it is so like an ass, that I do not know any little creature that represents a great one so much as a hare doth an ass; except in this likewise imitating the Egyptians, they suppose that there is something of divinity in the swiftness of this creature, as also in its quickness of sense; for the eyes of hares are so unwearied that they sleep with them open.
~ ~ ~ Sentence 3,304 ~ ~ ~
Sparing niggardliness will keep a glutton from dainty fish, and covetousness will confine a lecher from a costly whore.
~ ~ ~ Sentence 3,305 ~ ~ ~
As in one of Menander's plays, where every one of the company was to be enticed by the bawd who brought out a surprising whore, but each of them, though all boon companions, Sat sullenly, and fed upon his cates.
~ ~ ~ Sentence 3,312 ~ ~ ~
To him that loves a costly strumpet, we cannot bring a Panthea or Penelope for cure; but one that delights in mimics and buffoons, loose odes, or debauched songs, we can bring to Euripides, Pindar, and Menander, that he might wash (as Plato phraseth it) his salt hearing with fresh reason.
~ ~ ~ Sentence 3,336 ~ ~ ~
Besides, if there is no more proper time and place to say, Speak, tongue, if thou wilt utter jovial things, than at a feast, and freedom and raillery is mixed with everything that is either done or said over a glass of wine, how should he behave himself, who is not a true principally invited guest, but as it were a bastard and supposititious intruder?
~ ~ ~ Sentence 3,944 ~ ~ ~
To this Hylas, unable to contain, returned a scurvy answer saying that Ajax's soul, taking her lot in the twentieth place in hell, changed her nature, according to Plato, for a lion's; but, for his part, he could not but often think upon the saying of the old comedian, 'Tis better far to be an ass than see Unworthwhile men in greater honor shine At this Sospis, laughing heartily, said: But in the meantime, before we have the pack-saddles on, if you have any regard for Plato, tell us why he makes Ajax's soul, after the lots drawn, to have the twentieth choice.
~ ~ ~ Sentence 4,238 ~ ~ ~
And, they say, wisdom itself dictates to them these things, exhorting them thus: Let me go, and value not my being lost, if I must be carried about in the shape of an ass.
~ ~ ~ Sentence 4,239 ~ ~ ~
But this, some will say, is an ass-like wisdom which teacheth thus; granting that to be wise and enjoy felicity is good, and to wear the shape of an ass is indifferent.
~ ~ ~ Sentence 4,845 ~ ~ ~
For how can it possibly be frigid in others to praise any for such things, and not ridiculous for him to rejoice and glory in them?
~ ~ ~ Sentence 5,671 ~ ~ ~
Socrates therefore was not a fool or blockhead for seeking and searching what himself was; but they are rather to be thought shallow coxcombs, who inquire after any other thing before this, the knowledge of which is so necessary and so hard to find.
~ ~ ~ Sentence 5,741 ~ ~ ~
For to speak to Colotes of instinct and consent is, I suppose, all one as to play on the harp before an ass.
~ ~ ~ Sentence 5,841 ~ ~ ~
Was it then vanity and abundance of vanity, to set free the city of Athens, to render Sparta well-policied and governed by wholesome laws, that young men might do nothing licentiously, nor get children upon common courtesans and whores, and that riches, delights, intemperance, and dissolution might no longer bear sway and have command in cities, but law and justice?
~ ~ ~ Sentence 6,687 ~ ~ ~
558):-- As near a field of corn, a stubborn ass o'powers his boyish guides.
~ ~ ~ Sentence 7,804 ~ ~ ~
As we were come near the dining-room, Alexidemus the Milesian, a bastard son of Thrasybulus the Tyrant, met us.
~ ~ ~ Sentence 7,828 ~ ~ ~
Here Aesop, who was sent from Croesus to visit Periander, and withal to consult the oracle at Delphi, sitting by and beneath Solon upon a low stool, told the company this fable: A Lydian mule, viewing his own picture in a river, and admiring the bigness and beauty of his body, raises his crest; he waxes proud, resolving to imitate the horse in his gait and running; but presently, recollecting his extraction, how that his father was but an ass at best, he stops his career and cheeks his own haughtiness and bravery.
~ ~ ~ Sentence 7,843 ~ ~ ~
Whereupon Cleobulina made one of her riddles about the Phrygian flute,... in regard to the sound, and wondered that an ass, a gross animal and so alien from music should yet supply bones so fit for harmony.
~ ~ ~ Sentence 7,844 ~ ~ ~
Therefore it is doubtless, quoth Niloxenus, that the people of Busiris blame us Naucratians for using pipes made of asses' bones it being an insufferable crime in an of them to listen to the flute or cornet, the sound thereof being (as they esteem it) so like the braying of an ass; and you know an ass is hateful to the Egyptians on account of Typhon.
~ ~ ~ Sentence 8,246 ~ ~ ~
For as, when we hear the grunting of hogs and the shrieking of pulleys and the rustling of wind and the roaring of seas, we are, it may be, disturbed and displeased, and yet when we hear any one imitating these or the like noises handsomely (as Parmenio did that of an hog, and Theodorus that of a pulley), we are well pleased; and as we avoid (as an unpleasing spectacle) the sight of sick persons and of a man full of ulcers, and yet are delighted to be spectators of the Philoctetes of Aristophon and the Jocasta of Silanion, wherein such wasting and dying persons are well acted; so must the young scholar, when he reads in a poem of Thersites the buffoon or Sisyphus the whoremaster or Batrachus the bawd speaking or doing anything, so praise the artificial managery of the poet, adapting the expressions to the persons, as withal to look on the discourses and actions so expressed as odious and abominable.
~ ~ ~ Sentence 8,259 ~ ~ ~
In such passages therefore we are carefully to observe whether or not the poet himself do anywhere give any intimation that he dislikes the things he makes such persons say; which, in the prologue to his Thais Menander does, in these words:-- Therefore, my Muse, describe me now a whore, Fair, bold, and furnished with a nimble tongue; One that ne'er scruples to do lovers wrong; That always craves, and denied shuts her door; That truly loves no man, yet, for her ends, Affection true to every man pretends.
~ ~ ~ Sentence 8,462 ~ ~ ~
Her breast all gore, with lamentable cries, The bleeding innocent Cassandra dies, Murdered by Clytemnestra's faithless hand: Lie with thy father's whore, my mother said, That she th' old man may loathe; and I obeyed: Of all the gods, O father Jove, there's none Thus given to mischief but thyself alone.
~ ~ ~ Sentence 8,656 ~ ~ ~
For, the truth is, a dog or ass is of more value than a timorous and cowardly man that wallows in wealth and luxury.
~ ~ ~ Sentence 8,667 ~ ~ ~
presently altered it thus: Great disadvantage oft attends on wealth; We purchase whores with't and destroy our health.
~ ~ ~ Sentence 8,694 ~ ~ ~
the same may be applied to a man's dog or ass or any other beast of his which is liable to the like mischance.
~ ~ ~ Sentence 9,055 ~ ~ ~
But he who has collected and recorded the fart of Amasis, the coming of the thief's asses, and the giving of bottles, and many such like things, cannot seem to have omitted these gallant acts and these remarkable sayings by negligence and oversight, but as bearing ill-will and being unjust to some.
~ ~ ~ Sentence 9,367 ~ ~ ~
Ass, connection of Typhon with; musical instruments made from bones of.