Aristophanes

“ I first invoke, to join our choral band, the mighty Jupiter, ruling on high, the monarch of gods; and the potent master of the trident, the fierce upheaver of earth and briny sea; and our father of great renown, most august Aether, life-supporter of all; and the horse-guider, who fills the plain of the earth with exceeding bright beams, a mighty deity among gods and mortals. Most clever spectators, come, give us your attention; for having been injured, we blame you to your faces. ”

“ O mortal, who hast desired great wisdom from us! How happy will you become among the Athenians and among the Greeks, if you be possessed of a good memory, and be a deep thinker, and endurance of labour be implanted in your soul, and you be not wearied either by standing or walking, nor be exceedingly vexed at shivering with cold, nor long to break your fast, and you refrain from wine, and gymnastics, and the other follies, and consider this the highest excellence, as is proper a clever man should, to conquer by action and counsel, and by battling with your tongue. ”

“ Ye wretches, why do you sit senseless, the gain of us wise men, being blocks, ciphers, mere sheep, jars heaped together, wherefore I must sing an encomium upon myself and this my son, on account of our good fortune. "O happy Strepsiades! How wise you are yourself, and how excellent is the son whom you are rearing!" My friends and fellow-tribesmen will say of me, envying me, when you prove victorious in arguing causes. But first I wish to lead you in and entertain you. [Exeunt Strepsiades and Phidippides.] ”

“ You will no way differ from Chaerephon in intellect. Strep. Ah me, unhappy! I shall become half-dead. Soc. Don't chatter; but quickly follow me hither with smartness. Strep. Then give me first into my hands a honeyed cake; for I am afraid of descending within, as if into the cave of Trophonius. Soc. Proceed; why do you keep poking about the door? [Exeunt Socrates and Strepsiades] Cho. Well, go in peace, for the sake of this your valour. May prosperity attend the man, because, being advanced into the vale of years, he imbues his intellect with modern subjects, and cultivates wisdom! ”

“ Why, pray, did you not tell me this, then, but excited with hopes a rustic and aged man? Cho. We always do this to him whom we perceive to be a lover of wicked courses, until we precipitate him into misfortune, so that he may learn to fear the gods. Strep. Ah me! it is severe, O Clouds! But it is just; for I ought not to have withheld the money which I borrowed. Now, therefore, come with me, my dearest son, that you may destroy the blackguard Chaerephon and Socrates, who deceived you and me. ”

“ How can this youth ever learn an acquittal from a trial or a legal summons, or persuasive refutation? And yet Hyperbolus learned this at the cost of a talent. Strep. Never mind; teach him. He is clever by nature. Indeed, from his earliest years, when he was a little fellow only so big, he was wont to form houses and carve ships within-doors, and make little wagons of leather, and make frogs out of pomegranate-rinds, you can't think how cleverly. But see that he learns those two causes; the better, whatever it may be; and the worse, which, by maintaining what is unjust, overturns the better. ”

“ I give up this body to them to be beaten, to be hungered, to be troubled with thirst, to be squalid, to shiver with cold, to flay into a leathern bottle, if I shall escape clear from my debts, and appear to men to be bold, glib of tongue, audacious, impudent, shameless, a fabricator of falsehoods, inventive of words, a practiced knave in lawsuits, a law-tablet, a thorough rattle, a fox, a sharper, a slippery knave, a dissembler, a slippery fellow, an impostor, a gallows-bird, a blackguard, a twister, a troublesome fellow, a licker-up of hashes. ”

“ But you, while the man is astounded and evidently elated, having perceived it, will quickly fleece him to the best of your power. [Exit Socrates] For matters of this sort are somehow accustomed to turn the other way. [Enter Strepsiades and Phidippides] Strep. By Mist, you certainly shall not stay here any longer! But go and gnaw the columns of Megacles. Phid. My good sir, what is the matter with you, O father? You are not in your senses, by Olympian Jupiter! Strep. See, see, "Olympian Jupiter!" What folly! To think of your believing in Jupiter, as old as you are! ”

“ This is a thinking-shop of wise spirits. There dwell men who in speaking of the heavens persuade people that it is an oven, and that it encompasses us, and that we are the embers. These men teach, if one give them money, to conquer in speaking, right or wrong. ”

“ Let us arise to view with our dewy, clear-bright nature, from loud-sounding Father Ocean to the wood-crowned summits of the lofty mountains, in order that we may behold clearly the far-seen watch-towers, and the fruits, and the fostering, sacred earth, and the rushing sounds of the divine rivers, and the roaring, loud-sounding sea ”

“ Pas. For the twelve minae, which you received when you were buying the dapple-gray horse. Strep. A horse? Do you not hear? I, whom you all know to hate horsemanship! Pas. And, by Jupiter! You swore by the gods too, that you would repay it. Strep. Ay, by Jove! For then my Phidippides did not yet know the irrefragable argument. Pas. And do you now intend, on this account, to deny the debt? Strep. Why, what good should I get else from his instruction? Pas. And will you be willing to deny these upon oath of the gods? Strep. What gods? Pas. Jupiter, Mercury, and Neptune. Strep. Yes, by Jupiter! ”

“ By Jupiter! You will not deceive me; for if I am besprinkled, I shall become fine flour. Soc. It becomes the old man to speak words of good omen, and to hearken to my prayer. O sovereign King, immeasurable Air, who keepest the earth suspended, and through bright Aether, and ye august goddesses, the Clouds, sending thunder and lightning, arise, appear in the air, O mistresses, to your deep thinker! ”

“ Tell me, pray, if they are really clouds, what ails them, that they resemble mortal women? For they are not such. Soc. Pray, of what nature are they? Strep. I do not clearly know: at any rate they resemble spread-out fleeces, and not women, by Jupiter! Not a bit; for these have noses. Soc. Answer, then, whatever I ask you. Strep. Then say quickly what you wish. Soc. Have you ever, when you; looked up, seen a cloud like to a centaur, or a panther, or a wolf, or a bull? Strep. By Jupiter, have I! But what of that? Soc. They become all things, whatever they please. ”

“ For if you should happen to be detected as an adulterer, you will make this reply to him, "that you have done him no injury": and then refer him to Jupiter, how even he is overcome by love and women. And yet, how could you, who are a mortal, have greater power than a god? Just. But what if he should suffer the radish through obeying you, and be depillated with hot ashes? What argument will he be able to state, to prove that he is not a blackguard? Unj. And if he be a blackguard, what harm will he suffer? Just. Nay, what could he ever suffer still greater than this? ”

“ Would that the match-maker had perished miserably, who induced me to marry your mother. For a country life used to be most agreeable to me, dirty, untrimmed, reclining at random, abounding in bees, and sheep, and oil-cake. Then I, a rustic, married a niece of Megacles, the son of Megacles, from the city, haughty, luxurious, and Coesyrafied. When I married her, I lay with her redolent of new wine, of the cheese-crate, and abundance of wool; but she, on the contrary, of ointment, saffron, wanton-kisses, extravagance, gluttony, and of Colias and Genetyllis. ”

“ But come, by the Earth, is not Jupiter, the Olympian, a god? Soc. What Jupiter? Do not trifle. ”

“ Then, ought a man to throw away any part of his own property? Never! But it were better then at once to put away blushes, rather than now to have trouble; since I am now dragging you to be a witness, for the sake of my own money; and further, in addition to this, I shall become an enemy to my fellow-tribesman. But never, while I live, will I disgrace my country, but will summon Strepsiades. ”

“ For you do not know, by Jupiter! that these feed very many sophists, Thurian soothsayers, practisers of medicine, lazy-long-haired-onyx-ring-wearers, song-twisters for the cyclic dances, and meteorological quacks. They feed idle people who do nothing, because such men celebrate them in verse. ”

“ He sprinkled fine ashes on the table, and bent a little spit, and then took it as a pair of compasses and filched a cloak from the Palaestra. Strep. Why then do we admire Thales? Open open quickly the thinking-shop, and show to me Socrates as quickly as possible. For I desire to be a disciple. Come, open the door. [The door of the thinking-shop opens and the pupils of Socrates are seen all with their heads fixed on the ground, while Socrates himself is seen suspended in the air in a basket.] ”

“ But choose which of the two Causes you wish to speak. Strep. Of what two Causes? Phid. The better, or the worse? Strep. Marry, I did get you taught to speak against justice, by Jupiter, my friend, if you are going to persuade me of this, that it is just and honourable for a father to be beaten by his sons! Phid. I think I shall certainly persuade you; so that, when you have heard, not even you yourself will say anything against it. Strep. Well, now, I am willing to hear what you have to say. Cho. It is your business, old man, to consider in what way you shall conquer the man ”

“ And so you look down upon the gods from your basket, and not from the earth? Soc. For I should not have rightly discovered things celestial if I had not suspended the intellect, and mixed the thought in a subtle form with its kindred air. But if, being on the ground, I speculated from below on things above, I should never have discovered them. For the earth forcibly attracts to itself the meditative moisture. Water-cresses also suffer the very same thing. ”

“ DRAMATIS PERSONAE Strepsiades Phidippides Servant of Strepsiades Disciples of Socrates Socrates Chorus of Clouds Just Cause Unjust Cause Pasias Amynias Witness Chaerephon Scene: The interior of a sleeping-apartment: Strepsiades, Phidippides, and two servants are in their beds; a small house is seen at a distance. Time: midnight. Strepsiades (sitting up in his bed) . Ah me! Ah me! O King Jupiter, of what a terrible length the nights are! Will it never be day? ”

“ My uncle Megacles will not permit me to be without a horse. But I'll go in, and pay no heed to you. [Exit Phidippides.] Strep. Though fallen, still I will not lie prostrate: but having prayed to the gods, I will go myself to the thinking-shop and get taught. How, then, being an old man, shall I learn the subtleties of refined disquisitions? I must go. Why thus do I loiter and not knock at the door? [Knocks at the door.] Boy! Little boy! Disciple (from within) . Go to the devil! Who it is that knocked at the door? Strep. Strepsiades, the son of Phidon, of Cicynna. ”

“ For these innovations flourish by the favour of these silly persons. Unj. No; but wise persons. Just I will destroy you miserably. Unj. Tell me, by doing what? Just By speaking what is just. Unj. But I will overturn them by contradicting them; for I deny that justice even exists at all. Just Do you deny that it exists? Unj. For come, where is it? Just With the gods. Unj. How, then, if justice exists, has Jupiter not perished, who bound his own father? ”

“ You are a stupid fellow, by Jove! who have kicked against the door so very carelessly, and have caused the miscarriage of an idea which I had conceived. Strep. Pardon me; for I dwell afar in the country. But tell me the thing which has been made to miscarry. Dis. It is not lawful to mention it, except to disciples. Strep. Tell it, then, to me without fear; for I here am come as a disciple to the thinking-shop. Dis. I will tell you; but you must regard these as mysteries. Socrates lately asked Chaerephon about a flea, how many of its own feet it jumped ”

“ To many. Peleus, at any rate, received his sword on account of it. Unj. A sword? Marry, he got a pretty piece of luck, the poor wretch! While Hyperbolus, he of the lamps, got more than many talents by his villainy, but by Jupiter, no sword! Just. And Peleus married Thetis, too, through his modesty. Unj. And then she went off and left him; for he was not lustful, nor an agreeable bedfellow to spend the night with. Now a woman delights in being wantonly treated. But you are an old dotard. ”

“ But I am not able, miserable man, to sleep, being tormented by my expenses, and my stud of horses, and my debts, through this son of mine. He with his long hair, is riding horses and driving curricles, and dreaming of horses; while I am driven to distraction, as I see the moon bringing on the twentieths ”

“ You are calling both the female and the male alektryon in the same way. Strep. How, pray? Come, tell me. Soc. How? The one with you is alektryon, and the other is alektryon also. Strep. Yea, by Neptune! How now ought I to call them? Soc. The one alektryaina and the other alektor. Strep. Alektryaina? Capital, by the Air! So that, in return for this lesson alone, I will fill your kardopos full of barley-meal on all sides. Soc. See! See! There again is another blunder! You make kardopos, which is feminine, to be masculine. Strep. In what way do I make kardopos masculine? ”

“ Strep. I like your gods amazingly; and Jupiter, sworn by, is ridiculous to the knowing ones. Pas. You will assuredly suffer punishment, some time or other, for this. But answer and dismiss me, whether you are going to repay me my money or not. Strep. Keep quiet now, for I will presently answer you distinctly. [Runs into the house.] Pas. (to his summons-witness) . What do you think he will do? Witness. I think he will pay you. [Re-enter Strepsiades with a kneading-trough] Strep. Where is this man who asks me for his money? Tell me what is this? Pas. What is this? A kardopos. Strep. ”

“ Just You are debauched and shameless. Unj. You have spoken roses of me. Just And a dirty lickspittle. Unj. You crown me with lilies. Just And a parricide. Unj. You don't know that you are sprinkling me with gold. Just Certainly not so formerly, but with lead. Unj. But now this is an ornament to me. ”