Latin (Cicero, Pro Caelio) Literature Text

Front 1

meus familiaris L. Herennius dixit multa de luxurie, multa de libidine, multa de vitiis iuventutis, multa de moribus.

Back 1

My friend Lucius Herennius has said a lot about extravagance, a lot about lustfulness, a lot about the faults of youth, a lot about behaviour.

Front 2

castigavit M. Caelium, sicit neminem umquam parens; multa de incontinentia interperantiaque disseruit.

Back 2

He scolded Marcus Caelius, as a parent has ever scolded no body; he talked a lot about self-indulgence and lack of control.

Front 3

equidem multos et vidi in hac civitate et audivi (non modo qui primoribus labris gustavissent genus hoc vitae et extremis, ut dicitur, digitis attigessent, sed qui totam adultescentiam voluptatibus dedissent) emersisse alinquando et graves homines atque illustres fuisse.

Back 3

indeed in this country i have both seen and heard that many men (who had not only tasted this type of life with the edge of the lips and had touched it with the tips, so it is said, of the fingers, but who had given the whole of adolescence to pleasures), have emerged eventually and have become serious and famous men.

Front 4

itaque severitati tuae non respondebo; deprecari vacationem adultescentiae veniamque petere non audeo; perfugiis aetatis non utor;

Back 4

Therefore I will not respond to your strictness; I do not dare to plead for an exemption for youth and to seek forgiveness: I do not use excuses of age.

Front 5

tantum peto ut, si qua est invidia communis hoc tempore aeris alieni, petulantiae, libidinum iuventutis (quam video esse magnam) ne huic aliorum peccata, ne aetatis ac temporum vitia noceant.

Back 5

I only ask that, if there is at any time any general dissaproval of debt, of rudeness, of the passions of youth (which i see is great), neither the mistakes of others or the faults of age and of the times harm this man.

Front 6

in M. Caelio enim nulla luxuries reperietur, nulli sumptus, nullum aes alienum, nulla conviviorum ac lustrorum libido.

Back 6

For in Marcus Caeilius no extravagence is found, no high expenditure, no debt, no passion for parties and dens of vice.

Front 7

amores autem et hae delicae, ut vocantur, quae infirmioribus animis molestae solent esse, numquam hunc occupatum impeditumque tenuerunt.

Back 7

Indeed love affairs and these 'flings', as they are called, which are accustomed to be troublesome to weaker minds, have never kept him occupied and entangled.