T. Maccius Plautus Trinummus 3.2

LYSITELES

Stay, this moment; don’t turn away, and don’t hide yourself from me.

(He catches hold of his cloak.)

LESBONICUS

(shaking him off)

Can’t you allow me to go whither I was proceeding?

LYSITELES

If, Lesbonicus, it seems to be to your interest, either for your glory or for your honour, I will let you go.

LESBONICUS

You are doing a thing that it is very easy to do.

630

LYSITELES

What is that?

LESBONICUS

An injury to a friend.

LYSITELES

It is no way of mine, and I have not learned so to do.

LESBONICUS

Untaught as you are, how cleverly you do it. What would you have done, if any one had taught you to be thus annoying to me? You, who, when you pretend to be acting kindly to me, use me ill, and are intending evil.

LYSITELES

What!—I?

LESBONICUS

Yes—you.

LYSITELES

How do I use you ill?

LESBONICUS

Inasmuch as you do that which I do not wish.

LYSITELES

I wish to consult your advantage.

635

LESBONICUS

Are you kinder to me than I am to myself? I have sense enough; I see sufficiently well those things that are for my own advantage.

LYSITELES

And is it having sense enough to refuse a kindness from a well-wisher?

LESBONICUS

I reckon it to be no kindness, when it does not please him on whom you are conferring it. I know, and I understand myself what I am doing, and my mind forsakes not its duty;

nor will I be driven by your speeches from paying due regard to my own character.

640

LYSITELES

What do you say? For now I cannot be restrained from saying to you the things which you deserve. Have your forefathers, I pray, so handed down this reputation to you, that you, by your excesses, might lose what before was gained by their merit, and that you might become a bar to the honour of your own posterity?

Your father and your grandfather made an easy and a level path for you to attain to honour; whereas you have made it to become a difficult one, by your extreme recklessness and sloth, and your besotted ways. You have made your election, to prefer your passions to virtue. Now, do you suppose that you can cover over your faults by these means? Alas! ’tis impossible.

645

Welcome virtue to your mind, if you please, and expel slothfulness from your heart. Give your attention to your he-friends in the Courts of justice ¹ , and not to the couch of your she-friend, as you are wont to do. And earnestly do I now wish this piece of land to be left to you for this reason, that you may have wherewithal to reform yourself; so that those citizens, whom you have for enemies, may not be able altogether to throw your poverty in your teeth.

650

LESBONICUS

All these things which you have been saying, I know—could even set my seal ² to them: how I have spoiled my patrimonial estate and the fair fame of my forefathers. I knew how it became me to live; to my misfortune I was not able to act accordingly. Thus, overpowered by the force of passion, inclined to ease, I fell into the snare; and now to you, quite as you deserve, I do return most hearty thanks.

655

LYSITELES

Still, I cannot suffer my labour to be thus lost, and yourself to despise these words; at the same time, it grieves me that you have so little shame. And, in fine, unless you listen to me, and do this that I mention, you yourself will easily lie concealed behind your own self, so that honour cannot find you; when you will wish yourself to be especially distinguished, you will be lying in obscurity.

660

I know right well, for my part, Lesbonicus, your highly ingenuous disposition; I know that of your own accord you have not done wrong, but that it is Love that has blinded your heart; and I myself comprehend all the ways of Love. As the charge of the balista ³ is hurled, so is Love; nothing is there so swift, or that so swiftly flies; he, too, makes the manners of men both foolish and froward ⁴ .

665

That which is the most commended pleases him the least ⁵ ; that from which he is dissuaded pleases him. When there is a scarcity, then you long for a thing; when there is an abundance of it, then you don’t care for it. The person that warns him off from a thing, the same invites him; he that persuades him to it interdicts him. ’Tis a misfortune of insanity for you to fly to Cupid for refuge. But I advise you again and again to think of this, how you should seek to act.

670

If you attempt to do according as you are now showing signs ⁶ , you will cause the conflagration of your family; and then, in consequence, you will have a desire for water with which to quench this conflagration of your family. And if you should obtain it, just as lovers are subtle in their devices, you will not leave even one spark with which your family may brighten up.

675

LESBONICUS

’Tis easy to be found: fire is granted, even though you should ask it of a foe.

But you, by your reproof, are urging me from my faults to a viler course. You are persuading me to give you my sister without a portion. But it does not become me, who have misused so great a patrimony, to be still in affluent circumstances, and to be possessing land, but her to be in want, so as with good reason to detest me. Never will he be respected by others who makes himself despised by his own relatives.

680

As I said, I will do; I do not wish you to be in doubt any longer.

685

LYSITELES

And is it so much preferable that for your sister’s sake you should incur poverty, and that I should possess that piece of land rather than yourself, who ought to be upholding your own walls?

LESBONICUS

I do not wish you so much to have regard to myself, in order that you may relieve my poverty, as that in my neediness I may not become disgraced: that people may not spread about this report of me,

that I gave my own sister without a portion to you, rather in concubinage ⁷ than in marriage. Who would be said to be more dishonorable than I? The spreading of this report might do credit to you, but it would defile me, if you were to marry her without a portion. For you it would be a gain of reputation, for me it would be something for people to throw in my teeth.

690

LYSITELES

Why so? Do you suppose ⁸ that you will become Dictator if I accept the land of you?

695

LESBONICUS

I neither wish, nor require, nor do I think so; but still, to be mindful of his duty, is true honour to an upright man.

LYSITELES

For my part, I know you, how you are disposed in mind; I see it, I discover it, I apprehend. You are doing this, that when you have formed an alliance between us,

and when you have given up this piece of land, and have nothing here with which to support life, in beggary you may fly from the city, in exile you may desert your country, your kindred, your connexions, your friends,—the nuptials once over. People would suppose that you were frightened hence by my means, and through my cupidity. Do not fancy in your mind that I will act so as to allow that to happen.

700

STASIMUS

(advanccing.)

Well, I cannot but exclaim, Well done, well done, Lysiteles, encore ⁹ . Easily do you win the victory; the other is conquered: your performance is superior. This one (pointing to LYSITELES) acts better in character, and composes better lines ¹⁰ . By reason of your folly do you still dispute it? Stand in awe of the fine.

705

LESBONICUS

What means this interruption of yours, or your intrusion here upon our conversation?

STASIMUS

The same way that I came here I’ll get me gone.

710

LESBONICUS

Step this way home with me, Lysiteles; there we will talk at length about these matters.

LYSITELES

I am not in the habit of doing anything in secret. Just as my feelings are I will speak out. If your sister, as I think it right, is thus given to me in marriage without a portion, and if you are not about to go away hence, that which shall be mine, the same shall be yours.

But if you are minded otherwise, may that which you do turn out for you for the best. I will never be your friend on any other terms; such is my determination.

715

(Exit LESBONICUS, followed by LYSITELES.)

STASIMUS

Faith, he’s off. D’ye hear—Lysiteles? I want you. He’s off as well. Stasimus, you remain alone. What am I now to do, but to buckle up my baggage and sling my buckler on my back ¹¹ ,

and order soles to be fastened ¹² beneath my shoes? There is no staying now. I see that no long time hence I shall be a soldier’s drudge. And when my master has thrown himself into the pay ¹³ of some potentate, I guess that among the greatest warriors he will prove a brave ¹⁴ —hand at running away, and that there he will capture the spoil, who-shall come to attack my master.

720

I myself, the moment that I shall have assumed my bow and quiver and arrows, and the helmet on my head, shall-go to sleep very quietly in my tent. I’ll be off to the Forum; I’ll ask that talent ¹⁵ back of the person to whom I lent it six days since, that I may have some provision for the journey to carry with me.

725

(Exit.)