Theognis of Megara
Ancient Greek poet.
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One finds many companions for food and drink, but in a serious business a man's companions are few.
Adopt the character of the twisting octopus, which takes on the appearance of the nearby rock. Now follow in this direction, now turn a different hue.
No man takes with him to Hades all his exceeding wealth.
Surfeit begets insolence, when prosperity comes to a bad man.
Theognis appears as a finely formed nobleman who has fallen on bad times, with the passions of a nobleman such as his time loved, full of fatal hatred toward the upward striving masses, tossed about by a sad fate that wore him down and made him milder in many respects. He is a characteristic image of that old, ingenious somewhat spoiled and no longer firmly rooted blood nobility, placed at the boundary of an old and a new era, a distorted Janus-head, since what is past seems so beautiful and enviable, that which is coming — something that basically has an equal entitlement — seems disgusting and repulsive; a typical head for all those noble figures who represent the aristocracy prior to a popular revolution and who struggle for the existence of the class of nobles as for their individual existence.
Unless the gods deceive my mind,
That man is forging fetters for himself.
The best of all things for earthly men is not to be born and not to see the beams of the bright sun; but if born, than as quickly as possible to pass the gates of Hades, and to lie deep buried.
Wine is wont to show the mind of man.
Ploutos, no wonder mortals worship you:
You are so tolerant of their sins!
Bright youth passes swiftly as a thought.
Even to a wicked man a divinity gives wealth, Cyrus, but to few men comes the gift of excellence.
Too many tongues have gates which fly apart
Too easily, and care for many things
That don’t concern them.
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