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Home > Latin Authors and Literature > Marcus Aurelius - MEditations
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THIS being neither a critical edition of the text nor an emended edition of Casaubon's translation, it has not been thought necessary to add full notes. Casaubon's own notes have been omitted, because for the most part they are discursive, and not necessary to an understanding of what is written. In those which here follow, certain emendations of his are mentioned, which he proposes in his notes, and follows in the translation. In addition, one or two corrections are made where he has mistaken the Greek, and the translation might be misleading. Those which do not come under these two heads will explain themselves.
The text itself has been prepared by a comparison of the editions of 1634 and 1635. It should he borne in mind that Casaubon's is often rather a paraphrase than a close translation; and it did not seem worth while to notice every variation or amplification of the original. In the original editions all that Casauhon conceives as understood, but not expressed, is enclosed in square brackets. These brackets are here omitted, as they interfere with the comfort of the reader; and so have some of the alternative renderings suggested by the translator. In a few cases, Latin words in the text have been replaced by English.
Numbers in brackets refer to the Teubner text of Stich, but the divisions of the text are left unaltered. For some of the references identified I am indebted to Mr. G. H. Rendall's Marcus Aurelius.
BOOK I I "Both to frequent" (4). Gr. to mh, C. conjectures to me. The text is probably right: "I did not frequent public lectures, and I was taught at home."
VI Idiots. . . . philosophers (9). The reading is doubtful, but the meaning seems to be: "simple and unlearned men"
XII "Claudius Maximus" (15). The reading of the Palatine MS. (now lost) was paraklhsiz Maximon, which C. supposes to conceal the letters kl as an abbreviation of Claudius.
XIII "Patient hearing. . . He would not"
XIII "Congiaries" (13). dianomais, "doles."
XIV "Cajeta" (17). The passage is certainly corrupt.
BOOK IV XV. "Agathos" (18): This is probably not a proper name, but the text seems to be unsound. The meaning may be "the good man ought"
BOOK V XIV. katorqwseiz (15): Acts of "rightness" or "straightness." XXIII. "Roarer" (28): Gr. "tragedian." Ed. 1 has whoremonger,' ed. 2 corrects to "harlot," but omits to alter' the word at its second occurrence.
XL. "Man or men . . ." There is no hiatus in the Greek, which means: "Whatever (is beneficial) for a man is so for other men also."
XLII. There is no hiatus in the Greek.
BOOK VII IX. C. translates his conjecture mh for h. The Greek means " straight, or rectified," with a play on the literal and metaphorical meaning of ortoz.
"Lives," etc. Euripides, Hypsipyle, frag. 757 (Nauck). "As long," etc. Aristophanes, Acharne, 66 i.
"Plato" Apology, p. 28 B.
"For thus" Apology, p. 28 F.
"With meats," etc. From Euripides, Supplices, 1110. XXXIII. "They both," i.e. life and wrestling.
"Says he" (63): Plato, quoted by Epictetus, Arr. i. 28, 2 and 22.
"The hardihood of Socrates was famous"; see Plato, Siymposium, p. 220.
BOOK X XXII. The Greek means, "paltry breath bearing up corpses, so that the tale of Dead Man's Land is clearer."
BOOK XI V. "Cithaeron" (6) : Oedipus utters this cry after discovering that he has fulfilled his awful doom, he was exposed on Cithaeron as an infant to die, and the cry implies that he wishes he had died there. Sophocles, Oedipus Tyrannus, 1391.
"Epictetus" Arr. i. II, 37.